river town

i just finished a great book. a really great book. in fact, for a week i could not put it down. kev is  relieved whenever i finish a good book because he says he finally gets his wife back:). i think the reason i liked it so much is because it is about someone else's journey living cross culturally and i could relate to him so much. if you're interested, check out "river town," by peter hessler. funny, poignant, interesting. here is an excerpt i read the other night:

"i never changed my chinese name, but i sensed the ease with which my chinese identity became distinct from my american self. eventually i came to think of myself as two people, ho wei and peter hessler. ho wei wasn't really a person until my second year in fuling, but as time passed i realized that he was becoming most of my identity: apart from my students, colleagues, and other foreigners, everybody strictly knew me as ho wei, and they knew me strictly in chinese. ho wei was completely different from my american self: he was friendlier, he was eager to talk with anybody, and he took great pleasure in even the most inane conversations. in a simple way he was funny; by saying a few words in the local dialect he could be endlessly entertaining to the people in fuling. also ho wei was stupid which is what i liked most about him. he spoke with an accent, he had lousy grammar; and he laughed at the simple mistakes he made. people were comfortable with someone that stupid, and they found it easy to talk with ho wei, even though they often  had to say things twice or write new words in his notebook. ho wei always carried his notebook in his pocket, using it to study the new words, as well as to jot down notes from conversations. and when ho wei returned home, he left the notebook on the desk of peter hessler, who typed everything into his computer."