using chopsticks well; tragedy strikes

i know it's been a while since i rapped at you, but i wanted to wait until i had access to a working, and semi-clean, keyboard. these internet bars simply don't cut it. they are full of students playing online games or watching t.v. shows. people spend so much time in there, that some restaurants run a business of sending people through with carts of fried rice and other such things. also it's very dark. anyway, i've finally dragged my lazy butt over to the school's computer center, which is pretty small, but is deviod of people. probably because there is no counter-strike installed on these computers.

i'd like now to address the second part of my title today, so nobody stays worried throughout the rest of my post. i seem to have permanently misplaced my USB flash drive, which had all of the pictures i took while in beijing. so all that i am left with is the low quality versions i've put here, and some random stuff i've e-mailed to other people. but never fear, i've mostly gotten over it by now, and i remember what beijing looked like (crap). but what does that mean for my faithful readers? you'll have to wait a while to see any pictures while i sort myself out.

i think my favorite word in the chinese language is lihai, which directly translated means "fearsome." for example, you could say bruce lee is very lihai, which is probably the most appropriate usage of the word. however, you can also use the word to describe all sorts of things, or at least i like to. for example, someone's use of chopsticks can be lihai, as can the scenery. however, the most lihai thing that i can think of is clark's laziness.

my roommate is a pretty cool dude named Tang Yong. he's studying architecture here, but also likes to play soccer and take long walks on the beach. another thing he really likes is helping my incompetent ass out. it seems like we're gonna get along really well. last night he let me listen to some of his favorite chinese rock music, which is not bad considering the pop garbage that dominates here. i had him listen to my favorite song, "trailer trash" by modest mouse, and had fun trying to explain to him what "trailer trash" meant, as well as the title of the album, "the lonesome crowded west." he said that last semester he took a course on rock music, and the professor made them listen to "the wall" from start to finish on the roof of one of the buildings here one night.

well, today is another holiday here, and we're gonna try to go down to west lake (the major tourist draw in hangzhou) to look at some lamps or something. the weather has been really nice the last two days, and i took some pictures, but i'll write about all that next time. and because you all love us, our contact info is below:

Middlebury College School in China
Center for International Programs
Zhejiang University of Technology
Box # 1026
Number 6, Zhaohui District
Hangzhou, P.R.C. 310032

just stick anybody's name at the top of that. also, if you wish to call me, my phone number is 011-86-571-8881-7676. please be aware of the time difference if you do decide to spend a ridiculous amount of money to say hello. also, i am getting a fax line put in this weekend, so i'll get that to you as soon as possible (joke).

somebody remind me to pick up the bloc party debut album when i get back to the states.

he Friend of Your Enemy Is Not Your Friend, But Your Enemy

The title of this blog has been learned the hard way but at least it has finally been learned. This is about the part of the trip that Golze did not mention in his blog.

So sometime last week we left for Hangzhou, I didn’t remember the date but Golze has it in his blog. But if you really want to know when we got here, I have been here for 4 days now. You do the math. On the day that we left Beijing for Hangzhou there was just 11 of us. But it seemed like we had luggage that would have been suitable for about 23 of us. Personally I packed light for my trip to China, I packed enough that I could live out of one large backpack for several days. The only luggage I had for the trip to Hangzhou was my large backpack and to really small over the shoulder bags. All the stuff I had with me, I could carry myself. And for the most part the 11 of us who were going to Hangzhou on the train with me packed enough that they could carry their stuff themselves. However, not all the people who are here at Hangzhou came on the train with us, they chose to come from other places around china. And because these, for lack of a better clean word, jerkfaces do not know how to pack for a trip, they left half of their crap in Beijing and graciously giving us the duty to trains port their crap across china for them. And these people left huge ass suitcases for us to carry for them. They left more shit than I brought myself. I am not going to drop any names, but these are the most inconsiderate people I have ever came across. First because they left huge amounts of there crap for people to carry and secondly I have not gotten one thank you from anyone of these people. But moving on, because they left all their crap we had to carry it for them, something I was not going to do when I found out I had to do this. But unfortunately, their was a lot more bags than people so I was forced to transport one of Tixo’s heavy ass bags, but I am not going to drop any names. Putting all the bags on the bus to the train station was not hard. What was hard going up the stairs to the bridge that was the only way to cross the street. For some reason the bus driver could not park on the other side of the street where the train station was situated. I have also noticed that ever time I go somewhere in China stairs become a problem, Chinese stairs and me do not get along. So after negotiating the bridge stairs there are the stairs that lead to the train that we have get through. But before that Golze almost got killed but I will let him tell that story at his own leisure. So these stairs are a straight drop to the train. There was a time when I thought the bag that I was pulling was going to get away from me and smash all the little Chinese people below. It would have taken out like ten of them. It was a pretty big bag and these were pretty small people. But luckily I had no problems, but some of my classmates were not so lucky and either fall down the stairs or lost some bags or both. Once we finally go to the train we had to find places to put all of our stuff and all the other people’s stuff who did not come on the train with us. We ended up making a pretty cool fort in one of the “Ying Wo” (soft sleeper) areas that we had. It reminded me of my childhood days. There was so many bags that two people ended up having to share a bed for the 16 hour train ride, poor Joy and Jamie. But whatever, it wasn’t me sharing with someone, and that is all that matters. So to make a long story short we ended up having to carry all these people’s shit, who are ungrateful jerkfaces. And I also almost killed Golze with a bag that got away from me at the end of this trip. But lucky for him he was pulling two other bags that were not his, they slowed the runaway bag down and he didn’t die going down the stairs. But he was not pleased and gave me “The Golze Stare”. I thought he was going to kill with his eyes; it is a pretty scary stare.

So now we are in Hangzhou and it is really different from Beijing. The first thing that you notice coming here is that you are in a never-ending state of cold because all the hit systems if they have it suck. My room has the hit on full blast but it still is like 50 degrees in there. Another thing that is different is the food. It definitely has a different flavor, but hey in the end it is all Chinese food. Also another big difference is the way people talk here. They definitely use different words and have an accent that many of us are not used to. Sometime it is hard to understand them.

On note that is totally unrelated to anything remotely important, I am really feeling Usher’s music right now. It is probably because before today I only had a total of three CDs in China two being Usher’s (8701 and Confessions) and the other being a Chinese rapper’s CD that I cannot understand to save my life. Even though I don’t understand him it is still hot. He is like a mix of….of…. well he is not really a mix of anyone in the states, but it is still hot. But right now I am really feeling his Confessions CD, especially the song "Throwback". I don't that song is just speaking to me and so is the rest of the CD. Well, I am tired of writing about absolutely nothing so I am done with this blog and the blog about my trip is coming soon. Whenever this stupid computer let’s me access it and finish writing it.

And to all those that expect to talk to me on AIM, there is no AIM where I am in China. So you are going to have to talk to me the old fashion way, e-mail. Sorry.

...hello hangzhou

after an incredibly harrowing journey on the train, we have finally made it to hangzhou, which will be our home for the next three and a half months. so far, the place seems pretty nice, though right now it is cold and rainy. but there is also the color green, which i have not seen for some time. in beijing, there were some pine trees, but their color was more of a grey than a green. here there is grass!

we're staying at the zhejiang university of technology, which has a pretty large and nice campus, at least what i've seen of it. we're staying in the foreign students dormitory, which has pretty nice rooms, though also pretty cold rooms. it actually is pretty freakin cold here. sort of right on the line where you don't have to wear a hat and gloves, but the buildings aren't as uniformly heated as in beijing. i think it's because below a certain latitude, or maybe a river, in china, the government no longer provides free heat during the winter. so there is no heating here. except for the space heaters in the rooms of the foreign students dormitory, thank god.

our roommates move in this afternoon, so we're just killing time for now in an internet bar across the gate from the university. the staff here seems really nice. hopefully it will be better than last semester where the resident director just skipped out halfway through, apparently. anyway, here's hoping i get a good roommate.

My unforgettable, forgotten cab ride on Valentines Day.

I have only woken up drunk twice in my life and both times have been in China. And after last night I don’t think I am ever going to drunk again in my life, especially since Golze tried to kill me through alcohol poisoning. I am almost positive that Golze was trying to kill, I am not completely sure but nobody keeps feeding somebody that much alcohol unless they are trying to kill them. But before I get into how Golze tried to end my life. I have other things to write about.

So yesterday, I got back in to Beijing at 6:30 and the best thing happened too me. It was probably the first time ever that me being a minority has paid off. And it was freaking sweet. So after taking getting off the train Joy and I take a bus back to the school and because we have to our big backpacks with us we have to put them in the seat next to us. We get on the bus and have to buy tickets, I only have to buy on ticket, but Joy on the other hand has to buy two because the lady said that here bag was to big and taking up to much space. She didn’t even care about my bag. I thought this was the funniest thing ever. Joy was so unhappy about the situation. So I guess, the Chinese people thinking that I don’t look American has paid off.

After the bus ride we just went back to the school and slept because we were so tired. But after waking up and eating, Golze invited me and so other people to go out to a Chinese Punk Rock Concert at the “Shenme Ba” (The What Bar), which is about the size of a Battell dorm. Generally, I am not a fan of the Punk Rock but since I didn’t have anything better to do I went with him. But before we went to the Concert Golze had the bright idea of buying some “Bai Jiu” (it is the worst alcohol in the whole world, and the Chinese people love it) and two beers each. So before the Concert we shared a small bottle of Bai Jiu and had two beers each. By the time I Got to The Shenme Ba I had a nice buzz going. Even though the Shenme Ba was small it was still a pretty cool place. And the punk rock music was not bad even though they didn’t have their own drummer. Because they didn’t have their own drummer they invited every foreign they could to play the drums. So one of my class mates volunteered to play with them. She has no idea how to play the drums. But even though she had no idea how to play she still did a really good job. Maybe it is because Punk Rock music is not that complicated, I don’t really know why she did so well. But after she played three songs. This English guy comes out of no where and starts playing with the Chinese Punk Rockers. And he was hella good. But as the concert is going on Golze suggest to buy more drinks. He tells about this drink that is supposed to be really good, it is green tea and whisky. Unfortunately, the bar tenders had never heard of this drink so they let us make it ourselves. I have never tried and Golze had only had it once. Thus, we have no idea how to really make and how to make so it taste good. So we partially make the first one and Golze takes the first taste and says there is not enough whisky in it. Obviously, I trust what he says because is the only one who had this before. So when we are done making this drink we go back and sit down, and I take my first taste of this drink. It is the strongest drink ever made in the whole world. All you can taste is the alcohol. But like a trooper I drink all down. Then Golze goes and buys us some more drinks, this time he gets a gin and tonic. That has to be the gross old person drink ever in the history of the whole world. But I drank almost all of it before I passed it along. So at the Shenme Ba we meet some other foreigners and they invite us to go with them to some other bar. But before we go Golze suggest buying another small bottle of Bai Jiu. So we get the bottle of Bai Jiu and some Skittles to put in the Bai Jiu. He was idea to put the Skittles in the Bai Jiu to make it taste better. Hey, I was drunk at that point and it seemed like a good idea at the time. But let me tell you the Skittles did not make the Bai Jiu taste better at all. But when the bottle was finished it was nice to suck on some sweet hard Skittles. So at this next bar that we went, I think it was called the Black Sun bar but I am not to sure because I am really drunk at this point, so we sit down and the foreigners we are with buy us some shots. So we spend so time at this bar, I have no idea how much time. Time does not exist to me at this point. But since I didn’t want to drink anymore, I spent some time playing darts against this Chinese guy. I have to say I killed his “Pi Gu” (Butt). All those nights playing darts in Lacey and Matt Powers suit finally paid off. So after sometime we leave the bar, and get into a cab. And I get in to the front seat. Normally, the person who sits in the front is supposed to tell the taxi driver how to get back to the school. So spit out some words in Chinese on how to get back, whether or not he understood me, I am still not clear about. But some how the taxi driver takes us the front gate of the school. And this definitely not where I told him to go in Chinese. And I know Golze didn’t tell him how to get back because he was in the back sleeping and I was in the front in my own little world. So maybe Joy and Courtney told the taxi driver how to get back or maybe I did at some point. It is all unclear. But after getting out of the taxi, I did not say bye to anyone, all I did was go back to my room.

So today for some odd reason, even though this was my idea from yesterday, everyone wakes up around 10 a.m. and decides they want to go to the American breakfast place. I am still a sleep when the all decide that 10 a.m. is the best time to go. But like idiots, they wake me up and drag me along. I am not very happy that they changed my plan for two reasons. First the plan was when I woke up on my own free will we would go to American breakfast, and two I woke up still drunk. So I was in a very bad mode waking up this more. But even though I woke up in a bad mood, I am still glad they dragged me along because I love and miss American breakfast so much. So much. And I must say while I am writing this blog I am still a little drunk and it has been really really hard to write this. I keep losing my train of thought while I am writing. But now I am finally done writing so I am going to go to DQ and get some ice cream and crawl back into bed and pass out for the rest of my life.

This the part of the blog where I give shot outs to me friends.

I would like to say Happy Birthday to a couple of good friends:
Happy Birthday B.G.E. don’t drink to much for the 21
Happy 21 also to Julie, I am glad that your birthday went so well
Happy 21st Birthday to Skip too, keep up the good djing work and continue to hold down DMC.

And to all the DMC crew continue to make this semester the best one ever, so when I come back we can continue to do big things.

And to all the Nuns, continue to do the Nun thing, I really don’t know what you guys do, but continue to keep doing what you are doing. And bring me back something cool from London, I want something like the 6 off of Big Ben. The real 6.

And to Ann, I did put those pictures on your door. Hahahahaha.

To everyone you guys don’t need to worry about me because I am obviously smarter than the average bear.

Oh, yeah and the last entry to my Long March blog is coming soon. It will be coming out on February 16th, 2005.

so long beijing...

there's nothing like spending a sunday afternoon taking your kids to the military museum and letting them climb all over a tank. tomorrow's glorification of the military starts today!

we're heading down to hangzhou on wednesday afternoon, so you probably won't hear from me again until the end of the week. though maybe durrell will finally finish his stupid story about his trip. have you realized that he wrote two novel-length posts about the exact same period of time? where do i find these people...

The Long March Ended in a Threesome (The True Story of My Trip to Tai Shan, Qing Dao, and Da Tong) continued....

Since the Chinese Censor Bureau and the American Censor Bureau have threatened to end my blogging privileges and threatened to take a way my professional journalism licenses, the rest of my blogs will be toned down. Oh, and by Chinese Censor Bureau, I mean Golze (he has all the administrative on our blog, so he thinks he is Mao Ze Dong or something), and by American Censor Bureau, I mean my mom (she controls all the cash flow in my life, so enough said). I also would like to apologize again to all the parents who are reading this and to all the little kids I let down with my inappropriate language. I don't want anyone to forget, I do it for the kids. Because children are our future.

So now, let me continue from where I last left off, Tai Shan has a lot stairs. At first you don't notice how many stairs there are because the scenery is beautiful and there are many things to see along the way. I think my favorite thing that I saw before I realized that there are like a million stairs on that mountain was the Dragon tree. This is a tree that has some how grown together in to what the Chinese say is a shape of a Dragon. To me it didn't really look like a dragon but it still looked cool anyway. While this was my favorite thing before the stairs almost killed me, there was other interesting stuff that we saw a long the way. For example, Tai Shan is loaded with lots of temples. Because we were climbing on Chun Jie the temples were very lively and interesting. My favorite temple was the one right after the dragon trees, not because it was particularly interesting but because there was this one really funny guy there that had the "you speak so well conversation" with us, but in reverse.

The "you speak so well" conversation is a conversation that every Chinese person has with you once they figure out that you speak Chinese. If you are a Chinese student you will know what I am talking about, and if you are not maybe you won't find this funny or interesting at all. First you say a sentence in Chinese then a set of about two, three, maybe even four questions follow, the dialogue normally goes like this. "Oh, you speak question?" The normal reply is, "Yes." "What country are you from?" The normal reply is, "America." Then next thing they normally say is you speak so well. The normal reply is, "Of course." Or for more modest people, the reply is, "Something on the lines of Thanks or No my Chinese sucks." Then they sometime ask you next, "how years have you studied or how long have you been in China?" This reply varies. But it is always followed by, "wow, you speak so well." So that is the "you speak so well conversation." It was funny having the "you speak so will conversation with this guy in reverse, is one he obviously speaks chinese and he is obviously a chinese person, and two he knew all the standard replies. Re-reading what I just wrote, I don't think I explained this very clearly, but if you are a Chinese student that has ever had this conversation you would understand, how funny this was.

Back to The Long March, as I was saying before the march was pleasant and beautiful at first. It was even slightly snowing on our way up, to add more beauty to the climb. The fact that it was slightly snowing probably made our climb warmer than golzes. Just because of the fact that it was warm enough to snow. People who know me may think that I am being sarcastic right now, but I am so serious, the snow made it even more beautiful. I must say that I am not the outdoors type and more comfortable in the city, but at this point the climb was very.....ah...very...cool. I can't think of a better word that I can spell right now. However, once we reached the gate that had the trees growing the stairs started to get...um...since I am being censored, let's just say annoying. And at that point we had not even reached the halfway point. The halfway point did not coming until about 800 stairs later. 800 hundred stairs doesn't sound like a lot especially when you have to climb 6600 stairs. But let me tell you, with our backpacks and having already climbed like 12 million before that, I thought I was going to die by the time we reached the top. But once we finally reached the middle gate I was so happy. Then reality set in and I realized that that was only the halfway point and there was still more stairs to come. I swear I could have cried right then. But then I toughened up, fixed my backpack straps, and complained the rest of the way to the top. Since this part of the trip is all a blur in my mind, I am going to fast forwarded through this part. On the way up to the top from the middle gate, there was more stones with famous carvings in them, one really cool looking tree, majestic views, more temples, and one of the longest steepest stair cases with the tiniest stairs I have ever seen in my life. Let's pause here for a moment. This stair case from the bottom looks beautiful. It is hard to believe that man made it. It is also the last staircase before you reach the top of the mountain. It has about 1,600 stairs. I felt like a giant on each step, it was definitely not made for my feet. Each step I took, I thought I was going to fall all the was back down to the bottom. But climbing each and everyone of those stairs was worth it, once I reached the top. Reaching the top, was one of the greatest feelings I have ever had. My happiest about reaching the top did not last long, as I was bombarded by people trying to get me to sleep in there hotel for the night. But once I got away from them, the feeling of glory and victory quickly returned. Until, I reached the hotel that we would be staying for the night.

As my time at the internet cafe is quickly running out again, I have to end here. But I promise the next post that I have will be the last one concerning this trip. Which is good because by time I am able to blog again, I will be back at CET and my trip will finally be over.

This part is for my dad. Happy Birthday 48th Big Head, my you have many more. Man, you are getting old.

And to Ann, I don't know who did it, but it wasn't me.

bian POW!!!!1

in beijing, setting off fireworks (fa bian pao) is illegal, for obvious reasons. you don't want 15 million people recklessly launching highly flammable explosives in a dense urban area. however, that law only applies within the fifth ring road, the fifth highway that circles the city. so, guess where all 15 million people go to set off fireworks on the chinese new year: immediately outside the fifth ring road. and, since i'm writing this introduction, guess where i was on new year's eve. that's right, immediately outside the fifth ring road.

for reasons i won't go into in this blog post, i ended up about a mile outside the fifth ring road at 11:45 pm on new year's eve with a recently divorced chinese lawyer, four chinese people i didn't know, one of which was a doctor, and a korean-canadian diplomat from montreal with one leg in a full cast. a motley crew to be sure. immediately after passing under the highway, it was like world war iii. people were running everywhere, we had to swerve around enormous strings of firecrackers in the middle of the street, fireworks bouncing of buildings, etc. i don't know how, but some chinese people got their hands on some pretty serious ordinance. some of the explosions literally shook the ground. the above picture is fireworks bursting on the horizon.

needless to say, we had our own large cardboard box filled with with explosives. of course, before setting anything off, the chinese folks in our group decided it would be a good idea to start smoking. that is why, in the picture below, i am using a cigarette to light a rather exciting collection of fireworks. one of the tubes decided that vertical was not its preferred trajectory, and instead choose a more horizontal flavor. the damn thing ended up bursting about ten feet away, after bouncing off own of our cars.

all in all, a very fun time. here's your parting shot, beijing at sunset on new year's day.

The Long March Ended in a Threesome (The True Story of My Trip to Taishan, Qingdao, and Datong)

I don't really remember where I last left off, but I do remember I was angry. Well, I am not angry anymore and this trip has been pretty awesome. It has been the perfect thing to easy my mind. Since, I do not remember where I last left off, I will start at the beginning of our journey, which was the Beijing Train Station.

At the start of this trip it was Joy, Xiao Mei, and I, we where three lonely souls looking for a fantastic adventure. And right from the start we got it. Let me tell you, the Beijing Train Station before Chun Jie is ridiculously crowded. There are people everywhere, there is even a Chinese proverb for this experience (Ren Shan Ren Hai, it means people are everywhere from the mountain to the sea). Battling to get on the train was tough because everyone is trying to get on the train at the same time. People are pushing this way and that. I have played at least ten years of football, and it definitely did not prepare me for this experience. As people started to throw me out the way and I was not getting any closer to the front, I toughened up, and at one point I almost took out a little Chinese lady. Joy has a good picture of me beasting this little China lady. It is not really funny, but it was her or me, and let me tell you she had it coming. It was hard to get through the people, but once you got through it was easy to get on the train. And for lack of a better word the train was fucking sweet. We went with the more upscale part of the train and chose Ying Wo (Hard Sleeper). Ying Wo is a compartment with six beds, three on each side. I don't know how to explain how nice Ying Wo is but take my word for it, it is nice. And out of all the trains I took this was the nicest one. Oh, by the way we are taking this train to Tai An, the city that Tai Shan is in and if you don't know, Tai Shan is a mountain (in Chinese Shan means mountain). So, yeah, I lost my train of thought. Something about trains and riding on them. Ok, so we where in Ying Wo and the people that we were riding with were all very interested in us because we were Wai Guo Ren (Foreingers). A word of advise if you are a foreinger in China people will be very interested in you, and often the will stare at you for copious amounts of time, to the point that you will feel uncomfortable. I am so glad that I cut off my afro, because if I didn't have it people would definitely stare at me more. Right now, because I cut my hair, I can semi-blend in. People think I am Asian so they don't stare at me as much when I am by myself. They tend to think I am Malayasian or Indian or some other Asian, I have even got a couple of Chinese. But when I am with Joy people know right away I am a foreigner and they tend to stare at us even more. Inparticularly, Joy, she has brought us a lot of attention. I would just like to say right now, thanks Joy. At times this attention is very helpful and gets us the things we want (there we will be an example of this later in the story when I meet my train friend) and a lot the time it is unwanted and makes us feel uncomfortable. The fact that Joy and I can speak Chinese has only caused to be bring more attention upon ourselves. I like the fact that everyone says that we speak Chinese well, but sometimes when they find out that we speak Chinese all they do is want to talk to us. And speaking Chinese is hard if you didn't know and takes a lot of concentration, and when you are tired you just don't want to speak in Chinese. Maybe I am just lazy. However, this trip has definitely increased my Chinese speaking skills and even though it is tring at times I still like speaking in Chinese. But on this first train the attention was kind of cool and we meet some pretty cool people in our Ying Wo area. There was even one Chinese guy that could speak English. It was a good experience for our first train ride in China. Talking with those people just makes you realize how friend and helpful Chinese people are. I don't really want to get in to anymore details about this train ride because there are much more to come in this story and what I think was a much more interesting one. Also my time is running out at this internet bar and I have not even talked about my threesome experience on the top of Tai Shan.

So moving on, we caught the 10:00 am train to Tai An and did not arrive in Tai An until about 5:30 pm. When we got there the first thing we did was buy our tickets to Qing Dao, which was Joy and My next destination. Xiao Mei went to Ji Nan, Xiao Mei is a cool girl and everything but we were ready to part was from here once we got down from the mountain. But that is another story. Back to Tai An, we bought tickets and then we went to our hotel. The hotel was super sweet. I loved it. At that point it was the best place that I had stayed in China. To bad it was just one night. But the hotel had free dry cleaning and soft beds and what I later found out is the most important thing that you want from a hotel in China in the middle of winter. It had a good, check that, great heating system. At this time I didn't realize how important a good heating system is but through an unfortunate turn of events I would later find out. But at the time the thing that I would say that we all were most impressed with was the clean ass bathroom. At our dorm in Beijing, lets just say that our bathrooms are less than clean, but the heating system works fine. So once we finished getting settled in and finished being awestruck by the hotel, we went out to eat. One thing that I have learned from this eating experience is that one you should not go to Tai An expecting to eat good food, and two don't go to the beef place expecting good chicken or even other good dishes for that matter. Because in China it doesn't happen that way. So if you go to the beef place you should get some beef. Just a word of advice. After the eating and going to the internet cafe where I got to read some interesting emails, that I still have not quite had the chance to reply to, we went back to the hotel and took some hot ass showers in our clean ass bathroom. After the showers, it was time for some shut eye and we just prepared for the next day. That was Saturday, the 7th.

On Sunday the 8th, we prepared to climb Tai Shan and we began our Long March. Lucky for us, the base of the mountain was only a few blocks from our hotel. Before I begin, I would have to say that the best thing that I bought before coming to China was my travel backpack. It is so convenient and makes caring your stuff so easy. However, when climbing a mountian with all your crap on your back, your travel back becomes your worse enemy. At one point on the trip up, I just wanted to leave my bag behind. Let me explain why, Tai Shan is a mountain with a fucking ridiculously long ass staircase to the top. There are about 6600 steps to the top. I know because I counted everyone of them and steped on everyone. These are not the type of stairs that you take two at a time, especially when it is snowing. But that is getting a head of myself and I need to start at the beginning. So at the beginning of the trip everyone was happy and excited to climb the mountain. We even slept in until 10:30 am so that we could be well rested. We started the climb at about 11:15. So from the hotel there is a hill that leads up to the base of the mountain. Normally on this hill before you get to the base of the mountain, you can buy hot food of some sort. But because it was Chun Jie, there were absolutely no stores open. Lucky for us, we ran into this little girl that was making these pancake looking things. However they didn't taste like pancakes. They tasted more like a big ass pringle with out the salt but just as dry. But because there was no other stores open the big ass pringle hit the spot. After we all gobbled down our big ass pringles, we started our clean to the top. On Tai Shan, there are several gates, the most important are the First Gate to Heaven, The Middle Gate to Heaven, and South Gate to Heaven. At the First Gate to Heaven, everyone was excited, ready to climb, thinking this is going to be the greatest adventure ever. At first when we were climbing the stairs were not really a problem. We thought that if the stairs are like this, this climb is going to be easy. Later, we realized that our thinking was rather in correct. But before, we came to this realization, the climb was very enjoyable. According to Joy, "Tai Shan is the number one most holiest mountain Daoist place thing in China". So there was a lot to see on our way up the mountain. Tai Shan is known for having all those rocks with famous writings in them. I took a lot of pictures of those. You can see them when I get back or something. Also on the way up are a lot of cool temples and some roasters. But the worst thing that you see a lot are the fucking stairs. There a lot of stairs to the top of this mountain. I personally believe more than necessary. But since my time is running out in this internet cafe I am going to have to leave off here.

Highlights to come, the stairs and more stairs, a unusal threesome, the city by the sea, and Buddhas hiding in caves.

Tune in next time, same bat time same bat channel. And I am out.

the monkey's last days

so, everybody has left me here alone in beijing. other people you may or may not know from middlebury are currently galavanting around the frozen wastelands of china in the winter, while i sit here in the frozen wastelands of beijing. see below for an example.

i took that picture while standing in the middle of a frozen lake in a beijing park. there were guys fishing in the ice, pulling up guppies every now and then. we talked to them for a while, and one said that the city government doesn't like them doing that, and that he was nervous because we were foreigners who for some reason would broadcast to the world what they were doing. i guess i proved him right.

so i've been reduced to consorting with the lowly remaining students here, many of whom are not even from Middlebury!! *gasp* last night a bunch of us went to a bar on a popular bar street called sanlitun. actually, the bar is not actually on sanlitun road, but an alley nearby. I went there the first weekend, and there were at least a dozen bars and discos, etc. last night there were two bars. today there is one bar. beijing has for several years been threatening to shut the area down, and it looks like they finally got around to it. i went to one bar one night the first weekend, and now there is just a pile of rubble. it's pretty incredible.

in any event, i'm planning to get up early tomorrow morning to watch the superbowl (7 a.m.). i will make it a point to post once again before the new year, but if i don't catch you before then, xin nian kaui le, which means happy new year. so you can rock that on the 9th. welcome in the year of the rooster. in the meantime, here's a picture of the new beijing west railroad station.

Venting All My Anger and Some Weekend Plans

I think that the culture shock has hit me, because I seem to get pissed off real easily or maybe it's just the fact that the person that I thought was my good friend has continually let me down. And no, I am not talking about that dumb broad. So this whole China experience has caused me to have a new outlook on life. And from now on I am going to have a f*** you pay me attitude. It is time that I start looking out for me, and f*** everyone else.

Ok, that is enough of venting my anger. So this week we tried countless time to buy tickets to go to a mountain called Tai Shan. On Monday we started trying to buy tickets for this adventure, but every time we tried to buy tickets the ticket people wouldn’t sell them to us, things were looking real bleak. But finally on Friday, we had success and bought three tickets for Saturday morning to Tai Shan. This is the same place that Golze went to. Originally, there was supposed to be six people going on this adventure, but at the last minute Clark, Jamie, and Cahill dropped out; so it is just me, Joy, and Xiao Mei (an American student that is only 18, Xiao Mei means little sister) on this adventure. Today we arrived in Tai Shan at 4:30 and tomorrow we will climb the mountain. We plan to stay the night at the top to see the sunset and sunrise. It is supposed to be really beautiful and since we have to wake up really early on Monday morning to see the sunrise maybe, if we are lucky we will be able to find a place to watch the Super Bowl. The one thing that I hope about the hike is that it is not as cold as Golze said it was. But whatever I am tough like nails.

After we finish climbing the mountain, Joy and I plan to go to Qing Dao and celebrate Chun Jie (Spring Festival, Clark has a good blog about this, oh, wait that is Golze that has a good blog about this because Clark doesn’t write blogs) with Joy’s ex-Chinese roommate’s family. Qing Dao is on the coast of China so they are supposed to have some really good seafood. I can’t wait to try it. After the Chun Jie holiday, Joy and I will go to Da Tong in the Shan Xi province and look at the famous Hanging Temple and caves. I will explain more about these places once I go. Because I actually don’t know much about where I am going. Joy was like do you want to go here and here and I was like I don’t really know where here and here is but sure, so that is what I am doing now.

Sorry for all the angry words. But I had to vent my anger somewhere. So if you didn’t like it deal with it. Except if you are like an adult or my parents and stuff then sorry, and if you are anyone else reading this blog sorry.

50 marco polos

first off, i'd like to say that durrell is a blogging machine. i had no idea he'd be such an assest when i added him on. i'd also like to say that those last two blogs were perhaps the funniest things i have ever read. durrell, you're an inspiration to our entire organization. he even makes up for clark's enormous laziness.

so we just had our graduation ceremony, j-term is over, and we're speaking english again. we just had an amazing lunch at the marco polo hotel, and i ate wayyyyy too much, so i'm about to go lay down for a while. one cool note, we got graduation certificates from the people's republic of china. ok, it sounded cool before i wrote it.

My Own Introduction (even though it is pretty late and I hope that you all already know me and stuff)

I have just finished reading the introduction to this blog and it fails to mention the most important person participating in these blogs, namely me. Since the two jerkfaces that started this blog did not invite me to blog with them until we reached China, I happen to not be in the introduction. So this is my introduction. The most interesting thing about the introduction, is that Clark fails to mention the real reason that he began to study Chinese. But before I tell this story, allow me to introduce myself, my name is Ma Du and those other guys will be with me in China for most of my time here. Okay, enough with the intro. And back to why Clark began to study Chinese.

I have known Clark since freshmen year of college. Unfortunately, we were paired up to be roommates freshman year. But since I can deal with any situation that I am put in I made the best of it and it worked out fine. So after we have gone through all the orientation and all the coming into college introduction stuff, it is time to finally chose classes. Clark has no idea what he wants to do, he is freaking out. He starts doing the normal Clark thing and making lists and drawing maps and basically trying to plan out his whole life by the first four classes he takes in college. Clark is like a scared little rabbit. I swear he was about to wet his pants. But anyway, I tell Clark hey I think I am going to take Chinese and I think I am probably going to be a IP&E major. The next thing I know, Clark is like hey, “I want to do that too. He is like Ma Du, your so cool, I am so glad you are my roommate. From now on whatever you do, I am doing to do too.” And the rest is history. He is now studying aboard with me in Beijing and Hangzhou and also has the same major as me. But would I say that Clark’s a follower. I don’t know but I think I would say vote Pedro for president.

When in China, Don't Lie about Being an American.

So apparently that old ancient Chinese proverb about newspapers and toilets doesn’t exist. Damn it Clark, always making things up.

So about my day, which also includes a great story about Clark. Clark, Joy, Golze, Cahill, Jamie, and I all made plans to go see the body today. When getting off the subway we pass by the Chinese Museum of History, outside of the place is a Chinese women. When she sees us she automatically knows that we are American, so she comes right up to us and begins speaking in English and trying to get us to go into some exhibition art exhibit place, where they are probably going to try and sell us something. So, as she is speaking in English we start to speak in Chinese. And Clark says, using Chinese, “I can’t speak English”. So the lady continues to speak to us in Chinese and is trying to get us to go in to the exhibit place. Finally, she asks us, in Chinese, “Where are you from?”. Clark responds, in Chinese, “We are from France”. I was about to tell her that we were from Malaysia but then I realized I could not do that because Clark was with me. I know I do not look Malaysian, but a Chinese person has asked me before if I was from Malaysia, so in China I can pass. But anyway, once Clark told this lady that we were from France, she began to speak in what I think was perfect French. I don’t speak French so I don’t know. But anyway she started speaking in French and Clark’s only response was “Wee”. At that point we could only walk a way fast, because she either knew that we didn’t speak French or we made her incredibly sad because she thought her French was bad. But it was the funniest things that I have experienced since I have been in China. So a word of advise when in China don’t lie about being an American. Say that you are from the Netherlands. I mean who speaks Netherlandish, in any country.

After that awesome experience, we all went to see the body. To our surprise it was free. At one point we thought the Chinese Army was going to arrest us for not paying. But lucky we blended in with the rest of the Chinese people and got by with out paying. At least we thought that was what was happening but in reality it was free. When you are going to see the body, you have to standing in a line of four across with a million other people. After that, they slow escort you into the building. But the first stop is a place you can buy flowers. After that you ascend some stairs and start to enter the building where the body is. The first thing that you see is this statue of Mao Ze Dong sitting in a chair. It looks like the statue of Abraham Lincoln in Washington D.C. You know that one statue where he is sitting down in the chair and it is really famous and he is sitting, in a chair. So yeah, it looked like that. At the base of the statue is a table and that is where everyone put the flowers. We think that after the tour is over, the army people collect all these flowers and sell them to the next group of tourist that come through. So after that, you turn two corners and there is the body. He is in this dark room in a glass case with a bright ass light shining on his face. He looks kind of scary. You can only get about 5 feet next to him. I didn’t have my glasses and I have only seen pictures of this man. But he didn’t look like the Mao Ze Dong from the pictures. And he didn’t look real. We all think it was a fake and the real Mao Ze Dong is buried in the ground some where. I mean it has to be against some Chinese custom or something to not bury people. I mean putting them on display like has to break some Chinese traditional code or something. So, I am pretty sure it was a fake, like a wax body or clay or something else that you can make fake bodies out of. I would like to show you pictures but they don’t allow you take picture of the body. Probably because then people would really know it was a fake.

After seeing the body we went to a Muslim Mosque. The Muslim Mosque looked a lot like the Buddhist and Daoist temples that I have already been to. The name of the place is “Niu Jie Mosque.” It is a really famous Mosques in China and against the world. Apparently Mohammad Ali has been there. So guess it is pretty famous. The best part of the Mosque was when this Chinese guy started calling everybody to come and pray. He was singing something I could not understand, Clark has it on video, but It was really cool because everyone started to gather behind him and it sounded beautiful. As he was finishing every started to go and begin there praying ceremony. I don’t feel that my words can really explain how cool it was to see. Maybe if Clark ever decides he wants to post a blog, he might be able to describe the experience a little better.

Well after going to the Mosque we went to this Muslim restaurant nearby. The only reason I want to describe it is because we ordered this dish that we have never tried before and I want to remember the name. Normally when we go out we order a dish called Gong Bao Ji Ding (Kong Pow Chicken) and we are all sick of eating it because we have it almost everyday. But today we had a new dish, called Jiang Bao Ji Ding. I don’t think that you can get this stuff in the States, it is hella good though. Another thing about the food here that has really surprised me, is that I have not seen one egg roll since I have been here. At home when I think of Chinese food, I think of fried rice and egg rolls. But I guess that is a Chinese American thing. Who would have thought.

Something you guys should know, because maybe you don’t know this. But because the Chinese government has some conspiracy against our blog: Clark, Golze, and I can not see the comments that you write. So if you read our blogs and have interesting comments that you want us to respond to. Maybe you should email us. Because right now, I know that like only three people read our blogs.

And another thing that you should know is that, I keep a dollar worth of dimes, because pimpin’, it ain’t easy.

Are you serious

I have great news, everyday my la duzi is getting better and better. Even my appetite has increased a lot. In no time I will be able to gain back all those pounds I lost. Pretty soon my belly will be as big as my dad’s.

On an unrelated topic, something in China that I have seen quite often and I think I will never be able to get used to are kids on the street doing Da Bian (dropping a duce). It is the weirdest thing. All of a sudden you will be walking and there will this kid right in front of you doing Da Bian. The little kids here wear split pants; those are pants with big splits in the back, just for this purpose. I guess Huggies are too expensive or something. And one thing I don’t understand is how do these little kids, literally, not freeze their butts off with those big splits in the back of their pants. Because I have no holes in my clothes and I am freezing whenever I go outside. Even though this is weird, I have seen an even weirder version of this scenario. I was walking. Not really paying attention to what I was doing. When suddenly I almost bump into this little kid. She was squatting over a newspaper in the middle of the street. And I thought who she is paper-trained. They paper train kids here like they are dogs. I could not believe it. But thinking back, if you can train a little kid to use the bathroom on a newspaper, why can’t you train them to use the bathroom on the toilet? This is a conundrum. I guess it comes down to an old ancient Chinese proverb, “one newspaper equals a hundred toilets”.

This experience with these little kid reminds me of my friend, Caitlin. What's up Caitlin this is your shot out.

Well, so what have I been up to? I guess the answer to that question is absolutely nothing. I tried to see Mao Ze Dong’s body but the place was closed. If you don’t know who Mao Ze Dong is, you need to read a book. But today I plan to go see the body again. I report on how it looks when I come back.

This is Ma Du from China. Over and out.

"more like the south gate to freeze-ville..."

so i'm trying to remember where i left off. i guess i hadn't started climbing the mountain yet. so, the five of us set off up the hill at a leisurely pace. here's a picture of our friend/guide at the lower part of the "trail," which is actually a well maintained stone path.

at this point we're resting near the jing shiyu i believe it's called, which is a series of Daoist riddles carved into a rock face near a stream. even our guide couldn't read most of it, cause it was written so long ago, so i have no idea what it says, but those Daoists are known to be crafty devils. there are these types of things carved all along the path, none of which i can read.

this next picture is taken at the half-way point, appropriately titled "halfway gate to heaven." you can see a slight discoloration in the saddle in the mountains beyond. that is where the road leads. here it started to get a bit cold and a bit windy. but we were still pretty warm from climbing so much.

in the states, if someone builds a trail up a mountain they use switchbacks, and a lot of them, to make the slope a bit easier. in canada, they perhaps put one switchback in where we would use twenty. in china, they just build a big freakin' staircase. the following picture shows the part of the trail called shiba wan, which means eighteen turns, but they use the term "turn" losely here. it climbs about 600 meters in what is essentially a straight shot to the south gate to heaven.

now i consider myself a pretty accomplished hiker, but this mountain absolutely killed me. here is the four of us looking happy and warm and without a clue of the horrors that would await us at the top.

my pictures at the top are few and far between, as i tried to avoid taking my hands out of my gloves as much as possible. it was damn cold. we stopped at a restaurant at the top for a bite to eat and to warm up (there's essentially a city up there). they brought out some dishes that could be considered lukewarm at best, but were still steaming because it was so cold. the china has some pretty nasty loos, and tai shan was no exception. let's just say that if they weren't heating the restaurant, they definitely weren't heating the bathrooms, which means no running water. for at least two months. in any event, here's on of the pictures from the top.

so we descended in a rush, or as fast as possible without destroying our knees. at the bottom, hai miao took us to a restaurant he knew to kill time and eat dinner before our train came. hai miao is a muslim, so we went to a xinjiang restaurant (xinjiang is the western-most semi-autonomous province in china). interesting note, when the four of us walking in the restaurant, the owner thought we were all from xinjiang, because the natives there look vaugely eurasian. in any event, here is a picture of trevor eating a chicken head. he had lost some sort of contest but i don't remember what it was.

so we eventually ditched a the restaurant and camped out in the local KFC, where we had ice cream. the vanilla flavor in china is not actually vanilla at all, but tastes vaugely of soybeans. i actually prefer it to regular vanilla. at that point, one of the guys looked at his ticket and realized that the date printed was for the next night. we freaked out but hai miao quickly assured us that it only said that because they were student tickets, so we could travel on either day. we headed over to the train station to wait for the train. our plan, since we had standing tickets, was to sit in the dining car and eat very very slowly, but we got to the car and found all the conducters sitting there. they said they had a soft sleeper available. now that is the way to travel. you get your own compartment with four beds. so we crashed for seven hours, got back to beijing, and i promptly fell asleep again for another seven hours. i'll be honest, i'm getting tired of all this typing so i'll just leave it at that. if you have any questions, send me an e-mail.

Love, BEN

p.s. clark says he hates you all.
oh yeah, by climbing tai shan, legend has it that i'll live to be 100. how's that for an accomplishment while abroad?

How Could This Have Happened?

Yesterday I shaved my head and my face for the first time in a long time. After looking in the mirror, I realized how skinny have gotten because I have not been eating and I have been walking everywhere. If you have ever seen the movie fight club, there is this seen where is in the aid comfort group and there is this girl dying of aids and all see wants to do is hook up one last time. Well, I look like that girl. My face is so skinny now, I kind of look like a whole different person, but in a bad way because I look sickly. This weather has not helped my skin complexion at all. I am already really light but now I look pale. But, on a good note, my la duzi is almost gone. I have been able to eat more and more so I probably will gain all this weight back pretty quickly. So don’t even trip, I am doing fine.

So what have I been up to lately, let me think. Oh Sunday! Sunday I went to eat an American breakfast with Clark, Cahill, Jamie, and Joy. It was so good too. Even though my pancakes were burn, the milk taste like cream, and it was really expensive, it was still all worth it. It was so good eating American food. When the syrup hit my lips, oh gosh, I was in heaven. I really miss Middlebury’s weekend brunch. If I could bring one thing to China it would be Middlebury’s weekend brunch. I didn’t realized just how much I missed American food until I went there. I mean, I was missing it, but that just made realize how eating Chinese good everyday is going to start to get tiresome. But what can you do? So anyway after breakfast we went to this ancient Chinese observatory. It was a place in ancient times where they looked at the stars. The place could have been really interesting but all the signs for everything was in Chinese, so I did not really now what I was looking at. But it seemed like some pretty cool stuff. And the signs that were in English, they were using really big words so I did not understand. Right now I my English, if I am lucky, might be at a fourth grade level. But I have no real use for English anyway. After the observatory, Clark, Cahill and I went to this place called Bai Yun Yuan (White Could Temple). Joy and Jamie went to the hospital but that is their story. All I have to say is there is karma in the world. It was a pretty cool place. It might have to be the world’s best Daoist Temple. But Clark, told me like anyone could even know that. Clark’s a jerkface. Anyway, this Temple had a lot statues, paintings, and buildings. It was like most other temples but with a Daoist feel to it, kind like you might have found back in the hippy era. It was interesting though. If I learn how to put pictures on this thing you might get see some of this cool stuff. But that will probably never happen. On our way out of the temple we met this Chinese guy and I think his girl friend, she didn’t really talk to use. This Chinese guy was hella nice. He just started having a conversation with us about China and America. As we were walking we told him we were going to the Subway, but he was like no don’t do that because the subway is hella far and the stop we were going to get off at is hella far from our school. So he showed us how to catch the bus. I have to say the Chinese people are so nice. I know I would not have done something like that, but hey that’s just me. I am just like that. After leaving there we went back to CET and meet up with Clark’s roommate and Wang Wei Feng. We all went to eat Hou Guo (Hot Pot). It is this thing that has a spicy side and not spicy side and you dip raw meet in it and let it cook and soak up all the flavor. It was really good. But the best part of the story is the next day. When Cahill and Clark got sick. I say this because I am not a mean person. But Clark and Cahill have been making fun of me ever since I have gotten la duzi. And now finally they are feeling the effects and that is so great. I love karma. So that was Sunday.

On Monday, Jamie and I went to the flag ceremony at Tiananmen Square. Let me tell you, it was freaking freezing. I thought my hands were going to fall off. These gloves that I bought in China are no help against the cold. The only reason I bought these things, is because they were the only gloves in China that fit my hands. Other than the fact they fit on my hands, I probably would not really call them gloves. These gloves could not even keep a cool breeze out. So anyway it was freezing. I think the best part about us going to Tiananmen was the way the cab driver ripped us off. I don’t know for sure if he ripped us off but I am pretty sure that he “GuYi RaoDao”(took us the long way) us. I swear it should have been a 15-minute cab ride, but it was more like 30 minutes. The second best part us going to Tiananmen was the fact that we got there an early to stand in the cold and wait for the flag ceremony to start. The reason that we got there so early was that one of the Chinese roommates told us that the thing start at 4:30 but it really started at 5:30. This is also the reason that we jump in a cab because we thought we were going to be late. Unfortunately we weren’t. However, I must say that once the ceremony started it was kind of cool. Like 20 Chinese army men march out of Tiananmen gate with their guns and all marching to the same beat. And I know this sounds bad, but they all look the same. They are all the same height and all their clothes are perfectly in place. When they take flag down and tie it is the best part, because they do it so quickly and tie the flag in some type of super not that I can’t even explain. This ceremony takes place everyday at sundown and sunrise. So if you are ever in Beijing, I think it is something that is worth seeing.

a hard seat to tai'an

this weekend i went on a trip to Taishan, a mountain in Shandong province about seven hours from beijing. we left friday night, climbed the mountain on saturday, and came back sunday night. i went with my chinese roommate, and three guys from kalamazoo college who studied here in the fall. it was without a doubt the most frustrating, interesting, tiring, exciting, painful, and fun experience i've had in china so far.

chinese trains have four types of tickets: yingzuo, ruanzuo, yingwo, and ruanwo (hard seat, soft seat, hard sleeper, and soft sleeper). the prices increase as the quality of the ticket increases. the ride to Tai'an, the city at the base of Taishan, is only about seven hours from beijing, so we got hard seat tickets for about eight dollars each.

the lunar (chinese) new year is on february eighth (i think). the holiday is, from what i can gather, a mixture of thanksgiving, christmas, new years, and the fourth of july (there is a particularly good quote about this in Full Metal Jacket, Tet being the veitnamese version of the lunar new year). In any event, the holiday travel rush started last week, so right now there are several hunder million chinese people trying to go home to spend the holiday with their families, and most of them travel by train. and the hard seat is the cheapest ticket. and we bought hard seat tickets.

needless to say, the train was ridiculous. the difference between hard and soft seat is not that one seat is hard (they're both padded), but that in the train stations continuously sell standing tickets. there already were people standed when we got on in beijing, we had to kick people out of our seats, and more got on at every stop. there were a lot of people. i ended up sitting next to across from three girls heading home from beijing and next to a soldier also going home. i talked with the girls only a little, they kept playing tapes of themselves signing pop songs, and was going to ask them if they were all sisters when i realized that was an extremely stupid question. so i just shut up after that.

in total i got about an hour and a half of sleep, i think, broken up into fifteen minute segments. the girls had this enormous bag on the floor between us, so i either had to prop my feet up on it or bend them back underneath the seat. at one point, these women came down the isle, squeezing between the people sitting or standing there, trying to sell dried chicken, a Shandong speciality. they tried to sell me some beer. i didn't buy any.

we got to Tai'an at 5:30 in the morning, when it was still dark, and after following my absent minded roommate around in a circle, we got in a cab and asked him to take us to an open restaurant. we went to a horrible fast food joint with the most disgusting dumplings i've ever had and i had a pretty good bowl of warm soy milk (doujiang, i think). we ditched that place once it got light out and went to mcdonald's (maidanglao) where we had coffee and used the extremely clean and nice bathrooms (quite the opposite of the states). there we waited for my roommate's friend, Hai Miao, who eventually went up the mountain with us (my roommate took off and went home, the lazy jerk).

christ i've written a lot already, and i haven't even started climbing the mountain yet. i guess i'll break this post up into two parts. oh, before i forget, just a little teaser for next time, usually you can only buy your return ticket at the station you are returning from, so when we got to Tai'an and went to get our tickets, we discovered that they only had standing tickets (buying a ticket like that at this time of year is like going to the airport and trying to buy a ticket on the day before thanksgiving). so we bought standing tickets for the seven hour train ride back.

below is another of the crazy chinese translations that i've seen. the word for "caution" is mistranslated as "anger." in any event, the stone described was nothing to get worked up about.

i hear that the pictures may be too big for the format of the blog, though firefox is handling it much better than internet explorer. let me know what's up and i'll size future pictures down if it helps. anyway, check back later this week for the rest of the story, including pictures.

your friend, BEN

Am I Old?

Today was really cold or I am getting old, it was so cold today that my ankles and knees hurt. I felt like my dad, gimping around today. If I was smart I would buy long johns like everyone else, but I am not. So I will just have to walk around like my dad for awhile. Today was hella cold, but it was still hella fun. I woke up early to play basketball with some of the Chinese roommates. They are actually a lot better than you would think. But anyway we played outside, I thought that my hands were going to fall off. Every time I caught the ball it hurt. The Chinese roommates seemed to not be effected by it at all. It was like they were playing in the summer time. It was amazing. But after playing ball, I can back to CET and went with my roommate and Cahill to Gu Gong (The Forbidden City). It actually is not forbidden anymore that is why I was able to go. So the English name really doesn’t do it justice. It was a pretty interesting place. It is where the emperor used to live. We got to see all the places he got to make speeches and where all is mistresses lived. I would not have mind being one of his mistresses because from the looks of things they lived the good life. Overall, the trip was pretty good, the only thing that was killing me was the cold.
An interesting thing about the weather here is that sometimes there is this fog haze stuff in the sky. The Chinese roommates call it fog, but to me and the rest of the American students, it looks like pollution. I have never seen a fog that lasted all day before and stayed that high in the sky. But hay, maybe China has different type of special fog. I call it pollution, but who knows.

Buying Toothpaste in China.

When buying toothpaste in China, I have discovered you have two options. One, don’t ask the salesperson what the differences between these two toothpaste because she probably won’t understand that the two toothpastes are different in a very important way. Or two, you can buy an expensive toothpaste and not be cheap like me. Or I guess you have a third option and that is read the label carefully but that tends to be hard when everything is in Chinese and you can’t understand anything. Why haven’t we studied any words like tartar and cavity? Those would have been useful, but no we study Euthanasia Bill and a married woman’s parent’s home. I mean when am I ever going to use these words. But back to the point of the story, when in China it is very important that you know what you are buying, especially when it is toothpaste. Because you can end up buying a whole of Tea Flavored toothpaste like my friend Ma Du. And from what I hear Tea Flavored toothpaste is not that great. I do not know why that salesclerk did not tell that toothpaste was tea flavored. You look on the box and it has these little leaves that look like they are mint leaves but no. They are tealeaves. How gross is that. Next time I will read the box more carefully, I did think that the Chinese character for tea on there was a little unusually and I was also wondering why the box was yellow. I had never seen a yellow Crest toothpaste. But now I know and knowing is half the battle. G.I. Joe taught me that.

"this sure is a great wall"

i know it's been a while since i last rapped at ya, but i got hit hard at the end of last week by the ganmao, chinese for a hardcore winter cold that everyone in north china gets, and my stomach all of a sudden decided to quite quickly process anything i choose to eat. but i'm back on the up and up now, so i'm ready to assail you all with some more tales and pictures.

not last weekend, but the one before, we went out to the great wall. the above quote is reportedly what nixon said when he visited in 1972. the wall actually is pretty awesome. there's really nothing like it. we went to a section called mutianyu, which is sort of the second most popular tourist spot, but since it was winter there's pretty much nobody there. we walked along it for about an hour, had lunch, and slowly made our way back. it's really slow going for some reason, but we weren't in much of a hurry anyway.

here is me on the great wall of china. i bought a cheesy yellow t-shirt. you can see it in the fall.

the weather was relatively warm last week, but turned bitterly cold again for this weekend, which was great (!), because i was sick and our trip took us out to the temple of heaven. oh, before i forget, i also headed out to the forbidden city, which is actually not all that exciting. but anyway, the temple of heaven is pretty cool. it is within an enormous park. the part where you enter takes you along the "porch" of an old building, where hundreds of old people come to chat, dance, play music, gample, excercise, and try to sell you stuff. we talked with a bunch of them, and they were all very excited to tell us that they loved being retired. they come out to the park pretty much everyday. the average retirement in china seems much better than in the states.

the temple of heaven is way in the background. i took this picture standing on the circle mound, which is part of the whole temple of heaven ceremony thing. read a china guide book if you want to know more.

otherwise life had been pretty uneventful. i watched an entire movie in chinese, with chinese subtitles, and actually understood it, which is exciting. i've found that most of the time i can understand what people are saying, though a lot of the time i can't understand why they're saying what they're saying, or what i think they're saying. sheesh. oh, we also all went to a traditional chinese music performance at a tea house on friday night. it was good. that is all. i will leave you all with a picture of a camel enjoying the taste of the delicious fences of the beijing zoo:

love, BEN

p.s. it appears that people are actually posting comments on our blog. i can only imagine what exciting interchanges and witty remarks are being held. however, i would like to reiterate that we cannot see them, so if you want to communicate with us, please do so by e-mail.

Be Careful When Eating the Ma La Xiao Long Xia

First, I would like to say Happy Birthday to my Aunt Moe Moe. I hope that you are having fun.

Secondly, Nobody told me China was going to be this freaking cold. Everyday gets colder and colder. It is almost like I am back in Middlebury. I left Middlebury to get away from the cold, I guess that is just how my luck goes. Anyway, this weekend was one of the most fun weekends I have I had since I have been in China.

On Friday, after getting out of class and eating dinner. Dinner by the way was really good. We had this banana caramelized thing that was really good. I don't know how to explain it but it was good. Trust me. But after dinner, the Chinese roommates, my classmates, and I all went to Cha Guan (Tea House) and listened to ancient Chinese music. I thought that some of the songs were very pretty, while others were just so so. However, all in all it was a good experience. I am glad that I decide to go because at first I didn't want to. I mean who wants to listen to ancient Chinese Music right? Lucky for me I did decide to go, because it was better than what most people would expect. Although, I think on time is good enough.

On Saturday, pretty much everyone took a class field trip to the Temple of Heaven and Hong Qiao Shi Chang, (Hong Qiao market). The temple of Heaven was very lively. A lot Chinese people were out doing performances and things like that. If I can ever figure out how. I will put up some pictures. The temple of Heaven has three main structures. A really tall structure, which to me looked like Chinese version of the Leaning Tower of Pizza, just that it was leaning. But of course no one agreed with me, so maybe it doesn't look like that. The other structure in the Temple of Heaven is surrounded by a wall. The wall is really cool, because if you stand on the East side and start talking at the wall, a person can here you from the westside. The converse is also true. I know from experience. The last structure was a tall big round circle. At the center of this tall big round circle was a little round circle. Everyone wanted to stand on this little round circle and yell. I do not know why. I guess because it was the cool thing to do. So yes, I also did it. When in China, do as the Chinese, I always say. Anyway this structure things kind of sucked so I didn't stay long. So, really do not know what it was all about. But apparently, the Temple of Heaven is where the Emperor would come to give his sacrifices to heaven. And each of these structures represented some type of specially type sacrifice type place type thingy. Yeah, I don't really know but if you are really interested, I recommended you google it. I have found that google is pretty helpful with those sorts of things. Oh, this place had another special thing. This really long bridge. Made out of stone. Ok that's it for that place. After leaving the temple of heaven we went out to eat at Lao Beijing. It was nothing special, it is just a noodle place. This Lao Beijing that we went to was not that good, the one by our school is better. So after eating we went to Hong Qiao Shi Chang and went shopping. I bought so stuff that I really didn't need. I wanted to but so shirts but they kept trying to rip me off. The wanted like three dollars for a shirt. Come on now, I know that I am an American but please, three dollars. One person wanted ten dollars. I laughed in her face and told her that she was "zhen de hei" (literal meaning, really black, but I think it was your evil; not to sure a Wang Wei Feng taught me that). But anyway I was looking to buy $1.25 t-shirts but had no success. The lowest I got was about $1.60. What, I did buy was another memory card for my camera which cost about $15 dollars. Later, I found out that I got ripped of and could have got it for about $12 dollars. I always seem to get suckered. I also bought an old Communist propaganda poster. It says something like kill the American Devils or American Devils Die, something about America bad China good. I think it is hilarious and quite scary at the same time. After Hong Qiao Shi Chang we went out to eat.

Clark, Mark, Clark's roommate (Guan Tie Cheng), Clark's roommates best friend (Wang Wei Feng) and I all went out to Wang Wei Feng's family's restaurant. It is my favorite restaurant in China. The food was so good. First, we had appetizers. Cold tofu, pork something. Beef something, tomatoes, other stuff that was pretty good. And then what I thought was the really good came out. It was a huge Hot Pot of lamb meat. Oh, I need to mention all this food is spicy. This is very important for later in the story. And you need to remember that beer is the cheapest drink in China, although this time we had tea. But anyway, there was this hot pot full of lamb meat. The lamb meat melt right off the bone, it was delicious. And then they gave you these straws to suck the inside of the bone, very flavorful. Sooooooo good. This hot pot was huge. Then the main course came out. The main course is called "Ma La Xiao Long Xia". Ma is a flavor that does not exist in America, Ma literally mean paralyzing. La is spicy, but this dish was spicy beyond belief, but still so good. Words can not describe how good this dish was. Xiao Long Xia means crawfish. This is definitely my favorite Chinese dish so far. So they Bring out this huge dish of Ma La Xiao Long Xia, A plate that looks like a bicycle tire and as tall as my sister. At first, I did not know how to go about eating these crawfish, because I have never eat them before. But after a demonstration and several crawfish falling in my lap, I figured it out. So this whole time we are eating this really really spicy food and chatting and drinking beer. I do not realize that I have probably drank one huge bottle of beer to myself. Everyone stops what there saying and starts looking at me and laughing saying that my face is really red. I had yet to feel the effects of the beer when another huge plate of these Ma La Xiao Long Xia comes out. So, I am eating and drinking, when all of a sudden I cannot eat no more. I have reached my limit. I am now full, as the Chinese say "Chi Chengle" (stuffed). And I am "zhen de zhen de he zuile" (really really drink). I do not know how much I drank but it was a lot. By the end when everyone was done eating, okay, before that I was about ready to go to sleep. I pretty much was falling a sleep in the restaurant. By the time I got back to the dorm, all I wanted to do was sleep. However, the food was good. The next time I go and eat that, I am going to spring the extra dollar and buy the more luxurious sprite.

On Sunday, I really didn't do anything special. Clark, Golze, and I went to the Beijing Zoo. All the animals there looked really unhealthy. We spent about an hour in a half there because it was getting cold and that zoo was really not that exciting. The zoo's biggest attraction is its panda bears. This was my first time seeing a panda beer, so in my mind I am picturing a huge majestic, graceful beast. But these pandas were none of that. They were actually small boring doing nothing animals, except eatting bamboo. Apparently, they like the stuff. I think my cat, Kaboodles is more majestic and graciful than these animals and all he does is lay around all day. All so every place in the zoo had, to say the least, an interesting smell. Maybe because it was a zoo, I have been to a zoo in a long time, so I don't remember what they smell like. But this zoo did not smell like the zoos I remember. And that was my weekend.

Today, I went to The Bamboo Park and looked at the bamboo. The bamboo was just being bamboo. Staying planted and being green, and maybe even growing. I don't know it was hard to tell. But yeah, that was the Bamboo Park. As you can tell it was very interesting. Well time for me to go and do something. Probably study. I don't know if I have time. Lata.

Is Lassie Biting Back?

Today, I came to the realization maybe my stomach has been acting fun because of the dog meat that I ate this week. And maybe, my stomach is not used to that kind of food? Hmmmm. Dog meat taste like beef and at home I do not eat beef, so maybe my stomach has been acting funny because of that. However, Lassie still tasted pretty good if you like beef.
Another thing about the food or should I say drink here is that beer is cheaper than pop and even bottled water. I think the Chinese government wants its people in a perpetually state of drunkenness. At least it seems that some of the people are in that state by the way they drive here. I swear everyday ate least three times a day, I almost get hit by a car. The drivers here do not care about pedestrians, all they care about is where they are going. At times crossing the street can be very scary. It is almost like playing frogger or pacman. But back to the main topic, the beer. At home, I do not drink beer, matter a fact I have the taste of it. But since I have been in China, I have been drinking it a lot when I go to restaurants. This is mainly because some restaurants do not have "Kai Shui", boiled water. And if the restaurant does not have kai shui, we can not drink the tea or the tap water, because tap water will give you la duzi. I realize that I could order a pop, but remember pop is way more expensive than beer, so we all normally order the beer. The beer here is not bad. Every province in China has its own special beer. And I must say with some regret I have become accustomed to drinking Yanjing Pijiu, Yanjing is the name brand and pijiu is Chinese for beer.
On an unrelated note, Today I want with some Tongxuemen (fellow students) and our Chinese roommates to buy a cell phone. I am so glad our Chinese roommates came with us, because with out them we would have been absolute lost, not only in Beijing but in our minds. The people working at the cell phone place talked so fast and used so many words that I didn't know. I mean how often does the text book have words like telephone charger and Simm Card. Let me tell you, not very often. Since our Chinese roommates where there everything worked out fine and I bought the cheapest cell phone I could find, 一共是六百六元. It is not he prettiest looking phone but it will do. If any of you figure out how to give China a phone call or you have the money to do this, my cell phone number is 137-18-773-014. Holla.

How to Succeed at Being Sick in Communist China

Just let me tell you from experience, that being sick in Communist China sucks. Yesterday, I had a bad fever and along with that La Duzi. For those who are reading this that don't speak Chinese, La Duzi is "the runs". I do not know how I got La Duzi, because I have been eating the same thing as everyone else that I hang out with and they have had no problem with their food. Even though I was sick yesterday it was not so bad, because all my friends made sure that I was ok and helped to make me feel better, especially the Chinese roommates and Clark. The Chinese roommate are so nice and help you with everything. In America, if I was sick, I do not think I would have got the treatment that I got yesterday. It was nice to know that I had people watching my back. But other than being sick this week, my time in China has been great. Last weekend, I got to go to the Great Wall. It was magnificent, majestic even. We went to the part of the Great Wall that not a lot of tourist go to. So it was nice just being there with the Chinese roommates and my classmates. Also last weekend I went to a place call Bei Hai Gong Yuan. It is a park that has a big lake and some Buddhist temple on top of a hill. I really don't know how to describe this place but it was pretty. After going to Bei Hai, I want to a hu tong in the area. Hu tongs are old style neighborhoods. They have a communist Beijing look to them. The best part of going to the hu tong was seeing this old man ice fishing on the river, he was partly fishing, partly talking to the fish, and partly drink his beer. It was an interesting thing to watch. The last thing I did this weekend was go out with my roommate (Zhou Guan Wei) and his friend to LiuLiChang and to the gate of Gu Gong, Gu Gong is the forbidden City. I only went to the gate of Gu Gong because it is really expensive to enter. It is only 40 Kuai which like 5 dollars. But since I have come to China I have become extremely cheap. I do not know why. It has actually happened to all my friends. For some reason China makes you very cheap. Well, I can't think of anything else to write but apologize if my grammar and spelling have a lot of mistakes. I think I am starting to forget English.

good advice

i'm trying to post a picture of a sign in the forbidden city. if it shows up please let me know.

thank you kindly.

So this is China

I have been in China for about a week and a half. And have seen many sites around the neighborhood that is by my school. I think my favorite thing to do is go to the clothing markets and bargain with the people. I have done many things while I have been here in this short amount of time. For example, I went to Tiananmen square, I went to a Buddhist temple named Yong He Gong, and I have eaten different kinds of Chinese food. But I would have to say that the highlight of the trip so far was when all my friends left me behind and I had to go out on my own. It was the first time that I actually felt like I was in China. Because before that it just felt like I was in a big Chinatown. While I was on my own, it was fun because I was forced to use all my Chinese knowledge, which isn't that much, I have quickly discovered. When I was on my own I got to bargain with people in Guan Yuan market, I ate my first Dan Gao, it is a muffin type thing, and I also got to chat with many Chinese people. The best part of my solo adventure was when I went in to this small village type place and saw this shopkeeper watching the Houston Rockets play the Lakers. It was the best part because I got chat with him about all sort of things. He was a cool guy and really liked basketball. I want to go back there and chat with if I can find that place. I forgot to mention that the whole time I was lost, but it was still fun.

pictures!

long promised and finally arrived. here are some pictures i took on saturday (on an afternoon trip to a tibetan buddhist temple) and on sunday (a city-wide scavenger hunt with our chinese roommates). so without further ado:

this is, from left to right, joy, durrell, and clark (in his brand-new $20 "north face" jacket) crossing a square near our school. that rather impressive building in the background is the beijing exhibition center, an excellent example of soviet-influenced architecture. there are always a few people flying kites out in the square, but they're crazy because it's really freaking cold.

here is clark, as well as, from left to right, durrell, jamie, and mark (from amherst) on the path leading up to yonghegong, a famous tibetan buddhist temple in beijing. the thing was built in the 18th century, and has on display quite a number of artifacts from much earlier that were given to the various lamas as gifts from the chinese emporers. the standout is a two-story tall buddha carved from a single piece of sandalwood. it's some type of world record apparently.

here's joy, me, and durrell in front of one of the lions at the temple. to get the correct view turn your monitor on its side. i'm too lazy to go through uploading the correct version. it was really really cold that day (middlebury cold), and i was wearing way too little clothing. at least i didn't forget gloves, like durrell.

here's my attempt at one of those traditional vs. modern pictures of china you see everywhere. i am not a professional photographer.

this was taken on the scavenger hunt, also a bitterly cold day. its the entrance to gugong, the forbidden city. i have not been inside yet.

this is a street very near tiannamen square, to the east, which is the modern, upscale part of the city. our school is in the west, in a very typical residential area. i'll take some pictures of it soon. on this street it the beijing palace hotel and the hyatt regency. i had to go down here to find out how much a custom made qipao is, the traditional chinese dress for women (it's several hundred american dollars).

that's it for now. if you could please shoot me an e-mail to make sure these pictures actually show up, that would be tremendous. the response last time was overwhelming. it really makes me feel loved.

a secret missive

it appears that our blog is banned in china, which is really nothing special because every blog is banned in china. so i'm just assuming that these posts are working, etc. that also means that you no longer have to post comments, cause we can never see them. so if you want to talk to me or clark, have something special to say, or have a question, send us an e-mail.

anyway, i was planning to write quite a bit today, including posting some pictures, but logging into this crazy thing took so long that now i have to go to our academic orientation meeting. so..., this is probably the most uniformative blog post ever. i'm sorry. at least i'm doing better than clark.

it's 9:33 at night

and i'm about ready to head to bed. i'll be honest...the entirety of this post may be under the influence of two bottles of chinese beer, the fine brand of yanjing, which comes in probably about 20 oz bottles for 1.6 kuai each. that roughly translates to almost 30 cents.

we got in last night, late last night, and it had been snowing for quite a while. the pollution here is really bad. not only could we smell it immediately after getting off the plane, all the snow on the roads was totatlly black. not like the dirty stuff that's kicked up on the sides in the states, but black like a steer's toucas on a moonless prairie night (extra points for those who recognized the Big Lebowski quote).

this morning it cleared up, but i still don't get the sense that i'm in one of the biggest cities in the world. we walked down to a large department-type store today to buy some things, but it just seemed like a very large china town. i guess once i start hopping on a bus and really heading places will it hit me that i'm actually in china. i'm also proud to report that my chinese has indeed proved functional. a question about where to find the tea in the supermarket was answered with an intelligable response. i'm very happy about that.

anyway, this post has been sorta all over the place. we'll get some pictues up soon i promise. our chinese roommates for j-term are moving in tomorrow, which i'm excited about. we do this scavenger hunt thingie that takes us all over the city with them on saturday. i will keep you all updated on that. also, we're adding another member to our blogging team. durrell mack will be posting as well, once he gets the e-mail acceptance or whatever (the internet here can be kind of spotty. in fact, we can't seem to actually view our own blog, only make posts to it, so if anybody reading can see this please send me an e-mail and let me know you got it i would be forever grateful). otherwise, please remember this ancient chinese proverb: many men smoke, but fu man chu.