Well, we're not POSITIVE that it was food poisoning, especially since it seemed to strike pretty randomly. I was part of the fortunate 40% that didn't get it. My roommate, Arianne, wasn't so lucky and has spent the last three days just sleeping and trying to figure out if she can eat without it coming back up.
On Thursday there were literally four out of eleven people in my class still able to train (granted, some were laid up with minor injuries rather than illness). I almost wished I was also just ill enough to get out of Power Training… but when I was woken up that night by the sound of someone being sick in the bathroom a few doors down, I was exceedingly grateful to be healthy.
Anyway. I think I said before that I was in Beijing with my family for two weeks. We traveled to Mongolia and Xi'an and also saw a couple of Beijing sights that I hadn't seen yet (and some that I got to see again because some of my relatives visited us for the second week). I have a bad habit of just figuring that things will work out in the end (kids, this is also called "procrastination"), and I therefore didn't get my train ticket in time to get back by Sunday night. But I rolled in safe and sound on Monday evening.
I had called Joy beforehand to ask her to call a taxi to the station for me. So I figured I would find a guy waiting with a sign that said "Sarah" on it, or something… but when I got out, no one. Just a lot of Chinese people. One guy walked up and asked, "Taxi?" and I was like, "Well, yes…" I then figured out pretty quickly that he wasn't my guy, but I wasn't positive that I wouldn't need him, so I kind of just skirted around him and walked out of the station and looked around a little bit. I still didn't see anyone holding any sort of sign, so I called up Joy to make sure that my guy was waiting for me. She said he was, but meanwhile I somehow gathered several other Chinese people, asking me where I was going and if I spoke Chinese. That was pretty much the extent of their English powers. They soon formed a half-circle around me so that I wasn't sure who I was supposed to look at or if I should just ignore them all. Man, if that had been my first experience in China I would've been totally overwhelmed. But really it was more irritating than intimidating. I knew I would be all right, and I soon spotted someone walking over, holding up a sign on which I could just barely make out "Sarah". I hurried over, dispersing the crowd, texted Joy so she knew I had found him (or rather, he had found me) and hopped in the taxi, feeling as though I had just been rescued. Later Joy commented that it was unusual for them to see a foreign face, from which I surmised that the taxi driver had told her what happened. I sometimes forget that my face looks different to Chinese people.
The first day back felt strange. There were a lot of new people, and several people had left while I was gone, including my friend Simona, who was basically my only go-to person if I wanted to hang out or go into town or watch a movie or something. I mean, I guess I could ask some of the guys who I'm friendly with if they want to go into town with me, but I'm not really used to having guy friends and really it's kind of just easier to go by myself because I can just figure out my own agenda. That's kind of currently on my mind because I need to go into town today to get a new cell phone charger, which I left in Beijing.
But the point is that it took a little bit of getting used to, just because I had to slowly find opportunities to introduce myself to the new people when I obviously wasn't a new person myself. And then there was the fact that I hadn't trained (or really had time to train) while I was traveling and was therefore comparatively weak. My legs feel like they did the very first week I got here: super super sore.
I discovered Tuesday morning that my Sifu had injured his foot! Apparently it happened soon after I left. I asked if it was broken and he said it was, but then he took the cast off a few days later, leaving just one of his toes wrapped and said something about stitches… so either it wasn't a serious break or he doesn't actually know what "broken" means. I also couldn't really figure out how it got injured. But he says it should be better by next week. He's still okay to teach most of the time even with the limp, and travels longer distances by bike. I guess even Shaolin Masters aren't completely invincible.
For most of the week I was super tired, and was nodding off at like 8:30, even though I was taking naps during both the morning and lunch breaks. But suddenly I guess I caught up on sleep during the Thursday lunch break, because I've felt more awake than usual since then. During that time that I was tired I was also getting hungry between mealtimes, which doesn't usually happen to me here. Maybe it was just my body trying to get used to the schedule-- that, or the two weeks of straight travel had finally caught up with me. But because I no longer felt too tired, I thought that the weekend of rest wouldn't be of much use to me. As if sensing these thoughts, the dog (Gremlin) started barking her head off at 3:30 this morning, and when she finally quieted I couldn't sleep for the sound of distant roosters making an awful ruckus. And then my roommate's cell phone alarm went off at 5:45 even though she should've taken it with her when she traveled to Beijing this weekend. For whatever reason the language it's set to is French, so it took a little finagling to get the alarm turned off. I kind of feel like a genius for figuring it out. With all of that combined with the fact that I didn't get to sleep until like 10:30, it looks like I'll get a weekend full of catch-up sleep after all.
What else… oh, I finished my Sword Form! Grading is next week, so I'll be showing that as well as Basics, Continuous Fist (a Shaolin fist form), and hopefully my 24-Step Tai Chi if I finish it in time. It was kind of weird, though, because as soon as I finished the Sword Form, Wu Sifu started teaching me a Wudan Tai Chi form. Turns out he's teaching me one with about 140 steps in it. I'm not entirely pleased with that because I really just wanted to learn Bagua from him, but I do technically have time to finish the Wudan Tai Chi one and learn something else, especially since I'm getting through it pretty quickly. Ah well. On a similar note, now that I've finished Continuous Fist I get to learn a staff form from Young Sifu! I find that quite exciting. I wonder if he'll start me on that this coming week or wait until after Grading… I guess you'll hear about how Grading went next week, btw. Grading happens at the end of every month, but I didn't have to do it last time because I was a little less than a week shy of being there for a full month.
I finally got my internet this week! It's a little bit testy. I actually got it on Tuesday, and it worked for a while and then suddenly stopped working, so I figured I would talk to one of the translators about it later. I finally got around to that yesterday morning in the break between the two morning classes. First we tried plugging my cable into one of the office computers to see if the internet would work that way, and it did. So I brought in my laptop and started trying it out, fiddled it with a little bit… but neither of us really knew a lot about computers and it still wasn't letting me on. And then Young Sifu walks in and tries it, and of course it works. I've decided that I'm okay with that blow to my pride because he is, after all, a Kung Fu Master.
Since writing the above this morning, I went into town. I don't think I've really talked about that yet, so I shall do so now.
I decided not to bother with asking around to see if anyone else wanted to go into town with me. There's no one new enough that they haven't been yet, and by the time I set out around 10 most people had already made their plans anyway. So I got all ready in the cardigan I stole from my sister while in Beijing (jk, I bought it from her. Was a good deal.) and set out into Qufu.
To get into town, you simply have to walk out to the front of the school, where presently a bus will come by to pick you up for 1 yuan (that's like 16 cents). When I went out there were a couple of other guys waiting, so I talked with them for a little bit, but when I fell silent they started talking to each other in German, which was fine because I didn't have anything more to say. My main goal while in town (as previously mentioned) was to find a cell phone charger. Before I left I was fortunate to pass Leah, one of the translators, and I quickly asked her to write down "cell phone charger" for me in Chinese. I know of a smallish market that's pretty easy to get to by bus, so when I got there I sought out an electronics table and showed her my little note and dead cell phone, and asked "Ni yo mei yo?" (Do you have it?) and she produced a cell phone charger that charges your cell phone battery directly, then showed me that it worked. If it had been too expensive I would've started to look elsewhere, but since it was only like 15 kuai (a little over 2 bucks), I got it and moved on to the supermarket, where I got some other stuff, like hangers and apples. And a couple of weird little jelly drinks that look a little bit like Capri Suns. The fact that I've already finished three of them just shows I'm not mentally prepared to be in charge of my own food.
Speaking of food, I stopped at a little noodle place and had a really good bowl of noodles (for only 6 kuai!), which I hope doesn't make me sick. I feel fine so far, so my hopes are high on that account. Then I full intended to stop at the Milkshake Shop, but they were either closed today or for good. I hope it's not for good! Although their milkshakes aren't quite as good as an American one, they're still rather nice. It's really a cute little shop, too. For decoration, they encourage their customers to write on little sticky notes and put them up on the wall. Most of it is in Chinese, so it makes for a pretty cool effect. But then I'll occasionally see some English letters, mainly "SUJU". And because I'm brilliant, I know that stands for "Super Junior", a Korean Boy Band. Actually, a tentative goal in my mind has been to find a Super Junior CD while in China, so I walked into what I'm pretty sure was a CD shop while I was in town. But nothing popped out to me, so I left pretty quickly. I had passed another CD shop earlier, so maybe I'll try that one next time I go into town. But honestly, I have no idea why Chinese people think it's a good idea to blast music out of the front of their stores. It's really off-putting, and I didn't go into that one simply because I knew I would have to shout to ask if they had what I wanted.
The taxi ride home was kind of weird. I got a lady taxi driver, which usually kind of puts me at ease. But this one was kind of strange… she said something to me in Chinese which I didn't understand and actually pulled over, turned the car off, and ran into a little convenience store to buy some sort of drink that I think looked like milk. What the heck? If I had been in a better part of town I would have totally gotten out of the car and flagged a different taxi down, but I was close to the outskirts, so I didn't want to do so and risk not getting picked up. And then she kept spitting out the window, and when I asked her to roll my window up she only rolled it up partway so that it was still messing up my hair… hmph. Not the best taxi ride I've ever had. Come to think of it, that was kind of risky on her part to give bad service to a person who asked to be dropped off at a Kung Fu School.
But usually, the taxi drivers know where the School is if you say "Shaolin Wushu" (sometimes you have to say it really slowly), and get you there quickly and without taking unwarranted pit stops. Here the flat rate for a taxi ride is 5 yuan, and by the time I get to the School it ends up being anywhere from 13 to 20, depending on where I started out. That's a bit better than Beijing, where the flat rate is 10 yuan and often ends up being upwards of 40 yuan because the city is so huge. But really I can't complain on either account because the taxis are just so cheap in general.
Well, there's not a whole lot more to say. Really the novelty of this week was the fact that everybody was getting sick. If anyone wants to hear anything specific, just e-mail me or post a reply on this blog.
Toodles,
Sarah
(PS: Ginger Hannah, I finally checked my e-mail and found your comment! Yay! I <3 you. You should keep commenting on stuff.)
PPS: I totally stole the term "Solo Adventure" from my sister. Ruvs you, dear.
PPPS: In case you didn't catch on, "kuai" is the colloquial term for "yuan", which is a Chinese dollar.
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