My reassimilation to the US began on the plane. The first big thing that came back to me was on the flight from Beijing. I got a Diet Coke from the first drink service, and it was a Chinese can. I figured all the sodas were Chinese, so on a later drink service, I got Coke Zero, but it was an American can. I prefer American Diet Coke and Chinese Coke Zero, so I always got the inferior soda, but in China the tab on the can is rectangular or oblong, whereas in America it is very rounded. It's just different; neither good nor bad, but I got used to the other shape.
The next big one was on my descent in my hometown when I looked at the highway and did not see the ridiculous traffic that is always in Beijing. I then almost said "duibuqi" instead of "sorry" when I bumped into someone at baggage claim.
My first day at home was pretty relaxed and easy. I woke up at 6 or 6:30, lounged around til 10, then I walked to the drugstore (I really missed drugstores!!!) to pick up a prescription, retainer cleaner, and replenish my makeup supply which I entirely expired in China. I had lunch, then bought a pair of sneakers, followed by visits to both of my grandmothers. I ended my day with a Tae Kwon Do class, and it was fantastic. I was so happy to see my family and friends, and to be using my American phone again. I did a lot of texting to make plans for my weeks at home. Things feel really normal here, and I like that so far.
Tuesday was an early wake up, relaxing morning, trip to the gym, revisiting the local grocery store, seeing one of my high school BFFs, and going to Tae Kwon Do. I think the big reassimilation thing was the grocery store because I could identify everything and read all the packages. Stores are so much more intimidating in China. I really appreciate the softness, thickness, and plushness of my bed and towels here. My bed at Bei Da was a rock in comparison, and my towel very thin. Not things that were bad and uncomfortable, but here it is significantly more comfortable. I got to break a board and really feel at home in my group at TKD tonight, so it left me feeling very happy. I am getting confused between Korean numbers and Chinese numbers becasue there is crossover in pronunciation, but the numbers with the same pronunciation are different values (yi=1 in Chinese, 2 in Korean).
Wednesday and Thursday were uneventful, but I noticed that I got used to reacting to Chinese traffic patterns, so I'm surprised every time a car stops for me. In the US, traffic is mostly because there are such frequent stop signs and traffic lights, not necessarily the number of cars like it is in China. In China, there are too many cars and too few rules. The cars go whenever and wherever they can, the buses don't stop for anything or anyone, the bikes go where the cars can't, and the people go wherever they please; it's kind of insane, and it's so different to be in such an orderly traffic pattern again.
On Friday I found the apples my mom bought for me (they're my favorite kind, Pink Lady), and they were normal size. There is such rampant use of hormones and growth enhancers in China that no fruit is normal size, and even though it's big it doesn't even taste that good. This apple was delicious.
The overall thing is that I'm finding so many moments when I want to say, "This time in China..." or "In China they..." and I really accumulated a lot of stories and experiences!
Today is awesome because I've been appreciating the comforts of being home.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Monday, August 13, 2012
August 12: My 36-Hour Day
I'm home!! It's really great to be back. I really missed my family, and my bed is so fluffy, and I drove a car today, and I don't feel like traffic is going to kill me. I had a great time, and now I'm very happy to be home.
For me, August 12 was a 36-hour day because it started in China and ended in the US Eastern Time Zone. Using Eastern Time to standardize, my day started at noon on Saturday and ended at midnight on Sunday. Yay time travel?
I got up at 5AM, finished my preparations, skyped home, then went on the bus to the airport. My trip had a few parallels one the homecoming flight as it did on the outgoing flight. I had an overweight bag (this time I just paid the fee; I literally had nowhere to put the things), I got iced coffee, I had some time to sit before my flight. I didn't sleep on my flight from Beijing because I was seated near the bathroom and the traffic kept me up. I journaled about the flight, and I don't have much else to say here. I finished watching LOST, and I liked the ending (controversial, I know, but the writers ended the story).
My connection in San Francisco was terrible. I had less than an hour to get to my flight. Customs was easy, but it took a long time to pick up my bag for re-checking, and then I had to go through security again, and that took a long time. I even asked and was allowed to move past the group of Texas A&M students who were also returning from China; they were kind. It was stressful, but I made it to the plane, and then I slept for 2 or 3 of the 4.5 hours of that flight. The people across the aisle from me were alumni of my university, and one of them even lived in Beijing for a few years in the area where I was, so that was a cool connection to have.
My parents were waiting for me right where I came out from the airport gates. It was wonderful to see them. We picked up my bags and went home, where I unpacked everything, ate dinner (my mom cooked), showered, then went to sleep. It was a fantastic end to an endless day.
Travel day was awesome because it ended up at home!!!!!
For me, August 12 was a 36-hour day because it started in China and ended in the US Eastern Time Zone. Using Eastern Time to standardize, my day started at noon on Saturday and ended at midnight on Sunday. Yay time travel?
I got up at 5AM, finished my preparations, skyped home, then went on the bus to the airport. My trip had a few parallels one the homecoming flight as it did on the outgoing flight. I had an overweight bag (this time I just paid the fee; I literally had nowhere to put the things), I got iced coffee, I had some time to sit before my flight. I didn't sleep on my flight from Beijing because I was seated near the bathroom and the traffic kept me up. I journaled about the flight, and I don't have much else to say here. I finished watching LOST, and I liked the ending (controversial, I know, but the writers ended the story).
My connection in San Francisco was terrible. I had less than an hour to get to my flight. Customs was easy, but it took a long time to pick up my bag for re-checking, and then I had to go through security again, and that took a long time. I even asked and was allowed to move past the group of Texas A&M students who were also returning from China; they were kind. It was stressful, but I made it to the plane, and then I slept for 2 or 3 of the 4.5 hours of that flight. The people across the aisle from me were alumni of my university, and one of them even lived in Beijing for a few years in the area where I was, so that was a cool connection to have.
My parents were waiting for me right where I came out from the airport gates. It was wonderful to see them. We picked up my bags and went home, where I unpacked everything, ate dinner (my mom cooked), showered, then went to sleep. It was a fantastic end to an endless day.
Travel day was awesome because it ended up at home!!!!!
Saturday, August 11, 2012
The Very Last Day
My bags are packed. My roommate has gone. I've said many good-byes and see you in Septembers. My time in China is at an end, and it has been unequivocally fantastic.
Today was a day that I had set aside for packing, sleeping, and travel preparations, but being the insanely obsessively organized person that I am, I actually ended up having nothing to do today. I woke up at 6:45, which was not a great start, and there was a note from Andrea outside my door and a woman inspecting her room. When I couldn't fall back asleep, I watched some videos on YouTube and the one episode of BBC's Sherlock that I own while I rested and reclined.
Around noon, I decided to leave my room. I contacted a friend for whom Andrea left a phone card, and we met up outside for the handoff. I ended up taking the elevator with another girl from my program, Grace, and she was making plans for both lunch and dinner, which I joined. For lunch, we went to a steamed bun shop down the street from our dorm, and I had the tofu strips cold dish. This is my new favorite kind of tofu. It is a lot like a noodle, but it is tofu. My favorite preparations are when it is treated like a noodle or used to wrap vegetables like sushi. Anyway, I ate with Grace, Pooja, Feifei, Brian, Matthew, and Victoria.
After lunch, we stopped at the bakery for some final sampling of Chinese pastry, which I had yet to do. I got an egg tart and something filled with red bean paste, both of which were small tastes, sweet and delicious. At that point, Matthew and I decided to make a trip to the Silk Market for him to do his souvenir shopping and the rest of our lunch group went for manicures.
I really like talking with Matthew because he always has something interesting to say. Amid the talk of bargaining and which items to get, we discussed how to read people, views on souvenirs, seeing our families, and what we look forward to upon our return home. It was a really nice, peaceful time, but I think the fact that it was The End, the last shopping trip, the last chance for an adventure or story, was hanging over us a little and coupled with the rain, it was also a little sad in the nostalgic kind of way.
We got back at 4:45, which was just enough time for a decent rest before meeting up at 6:30 for dinner. My language partner, Helen, joined the group, which was really great because I wanted to see her one more time before going home. She went home herself for a few weeks, so I'm happy she returned to Beijing today because the timing worked out really well to see her again.
The group took the subway two stops to the Haidian Mall shopping area (near Carre-Four). It was later than anticipated, so we changed our plans and ate at a Taiwanese restaurant called Bellagio. My small table ordered a garlic ginger chicken (it was unexpectedly cold rather than hot), Chinese broccoli, and eggplant (my favorite, as always) as our dishes, and we had beef fried rice. Taiwanese desserts are a specialty, and I shared a chocolate ice with Helen.
I really loved being together as a large group for the last time, but I particularly liked getting to spend one more dinner with Helen. She has been the kindest language partner I could have asked for, and I am so grateful that she is my friend. I got to give her my broom, so I'm glad that went to someone who will use it, and as we said good bye in the foyer of my dorm room, there were endless hugs and promises to stay in touch. Really, we will, because there is a lot of geography between us, but I do care about what happens to her. We really did become great friends in the short time that we've known each other, and I appreciate how lucky I am to know her.
On the subway ride home, one of the guys was emphasizing the lastness of it all, and it was making me have a lot of feelings. I think he was trying to get me to react and possibly cry, but since there's such a mix, I just end up flapping my arms and ranting about feelings. It's all okay; I will be coming back to China, so it's not a true good bye, just the end of this particular trip with this particular group of people. I will miss them a lot, but I will see the majority in six weeks, and the others have e-mail as well.
I made my final run to the C-Store to get some food for tomorrow's breakfast and plane rides, then I finished my e-mails and went to bed before my early start to a long day of travel. I actually live the day twice because of the way I cross the international date line, so that's extra fun. I'm looking forward to the family hugs on the other end.
Today is awesome because I got to see my 中国朋友 one more time, have some great conversations, and spend my last day of Study Abroad in China with lovely people doing relaxing things.
Today was a day that I had set aside for packing, sleeping, and travel preparations, but being the insanely obsessively organized person that I am, I actually ended up having nothing to do today. I woke up at 6:45, which was not a great start, and there was a note from Andrea outside my door and a woman inspecting her room. When I couldn't fall back asleep, I watched some videos on YouTube and the one episode of BBC's Sherlock that I own while I rested and reclined.
Around noon, I decided to leave my room. I contacted a friend for whom Andrea left a phone card, and we met up outside for the handoff. I ended up taking the elevator with another girl from my program, Grace, and she was making plans for both lunch and dinner, which I joined. For lunch, we went to a steamed bun shop down the street from our dorm, and I had the tofu strips cold dish. This is my new favorite kind of tofu. It is a lot like a noodle, but it is tofu. My favorite preparations are when it is treated like a noodle or used to wrap vegetables like sushi. Anyway, I ate with Grace, Pooja, Feifei, Brian, Matthew, and Victoria.
After lunch, we stopped at the bakery for some final sampling of Chinese pastry, which I had yet to do. I got an egg tart and something filled with red bean paste, both of which were small tastes, sweet and delicious. At that point, Matthew and I decided to make a trip to the Silk Market for him to do his souvenir shopping and the rest of our lunch group went for manicures.
I really like talking with Matthew because he always has something interesting to say. Amid the talk of bargaining and which items to get, we discussed how to read people, views on souvenirs, seeing our families, and what we look forward to upon our return home. It was a really nice, peaceful time, but I think the fact that it was The End, the last shopping trip, the last chance for an adventure or story, was hanging over us a little and coupled with the rain, it was also a little sad in the nostalgic kind of way.
We got back at 4:45, which was just enough time for a decent rest before meeting up at 6:30 for dinner. My language partner, Helen, joined the group, which was really great because I wanted to see her one more time before going home. She went home herself for a few weeks, so I'm happy she returned to Beijing today because the timing worked out really well to see her again.
The group took the subway two stops to the Haidian Mall shopping area (near Carre-Four). It was later than anticipated, so we changed our plans and ate at a Taiwanese restaurant called Bellagio. My small table ordered a garlic ginger chicken (it was unexpectedly cold rather than hot), Chinese broccoli, and eggplant (my favorite, as always) as our dishes, and we had beef fried rice. Taiwanese desserts are a specialty, and I shared a chocolate ice with Helen.
I really loved being together as a large group for the last time, but I particularly liked getting to spend one more dinner with Helen. She has been the kindest language partner I could have asked for, and I am so grateful that she is my friend. I got to give her my broom, so I'm glad that went to someone who will use it, and as we said good bye in the foyer of my dorm room, there were endless hugs and promises to stay in touch. Really, we will, because there is a lot of geography between us, but I do care about what happens to her. We really did become great friends in the short time that we've known each other, and I appreciate how lucky I am to know her.
On the subway ride home, one of the guys was emphasizing the lastness of it all, and it was making me have a lot of feelings. I think he was trying to get me to react and possibly cry, but since there's such a mix, I just end up flapping my arms and ranting about feelings. It's all okay; I will be coming back to China, so it's not a true good bye, just the end of this particular trip with this particular group of people. I will miss them a lot, but I will see the majority in six weeks, and the others have e-mail as well.
I made my final run to the C-Store to get some food for tomorrow's breakfast and plane rides, then I finished my e-mails and went to bed before my early start to a long day of travel. I actually live the day twice because of the way I cross the international date line, so that's extra fun. I'm looking forward to the family hugs on the other end.
Today is awesome because I got to see my 中国朋友 one more time, have some great conversations, and spend my last day of Study Abroad in China with lovely people doing relaxing things.
Friday, August 10, 2012
Closing Banquet and Thoughts on Conclusions
It was really hard to get out of bed this morning. I was tired and I knew that the only thing we were doing in Chinese class was watching a movie (I Hope You're the One/Fei Chan Gu Ra (?), the first in the series of which we watched the second last week). I went, though, and was the first one there. I did well on my final, and ended the summer with the highest marks for my class, which I am very proud of since I did put in the work. Yao Laoshi gave each of us mooncakes as a parting gift, went over the exam with us, we watched the movie, then practiced for the talent show. In the middle of our rehearsal, Gu Laoshi came in and handed out our program polo shirts, so that was exciting.
I had two eggs for lunch from the baozi cafeteria, then I finished the cafeteria money on my card by buying a soda from the convenience store. For the early afternoon, I walked all over Bei Da's campus so I could make sure to see everything one last time. I got to take pictures and vlog a little, and it was pretty emotional to realize how much this campus has come to feel like it's mine and that I'll really miss it. The vlogging was pretty sentimental, particularly because I felt like it was my present self talking to my future self so I could remember how I was feeling as this program was ending.
I know I've talked about the program ending for a while now, but being the last day of actual programming, it's feeling more real than the time crunch countdown that I've been feeling. I really leave the day after tomorrow. There is absolutely no time to find more things to do. It's ending. It just hit home a lot harder when I was walking around.
When I got back to my room, I did some more packing and organizing for departure, and then I did some computer business. I had a couple of e-mails to answer, my camera needed uploading and charging, I charged my electronics for the airplane, and I took the time to fill out my program evaluation for the office at my university. The survey took a lot longer than they said it would, but that could be my own fault for taking a long time to write detailed answers. I hope it helps them. After all the business was taken care of, I had a little more than an hour before the talent show, and I used that time to watch some videos and generally relax before our final program. And, yeah, hitting 1700 photos was pretty exciting!!!
The talent show was at 6PM in Shaoyuan Building 7, the same place we had orientation and welcome lunch on the first day as well as the 4th of July celebration. I met with my classmates to walk over at 5:40 so we could be there a little early, and we arrived in time to greet our teachers and find seats before the program started. We sat by class, which was both nice and limiting, and Gu Laoshi began the evening with a speech (in Chinese) welcoming everybody and introducing the different groups of people present. There were not only the students, but also the Bei Da officials, our language teachers, some alumni from our American university, and the incoming international students from Beijing and their parents. Next, the head of the language program at Bei Da made a speech about how well we did learning Chinese, and we got to eat dinner when she was done.
After dinner, we had the talent show. Our class went first and sang "Nan Zi Han" from Mulan. The problem was that our Jackie Chan video was not playing loudly enough for us to hear, so we didn't do as well as we had practiced. Then Brian from class 2 sang "Swing Life Away" while accompanying himself on the guitar. The next act was class 3 reading a poem, followed by the Beijing freshmen spontaneously (at Gu Laoshi's suggestion) singing "Beijing Huanying Ni," which is still my new favorite song. We did our charades (which felt very silly), then class 5 re-enacted a Chinese dating show, class 3 sang their song, class 2 sang "Good Riddance" but wrote a new verse about being in China using both Chinese and English, and class 4 wrapped the show with their songs performed by the class band.
After the talent show, we mingled with the freshmen and took photos. I had some great conversations with three of them, one of whom is going to live in my dormitory! That was very exciting. I gave them my e-mail, and one of them saw the Chinese vocabulary I had written on my legal pad that I was carrying. She asked how long I had been learning Chinese and was impressed that it had only been eight weeks. I am so excited to see these new students on campus, and I hope that I can hang out with my Chinese dorm-mates to keep up what I've learned here. I'm so excited for them to come to join my university!! Their energy is fantastic and they are so ready to jump into everything.
I walked home with Andrea and Sam, and we got to talk about successful Chinese langauge experiences in the world rather than the classroom, and I began hugging people good bye because I don't know who I'm going to see tomorrow before I go. It's tough, but I know that I will be seeing the majority of them in just six weeks, so it's really okay. I just need to do the hugging to put a capstone on our time together here.
By the time I got home, it was after 10:00, so I had some relaxing time before going to sleep.
Today is awesome because I got to meet a new member of my residential college. Today is notsome because of saying good bye.
I had two eggs for lunch from the baozi cafeteria, then I finished the cafeteria money on my card by buying a soda from the convenience store. For the early afternoon, I walked all over Bei Da's campus so I could make sure to see everything one last time. I got to take pictures and vlog a little, and it was pretty emotional to realize how much this campus has come to feel like it's mine and that I'll really miss it. The vlogging was pretty sentimental, particularly because I felt like it was my present self talking to my future self so I could remember how I was feeling as this program was ending.
I know I've talked about the program ending for a while now, but being the last day of actual programming, it's feeling more real than the time crunch countdown that I've been feeling. I really leave the day after tomorrow. There is absolutely no time to find more things to do. It's ending. It just hit home a lot harder when I was walking around.
When I got back to my room, I did some more packing and organizing for departure, and then I did some computer business. I had a couple of e-mails to answer, my camera needed uploading and charging, I charged my electronics for the airplane, and I took the time to fill out my program evaluation for the office at my university. The survey took a lot longer than they said it would, but that could be my own fault for taking a long time to write detailed answers. I hope it helps them. After all the business was taken care of, I had a little more than an hour before the talent show, and I used that time to watch some videos and generally relax before our final program. And, yeah, hitting 1700 photos was pretty exciting!!!
The talent show was at 6PM in Shaoyuan Building 7, the same place we had orientation and welcome lunch on the first day as well as the 4th of July celebration. I met with my classmates to walk over at 5:40 so we could be there a little early, and we arrived in time to greet our teachers and find seats before the program started. We sat by class, which was both nice and limiting, and Gu Laoshi began the evening with a speech (in Chinese) welcoming everybody and introducing the different groups of people present. There were not only the students, but also the Bei Da officials, our language teachers, some alumni from our American university, and the incoming international students from Beijing and their parents. Next, the head of the language program at Bei Da made a speech about how well we did learning Chinese, and we got to eat dinner when she was done.
After dinner, we had the talent show. Our class went first and sang "Nan Zi Han" from Mulan. The problem was that our Jackie Chan video was not playing loudly enough for us to hear, so we didn't do as well as we had practiced. Then Brian from class 2 sang "Swing Life Away" while accompanying himself on the guitar. The next act was class 3 reading a poem, followed by the Beijing freshmen spontaneously (at Gu Laoshi's suggestion) singing "Beijing Huanying Ni," which is still my new favorite song. We did our charades (which felt very silly), then class 5 re-enacted a Chinese dating show, class 3 sang their song, class 2 sang "Good Riddance" but wrote a new verse about being in China using both Chinese and English, and class 4 wrapped the show with their songs performed by the class band.
After the talent show, we mingled with the freshmen and took photos. I had some great conversations with three of them, one of whom is going to live in my dormitory! That was very exciting. I gave them my e-mail, and one of them saw the Chinese vocabulary I had written on my legal pad that I was carrying. She asked how long I had been learning Chinese and was impressed that it had only been eight weeks. I am so excited to see these new students on campus, and I hope that I can hang out with my Chinese dorm-mates to keep up what I've learned here. I'm so excited for them to come to join my university!! Their energy is fantastic and they are so ready to jump into everything.
I walked home with Andrea and Sam, and we got to talk about successful Chinese langauge experiences in the world rather than the classroom, and I began hugging people good bye because I don't know who I'm going to see tomorrow before I go. It's tough, but I know that I will be seeing the majority of them in just six weeks, so it's really okay. I just need to do the hugging to put a capstone on our time together here.
By the time I got home, it was after 10:00, so I had some relaxing time before going to sleep.
Today is awesome because I got to meet a new member of my residential college. Today is notsome because of saying good bye.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Done with Schoolwork!!
Meiyou zuoye 没有作业 I don't have homework!!!
I really like the conclusion of classes, no matter what country they are in. It is quite liberating to not have to do homework or study anymore, particularly when the studying I have been doing was intensively learning around 25 Chinese characters each night.
I also realized that I only wake up in Beijing three more times (contact lens count and whatnot), and that's totally weird to me. I think that over my time here, even though I've known it was temporary and finite, I set up a sort of routine and life, and that pattern has been very fun and awesome all summer. I'm sad to see it go, especially because there are so many more things to see and do in this enormous country. That said, I'm still okay with leaving because I haven't seen my family for a long time and I haven't been home since March, so there are also things to look forward to as consolation for leaving my adventure in China. I think it's good that I have a bittersweet conclusion because it means I had a great time while I was away and I have people and things to come home to!
I took my Chinese final in the morning, and when we were all done with the test we practiced for the talent show and finished a movie about food and family that we had been watching all week. I finished my test pretty quickly and ended up having time to do some life tasks including a stop at the dorm, and I ended up walking back to class with four of the five students in our Chinese 2 class. It was pretty funny, and nice to have walking companions. Before class (since I woke up remarkably early today) I decided to go to the store on campus that uses the meal card to buy yogurt and a coffee, but then I remembered that they don't have the coffee I like and the yogurt I got was really odd. It was a cardboard cup of drinking yogurt that came with a straw. The package had a picture of a strawberry and some sort of grain on the outside, and when I started sipping, it was indeed strawberry yogurt, but there were pieces of cooked barley or something. It made it taste like cake and I didn't finish it because I didn't like it after a while.
After Chinese class, our class and class 3 went to a restaurant called Spice Spirit for lunch. Our Laoshi drove me and two other classmates, and he has a membership at the restaurant, so he knew just what to order. He really ordered too much food, but it was delicious. The main thing he wanted us to try was the Sichuan oil cooked fish, and that is served with a piece of bread to soak up the oil. I ate a little bit of that to try it, but my favorites were the salad, the lettuce with peanut sauce, the mapo tofu, and the pineapple rice. I think all the food was really delicious, but the entire meal was very spicy, so there was nothing to cool off my mouth with. The lettuce with peanut sauce and the pineapple rice were cooling and the rice was sweet, but the spicy was everywhere. I liked it though; it was tasty spicy. Other things on the table were prawns (they had full shells so I didn't try it), frog, chicken, spicy noodles, and spicy vegetables.
I spent the two hours of afternoon time I had relaxing in my air conditioned room, and then I left to meet Yizhou (my friend from high school who is a 北京人) at the subway station near Houhi for our meetup. In planning, we decided to meet at the station because we could then take a taxi together, and we were meeting early to beat rush hour crowds. I know the subways so well, so when we picked a station I knew exactly where it was and how to get there with the transfers without having to look it up, which was really cool.
When I was waiting at the 地铁站 (subway station), a guard came up to me to see what I was doing. I either looked lost or suspicious, but I told him 我的朋友在地铁三个站 (my friend is on the subway for three more stops). I didn't know how to say I was waiting for my friend, but the message came across and I was really happy to have handled the interaction.
We took a taxi from the station to the Houhai area, and it was really cool there. Houhai is a lake with a few bridges, an island, and lots of boats for rent that is surrounded by storefront after storefront of bars, clubs, and restaurants. Yizhou had made a reservation at a Yunnan restaurant, so we walked around and then went there for dinner. We ordered their specialties of beef and fish (best fish I ate; it was grilled with lemongrass), and we got chicken soup, pea flour glutinous rectangles, and bamboo rice. I really liked the food and the fish was my favorite. The soup was the best soup I've had in China (not such a fan of the seaweed soups), and the rice was extra sticky and a little bit sweet. The restaurant was decorated with paper flowers, lanterns, and wooden surfaces, and we had a table on the second floor by the window overlooking the lake, so it was a fantastic setting.
I loved getting to spend time with Yizhou and talk about life. She told me about her summer internship, travel to and from her American university, her upcoming semester abroad in Hong Kong, and her jazz dance class. I told her about my time in China and we played some "where are they now" with our former classmates. I used a lot of my Chinese language with her, and she was excited that I could speak at all, and I was excited to be speaking, so it was really fun. We walked all around the lake and took some pictures before ending our evening with beverages from a smoothie/juice/tea shop, and then going to the train station together. We took the same line but in opposite directions, so our good-bye hugs were on the subway platform. It was so fantastic to get to spend time with my friend, and I am truly happy to still be friends after these years apart.
Returning home was easy, and when I got back to my room around 10:00, I wrapped up my day with a shower, writing my blog, and going to sleep.
Today is awesome because I finished my classes, I had two fantastic meals, and I got to see Yizhou.
I really like the conclusion of classes, no matter what country they are in. It is quite liberating to not have to do homework or study anymore, particularly when the studying I have been doing was intensively learning around 25 Chinese characters each night.
I also realized that I only wake up in Beijing three more times (contact lens count and whatnot), and that's totally weird to me. I think that over my time here, even though I've known it was temporary and finite, I set up a sort of routine and life, and that pattern has been very fun and awesome all summer. I'm sad to see it go, especially because there are so many more things to see and do in this enormous country. That said, I'm still okay with leaving because I haven't seen my family for a long time and I haven't been home since March, so there are also things to look forward to as consolation for leaving my adventure in China. I think it's good that I have a bittersweet conclusion because it means I had a great time while I was away and I have people and things to come home to!
I took my Chinese final in the morning, and when we were all done with the test we practiced for the talent show and finished a movie about food and family that we had been watching all week. I finished my test pretty quickly and ended up having time to do some life tasks including a stop at the dorm, and I ended up walking back to class with four of the five students in our Chinese 2 class. It was pretty funny, and nice to have walking companions. Before class (since I woke up remarkably early today) I decided to go to the store on campus that uses the meal card to buy yogurt and a coffee, but then I remembered that they don't have the coffee I like and the yogurt I got was really odd. It was a cardboard cup of drinking yogurt that came with a straw. The package had a picture of a strawberry and some sort of grain on the outside, and when I started sipping, it was indeed strawberry yogurt, but there were pieces of cooked barley or something. It made it taste like cake and I didn't finish it because I didn't like it after a while.
After Chinese class, our class and class 3 went to a restaurant called Spice Spirit for lunch. Our Laoshi drove me and two other classmates, and he has a membership at the restaurant, so he knew just what to order. He really ordered too much food, but it was delicious. The main thing he wanted us to try was the Sichuan oil cooked fish, and that is served with a piece of bread to soak up the oil. I ate a little bit of that to try it, but my favorites were the salad, the lettuce with peanut sauce, the mapo tofu, and the pineapple rice. I think all the food was really delicious, but the entire meal was very spicy, so there was nothing to cool off my mouth with. The lettuce with peanut sauce and the pineapple rice were cooling and the rice was sweet, but the spicy was everywhere. I liked it though; it was tasty spicy. Other things on the table were prawns (they had full shells so I didn't try it), frog, chicken, spicy noodles, and spicy vegetables.
I spent the two hours of afternoon time I had relaxing in my air conditioned room, and then I left to meet Yizhou (my friend from high school who is a 北京人) at the subway station near Houhi for our meetup. In planning, we decided to meet at the station because we could then take a taxi together, and we were meeting early to beat rush hour crowds. I know the subways so well, so when we picked a station I knew exactly where it was and how to get there with the transfers without having to look it up, which was really cool.
When I was waiting at the 地铁站 (subway station), a guard came up to me to see what I was doing. I either looked lost or suspicious, but I told him 我的朋友在地铁三个站 (my friend is on the subway for three more stops). I didn't know how to say I was waiting for my friend, but the message came across and I was really happy to have handled the interaction.
We took a taxi from the station to the Houhai area, and it was really cool there. Houhai is a lake with a few bridges, an island, and lots of boats for rent that is surrounded by storefront after storefront of bars, clubs, and restaurants. Yizhou had made a reservation at a Yunnan restaurant, so we walked around and then went there for dinner. We ordered their specialties of beef and fish (best fish I ate; it was grilled with lemongrass), and we got chicken soup, pea flour glutinous rectangles, and bamboo rice. I really liked the food and the fish was my favorite. The soup was the best soup I've had in China (not such a fan of the seaweed soups), and the rice was extra sticky and a little bit sweet. The restaurant was decorated with paper flowers, lanterns, and wooden surfaces, and we had a table on the second floor by the window overlooking the lake, so it was a fantastic setting.
I loved getting to spend time with Yizhou and talk about life. She told me about her summer internship, travel to and from her American university, her upcoming semester abroad in Hong Kong, and her jazz dance class. I told her about my time in China and we played some "where are they now" with our former classmates. I used a lot of my Chinese language with her, and she was excited that I could speak at all, and I was excited to be speaking, so it was really fun. We walked all around the lake and took some pictures before ending our evening with beverages from a smoothie/juice/tea shop, and then going to the train station together. We took the same line but in opposite directions, so our good-bye hugs were on the subway platform. It was so fantastic to get to spend time with my friend, and I am truly happy to still be friends after these years apart.
Returning home was easy, and when I got back to my room around 10:00, I wrapped up my day with a shower, writing my blog, and going to sleep.
Today is awesome because I finished my classes, I had two fantastic meals, and I got to see Yizhou.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Puppets, Nanluoguxiang, and Wrapping Up TCM
Today was a special day. I skipped Chinese class to finally see my puppet show and I finished my TCM class, so the Public Health portion of this trip is concluded. I woke up at the normal time today, but instead of going to class, I first skyped my parents and then took the subway over to the puppet theater. I got there early and was asked to wait downstairs. I was one of five people there; the other four were two women with their two boys. They took photos in all the places I was last night, and I did some additional exploring before taking my seat front row center.
Ten minutes before curtain time, and little boy and his father arrived. Then, at both five til and five past ten, a bunch of audience members arrived. There was a young family who sat next to me on the right, and another family who sat on my left. The little boy didn't want to sit next to me, but I think he was more comfortable after I said 你好. Chinese people do not arrive early or on time for things.
It was kind of awkward to be alone and clearly foreign, and I was sad for the theater and company that the audience was so small, or at least it was for most of the time leading up to the show. However, despite this sadness, my excitement grew as time passed. I was finally going to see the show I've been trying to see!! Sixth time's the charm, right? The space itself was adorable, the music playing was very Chinese and certainly too loud, but it set the right mood, and I could see costumed people moving backstage.
The show started with one person wearing a triangular hat speaking, then an empress type character entered and the two of them talked. I don't know what they said, but they mentioned 朋友们 (pengyoumen; friends) a lot and used the phrase 朋友们一起 (pengyoumen yiqi; friends together), so that's was cool that they were using inclusive audience language.
The first shadow play was with three human characters and a tiger. The couple talked and possibly argued about something, and then another man entered, and the husband served him water and something alcoholic (I heard 水 and 酒). Then the drunk guy took a hike and the story ended with him fighting a tiger. The fight was really cool and very dynamic. The puppets did exactly what I wanted them to do, and I loved the interaction with music in a sort of Peking Opera style way, and there was even a time when the husband was rapping (more like speaking rhythmically, but it was still cool). They did have Chinese subtitles for the dialogue, so that helped since they spoke so fast.
Instead of an intermission, the pengyoumen were invited backstage to try the puppets. At first I didn't realize we were all allowed to play, but I was out of my seat as soon as I realized what was happening. It was the coolest part!! I was so happy to see behind the shadow screen and try controlling one of the people. Seeing the real construction of these puppets and the theater was so rewarding, particularly because I knew what I was looking at. I'm really happy that this is a standard part of their shows.
After the break, we saw another shadow play. This one had no dialogue and took place on a lake. The characters were a bird (a heron or stork), two frogs, a turtle, and some fish. The scenes were set using still pieces made from the same painted leather as the puppets, and there was a rock in a lake with some lily pads and a lotus plant that bloomed during the show. The bird was so lifelike and moved so well when it was flying, preening, and hunting. I love the frog puppets, they are pretty common to try playing with, and the turtle was just so funny because his head poked in and out of his shell. The puppets did what they were supposed to do, moving like life and dying like toys, and I was so happy to see the show.
It was a very hot day!! I managed the subway by myself totally fine (it was only one stop), and as I was walking back to the dorm, I got hiccups. I used TCM to make them go away by holding my breath and pressing the Neiguan acupoint, and it worked! That was pretty awesome. I had baozi for lunch with some friends, then did some studying, and took my TCM final at 2:00. It was an easy test, but I felt like the questions were looking for certain answers without asking the question they wanted to ask. It was open book, so it was very smooth.
I finished and got home around 3, when I started working on my studying for Chinese and writing my final paper for TCM. I wrote my paper about treatment of injuries with TCM therapies based on our clinical experiences. It was not a big deal. At 3:30, I met with Marissa to go to Nanluoguxiang because we planned to go together at the point when neither of us had been. It was fun to walk around, and we enjoyed going into the cupcake shop, tea shop, and journal shop. It was a cool area to walk around, and we made it back to campus around 6:30. On the train going there, for one stop there was a young family and the little boy tried to speak English to me. He said "peace" and "you are beautiful" and I responded in Chinese. His parents seemed impressed that I could reply in their language, and when they left I said "zaijian, pengyou," which means goodbye friend, and the cuteness of the interaction was a fantastic memory. I finished my paper, and then was in for the night. I needed to study for my Chinese final because I have to reinforce all the grammar plus learn the vocab that was reviewed in class today. The test shouldn't be too hard, but I do need to prepare.
I'm feeling great in this last week. I'm keeping busy, seeing the last things I need and want to see, and getting through the work part with effort and ease. I'm very happy with how this trip has gone, and I felt my progress when ordering ice cream at the hutong today (I don't like cupcakes; we were just intrigued by the presence of a cupcake shop since they're so trendy). I couldn't have done that when we got here and now it's not a big deal at all. That is simply amazing to me.
Today is awesome because I finally got to see my puppet show and it was everything I wanted, and I finished TCM class successfully.
Ten minutes before curtain time, and little boy and his father arrived. Then, at both five til and five past ten, a bunch of audience members arrived. There was a young family who sat next to me on the right, and another family who sat on my left. The little boy didn't want to sit next to me, but I think he was more comfortable after I said 你好. Chinese people do not arrive early or on time for things.
It was kind of awkward to be alone and clearly foreign, and I was sad for the theater and company that the audience was so small, or at least it was for most of the time leading up to the show. However, despite this sadness, my excitement grew as time passed. I was finally going to see the show I've been trying to see!! Sixth time's the charm, right? The space itself was adorable, the music playing was very Chinese and certainly too loud, but it set the right mood, and I could see costumed people moving backstage.
The show started with one person wearing a triangular hat speaking, then an empress type character entered and the two of them talked. I don't know what they said, but they mentioned 朋友们 (pengyoumen; friends) a lot and used the phrase 朋友们一起 (pengyoumen yiqi; friends together), so that's was cool that they were using inclusive audience language.
The first shadow play was with three human characters and a tiger. The couple talked and possibly argued about something, and then another man entered, and the husband served him water and something alcoholic (I heard 水 and 酒). Then the drunk guy took a hike and the story ended with him fighting a tiger. The fight was really cool and very dynamic. The puppets did exactly what I wanted them to do, and I loved the interaction with music in a sort of Peking Opera style way, and there was even a time when the husband was rapping (more like speaking rhythmically, but it was still cool). They did have Chinese subtitles for the dialogue, so that helped since they spoke so fast.
Instead of an intermission, the pengyoumen were invited backstage to try the puppets. At first I didn't realize we were all allowed to play, but I was out of my seat as soon as I realized what was happening. It was the coolest part!! I was so happy to see behind the shadow screen and try controlling one of the people. Seeing the real construction of these puppets and the theater was so rewarding, particularly because I knew what I was looking at. I'm really happy that this is a standard part of their shows.
After the break, we saw another shadow play. This one had no dialogue and took place on a lake. The characters were a bird (a heron or stork), two frogs, a turtle, and some fish. The scenes were set using still pieces made from the same painted leather as the puppets, and there was a rock in a lake with some lily pads and a lotus plant that bloomed during the show. The bird was so lifelike and moved so well when it was flying, preening, and hunting. I love the frog puppets, they are pretty common to try playing with, and the turtle was just so funny because his head poked in and out of his shell. The puppets did what they were supposed to do, moving like life and dying like toys, and I was so happy to see the show.
It was a very hot day!! I managed the subway by myself totally fine (it was only one stop), and as I was walking back to the dorm, I got hiccups. I used TCM to make them go away by holding my breath and pressing the Neiguan acupoint, and it worked! That was pretty awesome. I had baozi for lunch with some friends, then did some studying, and took my TCM final at 2:00. It was an easy test, but I felt like the questions were looking for certain answers without asking the question they wanted to ask. It was open book, so it was very smooth.
I finished and got home around 3, when I started working on my studying for Chinese and writing my final paper for TCM. I wrote my paper about treatment of injuries with TCM therapies based on our clinical experiences. It was not a big deal. At 3:30, I met with Marissa to go to Nanluoguxiang because we planned to go together at the point when neither of us had been. It was fun to walk around, and we enjoyed going into the cupcake shop, tea shop, and journal shop. It was a cool area to walk around, and we made it back to campus around 6:30. On the train going there, for one stop there was a young family and the little boy tried to speak English to me. He said "peace" and "you are beautiful" and I responded in Chinese. His parents seemed impressed that I could reply in their language, and when they left I said "zaijian, pengyou," which means goodbye friend, and the cuteness of the interaction was a fantastic memory. I finished my paper, and then was in for the night. I needed to study for my Chinese final because I have to reinforce all the grammar plus learn the vocab that was reviewed in class today. The test shouldn't be too hard, but I do need to prepare.
I'm feeling great in this last week. I'm keeping busy, seeing the last things I need and want to see, and getting through the work part with effort and ease. I'm very happy with how this trip has gone, and I felt my progress when ordering ice cream at the hutong today (I don't like cupcakes; we were just intrigued by the presence of a cupcake shop since they're so trendy). I couldn't have done that when we got here and now it's not a big deal at all. That is simply amazing to me.
Today is awesome because I finally got to see my puppet show and it was everything I wanted, and I finished TCM class successfully.
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Totally Awesome Tuesday
How on earth I got to my 46th post is beyond my comprehension. I am also nearing 1600 photos from the entire trip, so that's pretty cool.
Anyway, back to today. I had my morning Chinese class (perfect tingxie, new vocab, talent show discussion, and movie), and then I had a really fun lunch conversation with Matthew and Philina. We talked about religion and politics, and it was awesome to compare ideas and opinions in such a relaxed and accepting way when we differed so much. I ate vaguely Asian chicken from the western food part of the cafeteria. It's chicken with Asian flavored sauce, vegetables, and rice, served with a spork. Then we had an hour break before the TCM field trip when I checked e-mail, YouTube, and took care of some computer business.
Our TCM field trip took us back to the hospital for a lesson in Tuina or massage/chiropractics. We were told to wear our lab coats again, which is always fun because we look like doctors, but then it didn't matter because we were in the classroom instead of the clinic. It was a very fun lesson because we had a Power Point (Chinese professors LOVE to use PowerPoint and they call the slideshows ppts after the way the files are saved), but each slide was a description of the motion and we just learned the different massage strokes and tried them out on ourselves and each other. My partner was really good at it, so I was very lucky!!
On the bus ride back and extending for about an hour, I had a high quality conversation with Matthew again. I continued one of our topics from earlier, but then it morphed into a conversation with food, and then we talked about personal philosophies, experiences and impressions of Beijing, and some really cosmic stuff. It was fantastic, and I am so happy to have had this conversation.
Tonight was take two of going to the puppet theater, but alas it was another failed attempt. We had a notecard with the name of the place and some directional hints written in Chinese characters, pinyin, and English so we could work with the taxi driver, and he was fantastically nice, but he couldn't find the place, so after driving around for a while, we had him drop us near the subway stop. We asked for directions from the guard, the tourist center, and the ticket counter for the park, and they kept pointing in the same direction, so we knew we were walking the right way. Then, all of a sudden, we found a big sign for it on the outside of the temporary metal wall surrounding a construction site that had an arrow, so we walked around the construction site, past the sweet potatoes and stinky tofu, and couldn't find it. We asked one of the construction workers and he said it was inside, but we had to enter through the other opening to the site, so we went back the way we came.
We found it! Except there was no show tonight. The woman from the theater told us there will be a show at 10AM tomorrow, and we asked about some scheduling and didn't buy tickets because of class. She was so kind and let us look around the building, and it was amazing. They have a museum component with both modern and 300 year old puppets, information about how the puppets are made, and so many puppets of all sizes. It was so wonderful to look through. She spoke only Chinese, and I understood most of it, which was also really cool. I ended up buying a ticket for tomorrow morning's show with the encouragement of my friends because this is such an important experience for me, and the Chinese class I am skipping will not be a big deal to miss and I can teach myself what I need to know for the final. Having this particular experience is more important than going over new vocabulary I won't have a chance to use, and I haven't missed a single class this whole time, so I do feel a tad guilty, but it's cosmically okay.
We left the puppet theater happy to have at least located it, and ended up taking a lovely walk through the neighboring Yuanmingyuan Park. It was a beautiful park with gorgeous lakes filled with lilies and lotus. They were actually having a lotus festival, and the park was one of the most well maintained nature settings in all of Beijing. The lakes had bridges that were absolutely beautiful, there were lots of cats running about, and we even saw a frog in the grass. It was certainly not a lost evening to have a walk in a park with good friends and good conversation.
We took the subway back, I went to the c-store for a beverage and ice cream before heading to my room to regroup, and then I went to bed, excited for the puppet show that I will see tomorrow!
Today is awesome because I had amazing conversations, learned massage, found a new park, and located the puppet theater.
Anyway, back to today. I had my morning Chinese class (perfect tingxie, new vocab, talent show discussion, and movie), and then I had a really fun lunch conversation with Matthew and Philina. We talked about religion and politics, and it was awesome to compare ideas and opinions in such a relaxed and accepting way when we differed so much. I ate vaguely Asian chicken from the western food part of the cafeteria. It's chicken with Asian flavored sauce, vegetables, and rice, served with a spork. Then we had an hour break before the TCM field trip when I checked e-mail, YouTube, and took care of some computer business.
Our TCM field trip took us back to the hospital for a lesson in Tuina or massage/chiropractics. We were told to wear our lab coats again, which is always fun because we look like doctors, but then it didn't matter because we were in the classroom instead of the clinic. It was a very fun lesson because we had a Power Point (Chinese professors LOVE to use PowerPoint and they call the slideshows ppts after the way the files are saved), but each slide was a description of the motion and we just learned the different massage strokes and tried them out on ourselves and each other. My partner was really good at it, so I was very lucky!!
On the bus ride back and extending for about an hour, I had a high quality conversation with Matthew again. I continued one of our topics from earlier, but then it morphed into a conversation with food, and then we talked about personal philosophies, experiences and impressions of Beijing, and some really cosmic stuff. It was fantastic, and I am so happy to have had this conversation.
Tonight was take two of going to the puppet theater, but alas it was another failed attempt. We had a notecard with the name of the place and some directional hints written in Chinese characters, pinyin, and English so we could work with the taxi driver, and he was fantastically nice, but he couldn't find the place, so after driving around for a while, we had him drop us near the subway stop. We asked for directions from the guard, the tourist center, and the ticket counter for the park, and they kept pointing in the same direction, so we knew we were walking the right way. Then, all of a sudden, we found a big sign for it on the outside of the temporary metal wall surrounding a construction site that had an arrow, so we walked around the construction site, past the sweet potatoes and stinky tofu, and couldn't find it. We asked one of the construction workers and he said it was inside, but we had to enter through the other opening to the site, so we went back the way we came.
We found it! Except there was no show tonight. The woman from the theater told us there will be a show at 10AM tomorrow, and we asked about some scheduling and didn't buy tickets because of class. She was so kind and let us look around the building, and it was amazing. They have a museum component with both modern and 300 year old puppets, information about how the puppets are made, and so many puppets of all sizes. It was so wonderful to look through. She spoke only Chinese, and I understood most of it, which was also really cool. I ended up buying a ticket for tomorrow morning's show with the encouragement of my friends because this is such an important experience for me, and the Chinese class I am skipping will not be a big deal to miss and I can teach myself what I need to know for the final. Having this particular experience is more important than going over new vocabulary I won't have a chance to use, and I haven't missed a single class this whole time, so I do feel a tad guilty, but it's cosmically okay.
We left the puppet theater happy to have at least located it, and ended up taking a lovely walk through the neighboring Yuanmingyuan Park. It was a beautiful park with gorgeous lakes filled with lilies and lotus. They were actually having a lotus festival, and the park was one of the most well maintained nature settings in all of Beijing. The lakes had bridges that were absolutely beautiful, there were lots of cats running about, and we even saw a frog in the grass. It was certainly not a lost evening to have a walk in a park with good friends and good conversation.
We took the subway back, I went to the c-store for a beverage and ice cream before heading to my room to regroup, and then I went to bed, excited for the puppet show that I will see tomorrow!
Today is awesome because I had amazing conversations, learned massage, found a new park, and located the puppet theater.
Monday, August 6, 2012
The Last Monday
Today was a pretty good day, though I had a very boring evening. I woke up at 8AM, went to my classroom early to finish studying for my tingxie, had Chinese class that consisted of tingxie, learning the new vocab, doing the textbook exercises, and watching part of a movie about food. Then everybody gathered for our final closing meeting. We went over the schedule for the week in terms of classes and field trips, learned our departure procedures, and said good-bye to Zhang Laoshi who has to go home early for business relating to his new tenured position at his university. It is sad to see him go, but he has been an amazing leader for our trip and I'm glad to have known him.
I had lunch with some friends in the cafeteria I ate in with my language partner during the first week of the program. I had some vegetarian dishes, a carrot and potato dish and eggplant, and it was tasty, but there was a lot of gloopy sauce that I didn't want to eat. After lunch, I went back to the dorm to have a break before TCM, and then went back to Building 3 for my class.
Our lecture today was on the integration of TCM and Western Medicine (WM). Our professor was the same guy who talked to us about herbal medicine, and I really like him. He's smart, thoughtful, organized, and has the deepest voice I have ever heard. The first half of class consisted of him lecturing on the history of integration, movements for and against integration, and the successes of integrated therapies. After our break, he brought us into a discussion of why integrated therapy is good or not, and we were able to voice our opinions in class. It was a very productive last lecture.
After class, I made a trip to the store to buy my breakfast food for the rest of this week, then I brought my things home and got to work on e-mail and learning my characters for tomorrow's tingxie. I also tried to set up our TV so I could watch some of the Olympics, and I got it to work, but I didn't enjoy broadcasting the ping pong match with Chinese narration because I didn't understand what the commentators were saying. I really love the Olympics, but I will have to get the videos as a replay after it ends because I just can't figure out how to watch the things I want to see in a language I understand. Still, Jake Herbert for gold in men's wrestling on Saturday!
I had a simple dinner in the building 5 cafe, then came home for a quiet night of studying and video watching. I had initially planned on having dinner with people, but then the plans fell through, so I was alone tonight. I have plans for the rest of the week, so it's fine, but I'm kind of getting tired of spending time alone. I've also realized that it's August, which means I'm de facto participating in BEDA (Blog Every Day in August) since I'll have 12 posts anyway, so I might as well finish out the month or something. Maybe; I've kind of blogged every day all summer, so maybe being home will be a break from writing online. It's just interesting to be doing the thing that I've watched people do.
Today is awesome because TCM lectures wrapped on a high note.
I had lunch with some friends in the cafeteria I ate in with my language partner during the first week of the program. I had some vegetarian dishes, a carrot and potato dish and eggplant, and it was tasty, but there was a lot of gloopy sauce that I didn't want to eat. After lunch, I went back to the dorm to have a break before TCM, and then went back to Building 3 for my class.
Our lecture today was on the integration of TCM and Western Medicine (WM). Our professor was the same guy who talked to us about herbal medicine, and I really like him. He's smart, thoughtful, organized, and has the deepest voice I have ever heard. The first half of class consisted of him lecturing on the history of integration, movements for and against integration, and the successes of integrated therapies. After our break, he brought us into a discussion of why integrated therapy is good or not, and we were able to voice our opinions in class. It was a very productive last lecture.
After class, I made a trip to the store to buy my breakfast food for the rest of this week, then I brought my things home and got to work on e-mail and learning my characters for tomorrow's tingxie. I also tried to set up our TV so I could watch some of the Olympics, and I got it to work, but I didn't enjoy broadcasting the ping pong match with Chinese narration because I didn't understand what the commentators were saying. I really love the Olympics, but I will have to get the videos as a replay after it ends because I just can't figure out how to watch the things I want to see in a language I understand. Still, Jake Herbert for gold in men's wrestling on Saturday!
I had a simple dinner in the building 5 cafe, then came home for a quiet night of studying and video watching. I had initially planned on having dinner with people, but then the plans fell through, so I was alone tonight. I have plans for the rest of the week, so it's fine, but I'm kind of getting tired of spending time alone. I've also realized that it's August, which means I'm de facto participating in BEDA (Blog Every Day in August) since I'll have 12 posts anyway, so I might as well finish out the month or something. Maybe; I've kind of blogged every day all summer, so maybe being home will be a break from writing online. It's just interesting to be doing the thing that I've watched people do.
Today is awesome because TCM lectures wrapped on a high note.
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Hipster Hutong
Today was my last Sunday in Beijing. I woke up, skyped with one of my best friends from home, grabbed a tuna panini for lunch from the cafe in the dorm area (which is the same lunch I had on the first Sunday), and had a generally boring and quiet day about my room. I started organizing my things for packing, watched Howl's Moving Castle, and studied my Chinese flashcards. I'm feeling pretty in control of everything in this last week and the whole upcoming international travel thing.
At 6:30PM, I met up with Professor Carmichael to go to a converted hutong for dinner and exploring. We had a lovely route planned from a slightly farther subway stop that would theoretically take us past some interesting things as we made our way to the hutong and beyond for a vegetarian dinner, but things never go according to plan in China.
We got out of the subway and started walking in the generally correct direction. It was a cool area with lots of small quirky shops and restaurants of all sorts. We eventually came to an adorable little park with a small pond, some sculptures, and lots of willow trees and flowers, and that was the highlight of the exploring. When we got out of the park, we were a little lost and ended up hailing a cab to get us to the hutong. It was the first female cab driver I had seen.
Anyway, we got caught in a traffic jam and started walking, but then we were one street too far north, so we wandered up and down there until we were tired and hungry and lost, so we got in another taxi to get there, and then we finally got to the hutong around 9PM.
It was the most hipster place I have seen in all of China, and the idea of a hipster hutong is just an oxymoron. The shops there were all unique and quirky, which I was not expecting at all because I thought they'd be like the "ancient streets" we visited in the south that were shop after shop of the same useless souvenirs. We walked into a few shops with journals to find a gift for our residential college master, and we found the right thing to bring back, which is nice a funny.
We had a very late dinner at a restaurant in the hutong. We ordered jasmine tea, cucmbers, Chinese broccoli, mushrooms and broccoli, and tofu wrapped vegetables. I really liked the dishes, and the tofu was my favorite. I really liked the rolls both plain and dipped in the dipping sauce. It was probably my favorite dipping sauce.
We discussed a lot of favorite things from the trip: foods, meals, sights seen, places visited, parks, shopping, etc. It's really cool to be able to look back over the past two months and see where I started and where I'm ending. Overall, I came in knowing nothing, and I'm leaving having seen all the sights on my list, understanding the culture a lot better, and being able to speak some Chinese. I have mostly memorized the subway map, have visited many hospitals, and am perfectly comfortable at Bei Da. It's really been transformative.
I got home just in time to write my blog, do a final flip through my flashcards for tomorrow's tingxie, take a quick shower, and go to sleep before my final week of classes.
Today is awesome because I got to see the hipster hutong and get lost in a really neat park.
At 6:30PM, I met up with Professor Carmichael to go to a converted hutong for dinner and exploring. We had a lovely route planned from a slightly farther subway stop that would theoretically take us past some interesting things as we made our way to the hutong and beyond for a vegetarian dinner, but things never go according to plan in China.
We got out of the subway and started walking in the generally correct direction. It was a cool area with lots of small quirky shops and restaurants of all sorts. We eventually came to an adorable little park with a small pond, some sculptures, and lots of willow trees and flowers, and that was the highlight of the exploring. When we got out of the park, we were a little lost and ended up hailing a cab to get us to the hutong. It was the first female cab driver I had seen.
Anyway, we got caught in a traffic jam and started walking, but then we were one street too far north, so we wandered up and down there until we were tired and hungry and lost, so we got in another taxi to get there, and then we finally got to the hutong around 9PM.
It was the most hipster place I have seen in all of China, and the idea of a hipster hutong is just an oxymoron. The shops there were all unique and quirky, which I was not expecting at all because I thought they'd be like the "ancient streets" we visited in the south that were shop after shop of the same useless souvenirs. We walked into a few shops with journals to find a gift for our residential college master, and we found the right thing to bring back, which is nice a funny.
We had a very late dinner at a restaurant in the hutong. We ordered jasmine tea, cucmbers, Chinese broccoli, mushrooms and broccoli, and tofu wrapped vegetables. I really liked the dishes, and the tofu was my favorite. I really liked the rolls both plain and dipped in the dipping sauce. It was probably my favorite dipping sauce.
We discussed a lot of favorite things from the trip: foods, meals, sights seen, places visited, parks, shopping, etc. It's really cool to be able to look back over the past two months and see where I started and where I'm ending. Overall, I came in knowing nothing, and I'm leaving having seen all the sights on my list, understanding the culture a lot better, and being able to speak some Chinese. I have mostly memorized the subway map, have visited many hospitals, and am perfectly comfortable at Bei Da. It's really been transformative.
I got home just in time to write my blog, do a final flip through my flashcards for tomorrow's tingxie, take a quick shower, and go to sleep before my final week of classes.
Today is awesome because I got to see the hipster hutong and get lost in a really neat park.
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Summer Palace and Acrobatics Show
Today, Saturday, August 4, 2012, was our final group excursion. We met at 8AM to take subway line four from the East Gate of Peking University Station to the Beigongmen Station, and then entered the north gate of the Summer Palace. The Summer Palace is the complex that was built for the emperor's mother, and Empress Dowager Cixi lived there. There is a manmade lake and island, which is a pretty nice tribute that a son can make to his mother.
Side note: all places in China have gates on all sides where you have tickets and security. So, at Bei Da we have a North Gate （北门), East Gate, Southeast Gate (across the street from where I live), West Gates, etc. It actually gives me a sense of the area a location occupies and helps me find my way. Knowing the gate system was really helpful when exploring Beihai last week.
Anyway, back to the excursion. We went through the north gate of the Summer Palace, and first passed through the Suzhou city that the emperor recreated in Beijing. Apparently, he had the eunuchs and maids dress as vendors from the south and he would pretend to be an ordinary person and hang out there. We walked on a really pretty tree-lined path until we got to the marble boat on the lake. There, we stopped to take pictures and buy water before moving on to the main attraction.
The main building that people visit is a hall with a multiple-armed Buddha in it. To get there from the marble boat (by the way, this is one of two marble boats in Beijing; the other one is on Nameless Lake on Bei Da's campus), we walked on a long covered path with famous paintings on the ceiling. Bei Da scholars analyzed the paintings to determine which stories they represented from Chinese history and myth. Then we got to the buildings. We had to climb 100 stairs to get to the top, and the view of the lake was beautiful. We had thirty minutes to explore that area, and once I had done my rounds, I sat with Gu Laoshi and we chatted for a while. He told me that it is a requirement for Beijing couples to go on a date to the Summer Palace, and we chitchatted about lifey things with the program.
Before we left the upper level, a girl from Inner Mongolia asked if she could take a picture with me. It was pretty adorable; she started asking Gu Laoshi in Chinese because she was shy, but he made her ask me herself. She could have spoken Chinese and I would have understood, but she said it in English. I happily posed with her. I was initially warned that this would happen a lot, but it really hasn't. I was asked to pose in Fragrant Hills Park and a man took pictures of me and Anabella at the Qing Tombs, but other than that, the photos have been without permission and from a distance.
The next place we visited was a bronze pavilion, and then we had lunch at the royal kitchen. Gu Laoshi ordered delicious food for us, and my table really enjoyed everything. It was the first time we had a meal entirely without pork. Highlights include fish without bones, kung pao chicken, shrimp, Beijing style breads, amazing tofu, and walnut cookies. Lunch was really good today, and I fully enjoyed my meal. I really don't eat much of a breakfast before starting the day because I don't like to eat early, so I was hungry, and it energized me for the rest of the day.
After lunch, we took a boat ride across the lake to visit the island. The boat was reminiscent of the trip to Hangzhou, except it moved faster and we had a breeze. At the island, we visited a building that has been turned into a souvenir shop, and mostly just walked across the island to the marble bridge with 18 arches to go to a pavilion on the mainland where a flautist was performing. I had my second photo ask at that pavilion, and this time a boy asked me to take a photo with him and afterward he thanked me and told me I was very beautiful. This only happens in China.
Walking over to the East Gate of the Summer Palace, one of Gu Laoshi's former students stopped him when she ran into us. It was completely unplanned, and rather hilarious to run into an alumna of our university in Beijing of all places, so we were all kind of amused by the occurrence. At the East Gate, we visited the dragon-cow creature statue that determines if you're telling the truth, looked at a gallery of chipped marble art, and then took taxis back to rest for a few hours before the Acrobatics Show. It was a beautiful hot and sunny day, so the siesta was lovely.
At 5:30, we met in the bus to drive across the city to the Chaoyuan district to see the show. I sat with Professor Carmichael on the bus, and we had a lovely conversation on the ride over. When we got to the theater, I took some time to look around. The front light system was a couple of moving lights, and I later realized that all of the instruments were intelligent fixtures: Max 700s, Mac 301s, Varilites, all the fun stuff we use for DM.
The show itself was spectacular. It began with a dance number, then a chair stacking balancing act, straw hats, umbrella pedaling, partner strength acrobatics, shoulder ballet, wheel spinning, cycling, and motorcycles in a sphere. The chair act was stacking chairs and balancing on top with handstands and such. The straw hats were juggling, tumbling, and staking people with straw hats as a prop. The umbrella thing was a woman on her back with her feet in the air, twirling and balancing a parasol. Partner strength acrobatics was two people who held each other up and did various balance and strength related feats. Then we had intermission, and the first act after intermission was shoulder ballet, where a woman stood on pointe on a man's shoulders and head. The wheel act was an axis with a wheel on either side that spun through the air and two men inside or on top doing various things while balancing as the thing spun. The bicycles were stacking people on moving bikes. The motorcycles were eight men on motorbikes driving in formation in a mesh sphere.
It was all amazing and I kept being more and more amazed at what these performers were doing. The lighting was pretty cool as well; since the instruments could change colors, each act had a color to set the mood, but it also changed when major events happened in the performance. The backdrops were various locations around Beijing.
After the show, I came home, had a snack, relaxed, and went to bed.
Today is awesome because of the Summer Palace and Acrobatics show.
Side note: all places in China have gates on all sides where you have tickets and security. So, at Bei Da we have a North Gate （北门), East Gate, Southeast Gate (across the street from where I live), West Gates, etc. It actually gives me a sense of the area a location occupies and helps me find my way. Knowing the gate system was really helpful when exploring Beihai last week.
Anyway, back to the excursion. We went through the north gate of the Summer Palace, and first passed through the Suzhou city that the emperor recreated in Beijing. Apparently, he had the eunuchs and maids dress as vendors from the south and he would pretend to be an ordinary person and hang out there. We walked on a really pretty tree-lined path until we got to the marble boat on the lake. There, we stopped to take pictures and buy water before moving on to the main attraction.
The main building that people visit is a hall with a multiple-armed Buddha in it. To get there from the marble boat (by the way, this is one of two marble boats in Beijing; the other one is on Nameless Lake on Bei Da's campus), we walked on a long covered path with famous paintings on the ceiling. Bei Da scholars analyzed the paintings to determine which stories they represented from Chinese history and myth. Then we got to the buildings. We had to climb 100 stairs to get to the top, and the view of the lake was beautiful. We had thirty minutes to explore that area, and once I had done my rounds, I sat with Gu Laoshi and we chatted for a while. He told me that it is a requirement for Beijing couples to go on a date to the Summer Palace, and we chitchatted about lifey things with the program.
Before we left the upper level, a girl from Inner Mongolia asked if she could take a picture with me. It was pretty adorable; she started asking Gu Laoshi in Chinese because she was shy, but he made her ask me herself. She could have spoken Chinese and I would have understood, but she said it in English. I happily posed with her. I was initially warned that this would happen a lot, but it really hasn't. I was asked to pose in Fragrant Hills Park and a man took pictures of me and Anabella at the Qing Tombs, but other than that, the photos have been without permission and from a distance.
The next place we visited was a bronze pavilion, and then we had lunch at the royal kitchen. Gu Laoshi ordered delicious food for us, and my table really enjoyed everything. It was the first time we had a meal entirely without pork. Highlights include fish without bones, kung pao chicken, shrimp, Beijing style breads, amazing tofu, and walnut cookies. Lunch was really good today, and I fully enjoyed my meal. I really don't eat much of a breakfast before starting the day because I don't like to eat early, so I was hungry, and it energized me for the rest of the day.
After lunch, we took a boat ride across the lake to visit the island. The boat was reminiscent of the trip to Hangzhou, except it moved faster and we had a breeze. At the island, we visited a building that has been turned into a souvenir shop, and mostly just walked across the island to the marble bridge with 18 arches to go to a pavilion on the mainland where a flautist was performing. I had my second photo ask at that pavilion, and this time a boy asked me to take a photo with him and afterward he thanked me and told me I was very beautiful. This only happens in China.
Walking over to the East Gate of the Summer Palace, one of Gu Laoshi's former students stopped him when she ran into us. It was completely unplanned, and rather hilarious to run into an alumna of our university in Beijing of all places, so we were all kind of amused by the occurrence. At the East Gate, we visited the dragon-cow creature statue that determines if you're telling the truth, looked at a gallery of chipped marble art, and then took taxis back to rest for a few hours before the Acrobatics Show. It was a beautiful hot and sunny day, so the siesta was lovely.
At 5:30, we met in the bus to drive across the city to the Chaoyuan district to see the show. I sat with Professor Carmichael on the bus, and we had a lovely conversation on the ride over. When we got to the theater, I took some time to look around. The front light system was a couple of moving lights, and I later realized that all of the instruments were intelligent fixtures: Max 700s, Mac 301s, Varilites, all the fun stuff we use for DM.
The show itself was spectacular. It began with a dance number, then a chair stacking balancing act, straw hats, umbrella pedaling, partner strength acrobatics, shoulder ballet, wheel spinning, cycling, and motorcycles in a sphere. The chair act was stacking chairs and balancing on top with handstands and such. The straw hats were juggling, tumbling, and staking people with straw hats as a prop. The umbrella thing was a woman on her back with her feet in the air, twirling and balancing a parasol. Partner strength acrobatics was two people who held each other up and did various balance and strength related feats. Then we had intermission, and the first act after intermission was shoulder ballet, where a woman stood on pointe on a man's shoulders and head. The wheel act was an axis with a wheel on either side that spun through the air and two men inside or on top doing various things while balancing as the thing spun. The bicycles were stacking people on moving bikes. The motorcycles were eight men on motorbikes driving in formation in a mesh sphere.
It was all amazing and I kept being more and more amazed at what these performers were doing. The lighting was pretty cool as well; since the instruments could change colors, each act had a color to set the mood, but it also changed when major events happened in the performance. The backdrops were various locations around Beijing.
After the show, I came home, had a snack, relaxed, and went to bed.
Today is awesome because of the Summer Palace and Acrobatics show.
Friday, August 3, 2012
Chinese Class Bonding at Traditional Hot Pot
Today was mostly centered around my Chinese class. I got there early to study for my oral test, and I took it first before class officially started because we had a long movie to watch. I think it went well; I was able to respond to the questions and I remembered the dialogue. I did forget the pronunciation of the word for "flash frozen" because there was a sentence about frozen dumplings I had to read, but that's okay.
We watched a movie called Fei Cong Gu Ra 2, which was the sequel to a movie about a middle aged man who is in search of a wife. The girl he proposes to wants to do a trial marriage to make sure they could last, and it ends up being a contest of who can annoy the other the most first, then the guy's friend gets malignant melanoma and dies, and it brings them back together after a lengthy separation. It ended with the setup for the third movie, and it is the basis for a dating show on Chinese TV.
After class, all of us, including Yao Laoshi, took the subway over to a traditional hot pot restaurant. Laoshi knows the place and ordered for us, and it was really good. We had beef, lamb, noodles, mushrooms, fungus, cabbage, green vegetable, tofu, chilled tofu, radish, bittermelon, maybe more stuff for the broth, and three cold dishes: Beijing tofu, peanuts, and cucumbers. I ate it with the traditional dipping sauce that was plated beautifully with the character for lamb written in sesame oil on top, but others had spicy sauce or garlic sauce. Everything was delicious, and while I swore I'd never eat hot pot again after that first week of eating only hot pot, I'm really glad I went. We had a really nice time, and I think we bonded as a class and got to know our teacher better as a result.
Once we finished eating, we walked back to campus. On the way, Laoshi pointed out some spots he knows: a foot massage place, the place he and his friends used to go for barbecue and beer, the grocery store. We actually stopped in the grocery store to get ice cream, but I finally found the tea tins I was looking for, so I got them because I saw them. It was a really nice walk, and we re-entered campus through the West Gate and walked past the lake and the pagoda. I realized that I hadn't been to the north part of campus since we stopped having class in the Russian Building, so I have to make sure to do a final walk all around campus before I leave next week.
I spent the afternoon catching up and getting ahead on work. The paper for Public Health class was assigned to us after we turned in our final exams, and the assignment sheet said it was due on August 31, so I was planning on writing it on the airplane, but it is actually due on Monday, so I set aside the time to just get it done. I also wanted to finish the reading in the TCM coursepack so I could have my highlighting done before it's finals crunch time next week. Since I finished those items at an odd time, I moved on to preparing my flashcards for next week's Chinese vocabulary, and then all of a sudden it was 7:00. It was a quiet evening as afternoon turned to night, and I went to sleep early so I could be fresh for the final group excursion tomorrow to the Summer Palace.
Today is awesome because my Chinese class got a chance to socialize together and I got a lot of schoolwork done.
We watched a movie called Fei Cong Gu Ra 2, which was the sequel to a movie about a middle aged man who is in search of a wife. The girl he proposes to wants to do a trial marriage to make sure they could last, and it ends up being a contest of who can annoy the other the most first, then the guy's friend gets malignant melanoma and dies, and it brings them back together after a lengthy separation. It ended with the setup for the third movie, and it is the basis for a dating show on Chinese TV.
After class, all of us, including Yao Laoshi, took the subway over to a traditional hot pot restaurant. Laoshi knows the place and ordered for us, and it was really good. We had beef, lamb, noodles, mushrooms, fungus, cabbage, green vegetable, tofu, chilled tofu, radish, bittermelon, maybe more stuff for the broth, and three cold dishes: Beijing tofu, peanuts, and cucumbers. I ate it with the traditional dipping sauce that was plated beautifully with the character for lamb written in sesame oil on top, but others had spicy sauce or garlic sauce. Everything was delicious, and while I swore I'd never eat hot pot again after that first week of eating only hot pot, I'm really glad I went. We had a really nice time, and I think we bonded as a class and got to know our teacher better as a result.
Once we finished eating, we walked back to campus. On the way, Laoshi pointed out some spots he knows: a foot massage place, the place he and his friends used to go for barbecue and beer, the grocery store. We actually stopped in the grocery store to get ice cream, but I finally found the tea tins I was looking for, so I got them because I saw them. It was a really nice walk, and we re-entered campus through the West Gate and walked past the lake and the pagoda. I realized that I hadn't been to the north part of campus since we stopped having class in the Russian Building, so I have to make sure to do a final walk all around campus before I leave next week.
I spent the afternoon catching up and getting ahead on work. The paper for Public Health class was assigned to us after we turned in our final exams, and the assignment sheet said it was due on August 31, so I was planning on writing it on the airplane, but it is actually due on Monday, so I set aside the time to just get it done. I also wanted to finish the reading in the TCM coursepack so I could have my highlighting done before it's finals crunch time next week. Since I finished those items at an odd time, I moved on to preparing my flashcards for next week's Chinese vocabulary, and then all of a sudden it was 7:00. It was a quiet evening as afternoon turned to night, and I went to sleep early so I could be fresh for the final group excursion tomorrow to the Summer Palace.
Today is awesome because my Chinese class got a chance to socialize together and I got a lot of schoolwork done.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Clinical Training in TCM
The most remarkable thing about today is that I got to administer TCM therapy to my classmates. After the usual Chinese class and baozi for lunch, my group for TCM put on our lab coats and went to the TCM ward of the Peking University Health Science Center Third Hospital to learn in the clinic. Dr. Guo, a practitioner with 23 years experience, explained some of the therapies to us, showed us some techniques on actual patients, and then did some demonstrations and tutorials on cupping, moxibustion, acupuncture, and gua sha for us, and we got to try all of it.
Personally, I applied cupping to one or two of my classmates, I administered gua sha, and I took pictures when Dr. Guo asked if anyone had brought a camera. I let a classmate apply cupping to me, but since I didn't really have a particular ailment, it was more for getting the technique than curing me.
The technique for cupping is that you soak a cotton ball in alcohol, place it in forceps, light it on fire, stick the fire to the bottom of the jar, and then quickly apply it to the appropriate point. The timing is what takes practice. With gua sha, you run the scraper (which is really blunt and is more of a massage tool than anything else) along the jing luo meridians where it will help the ailment.
The coolest part of the day was that Dr. Guo could find the acupoint based on the consultation and then diagnose the patient's problem. For instance, a girl who runs a lot but doesn't stretch said she had knee pain, the doctor found the point, and then said that she was hurting because she was tight. Or another girl with stomach pain had a point on her back that correlated with a specific kind of stomach pain that she had, but did not specifically describe. The diagnosis was really amazing to witness.
I did feel kind of guilty for us taking hospital beds when there were patients waiting. The patients were very kind and when the doctor asked if the American students could observe, they all said yes and even encouraged our intellectual curiosity.
After class, I had about an hour to myself where I watched "Once More with Feeling," the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, because the songs were stuck in my head. At 6, I left with some friends to have dinner in an area called San Li Tun. This is where the western shopping centers are, a bunch of interesting international restaurants, and the bar scene. I had yet to go, and since I'm a fan of Middle Eastern cuisine, it was a good night to go.
On the way, since we were going with one of the Chinese teachers, we had some train troubles. First, Laoshi and I got on the train as the doors were closing, so we had to get off at the next stop to rejoin the group on the next train. It was pretty hilarious, particularly because she wasn't my Laoshi, but the doors almost closed on my body, which was scary. Then, on the next train, there was a man who almost got in a fight with Laoshi and was being mean to her because he thought our group was being too loud. The students nearby defended her, which was both nice and kind of scary, and we got off the train shortly after the incident. Then we went out the wrong gate of the train station, so we were late for the reservation.
First of all, San Li Tun is a really cool area. It's very modern, with gorgeous architecture that is primarily glass and beautiful LED lights in the trees. I'm really happy to have finally seen it! Second, the restaurant was awesome. It was called Bite-a-Pitta, but really Bait HaPita, or Pita House. It was Israeli food and I had hummus, falafel, pita, and shakshuka (onion, bell pepper, tomato stew with eggs cooked on top) for dinner. It was so good, and I told the owner that I really enjoyed her restaurant. Who knew I would be speaking Hebrew in China? I left dinner in high spirits.
Today is awesome because I got to be a TCM therapist for a day.
Personally, I applied cupping to one or two of my classmates, I administered gua sha, and I took pictures when Dr. Guo asked if anyone had brought a camera. I let a classmate apply cupping to me, but since I didn't really have a particular ailment, it was more for getting the technique than curing me.
The technique for cupping is that you soak a cotton ball in alcohol, place it in forceps, light it on fire, stick the fire to the bottom of the jar, and then quickly apply it to the appropriate point. The timing is what takes practice. With gua sha, you run the scraper (which is really blunt and is more of a massage tool than anything else) along the jing luo meridians where it will help the ailment.
The coolest part of the day was that Dr. Guo could find the acupoint based on the consultation and then diagnose the patient's problem. For instance, a girl who runs a lot but doesn't stretch said she had knee pain, the doctor found the point, and then said that she was hurting because she was tight. Or another girl with stomach pain had a point on her back that correlated with a specific kind of stomach pain that she had, but did not specifically describe. The diagnosis was really amazing to witness.
I did feel kind of guilty for us taking hospital beds when there were patients waiting. The patients were very kind and when the doctor asked if the American students could observe, they all said yes and even encouraged our intellectual curiosity.
After class, I had about an hour to myself where I watched "Once More with Feeling," the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, because the songs were stuck in my head. At 6, I left with some friends to have dinner in an area called San Li Tun. This is where the western shopping centers are, a bunch of interesting international restaurants, and the bar scene. I had yet to go, and since I'm a fan of Middle Eastern cuisine, it was a good night to go.
On the way, since we were going with one of the Chinese teachers, we had some train troubles. First, Laoshi and I got on the train as the doors were closing, so we had to get off at the next stop to rejoin the group on the next train. It was pretty hilarious, particularly because she wasn't my Laoshi, but the doors almost closed on my body, which was scary. Then, on the next train, there was a man who almost got in a fight with Laoshi and was being mean to her because he thought our group was being too loud. The students nearby defended her, which was both nice and kind of scary, and we got off the train shortly after the incident. Then we went out the wrong gate of the train station, so we were late for the reservation.
First of all, San Li Tun is a really cool area. It's very modern, with gorgeous architecture that is primarily glass and beautiful LED lights in the trees. I'm really happy to have finally seen it! Second, the restaurant was awesome. It was called Bite-a-Pitta, but really Bait HaPita, or Pita House. It was Israeli food and I had hummus, falafel, pita, and shakshuka (onion, bell pepper, tomato stew with eggs cooked on top) for dinner. It was so good, and I told the owner that I really enjoyed her restaurant. Who knew I would be speaking Hebrew in China? I left dinner in high spirits.
Today is awesome because I got to be a TCM therapist for a day.
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Puppet Show Fail
Today was pretty good and much better than yesterday. It was still raining, so I wore pants for the first time in China. Apparently it has been unusually rainy this year, so on the one hand it's been less hot, but on the other we've been wet and unable to do things. Chinese class was normal and we had lunch as a group with announcements. The announcements were about today's field trip for TCM, the changing of the due date for our Public Health paper from August 31 to August 6 (Monday), and the second cancelling of our herb picking trip. At this point, it's cancelled for good, but there's still hope that we might have the trip at the last minute. I'm saving my jeans.
For TCM, half the group did clinical training in acupuncture and cupping, and my half of the group got some background on the Peking University Health Science Center and watched a movie about a child abuse trial based on the marks from the TCM therapy Gua Sha (scraping). Gua Sha is a home remedy for colds, stomachaches, and the like, so the child's grandfather did it to make a tummy ache go away. The kid then hit his head and was taken to the ER, where they found the marks on his back, and then turned him over to child welfare services. The movie was infuriatingly unrealistic about the legal system and the characters were caricatures, but it got its point across about cultural literacy.
We got back from the field trip just after 5PM, which gave me an hour to get ready for the puppet show. I went with Marissa and Professor Carmichael to the Chinese Shadow Puppet Cultural Club, which was recommended by the Beijinger (a magazine for expats in Beijing). Seeing a Chinese shadow puppet show was something on my list since I learned about the tradition in my puppetry class last February. The puppets are intricately cut, painted so they cast in color on the shadow screen, and have lots of joints that let them move very dynamically. Needless to say, going to this show was something I was VERY excited about.
Well, we left at 6 and took the subway to the appropriate stop then walked in the direction the internet said to walk. We walked the 100 meters, but there was no theater. Then we kept walking, and stayed on one street, but it ended up turning into another street that was not the right street, so we started walking back the way we came. Then it was 6:35, so we hailed a taxi to take us to the address. The taxi driver took us back to the East Gate of Peking University. At that point, it was 6:45, we weren't going to make it to the show, so we walked home with plans to see the puppet show next Tuesday. I'm pretty disappointed that it's taking until the last week to go because it's something I've been wanting and trying to do for a long time, but we have come up with a new plan to get there. I'm sending the website to Marissa and Professor Carmichael and we're all going to look up the characters and directions and take a taxi next Tuesday. This WILL happen.
I ended up doing homework tonight. I read about acupuncture and learned my characters for tomorrow's Chinese test. I'm looking forward to learning acupuncture tomorrow afternoon, and I'm planning on writing my paper on Friday afternoon to get it out of the way. I really hope it stops raining for these last 11 days so I can keep doing things.
Today is awesome because I got a perfect score on my tingxie.
For TCM, half the group did clinical training in acupuncture and cupping, and my half of the group got some background on the Peking University Health Science Center and watched a movie about a child abuse trial based on the marks from the TCM therapy Gua Sha (scraping). Gua Sha is a home remedy for colds, stomachaches, and the like, so the child's grandfather did it to make a tummy ache go away. The kid then hit his head and was taken to the ER, where they found the marks on his back, and then turned him over to child welfare services. The movie was infuriatingly unrealistic about the legal system and the characters were caricatures, but it got its point across about cultural literacy.
We got back from the field trip just after 5PM, which gave me an hour to get ready for the puppet show. I went with Marissa and Professor Carmichael to the Chinese Shadow Puppet Cultural Club, which was recommended by the Beijinger (a magazine for expats in Beijing). Seeing a Chinese shadow puppet show was something on my list since I learned about the tradition in my puppetry class last February. The puppets are intricately cut, painted so they cast in color on the shadow screen, and have lots of joints that let them move very dynamically. Needless to say, going to this show was something I was VERY excited about.
Well, we left at 6 and took the subway to the appropriate stop then walked in the direction the internet said to walk. We walked the 100 meters, but there was no theater. Then we kept walking, and stayed on one street, but it ended up turning into another street that was not the right street, so we started walking back the way we came. Then it was 6:35, so we hailed a taxi to take us to the address. The taxi driver took us back to the East Gate of Peking University. At that point, it was 6:45, we weren't going to make it to the show, so we walked home with plans to see the puppet show next Tuesday. I'm pretty disappointed that it's taking until the last week to go because it's something I've been wanting and trying to do for a long time, but we have come up with a new plan to get there. I'm sending the website to Marissa and Professor Carmichael and we're all going to look up the characters and directions and take a taxi next Tuesday. This WILL happen.
I ended up doing homework tonight. I read about acupuncture and learned my characters for tomorrow's Chinese test. I'm looking forward to learning acupuncture tomorrow afternoon, and I'm planning on writing my paper on Friday afternoon to get it out of the way. I really hope it stops raining for these last 11 days so I can keep doing things.
Today is awesome because I got a perfect score on my tingxie.
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