Chinese is....rather difficult. Tests are hard and studying is taking over my life, but I don't want to talk too much about that because then I'll just sound negative. I'm having a great time in China, and it's really nice that I can actually see how much better my Chinese is getting as the days go on.
Spring Break is in a month (April 4th-9th, or something like that), so this weekend, Erin and I along with some of the other students we're friends with are planning our trip. We have it narrowed down to either XinJiang (a predominantly Muslim province in the far west of China. It borders 8 countries including Russia, Pakistan, India, Kazakhstan, etc.) or Thailand. Both have cheap flights, so I'm not really sure right now. We'll see.
Well, went to the mountains a few weekends ago with the roommate and a few other students. We stayed with the family of one of the roommates in this tiny village of about 100 people. The village is based around this Buddhist shrine/small temple and everyone congregates there. The first day we were there, we went trekking into a local bamboo forest. The villagers all grow their own bamboo to eat (which is phenomenal, by the way), so it was really cool to see their rows of bamboo growing. We slept in really nice rooms (for China), but there was no heat anywhere or hot water, so things got cold that weekend. The next day, we got up early and explored the village with the family. It turns out that the family business is pig farming, so we went to their farm and visited. Baby pigs are cute, by the way. Later, we went to this really cool archaelogical dig nearby that the Chinese government is currently excavating. It's the remains of the civilization of the HeMuDu people from something like 2,000-3,000 years ago. Really neat stuff, except for the fact that the rain had eroded alot of the people's progress and caused several cave-ins. Oh well...that's China for you. They tried to build a roof over the site, but of course, it leaked. Hahahaha, oh China...
Last weekend, we stayed in Hangzhou and explored the city some more. We got a few glimmers of nice weather, so we all went to West Lake to walk around. It was a really nice weekend overall. This weekend looks to be more of the same. My friend, Katelyn Wear, mentioned to me that she knew a high school friend who was in Hangzhou working this semester, so a few days ago, we got into contact with one another, and I think we're all going to go out tonight. Apparently, there are several Americans working with her, so it'll be nice to meet some more Americans in Hangzhou.
I promise to be more diligent with the blogging from now on. I think I'm finally adjusted to life in China, so things should get more consistent from now on. Until next time, here are some pictures that I've accumulated. I started a Photobucket.com account that I'll update occasionally, so you can just follow me there. Oh, and there are some videos too: Here
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