whaaaat..? I'm going to try to post, even though the entire blogger interface is all basically in a crazy language that I don't understand even a little bit. I've been in Beijing for more than a week and I think I've "learned" (by which I mean I can sort of recognize) 10 characters (out of, what, 8,000?), and they are, basically: me, vegetable, bathroom, woman, thank you, hello, goodbye, train, internet cafe, dumpling. Oh, and "happy new year." So I guess it's more than ten. Still. Dude. Few things are more demoralizing than feeling quite smug and proud of yourself for attempting to order yet another plate of stir-fried vegetables in Chinese, only to have the waiter inform you in a broken accent that they, in fact, "don't speak English."

I'm stuck in the big city o' smog until my visa(s) get approved. The Russian visa is basically impossible to get in Beijing proper, so I'm going to head south first, to Kunming, and wander around Southeast Asia for a bit before coming back up this way and hitting the Trans-Mongolian.

Time on the ol' interweb's running out...more soon and hopefully photos too, at some point...!  ¶ 9:31 PM

  wow How amazing is this? I found it on a backpacker-friendly site for cutting through the "red tape" involved in traveling through Russia:

  ¶ 5:13 PM

  existential crisis Okay, first of all: wow do I have a lot of crap. One would not reasonably imagine, in an apartment the size of a shoebox, that so much crap could even accumulate. I've only been here for 2 and a half years! Where did all of this come from? I have multiple lamps and a real bed and various pieces of artwork that I actually care about and--get this--even plants. Well, okay, just the one plant. But, dude, it's alive. I'm so totally not going to be able to sell my aloe plant on craigslist. And since when do I have both a perfectly serviceable aloe plant AND lotion with aloe in it??? That is just like having a kitchen item that can only do one thing, such as a goddamn melon baller, and everyone knows how I feel about that shit. Who am I and what did I do with Jenny?

And then there's the school stuff. SO MUCH school stuff. There are of course a lot more books than there were in 2003, but the bigger problem is the reams of paper...all of those notes, and essays, and outlines and drafts of essays, and half-baked project ideas, and expensive-yet-interesting-and-potentially-useful-in-future-syllabus-development coursepacks and let's not forget all of those thesis drafts that I can't quite bring myself to completely toss.

But the worst part of this process--at least when you're an internal processor like myself--is the obligatory life-review that comes with sorting through boxes of personal papers. God almighty, do I ever write everything down. And man is it weird as hell to sift through my musings of 2003 and realize just how short and brutish the last two years have actually been. Theme number one: I was a certified dumbass when I arrived on campus, it is now true and official. My papers all make terrible, feeble, horribly failed attempts at 1) humor and 2) overwhelming denouncements/absurdly parsimonious--yet surprising and nontraditional!--conclusions, and I meaninglessly name-drop in my half-assed "literature reviews" like I'm a little too tipsy and rather insecure at a cocktail party. And I'm sure I'll look back at my personal statements for grad school--and, indeed, my thesis--in another quarter or two and feel just as hopeless and stupid. It's really quite tragic. Theme number two: I really was ambling toward perdition when the UW stepped in to save my ass.  ¶ 1:01 PM

  done and done It's official: I'm gradu-a-mated. It's so strange. I've been so focused on this for so long and at such a breakneck pace for the last two years that I don't really know what to do with myself. I managed to distract myself for a few weeks with last-minute conference planning, and the thing finally went off without too many hitches yesterday, despite a near-fatal week of cancellations and even several no-shows. The flake rate was not nearly so bad last year; I have no idea what happened. Still, the papers that were presented were quite interesting: I know a hell of a lot more about shipbreaking in India and images of the Middle East in U.S. newsmagazines now than I did before. And there were cookies. I'm graduated, somewhat educated, and there were free cookies. Nothing to complain about, really.

Packing, obviously, is the next thing. I'm picking up my new pack tomorrow, which is so far the one Big Costly Pre-Trip Indulgence ($109 on sale at REI, yo). Even though this is a pretty small pack as far as they go (compared with the favored styles of long-term backpackers, many of which are as large as a ten-year-old), it's initially all going to weigh far too much since the first part of the trip is the coldest and will require me to tote around several extra layers of crap (and, like, real shoes). But I seriously don't want to get stuck in Chengdu without some decent long johns, not to mention that February excursion to Tibet. I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to visit Shangri-La before it really does become overrun when China completes the Lhasa railroad and opens the roof of the world to all and sundry (i.e., definitely for the '08 Olympics, if not before). I found some especially stunning photos that have me reeeeeally excited about connecting with some fellow travelers, going in together to rent a 4WD, and hitting the "Friendship Highway," which links Lhasa with Kathmandu. Here's a charming little map of the route (note insane proximity to Everest base camp, which is itself at an altitude about 3,000 feet higher than Mt. Rainier):



So the current plan is to hang out in Beijing for a bit and take full advantage of Peter's translation abilities, then take the train to Chengdu, fly to Lhasa (apparently a terrifying and spectacular flight that skims right alongside Everest's summit), wander around Tibet for a few weeks, and wind up in Nepal--which is, like China, very much part of my larger intellectual project on this whole trip. After that, I'll probably be very much in need of some warm weather and good wine, and Dan will be in Australia by then...so I'll have to look into cheap tickets from KTM to Southeast Asia. Even with the detour, I should be back to Central Asia--and then Russia--by early April. And I should know where I'll be moving in August by then, too...I just can't believe this is what my next three months look like.  ¶ 1:01 PM