but what was this week like? it began with the whirlwind trip to and from xi'an. i am so glad i got to spend a little more time there over the summer, because this trip would have been FAR too short to call my only visit. but i finally got to see the famous bing ma yong... qin huang shi's army of terra cotta soldiers. just like everyone says, the history is actually more interesting than the site. only about 1,000 soldiers and horses have been unearthed, because it is so difficult to piece together and preserve them. 5,000 more remain underground. but when people casually throw around the total number of 6,000, you think you are in for a massive sight. not quite true. i think the tomb of jingdi that i visited this summer was actually more interesting and better preserved.
the highlights of the weekend for me where seeing my friend jesse again, and walking on top of the city wall (best preserved in china, most were destroyed during the cultural revolution. another activity that i anticipated alliance covering, so didn't do over the summer). "jesse" is from chaozhou in guangdong province. i met him and his friends in my hostel lounge over the summer, and he showed me around xi'an for my last two days there. it was tons of fun to go around with a "local" (he's lived there for his marketing job, over a year now). he even postponed his winter trip home so we could meet up this last time!
when he was dropping me off back at the hotel, i introduced jesse to mr. yang, our teacher and guide for the weekend. they engaged in a very interesting debate about cantonese versus mandarin. i was able to follow the general idea... jesse's point of view is that cantonese is an important, historic dialect of chinese that absolutely must be preserved, but the central government is trying to stamp it out through the education and employment systems. yang laoshi countered that mandarin is china's new standard, and it should be adopted by everyone for the sake of modernization and development. i just walked away feeling glad we don't really have this issue in america.
returning to beijing this week, everyone got sick. probably the lack of sleep (1 night on train, 1 night in hotel, 1 night on train, class). whenever my immune system is down, i get a sinus infection, so here i am! drinking tons of tang, per baba bing's instruction. nevertheless, it was a busy week.
monday: dinner with wei laoshi and tim quinn. wei laoshi was my first chinese teacher ever! CHIN 001 at GW, last fall semester (only a year ago. wow). wei laoshi is now back at her home institution, the intensive chinese language program of BLCU. it was so wonderful to see her; she is adorable and hyper as ever, praised my progress, and admitted that she was downright worried when i left for china. 一句话你都不会说！"you could not say anything!" tim quinn is a classmate from gw who (1) also studies chinese (2) also has a parent who works at toyota and knows my mom! he is a sweet kid, finishing up his program with ACC right now, and we'll both be back at GW in the spring.
tuesday: drawing a blank here.
wednesday: friend from the university of nanjing visited! antonio, from chile. we met in lhasa over the summer. he was stopping through beijing so we got coffee, went to the zhongguancun electronics market (i held a macbook air! eek!), had a yummy korean dinner, and went to solutions in the evening, per the alliance beijing custom.
thursday: dragged body to class and film studio field trip. it was freeeeeezing.
peng kai di busting moves in the alleyway from crouching tiger hidden dragon, where zhang ziyi first escapes with chow yunfat's green destiny sword.
me freaking out in front of the teahouse set, also from CTHD.
oliver "flying" in wuxia martial arts style.
thursday evening: interviewed over the phone with ____ think tank in DC for spring 2011 internship.
friday: woke up to excellent news from ____ think tank, but more on this later. did basically nothing except skype and drink tang (let's call it resting)
saturday: hiked the great wall with the group! pics in post below. stayed in and watched inglorious basterds with caro and mallory. since when do i watch movies.
sunday: more rest and nothingness. did my homework for another upcoming interview, took a practice HSK test (ick gag yuck die), translated interview responses for my research project, drank tang. what is becoming of me?!
actually, i can kinda answer that question myself. i'm ready to go hooooome! so i am spending more time engaging with "home".. skyping with friends, doing research for internships, downloading xmas music (or receiving it in emails, 多谢 cissey ye), mapquesting me and my dad's road trip across the country, stalking my little and new grandlittles, etc.
it's fair to accuse me of wasting my precious little time left in zhongguo. but on the contrary, i like to argue that i am psychologically preparing to return. late in the summer, when i was in peak china-mode, i had to look up people on facebook and places on google when friends brought them up. i had literally forgotten many elements of my life at home. buxing! not okay... now that i am actually returning to all of it soon. and i am pretty darn excited. bring on the christmas lights, cuddlefests, peppermint mochas, and trips to mammoth. and tap water.
so i know we don't know each other but i have for the first time since i came home from china looked at the alliances facebook page and started reading some blogs. i had to comment on this one because i couldn't agree more with you in respects to the terra cotta warriors. i'm a history major, had read all about them. i was in the beijing program last fall, and the xi'an program this past spring. i was sooo excited to go see them, and i think i wanted to leave after 5 min. not to knock the history, but the actual site was not worth shattering my preconceived notion of what the terra cotta warriors were like. maybe its my fault for building it up to be amazing, but i also blame all the books i've read that have done the same.
ReplyDeleteanyways, i found that interesting because your one of the first people to admit this openly.
oh and how do you like the film class your in? i loved it. i found it to be very interesting and actually just watch Farewell My Concubine and Shower over Thanksgiving break. Did you watch those movies yet?
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