Watch How I Soar

So, week seven.  On Monday Cindy and Ellen were back in the office, so I had someone to help me a little with HR issues and another summer hire to chill with as the others started to leave.  (Lara left the week before.)  Monday was also a gorgeous day, so Clara, Ian and I went to Pudong to get drinks.  Clara and I ordered Dragonballs, because Dragonball.  We still haven't gone to Puxi for drinks... hopefully that will happen this week so I can get a picture of the view.

Week seven was mostly memorable for the weekend(ish).  On Friday the summer hires and the interns for State, FCS, and ATO got to attend a FAST officer event with Ambassador Baucus.  It was nice to be included in the event and to meet such an important figure for Mission China.  He was extremely nice, and even took the time to shake everyone's hand before he left.

On Saturday, the summer hires and (state) interns got together for a couple hours of Karaoke.  It took sometime to warm-up, but in the end we were all dancing and singing along to the songs.  It was interesting to see which songs the summer hires new (a lot of songs that I remember as important to my middle school years they did not know).  We also all learned that Asa is a natural born rapper, and that the music video for Radioactive is very confusing.

Before I start talking about week 6, I have one more thing to mention about week 5.  On Sunday, Eliza (my boss) and her daughter Lara (one of the summer hires) took the three interns out to brunch at the Meridien hotel.  Coincidentally, this is where Ayla and I stayed when we came to Shanghai two years ago, but we never got to have brunch, which was delicious.

A lot happened on week 6, so I'm going to try to go through everything pretty quickly.  Nothing happened on Monday, so I'm off to a good start.  On Tuesday, Eliza left leaving me as the last person who could do HR work.  Asa got to leave work early to pick up our last intern, Bob, at the airport because Clara and I were doing a talk at PAS that night about the greatest state of them all, New York.  Before the event, we had dinner with Katie and Amina as a mini birthday celebration (Amina and I share the same birthday).  The event was well attended by both children and adults, and we even had an interactive trivia portion where we gave prizes (maps of the US) to people who go the questions right.  At the end, everyone wanted a map.

Afterwards, we gifted Bob and Asa with a set of house rules that Lara and Clara made up (it includes Sexy Saturdays and a pilgrimage to Hangzhou in August).  That night my boss also texted me asking for a favor, so we got to go back into the consulate at night which was a lot of fun.  For once I wasn't the one attacked by mosquitoes, and Clara started to understand the cons of working at the COB.

On Wednesday, I went to Scoreboard with Rachel to meet up with some guys she met.  Some other people showed up over the course of the night as well, including Lara (Eliza's daughter), and we had fun continuing to add words to our new language.  We ended the night with a round of shots for my birthday, and then we went home.

Thursday (22!!!!) was a lot of fun!  The summer hires and other interns kept on wishing me happy birthday throughout the day.  Meg started early by gifting me a can of Swiss Miss she found in the CLO office.  At lunch, I got creative and beautiful birthday cards from everyone (except Bob who didn't know it was my birthday, but he game me an impressive card that he created using paint later).  I also received chocolate cake and a Polaroid camera!!! :D  Of course I had to use the camera right away.

On Thursday, Clara's friend Patrick came down from Beijing to spend the weekend in Shanghai.  On Friday, we went out with Rachel to Cirque de Soir which was... interesting.  On Saturday we hosted Taco Night at our place.  We invited a lot of Shanghai friends and some people Clara and her Pomona friend Darrell know from college.