PACKINGPACKINGPACKING

I have five days off for Dragon Boat Festival and I am using them to get ready to head home. Well, Monday I went to Century Park with Sarah and some friends of hers for a picnic and crazy four-person-bike races around the park. But other than that....packing.

I have two wardrobes in my bedroom so what I am doing is taking everything I want to take home and putting it in/on one wardrobe and taking everything I need to throw out/sell/give away in the other wardrobe. It helps with the organizing and since I can just close the doors and hide the mess, my apartment still looks clean. It's a really depressing process going through my stuff and deciding what is worth keeping. I have tried to keep the reminiscing to a minimum since I have a lot of stuff to go through.

Most of my big items have already been claimed. Stephanie wants my toaster oven, blender, comforter, and a bunch of my small kitchen items. Becky and Chris want my big pot and my DVD player. I've promised to give Kelly my guitar as long as she practices with it (Yinglong needs love!). I organized a sort of open house party during my last few days here which serves a dual purpose of saying goodbye to people and I've encouraged people to just take my stuff away while they are here. Anything that doesn't belong to the school or I'm taking home must go!

As for the excess, I've already packed one decent sized box to mail home. It's stuff I want to keep but not essential, so I am risking it to the Chinese post office. Two month ground shipping. I am going to do a test pack of my stuff and see if I can get everything I want to take home in my two allowed suitcases. If not, I am going to have to start making another package to send home.

Moving from one country to another is troublesome.

Today marks NINE days until I leave.