Hiatus

Grasses and pasture, MOE USA

So,

I have admittedly let my blog fall by the wayside, as many of us do, when life gets to be a little too chaotic.  I apologize to anyone who periodically checks in and wondered what happened, but I assure you the full story (coming soon), is a rather epic one, though full of a very different kind of adventure.

The Diploma: 2.5 Years in the Making

You see, I mentioned before that I was still in school.  I say was and not am, because I finally passed my oral exam for a MA in Anthropology at the end of January and received my diploma at the end of February.  Since my last blog post, I finished writing my 95 page thesis, defended said thesis, re-wrote a good chunk of my thesis to focus on another subject, submitted said thesis (which was probably the hardest part because the library system continued to reject it until the very last day when I had to get help from the library staff to beat the deadline!), printed hard copies of my thesis in bound, book form and ran them to various departments in exchange for stamps, and finally submitted the stamped paper for my Chinese diploma (I still had to wait a week for the English copy).


Of course, this whole process took several months and involved a number of convoluted steps in between, but in the end I managed to get my diploma, only to find out my visa was being canceled immediately and I needed to leave the country or get deported.  This also created a lot of chaos, and ultimately I found out it was possible to extend my visa, but by then I had already booked a ticket back to the US.

Back on the road, MOE, USA

So here I am, back stateside for the time being while I find out about jobs and my future.  In the meantime, I will be releasing the numerous back posts I drafted but never finalized or published.  I'll also be posting more on the US and my responses to a variety of "standard American" experiences because a lot has changed since I last visited over five years ago, and I mostly feel like a foreigner in my native country (more on that later... plus Cinnabon!).


I promise more is to come, and all will be explained- check back in the next week or two for the release of travel back-posts!