Turns out writing blogs takes more time than expected, so I’m gonna try and some up what’s been going on more concisely.
Starting off way back on June 12th, I went to Happy Valley amusement park with other friends. Happy Valley is essentially Six Flags + Disneyland. The first thing to do was obviously go on the biggest, best ride. I was a little let down, as it didn’t look too great (when compared with Cedar Point). To my surprise the ride was actually pretty awesome! The next ride also turned out to be quite stupendous (with no lines I might add). The reason for no lines was because the rest of China was working on the weekend to get the Dragon Boat Festival off the next week. The rest of our day consisted of more rides that weren’t anything I couldn’t handle. One of the last rides we went on was a “Splash Mountain” kind of ride. As we didn’t want our shirts to stay wet, we decided to take them off; it was hot out anyways. Unfortunately, we got a little wetter than expected. Meaning we got completely drenched from head to toe and had a bunch of locals looking at us thinking, “Why didn’t they purchase $.03 ponchos?” Luckily, I planned ahead and wore my board shorts, which dried out quite nicely. In addition, we got to see a cute little parade, I outsmarted the witty Italian ice cream man (kinda), and we ate some delicious BBQ (as we do almost everywhere).
798 Art District:
Now this was a lot of fun for me. The 798 Art District previously was a German-owned military base. Then after they left, artists took over because there was so much free space and sturdy buildings for exhibits to showcase their work. Now it is famous for being the number one venue for artists to display their work in Beijing.
There was the usual street art (graffiti, objects abstractly pasted on buildings/walls) almost everywhere. But there were also a lot of cool exhibitions that showcased art from many different cultures (Indian, Italian, Korean, Native American, etc.). It was really cool to see not only those cultures work, but how a lot of them fused Chinese culture in, too. Unfortunately, a lot of the nicer exhibits did not allow photography. However, some really cool ones did (which made me very happy, as I got to take pictures of some great pictures haha). Another great part was that I got to meet and catch up with a good friend and classmate from back at Michigan who lives in China! We spend a lot of time talking over photography, future career paths, and attempted to appreciate all the art we encountered. Also exciting was that we got American food for lunch! I got myself a good old-fashioned char-broiled burger (oh greasy beef, how good you taste). That satisfied the cravings I’d been having for a piece of meat larger than my thumb (which Chinese never serve). All in all, it was a great day; catching up with friends, taking cool pictures, and seeing how artists from around the world perceive life.
Clay-making:
So when I first came to China, I am pretty sure that clay-making was not on my list of things to do. Yet, I still found myself as a pottery shop with friends and teachers learning how to mold clay on one of those spinny tables. First, one of the workers showed us how it was done. He made one clump of clay go big then small, flat then tall, a plate then a vase…it was INSANE (so talented). Next, we all got our stylish aprons on and attempted to mold our first blob of clay. I started out pretty good, and then I got anxious. I pressed on the pedal to make the table a little too fast. My nice looking cup quickly turned into a Picasso painting. By my fifth blob of clay I had finally made something worth keeping (which turned out to be included in the price J). I won’t say what I ended up making because someone reading this blog may end having it as a gift. Even better was that the pottery place also painted and glazed your piece for you. In summation, we got lessons, unlimited clay, to keep our piece, to have our piece fired, painted, and glazed all for less than $3.50.
More recently:
I have had this week off of classes (which I unfortunately haven’t really been taking advantage of) mostly relaxing. Tomorrow I will be going to take my placement test at Beijing Language and Culture University to see where my Chinese is at (hopefully not too low). Then classes will begin on Friday. Friday night I will be hopping on a train to go to Tia Shan (cool mountain). Saturday will be spent climbing it, taking pictures, and meeting monks. The purpose is mainly to see the sunrise on Sunday (around 4AM) as it is supposed to be surreal. I’m definitely looking forward to spending a night on the top of a mountain. Since classes will be starting I am not sure how much time I will have in the near future.
Till the next post!
- Kevin
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