i have written some of the most atrocious and inelegant chinese sentences of my life in the past 4 days. i have also written a few rather pleasing ones. the former far exceeds the latter. i've also managed to translate short passages on toyota's economic strategies, the formation of petroleum, the arab oil crisis, the dangers of excessive nostalgia in old age, and choice morsels from speeches of lky. i've also learnt to say things like hydrocarbons and compressibility of gas and measurement of cosmic rays. it is v amusing.