Anyway, at first it was pretty weird to be back in America. Not because it's a culture shock to be back in America, but because it seems like nothing has changed-- except that suddenly I can do Kung Fu. Like, I just picked up my life where it left off at the end of August and sometimes I suddenly go, "oh yeah, Kung Fu!"
Okay! Let's talk about my last week. Every time I update this I just feel so brilliant about keeping a daily journal. You should do it, guys. It's what the Cool Kids do.
Both Monday and Tuesday were days off for Chinese New Year. It's a pretty big deal in China. Sort of like Christmas. I was kind of in denial about leaving, so I didn't train all that much on either day. But! I did get some last-minute stuff done. Not on Monday. On Monday I watched both Kung Fu Panda movies with a couple of other people. And wrote my 2nd to last update.
Tuesday I went shopping! That was sure fun. I went with Mintoi and Chee. It is SO much nicer to go shopping with someone other than just yourself.
Mintoi and Chee both traveled over the weekend (for the life of me I can't remember the name of the city), but they came back a little after 9, whereupon we all decided to go out together.
We started off at the supermarket, and I got a few things (including some hawthorne! Yay!). In Bai Yi, there's a little section at the front that seems to sell stuff like scarves and hats and jewelry. I went there a while ago to get some hair clips (which have served me well). After some short contemplation, I stopped in to see if I could find one of Ellyn's requests for a certain type of hair ornament. I didn't find any, but I MIGHT'VE bought something else, except that the moment I entered I started being followed by one of the store girls. BOY is that annoying! She had a written receipt type thing in front of her, like she was going to write something down the minute I touched it. I didn't know how to say "stop following me" in Chinese, so I tried to use some pantomime and English, but she was like "haha ting bu dong" (I hear you but I don't understand), and after walking up and down all the aisles without finding my thing, I had to get out of there because I simply cannot shop with someone looking over my shoulder at everything I touch.
Anyway.
Mintoi said they had seen a hotel that seemed like it had a good menu on a previous trip into town, so we walked over there for lunch. We walked through the Underground street because I expressed my intent to buy a new coat. I did end up finding and buying one, and the more I think about it the more I like it. It was in the men's section, so it's sort of sporty and cool, and it's a color of blue that I think brings out my eyes really well. We also stopped by the Underground, where I got two calligraphy brushes and managed to find the requested hair ornament.
The hotel/restaurant was super nice. The last restaurant I ate at in China, and it was just super good. Chinese food, REAL Chinese food is just sooo good! While we were waiting for the food to come, we looked over at the table next to us, where they were getting up to leave-- they had barely touched a third of what they got. If I had had more gumption (and Chinese), I totally would've gone "can we just have what they left", because they didn't box it up or anything! I don't know if this was a cultural thing. It does seem a bit Chinese, though. We finished with our food around 1:00, and then headed over to the Souvenir Street, which is an alleyway next to the Confucius Temple wall.
There I got some last-minute souvenirs, and right now I'm kind of regretting that I didn't get one of those extendable swords. They're sort of like a plastic lightsaber, but they look quite a bit nicer. Wu Sifu has one… but maybe it's just as well because after buying some stuff I suddenly realized I didn't have much left. In fact, I didn't have quite enough to take my own taxi to the train station. That's usually about 60 kuai.
One thing I forgot to get in town was a bottle of red flower oil! It's awesome. It's like 3 kuai a bottle and you put it on sore muscles and it super helps. It smells good, but if you use it for too long then it smells like pain.
Here's an excerpt from Wednesday's journal:
It doesn't feel real. The fact that I'm going home in a few days, I mean. Can I really change to a different life so suddenly? Like, when you move houses it's usually a pretty slow process, where you go between the two houses, packing and unpacking your stuff, slowly building everything up… but when it's just you, two suitcases, and an airplane, all you have between the two lives is a day. Weirder still, I'll be traveling back in time, to before I left.
During lunchtime on Wednesday I recorded a bunch of forms with Yogi (thanks Yogi!) because he has an awesome camera and is a professional photographer. That's one of the strange things about the School: you just have no idea what people do in real life. Like, there are Nuclear Scientists, Social Workers, Lawyers… Mintoi's a Health Journalist. Wait what was I talking about? Forms! I kept drawing a blank on some of the forms, (I was facing the wrong way and stuff), so we didn't get all of them. But I think now I have some sort of recording of all the forms I did, even if I'm not the one doing all of them.
In the afternoon, Wu Shifu's son dropped him off, so we got to meet his family briefly. I think it was his son, his son's wife, and two of his granddaughters. One was 18, the other looked about 4 (the granddaughters, I mean). Mintoi was talking to them, and I sort of was getting the gist of what she was saying. I caught "gong zuo" (work), and then Mintoi started talking about her work, and since I already know she's a health journalist I was getting a bunch of that. But then she told them that I spoke Chinese, that Nellie had taught me some, and I was like (in English), "Are you telling them I speak Chinese?" and everyone laughed. Maybe they all knew enough English to understand that question. :)
Thursday: last full day of training. Near the end of Qi Gong, Brendan tried going on the ice, and it was working! Except I think it cracked, so he scurried off of it. Then apparently some more people were trying it after class, but I missed all of that. Dang.
For qi gong, a lot of people do meditation as well, and get one of the little muay thai pads from the training hall to sit on. Apparently one of the guys dropped theirs onto the frozen pond, because after I finished my qi gong forms, I walked over to see a few people with spears and a long wooden log, trying to retrieve it while standing on the 'porch' of the pagoda, which was at least 15 feet above the ice. Fortunately, they succeeded after a lot of finagling.
Power Training was not… so bad. We did an ab thing. Check out my gazillion ab muscles. We were still with "Stripey's" class for the whole week, so it was kind of interesting to have different people for partners. When I look back on it, it was sort of strange to be partnering with grown men, especially when I was the only girl in the class… but I hardly ever thought about it. The only time I would remember that girls are different is when we would race around the ponds and I was so obviously slower than everyone else. Man, that was frustrating.
Then for all of the second class, Mintoi and I just sat and talked to Wu Shifu (with Mintoi translating most of it). We told him that we were leaving tomorrow, and he admonished me to practice, because it would be a shame not to… and you know what? It really would. I spent five months here, I gotta have something to show for it! I shouldn't just let everything drop out of my head. That would be stupid. An expensive waste of time.
The last day, the classes were all as per usual. Forms, Power Stretching, free class. For the free class I went over to the Training Hall, where Stripey Sifu was teaching some people how to do Butterfly Kicks, so I joined in. It's pretty hard to tell if you're doing those right, y'know? Then I finished packing up, and people came by and took the free stuff me and Mintoi were leaving behind. Most of the rest of the afternoon was spent hanging out, taking pictures, chatting… etc. And then after dinner, out came the taxi! Chee, Mintoi, and I all piled in with our four suitcases (the trunk had to hang open to fit them all), and we went off to the train station. I asked Mintoi to ask the bus driver to stop at the Pharmacy so I could get those Red Flower Oil bottles-- and I did! Yay. Now I just need some pain.
Miraculously, I managed to get my two huge heavy suitcases situated on the train without too much hassle (and a little help from M/C who are now experts at ukulele-toting. The train ride went by pretty quickly, and then I was lucky enough to get picked up by President and Sister Lewis, who are the leaders of the China International District Branch (aka the Virtual Branch-- you know, the church I've been calling in to every Sunday?). They let me stay over at their lovely (and super Western) home on Friday night and even took me to the airport on Saturday morning.
Then I managed to get through the entire airport without any untoward incidents. Actually, that's not completely true: when I was checking my suitcases (phew!) the lady made me open my bag and pull out my sword. I was all like, "I HAS PAPERWORK FOR THAT", so she did end up letting me put it back and keep it and stuff. It was a really good call to have all their workers know how to speak English.
They REALLY don't want you to bring Chinese water outside the country! I had filled up my water bottle for the plane, but emptied it in order to get through security, so I was like "I'll look for a drinking fountain and fill it up again there". I did find a drinking fountain, of sorts. Instead of drinking fountains in China, they have hot water boiler dispenser things. It's the same for on trains. Basically so you can have hot instant noodles, which are like 4 yuan if you get them in a convenience store and like 6-8 yuan if you get them IN the airport or train station. Anyway, I put some hot water in my bottle, but then I had to go through a second security check to get onto the plane. They had a little assembly line of workers emptying out water bottles, making you open your bag, checking for suspicious-looking eyebrows, etc.
The plane ride was filled with intensity! Drama! Action! Explosions! Honestly I was a little desensitized by the end of it. Putting movie screens on international flights was the best idea ever. Finally watched X-Men: First Class and Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Started watching Pirates 4 but got bored 10 minutes in. There's only so much Jack Sparrow hijinx I can take…
When you get off an international flight, it's a bit different from getting off a regular flight. They gave me a card to fill out about stuff I was bringing in, most particularly stuff I had bought and what was the dollar value for it, and I was like "how much did that hawthorne candy cost". I think the total that I put down was $100 USD, but… I probably brought in more than that.
It started off with a series of hallways where some airport people point you in the right direction. I got really surprised when the lady said "Good Morning", because even though Washington was at 7:00 am, it was more like 10:00 pm back in China. The hallways lead you to some lines where they check your passport and stamp your card that you filled out, and then you go down an escalator to the baggage claim. I got one of my suitcases almost right away, but the second one took FOREVER. And then once I had it I realized I had put away my little stamped-and-filled-out card that I had worked so hard for, so I got to stand there even longer and dig through my ukulele bag where I had stashed my purse. Ugh.
The next part was then a bit confusing, but once I knew the answer to the question "is Seattle your final destination?" (answer: yes), I got through the maze of subway rides, elevators, and hallways with the help of the nice airport people who for some reason didn't look Asian. That was really the only culture shock I had (also, I could suddenly read everything). I was starting to stare at all the "foreigners". I mean, I know I saw a lot of foreigners while I was in China, but when you're traveling you really don't see any. So… anyway. I got over it.
I called my peeps using my American cell phone, which I had put in my checked luggage so I couldn't get to it until then, and was found by my dear little sister (who, for the record, is taller than me) and got to go home.
And that was it. That was my trip to China. Now that I've gotten over the jetlag (which was the worst ever) and put away most of my stuff (not that I got a lot-- cheap Kung Fu student is cheap), I'm ready to move on to the next step in life.
College.
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