The motivation

I heard the sounds of children playing, cars honking, and “RRRRRRRrrrrr”. I opened my eyes; a few mosquitoes were having some fun in my hotel room.

Today was my first day in B.

I walked to the front desk. Nobody was there, so I left them a note complaining about the mosquitoes.

It was noon, and I wasn’t fed yet. Right next to my hotel there was a local restaurant. Sweet and sour pork, Kung Pao chicken, chow mein…mhmmm. At the door, a chubby woman looked at me and shouted, “ limian zuo!”

I couldn’t wait to look at the menu: “The thin cow picks three text cure” ...didn’t know what that was. “Living to fry the beef rice” …what?? “The bureau swallows to take the fish idea powder” I had no idea what “fish idea powder” was, probably it was the brain part?

OK, enough.

I checked with the chubby lady to see if they had pork, or chicken. She looked puzzled and said,“bu dong, bu dong!” That left me with no choice but to look down at my menu again. I noticed that on top of the menu, there was “The fried rice of Indonesia”

Hallelujah.

After lunch, I went into a shop selling electronic goods. I walked around and set my eyes on a headset. Before I tried it on, I noticed that there was a notice saying:

I needed more hints to understand what kind of business they were doing in this shop, so I went out and checked the name of the shop again; it said “Translate Server Error”.

I needed a walk to clear my head.

I went into a zoo, and saw a sign:

Creepy, but I smiled back.

Everyone was on the way back to their offices; not many of them had time to stay in a zoo. I saw a few monkeys sitting inside a cage. These funny and furry friends stared at each other; looking bored. I saw another sign:

I wanted to have some fun. I put my right hand into the cage and tapped one of the monkey’s shoulder (whose back was facing me), then I looked away immediately before he turned around, acting as if I was an innocent visitor. He examined my facial expression carefully, and then turned his back on me again. I was having so much fun and couldn't stop from doing it again. This time, his friend saw what I did. And before I knew what was going on, I felt a sharp pain on my index finger.

The monkey bit me!

My finger was bleeding so badly and I didn’t know to whom I could turn for help. I decided to return to my hotel and took a rest.

I put a bandage on my finger and laid down on bed, and then I heard the mosquitoes again. With all the frustrations and pains I had gone through today, I rushed out and shouted at the front desk, “I need all the mosquitoes to be out of my room, now!” The front desk lady, looking scared, replied in broken English, “I see your note, but not understand your handwriting…”

I went back to my room, laid down again, and stared at my bleeding finger, the mosquitoes were started to get excited I could tell.

I needed to look for a Chinese language course tomorrow.