from around here

some of my favorite pictures from last night:
my coteacher augusta and her fiance, jerry. last time i saw jerry, i couldn't say much chinese at all, so every time i would talk to him last night, he shook his head and said 'it's so weird to hear you speak chinese!'
jerry, katie, krissy, phil and george
augusta's taiwan fab shoes.

the couples were awesome.
alan and natalie
steph and carly in perfectly taiwanese matching couples shirts.
martin and olenka (in homemade shirts)
tess, danielle and i (look at that dressss!! i felt like a taiwanese princess)
evvvveryone playing bubblegum
dancin'
i bought balloons for minimal cost + maximum decor impact
katie, me, tess, phil

tonight i went over to the apartment to pick up some stuff i forgot and i asked the security guards what we should do about the cable and our lack of hot water. the security guard called the cable guy (at 11:30pm), woke him up, and scheduled an appointment for tomorrow.
megan: we don't have any hot water either
retired guy who hangs out behind the desk: you can say that in chinese
me: we don't have any hot water
guy: did you turn on the gas?
me: we can cook with it, but the water isn't hot
guy: did you try turning on the gas..?
me: we're a bunch of american girls who can't read the chinese. i don't know how to turn on the gas
guy: let's go try
me: now?
guy: yeah, why not?
..as we're walking to the elevator..
guy: you guys had a lot of people over for your party last night. was it fun?
me: yeah it was a lot of fun, i'm sorry we were loud, but we just wanted to show all of our friends the new apartment
guy: it's ok. it was saturday. i went to sleep at 2am
me: could you hear us?
guy: yep

so that was funny/productive. turns out the battery was missing from the hot water heater unit. we never would have figured that out on our own. we were also surprised to find out that the retired man lives on our floor, across the hall. he asked why i wasn't staying there that night and i told him i'm not going to live there since i'm going home. he told me to come over often. those guys are so nice.