Friday, June 20, 2008

After my first test.

Ok so, I realize this blog sucks. I really do not have a lot of free time, because I have to learn between 40 and 60 new Chinese characters a day. I am going to try to put up some of my photos as soon as I figure out how to. So far what I've learned about China is:

The food is awesome.

Everything is really cheap.

The bathrooms are kind of gross (more on this later)

The people are extremely nice.

Chinese is hard.

I wish I had brought a spare pair of shoes, because my sneakers got wet and it took me a while to get them dry. I am still to afraid to go anywhere by myself, because my Chinese is not that good, and I have no idea where I am. I tried to go wander around the city today, but I forgot where the metro was, so I just went to a store I had already been to, and then walked home. I firmly resolve to see new and interesting things this weekend.
Last week during our orientation we were privileged enough to have performers come to BIE (Beijing Institute of Education. where CET is hosted in Beijing) and perform traditional Beijing street performances. they were all very interesting:
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This guy played something like a Chinese version of castanets. He spoke/sang very quickly at the same time.
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This man made small sculptures out of dough (yes, like play-doh but much cooler) Pictured here is one of the mascots for the Olympics which will be here this summer.
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This woman performed magic tricks completely silently. They were low tech but I still don't know how she did them.
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This guy was so chill. he sat at the other end of the room and painted kites that look like this:
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By hand people! Amazing!
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This girl was doing amazing feats on that yo-yo you see. I don't know if it has a special name, but it was very exciting to watch.
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Ok so all the performers were pretty amazing, but this guy I think was the most popular, just because none of us had ever seen anything like it. He takes sugar and melts it into caramel and then blows it up with air and paints it to create beautiful animals. Beautiful EDIBLE animals (I know, they're so pretty why eat them, but they are made of sugar and melt, so its better not to waste it) Did I mention he does this in a matter of seconds. Here you can see the finished product:
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Amazing, right?? if you want to see more of the stuff he or any of the performers did you can just click on one of the pictures and browse through my Beijing set.

All and all it was an amazing night, and each one of the performers made an effort to include us in their craft. Even with the language barrier we all learned a lot. And there was free food. Need I say more? Also if anybody wants to give me new adjectives so I can stop saying "amazing!", feel free.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Day 1ish

So this is my first post, and it should be longer but I am in kind of a hurry. My name, for those of you who don't know, is Matt. I am a graduating senior at the Univeristy of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB for those who know). Go Blazers! I am currently studying with Boston University and CET Academic Programs this summer in Beijing, China. I flew out of Boston on Tuesday, June 10th and arrived in Beijing on Wednesday, June 11th. I had to change planes in Chicago, and we were delayed there for like 90 minutes because "a pump was pumping when it should be off". I fully intend to write more later, perhaps I can come back and add to this entry, I am not much of a blgger so I'm not sure.