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Sign up with Google Sign up with FacebookQ: what's the hardest part you have had encountered in 2011?
When a thief slashed my sling bag in an overloaded bus and I lost my passport, money and some important documents during the start of Chinese new year.I went to police station to report the incident and it was so grrrrrrrr.....
When will people learn that money, and passport and other valuables are to be either home or in a money belt. Being a foreigner in China, is like having a neon sign on your forehead and back saying in Mandarin "rich foreigner, thieves welcome, come and get me".
To me was when I went to ICBC ATM machine and got 3 fale 100 Rmb bills, and one month later got 5 more. I even called the Police, wasted 4 hours complaining, and nothing was done. Zwell, now I use Bank of China, and so far, so good.
The hardest part of 2011 was watching my closest Chinese friend, and god-father to my children die from liver cancer. He was also 5 years younger than I am.
Happy's advice is sound. Don't carry anything with you that you can't afford to lose. And if you have to carry it, do it in a way that doesn't make it easy for thieves.
Mr_spoon:
Oh god, my condolences. I hope this year will be filled with nice things
When the school (and yes, me, too) screwed up because of lots of interconnecting minut circumstances and a sever lack of communication and then, my passport expired. Thank God for guanxi! It was a crazy week, but the result was smooth as silk.
I suppose going through the application process for getting my visa. The first job I applied to fell through, and then they tried to scam me. The job I have now worked out fine, but altogether it was months of waiting and worrying and hoping everything would go well. The only thing worse than that was waiting and worrying about getting an internship and graduating from college.
finding an apartment near my school..... it was crazy!!!
The hardest thing I went through this year is also a reason I've decided to come to China, although I'm happy it happened to me in the states and not in China.
I got blood poisoning in May and didn't know it. When I finally went to the emergency room, I was admitted to the hospital, and had emergency surgery. After 32 days in the hospital, 3 blood transfusions and 5 surgeries (3 to cut out all the dead tissue, and 2 to close up the wound which was pretty much from hip to hip and up into the left side of my abdomen), my surgeon told me if I had waited til the following morning, they wouldn't have been able to save me. I'm still working on my leg strength. 2012 HAS to be better.
China has always been my dream tour. I figure I better do it just in case.
I had to realize that I'm more of a patriot than I ever imagined or even considered. I didn't know how fortunate or happy I was that I was an American passport holder until I had to constantly prove who I was and surprisingly/strangely defend it on-a-regular-basis while being here.
I think Benjamin said it best "If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything"
I frankly had a smooth year.
The hardest was going back to France for 2 weeks. Becoming so shy it's crippling, like the good ol' days, and feeling so unfomfortable everywhere I couldn't use public restrooms (still as fun as before during 10 hour drives) nor have a conversation in public without speaking as silently as possible for 2 weeks made me remember how lucky I was to be here.
Social awkwardness at its best.
I know a family that had their home and business burn down. I had them over for Xmas dnner last year. I gave the wife one of my kittens. I actually helped rebuild and lent them some money. We are both into hotrods. I have two ,a'38, '33. I bought another project and some parts from this guy. Then one day the police came and arrested him for fraud. So I got stung also. I charged him, he got 30 days and the court compensation order on him isn't worth the ink. So now I'm sueing him, but he's sueing me for more. They claim I B&E and stold 10,000 worth of tools. They even have witnesses. They must all be on drugs cause that never happened. This is where I like Chinese law, this guy needs a caning. Our justice system sucks, it's designed to make lawyers money, not for justice.