Finally some relief

Well...the summer definitely hasn't panned out anything near what I expected. After 3 and a half days in Beijing, I decided to discontinue my involvement with the project I was going to be working on this summer, leave Beijing, and start my own venture. I won't discuss the details of why I had to quit, but as someone who has worked in China before and someone who has never quit and ran in the same day, I'd say I have very legitimate reasons for leaving.

I have over 2 months ahead of me. The uncertainty is both scary and exciting. The idea of doing my own thing (I hesitate to call it a startup), has been swimming around in my head for a long while, but now that I'm actually putting a foot forward and starting this long awaited project, to say I'm a tad bit scared would be an understatement. I have no doubt that every aspiring entrepreneur goes through stages of fear and doubt. I just never thought I would actually do it myself. However, I'm in the midst of grad school, have a whole summer ahead of me, good resources at my disposal, so why not? Everyone has to start somewhere, but it's not until you take that leap to start your own venture that success becomes a possibility. Besides working on my own project, I will also be doing some traveling. Tentatively planned so far is a trip to Yulin which is in the next province over. After that, I might be heading to Japan.

The last few week have been quite stressful, but at the same time, incredibly random and strange. I think I'm a magnet for random and strange, and as China seems to be its own magnet of random and strange, well, put me in China and all sorts of bizarre things are bound to happen. I'm just glad that I'm now removed from the main source of stress and can start to enjoy my summer.

On Call

Sorry for disappearing for almost 3 weeks. I've basically been on call since arriving without any knowledge of where I need to be and when until the very last minute. I ended up staying in Shanghai for an extra week, and having just arrived in Guangzhou a few days ago, I've just been informed about an hour ago I need to catch a flight to Beijing tomorrow to start work. I did not even know Beijing was part of the plan until a few days ago...I'm trying not to rip my hair out, but luckily, I've been blessed with a thick head of hair. 

I promise to post pictures and more interesting stories once my work situation has been settled though I have a feeling I might be on my toes for the rest of this summer...Stay tuned!