Last night I had trouble sleeping, I think I fell asleep sometime after 5am. Needless to say the next morning my alarm clock, which is my cell phone, had no effect on my slumber. When I fall asleep late I wake up late, I guess some people wake up at the same time but are just tired, not me, I'm a late waker. But today I may have woke up even later if it hadn't been for the buzzing.

We don't get many buzzes here. I think I've gotten some false buzzes, someone pushing random intercom buttons hoping someone will just push the button and let them in. If you're still confused by the term "buzzing" I'm referring a little phone like device with a red button in our living room area, when someone comes to visit they just push a button with our apartment number and floor number on it, then we can pick up the phone thing and talk to them, see who it is, and if we feel inviting we can push a little red button that unlocks the downstairs door. Today I was buzzed awake by an impatient sounding buzz. I wonder how many times she pushed it.

I stumbled out of bed and said "Wei?" into the phone, I heard nothing so I just pushed the red button. In seconds I heard a knocking at my door, I'm only on the second floor. I had put a towel around my waist I figured it was my room-mate, having locked himself out or something, so a towel seemed quick and modest enough. I didn't want to open the door in my BVD's. (It's very hot here) But it wasn't him, it was my landlady. She was talking pretty fast, all I understood from her Chinese was "open(ed) door." Hmmm. I asked her to wait a second, I figured we had left something on or open, a window or a door or something. It made sense at the time, I was still half alseep. I couldn't figure out what was wrong so I went back to the door and let her in, she seemed to want to come in, I was still in my towel.

I was a little embarrassed being in my towel with her there, if I had been more awake I might have actually put some pants on to answer the door, it doesn't really take that much longer. She walked over to a big box-like thing that files the corner of our living room and started moving junk away from it. I lived here for a few months before I figured out that the box-like thing was actually a boarded over stairway to the restaurant below us. I live in the second floor dining room of a little restaurant. She flipped some latches and opened a little half-height door, I started to think that she locked herself out of her restaurant and was using the stairs as a back door in, that made sense. Soon I could finish waking up and shower and stuff, I looked at my watch, I had already missed most of my first period class.

But she didn't go down the stairs through the little door. She yelled something down the stairs, and then 6 people in business suits, including one attractive young woman in business attire which naturally heightened my embarrassment. They filed into my little living-room/kitchen area. They were all apologizing to me as they filed in, but still they came.

Did they all get locked in the restaurant and she was locked out and she was now rescuing them? How would that be possible? No, because instead of filing right back out the other door they started to, all of them, examine our apartment. Not that there was much to examine. I backed around the door deeper into my bedroom, out of site of the stairwell. It was a little awkward being in the same room with 8 people in business attire with a blue towel wrapped around me, but I'm amazed at how normal it all seemed. After a few minutes, it seemed like many minutes, most of them seemed done looking, or at least done looking in my room, so I closed my door and got ready to take a shower.

The living room was empty when I went with my blue towel from my bedroom door to the bathroom door, but the stairwell was still open and I could hear voices. Sure enough once I had popped into the little bathroom and closed the flimsy little door I heard the voices grow and I saw shadows go by the frosted plastic window of the little bathroom door.

I'm not terribly shy really, my parents used to always yell at me for leaving my blinds up in my bedroom, I still can't see why they'd get so flustered about it, who'd look in my window? I was kind of laughing at myself as I tinkered around in the bathroom running the water until it got hot and putting my towel in a safe and dry place so I could hose myself down with the little hand held shower head. As I showered I wondered what I would say if someone opened the door while I was showering to "examine the bathroom." I also wondered, as I watched the shadows pass by the door, if I'd have an audience when I stepped out of the shower/bathroom in my little blue towel. But I didn't, even though the little stairwell door was open and I could hear business-like conversations now at the bottom of the stairs, my little apartment was empty just long enough for me to flee to my bedroom, make my bed, hide my laptop (you never know), and rush off to school.

On my way out I locked my door, even though the stairwell door was open, I considered closing and latching the stairwell door but it seems like my landlady is trying to rent out or sell her little restaurant, which is bigger than the one floor it occupies, it has second floor: our apartment. Maybe I'll have to move pretty soon. Maybe not.