Giving Thanks at Thanksgiving - Part 2

Thursday 24th November

"Happy Thanksgiving everyone”……”Happy Thanks(cough)”

I’m trying out my American accent and its getting nowhere. Not to worry, people will still enjoy my British accent (yay).

The plan for today would be that we meet up at John and Jane’s house for thanksgiving at 1pm. But c’mon people, it’s the holidays, we don’t have time limits. After waking up at 10am, and getting ready I made my way to the kitchen, where a delicious smell was originating. Greeting my hosts Buzz and Kathe, alongside Greg and Chrissy. By this point the swelling on Greg’s eye had subsided, he had taken an anti-histamine to calm it, but though it’d be better to head to the pharmacy to see if anything else could be done. ………Forget all that, I’m starving (bad choice of words at a holiday which promotes gluttony), by which point Kathe had cut a slice of a breakfast pudding. I can’t remember the actual name but OMG, that was a taste of heaven, so creamy and chewy at the same time.

Now that the hunger has been suppressed by the heavenly foods, the morning can begin, While Buzz took Greg to the pharmacy, me and Chrissy wanted to settle a dispute we had in the car last night. Greg is under the impression that Oceanside, a place not far from San Diego is very dangerous, but Chrissy says otherwise and that it would be a great place to retire (Although frankly the neighbourhood around Poway, where Buzz and Kathe live is more than suitable.)

I searched online to compare crime statistics, and it turns out that apart from rape and car theft, Oceanside is below the national average on all types of crime. Chrissy was delighted by this, but since I found this site, we decided to dig deeper. I checked out San Bernardino, but now I wish I hadn’t. It is significantly above the national average in ALL areas. I hope this just relates to the main part of San Bernardino and doesn’t travel north to the campus.

I was then asked to try out Compton, which turns out to be the North London of California. It was bad, VERY bad. In all areas apart from theft and car theft it beat San Bernardino. I was definitely relieved to hear that there’s somewhere worse than my place J

1pm came and we were still sat around gossiping, it wasn’t until about half 2 when we made our move. Definitely no rush on this one, we only went 3 miles down the road, to an even grander house. Seriously, this makes my house back in the UK look like a shed. An infinity pool, huge dining/ living areas and a driveway even the celebrities would be jealous of. Just thinking about it makes me wonder why the hell I didn’t take any pictures.

For the next few hours I would play babysitter for the young girls, the same girls who put on the show for us all last night. From what I can remember, I spent the majority before the thanksgiving buffet playing ‘Trouble’ with Liz, the youngest. Trouble is just the American version of Frustration, only pocket sized. During the same time, Grace, Liz’s older sister was constantly asking me about the UK and how I’d say things in my British accent. I knew people would find my accent intriguing, but kids take this to a whole new level, not that I have a problem.

Babysitting aside,  6pm came and the food was ready. A barrage of food to choose from, from Turkey and Prime rib, to home-made stuffing and cranberry sauce, not forgetting my bread basket of course. Literally an orgasm in the mouth (not to be confused with oral for those with dirty minds), but the fun isn’t over yet. After time discussing my situation, we had dessert, which included pumpkin brownie cake, pumpkin pie (fairly big on their pumpkin in the US) and of course, my favourite, APPLE PIE.

Having had enough food to last me at least 2 days, the night concluded with plenty of card games, including 4 player canasta with Chrissy, Greg and Megan. This then became the cause of much discomfort in the form of accused cheating. We agreed that there would be no team-talk between either team. This was quickly ignored by the girls, so the boys thought we’d do the same. Christine laid a 5 down, which we could use. I briefly reminded Greg that a 5 had been laid where he then understood that we could use this. In the spirit of things, this gave us the advantage in that game, which Christine wasn’t pleased about. Despite her relentless challenges, the action stood and the boys won by over 1000 points, a considerable deal in Canasta.

During our last game, Shanghai Rum, the topic of conversation came back to mocking my accent, which somehow led us to watching a clip of an American comedian, who seems to have a fondness for taking the mick out of New Orleans. It reached 11pm and since we needed to set off early, we headed home, an early night for a early morning

Giving Thanks at Thanksgiving - Part 1

Wednesday 23^rd November

A 2 part special, commemorating the traditional American holiday that is thanksgiving. Nothing says “let’s eat” better than the celebration caused by pilgrims from our side of the Atlantic pond. So in a way, we gave the USA a special holiday so it’s only fair I get to join in……..right?

Of course there’s the small issue of getting to the part first. The initial plan was to meet Chrissy at Baldwin Park train station at 12:00 so we could pick up ‘the amigo’ (Greg to me and you). That plan was soon shifted, since Chrissy couldn’t get out of work until lunchtime, which put me on the next train, which was a whole 2 hours later.

To prepare for the upcoming feast, there’s no better way to get ready than with a gym session. Since the gym would be closed from Thursday to Sunday, I decided to get an extended session in. 1 hour 30 mins, burning 1673 calories J, not that that matters since I’d be putting all that back on very easily.

My friend Zack offered to drive me down to the station. Since the Thanksgiving holiday tradition dictates that all guests bring a food related item with them, we stopped off at the local grocery chain, where I picked up this brilliant bread basket. Literally. There were about 24 rolls, in a basket made from bread. On the train riding over I looked pretty darn silly carrying a bread basket with me.

Putting all this to one side, I met Chrissy, 2 hours over-schedule at the stop after Baldwin Park, where we set off to Greg’s work, waited for him to leave and then we’d set off. But of course, it’s a holiday so it never goes to plan. After arriving shortly after 3pm, we were told Greg had to wait for a shipping order, which gave me and Chrissy time to hit the local Taco joint and a much needed restroom break.

We got our food, then headed back to pick Greg up, who had finished by this point. We left one car in the company parking lot (relax, it’s secure) and set off to Poway, near San Diego. With good traffic, this would have taken about 1 hr 20 mins, but apparently, everyone else in the country decides to head south for the holidays. Making up good time on a toll road, which no-one wants to go on for some reason, we made it in 2 hours exactly (precise time may vary)

We pulled up to a very pretty house, where we would spend the rest of the night. The actual Thanksgiving party would be tomorrow a couple of miles up the road. And seriously, this small house isn’t far off rivaling the Calabasas house I saw a few weeks before, it’s just gorgeous. If everyone’s house is like this, it makes the UK look like a slum.  

I made my way round everyone, introducing myself. Unfortunately I’m terrible with names so I’m not gonna rattle off some names, simply because the majority have already rattled off. The house belongs to Greg’s parents, Buzz and Kathe, and ironically enough it was also Kathe’s birthday. I remained a gentleman and refrained from asking how old she was. I also met Andy, Greg’s brother and a whole host of kids. There was another couple, who I didn’t get chance to meet.

Starting the show is Nick, Greg’s son from a previous marriage who I spent quite a bit of time with since he’s 22. Next in line is Katie (19), Greg’s daughter from the other marriage. Then come the twins, Johnny and Megan, both 16, who were constantly on my case about my British accent. Johnny even downloaded a British terminology app, just to test me on certain words that Americans don’t use. I was actually quite surprised just how many words are different. They didn’t even know what “taking the mick” meant.

Moving down the chain were 5 girls, I forget their ages, much less their names. I know Kendal is the oldest of the group, then in no particular order: Grace, E(liz)abeth, Katelyn and 1 more who I just can’t remember.

Now we’ve exchanged pleasantries, it’s time for some food: a student’s vital lifeline, especially if it’s free. A small buffet laid out for all of us to enjoy, closely followed by typical American discussion – Sports and Politics, 2 areas that I have no expertise in. No matter, because the girls had put on a little show for us. Food AND entertainment, most people pay good money for this. The typical ‘happy birthday’ to Kathe followed, something I did have expertise in.

The evening got a whole lot better, with the promise of learning 4 player Canasta (not like the way I spelt it last time, which gives Chrissy an enormous amount of please in telling other people), Just like 2 player, but you essentially have double the chances to win/lose. However I was dragged into the girl’s game of Yahtzee, another game I never played before. Rolling the dice and seeing what comes up, kinda makes me wonder, what the heck I did in my childhood.

Canasta followed, where the teenage crowd got involved. Rather than play, we spent more time mocking my accent than playing. We kept using the typical phrases like “taking the mick” and “Johnny means condom” to much enthusiasm. While we were battling away with the cards, Nick and Greg were literally battling away (playfully though). Oddly enough, Greg took a tumble and 5 minutes, his eye had blown up like a hot air balloon. We believe he had an allergic reaction with something that obviously got aggravated by the play-fight with Nick. Before we knew it, it was 11:30pm and everyone was leaving. No matter, I’d be seeing most of them tomorrow.

Since I’d been suffering with a small headache from about 3pm, but had been putting a brave face on things, I headed to my room, which originally was downstairs, then upstairs and then back downstairs again. I didn’t complain, it burned a few more calories off. That night was one of the best sleeps ever. After a few 5/6 hour nights, I was relieved to get a solid 8 ½ hours of good sleep.

Navigating the 3D maze

Tuesday 22nd November

Today was the day I’d sort out what I’d be doing for the next quarter. Unlike Universities in the UK, you pick the classes per quarter, not once a year. I’d already been able to register for one of the 3 courses needed for the winter quarter, since the course requires no pre-requisites. However the other two required certain pre-requisites, which could be fulfilled, but because I’m an international student, I don’t have the EXACT prerequisites.

ECON 430 – International Economics – No pre-requisites

MKTG 410 – Consumer behavior – MKTG 305 and junior status. (Completing MKTG 305 now, but the system doesn’t recognize me as a junior. This was a simple act of getting up to the 4^th floor, explaining the situation and getting them to add me)

ECON 322 – Managerial Economics – ECON 200, 202, 335 and MATH 120

This one was the kicker. The perquisites weren’t really too much of a problem, since 200 and 202 were covered in both years 1 and 2 along with 120. 335 has been covered in year 2 although I could potentially do with a quick refresher before I start. That wasn’t the problem though, the real problem was getting to the economics department. The Social sciences building is renowned around the campus for being ‘the building with the hole’.

This basically means that floors 1 and 2, you can’t access the smaller section, without going up to the 3^rd floor and then going back down another set of stairs just to access the lower floors. It took literally about half an hour to find the office and make my case. Luckily, the case made was a lot easier than finding the department.

This gave me enough time to squeeze a gym session before my classes. 6 hours of boredom, in which the only worthy news to share is that my grade for my 2^nd Marketing midterm is 87% (B+) slightly better than my first grade.

The rest of the day was spent preparing for my impending Thanksgiving experience……

The presentation...amongst other things

Apolagies again for the late reply. When you think that I'm just being plain lazy you don't expect me to forget writing this blog. But i digress...

Picking up where we left off, from Wednesday 16th, it was an uneventful, yet productive day. The presentation for our China real-estate report was tomorrow and we needed to make several changes since we weren't allowed to copy what groups 1 - 4 had already done.

Thursday came, and after the morning ritual of the gym, freshening up and checking 4 e-mail accounts (really need to consolidate these) and making the final preperations to the presentation. As always before any big presentation or test, I treat myself to a smoothie, which this time was a "StrawMango Whirl" seriously I need to start trying more of the things, they're just soooooooooooooooo good.

After a fairly brief marketing class, since the professor wanted to mark our tests from Tuesday 15th before he set about working on the Final exam on Thursday 8th December, It was time for the Management class and our presentation, which everyone had been dreading from day 1

4:05: Professor took role and asked for group 5 (thats us) to prepare our presentation. At that point, Group 6 jumped the gun and requested that they go first. Based on our experience from groups 1 - 4 they were more likely to get more questions than us at the end. So we let them go first, 10 minute presentation turned out to be closer to 20 minutes, followed by 5 minutes Q&A.

4:30: Now that Group 6 had presented, it was time to prepare our presentation. No sooner had group 6 sat down, but Group 8 stand up and want to present theirs. in the time it took us to realise and try to argue, they had already gone to the front of the class. And now I know why. Half an hour later and they're still on their presentation. The professor actually had to stop the group, who by this point were just reading from a script.

5:00: We stood up to present our presentation, but group 7 did the same too. Now we'd been kicked back twice, we weren't gonna make it a 3rd. We reached the front and started to deliver the presentation. Brissette started our group off with an overview of the case study, which we were all bored of hearing from the 6 previous groups. Skipping over that, Matt then talked about the Legal, Political and Economic factors to consider.

Which passed the baton over to me, and my 2 slides on how an American company should enter the Chinese Real-estate information market. As soon as I suggesed a merger/ acquisition with an existing company, the professors eyes literally lit up, we were the only group in the class who actually presented a real-life recommendation, as opposed to the theoretical answers of the other groups.

Disaster struck on the last point of my 2nd slide. As I was talking about the reasons why acquisitions were beneficial to both companies, my mind literally froze. I was stood there for about 10 secs just ummm'ing and ahhh'ing. Apparently i'd gone snow white, but I managed to pull the last point out of thin air, which led Nergis to finish off about the resulting structures of both companies.

Our presentation was the shortest of the class, but still over the 10 minute 'limit'. We sat down, feeling so relieved, now all thats needed is the rest of the report.

The final class seemed to fly by, 2 hours felt like 2 minutes. I didn't want this to die down for the rest of the day, which led me to the village square for a few hours of pool and ping pong.

Now that the worst of it is over, we decided between the 4 of us to take a couple of days. For Brissette and Nergis, this meant working on other projects, but for me and Matt, it meant we could finally relax.

And thats exactly what I did for Friday and Saturday........and Sunday..........and the vast majority of Monday too. Never mind, On Tuesday i'd be able to choose my classes for next quarter, but thats a story for another time.....

In and Out and shake it all about

The blog is going to be reformed. As most of you are probably aware, i'm very busy at the moment. As I Write this however, one of the biggest obstables has been overcome...well sort of.

Before we get to that however, I wanna talk about a slightly eventful Sunday (13th November). The morning started as always, with a gym session. I managed to get an hour of research into the Chinese housing market, when I got a call for a bite to eat. Only this time, I was invited to try a specialty, "In and Out Burger", a fast food joint with a few surprises.

The venue was supposed to be 10 minutes down the road, but trust Zack to forget the Sat-Nav. We headed down the 215 highway and saw the sign. Unfortunately, we missed the turning, and had to re-navigate through the winding streets of downtown San Bernardino. It took just shy of half an hour to find the place, but boy was this worth it.

There was so much hype about this place, so it was only right that i try it out. It's almost a pure drive-thru with burgers, fries and shakes similar to a 70's diner. I ordered from the 'hidden menu' which is basically a few items that aren't normally open to the public. A 4 x 4  burger, 4 cheesy beef patty's in one huge burger. Granted the fries weren't that good, the burger more than made up for it.
A nice way to kill a couple of hours, before we headed back to CSUSB (making a stopoff at Wal-mart)

The rest of the day was less than eventful. Which is also the same as the whole of Monday, which also included a lot of revision for the upcoming mid-term on Tuesday.

Coming up...overcoming the obstable (on Thursday)

Handing in the week's notice

Friday 4th November - Saturday 12th November

First off, apolagies for not updating in over a week. Times are getting tough academically, and i've been focused on working .After all, that's what i came here to do.

The other reason for not updating is the fact that i haven't really done anything worth mentioning. During this 8 day block, i've been a complete bore and not done anything fun. Aside from the odd game or two of Tetris, watching US shows 3 weeks before they hit the UK and commenting on a couple of Bradford University radio shows, which mention a feature about things that have been on various parts of my body things have been quiet on this side of the pond.

Only a couple of things that I will mention though

My impressive pool record keeps on getting better. I've lost count of the amount of games i've played, but i know i've only lost 8 of them (5 by default [potting the black and white])

Saturday 5th November saw me being blackmailed into attending an event. Hosted by my Finance tutor, it promoted Bangladesh and the culture. Starting at 6, and due to go on until 1am, I thought since i'm being offered extra credit to attend i may as well make the most of it. I met up with a friend of mine, who brought along her sister for 'moral support'

And boy did we need it. The entire event was totally out of shape. the presentations droned on forever, the stage changes were not rehearsed in any form, and by 9pm, we were literally falling asleep due to the boredom. We had to wait a bit longer for the tutor to come round to our little finance group to hand out attendance slips and a mini quiz. attendance was an extra 3% of the overall grade and the quiz was worth another 2%. I'm pretty sure i completed the quiz correctly, so that 5% already earned. We all left after that, which left 100+ to enjoy the limited offering of song and dance.

The gym sessions are going well. i've been consistently hitting 1200 calories in 65 mins, which surprises me more than you. Considering I barely did any exercise in the UK to a calorie burning machine i'm doing alright (must be something in the water)

I've also been in touch with my adopted Auntie Chrissy, who has invited me to join the two of them to San Diego for Thanksgiving. I'll be heading over on the Wednesday, driving down Wednesday evening, spending the entire day with part of Greg's family. I will then be coming back on the Friday, to which i'll be entering the final week of classes before my FINALS :(

Speaking of examinations and testing, the project that has kept me occupied for a considerable time is for my management 405 class. In our group, we have to research into the Chinese mortgage and real estate market for a US company. This would normally be fine and I could get it done in about 2 weeks, but this involves China, who restrict the amount of information about its country to non-residents. This makes searching for information almost impossible. You have to search literally every corner of the internet to find the information. I'll have it done soon......hopefully

The weird and the wonderful

Thursday 3^rd November

A very early start for me, waking up at 7am. While this may be a normal waking time for most and working time for others, this is a nightmare for most students. However my preparations certainly paid off. By drinking half a power shot just before my session, I was able to break my record AND my target, 1205 cal’s. 

The reason for the early start was that my management group was getting together to talk to our Indian colleague. We gathered the troops and waited for our colleague. Half an hour gone and no contact; Everyone else had classes, so I was left alone and surprise surprise, barely 2 minutes after everyone left, our Indian colleague came online. I spent half an hour talking by text, gathering information.

The day gets stranger as well. Marketing 305 came and went, but half way through management 405, there was a muffled “bang” followed by the fire alarm. After everyone evacuated it turns out there was SHOTS FIRED in a room on the other side of the building. The building was shut down for the rest of the day, meaning my Finance class was cancelled and I wouldn’t be getting my mid-term grade.

This led to an early finish, which was put to little productive use. After about an hour researching and a total of 50 words in the essay, the rest of the night was spent in the village square. More pool annihilations, which led to a game of American Football catch. Unfortunately, this led to a throwing injury, which I hoped would fade away with a good rest. Having been up at 7 I actually made it to sleep before mid-night for a change. 

On a side note, I can now update my achievements. At the moment, my grades stand at

Marketing 81.5%, (after 1 mid-term) [ 1 mid-term and 1 final]

Management – 97.9% (after 8 CAT’s, 2 presentation, 1 deliverable game) [1 30 page essay]

 Finance – (none as of yet) [ 2 mid-terms and 1 final]

The headphone dilemma

Wednesday 2^nd November

Ah Wednesday, another day without classes but other work needs to be done. The gym session hit 1155 cal’s in 65 mins, getting better all the time, the target is to hit 1200 soon. The normal Wednesday protocol includes listening to a radio show on the Uni radio network back in Bradford.

(insert cheap plug for “The And Be Done With It show”)

As per my brother’s nagging, I managed to order a pair of headphones, but I soon ran into a problem. The headphones I ordered were only to be shipped within the US, but I could only pay with a US based PayPal account. This provided a real problem, since I now had less than 24 hours to fulfill my obligation to the seller. 

After 4 hours of searching, I was able to borrow a friend’s credit card after submitting an e-mail to the seller to accept a payment other to buy on their card, then pay the cash equivalent.

As a further reward, I introduced my friend to typical British humo(u)r. namely Mock the Week, where we proceded to waste away the rest of the night.

Double negatives

2 days updates, very brief, but it’s better than nothing

Monday 31^st October – It’s supposed to be spooky

Considering the 31^st October is meant to be a scary day (disregarding Friday 13^th) not a lot happened today. After cracking out 1140 cal’s in 65 mins, and 4 hours on a 1000 word essay for my last mini project, I prepared for the upcoming Halloween event. This however turned out to be a total boo boo, but despite this, it lasted for 5 hours. 

Tuesday 1^st November – Failed International relations

. Gym 1145 cal’s 65 mins

 . Building up contact between our management group and a student from India. Unfortunately this didn’t work out too well for us. (time issues and lack of internet connectivity in Mumbai)

. failing the international contact, went to classes

. Continuing the Halloween theme, saw 2 movies – Zombie land (funny) and Orphan (plain weird)