Archive for the ‘china life’ Category

Doing a bit of catching up with this entry.  I have a backlog of photos to share so here we go with that …

On December 28, while Chana and Teresa were still in town, a friend invited us all out to KTV inside the city wall.  So we headed over to Li Jia Cun (李家村) to get our song on.  It was pretty fun and after a few hours we all headed back home.  Here are a few photos:

That was lots of fun.

A few days later was my birthday.  After a morning wushu class I went home and washed up for a nice brunch with Ruhi at the Shangrila Hotel.  It was delicious and I got a wonderful card and gift — tickets to the visiting Fame 2010 Live broadway show that is coming to Xi’an!  The show is on 1/9, which is also the 4 month-iversary of our wedding.  Pretty neat.

Here are some pictures from the brunch:

When we got back home we took a couple of pictures too.  Here is one in celebration of the upcoming and poorly named “Karate Kid”.

In the evening we met up with Charisse and Theresa at the Da Yang Tan (Big Wild Goose Pagoda).  It was my first time there and boy is it hmm .. well, “big”, I guess.  And a little commercial looking, I suppose.  Quite the tourist attraction.

Then we walked to Chang An Lu and caught a taxi to Gaoxin where we partook of Ro Jia Mo and some B&R Ice Cream:

Then a few days later we found ourselves at the Xi’an Sports University checking out information about classes with our friend, Yue Xiao Yu.  She was kind enough to provide us with some introductions with one of the teachers there.  We commemorated the occasion with a few photos at the front gate:

Then it was off to meet up with Ruhi’s friend Stephen, a doctor in Xi’an who I got to meet for the first time.  Very nice guy and was very helpful answering some medical questions for us.  Here he is:

And finally we went to Ruhi’s friend’s home where she and her son treated us to some Shaanxi home cooking. It was quite delicious and I learned how to make Suan La Bai Cai!  Pretty neat.  Her name is Martha and here are some photos:

It was quite delicious.  Actually, that was yesterday (Wednesday, January 6) after wushu class.  Today (Thursday) we had an early morning appointment at the medical center so we grabbed some breakfast in the village on our way back home.  Some Chinese donuts!  Delicious!

And, with the exception of my birthday party video footage, that pretty much brings us up to date.

I did go to the Xi’an International University today, a private university located a mile or so from my home.  I was asking about Chinese language programs for the spring term but I’ll fill you guys in on all of that once I figure out exactly what I will be doing.

Tomorrow morning is wushu. My knee has been really acting up the last 2 days so I’m going to see what happens in the morning.  If I don’t feel up to it, I might just go and work on the side on some choreography stuff.  Hopefully I’ll be okay.  Although, it also means I have to wake up in 6 hours so I better go now.

Until later …

I have been negligent on sharing some of my non-wushu related adventures with all of you.  So I finally got around to uploading some photos that I have taken to share with you.  I actually have a TON of videos that I need to edit and post up as well, but it will have to wait until later in the week.

Wu Ya Nan Billboard

First up, well … okay.  This is sort of wushu-related.  I took some pictures of a billboard that they have outside of the wushu guan (武术馆) at the Shaanxi Provincial Sports Training Center (陕西神体育训练中心)  which features Wu Ya Nan and a Sanda athlete who both got medals at the recent All China Games in Binzhou, Shandong (山东滨州).  Check it out:

Dou Dou and Family

Waaaay back on December 17 Ruhi and I visited Xuixin (Susan), a local Chinese Friend who works/ed for Ruhi’s consulting company.  Her and her husband asked us over to help with some stuff and while there I got to meet her son, Dou Dou, who was super cute.  I took a bunch of photos of him, Susan and her husband which you can see here.

Holiday Visitors

During this holiday break we also have a few guests visiting our home.  On Thursday, the 24th, Chana and Charise, two sisters who are also from Seattle, came up from Macau to visit. They live/work down there and decided to visit Chana’s old haunt for the break.  Chana and Ruhi used to be roommates and actually Chana used to live in our apartment, so she is very familiar with the area.  I also used to hang out a lot with her brother, Cameron, who lives in Shanghai.  Small world, huh?

The day after they arrived, we went out to dinner at a really nice restaurant (good food , good prices) just up TuanJie Nan Lu (团结南路) from our place (about a block away) and got some delicious food.  Here are some pictures from that evening.

L-R: Charise and Chana

That evening another friend, Adam, whom you might remember from this video/blog entry, came to stay with us too.  We were lucky because he brought his guitar.  For those of you who don’t know, Adam is from Scotland and an AMAZING guitar player.  He is also super fluent in Chinese, having graduated from a Chinese university a few years back.

The morning after he arrived he graced us with some morning guitar playing.  I got some photos of our leisurely Saturday morning socializing and tried to get some video of us doing a bit of “guitar talk” as well.

NOTE: The video is only viewable on wushuzilla.com

Now, if you are reading my twitter feed or my facebook status messages, you already know that there was a big surprise birthday party that Ruhi put on for me on Saturday evening.  However, instead of adding it to this blog, I’m going to give it another entry, probably later in the week.  In fact, we took a LOT of video and I want to edit it a bit before posting it up.  A few highlights:

• Musical concert by Adam, including singing Shaanxi Style Opera for a surprised group of local Chinese
• Yuan Ming doing an aerial in my living room
• A surprise visit by Ruhi’s English students who went WAY out of their way to come to the party
• Amazing gift from Wu Ya Nan — Nike Shaolinquan shoes!
• Theater Sports and Musical Performances galore.
• Lots of great friends and lots of good times.

Stay tuned for that later in the week!

Also, I’m going to be starting a new regular feature, “Ask the ‘Zilla” where I answer some of the questions I get here on wushuzilla.com (or one of the other websites) related to wushu.  Quite a few have been coming in so I’m going to try and answer them (as best I can) here.  Stay tuned for that, probably on Tuesday.

Today Yue Xiao Yu was kind enough to help Ruhi and I as we went to puchase a bike.  I realized that it was a better use of my time and money to start biking to wushu class (its only 5 – 6 km from my home) and so we set out to do some bike shopping.  I also had a chance to do a quick interview with her in the cab and introduce her to everyone.

Here, for your viewing pleasure is our trip to go bike shopping with Yue Xiao Yu!

And for those of you on alivenotdead.com or Facebook, you can check out the teaser for the video here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACN5xfCDxCY

After a very quick trip (around 48 hours) to the south of China I am back in Xi’an. Nothing major to post up, but just wanted to let everyone know that I am back and should be blogging regularly again soon.

I went down south to renew my visa. I flew down on Thursday afternoon to Guangzhou, took a bus to the Futian border crossing in Shenzhen, and then took another bus from Lok Ma Chau to Tin Shui Wai in Hong Kong where I stayed with Jack, actually not sleeping at all the whole night.

I left off at 9:30 AM and took a bus to Sheng Shui, the MTR train to Lo Wu (Luo Hu) and then the express train up to Guangzhou where I met up with Ruhi and caught an overnight train to Xi’an. I slept a solid 12 – 14 hours during the trip and we just arrived this afternoon.

Since spouting out names of locations don’t mean much if you aren’t familiar with them, I made a few maps to demonstrate the route …

From Home to the Airport in Xi'an

Flying from Xian to Guangzhou (about 2 - 3 hours)

Bus from Guangzhou to Shenzhen

Cross the border at Futian/Lok Ma Chau and then a bus to Tin Shui Wai

Bus from Tin Shui Wai to Sheng Shui and then the MTR to Luo Hu

Train ride from Guangzhou to Xi'an via Wuhan and Zhengzhou

All in all it was a pretty good trip.  Mainly because I didn’t get any illnesses or get snowed in anywhere.  But also because it all went according to plan.  Yay for plans! (Mark likes plans)

Tomorrow morning Ruhi and I are meeting Yue Xiao Yu to go shopping for a bicycle.  I am going to see about doing some video-ing of our excursion too so you can enjoy that. After that I am meeting my tutor, Ada, for an hour of Chinese learnin’ and then I believe Ruhi and I are meeting some new friends in the evening.  A jam-packed day to be sure.  Yay for Sundays!  (Mark likes Sundays)

Just to keep you all in the loop with my bloging habits, I have set up the following schedule for the topics of my blogs (at least for the time being). On Monday – Friday I will blog about wushu, specifically about the training I have on each day, posting up any photos or videos that I might take. On Saturday I will blog a week-in-review of my non-wushu related activities (i.e. the other 22 hours of my day), and then on Sunday I will post up another chapter of my ongoing Wushu Retrospective.

On any days that I don’t have wushu, like this past Thursday, I will either blog something random and interesting, or I will take a day off from the blogosphere and perhaps focus on less important things — like earning a living.

So, in keeping with this brand new tradition, I will bring you up to date with the last week of my non-wushu life here in China.

I actually blogged a bit about this on Tuesday so there isn’t really too much to talk about. But here are the updates:

Travel Plans

Ruhi suggested looking in to getting a plane ticket down to Guangzhou instead of taking the train and, after looking at the ticket prices, I realized that it would only be another 50 RMB to take a plane instead of the train. On Friday I called up CTrip and booked a ticket leaving next Thursday afternoon.

Unfortunately Ruhi had to go to Beijing first, so I bid her farewell after we grabbed something to eat at Subway Sandwiches on Ke Ji Lu. Here are a few pictures I took of her before saying goodbye.

I just spoke with her a few minutes ago and she is safe and sound in Beijing as of Saturday evening.  She will be train-ing down to Guangzhou on Sunday/Monday and then take a quick trip to Zhuhai and Macau.

Meanwhile, I will spend the week working and wushu-ing until Thursday afternoon when I will fly to Guangzhou and spend the night in Hong Kong with Jack.  Then right back to Guangzhou the next morning to catch the train to Xi’an with Ruhi.  Probably the quickest trip to Hong Kong I’ve ever taken.  I will be in Southern China a total of 20 hours before heading back, and in Hong Kong for only 10 or so.

I feel like such a globetrotter!

Chinese Studies

I wanted to write a little bit about my Chinese studies too, since that is one of the things besides work and wushu that I have been focusing on these days.

I have both of my Tutors (Grace and Ada) on a rotating 2-week schedule.  So I meet with each one on alternating Saturdays.  Unfortunately due to a miscommication I wasn’t able to meet with Grace today so this is my first week off of Chinese tutoring since starting.

With my tutors I generally focus on three things:

First, we go over a specific topic that I want to learn vocabulary for.

For example, last time I met with Ada I asked her to teach me vocabulary related to learning Chinese.  Words such as “noun” (名词), “verb” (动词) and the like, as well as a couple phrases related to learning language like 废寝忘食 (Lit. “Less Sleep, Forget Eat” meaning you are so busy studying you don’t have time to sleep or eat) and 临急抱佛脚 (Lit. “Grabbing Buddha’s Feet” meaning a last ditch effort to ask for divine assistance with a test).

Last time I met with Grace I asked her to teach me words related to religion and philosophy such as 精神 (Spirit), 灵魂 (Soul) and 人类 (humanity).  Also how to express some of my own thoughts in to Chinese such as 我觉得所有的宗教同宗同源一位神. (“I think that the purpose of religion is to unify people”).

Second, we review my study of flash cards and I have them test me on how well I’ve learned them.

And Third, I ask them to recite a page from a book or some passage for me so that I can listen and practice speaking in the right way.  Basically providing me with a pronounciation guide.

On thing I’ve learned is that I have to limit the amount of time we talk about new vocabulary.  With Grace we ended up doing a whole hour on new vocabulary, but since I listen to the lessons after we meet during the week (while walking, working, etc.) an hour of new words is a bit too much to absorb.  20 – 30 minutes is just about perfect so I will try to limit the time spent on that area in the future. Also, I need to ask them for more examples of useage so that I get a better idea of how to use the new words.

Besides meeting with Tutors I also am working on learning all the radicals (all 214 of them) through my flash-card study.  This week I am going to start incorporating some actual characters/words in to my flash card study too, since learning radicals doesn’t actually help improve my useable vocabulary very much and I really need to start learning words.

I found a list of the Chinese words based on frequency of use, so I’m going to use that as my base for learning.  I just have to learn 1,000 to have an 89% comprehension of most written texts. Thats not too bad and I think that is certainly do-able over the next year.  So far since starting this just under 2 months ago, I’ve memorized arond 70 radicals.  Based on that rate I should have them all memorized by the time Spring Festival rolls around.  And by the end of 2010 I hope to have all 1,000 of the most frequent characters memorized (fortunately I already know at least 100 or 200 of them so that gives me a head-start).

A few other things I do when learning Chinese (or am going to start doing shortly) are …

1. Learn Chinese Songs: There are several sites that list out the characters, pinyin and translation for popular, folk and patriotic Chinese songs.  I’m going to try to pick up a few so that I can sing along at KTV or just belt out the Chinese National Anthem while walking through U.S. Customs and Immigration.

2. Watch Chinese TV shows: I got Doreamon, one of my all-time favorite Japanese animation shows, on DVD.  They speak Chinese which is going to be helpful with my listening practice.  I don’t have to memorize all the words, but I want to get used to listening to simple (i.e. animation-style) Chinese expressions and vocabulary on a regular basis.  I just wish that the subtitles weren’t in traditional characters …

3. Read Chinese Children’s Books: I’ve picked up a couple simple texts to practice reading and understanding.  The best books have just Chinese with supporting pinyin and no English so that I have to figure out the meaning of what I’m reading.  Just like a Chinese kid would have to do when they were learning to read for themselves.  I figure the best way to learn a language is organically, just like a child does.  So thats what I’m trying to do.

4. Writing a Chinese Journal: I won’t be starting this one until I’ve learned more characters, but I plan (probably around Spring Festival or maybe a bit earlier) to write a small journal in Chinese and have my tutors read it over and correct my grammar and word-useage.  I think that besides reading Chinese, writing Chinese is probably one of the best ways to get a grasp of the written language.  Who knows?  Maybe I’ll even start blogging in only Chinese next year.  Anything is possible!

In case you haven’t seen it, here are a couple pictures of me with Grace, one of my tutors.  Just to prove that I’m actually making an attempt to learn some Chinese while living in China.

Besides Work, Wushu, Chinese and upcoming Travel there isn’t a ton of other things to blog about.  I have started up on my novel again.  I got really far behind in November with my illness and Anhui adventures so I decided to do my nanowrimo in December instead.  I finished another chapter earlier today and hope to get more out the door in the near future.

Its also been nice slowly getting to meet Ruhi’s Friends, and even making a few of my own through Wushu or learning Chinese.  I hope to get that English class with the wushu athletes going soon so that I can get some wushu socializing on the calendar.

By the way, after blogging about the smoggy weather, EVERY day since then has been sunny, warm and pleasant.  Its hard to believe it is December in China, but go figure.  Maybe I need to complain about the weather more often in my blog.

Until next time ….

Before I blog, I wanted to share something that I saw today.  You may recall that I mentioned that the winter smog from the coal burning and polution gets pretty bad here in Xi’an.  But we also get a bit of fog from time to time.  And when you combine the two things together, like we had today, it turns in to a pea soup the likes of which I never saw in my 14 years in the Bay Area.

Here are a few comparative shots from the morning and the afternoon so that you can get an idea of what it looked like from our living room window:

And just so you don’t think it looks like this all the time, here is a picture from just a month or so ago:

See?  Blue skies!

Anyway, back to the blog …

Three main things happened today in the World of Mark.  Well, okay … more than three things.  But three things that I’m going to blog about.

First, was figuring out what to do about our visa renewal.

We spent most of the early hours of the day (i.e. before lunch) going to the visa office and trying to get an extension on our tourist visas.  As we are in the process of closing down Ruhi’s company (after which we will probably start up a new one in 2010) we are technically in China as tourists.  As a result, I either have to leave the country every 30 days (60 for Ruhi) or get an extension.

As you will recall, last month I left the country and went to Hong Kong, only to end up spending a week in Anhui with the flu.  This time we decided to get a 30 day extension instead.

That is, until we found out that the cost of a 30 day extension for U.S. Citizens is 940 RMB ($140 USD), which is also the price of a full one-year multiple entry visa.  But only for 30 days!  Well, for less than 940 RMB we can just take the train down to Guangdong and hop across the border, so why spend all that extra money?

So, on Friday Ruhi will be traveling to Beijing for some meetings.  To save some money I will be going directly to Guangdong from Xi’an.  Sorry to Wu Di, Jenn, Chris, et al. for not being able to make it over to the capital this time around.  But Ruhi will be there in my stead for 2 days.

On Wednesday I’m going to catch a train down to Guangzhou and then hop across the border.  Ruhi will have already been staying in Guangzhou for a couple days and on Friday afternoon we will catch a train back up and get home on Saturday morning.  This time around I opted for the faster train, as the slower one is obviously not an option.  Who wants to go all the way to Anhui anyway?

Here is a map of Ruhi’s journey.  As I said, my route is just a straight back and forth from Xi’an to Guangzhou.

The second thing that happened today was a revamping of our home.

Yue A-yi was here to clean today so we took the opportunity to swap our bedroom and the second room around.  After several hours we have set up the place so that we’re both working in our “spare” room with all the natural light, and our sleeping room is the darker, more comfortable one that gets much warmer.  Plus we moved some furniture around in the main room.  I love optomizing my living space.  According to Ruhi I get a twinkle in my eye when I am in that mode.

And the third thing is (hopefully) a change to my training routine.

I called Yuan Ming earlier in the day and asked him for Coach Zhang’s phone number.  He didn’t have it, so I had to relay the message through him.  I told him that (1) I would not be able to make it today and that (2) I wanted to switch my workouts from the afternoon at 3:00 to the morning at 9:00.  He said he would talk to Coach Zhang for me.

In the evening I gave him a call but it turned out that Coach Zhang wasn’t there today.  Tomorrow morning they also don’t have training because there is a meeting, so I will just go in the afternoon as usual.  Then, assuming Coach Zhang is there, I can ask him about switching to the morning session.

Why switch to mornings?  Well, for one, it will make me more productive with my work.  I will have a bigger chunk of time to get things done during the afternoon and evening.  Also, I think it is better, physically, to exercise during the earlier hours of the day as it sets up your body’s metabolism and function better for the rest of your waking hours.

Plus, I just feel better when I train in the morning vs. the afternoon.

So, that is what happened today.  Tomorrow it is back to the wushu grind stone.  Today they had strength training, so tomorrow, I”m not really sure what is happening.  I’m hoping it is wushu, but it might be running too.  I’ll just play it by ear and make sure I am prepared for any contingency.

Until tomorrow …. here is a bonus picture that I swiped from Wu Di’s camera in Binzhou.  Enjoy!

I will say right now that I didn’t take any pictures or videos today during practice, so if you are just here for that, you can go now.

The reason I didn’t get any media is because I was busy getting my butt kicked with some serious strength training and conditioning.  It was basically a repeat of Tuesday, but unlike Tuesday, this time around I actually participated in as many of the exercises as I could.

In fact, at the beginning of class I was feeling pretty good.  Probably because of the day of rest on Thursday.  I was raring to go.  We did our usual joint warm-up and running around (it is slowly starting to get a little easier) and then we did our stretching.  After that it was time to go in to the weight room.

Again we did work with the big bar and weights.  20kg to start (not including the bar, which i think is another 10kg or so).  I asked for a bit more clarification from Yuan Ming about how the exercise is done.  They focus not on the squat itself, or even on the rise from the squat, but mainly on the pop-up at the top where you’re supposed to use your quads and calves in unison to give you a slight explosive “push” upwards.  Similar to plyometrics, I guess.

We did 4 sets of those, each time increasing the weight by 10kg or so until we had gone up to around 50kg.  I could handle the weight okay, but some of those kids were having a rough time of it, given the fact that they coudn’t weight more than 50kg themselves.  After each set you were supposed to go sprint out of the room to get your legs moving.

Then they brought the weight down to around 15 kg and we did calf hops with the bar on our shoulders.  20 hops, 4 sets.  By the end of this I could start to feel it in my quads.

Then it was time for conditioning.   Coach Zhang devided us in to two groups: big (“da”) and small (“xiao”).  I was in the “big” group, but mainly because the small group goes first and sometimes I don’t know what the exercise is until I see people doing it.

First up was a 3 hop exercise.  You hop up 3 times, the first time with high knees, the second time with feet behind you and the third time with legs out to the sides.  You do 10 of those, so basically 30 hopes.  3 sets.

After that was incline pushups and a down-and-back wheelbarrow run.  3 sets.  I didn’t have a partner for this so I did incline pushups on the stretching bar by the window.

Then they did 3 sets of 20 lunge jumps.  I can’t do those so I did lunge walks along the carpet, 3 sets of 16 each.

After that we did 3 rounds of frog leaps down and back on the carpet. Or maybe it was 4.  Hard to remember.

After the frog leaps we did core work.  V-ups were done on the coach’s count up to 10 and then 5 quick ones followed by holding your legs and torso off the ground for 15 seconds.  Then turn over and do 30 fish flops followed by holding that position for 15 seconds.  4 rounds of all this.

Then they did some around-the-carpet single leg runs.  My knees wouldn’t let me do this one so I did calf-raises instead.  30 each leg.  3 sets for both them and I.

Then it was time for sprints.  We would walk down the length of 2 carpets and then sprint as fast as we could back.  My quads were pretty worn out by this point so slowing down from the sprint at the end of the room I almost fell, not realizing that my legs had weakened.

After 6 sprints we were told to stretch and relax.  And that was class.  It was a good workout and I’m glad I have the weekend to recover because it will really help.

One nice thing was that during the class Yue Xiao Yu came up to ask me a few questions about English.  Its nice that they feel comfortable enough with me to ask me questions.  I’m going to see if I can’t start up a little once-a-week English conversation practice for her and some of the other athletes that have expressed an interest in learning English.  Unfortunately they are trying to learn on their own, which I know is not easy.  So I figure I should let them take advantage of the opportunity presented by having a native English speaker training with them for the next year or ten.

This weekend should be a good one.  I’m meeting my Chinese tutor(s) tomorrow (Saturday) and doing my Chinese study over at the Village Cafe.  Then Sunday will be spent doing some work and getting things in order and organized at home.

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving.  It came and went with narry a notice here at the Moran’s Xi’an household.  It was just a year ago that I was in Idhao celebrating the holiday wth my mom and Reid.  Here are some nice pictures of that in honor of the holiday.

Since I didn’t have to go training today, I thought I would post up a few pictures from the past few days of non-wushu-related life in Xi’an.

Making Noodles (10/25)

First though, I realized that I forgot to post up a bit of footage and photos from waaaay back on the 25th of October after Ruhi and I had visited Garnett and Umesh at the Xi’an Translation University (西安翻译大学). When we got back home we dropped by the local market village and got some noodles at one of our favorite little restaurants. This time around, since I had my video and still camera I thought I would capture some of the magic.

We ordered mian piao, a noodle dish made with flat noodles. Here you can see some photos of them being made and put in to the cooking water.

And here is a video of our noodle dish being made.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hV4hWLrgrj8

Are you hungry yet?

Winter Smog (11/24)

Anyway, moving back to the present, one thing that Xi’an has which is unique from the other cities I’ve lived in around China, is the winter pollution.  It is a combination of the high number of coal being burned in the winter for heat, as well as the fact that we are in a valley surrounded by mountains.  As a result there are some days when the winds are blowing the wrong way and you can barely see a block away from you, sometimes even less.  Here are some photos I took the other day in front of our apartment complex.

It wouldn’t be so bad, but you can really smell a sooty flavor in the air and it makes me feel like eating BBQ all the time.   It also makes running around the track at the Sports Center quite interesting.  But I suppose it is one of the reasons that Xi’an is a good place to visit in the spring, summer and fall.

Although, one nice thing about Xi’an in the winter is that it doesn’t get super cold.  Well, at least it hasn’t this year.  Unlike Beijing that is under a carpet of snow, or Shanghai with its super frigid winds right off the ocean, Xi’an is a bit farther inland so we don’t get super freezing. (Crossing my fingers)

Restaurant Eating (11/25)

On Wednesday night we got a little hungry so we went to one of the other restaurants in the outdoor market next to our building.  This one has yang ro chua’r, which is the main reason we go there.  We originally wanted to go to another restaurant but they were closed so we ate at this one.  Here are a couple pictures.  I would have taken some of the food, but it was gone before you knew it!

Meeting James at the Village (11/26)

And tonight we went over to Shi Da Lu’s Village Cafe to do a little work, get something to eat and meet up with James, a Friend of Ruhi’s who lives in Xi’an.  Actually he will be moving close to our home in another week or two so we will practically be neighbors!  Here are a few photos of us hanging out at the cafe.

And thats about it for this time around.  Tomorrow it is back to the wushu guan and some more training.  Its been great having a day to heal up and I hope my body took good advantage of it.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you in the U.S. and Happy Day of the Covenant for those who know what that is.

Site Updates (11/26)

By the way, I changed out the header of my website (and the website looks pretty different these days if you haven’t visited it in a while), wushuzilla.com.  There is a pretty good chance that, if you are reading this, you may not have visited in a while. I actually have my blog replicating to 4 different websites, so you may not even know I have the site at all.

I also have a few ideas for the site that I will try to implement in the semi-near future.  But we’ll see what happens.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions, please feel free to use my new contact form on my website too.  I’m happy to hear whatever you might have to say.

On Thursday night Ruhi and I had trekked over to Shi Da Lu to meet up with Jamie for dinner at the Village Cafe.  While there Adam, a long-time resident of Xi’an now living in Shanghai, happened to call Ruhi and let her know that he was in town.  So we all made plans to meet up the next night and have dinner.

So Friday evening, after wushu class, I came home, cleaned up and then Ruhi and I took a cab over to the south gate to meet up with Adam and another friend, Jia Run.  (It turned out Jamie couldn’t make it.)  The four of us met up at the South Gate of the Xi’an City wall, just across from where I stayed with Wushu West only 4 months before.  My how time flies!

We went to eat at a restaurant that had been an old haunt of theirs back in the day.  It turned out to be pretty delicious as we ordered some Gong Pao Ji (Kung Pao Chicken), some Suan La Bai Cai (Hot and Sour Cabbage), a bit of soup and plenty of tea, and got down to some serious conversatin’.

After getting our fill of food, we all headed back to the South Gate area where Jia Run caught the good old 600 bus to her home.  Then Adam, Ruhi and I went to the hostel where another friend of theirs was staying.  Adam was in town doing some work for a Scottish company called Pure Media, a group that works with poor and underpriveledged groups and provides training and education in the arts.  (Adam is actually a very good musician (guitar) who was even featured in Xi’an television for being the first foreigner to ever learn and perform Shaanxi style Chinese Opera.)  Unfortunately the guy we went to see wasn’t there, but we did manage to make our own little street party, which was pretty fun..

After that we hung out a little longer pulling a “parking lot wushu” (sans wushu) until it got late enough for Ruhi and I to catch a cab back home and rest.

I hope you enjoyed the pictures.  Here is a video of us enjoying ourselves, just for your entertainment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyyQCbrhSTY

And for you folks in the mainland:

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTMzODUyMjA4.html

NOTE: I got a few photos off my film camera so I’m posting them up with this entry, even though they are from the entire 10 day trip.

I had jokingly said to Ruhi that with my luck I would probably get to Hefei (合肥) just to find myself delayed overnight by the weather again.  Ironically it almost came true.

Workers at a Xi'an Airport cafe waiting for customers

My plan was to take a morning train from Fuyang to Hefei (3 hours), get my plane ticket at the e-Long office, and then catch my 5:20 flight at the airport, arriving in Xi’an around 7:00, and hopefully home in time to get some dinner and enjoy a bit of rest at home.

And it started out okay too.  I woke up around 7:00, cleaned up, packed my things (yay for being a light packer!), and then got a quick bite at the hotel’s free breakfast buffet (nothing to write home about) before checking out and catching a cab to the train station.

It looked like there had been a fresh coat of snow on the ground from the night before.  But the snow wasn’t falling very heavy, even though it was overcast.  And the snow was pretty minimal so I didn’t think too much of it.

At the train station I waited a few minutes before they let us on.  (I don’t really understand the huge rushing of people to get on the train, considering that all the seats are pre-assigned.  It isn’t like someone will swipe your seat, right?  Maybe it is for the overhead packing space …)

I know why they call them hard seats (硬座) now.  They are no gift to the lower back, that is for sure.  I spent a fair amount of time playing my Nintendo DS and thanked my lucky stars that I brought it along with me for some entertainment.  Thank you Mario Brothers!

Sidewalk eating in Shenzhen

I noticed as we were traveling that the snow level outside was getting  a bit deeper.  ”How come the farther south we travel, the thicker the snow?” I asked Ruhi rhetorically through SMS.  By the time we arrived in Hefei around 1:00 PM it was snowing pretty steadily.

I grabbed a taxi and gave them the address (intersection) of the ticket office where e-Long has their pick-ups.  It actually took me a lot of walking around to find the place.  If you didn’t know where it was, you wouldn’t know where it was.  And that was the case for me.  It was purely by accident when I got there and they handed me my ticket.  I had actually asked the person at the counter what their address was (bad labeling on the buildings) and the lady next to her handed me my ticket.

Getting a taxi from there to the airport took another 30 minutes, but I still managed to arrived about an hour before the scheduled check-in time for my flight.  The guy told me to come back at 3:50.  So I had a sandwich and drink at the airport restaurant.

3:50 rolls around and the ticket counter has plenty of customers but nothing is happening.  4:00 .. 4:20 … By 4:30 we’ve been told that the flight hasn’t left the city of origin on its way to Hefei due to weather conditions.  Once they know if there is going to be a plane or not, we will know if we are flying out or not.

I got on the phone and ASKED Ruhi to  help me book a hotel in Hefei for the night. Just in case.

Bill sticks his tongue out at the horrible tang su li ji

But as soon as I hung up the phone with her there was a flurry of activity and it turned out the plane was cleared to come to Hefei.  I stood in line and got my boarding pass.  Seat 20A on Tianjin Airlines.  My first time to fly with them.

Now, getting your boarding pass just means you have a seat assignment.  But until the plane actually shows up, who knows if you will actually get to where you are going.  We sat in the gate area for a long time waiting.

5:30 … 6:00 … 7:00 … 8:00 … 9:00 … And the same announcement over the intercom.  ”Your flight has been delayed due to weather conditions.  Thank you for your patience”.

And all the while other flights were dropping like flies.  ”Flight MU3948 to Beijing has been cancelled .. Flight CZ2349 to Tianjin has been cancelled … ” It was like waiting for the worst lottery ever …

At 9:45 we were suddenly told that we could board the plane.  We could board?  I didn’t even know it had arrived!

We scrambled to the bus which took us out to the tarmac and on to the plane.  It turned out there were only about 30 passengers on the flight, which means everyone had some nice room to relax.  I spent the time studying my Chinese flash cards and playing my Nintendo DS.  Oh .. and a bit of sudoku during take-off and landing …

My hotel room in Fuyang, Anhui

Now, this whole time I hadn’t told Ruhi that I had gotten on the plane.  Part of me, I admit, was scared that as soon as I said “I”m coming!” they would announce that the plane had a case of the measels, or it had colided with Santa Claus, or that gnomes had hijacked the airport and we were all going to be auctioned off as slaves in an underworld blackmarket operation.

The other part of me wanted to surprise her.  She was expecting me to possibly not be showing up at all that night. Especially considering how late it was.  Before we got on the plane I said that I was turning my phone off to conserve battery and that I would call her back when I got more information.

Then, after we landed in Xi’an, I called her again and told her that the airline was going to put us up in a hotel for the night and asked her to cancel the other reservation she had made for me.  (That could have been a signal right there, since airlines in China don’t really do that unless you are flying international and missing a conneciton, especially not Tianjin Airline on a 2 hour domestic route.)

I walked pretty much straight from the airplane, through the airport, and in to a taxi which drove me the 150 RMB (about $22) trip home (!!!!).  That might be cheap in the U.S. for 45 minutes in a cab, but here it feels pretty pricey.  As I was entering our building and going up the elevator I tried to call her but didn’t get through.  But she called me back and as I got off the elevator I said “Oh, hold on … I need to use the restroom.  I’ll call you back.”

Then I came in the front door and said “Excuse me.  I’m looking for a restroom?”

She was pretty surprised. ;-P

Train-side snow on the way from Fuyang to Hefei

And I was pretty tired.  Still a tickle in my throat, but for the most part none too worse for wear.  What was originally supposed to be a 2 day trip to Hong Kong ended up including a week in Anhui, a brush with the swine flu and the storm of the century.

The best part of the trip was that I pack well so I was prepared for what happened.  I had warm enough clothes, I had the ability to get food and lodging, and I even had flu medicine in my emergency travel kit (never leave home without it!).

Of course, the worst part of the trip was missing a week of wushu, being stuck in the middle of no-where (no offense Fuyang fans), and being the sickest I’ve been in a few years.  But these things happen and it isn’t anything that you can control.  Sometimes you just have to take things as they come and make the best of the situation.

Especially living in China.  Where you never know what is going to happen.