Posts Tagged ‘jennifer wang’

After the last events (duilian: sparring sets) of the 11th All China Games in Binzhou, Shandong, China, Ruhi and I, along with Marla, Jenn and Wu Di, headed back to the hotel, but not before stopping to take a few photos outside the sports arena.

We were going to the hotel to take care of a little file transferring.  Wu Di had asked for the footage of her events and the various photographs I took during the competition.  Wang Xi also asked me to give Wu Di his changquan form so that he could take a look.

After that everyone was on the hungry side.  First we went down the street to our favorite restaurant with the large chef, but he was just closing up (it really was a very good restaurant).  So, we climbed in a couple cabs who took us to BoHai Road No. 6 (bohai liu lu) which had a bunch of Muslim restaurants.  We walked around until we found a good one.  It just so happened to have Zhang Ji Dong eating there with a bunch of coaches and judges (he was just certified as a judge).

But we sat at our own table and then Wu Di called over some friends to visit us.  Gao Song, coach for the Hong Kong Team (originally from the Liaoning Wushu Team) and Yang Yu Hong, super nice guy from the Shanghai Wushu Team.

We ate a bunch of food and had a nice time, but unfortunately Ruhi and I had to leave early because we were waking up at 5:00 AM and it was already almost midnight.  We said our farewells and headed back to our hotel to pack and prepare for our very long day of travel on the 15th.

5:00 AM came along a bit too soon, but we managed to pack up our things, check out of our hotel and get on to our long-distance (2.5 hour) bus to Jinan by 5:35.  The bus took off as scheduled around 5:50 and we slept uncomfortably in our seats until arriving in Jinan and taking a taxi to the train station.

When we got there I realized that one of the train tickets had fallen out of my pouch.  We were planning on upgrading to the soft-sleeper, but instead upgraded one ticket and purchased another for the berth next to it.  But something pretty amazing happened later on while we were on the train.

A few hours after departing from Jinan a conductor came up to our compartment and said that someone had turned in our ticket and that we could get a refund for the price of the original ticket.  To be honest, we were floored.  It isn’t often that someone in China comes up to you and offers to give you money.  We were so surprised we took a picture to make sure we didn’t dream it.

We shared the compartment with a nice man from Urumuqi and his business associate.  He invited us to come visit him out in Xinjiang, which we just might do someday.  It really is a beautiful place.  He showed us pictures and it actually looked a lot like Eastern Idaho.  I showed him some photos of Eastern Idaho and he agreed.

Our train made its way through Shandong, across Henan, through Zhengzhou, and then over to Shaanxi, where we rolled in to Xi’an around 12:30 AM on the 16th.  We did manage to sleep for a few hours on the train, but it was hardly a good night’s rest.  After a taxi ride from the train station to Xi Gao Xin (Xi’an High Tech Zone, where we live) it didn’t take very long to crash in to bed.

And here we are in Xi’an.  I’m about a week behind on these blogs, but I’ll get you back up to date with the next one as it will be a recap of my first week in Xi’an.  Stay tuned for my adventures getting the luggage we shipped from Shenzhen, hitting the Muslim Quarter for some Shahaub Dumplings, and our outing with last year’s Chinese National Taiji Champion!

As previously mentioned, Ruhi and I attended the 11th All China Games in Binzhou, Shandong, China from October 12-14, 2009.

As usual it was a fun event filled with friends, food and more wushu than you can shake a stick at.  Of the 6 morning and evening sessions, I attended a little over 4 of them (sorry, not a big fan of the taiji events) and managed to get quite a bit of footage, but mostly of those people or events that were of interest to me.

I saw Ray from w1f.com at the competition, so you can expect to see all of the footage on their website sooner or later.  In the meantime, I’ve begun uploading footage to youtube.com/wushuzilla and will probably put it up on youku.com later (for those of you in China).

As for results, you can get most of those on one of the wushu forums (jiayo.com, w1f.com, etc.) and I’m not really that in to the points and scoring, preferring to watch and get inspired with all the great wushu technique and choreography.

But one thing I did this time that I haven’t done much at other competitions is focus on my photography.  I’ve been getting more in to that so I took some time to try my hand at a bit of wushu action photos. You can see my whole gallery from the competition here, but I will show you a few of my favorites so that you can get a flavor for the fever.  I’ve grouped them in to categories for your convenience:

Competitors

In the Stands

Friends

And so another wushu competition comes to a close.  I got to combine a bunch of favorite things (wushu, friends, shandong, ruhi, photography, etc) at once so I was pretty happy.  Early on the 15th we had to take off to Xi’an so I wasn’t able to celebrate Wu Di’s birthday or stay out too late on the 14th, but it was a great trip none-the-less.

As some of you know, about 10 days ago or so I put a call out for folks to help out my friend Jennifer who was going to Beijing University for a year to study.  The response was overwhelming and I can’t say enough to express my appreciation.

So I won’t.

Instead, I’m going to post up a message from Jennifer letting us know what is going on with her and sharing some of her experiences to date.  Enjoy!

I never know where to start with these kinds of things... but I guess
I should start with the most important thing:  THANK YOU!

The kindness of both friends and strangers that has been shown over
the past week has humbled me more than anything I've ever experienced.

After going through all of my struggles with red tape at school and
funding and such, I was really starting to feel discouraged about
whether or not this was the right thing.  When I finally thought
everything was ready to go, I realized I was faced with the financial
aid SNAFU, I didn't know how I would possibly be able to fulfill my
dream of studying in China.  I was completely discouraged, and felt
that maybe it wasn't the right thing to do.

Enter Mark. When I first read what he put up on his site, I cried.
Not because I thought I would get any money, but to have a friend
write something so nice about...  I mean, it's like you always have
these things that you hope your friends (and other people) think
about you, but to actually see them written down where other people
can see them... it's just stunning. That to me was one of the
greatest gifts anyone could have ever given me.

Then, much to my surprise, people started donating money.  Friends,
people I've met online only, and people I didn't even know donated
money.  It was the clearest evidence to me that this really was the
right thing to do.  That it really was meant to happen.  And now, just
over a week later, I'm here in China.  I'm completely jet-lagged
because I took a morning flight (which I'd never done before), but I'm
so happy.

It's interesting to me because although there are a number of cosmetic
changes to the city, the general feel of Beijing feels the same.  I
feel almost as if I never left, or if I did, it was only for a matter
of days rather than years.  I feel like I'm at home.  I landed in a
new terminal at the airport, took a new shuttle to customs and the
baggage claim, went through customs in a different place, but the
general hum and process was the same. I got to my hotel, checked in,
and went exploring to find something to eat.  I found a chain noodle
place that I had liked in the past, went in and ordered the same thing
I used to eat, and enjoyed my first meal in what is to be my home for
the next 11 months.

I spent yesterday meeting up with old friends and going to places I
have been in the past, reacclimating myself to the "new" Beijing.  It
is everything I had hoped for. I bought a cellphone and talked to the
salesperson, asked my questions, listened to their spiel and realized
that my Chinese was going to improve immensely this year.  I have no
choice but to speak Chinese. No other way to communicate.  I don't
have anybody to fall back on to help me explain what I'm looking for,
or what I've been told.  It's exactly what I need.  It's still
slightly unreal.  I can't believe I'm here.  I can't believe I've
actually made it.  It's been so long coming, and something I've hoped
for for such a long time. To have it finally be real, I can't thank
all of you enough.  When I get my financial aid, I'm planning to make
a donation to Giving Anonymously (www.givinganon.org) because I hope
to do for someone what all of you have done for me.

To those of you who donated money, and those who didn't but held me in
good thoughts:  Thank you.  You've made all of this possible.  I'll do
everything I can to make this the best, most fruitful trip possible.

~Jenn

I would like to tell you a bit about my friend, Jennifer.

I have two best friends in the world (not including Ruhi, who gets a special status higher than best friend).  Two people that I have a very special bond with and can literally talk to about anything.  One of them is Jennifer Wang.

She would be too embarassed to do this herself, so I am taking the initiative to help her out of a bind.
You see, one of Jennifer’s passions is China.  She really loves China.  And as a result she is very serious about learning Chinese.  After a long time away from school, she recently went back to school to get her degree in Chinese Language, which, as someone who once tried to go back to school himself, is not an easy thing to motivate one’s self to do.  She left a good paying job at an advertising agency to fulfill her dream and put herself through school and get her degree.

Now, although she has spent some time in China before, in order to really get good at a language it is necessary to really study the language intensely in the native environment: China.  She was recently accepted to a wonderful study abroad program through her University at Beijing University (Beijing Da Xue), the BEST university in a country of 1.6 billion people.  It is a great chance for her to really pursue her dream and follow her passion.

However, in all of this, there was snaffoo with the timing of her Student Loan payment.  She will not be receiving the next student loan payment until she has already been in China for over a month.  The problem with that is that she needs that money to pay for books, lodging and food for the first several weeks.  It isn’t a ton of money.  Just a few hundred dollars.  But it isn’t something she has readily available.
And the clock is ticking.  She is leaving in less than a week and needs to come up with the money IMMEDIATELY.
It is down to the wire.

Now, the reason I’m taking the initiative to do this is because of a few reasons:

1. She isn’t the sort of person who feels comfortable asking people for money.  I can relate to that.  I don’t like asking people for money either.  It is a very uncomfortable thing to do.  But I have NO problem asking on someon else’s behalf. Especially someone awesome like her.

2. It isn’t a hand-out.  It is just bad timing on the part of the student loan payment.  She isn’t needy or destitute, but she really could use help on fulfilling this part of her life.

3. She is an important person to me and I want to help her in any way I can.  I would give her the money myself if I had it, but I don’t.  So I’m reaching out to my extended network of friends, family and co-horts.

I have set up a donation button through paypal, which you can use to send whatever you like.  $2.  $5.  $20.  It doesn’t matter.  Every little bit helps.  And in this economy I’m well aware that it isn’t easy to scrape together money for something like this.

But if you can do it, I promise that it will go towards something worthwhile.  Not just the fulfillment of her dream of studying in China, but an opportunity to help educate and motivate someone to really excel at something they are really good at.

Her grades are top notch — she was on the Dean’s list every quarter she’s been back in school.  She is one of the smartest people I’ve ever known — literally.  She understands and knows Chinese culture so this isn’t someone who is just going for a fun year abroad — she is SERIOUS about studying Chinese and China.

And she really deserves this opportunity to study in China.

So, if you can, please help out.  I don’t want to sound like Sally Struthers getting food for kids in Africa, because it obviously isn’t as dire as that.  But to me this is important, and whenever we have a chance to help out someone fulfill their purpose in life, I think it is something worthwhile to be a part of.

Whatever you can do is very much appreciated.

THANK YOU!  XIE XIE!

L-R: Wang Fei, Wu Di, Jennifer, Wang Wei, Me