Right, so it sounds like there’s some heavy shelling going on outside my apartment. Evidently someone got their days mixed up and mistakenly thinks today is the start of Spring Festival – which is, in fact, a week from today.
Along with an ever-growing symphony of car horns, there have been constant explosions since I got home about three hours ago. I had assumed that perhaps it was some over zealous kid that got his hands on some firecrackers, but when looking out the window I saw an old man light and run…
I have a feeling that this is just a taste of things to come, and I also get the sense that I might be having a rough time sleeping… or watching TV… or doing anything but reminding my heart not to stop at every big bang for the next two weeks or so.
In less ticker-terrifying news – I officially have my full Chinese names, and better that, I can actually write it. The name is Lei Rui An, Lei being a surname and Rui An being the given name. I had the given name already, but no surname, however my Chinese friend Gavin helped me out. He came to me yesterday, looking like he had been pondering it all night and announced “Ryan, I think your Chinese surname should be Lei – it is well suited to the meaning of your name I think.”
Lei means swift, or quick action – and thunder.
Rui means auspicious, a felicitous omen.
An means peaceful, tranquil and quiet.
The Rui An bit, pronounced Ree-anne, comes from a bit of a creative spin on Ryan.
All and all I’m quite happy about the name. If you’re curious about the characters, they are the three above in the newly designed header for my blog. Yes, I finally got around to putting a little personality into this page. What do you think?
Well – dinner awaits… oh, and I would like it to be noted that with the exception of the succeeding comment, I made absolutely no DOGGIE BAG jokes about my dog soup leftovers… it was hard. Very hard.
