Look a foreigner!

    After my first few weeks living here I have become extremely comfortable walking around and going wherever. I tend to forget how much I stick out like a sore thumb here. When I meet up with friends we pick a metro exit, and every person exiting the station will look at you. It's like having a D-list celebrity status.In  Bao'an there are not too many foreigners, you can really soak up how special you are. When you spot them it is like animals in the zoo. I feel the urge to stare like the locals do to me and go and ask them a million questions. But I don't, that would be really weird and awkward.
                

 

   This weekend I went to one of the ex-pat parts of Shenzhen. It was quite refreshing to see what looked like a western city, western toilets, and somewhat of a western club.  I was completely overwhelmed at first by the number of ex-pats I saw in the clubs. It was like I had left China for the evening.  I have a theory that clubbing is more of a status symbol here than a place to go dancing. Or perhaps that is my girly perception of clubbing, just to dance. What I noticed about the clubs here was the lack of dancing and dance floor. It was mostly intimate table settings and overpriced liquor. I'm probably wrong about my theory. Either way it was probably one of the most fun weekends I've had since arrival.

  

This is my all you can drink wristband from the other evening. It's hard to tell, but to the right is a plate of Western food. Delicious!

   Another gem of China is the street BBQ and popup restaurants. During the day it is a building with a garage-like cover over the facade and broken pavement in front. At night it is a hubbub of hotpots and various street food, where the beer is dangerously cheap. A beer is roughly 5-7 RMB, less than $1 US dollar. To make it even better, they don't really close. On many occasions time has slipped away from me and it is suddenly 4:00 AM. I am not over the novelty of the lack of open container policy either. Browsing the popups and other night life while drinking a beer on the street is like enhanced drinking. I fully expect some reverse culture shock when I go home and can't walk down State Street with my unfinished drink.

   The other night when I was on the street having a beer I went in a convenience store for another. I came across this off color offering. PBR, WW2 edition.

                

This is by far the most hideous piece of clothing I've ever seen. I saw the cardigan and wanted to add it to my collection, but then I realized it was attached to a dog shirt that doesn't even match.

This is my lunch from the other day. Soup with duck and noodles. I have found myself eating way more carbs than ever in my life, but still losing weight. Maybe it's all the sweating from the heat.