What's in a Name?

I once had a student named Peach, whose name was given by her kindergarten teacher, who, apparently, named all of her students after fruits. Later on, Peach just didn't want to be Peach anymore, and so, told her mom that she wants to be Angela.

Presently, I have a class with little Disney princesses named Ariel, Anna and Elsa, who decided to change her name from Fiona about a week ago, and stepped into my classroom yesterday wearing the Snow Queen's dress.

Yup, changing English names in China is as easy as changing t-shirts!

Avocados and Soy Milk

I transferred to a new (super cozy) apartment and inherited a new (old) bike, which I use to bring me to work. Today, I felt brave and decided to bike outside the Fengtai area and get myself some avocados and soy milk and other delicious goodies at the Sanyuanli Market in Liangmaqiao. I checked my map app and it told me that it's about 20 kilometers away from my place. And I said, bring it on. All for avocados and soy milk. I started today's adventure at around 7:30 in the morning.

I enjoyed the bike ride going there. The air is cool and relatively good today (AQI at about 50-60... Yes, that is good for China standards). I got even more amused to realize how easy it was to travel from my place to the busier parts of Beijing. I felt so accomplished when I started seeing familiar places; areas that I would go to back to when I still lived in the central business district. Being out on the road gave me the opportunity to actually see Beijing's charm. I usually just take the subway... You can imagine how not so pleasant that could be.

Finally, I reached Sanyuanli Market, and it was already 9:30. It took me two hours. WOW. But I didn't feel tired at all! After getting my goodies, I hopped on my bike and started to pedal home.

...But I didn't go home. I was bursting with energy! I went to Sanlitun, stopped by Yashow (the less aggressive version of the Silk Market) and got myself a sim card for my pocket wifi (Side story: When I got home, I realized I paid less than what I was supposed to and felt awful. I bargained for it at the beginning, but the guy who attended to me said it's at a fixed price. He was really nice and spoke English, too. I'm sorry!), looked for Jenny Lou's, got lost, went to U-Town, found Jenny Lou's, got myself 3 cartons of Vitasoy and sunflower seed bread.

Only then, did I start my journey back home. This was at around 12:30.

By 13:00, my legs were already dying. I had to talk to myself a lot (don't judge) to distract myself from my aching right knee (which always hurts whenever I run for a long time... Apparently, when I bike, too) and also to push myself to just keep going. It worked for a while. Eventually, I just got dead tired and slowed down. I made some wrong turns again. Totally expected, but I was just dying to get home.

I went through my apartment door at around 14:00.

That's six and a half hours. Around 50 to 60 kilometers in total.

All initially for avocados and soy milk.

I conclude that I will never do that again.
But I have a feeling that I most probably still will.