Last Day at Hanggao ... [LAST POST OF 2008 GROUP]

(Nick)

Before I talk about today, I must comment on last night's farewell banquet. It was so cool to see both of our host families, teachers, and friends together in one room - the energy was amazing. The food was delicious (of course) and there were many, many toasts throughout the meal. Drew, Emily, Cady, and I toasted both Madame Miao (the principal) and Lu Naichuan, the exchange coordinator. Madame Miao came over to each table and told our host families what she thought of us (according to her I am very handsome and my speech in Chinese was the best out of the four of us...HA). It was a great night and it was so hard to leave at the end.

Today was our last day at Hanggao. Jerry and I were a bit late to school, as usual, because Jerry overslept....rather than receiving detentions for being late too many times, students just get their name written down and they might be spoken to but most of the time they are just required to sing in front of their class!! There is definitely more trust between students and faculty...and it works. They never skip class, never leave class to go to the bathroom, and it is rare when a student is absent due to illness. I guess this is due to Hanggao requiring high marks on an exam to even be admitted, but it is pretty refreshing to see a school where everyone is in nearly perfect harmony. Anyways, this morning our papercutting class was cancelled because our teacher had a meeting, so instead we went to Free Mori and bought some delicious pastries, and also wrote our names on an apron that we later gave to our chef as a farewell gift. The next class we had was P.E., where we played badminton basically the entire time. We gave both of our P.E. teachers gifts, our male teacher a New England photography book and our female teacher a 2007 Grammy Nominees CD. We will miss both of them a lot....considering how much we have eaten here we might be needing them back in America after our families see just how much weight we've gained.

We then had our last Hanggao lunch. We presented our chef with the apron that we decorated, and then took a photo with him...he was very happy! All of our host siblings are very sad that its our last meal because once we leave, they will have to go back to eating the normal school food (which is apparently pretty bad). Patrick and Ella came into our room and we took some photos together. We walked out to English corner for the last time! I am really going to miss English corner, its definitely my favorite time of the day because we get to socialize! It's hard to socialize during the rest of the day since the students are so focused on their classes. It is also the only time we get to see Patrick, Ella, Frank, and Kathleen, the busy seniors...they have to sacrifice a lot each day to go to English corner when all their classmates are studying, and we are very grateful that they care so much about seeing us. English corner today consisted of LOTS of picture taking, email address exchanges, and presents! It was really overwhelming because there were so many people I wanted to talk with and take a photo with but not enough time! I tried my best to hug as many people goodbye as possible, take as many photos as possible, and yes, sing into one of my classmates recording devices so they will forever have my rendition of "I want it that way," by the Backstreet Boys. I will miss English corner so much...it feels like just yesterday that we had our first one! It is so fun to hang out with all the students at Hanggao without them having to worry about schoolwork (well, for the most part).

In the afternoon I took some time to write letters to Helen, Rose, and Derek, all English teachers that I have grown pretty close with and will miss a lot! The English department has been so hospitable...the 5 of us must be quite a pain to have in the English office but they have survived. I am going to miss Helen the most...she has basically been like a mother to us. Not only did she take Terry under her wing while we were in Hangzhou, but also us as well. She is so helpful and always so interested in us. I only wish I could've been at DS when she was the teacher of the Spring 2004 Chinese delegation. Four years later, and she still has a Dover-Sherborn nalgene water bottle and a DSMS sticker in her cubicle. She clearly got so much out of her time in the U.S. and her way of giving back is always being there for us! It is people like her that make me realize just how life-altering this exchange really is. I hope that I can see her again sometime in the near future! I am definitely going to miss her smiling face every morning at Hanggao.

After school I played badminton with some of my old classmates from Class 1. I'd really missed playing with them, as it had been 2 weeks since I switched host brothers, so it was really nice to be with them again! However, once we were done playing, it meant I had to say goodbye to all of them which was really sad. I hope to come back to Hangzhou sometime in the next couple years, but you never know, and although email is great, the prospect of not seeing them is too hard to bear!

We met at the school gate at around 5 PM, where we were joined by Patrick, Ella, and Baker. We went to our favorite Japanese restaurant near the school for a quick dinner before Patrick had to leave for more classes. Speaking of Patrick, I am pretty sure he is the Chinese version of me. We have a lot in common and even though I've only known him for 5 weeks, I would consider him one of my best friends. I think I will probably miss him the most out of anyone in Hangzhou, just because its not everyday that you meet someone who is exactly like you, and it will be hard to be so far away from him. I know he is someone that I will always keep in touch with, though, and hopefully our paths will cross sooner rather than later. Anyways, after a Japanese dinner and Patrick's departure, we took a public bus to Xihu (West Lake). We walked around for a bit, which was nice with the warm breeze. We went to Starbucks and sat around talking for a good 2 or 3 hours! It was glorious. At around 10 PM, we took taxis home (which is actually a hard task, vacant taxis are hard to find), and Baker dropped me off at my host families apartment complex. Since this was the last time I was seeing Baker, I hugged him goodbye. Baker was such an important part of our days at Hanggao, considering he was the translator for all of our teachers. He is probably the nicest, most warm-hearted person I know. I will miss him so much.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Hangzhou. Today was definitely pretty emotional though, since Hanggao has become so important to us in the last 5 weeks. It is hard to believe that it is basically all over. This exchange has changed my life in so many ways. But when I say exchange, I guess its really just the people involved that have changed my life. I am definitely going to miss living in China a lot, but most of all, I am going to miss all the people that I have connected with. I can't imagine my life without these people and I hope that this is just the beginning of a lifetime of friendships. As I transition back into Dover-Sherborn High School next week I will always carry with me the many unique experiences of my time in China. This was the best decision I ever made in high school, and no matter how stressful, tiring, and sometimes, awful high school was, my 2 months in China are what I will always remember when I think of high school. I wouldn't trade this experience for the world. Thank you DS (but mainly Viz) for giving me this opportunity.

See y'all in the USA! We will be arriving Tuesday night and I am totally going to school on Wednesday to see everyone. Zaijian Zhong guo, Ni hao Mei guo!

Yang Ni Ke

The Great Banquet

(Drew)

Well this is probably my last blog entry in China. Just the realization of this is making me sad. It depends how busy we are in Shanghai but i doubt ill have time for another blog entry because it would be on the day we leave. So updates on my travels. Our morning classes have been going great. We finished our "masterpieces" in both Ccalligraphy and Chinese Painting. Our body and Kung Fu classes keep us in shape while we stuff our faces with Chinese food. When i get back i might take a little time off from dumplings and noodles though. This week we have given all our teacher gifts out to show appreciation to all the teachers who took time to teach an extra class in the morning. My abilities at Ping Pong, Badminton and Running have all seen dramatic improvement over the last 5 weeks. I wish we played more badminton back in the states, its sort of the Chinese equivalent to Tennis. Everyone plays.

ooo... host dad brought me an apple (peeled), gotta love the hospitality in this place.

Today i got up a little earlier than usual. "Usual" has turned into 10 minutes before i leave in which i gobble whatever i can on the table before heading out the door. This morning i had a little more time to prepare for my day. I got to school (safely i might add, each day adds new perils to my trip to and from school) and did the normal routine, checked up on e-mail and chatted with team china before our Chinese class. We dedicated today's Chinese class to translating small scripts we wrote in English into Chinese. Today was the day of our going away banquet, which went very successfully (ill get to that later). After Baker the Bread maker helped us translate, we spent the rest of class practicing the actual speaking to each other, i knew it would be a train wreck if i didn't. Our second class today was calligraphy, but we already finished our "masterpieces" and didn't really have anything to work on. Yang Lao Shi said that we could take home the brushes we have been using as gifts. Yang Lao Shi is definitely one of Team China's many favorite teachers. We spent most of the class working on other constructive things, reading and writing etc. as well as practicing our speaches. First period in the afternoon was gym for Nick, Emily and Me, they played badminton while i spent the time practicing my Ping Pong with Joe. Second period i had to run home and get my silk vest for the banquet that i did not realize i would need because i assumed we had time between school and the banquet. I took a quick shower and changed as well, it was very warm today (over 70 degrees). Last period we had a farewell meeting just like the one we had at the beginning of stay in Hangzhou with all the administration at the school and all our host brothers and sisters along with various other teachers. We said our final thoughts about our stay and gave our deepest thanks for our trip and the hospitality they showed us while at Hanggao. We exchanged gifts and took many pictures.

After about 20 minutes we set off for the banquet. The banquet was massive. We had 5 large tables completely filled with people. Our list was just about 50 people which included all people who were related to the exchanged, our entire host families, our teachers at Hanggao and of course Patrick. Team China loves Patrick. Each of us got a table with both of our host families. At my table i made many toasts to my host families and to Patick, Ella and Baker who were all at my table. I thanked my host families for everything and had lots of fun chatting with them. My two host fathers did toasts to each other every couple minutes and proceeded to chug a small glass of wine each time. Team China made many toasts including Lu Naichuan and Madam Miao. We took lots of photos of all the different groups of people, we had lots of fun. The banquet was a great way to wrap up our stay in Hangzhou, we celebrated our stay rather than mourned our departure.

Fleeting Moments

(Terry)

Sunny skies overhead today; cherry blossom petals swirl along the driveway with the breeze, and we try our very best to ignore that clock ticking in the background. Offhand comments acquire more import, a casual snapshot becomes the last picture arm-in-arm with a now-dear friend, and there's a piquancy to all the little happenings that compose our day.

We've done our darndest to concentrate on morning classes. To our endless delight, we find that Yang Laoshi has crafted and stamped calligraphy for each of us -- loads of framing work now awaits us at home. Brushes swirled busily across numerous sheets of paper, and we find Yang Laoshi liberal with praise today: so many red circles and "very good"s! After he leaves us, poetry and portraits are our self-assigned work, until our history teacher joins us. We peer at the powerpoint he's prepared about some of the highlights of Hangzhou, including the Lingjing and Daoist temples. (We'll visit the Lingjing Temple this Saturday.) Class ends with a trip out to take pictures with the nearly century-old cherry tree as background. After our customary huge lunch, the young folk all head out to English Corner while laundry beckons me around the block to my washing machine!

The Chicken Masterpiece

(Cady)

Hey everyone!This may just be my last blog entry of the trip, unless we end up getting to an internet cafe in Shanghai. The exchange is really coming to an end. The big trip, the one we spent nearly an entire year anticipating, is almost over. The fact that we'll be graduating soon, going off to college, voting in a presidential election, and fending for ourselves is really beginning to hit me. These realizations, along with the fact that I'll soon be back in Dover-Sherborn, are scary but so exciting. That doesn't seem entirely related to China, but this trip has been such an integral part of my senior year that I'm sure it's played a part in the whole "growing up" thing. Anyways, this blog entry is really supposed to be about Tuesday. So here we go.Our first and only class on Tuesdays is Chinese Painting. Unfortunately, our teacher wasn't actually there. We decided to paint anyways though (don't worry, Baker said it was fine). We were supposed to be making our "masterpieces" since it was our final Chinese Painting class. I felt a little disgruntled- we were supposed to be making brilliant works after all! Sure, I like Chinese Painting, but it's difficult and therefore sometimes very frustrating. On tuesday, however, I opened the book of birds to a rooster that I have been admiring since day one. I proclaimed, "I am going to make a chicken....and it is going to be a masterpiece!" And I did. Well, okay, the chicken isn't quite like the one in the book. I am very proud of it though, since it actually resembles a chicken MORE than it does a worthless blob. Mission codename chicken is successful.After I completed my masterpiece chicken, I was quite ready to retire my brushes. Drew was having painter's block, so we went together to get milk tea and lollipops while the other three continued painting. I will be quite sad when I no longer have every day access to milk tea. Also, lollipops here cost wu (five) jiao. Like a dime, shi (ten) jiao is equal to one yuan. Therefore, one yuan gets you two lollipops, which means that seven yuan, which is equal to one US dollar, get you fourteen lollipops. I just thought that I would impress that figure on you. Fourteen lollipops for one dollar. Oh, I love China. Then again, at the rate the dollar is falling, soon it may only buy thirteen lollipops. I would suggest that all US citizens go out and buy all fourteen lollipops while they still can.We did a variety of things in the afternoon. The tailor, once again, brought back our dresses. I was finally satisfied with mine- I'm actually quite happy with it now. As of today, Emily's is good now too. Success! Nick and I rehearsed for the "play." Have we written about that? We acted out scenes from The Million Pound Bank Note with a couple of my classmates and then performed them for my entire class today (I am writing this on Wednesday, by the way). I acted in a restaurant scene, speaking a total of three lines which I, much to the awe of my classmates, memorized after one practice. I was actually really impressed by how quickly they managed to memorize their lines since not all of them even speak English very well.After rehearsal, Doris and I took the bus home. Very crowded. Her uncle then picked us up and brought us to a nice restaurant where we had dinner with my host mom, her brother and his wife, and her mom. At home, my host mother has taken to forcing Doris and I to eat every last bite of every dish she prepares. Her mother is almost exactly the same as she is, so you can imagine that between the two of them urging me "eat more! eat more!" I certainly ate more. My first, second, and third stomachs were very, very full. Then home, shower, computer, bed. You know the drill. And that's about it for Tuesday.In exactly a week we will be on a plane bound for America! We're getting excited to see everyone back home. Nick even has a small posse of admirers lined up to meet him at the airport. Well, see you all then!Cady

Ellas's Birthday

(Emily)

sunday was the day that the team china kids had been looking forward to since the beginning of the week- it was the day of ella's birthday party!

ella's birthday party started at 10am at a kareoke place across the street from the one that we have been going to (haoledi). this one was chosen because ella though it had the most american songs and it did not disappoint. even though it was 10 in the morning and we were all a little tired, we perked up after being in the room. besides us, ella had invited patrick, aj, and cerrus (sp?) along with last year's group: frank, kathleen, and rose. it was a ton of fun. we sang the requisite songs (britney spears and beatles) and even some new ones. cady did an amazing rendition of the intro of lonely by akon and we even tried to sing zhong guo hua. the latter was not as successful as we would have liked it to be but we have the 'zhong guo hua' part down now. patrick's really good at dancing and as he was singing love stoned by justin timberlake, he also danced along. pretty soon, it was time to go to lunch, which was at a japanese restaurant around the corner.

the food at the restaurant was delicious- i was very happy with my yaki udon with miso soup. frank also presented us with a roasted chicken that he had bought for us in the morning, so we had a little of that as well. after lunch, kathleen, rose, and frank had to go. we went SHOPPING! the boys were really excited for this part because they really wanted patrick to help them pick out some new clothes. we went to the downtown part of hangzhou and looked around the outlets (very very very hot and crowded- bu hao!). the boys didn't find anything that they thought was worth buying (they did try on a lot of clothes) and in the end, it was cady and i that ended up making purchases (she-a sweatshirt shirt with a rainbow god on it from jasonwood and me-a summer 'frock' with a square neck from only). such is life.

after bidding patrick, aj, and cerrus goodbye (they all had places to go), the five of us walked along the west lake...sort of. we were all freaked out at the large amount of people swarming the causeway (it was a beautiful day so go figure), so we just sat on the edge of the water, getting many odd looks, and just chilling. it was a very team china.

after ella's birthday, i went back home and met my host mom's brother along with his wife and daughter. the daughter is in fifth grade and has pretty good rudimentary english. we went to wal-mart together after dinner and she was able to tell me her favorite foods as well as ask me various questions. she also thought my attempts at speaking chinese were highly hilarious and helped me with identifying some foods in chinese.

and this is how sunday went. until next time, zai jian!

Happy Easter!

(Nick)

Happy Easter! Today we celebrated Ella's birthday! We met up at a KTV (karaoke) around 10 AM and spent a good 2 hours singing our hearts out. Our voices were less than stellar, however, as it was so early in the morning. It was a fun group - Ella (obviously), Kathleen, Frank, and Rose (the 2007 Exchange group that came to DS), Patrick, a couple classmates of Ella's, and Drew, Emily, Cady, and I. We were all a little burnt out from a busy weekend, but we were entertained by Patrick's amazing dancing skills which made it 100 times better. After KTV, we went to a Japanese noodle restaurant for lunch. It was delicious, and despite being in a city of 6 million, i managed to see a couple classmates eating lunch at a nearby table! Rose (English teacher) paid for the meal despite our protests. After our meal, Rose, Frank, and Kathleen all had to leave because they had school-related things to attend to. We barely ever see Rose since she is always busy, and Kathleen and Frank are of course studying like crazy for the college entrance examination at the end of the year. One thing that we do have to keep in mind here is that although we are about to graduate and our lives are (somewhat) stress free, everyone here is working and studying hard. Last spring, when Ella, Frank, Kathleen, and Rose came to DS, I was experiencing the end of junior year madness and AP exams...and i barely got to see them in DS. We all wish we could've had more time with each other in both DS and in Hangzhou, but school will always interfere with that. It's too bad, but it's a fact of life.

We then went clothes shopping for a solid 3 hours. Patrick is a clothing fanatic so he took us to all the good stores, and a couple of us made some great purchases. I had to refrain from buying anything, however - my bank account is rather small at the moment and I'd prefer to not come home bankrupt. Money sure does go fast here! Hangzhou is very cosmopolitan and fashionable so it is a great city for shopping. Patrick had to leave early because he had sunday classes (considering all grade 3's have classes on saturdays that is technically a 7 day school week for him......torture). We walked to West Lake and enjoyed the scenery, although the Broken Bridge was literally covered with people completely. West Lake in general, though gorgeous, is so crowded that it is sometimes hard to fully enjoy it. The weather was fantastic...probably high 60's and very sunny...sure beats Massachusetts. Emily and Cady were picked up by Emily's host mother, and Ella, Drew, and I took a taxi back to KTV, which is close to Ella's apartment and where Drew's bike was. Ella handed me a 20 yuan bill and gave the taxi driver Jerry's address...I insisted on paying but she wouldn't budge...even on her birthday.

When I got home, my host family and I (well, minus my host father who I've seen once and is constantly working at the Bank of China) went out by the river and took pictures together. When we got back to the apartment I showed them photos from home, and they showed me photos from their recent trip to Australia and New Zealand last summer. We went out to dinner to a Thai restaurant by West Lake....it was so good. Now Jerry is doing homework and I am preparing myself for my final week at Hanggao :(

My grandparents have enjoyed teaching me the Hangzhou dialect. They taught me "mado" which means stupid or foolish guy. Whenever I say it they burst out laughing...and whenever they have relatives or friends over, they ask me to say it for them. They also find my Chairman Mao (Mao Zhushi) bag and wallet hilarious...everytime I put on my bag, which is every morning, they laugh at it. It would be interesting to hear what my grandparent's lives were like during the Mao years...but it is a somewhat touchy subject here so I haven't asked them yet. It is so weird to think that these people have lived through so much historically...China has changed dramatically over the course of their lifetimes.

We have been in China long enough that it really doesn't feel like a foreign country to me anymore. Perhaps that is just because Hangzhou is so modern, but I honestly think that I have adapted to life here. Now that we have been in one place for nearly a month, I feel connected to not just the city of Hangzhou, but to the people. The fact that I have good friends here is just so comforting and I feel like I am a part of something rather than an outsider looking in. I mean, that is not to say that my lighter hair and fair skin do not constantly attract stares 24/7, but you get the idea. Even though I can clearly remember my first day at Hanggao, it feels like I've been here for years. The people I have met in Hangzhou have made the Exchange for me. We have one more week here and I am not looking forward to the end of it. Time goes by so quickly here and before you know it we will be back at DS.

Again, Happy Easter to everyone back home!

Tailoring the End of the Week, Too!

(Terry)

Our morning today began with some unexpected free time, as our papercutting teacher had to attend a meeting. After a few forays around campus, we found ourselves snacking on chocolate cake provided by the boys, then heading off to the gym to work off those calories in PE. Our express hopes for badminton were fulfilled, and birdies soared at the flick of a wrist (much to the potential dismay of my old tennis coach, who would blanch to see this.) You all should expect some accomplished young players to return to the States, clamoring for a badminton set at home! Our gym teacher then finished teaching us the last portion of the kung fu routine he'd begun last class. We all really do enjoy the challenge, though try as I may, the flow of the moves from one position to the next is just not happening gracefully yet! Our entrance into the lunch room surprised us: the usual complement of individual servings was replaced by a huge spread of eleven different dishes laid out in banquet-style array on the lazy-Susan at the table's center. A locally famous soup, an eggy soft-tofu custard, beef and broccoli, breaded fish (boneless, no less!), vegetables galore, topped off by a flan-style dessert and a sweet bean-paste-filled steamed bun. Darned little was left after our crew finished up! We also said goodbye to Lujia, who'll be returning to Toronto this weekend, at the end of his spring vacation here. After two weeks, we'll miss his cheery self as our extra translator-and-pal during the morning round of classes!Plans for the afternoon have been adjusted on the fly over the last day... We'd initially expected to meet the tailor at 2:00 p.m. for a final review of our vests/dresses, but Cui Hongxiang (Helen) received a call that the buttons were not finished, and the tailor wouldn't arrive until 5:00. Host brothers and sisters were kind enough to shift late-afternoon plans without grumbling over the delay (it also turned out that we could have spoken to our originally-planned classes after all...) Instead, papers were written, emails sent, websites visited, books read; a quiet bustle of activity in the English office. Third period, Emily and Nick were able to visit a year-one class with me. This proved to be the chattiest class of the two dozen I've seen, with no need for us to "lecture about America" before the next question popped up! Afterwards, everyone headed in different directions for a bit until the tailor's sister arrived bearing the long-awaited creations. The guys had an easy time of it, but the qi paos for Emily and Cady needed to be taken-in here and there. The overall effect is smashing for all four, though -- China Banquet, here we come!

Twelve Days and Counting ... Reflections

(Cady)

Hello one and all,

Twelve days. We have only TWELVE days left in China. That thought is absolutely astounding to me. That's less than two weeks! It's funny because the time has gone by so incredibly fast, while the same time, I feel like I've been in Hangzhou for ages- like I've known some of the people here for years. I was thinking about the whole China experience today, and I'm just as sure as ever that I have no regrets. Although I missed the musical and two months of senior year, I wouldn't trade the time I've spent in China for even the most perfect two months I could have ever experienced at Dover-Sherborn. That's not to say anything against DS. What I mean is that I (and I think that others would agree) have had such a truly profound experience on this exchange. Sure, we've had our ups and downs, but throughout our trip in this crazy country, we've learned a whole lot about our crazy selves. Am I sounding sappy yet? I think we've all, at the very least, learned how to stretch and adapt when put into new surroundings. I've found that, more and more, I am able to brush things off and just laugh at myself. Even if I'm in a bad mood, I am much more able to smile and be friendly to everyone (which usually ends up making me genuinely happy). I guess what I'm really saying is that interacting with the people of China- guides, teachers, students, host brothers and sisters- has ended up warping me for the better. I'm not crying "epiphany!" or "self-evolution!" I'm simply noticing that I'm the same, old Cady with some slight alterations, maybe a few improved traits, and a bit more world experience. Maybe it's just me, but I think that's pretty cool.

Anyways, back to life in Hangzhou. I've fallen into a good routine with my new family- up at 6:20, ready to eat by 6:40, finish breakfast and hit the road by about 6:55. That, by the way, is very impressive when compared to my mornings back in Dover where I don't generally rise or shine until about 6:50. Doris lives a lot farther from the school than Eve did. At first I was a bit dismayed to find out that I would be taking the bus home after school. These are not school buses, mind you, these are public city buses which tend to be jam-packed at that hour. I've gotten used to it though, as with all things, and don't find the rides very irritating or unpleasant. This morning we had Chinese first with Gao Li. We were all a bit skeptical, seeing as how we spent the entirety of our last class learning the Chinese translation of Captain, O my Captain by Walt Whitman. Don't get me wrong- it's a great poem. Learning it in Chinese was a bit tedious and exhausting though, so naturally we wondered what today would bring. Another poem! Only five lines though, about cherry blossoms in the spring. It was entirely appropriate because Hanggao is having a "literature festival" on Sunday to celebrate the blooming cherry trees. So, we spent part of class learning the poem, and part of it outside by the actual cherry trees reading the poem TO them. It was all well and good, and the class only lasted half a period because our teacher had to go prepare for said festival. Actually, the students here have some really cool traditions that correspond with the blooming of the cherry blossoms. Everyone writes his or her wish on a piece of colorful paper and they all get tied to the trees around the cherry trees while the flowers are in bloom. It's supposed to be good luck, and I suppose if you're super lucky then your wish will come true!

After Chinese we had Calligraphy with one of our favorites, Mr. Yang! We were working on our "masterpieces," as Baker says. Yang Laoshi wrote out four characters for each of us to learn and write out on nice, white calligraphy paper. Naturally we were all incredibly intimidated. I got the most difficult set (yikes!) which translated into Chinese-American friendship. Em's was something about a beautiful mountain. Drew's was "sun and moon shine brightly in the sky" and Nicks meant roughly "a thousand mountains, ten thousand rivers." Basically they were all little sayings that are made with particularly beautiful characters. I'm not sure that we always do the characters justice. But hey, we try. After Calligraphy was lunch. Yum. Then English corner. Yay. Then class where I journaled and pondered much of what I wrote about in my first paragraph of this entry.

During our second period of the afternoon, Drew and I went to help out Terry with one of her English class "presentations." Generally we get up in front of a class, talk for a long time about Dover-Sherborn, the college process in America, our families, things like that, and then take a few questions from those who are brave enough to ask. We were lecturing a particularly giddy and outgoing class today though, and the questions started coming right away. It ended up being a lot of fun because the group was so enthusiastic. What is your town like? Do you have buildings as tall as in Hangzhou? We've heard that Americans don't really get homework, so what do you do after school? (we try to kill THAT rumor as much as possible). Those are just some examples of questions asked. Very successful presentation, I'd say. After that, Drew and I went to the gym to join my PE class. Everyone had to practice badminton techniques, except for us foreign kids (me and Drew) who were allowed to just play a game on one of the nets. Twas a vicious match. I've found that I have greatly improved in the area of badminton from when I first arrived in China (see!? personal improvements!). After that was the period during which everyone goes to whatever club they belong to. All of Team China ended up going to the English Club that just watches "Friends" every Thursday. Good stuff! Derek, my English teacher, is having his students do scenes from the million pound bank note. So, he has made Nick and I actors in this little production that we are apparently performing next Wednesday. We had a meeting with him and the other students in the "play" after school today. We're practicing tomorrow after lunch!

Well, that about sums up today. We're quite excited because our dresses and vests should be ready tomorrow! I think the most important thing at this point is to enjoy our final week in Hangzhou. Ohh, it's Ella's birthday on Monday, so for anyone who remembers her- don't forget to send a HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELLA on facebook! See everyone soon.

A Day at Hanggao - Calligraphy to Badminton

(Emily)

hello all.

the past few days have flown by- i have no idea where the time's going (maybe narnia?). anyways, today was no exception.

the day started off pretty much without a hitch. miao tells me to be ready by 7 yet at 6:50, her mom and her are waiting for me to get out of the bathroom (i was combing my bangs!). so tomorrow, i'm going to try extra hard to be ready at 6:45 just in case her parents want to leave early again. the ride to school is uneventful. her parents like to listen to talk shows (we ride with both of them- her mom gets off at our school and takes the bus to where she teaches, which is at the experimental school on wulin street) and miao likes to look out the window/nap so talking isn't really an option in the morning so i've taken to putting on my ipod and zoning out for the 20 minutes.

this morning we had calligraphy and hangzhou history. in calligraphy, we got sparkly sheets of rice paper with what i believe to be mica embedded into it. mr. yang told us to do masterpieces and write ri, yue, and two other characters which, when combined, meant 'the sun and the moon shine brilliantly' or something to that effect. he demonstrated and made it look like the easiest thing in the world. i, on the other hand, made one of the characters look like 'it is sleeping with one of its legs out of the bedroom door' according to mr. yang. mr. yang also has this 'what is this' shrug that he does with the best expression on his face. he also told us that good zen comes with calligraphy because a person has to regulate their breathing in order to truly make the brushstrokes work. i can vouch that this somewhat works; when we were practicing writing our names small for our 'masterpieces,' i wouldn't breathe in between characters. i felt sorta sick after that but it was worth it seeing my name legibly written in chinese. i even merited one 'very good' from the laoshi himself.

history, while perhaps not a class that i look forward, was amazing today. easily up there on one of the best classes i've had here. we got into the classroom after taking a break and saw that our teacher had set up the powerpoint (we usually have powerpoint presentations given to us in chinese then translated by lugia or baker). oh dear we thought. he started talking about wushan temple and in one of the slides, he talked about how the manchus and the tibetans share the same buddhist beliefs in that they believe sakyamuni was very fierce and war like (there was a manchu carving done of sakyamuni owning his opponents). i asked an off topic question about what he thought of the lhasa riots (because the manchus are apparently related to the tibetans) which spurred a whole conversation on tibet. he had some really good points; he argued that what the westerners see happening in tibet, they don't understand because they don't know the full story. he told us that the tibetans weren't peaceful and were in fact, quite barbaric before the ming dynasty, when china assumed control of them. he said that they were feudal and used human skin to make leather and that the chinese helped them and set up the control of the dalai lama. he also compared tibet to the south in america; the south wanted to separate from the north, but the north wouldn't allow it and put it down with militant force (war). he said that the tibetans were like the chinese because they were from similar family trees 2000 years back and that china made tibet what it was today. while i took this with a grain of salt, a lot of the points he made were very valid (the cynics in the peanut gallery will have to take my word on this- i can't condense the hour long conversation that we had into a few sentences). after talking about tibet, we then went on to talk about tiananmen square and what he thinks of mao. he was really eager to answer our questions and wasn't offended when we (respectfully) challenged his position. if anything, he was fascinated by our opinions. his responses, while maybe in line with the party line, were well thought out and backed up with a plethora of facts. after today's class, my respect for him has skyrocketed and being in that class and talking about the cultural revolution and great leap forward made us all think of modern china with viz.

lunch was excellent. there was tomatoes and eggs which were very very good as well as peeled mango and coca cola. we were all happy campers. after lunch was english corner where team china: the musical was put on. at random points in our conversations with people, we did the hokey pokey, the chicken dance, and the friends theme song, among others. talking to the chinese kids is so much fun. they've become less intimidated by us and now we even have a regular group that comes to english corner daily. team china looks forward to it everyday and the conversations are always different.

my afternoon was pretty boring- i worked on math with terry for most of the afternoon and then went to 'balls' (what penny calls it) with drew and nick (cady's class had class meeting apparently). drew ran while nick and i played badminton by the track.

and now, i am here, at miao's house. you may think i don't talk to her that much since i really haven't mentioned her in today's blog but fear not- we're getting to know each other and she's so cool and nice. last night we were talking about the kids in her class and she told me that the girl she sits next to got a really short haircut by accident and she asks miao everyday if her hair has grown; miao dutifully tells her that it has even though she can't discern a difference. my host mom is really adventurous-she loves traveling and usually goes alone since miao's dad doesn't like to travel and miao usually stays at home. she's been to all over china (including tibet-be jealous, mom) as well as europe and when miao comes to america in the summer, my host mom will travel around america while miao's at camp. she's also insanely skilled at badminton and is no.2 in the hangzhou teacher's league. my host dad is really good at cooking and made a dish with a pink broth, which he then put over my rice to make magenta rice. it was very pretty- i took a picture of it.

that's all for now! bye!

Hammering the Beggar's Chicken

(Nick)

On Friday night, as you probably know, we switched host families. My first host family drove me (and my bajillion bags) to my new host families home. I said goodbye to my host father and gave him a hug, and then my host mother took me into my new host families home. We sat down with my new host family and my first host mom talked with them about me and what i like to eat (chie zi...eggplant). Then I said goodbye to my first host mom and Raven...which was really sad...we were all crying as they were boarding the elevator. I felt bad crying because i didn't want my new host family to feel inferior, but at the same time, i really was sad at the prospect of not seeing Raven and his parents all the time anymore. Hangzhou is a city of 6 million, not of 4,000 like Sherborn and 6,000 of Dover, so its not like I will see them around....I will see them at our farewell banquet though! Raven and I are emailing each other daily. While I was staying with my first host family, Raven, his mom, and I would always say "bu hao" when his father smoked. I told him that I want him to quit so he can be healthy. Well, now that I left, according to Raven (in his emails), his father has made a vow to quit before Raven comes to America in September! Raven and I are quite pleased.

My new host family situation is quite a bit different than my last! This time around I have grandparents! Jerry lives in an apartment with his grandparents, and his parents live in a separate apartment on another floor. His mom visits frequently for meals, but his dad seems very tied up with work so I only see him on weekends. I really like the concept of living with grandparents...it adds a whole different perspective. They are basically like real parents to him though, as he calls them baba and mama. He told me to call them Wai gong (for my grandfather) and Wai po (for my grandmother) which I have started to use a lot. Their apartment is really nice. Not nearly as western as my last one...a lot more Chinese feeling, but still very comfortable. I have a plasma television and brand new computer in my room, as well as a heated queen-sized bed...it doesn't get much better than this. My new home is located in downtown Hangzhou, about a 10 minute walk from Hangzhou High School. In the morning my host mother drives us to school and then we walk home in the afternoon (or should I say evening, school gets out at 5 PM!). My host parents work in the same building but they drive to work separately - my mom in her Toyota Camry and my dad in his Audi A6 (yes, I am aware that I am a car nut). Jerry said that their hour's vary...sometimes they will come home at 7 PM and sometimes at 2 AM, because they are out with clients playing mah jong! So my grandparents are the ones I see the most. Since they don't work anymore, they do all the cooking and various house jobs. I come home everyday and my bed is freshly made, and my clean laundry is folded neatly on my bed. I could get used to this! Jerry is really cool...and pretty goofy like me. His English isn't as good as Raven's though. He walks around with a pocket electronic English dictionary and whenever he can't remember how to say something, he whips out the dictionary. I never thought someone would take longer than I do to get ready in the morning, but Jerry sure does! In the time that I spend showering and eating breakfast, Jerry is applying his hair gel. It is definitely a confidence booster, I guess! Jerry and Joe (Drew's host brother) are good friends and they are hilarious together...always playing tricks on each other.

On Sunday, my host family took me to the Xixi National Wetland Park in the outskirts of western Hangzhou. It is a beautiful park and we spent a couple hours on a wooden boat cruising around the wetlands! After some beautiful scenery we drove to Lou Wai Lou restaurant, perhaps the most famous in Hangzhou. Present at the meal was not only Jerry, my host parents, and grandparents, but also Jerry's cousins, aunt, and uncle. When my host parents asked what I wanted to drink, I said Sprite. The waitress then proceeded to pour sprite in everyone's cups...oops! Jerry's father asked if I wanted beer and wine, which, considering I just made a room full of mostly adults get served sprite, of course i did! It wasn't really a big deal though..we all had 3 glasses each of sprite, beer, and wine respectively.The meal was outstanding (as to be expected)...dongpo pork, Xihu (west lake) fish with vinegar sauce, and yes, beggar's chicken! It takes four or five hours to cook, and they cook it in a clay shell. The waitress brought it out and my host father told me to go over to her. She handed me a hammer which I used to break open the clay. Jerry told me that I will now have good luck since I hammered the beggar's chicken open! The intense cooking process is so worth it - the beggar's chicken was delicious.

This morning wai gong woke me me up at 6:20 and i showered, ate a delicious breakfast of fried dumplings, hard boiled eggs in vinegar, and oatmeal. My host mother drove us to school as usual but the traffic is so bad, and even though we are close to school, we were a bit late. This morning we had Chinese painting! I think we all agree that it is our favorite class. We have it for three hours and it is so relaxing. Our teacher is such a talented artist, though, so it is sometimes embarrassing to paint while she is looking over my shoulder. Today I painted a cherry blossom tree, Drew and Emily painted sparrows, Cady painted a pumpkin and Terry painted flowers. My cherry blossom tree came out pretty well considering I am a horrid painter, but then of course, with my luck, as I was writing my name in Chinese characters, it made one big black blob. Laoshi to the rescue! She made my ugly black blob into a beautiful sparrow...i really envy her ability to transform even the ugliest thing into perfection. Terry is rather good at painting flowers and the teacher is always really impressed with her work. Drew just makes all of us look bad. In the middle of our three hour painting block we had a half hour break which we spent getting nai cha (milk tea) and then we bought some cheap iPod speakers in the market across from Hanggao...so we can listen to music during classes like Chinese painting!

After class we had lunch as usual, and then English corner. A lot of my former classmates (from Raven's class) come to English corner now. I've gotten so many presents from them - a Chinese fan with a poem in both Chinese and English written on it as well as a personalized note, a bracelet with my Chinese name engraved on a stone, and a book of Hangzhou postcards. I miss my old class so much....the guys were really funny, and the girls were really sweet and never got too shy around me. We went to classes with our host siblings next. Jerry and Joe are in the same class, so naturally Drew and I are in the same class. Drew finished Angels & Demons and he brought in the 7th Harry Potter for me to read...a big mistake because now I am hooked and I have an 8 page AP Gov position paper due when I get back to America on US/China foreign policy...ahhhh. During the last period we had class meeting. First we watched two Beijing Olympics (propaganda...what? did I just say that?) videos that I guess were intended to get the Chinese students excited for the Olympics...yeah, not hard at all considering they've been waiting since 2000 to finally see August 2008 come around. They cheered really loudly after each video clip. Then Drew and I went up in front of the class and introduced ourselves for 15 minutes...we talked about our activities and interests, high school in America, drivers licenses, and of course, the college process. After, we played a game that was basically like Olympics charades....two teams with two people on each, one person had to act out a particular sport and the other had the guess it. Drew and I dominated.

That is all for today. Time is going by so fast...in exactly two weeks we will be landing in Boston :( Our stay in Hangzhou is just too short! If I could choose to spend an entire year at Hanggao...I totally would. I just know that I am getting attached to so many people here and saying goodbye is going to be awful. Ric sent us an email saying that a former DS China Exchange student, Julia Stevenson (2004) commented on our blog...her words made me realize just how precious are time at Hanggao is. Sure, we can study abroad in China during junior year of college (like her), but we are never going to have an experience like this ever again. I think it is finally hitting home that we are coming closer to the end of a journey that has lasted about a year now in total (Application, interview, Modern China Tutorial, Chinese class, and finally CHINA). Okay, 2 more weeks to make the best of it. Ready, set, GO!

3000 Steps

(Drew)


I've been in China six weeks. It does not feel like six weeks have gone by. Before we left we figured out that 8 weeks is china is almost as long as our summer vacation. Our summer vacation feels like a very long time so, this thought scared me a little but now eight weeks is not enough. There is a chance that I "accidentally" miss my flight back (don't tell Viz she has too much to deal with already).

Well Friday we switched host families. I got last minute goodbyes with Mark and his mom, a few pictures and i was off to my new home. I walked my 600lb suitcase from Marks house to Joes house which is about 10 minutes walk. They live on the same street, which is also the street that the school is located so it makes it simple for my brain to remember how to get home after running. Joe sometimes has afternoon classes so some days he won't even be home when I get home.

My new host family...

Although I'm sad to leave my old host family I think I'm going to be very happy with my new host family. My host Dad just got back from a business trip to Italy. He brought back with him a several books showing Rome and other tourist sites. His trip was well timed to go with the new book I'm reading, "Angels and Demons". Unfortunately the "new book" is soon to be "old book" because I'm so addicted I've almost finished it in several days, tomorrow I'm headed to the bookstore to pick out a new book. One of the books has a DVD with virtual tours that you can look around famous sites in Rome. It really makes my book come alive. My host mother and father both speak English quite well, my host father is slightly bette! r than my mother but he has a thick accent and crude grammer.I can easily understand him but Joe is constantly correcting him. For some reason this entertains me to see Joe critisize his dads english and the banter that ensues. My family seems to enjoy my use of the small amount of Chinese I know because they laugh every time I can say something. My vocabulary in Chinese has definitely expanded since being here and hearing Chinese reinforces the Chinese that I already knew (or was supposed to know for that midyear i took). Saturday I went out with Team China and all our host siblings to Pizza Hut, delicious (hao chi). Joe was getting upset that everyone else was late; he kept repeating "my patience has ended". I couldn't help myself from laughing, I'm not sure if it was the way he said it or how Team China is just too used to each other being late. I also wondered later if he was quoting a video game where one of the characters repeats that same l! ine. Joe seems to enjoy messing with Jerry (it's hard to explain but Joe is a bit of a jokester).At pizza hut Joe had the Cady and Emily convinced that Jerry had a girlfriend and it was Cady's previous host sister Eve (this has been confirmed as not true). After Pizza Hut we met up with my friend Eric from class six along with a few of his classmates and our group friend "Baker the bread maker" who translates for all our morning class. He also translates our orders to the milk tea guy each morning.

KTV was so much fun, I love having your own room to just hang out with all your friends. I've been taught a new game with 5 die under a cup that you shake. Cady's previous host sister Eve also enjoys playing (I think it's because she can beat me almost every time). I'm getting better though, I can be sneaky too. Our KTV group was so large though, I think I wrote about this problem last time I wrote a blog. Our group of friends is growing so we invite more and more people, but I think 15 people in a small room is probably the limit.

Sunday morning I got up early to shower and eat breakfast before Joe, Lilly (my host mom who is leaving tomorrow on business in Beijing) and I went hiking. We took a taxi to Zhe Jiang University, the 3rd best university in China. We walked through the campus and saw the massive statue of Mao Zedong. I took several photos in front of the statue with my host brother Joe. Our hike began up a staircase with 800 steps. It actually marked off each 100 steps with a small carving. This massive flight of stairs brought us to the trail that contained several thousand more steps that would lead us a few miles around the mountains of Hangzhou. We took short breaks to take in the scenery and to eat some snacks. My host family quickly learned that I will never! refuse a pealed apple. My family also seemed amused at my ability to throw rocks far distances off the mountain. Joe said later that I probably killed someone below us. The trips final destination was the temple on top of the tallest peak in Hangzhou, Bei Gou Fun. The temple was for the god of money, naturally many people seemed eager to donate money to the shrines around the temple and rub the various statues for good fortune. I was exhausted at the top of the mountain. My host family seemed to be in amazingly good shape, they seemed to barely notice our 5 hour journey through the mountains. Instead of taking the cable car we descended a more direct root (the line for the cable car would have taken at least an hour) to the base which took very little time but descending at least 3000 steps in such a short time can be tough on your legs. We took a bus (I have developed an ill temperament toward overcrowded buses) to a nearby KFC for lunch. I love Chinese KFC, they have soft serve ice cream and French fries and chicken nuggets as well as all the normal foods you would find at an American KFC. After telling Team China about my hike on Sunday I think they want to go with me next weekend.

Monday = Year One Class for Me!

(Ms. Luskin)

On this somewhat grey day, I was amazed to find myself among the faculty early-birds awaiting the outdoor opening-ceremonies for the week. It's now my earnest goal that, some AFS day, I'll be first to identify the Chinese national anthem (since I've been able to listen to it so often during our stay.) Fair warning to Vizulis, Preiser and Barrett: Luskin's sharpening her ears! I've been equally amazed to find that the teachers behave as casually as the students do during this ceremony: while we all stand in our formal lines facing toward the speakers on the gym stairs, low -voiced chatter continues non-stop while an administrator or student offers (I'm certain) well-crafted advice. After the ceremony concluded, I had time to grab a bite of breakfast, since Monday's classes begin fat 8:15. My usually solo breakfast munching is warmed by Cui Hongxiang's (Helen's) cheery company today!

And the Monday round of special classes kicks off with Chinese class. We've begun Walt Whitman's "O Captain, My Captain," a poem that my father used to recite to us when I was a kid; I expect that all the military-school guys of his era learned these martial poems. It's proved to be a heck of a challenge for our beginner Chinese abilities to keep the pronunciation, tones and meter coordinated; Gao Li is giving us lots of practice in reading aloud one after the other! But, in fact, these three stanzas are coming together as we find that practice does make (less im-) perfect!

I worked hard to be pleased that I got to speak with year-one (10th grade) English classes next, since it meant that I missed our gym class. No matter what we do in PE, it's always such a good hard workout for this old lady! Ah, well, I'll just have to make time to do something active later in the day. I discovered that I'd be meeting with Cui Hongxiang's husband's classes today; that's wonderful, actually, because it will give me a chance to get to know him a bit more. The students, though, seem so familiar, much like my 10th-grade-Algebra-II people: perky, un-jaded by upperclassman status, and full of questions! The two hours flew by, and I headed over to our lunchroom to meet up with everyone again.

I'm sure you've read the details of the weekend blog, and the changes of host sibling/family that came last week. So bittersweet to know that I'll see Eve, Penny, Raven and Mark much less, even as I soon learn to be just as fond of the new faces arrayed before me: Doris, MiaoMiao, Joe and Jerry. Maybe because Team China are experienced exchange people now, I hear less "getting-to-know-you" informative chat, and more "we're-already-comfy-together" everyday conversation! Either way, I was charmed by Cady's description of her old and new host parents discussing details of her care-and-feeding: "like I was a puppy they were adopting!" How much all these folks have learned about each other in just over two weeks!

Since I had some emails that clamored to be dealt with, I waved goodbye to the kids as they made their way to English corner after lunch. Many young folks have been heading over to meet us there, curious to know more about the people behind the faces that they see in their halls and classrooms. I'll see my American crew again before morning class tomorrow...

Movin' on - New Host Families

(Cady)

Hey everyone!

As you all know, we have officially moved in with our new families. For me the switch happened after dinner on Friday night. Before that though, my host mom came home with silk scarves and longjing tea for me! I was truly surprised, but of course extremely happy. It was sad saying goodbye to Eve. Her mom drove us both to my second sister, Doris's, home where we sat in the living room sipping tea while the moms discussed my maintenance in Chinese. Since Doris had class, I had 45 minutes alone with my new, non-English-speaking host mom. The coffee table in the living room of my new apartment is cluttered with all sorts of sweets because Doris told her mom that I like candy, all of which she proceeded to try to feed me within a very short period of time. I showed her pictures of my family back home and she called her husband, who lives in Beijing right now (he's attending the Party University for a year), so that I could speak to him in English over the phone. Actually, he seemed like a very nice guy and we ended up talking for about twenty minutes. As you can imagine, his English is very good. After Doris came home we shared more photos, and then off to bed.

The following morning was typical of a Saturday- we meet at the school at 9:00 am and from there some teachers take us to a new destination. Oh, before that I had breakfast with Doris and her mom. She actually cooked us breakfast! I say this with such excitement because it was my first experience with being served breakfast by a Chinese mom. In case anyone is interested, I had toast with ketchup, greens, and egg on it, along with a dim sum bun and some bacon. Impressive, right? Anyways, yesterday we went to Wu Village. The village is about an hour and a half away from Hangzhou. The bus ride was fairly interesting because we were all buzzing with the excitement of new host brothers and sisters. Nick and Drew's brothers are both extremely funny, but I'm sure they'll want to tell you about that themselves. Doris and I spent most of the ride sharing my Ipod. We must have arrived at Wu Village at the exact same time as every other tourist, because the place was packed! The village itself is sort of like an interactive museum. Or a lived-in ghost town. There are canals running all through the town, which reminded me a bit of Lijiang and made the area very beautiful. At the same time, it was so crowded that it felt like we spent all morning in one massive line. The part of town we walked through, as I said, has basically been transformed into a museum. The narrow streets led us into buildings where we had our tickets punched and viewed very old furniture (especially beds), costumes, and the special "blue and white flower fabric" for which the town is famous. I really enjoyed the architecture of the buildings and the look of the canals more than the furniture, but that may be because of all the tourists packed around every single piece on display.

Then, of course, came lunch. It was one of those meals where we all got extremely stuffed and then they brought out the carbs. Fried rice and noodles followed what had already seemed like a hundred delicious dishes. After that we had a short, scenic boat ride on the canal, much like the one we took on West Lake. Ah, and let's not forget- we did a bit of shopping. Then it was back to Hanggao where karaoke plans awaited us. The eight of us (Me, Doris, Em, Luna, Nick, Jerry, Drew, and Joe) had dinner all together at the Pizza Hut across from the KTV place. Drew and Nick each got their own pizza... yikes. We went to the same KTV place we'd gone to the first time, so we were all familiar with how it works. Eric, a former classmate of Drew and host for the night, had reserved one of the big rooms. Good thing too, because there were a lot of us there. Eric brought four classmates with him, plus Eve, Baker, and my classmate, Peggy, all came. Needless to say it was rather crowded. In a good way though. Lots of singing and socializing went on until about ten when we all parted ways.

We tried to make hiking plans for this morning (Sunday), but in the end no one rose or shone in time for the 8:00 am time Eric and I set. Well, except for me, but it wouldn't be considered acceptable, I think, for me to hike alone with a boy. Therefore I spent the morning amusing myself in various ways, answering questions for the Focus, and thinking about college. AH! Doris's mom had lunch ready for when she got home from class (Math from 9-11). That was great, of course, and after wards Doris and I went to the supermarket to buy snacks for this afternoon. Since I have a cold, Doris's mom bought me Tylenol and imposed nap-time on me. So I napped. After that some girls from our class came over to just hang out. It was actually a lot of fun. They taught me how to play a two-deck card game and I taught them Spit, which they got pretty in to. We also spent a lot of time just talking and goofing around. Then we made dumplings. After dinner another girl, Doris's old neighbor, showed up bearing a present for me. So she, Doris, Peggy and I sat around talking until they all had to disperse and do homework. Overall, a good day. So that pretty much brings us up to date. My actual day for the blog was Saturday, but I thought I'd include a bit about today since we all went our separate ways.

Hope all is well and dandy in Dover-Sherborn. See you all in two weeks! Whoa, so soon.

Cady

Kung Fu with the Master!

(Emily)

friday:
so on thursday i packed up in anticipation for changing my host families. my host families had arranged it so that my new host dad would pick up my luggage at school friday morning.

friday morning came and we successfully did the changing of the luggage. big yellow was bursting at its seams. i'll most definitely need another bag for returning home to america (and i thought i didn't!). saying bye to my host dad and mom was really hard. i'll still see penny daily though because miao miao's class is close to her's. (note: luna doesn't respond to her english name so she asked us to call her by her nickname, which is miao miao- little tree since she was born on arbor day).

after saying goodbye to my host dad, who drops penny and i off at school each morning, i went to my morning classes. today was paper cutting and kung fu (pronounced more like kong fu). paper cutting was significantly less disastrous for me than it was last week. i actually got a decent papercutting out of the olympic panda that i was doing (after two tries...), although one looks like it could be a member of the happy tree friends....it's missing an eye and an arm. it was very satisfying. of course cady and drew put me to shame with their awesomely more intricate pandas. they've now moved onto more detailed window paper cuts.

kung fu started off with basketball...until the teacher realized that even though we were american, we majorly sucked at making the ball get into the hoop. we really can't even call what we were doing basketball. at one point i said "10 bucks says emily will get hit in the face." sure enough, within five minutes a ball smacked me square on my nose. however, cady and i were quite successful at dropping the ball to the point where we started kicking it around because we were too lazy to pick it up. that's when our teacher (not the cute lady teacher-it's a man who closely resembles a sparrow...and is insane at kung fu and badminton) handed us a soccer ball. we had a great 3 v 3 game (drew, cady, and i vs. nick, lugia, and baker). drew cady and i dominated. slash drew dominated and cady and i just ran up and down the court trying to help out. it was lots of fun. we were all pretty sweaty by the time we took a water break. then, we started to do kung fu. our teacher taught us another sequence that was harder than the first one we learned. it had jumping/punching while simultaneously turning and punching over three steps. my brain could not handle it. that being said, it was still really fun. the amount of grace and control that is mind boggling. our teacher is insanely coordinated and makes it look so easy! i keep mortal kombat running through my head (a la piper and andrea's china movie). it makes everything seem more badass.

lunch was amazing (per usual). english was interesting. the english lessons here focus on.... pracitcal uses? we learned about anorexia today and how to identify it. there was even a listening comp. segment where a woman was telling the doctor what she ate (apple, banana, and bread over the course of the day) and the students had to identify what she had (it was anorexia). the fact that the kids were learning the words for anorexia and protein intake is so in depth- i'm pretty sure not even the ap spanish/french/latin kids know the word for anorexia. it's just not something that comes up in everyday conversations. i was weired out.

after school i bid penny goodbye and said hello to miao miao. her driver was waiting for us and drove us to her house, which is about 20/30 minutes away from hanggao. while we were driving, she told me that the area that she lives in is popular for migrant workers because it is farther away from the center of hangzhou and therefore the housing prices are cheaper. i will admit, i was getting a little mortified. imagine my surprise when the elevator took us to the top of the apartment building and opened up to a gorgeously modern living room (sleek light fixtures included). my jaw dropped. tinkling in the background was a zen water fountain, positioned underneath the spiral slatted wood staircase. at the top of the stairs is a high ceiling study. miao miao's room and a patio where plants that her father grows are next to the study. when miao miao led me to my room i think i let out an audible gasp. i have a queen size bed (a giant box spring- as hard as the beds at yangshuo) with a flat screen tv. very ultra modern furniture. and a massage chair. holy cow. i met miao miao's father at dinner. he's a chinese teacher at a middle school and doesn't speak any english. he's not very talktative but he did say through miao miao some words of welcome. i didn't meet the mom on friday (i have met her though- she's a math teacher in another middle school and is very softspoken and pretty) because i went to bed at 9. i was in bed at 8. i had been fighting a cold for a couple of days and wanted to kill it asap, so sleep was mucho importante.

and this is how my friday went. sorry again for the delay! zai jian!

Check off "Attend a Business Dinner in China"

(Nick)

We have already been in Hangzhou for more than 2 weeks! Time sure does fly here.

Yesterday was Raven's 16th birthday! I was originally supposed to stay with Raven for the second part of the exchange, but he told me that he wanted to celebrate his birthday with me so that is why I stayed with him first. Two days ago we went to a really good bakery called Free Mori to order a cake, and we picked it up yesterday. We went to a restaurant across the Qiantang River Bridge that was a little sketchy looking on the outside, but according to Raven, is the only restaurant in Hangzhou that still has the traditional Hangzhou cuisine! In the front, they had many different tanks of various aquatic animals - catfish, turtles, shrimp, and eels! Immediately upon arriving, four catfish were taken out of the tanks and taken to the kitchen for us! After a great meal, I sang happy birthday to Raven (Zhe ni shengri quai le) and gave him two CDs that I had bought during lunch break (Maroon 5 and Gorillaz). Later that night, we lit candles on the delicious raspberry pudding cake from Free Mori. We sang happy birthday (in English this time, his parents are trying to learn more English since Raven is coming to America next year). Before Raven blew out the candles, he spent a good 5 minutes with his eyes closed, praying (I guess its the Chinese equivalent of making a wish before blowing out the candles!). The cake was delicious and it was so great to be able to celebrate Raven's birthday while I'm here!

This morning we had Chinese and Calligraphy. In Chinese, we translated Walt Whitman's poem, "Oh, Captain! My Captain," (Chuan Zhang! Wo de chuan zhang!) into Chinese. Our teacher, Gao Li, had to leave early and attend a meeting, so we spent the remainder of the period playing ping pong. We got our daily fix of milk tea at our usual spot (the two guys who work there now know who we are and have memorized what we order each time). We had calligraphy next (which we have grown to love). Each day we have a competition for who can get the most "very good"'s from our teacher, Yang laoshi...they are hard to come by! Towards the end of each class, he sits down and "grades" our calligraphy sheets....there are the rare "very good"'s, the occasional "OK"'s, and the ever so frequent grunting noise as he draws a line across a line of characters and then says "NO!" He is so funny and his rather blunt grading system has helped us get a lot better at calligraphy.

After classes, we had lunch (which of course included our chef coming into our room, inspecting our reactions to his meal, and then laughing with us). Patrick and Ella came in as usual and because it was raining, we went to a classroom for English corner. Emily, Drew, and I left early, though, to go silk shopping (for the second day in a row). Yesterday, as you may recall, we got silk for our vests/dresses, and today we wanted to do some silk shopping for family and friends. Silk street runs parallel to Hangzhou High School (talk about a great location...in comparison, Dover-Sherborn High School runs parallel to, well, NOTHING). I bought silk scarves for my mom and grandmother, and a silk tie for my dad. Both Emily and Drew also made many great purchases! In P.E., the badminton kids were watching a movie but Michelle, a girl in Cady's class, managed to convince the gym teacher that we didn't have to watch the movie and we could play a game of badminton...so we did...on the wet badminton court outside. Cady, Raven, Nolan (Raven's friend), and I enjoyed a (slippery) game of badminton.

Derek (English teacher) invited Cady and I to come to English club last period to teach two songs. We taught them "Let it Be" by the Beatles and "Good Riddance (Time of your life)" by Green Day. We typed out each song on Derek's laptop, which was projected on the board. Cady and I sang each song first, then we spoke each line and had the class repeat it, and finally we sang it altogether. "Let it Be" seemed to go fine but the Green Day song was a little difficult lyrically and melodically for the class. Nonetheless, it was a lot of fun to teach them and I think they really enjoyed learning the songs! After English Club, Derek and Michael asked me if I want to help out with a sort of musical revue that they are planning at Hangzhou High School. They want me to choose talented people to be in it! I am looking forward to it...considering I had to miss my senior musical at DS, I am always up for anything theater related.

After school, my host mother, Raven, and I walked to the Zhejiang International Hotel and met up with my host father for dinner. Once we got there, my host father said he would have to eat separately with his business partners, so it was just my host mother, Raven, and I at the table. (Speaking of which, it took me about a week and a half to realize that yes, my host father has a job (he is a businessman), and no, his job is not being a mom). Then my host father came out and said that his business partners wanted to meet me so we can eat in their private room. We went into the room and 4 of his business partners were there (only 2 wives were present). I shook hands with all of them (hand shakes in China last SO much longer than in America). One of my host father's business partners told my host father that i was "sui" (handsome) and he then proceeded to make a tost to the "handsome American boy." Now that was just the beginning of all the tosts...it felt like each person made a toast to every single person in the room, individually. All of my stereotypes of Chinese business dinners ended up being true....lots of alcohol and lots of cigarettes. Each businessman must've smoked at least a pack of cigarettes throughout the whole meal. The actual meal was delicious....goose liver, crab eggs, baby squid, and eggplant! At about the middle part of the meal I found out that the business partner sitting directly across from me was "the boss." So, of course, I toasted the boss of the company! I also found out that although all of these men were Chinese, they came from all over! The one who spoke the best English (and gave a toast to the "handsome American boy") lives in Germany, and another lives in Tokyo, Japan! They asked who I supported for the upcoming presidential election, and I told them Obama.....and then I said "George Bush...bu hao, bu hao" and they all laughed. They asked if I had heard about the New York governor who recently resigned (they sure are up to date with their U.S. news), which I had. Even though I don't know that much Chinese, I could actually understand a surprising amount of what they were talking about....or at least I got the gist of what they were saying. The meal lasted a couple hours so by the end I felt like I was about to pop! Once all the men took out their papers/portfolios (and actually started conducting business...) my host mother, Raven, and I decided to take a taxi home. I said goodbye (zaijian) to all the men, and shook all their hands (once again). They all seemed like great guys and I was glad to have gotten the chance to meet them. I can now check off "attend a Chinese business dinner" off of my list of things to do in life. It really was a sight to see!

Life in Hangzhou is going so well. There is SO much to say but unfortunately, it is late, and I need to sleep. Tomorrow we switch host families which is going to be very hard. Not looking forward to saying goodbye to my host family! But I can't complain - I've got a second host brother and family who are ready to host me, and who knows what is in store for the second portion of our Hangzhou adventure!

Wednesday: Tailored to Please!

(Ms. Luskin)

My day proved to be quite a departure from our usual Wednesday…

I’d been asked to speak to Hu Kun Lin’s (William’s) year-two English classes during the first two periods, so I knew that I’d miss the early class for Team China today. I’ve really enjoyed chatting with these classes, and find they quite enjoy a mixture of stories about America interspersed with my responses to questions that they are brave enough to ask eventually. These young people hang from every word when I talk about student life at DS: class length (long); lunch time (appallingly short!); passing time (almost unthinkable, since the kids here stay in the same classroom for most of the day, but do expect their customary 15 minutes free between classes!); the wide variety of club and sports activities (astonishing!). Every classroom has had its own topics of interest, but student dating, the upcoming Presidential election, and US university admissions are recurrent themes. All the students are remarkably attentive; I’d anticipated a polite lack of yawns, but these kids are completely engaged in what we Americans have to say! (After lunch yesterday, Team China accompanied me in pairs to speak with two eleventh-grade classes, which changed the classroom dynamic quite a bit!)

Overhead projectors here are “old technology” now, and rarely have worked in the classrooms I’ve visited, so while one of my photos zigzags down the left aisle, a similar photo makes its way down the right aisle. Eventually, the pictures travel forward again, while kids chuckle and point out this-and-that in the pictures. Fun to see them relax from their earnestness, too!

After the English classes, I headed back to the English office to drop off my photos, only to find that my box from the States had arrived at long last, more than five weeks after it was shipped! Naichuan has been bickering with Customs, who wished to charge a goodly amount of additional duty on this package, so I was delighted to find out that he’d prevailed upon them to knock the price down considerably. (Who knew you could bargain with a government??) With Cui Hongxiang’s (Helen’s) help, and to my unending relief, I unpacked the box and brought a load of gifts safely to my apartment around the corner. (I’d been a bit tormented by nightmares of the box remaining in limbo while we headed home, bereft of American thank-you gifts to share with our friends here!) This happy task took us right up to lunch time; in our lunch room: the familiar wide variety of food, the familiar visit from our chef, the familiar chatter of all the young folk. As the kids headed to English Corner and I ran off to get a bit of emailing done, we agreed to meet at 2:00, since Cui Hongxiang had volunteered to take us silk shopping. Woohoo!

If you’ve ever seen last year’s blog, I’ll tell you that our experience was quite the same. At the silk warehouse, there were numerous samples from which to choose, but many colorways of a pattern proved not to be in stock. In the end, people winnowed their preferences down to one each: a silvery-grey-and-white happiness symbol for Drew, a classic ink-blue dragon fabric for Nick, a lovely green tone-on-tone pattern that haunted Cady through several compare-and-contrast pairings, and a stunning plum blossom (in plum!) with a gunmetal background for Emily – oh, and a peacock blue plum blossom pattern for me. Next, we trekked off to the marketplace across the street from school for lining fabric, and then found that our tailor happened to be in her shop there as we passed by, so the measuring began! We don’t yet know the timing for delivery, but soon enough, the guys will have their vests and we womenfolk our dresses, each with of the details we requested from out tailor. Look out, prom night, here comes Team China!

Wanted: A Weekend Time Machine

(Drew)

I had a great weekend. It began on Friday with going out to KTV with our host brothers and sisters and one of my new friends from school Michael. Michael wants to come to America for College so he is taking a four part test with reading, writing, speaking and listening. Although i forget the name of this test its all in English and tests to make sure kids could get by in an American university setting. Michael is allowed to write something up for his spoken part of the test and asked me to help edit it with him as a native speaker. Saturday the school took us to a pottery museum/factory. We all made our best attempts on a pottery wheel making what sort of look like pots. We got a little frustrated, and the pottery master had to re-center our pots several times. Later on Saturday i had supper with my family which was followed by Eve and Cady coming over for movie night. It really ended up being just me and Cady watching Across the Universe because Eve and Mark just worked on homework. Sunday morning Eric, one of my classmates, took me sightseeing in Hangzhou. His mother is English who works several hours outside Hangzhou so she doesn't come often. His mom has never spoken to a native speaker of English before so her spoken English was probably not representative of her actual knowledge of English. Her English was still very good.

We went to Li Feng Pagoda on the south shore of West Lake (Xi Hu). We took a bunch of pictures of our trip with Eric's I-phone. I didn't realize that it was an I-phone until today when he had it in school. It was a perfect day for seeing the Pagoda. There are five floors to the pagoda each one has artwork all around the walls. The wood carvings on the first floor were absolutely amazing I'm regretting not bringing my camera. The view from the top was gorgeous (no not resembling a gorge). You could most of west lake which still had a layer of mist around it because it was still before noon and the sun had not scorched it off yet. We also walked through the hill adjacent to the pagoda which was very tranquil and shady, again regretting not bringing my camera. After the pagoda we drove through a park near by before heading back to my house.

For lunch we went over to Eves house where Cady had made us pancakes. Slightly lemony but still good, and all was well because they had a jar of peanut butter. Everything is good with peanut butter, that should be one of Newtons laws actually. I was very full from lunch and had only a few minutes back at the house before i set off with mark and two of his friends to a nearby agricultural university that had ping pong tables you could rent out. Marks parents also showed up to exercise. I ended up playing marks dad in ping pong for quite some time. I played ping pong for about 4 hours straight. I'm addicted. Although i think I'm getting pretty good at ping pong i was playing next to a kid (I'm estimating to be 9 years old) who could barely see over the table and I'm pretty certain i would not be able to score a single point on him.

Ive found that everyone in China loves sports, although in Hangzhou high school i don't see a lot of talent besides in ping pong and badminton. Those are the two sports that everyone can play in China. Hangzhou High school along with many others in China are big fans of the NBA more specifically the Houston rockets with Yao Ming and Tracy Macgrady (T-mac as I've heard him referred several times).

My running after school is going well. I think our private gym classes are awesome for keeping us in shape. We do yoga type stuff that improves our flexibility and strength. We also have done a lot of core exercises which is important for a runner, like me :).

Monday English corner we met many new people, English corner is growing exponentially it seems. By the end of the trip the entire school plus some random strays off the streets will be attending. Monday we met the four kids that are coming to D-S. I already like them naturally. They all seem very friendly. I also met two junior girls, one of which had gone abroad last year for six months to Washington state. If she hadn't told me that she had been to America i probably would have guessed because the way she talked was very Americanized. I found we speak with many expressions and not proper English in every day conversation. When you speak to your average Hangzhou student they use proper English. The girl i met talked very much like i do with my friends and used expressions just like us. She also just arrived at the school this semester and seems not to follow the rules such as no pierced ears and wearing a uniform, what a rebel. Many seniors don't wear uniforms either, they always use excuses such as it is in the wash or its lost. We have already been asked many times what we are doing next weekend, its quickly turning in a problem only having two days on the weekend. I want to see so many people and do different stuff with my various friends i need some sort of time machine to do everything.

Another awesome blog post to keep everyone back home entertained. One last quick note. They finally gave me a chair in class, YES! so comfortable... until now i had a little stool with no back. And i can lean back in my chair because I'm in my back row (sorry mom).

Ants in Pants?

(Cady)

Hello everyone!

So, today Nick figured out that we leave Hangzhou exactly three weeks from yesterday. Wow. It's amazing to me that we've already been in Hangzhou for over two weeks, and even more astonishing that we are leaving in what now seems like a very short amount of time. We're switching host brothers and sisters this Friday too! It's very bitter-sweet I think. I'm going to miss Eve a lot. I have now taken to calling her Pinky because she's rather cute and small and in love with the color pink. On the other hand, I really like my second host sister, Doris. I haven't had the chance to spend a lot of time with her yet, even though she's in class five with me. Actually, I'm the only member of Team China that's going to be in the same class for the entire exchange which also has it's good and bad points. I'm happy with the situation though because I'll still be able to see Eve every day and I'll be able to become closer with the classmates I'm already friends with. Not to mention there's still some kids in my class that I've never even talked to. That may sound ridiculous, but keep in mind that there are about fifty kids in each class, and not all of them are outgoing enough to just come up and talk to me. I'm making progress on that front though, never fear.

I think the weekend has been thoroughly covered, seeing as how Em did the blog for yesterday and we spent pretty much the entire day together. Although it was just a weird coincidence that we both had pancake disasters on the same morning. I'm not sure if anyone mentioned this, but we did make it to KTV on Friday night, which was lots of fun. We'll definitely be back for Ella's birthday and possibly sooner if time allows. It's pretty much the perfect night out, well for Nick and I at least. Seriously, a private room where you hang out with your friends and sing all night long- what more could we ask for? Anyways, Em ended up sleeping over last night so this morning was one big getting ready for school party. Since we had a "guest," we ate breakfast at home instead of on the road, which ended up making Eve late to school. I mention this because it's really quite funny what happens when someone is late to Hangzhou High School. There are class meetings every Tuesday during eighth period where the kids who were late to school throughout the past week have to sing songs for the class. It's really very funny, though some kids are very embarrassed by the ritual. Eve says that since I was late today too (even though it's not on record) she's going to make me sing with her tomorrow. So be it. Speaking of Eve, she just came running up to the third floor with a large cup of milk tea for me that her little brother brought home. It's like my prayers being answered!

Anyways, our first class this morning was Chinese. We focused on shopping, which would have probably come in handy before going yesterday with Emily and Ella, but better late than never. Then we had private PE which turned into another day of cheerleading. Hey, I thought it was pretty fun. As I may have said before, we're all pretty good at laughing at ourselves when it comes to that sort of a thing. Then we used some weight training equipment, did an ab workout, and finished with some strength training on the mats. I told our gym teacher that we're going to bring her back to America so that she can whip us into shape every day. Lucky for us, lunch was next- we always feel very ready for lunch after private PE. Then English corner! There were actually a lot of kids waiting for us today when we got there, which was naturally very exciting. As Em mentioned, we met the kids who are coming to America. They all seem very curious and outgoing so I think that they'll find socializing at DS only minimally scarring. Oh, I'm only kidding, I know they're going to have a blast in America. We'll make sure of it. "Team America" (not to be confused with the film), as we informed them they would be called from now on, is made up of Ivan, Alice, Sam, and Bob. Two girls and two boys- sound familiar? A group of girls from my class came to English corner too, including both of my host sisters. Crazy Michael who refers to everyone, including Terry (though we informed him today that only Team China could speak to her that way), as "sexy" showed up too. Good turn out today- hopefully it continues to grow.

After that it was once again time for afternoon classes. I had to explain the term "ants in your pants" to my desk mate, Garbo, because I was particularly energetic today. I only spent one period journaling because Garbo and I talked all through Geography and History. The first because she, along with the rest of the class, never pays attention during Geography, and the second because we ended up having so much fun during the first. Then eighth period was running class which is where the entire sophomore grade runs two laps around the track and then splits off to have PE. So badminton, as usual. Free Mori with Eve and Drew after school. I have a cinnamon walnut roll for tomorrow morning. Tonight we mixed things up a bit by going out to dinner. Eve's parents took us out to dinner at a fancy restaurant along West Lake. The food was fantastic, and the waiters at this obsessive-compulsive way of filling up your teacup literally the second you drained it. Now that's what I call service. For my family's reference, I had shrimp, scallops, and crab legs tonight all of which I enjoyed very much. Now, I'm a pretty bold eater but shellfish has never really whet my appetite. As Em said this morning though, I am now completely unfazed by anything edible at this point, and I actually enjoy pretty much everything I try. I've been playing with the idea of trying the whole fried scorpions on Hefeng Street because, honestly, what's more badass (can I say that on the blog?) than eating scorpion?

Well, I will leave you with happy thoughts of exotic (and maybe kind of scary) food. As always, I hope all is well in Massachusetts. Is it still a winter wonderland? All I have to say is hah hah. See you all in three weeks!