"Huh, why would you do that to yourself?"

I'm taking a course called Sino-US diplomatic history. It's kind of funny the looks I get when people find that out. The looks kind of say "Ouch, are you crazy?" The class in and of itself isn't bad, it's just all of the reading that is associated with the class. We're slated to read about 4-5 books. It kind of helps that it's an interesting enough of a topic. What doesn't help is that I don't really have much of a background in history of Asian countries.