Weekend in He’nan

This weekend four of the ten scholarship students went on a weekend trip to the province of He’nan, located south of Beijing.

We started our journey on a seven hour sleeper train from Beijing station to Kaifeng city. The cabins were three bunks high narrow and if you were unlucky enough to have to stand on others heads and scramble to the top bunk it smelled a bit funny. Otherwise it was quite comfortable. We arrived next morning in Kaifeng city greeted by our tour guide, a Chinese guy whose name i think was Mr Chung and taken for breakfast, the cakes were very nice.

After this we boarded our bus ( the driver looking like an extra from the matrix) and headed for Baogong temple. This was built in 1984 so although it was a modern memorial temple they had retained a fairly authentic ancient feel to it, with many artefacts and some rather scary wax models of Lord Bao himself sentencing someone to death.

Next onto the Dragon Pavillion were we saw the imperial palace the Emperor would have stayed at. During the 29 degree heat suddenly a sweaty looking emporer complete with guards, daughter and dancers put on a show for us, good on them for giving it a go even though we didn’t understand a word of it. Then it was on to the Iron Pagoda an excellent feat of Chinese architectual knowledge thirteen storeys high and still standing 900 years later, built at a slant so that over the years it would righten its self. We climbed the stairs, some making it futher than others (most gasping for breath afther the first few floors).

In the evening we had a very dogy looking mutton hotpot then it was off to the lovely hotel, that even had a bath and free toothbrush. We had a little look around but the locals seemed to had never seen westerners before and we got uncomfortably gawped at. We did however see the locals out in force doing t’ai chi with whips and fans and you name it.

Next morning early rise, huge breakfast a nod off the matrix driver and we were off to the Shaolin temple. Much more commercial than expected apparently the head abbott drives a benz! We saw some buddhist monks from different ages put on a kung fu demonstration which was excellent, demonstrating weapons and how kung fu is taken from nature, imitating frogs, scorpians, ducks and all sorts, very flexible flinging their legs behind their ears and everything. We also saw the beautiful pagoda forest, a section of the temple were the monks ashes are buried under huge stone pagados, facing India were buddhism originated.

After this lunch and onto Luoyang city and the Longman caves. This we agreed was our favorite, a cliff face of limestone that had over thousands of years been carved into. Many caves in all sizes with buddhas ornately depicted some enormous some as small as 1cm. We stood on the opposite side of the Yi river and watched the soon go down behind the largest,wonderful.

Then back to the sleeper train more scrambling over heads and dropping pillows on unsuspecting Korean familys and it was back to Beijing, a good time had by all.

Classes and Kung Fu

Classes are in the Run Run Shaw building and last from 8am until 12pm (four hours daily). From our accommodation (the international students’ building) it’s a 10 min walk to the other side of campus, or, for the more adventurous among us, a five min cycle. The first session focuses on a recap of the previous day, introduction of new words, and grammar points. The second session consistes of reinforcement of the new words, and the new words in sentences and ‘real life’ scenarios. Classes are not an easy feat – we learn pinyin and characters which we memorise in our spare time.

On Wednesday evening some of us went to Beijing city centre to join in the Olympic one year count down launch ceremony. Unbeknown to us, the actual celebration was invite only but we managed to get quite close and heard the faint rumbling of some fireworks. It was nice to see the Chinese community so enthusiastic about holding the event in 2008.

On Thursday we went to a Kung Fu performance at the Red Theatre. The performance lasted about an hour and a half and followed the story of Chun Yi – the legend of Kung Fu. We were all quite surprised at the quality of the performance, but unfortunately we were forbidden to take any photos!

Arrival and the first week

Arrivial in Beijing is not without confusion, as the obvious langauge barrier presented itself to us. For the first day we got by with our poorly pronounced ni hao’s and xiexie’s, but thankfully there was a representive from BLCU at the airport to meet and drop us off at our designated accomodation (which by the way is a very nice shared room with A/C and TV) and the very nice people at the course regisration desk were patient and very good at understanding our tired hand gestures / ‘phrase-book Mandarin’.

 Our first days in the city were spent exploring the local area (I heart wu) as well as a visit to the forbidden city and Tian’anmen Sq via the very well ventilated subway system (London, take notes). Weather in Beijing takes a while to get used to, with extremely hot days followed by some extremely servere storms which seem to take advantage of the lack of drains in the streets to form immense flash floods. This resulted in us having to cross a river (‘road’) up to our knees to get to the local bar.

 The first day of classes is a simple test to find out how much you already know, for some this was a frustrating experience as 2 years of speaking/listening/writing in pinyin still leaves you in the beginner class to learn the characters from the beginning. My test was pretty simple and lasted about 30 seconds after I told the examiner, “I cannot speak Chinese”.

On the first weekend there was a free trip to the Great Wall of China (about 90 mins on the bus from BLCU) which was a really great exprience and everyone had a great day. Although some top tips would be to take your own food and water (prices up to 10 times more than in the city) and if you insist on buying stuff from the tourist stalls then you can really haggle down prices to seemingly ridiculous amounts. Also, take advantage of the cable car up and the toboggan down!

4 hours of class per day really takes it out of you, and we all think the original idea of 6 hours would have just been too intense. During our first week we have spent most afternoons making flashcards and revising the mornings vocabulary in groups.

Although there is a quite a lot of work, we are all still finding time to explore the city’s amazing array of restaurants with food from around the world. There has even been an adventure into the more colourful side of Beijing’s nightlife.