(This is a picture of Martyr’s Park, which is right by where I’m living, at 11pm)

These days I’ve been waking up every morning at 7:30 getting a bite to eat, some soy milk and Nescafe before walking to a middle school in downtown Changsha. Once at the school I have a morning TEFL training session then two hours of advanced Chinese class. We have a break for lunch. Mostly I’ve been eating 兰州拉面 (Lan zhou pulled noodles with beef) from a place right by school where the employees, including a kid who can’t be more than 9 years old, know me pretty well. After lunch when the temperature is somewhere in the nineties and the sun is at full force I head back to a sweltering classroom to learn more about teaching English in China. Getting out at 5:00 I shower before heading out to dinner at a brand new restaurant and spending the night exploring this new and fascinating city. Arriving back to my hotel room at some late hour I pass out and start a new day all over again. It has only been a month… no wait! just a week since I arrived in Changsha. My days are dense with the smells, sounds and copious amounts of sweat that come with living in Changsha in the summer and I am tired. I love every moment.