09.04.14 - 12:53AM

My first week of classes is coming to an end. Like many other "first weeks" that I've gone through, professors went over syllabi, classroom requirements, projects, etc. Nothing special.

I've also become friends with a couple of locals here. I'm not sure if it's culture shock, but I find it very difficult for me to speak in Cantonese when communicating with locals. For some reasons, English always comes out first, and then my Cantonese is slurred/ unclear/ soft. When I was home, I used to be able to speak in a way where people would at least understand me. However, locals here have trouble understanding what I say. At times, I find that I don't have the confidence to speak in their dialect. This has been very troublesome, especially when I'm trying to learn how to print from the school's printer. It took me a VERY long time to figure out how and where to print because locals at the IT desk had trouble understanding me.

My goal for the semester is to speak in Cantonese AT ALL TIMES. I really hope this will be successful since I'm only comfortable speaking in this dialect around 20% of the time.

I hope my parents aren't completely disappointed in me.

On the other hand, I've been typing a lot more Chinese when communicating with my relatives. Because many of them don't understand English, I have been typing in Chinese characters. This has improved my writing skills. Now, if only I can type and speak at the same level, then my parents will surely be proud!

I've also been catching up on some reading:

Crazy Rich Asians - by Kevin Kwan (National Bestseller)
Angels & Demons - by Dan Brown

Both are pretty good so far, and I'm looking forward to reading other Dan Brown books. :)

Time to sleep ~

1:03AM