English, please!

So, we've had a few "complaints" about our nonenglish blogg, so I will try to write some in english as well. Good luck to me! And to all you norwegians that don't like english, hehe! And to you englishreaders, that have to try to understand my norwegianenglish.. Puha!

Okej, so we are in Beijing, literary feeling the exitment about the olympics.. Well, we are not so into sports, but the people here are! They have tvs in the metros, showing and explaining the different sports and so on, very funny! We still have not seen the birds nest or the other olympic arenas, but maybe we will make after school some day.

We have class each day from 9 to 12, very early, and we are so not used to it! Puh! And we both got the cold(er forkjola, suger..), so we mostly focus on school, and not on the tourist-sights.. Still have not seen the great wall.. Typically! But this weekend, we have to go!

Learn chinese 1-2-3:
Ok,. pay attention to the tones! There are 5 different, 1.: high flat tone, 2.: upwards tone, 3.: down and up in one tone, 4.: down tone, 5.: neutral tone(easiest, no tone..) 1 and 3 are long, 2 and 4 are fast. And if you say the wrong tone, you may say something completely different than what you meant, so be careful! We also learn how to write with caracters(tegn), but that I won't teach you! Too difficult! Tai nan! (Chinese.. hehe!) We know how to greet people, how to ask about theyre name, how to tell about our family, order something in the restaurant, and a lot of words. Chinese is also built by cyllables(stavelser), and each cyllable has its own caracter. Some cyllables may have the same pronounciation, but totally different meaning, and different caracters.. So its harder than we thouhgt, but its great fun and our teacher is great too, so its worth it! And maybe even useful, even though we only have two weeks time for the course, because now the phrasebook will be much easier to figure out! Great!

So, about the political situation, oh no, this I probably should write in norwegian, so they dont close our blog.. Oh, I guess it will be fine, who cares anyway, or why would the chinese care?

The thing is, about Tibet and everything, that the media here in China gives a complete different story about Dalai Lama and the tibetans.. We've always heard that tibet wants to be free, and that all dalai lama wants is peace and so on, this is familiar, but that is not the story the chinese are served.. They say that Tibet is chinese, and have been for such a long time, so what is all the fuz about? Tibet is chinese, final. And they also seems to believe that actually, the thing dalai lama wants, is to go back to the old days, like Tibet was before China entered, and back then slavery was the norm. So the chinese say, thanks to China, things are much better in Tibet than they were before, and Dalai Lama wants to go back to an old system, which is built on slavery, for instance..

So thats another story.. Totally different, and very weird for us to hear. But thats what the chinese have been told, and what they believe. So they dont really understand why western countries are threatening with boicot and everything.. And they are not afraid of a boicit, because they think no one actually dare, China is big and upcoming, so a boicot is not so easy..

Thats some thoughts about chinese language (Hanyu) and the olympics, all written in english(Yingyu) Hah! I'm good!
Comments, please! And complaints, if english is too much to someone.. hehe!

Ok, later! I'm hungry! (Wo er) (Pay attention to the tones! Which I cannot show you, haha!)
gunhild