I'm used to this already?

The famous Pearl Tower on the Bund!

Mal and Anthony taking a pic with the security guards

Entrance to East China Normal University

Casual Mao Zedong statue in the middle of campus

The next Yao Ming or Jeremy Lin?

Safe drinking water and toilet paper-all you need to survive!

The view from my window

I can't believe this is only my 6th day in Shanghai! It already feels like I've been here forever. Plus, I've finally seen the sun here! Such a nice change =) We've just finished up orientation, so I'll be starting classes on Monday. I'm taking Mandarin Beginning 1 (Hopefully I'll move up into Beginning 2, since my book only covers things I've already learned), Modern Chinese History, Issues in Chinese Society, and Chinese International Relations. I'm most excited for Issues-our book looks really interesting and there is definitely no shortage of topics! Mandarin is Mon-Thurs from 10am-12pm, and my other classes meet only once a week for 3 hours; no one has class on Friday!

As far as what I've been up to the past few days, it's been great. We did an "Amazing Race Shanghai" competition yesterday which sent us all around the city, so I am getting much better at navigating how to get anywhere. We've been trying out all the restaurants around campus- we went to one last night called "Ali Restaurant"! Also we've been exploring the nightlife in Shanghai, which is so far all it's hyped up to be. Taxis are super cheap, and most clubs have no cover and are 80 Yuan (like $13 American) for open bar all night! The clubs are wicked fun-all the music is American pop songs and every club has crazy dancers and performances every night! Not that many Chinese people dance, so it's usually mostly us that are on the dance floor (they do like taking pictures of us dancing, though!). A lot of CIEE people like going out, so we're already starting to get to know each other really well and I always have a lot of fun.

I still haven't taken that many pictures, mostly because it's been so dreary until lately, but here are some!

My bed! (Not padded at all)