Dreams and Revising

I know that I am not the only one that goes through the whole lets-dream-about-an-anticipated-event-shortly-before-it-occurs. Well, this morning, I awoke from a dream where I was in China. The oddest thing was that it made absolutely no sense whatsoever. First, some of my friends from here were there - and I know that they have no wish of going to China, even if they were going to study abroad. Second, the building that I recall being in distinctly reminded myself of the school buildings here. I'm not saying that the buildings there would be noticeably different, but from some of the pictures that I've seen so far of Beijing Foreign Studies University looked a smidge more... older and run-down than what I remember "seeing". Now that I think about it, it resembled my high school's cafeteria. O_o Anyway, third of all, I was somehow telling my friends what I thought of China like I had already been there for a while. The weirdest thing, however, was that when I told them the stories, I actually had 'flashbacks' - if you could even call something a flashback when I've never been there before.

This dream, I have to say, is the beginning of my coming to acknowledge that I shall be going to China and living there for about four months shortly. This fact has not actually hit me quite yet. This is usually the case and I most likely won't "realise" this rather important fact until the night before.

That is to say, from this day forward, I shall start blogging more about what I think might happen, how I feel; my anticipations, my discomfitures, my thoughts, and my questions shall be made known. (Yes, I'm sure a part of my subconscious is anxiously awaiting when I can actually blog about my experiences on site, instead of pre-departure jitters and ideas.)

On another note, I also recently realised that my knowledge of the Chinese language has diminished quite a bit since I left Austin. It makes sense. After all, I had Chinese class every weekday: every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for an hour, and every Tuesday and Thursday for an hour an a half. On top of that, I almost had a quiz, test, or homework assignment due every day so I had to practice it. With class that fast paced (we went through a lesson a week to two lessons a week on the cramped ones), I relied on that to get me to actually learn it. I remember being able to recall most of the words, how to write it, their pin-yin with their tones, and their English translation. I could read all of them - with the older terms, I could still recall them, I just needed a bit more time. Now, I find myself only being able to write a good number, but seriously lacking when compared to my previous knowledge. As for reading it, I find that I may recognise a character and I may know how to write it, but I really have to think in order to get the pin-yin, not to mention the tones. And the oddest thing is that sometimes, the translation of it may slip my mind completely.

These weeks since school was let out, I would 'practice' my Chinese by listening to my Chinese songs and writing down what I understand and know how to write. Of course, it's very frustrating that I may understand something, but I don't know how to write it. (The curse of having a background in Chinese.) Obviously, it's not very thorough with going through all the characters I learned.

It is time that I open my orange course books and reviewed every single one of them until I can recite them from memory like I could a mere two months ago.