Smog, Snow, and a little bit of Narrating Work

Thanks to all the effort poured into trying to cleanse the skies of Beijing for the 2008 Summer Olympics, we've enjoyed quite a surprisingly large amount of gorgeous days like this, with skies so unexpectedly clear they barely even have any clouds. 

Unfortunately, nothing good lasts forever, and this total lack of air pollution was in no way an exception to the rule, as you can take a look for yourself at the photo I took just this morning. 

Not much of a pretty sight, huh? Such has been the condition of the skies here for the past few days, on account of the colder weather we've been having. As temperatures have dropped, city residents are using their furnaces more often. Mind you, most of the furnaces here in Beijing run on unrefined  coal, and thus the lower the temperature dips, the more gray the skies become. This morning was particularly bad; as I walked to Chinese class, I almost couldn't tell if I was looking at my own breath or just more smog. 

I really guess I shouldn't gripe about this, though. Actually, I should probably be counting my blessings instead, and be thankful for all the wonderfully clear days I've enjoyed here. After all, according to several sources, the skies above Beijing haven't been so clear in literally years. According to a friend I chatted with this morning, until recently, some kids in Beijing only knew what the true color of the sky was from pictures. Also, when compared to some of China's industrial cities, the sky in Beijing is as clear as crystal, for supposedly, in some cities the smog is so terrible, one can't even see the other side of the street. 

Fortunately, an impossible-to-ignore increase pollution isn't all we've had around here. Just yesterday morning, we were all blessed with a wonderful wintertime surprise. 

SNOW! Ha ha ha! Ha ha.....uh....heh....er, sorta. I'll admit, you can't see it in the above photo at all. That's because it was more of a very, very, very light flurry that we had. But it was still snowing, nonetheless! Don't tell me that you can possibly deny my photographic proof below!

Granted, it wasn't enough for snowballs, building a fort, making a snow man, sledding, or any type of wintertime merriment. Still, at least it was enough to get me all jazzed up into a holiday mood and start blasting Christmas tunes.

Also, I got my first gig as a professional narrator....kinda. Emillio, the Italian Jesuit who I've been proofreading papers for, had to do a powerpoint presentation for one of the TBC classes he was taking, Arts of China. However, rather than have me proof-read his presentation, he wanted my to actually narrate it instead. And so, last Saturday, I met him at about 8:15 AM, went to his apartment on campus, sat in front of his MacBook, and he recorded me reading every single one of his slides out loud (after I had to check them over and make some revisions....it's hard to read something out load when a bunch of the sentences just don't make grammatical sense.)

After he gave his sincere thanks, I went my way, happy to have helped a friend. However, shortly afterwards I forgot the whole matter entirely until Tuesday afternoon, when I got out of my Modern Chinese Fiction class. Before I knew it, I was suddenly being showered with compliments from various friends coming out of the class next door, much to my confusion until I learned that it was Arts of China which had just gotten out. Apparently, my debut as a narrator had actually gone over quite well, to my surprise. 

Don't expect this first-time performance to lead to anything special, though. In my opinion, my older brother Stephen and his comedy skills are still the best chance the Staysniaks have to win an Academy Award  (unless the brothers Staysniak finally get our Christmas album off the ground....then maybe we have a couple Grammys in our future.)