Day 4, Saturday, turned out to be quite a bit more interesting than I initially expected. There wasn’t supposed to be much happening today, just a short meeting with Dr. Hara to go over my new MRI images.

When I woke up for breakfast though I found a message waiting for me on my phone from Ma Li telling me she was going to drop by in the afternoon. I hadn’t expected her back until Monday so that was a pleasant surprise!

The morning was spent in comfort, laying in my sweet electric bed drinking coffee, reading journal articles on deforestation, and chatting with my brother through Skype mobile. Masako-san (my nurse) stopped in on her way home after working the nightshift and we had a nice chat about suppository laxatives and catheter tubes, both of which get I to enjoy on Tuesday, yeah baby!

Things didn’t pick up until the afternoon though. First, my lovely girlfriend showed up at about 2:30 and brought a fat box of holiday cakes from Mister Donut – hell yes! Then together we had the MRI discussion with Dr. Hara – my PCL is also quite loose but otherwise appears undamaged and I have some very minor cartilage tearing, but they anticipate a fairly routine surgery. The real kicker came after we had returned to my room though…

Ma Li and I were sitting on my bed studying, me with my Beginner Chinese and her with her Fluent English (awwwww!), when an email blooped onto my phone.

It was from Professor Zhang Kunmin, the former head of environmental policy for the Chinese government as well as a million other titles. I had earned his friendship in the fall of 2005 when I took his Theories of Sustainable Development class and had the cheek to present my final project on why Sustainable Development is impossible, and on the final day of class no less! Outside of class that same semester I also edited the English version of a paper on environmental policy in China by one of his associates in preparation for publishing in a journal.

So, last week before I left for the hospital I emailed Professor Zhang – who no longer teaches at APU – to humbly inquire into the availability of any internship work in China through one of his organizations. Professor Zhang then forwarded my email with an introduction of his own to the man whose paper I had edited last year.

The email I received back today was Prof. Zhang letting me know that Dr. Wen Zongguo, who is now a professor in his own right in the Department of Environmental Science & Engineering at Tsinghua University, should be able to extend me an internship position in his department and wanted to know what sort of work I had in mind.

This is a major coup!

Tsinghua University, located in the heart of Beijing, is widely regarded as the best university in all of China and is a major hub for research of all kinds in the Asian hemisphere.

The benefits to my academic progress, future career, and cultural awareness that a 4 or 6 week stay would provide are tremendous!

Nothing is firm yet, but this is a solid and extremely promising lead, and I’m excited.

The only obstacle of course is this *minor* surgery I’m having on Tuesday…

But if my surgeons don’t botch the job, and if rehab goes well, I should be good to go come mid-to-late February…

Certainly something to look forward to!