Just Living Life in Xi'an

I finally have that video of the guys playing "Creep". Zhang on guitar, Sean singing, and Joe on drums. We've spent several evenings just hanging out and playing songs like this. Zhang and Malcolm are awesome on guitar. Joe does his drumming on everything from Zhang's small drum plate thing to beer bottles. Chris can really (really!) sing. Sean's singing took a while to get used to, but it's grown on me. Even Xie Miao has pitched in a little. I can't sing too well, but I do a little. Chris and I sang all of American Pie. It took a while.



Also, continuing the music theme, I am majorly bummed out that I'm missing Neil Young's spring tour. This always happens. One day I will make be there to see him play. I have too!

And I bought a used bike for 90 kuai (less than 15 US dollars). It was a bit sketch getting it. I went with Xie Miao and a few of her friends. We found a bike shop but they only had new bikes, which were too expensive. So they wandered off for a bit, talked to this man, came back and said if I gave them 90 kuai they would come back with the bike. I was a bit hesitant but Xie Miao seemed to trust her friends and 90 kuai really wasn't that much (I'd been expecting at least 150 kuai).

Anyway, I love my bike. :) Although the streets are a little chaotic. I think it might be wise to invest in a helmet.

洛阳 (Luo Yang)

Last week we all went to 洛阳 (Luo Yang), which used to be the capital of China and was very important to the development of Buddhism in China. We visited the grottoes at Longmen park, which were really cool. Unfortunately, the largest Buddha in the grottoes was under construction. That particular Buddha was modeled after Empress Wu from the Tang dynasty (she was a major supporter of Buddhism). So I don't have any photos of that Buddha. But I do have this:



Another Buddhist site we visited was 白妈寺 (Bai Ma Se, White Horse Temple), which is one of the oldest Buddhist temples in the world. The temple was first built almost 2,000 years ago but has been redone several times since then. It was really peaceful to walk around there - I never really get tired of Buddhist temples, no matter how many I go to.

We also went to a Shaolin Temple, where we saw a performance by some of the monks there. During the show, they call for three volunteers to compete against each other on stage. Chris and Patrick both volunteered and Chris actually won. We also got an awesomely funny photo of all of us together, posing with some of the monks. I will definitely look to Marshmallow on rainy days, ahaha.


In addition to going to the Shaolin temple (which is actually also a school), we went to another kung fu school, where a young man who used to be a student there spoke to us. He, like most of the other students, had been sent there at a young age. They train every day, live together the school, and hardly ever get to leave or see their families. Life is very rough for them.

After training for many years, a lot of the students go on to be body guards or find other such work, but they eventually become too old for this kind of work. As they generally do not have any other skills, they have a lot of trouble finding work. The young man we spoke to was an exception in that he left the school when he was eighteen years old and went to college. He's going to pursue his PhD in Beijing, which is a major achievement for someone of his background.

While at the school, we had a short impromptu lesson in kung fu. Crystal and I were partnered up, with a young girl as our teacher. She was really good and unfortunately my body simply could not handle some of the moves. At one point, we were supposed to assume a sort-of squatted position but I was not stretching low enough so she nudged me down into the proper position and my legs just kind of gave out.

Also, while in Luoyang, I bought Tin Tin comic that had been translated into Chinese. I love finding things like that here and the writing is simple enough that I can read most of it and look up the rest.

旅行团 (Life Journey)

One of the first things Xie Miao and I discovered that we had in common was our love of this band: 旅行团 (Luxing Tuan, Life Journey). I only have about four different Chinese artists on my itunes but I was listening to them one day and she goes: "Oh! You like Life Journey! They're one of my favorite bands!"

Apparently, she saw them live last year at a festival. I wish I could see them too!



I also really like this artist, 田原 (Tian Yuan), and song 放聲再見 (Fang Sheng Zai Jian):



I was also going to post an awesome video of Marshmallow and his roommate, Zhang, playing "Creep" by Radiohead on the guitar, with Sean singing and Joe on drums. They were playing a few songs Thursday night, among which was "Wish You Were Here" (unfortunately, not yet captured in video). However, the damn video wouldn't load. I had it loading up to Youtube for nearly seven hours on Saturday, and it failed. Argh. Maybe I can post it later, when I get a good internet connection.

入乡随俗

入乡随俗 (ru xiang sui su) is recent vocab I learned in class. Basically, it means "when in Rome..."

When we first met, Xie Miao and I were talking a lot about tea. And so, yesterday, she brought this for us to use:


Her English is very good but I have to keep reminding her (and myself) to use more Chinese. Although, for the last week, my voice had been nearly non-existent. I got a sore throat which began with a few drinks and was probably exacerbated during sessions of yelling during Mafia and reallyyy cold and miserable weather. Xie Miao actually bought me some medicine to help:


It's from Hong Kong, so everything is written in Chinese and English. Tastes nasty (to me) but works really well. The ingredients list is really interesting: Loquat Leaf, Fourleaf Ladybell Root, Indian Bread, Pummelo Peel, Chinese Magnoliavine Fruit, Fresh Ginger, Liquorice Root, Menthol, Honey, Syrup, and a few other things.

Oh, and I found peanut butter at Vanguard. Yay! Which isn't exactly going with "入乡随俗" but whatever...


Photos of Wild Goose Pagoda that I never posted, from about two weeks ago. While walking up the stairs, I actually recognized the space from when I was there in 2005. It's the first place I've actually recognized in Xi'an - and it was the stairs really, not the rest of the pagoda or even the outside. Which is weird. Maybe because I remember Mom saying I'd make a good anthropologist as I was walking down those stairs.


So much smog...the pollution is insane.