The bacon to my scrambled eggs

Happy bacon day! Classic. 

This post isn't as much about me (thank god, right?), it's more about my best friend, Lindsay Thompson. Lindsay is a perfect balance for me, an unparalleled puzzle piece that fits me perfectly. When I'm a drama queen (never), she's calm. Do you know her? I hope so. Everyone should have a Lindsay

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Homesickness is a strange thing. Everyone's experienced it. When you are nostalgic for home, it doesn't matter how far you are from your family or friends. You can be a short drive from home or on the opposite side of the earth, it's the same feeling. It can come from missing a person, a place, food that doesn't upset your belly, or just lacking familiar things. I've not had too much of this during my first year in Asia.  (A year!?!?). However, recently I had some serious homesickness, manifesting itself in the form of nightmares and tears, triggered by my concern for my friend, Lindsay.

Lindsay and I were college roommates for 2 years, fluent in interpreting each others eye contact and mumbles (sometimes it's scary good), captains of our university volleyball team, and often found not more than a foot away from the other-even on the SU Athletic Hall of Honor.  She is the bacon to my scrambled eggs. She's hit a bit of a rough patch regarding her health. Not a stop sign but a speed bump.  She just had surgery and is now recovering from major surgery trying to get back to her normal life...working 3 jobs, 

Lindsay's taught me a lot. Yeah I know that sounds mad cheesy. Besides the unwavering courage she has sustained through this time, she also recently taught me about homesickness. When she first went to the hospital, she spent quite some time in the ICU. When she got home, I asked her what the best things about being home were. She said she missed her bed, soft sheets and soft clothes, food, and obviously the comfort of being somewhere familiar after somewhere so unassimilable. Do you want to know how different that is from being homesick on literally the other side of the world in Asia? Absolutely nothing.


Great, now that makes my wallowing self pitty days where I JUST WANT A SANDWICH feel embarrassingly trivial. Well Christina at least people aren't sticking needles in your arms searching  for a vein. Oh and just shut up about the lack of AC.


It doesn't matter where you are. Missing home is missing home. If you're 15 miles away at Seton, you'll miss the same things as you do when you're living in Asia. I'll be fine, Lindsay will be fine.






I've spent more time alone in the past year than ever before, by far. This has made me realize how lucky I am to have my friendships back home. I'm grateful for the people who keep in contact with me, and vice versa. My success in making friends in China has been...uhh, unfruitful. That's alright though, because its made me realize that the friendships like the one I have with Lindsay, the sustainable ones, are not only valuable but INvaluable. The relationships like Lindsay's that transcend oceans of distance, and a year of time (a lot when you're 22) are something to be clutched to for dear life. Thanks for that, Linds.




Other things Lindsay has taught me? How to take really good photos....volleyball ones that end up in Southwestern magazines sent to all current students and alumni. Remember that time?

CRU socks are always appropriate (perhaps that was just me...)

That serious pictures are never necessary, and there is no other chin my head fits under more perfectly. Oh and of course, EVERY DAY SHOULD BE BACON DAY, Y'ALL.

My mom and sister arrive tomorrow. AHHHHH. Soon this temporary homesickness will be relieved. And Lindsay is recovering well, not without pain, but she's a fighter if I've ever seen one.

Mountaineering through Inner Mongolia

Honestly, if given the choice, above almost anything else I would really like to climb mountains. Not just any mountains, but the biggest baddest mountains out there. Serious mountaineering is the coolest thing ever. I watch countless documentaries about them just to pretend for 5 minutes I am one of them. I know it's a random, dangerous and expensive hobby...so I'd just like to try it for half a day then give it back to the people who aren't posers like me. Like the pinch hitter on the Everest summit team. Okay.. not not my best metaphor.

Just a few minutes outside of Yinchuan lie the Helan Mountains. They run between Ningxia (my province) and Inner Mongolia. I've been a few times, to a place called suyukou. I live in the desert of china and somehow there's a national forest towards at the top of the mountains? The first time I forgot my camera. Smooth move. The second time I brought Austin back! 

AustIn and I both agreed that this was our favorite day of his trip. 

After being up pretty high, we wandered down the mountain, out of the forest, and down a road where we stumbled on a quiet little Buddhist temple and part of the Great Wall. It was amazing.  Sometimes between the snot rockets, rice comas, and the horrifying toilets I kind of forget how awesome China is. Things like this are necessary reminders because they help me keep in mind how much I like China, and why I'm here.

Another part of the Helan mountains has really crazy old rock art carvings. I went back in May to see some of the 6,000 pictures found carved into the side of the mountain. Some of them date back 10,000 years. Imagine Mongolian Mountain Men carving pictures into rocks on the side of a mountain 30 feet in the air. Although I personally like the scenery better, the rock art is what makes these mountains somewhat famous in China. It's nice to spend some time in the mountains because I've not had much time around mountains before. Which makes me interest in mountain climbing all that more bizarre. Although, most of all I just want to jump the border to Inner Mongolia before I leave.

This is the most famous rock art picture of them all. It's the sun god and it kind of definitely looks like an alien. The weather was not great, and lots of the carvings were really high up so I had to mega zoom so I didn't get the best photos...

Branching out and blending: Austin in China

Austin came to visit me! After nearly 10 months in Asia, somebody finally made the trek to this side of the world.  It was a pretty stellar 3 weeks. We spent some time in Yinchaun, went to the mountains and he watched Netflix while I babysat..err taught English. Having him here was just as awesome as it sounds. 

We also took an overnight train to Xi’an, famous for the Terracotta Army. The Terracotta Warriors were built in about 200 BC by a 13 year old emperor who was so terrified of death, he needed a fake army with over 8,000 soldiers and hundreds of horses and chariots to be buried with him (no seriously). 

The army was pretty cool…but not nearly cool enough for people to call it the 8^th wonder of the world (that should be Angkor Wat in Cambodia). Most of our time was spent buying souvenirs for Austin, and hunting down the nearest sandwich for me.  Yinchuan has two restaurants with western food: KFC and Pizza Hut. So, naturally when presented with a weekend outside of this city, I established a Chinese food ban from our diets. Austin didn’t fight me for a second.

The coolest part might have been successfully blending in as real Terracotta Warriors. 

Culinary highlights of Xi’an included me inhaling a subway foot long sandwich in about 2 ½ minutes…my first sandwich in almost 4 months... and spending probably ¼ of my paycheck on Starbucks.

... and eating french fries and an oreo  Mcflurry from McDonalds.

I promise we got a little bit of Eastern culture into our days, I just ensured they were adequately alternated with Starbucks and sandwich breaks.