A funny thing happened on my way to english corner

So I went to english corner yesterday and it was great. But before I get into that, a funny thing happened on my way there. I was taking one of the back roads to the bus stop, keeping my head down a little but still being able to see where I was going and I see these sneakers come out from around a van (something you don't see very often because many chinese men wear dress shoes) and the sneakers are followed by very baggy pants, then as I continue to look up, 3 or 4 layers of baggy sweaters with a big baggy jacket and a baseball cap set sideways. Then a chinese face, the he was followed by 2 others, dressed the same way. I couldn't help but smile and almost laugh. Then their faces as they saw me was a look of "OMG, it's a real one. It's one of the people we are trying to look like" and as we passed each other I couldn't help but continue to watch them as I was going. So much so that I was looking back at them as I continued to walk and as they continued to walk by. Then they all said hello and I smiled and waved. It was so funny to me that I was smiling the whole 20 minute walk it took me to get to the bus stop.
Anyway I got to english corner and the regular bunch of characters were there. I gave an english name to a new friend of mine and made some other friends. This time we discussed the holidays and what it meant to us westerners as well as communication and technology. How much it's evolved and become such a huge part of our lives. Then just about when we were finishing up, my new friends almost demanded that we go out for dinner. There is a university about a 15 minute walk up from Giano's and this is where we went. The university cafeteria is unlike any cafeteria I have ever seen. There is an area where people eat downstairs but you go upstairs and you've entered a fancy restaurant, complete with table cloths and waitresses. We (and by we I mean my friends) ordered a few dishes and we had a good time talking, laughing and eating. They were amazed by the chinese I knew as well as my proficiency with chopsticks.
Then after a couple hours we decided to part ways. Three of the boys were kind enough to walk me to my bus stop and wait till my bus came and then that was about it.
So I exchanged phone numbers and email addresses with everyone, with promises to call etc. Plus I told everyone that I won't be at english corner for the next 2 weeks since those would be christmas and new years but I will be there the week after that. I think they are looking forward to it as much as I am.
So that's how things went down.

TTFN