Guilin

Two weeks ago (Sorry, I've been very busy!) I went to Guilin and Yangshuo with AJ and his family. Guilin is known for being the most beautiful place in China. It is a three hour plane ride south of Beijing.

北京欢迎你！

Jingshan took us to the Olympic Park this morning. Carolyn, Rebecca, Hannah, Becky and I arrived around 8:20 a.m., 25 minutes before we had to meet, in hopes of grabbing some McDonald's breakfast (a few big hash browns!) and 星吧克 (Xing ba ke, a.k.a. Starbucks) beforehand. We trekked past the school (where we were supposed to meet everyone), all the way down the street aaaaand around the corner to the Wangfujing Mall, where Starbucks in located, only to find it was closed until 10 a.m. A slight difference from the U.S. We all settled with hot chocolate from MickyD's. A side note: I never ate McDonald's in the States, but 40 cent ice creams and fries are so tempting when haven't eaten all day and you walk out of school around 4 p.m. -- The McDonald's is RIGHT next to our school.
I was interested in seeing the Olympic Park, not so much so I could see the inside of the Bird's Nest or Watercube, but so I could gage the crowd's level of excitement. The Olympic symbol is everywhere here. Everywhere. On cell phones, billboards, banks, stores. It's bordering on pathetic; 10 years down the road, even two years, China can't be celebrating that the Olympics were once here.
I had high hopes going to the actual scene. I didn't get to watch much of the Olympics last summer, but I had heard such great things about ceremonies and buildings. The watercube was made to sound as awe-inspiring as Michael Phelps's eight gold medals, and people are still talking about the Bird's Nest. I was just talking to a friend online and one of the first things he asked me was, "Do you do a lot of visiting? Have you seen the Bird's Nest?" I told him we'd actually gone this morning.
"You did!? Was it as it looks like on TV?"
I don't exactly know how it looked like on the TV, but I would assume it wasn't how it looked in real life. In all fairness to the Park, it is winter, so wooden boxes topped with green clothe stood in lieu of flowers. The "forest," about a mile down the walkway from the Bird's Nest and Water cube looked more like a pike of dirt with scattered pines on it. Maybe the mound was at least green in summer.
The place was fairly crowded. There were lines to get into both buildings and a fair amount of people use the promenade as a place to exercise. Some were speed skating on roller blades, a few were running and speed walking. The place is miles and miles long, so on beautiful days it must be nice to and just walk. I don't think that much open area exists anywhere else in Beijing. Speakers line the walkway and shuffled through three songs: "Beijing Huan Ying Ni" ("Beijing Welcomes You," 北京欢迎你), "One World, One Dream" and some song all in Chinese I couldn't understand.
People use the Bird's Nest as a place to picnic and were scattered over the fake grass. A larger list of songs were blasted from speakers inside, which the Beijing Olympic mascots danced to.

Hello, my name is Busdriver.

An assortment of English names we've come across in the last week:

- Lebron
- Ludacris (he sits in the back of class)
- Oprah
- Busdriver
- Shark
- Jack Sparrow

Morning run

When it's too cold to stand in lines and perform morning excersises, but too warm to stay inside and study, the middle and high-schoolers go out and take three laps (depending) around the school. Becky and Hannah's class sprint their three laps, picking up the pace each time. Some return with sweat dripping down their foreheads. My class, on the other hand, takes two laps, and prefers walking to running. Some even stay inside.
Most middle schoolers take it seriously. They only have to run around the track though, whereas the high-schoolers run around the whole building.

Free Day!

Instead of morning exercises, Jingshan holds a flag raising ceremony every Monday from 7:30 - 8 a.m. The whole school stands in columns, except for the elementary school who stay inside and peek their heads against the windows while the national anthem blasts. Middle schoolers in their green uniforms and high schoolers in our blue ones stand on separate halves of the court. Each class forms two lines, one for boys and one for girls, with the exception of class four (the special class for the best math and physics students). Girls and guys stand together otherwise the girls line would be far too small and the boys unproportinally long in comparison to the rectangle formed by the rest of the school. Announcements always follow the flag raising. Today, the speaker praised a student for returning an 100 yuan bill he/she found on the ground. Acts such as this help the harmony of the school.

In English, students started to present their "My Dream Festival" projects. The first kid to go called his festival "Free Day!" Free Day is essentially like any Friday afternoon or Saturday in America, with some added bonuses. It's a day when students can totally relax and not worry about or be assigned any homework. They can hang out with friends or "special ones," meaning boyfriends or girlfriends, all day long. Unique festival perks include the possibility to assign teachers homework, instructing teachers how to dress "better and more formal" and calling up your teachers and telling them everything wrong with their class ("You assign too much homework," or "Your class is boring!"). He carefully went through the year's schedule and decided that there are two adequate days a term, further enough from vacations that they're useful and mid-terms that kids can actually relax. His presentation was accompininied by the best powerpoint I've ever seen complete with his own animation and music.
When he finished the teacher turned it over to the class for grading. Everyone said he deserved an 100, but the teacher gave him a 95 because he didn't make enough eye contact with the class.
What would you do on your Free Day!?
I'd make jiaozi and baozi and eat them!