... don't know much about the French I took.

So it's been a while since my last blog entry. As expected uni hit me. It hit me hard, and in a very french manner. Have you ever been thrown under the bus by a french person? See, and it happened to me, too. Plus, I found dining paradise, which is great because being a radio host makes you hungry!

After the game last Saturday, Maria and I were quite hungry. We decided to stop by the dining hall, a food facillity provided by the university for students, who are are willing and able to pay the price. It is super expensive, but in one-and-a-half hours, which I can only describe as "my dream come true", I discovered why. It cost me $12 to enter heaven and man, was it worth it. They had everything. Pizza, burger, burritos, potatoes, pasta, rice, chicken, beef, pork, fruit, a salad bar, sausages, every beverage imaginable, soft ice, regular ice cream, various cakes, soups and even german "Braten mit Spätzle". Ok, I have to admit that the german food wasn't even slightly authentic, but thank god I can't afford this dining paradise. I know about my self-control - I know that I don't have any - so I'm certain that I'd put on more pounds than my body-building ex-roommate does in weight training when there's a cute girl around. Check it out:

And that was just our first course... As we sat there quietly, stuffing our faces with food, we watched a football game on one  of the massive flat screen TVs, which were located in every part of the dining hall. After a while of chewing noises and football-watching I said:
"Chicago."
"Mh" Maria responded with her mouth half full "are Chicago the one's with the black and white stripes?"
I started grinning, which made most of the burrito I had just put into my mouth fall out, right on the table I wouldn't have to clean. 
"Yes" I answered after a short while, but Maria didn't seem to notice the stupid grin on my stupid face "and they've got whistles, too. Look."
"Oh, yeah" she seemed confused and I had another slice of pizza.

Cut Maria some slag, guys. Did she have any idea of what football was about? No! But did she try to understand it? No! But probably  that's not too important anyway.

Moving on to more shocking news, I've fallen victim to abuse:

I hadn't studied Chinese for Wednesday's class because I was so swamped with readings for other classes. When I told Caroline, a french friend (or at least I used to think so) of mine - I think I already mentioned that she's in my chinese class in a previous blog entry - on Wendesday morning, she immediately  started smiling. But it didn't seem like she was amused. It was more of a completely unamused grin. The kind of demoniac grin the joker puts on before blowing something up... And she was about to!

I made nothing of it, so I was quite confident I could stay under the radar for this  lesson. We learned new words and characters, we revised some content from previous classes and I was good and almost invisible, leaned back in my comfortable desk chair. As the last task of the day, we had to revise everything we had learned in a single conversation with a partner. Since the person closest to me was Caroline, we practiced together. Luckily she already knew I'd be shit at this revision - which I was. So she just smiled again. This time there was a little amusement in her smile and a whole lot of evil. But before I could really notice, she  started the  conversation:

"你好?" she said.
"你好" I responded "你叫什么名字?"
"我叫我宝。你呢?"...

Getting in to the conversation, it became obvious that I should have spent more time studying and less time sleeping the previous night. But Caroline didn't seem to care. She just smiled all the way through  our (very bumpy) talk. After a while our professor asked whether any team wanted to present their skills to the class. If this wasn't the case, she said, she wouldn't mind either since our time was up anyway. I was relieved that I had  made it through class without embarrassing myself. I smiled and turned my head to Caroline. She  smiled back.

"Noone?" our professor asked.

I gave Caroline a "Yeah-right"-look. To my very consternation, she slowly raised her hand from the  armrest of her chair. 

"No!" I whispered, now quite baffled, thinking she might have missunderstood my "Yeah-right"-look.

But the look on her face was now a grin, a grin so evil, it made me think Dolores Umbridge had just joined my chinese class. She definately hadn't missunderstood my look. She wanted to see me suffer. She slowly raised her arm and I understood. And I accepted my fate. Everybody was very amused by my demise. Everybody, except for me. This betrayal will not be forgotten!

Ok, let's face it. I will probably forget to get back at Caroline, but in case I remember, I'll let you guys know. 

The  other day I had to read a lot. Ok, I have to read a lot every day, but the other day  I had to read a LOT. And I didn't want to spend all day inside. So I decided to read outside. I also decided I'd need a pick-me-up halfway  through the readings, so I brought a spoon and my iPad to get to it:

A short trip to the supermarket and $3 later I had a pint of ice-cream and went to the  park. I ate the ice-cream immediately. It was delicious and I was motivated to commence with my readings:

One problem with this park was, that there was a playground right next to it. And children are LOUD! I think I could have gotten more work done on a runway. Or at an Iron Maiden show. Or at an Iron Maiden show on a runway. Fact is, kids are noisy and I didn't get any work done. Next time, I have to pick out a more appropriate park for studying. Thirty minutes later I returned to the supermarket and bought a bag of chips. Don't judge me, ok? The cashier (the one who had sold me the ice-cream earlier) already did that rather intensely, looking at me, then at the used spoon in my hand and then at the  bag of chips. He sighed and scanned my chips.

The day didn't end on that negative note, though. I went to a meeting of these radio people I told you guys about. I can start working there! I was excited. And I still am. I'm going to be a radio star. And I won't let video kill me!