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Catch-up Post:
I apologize (again) for being so delayed in my postings. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to post in a timely manner at this point, so I’m not going to make any promises…

Since my last posting, there have been a few weekend activities, some random events worth noting, and one independent travel weekend. Since it’s taken me so long to write these down, I forget many of the dates of these events, so they are arranged chronologically as best I can remember. This first posting will cover everything aside from the independent travel weekend, which will get its own posting.

第一个周末活动 (Weekend Activity One)：

We went persimmon picking! A rather fun and normal Midwestern activity in the United States is to go to a nearby orchard or field and pick some fruit; as a family we went countless times to a nearby farm and apple orchard to enjoy the leaves turning and some apple cider with doughnuts. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything similar to this here in Xi’an, but there are some persimmon and pomegranate orchards about an hour outside the city. Some of my classmates not from the Midwest thought the idea of going out into the countryside to pick fruit was rather odd (it had never even dawned on me before that it’s a tad strange), but most of them came anyway.

The bus ride out to the field, not surprisingly, took much longer than we expected. A mixture of muddy roads, construction, narrow paths up and down hills and confusion on where exactly this orchard was (you wouldn’t think it wouldn’t be hard to find, but it was— the entrance was on the top of one of these hill paths,  though the orchard was much further down the hillside) all contributed to our delayed arrival. Apparently we had just missed when the pomegranates had been the ripest, so we went persimmon picking instead.  Since persimmons grow rather high up in trees, the method for harvesting them involves taking a large stick with a grooved end and using the groove to pull the persimmon off the branch. Ideally you catch the persimmon as it is falling so it doesn’t smash on the ground (through the mixture of grass, mud, and fallen leaves provided a fairly cushioned surface). 

Persimmon picking on the hillside

Having never had a persimmon before, I didn’t know what to expect. I remember liking them a lot and tasting like a mixture of tomato (which I have grown to like a lot more since being in China, so hopefully the American tomatoes can live up to my new standard) and a peach. Strange, I know, but rather tasty, though particularly messy to peel and eat. 

 Beautiful landscape around the orchard –
you miss nature a lot when you live in a city constantly under construction

参观小雁塔 (Visiting the Small Wild Goose Pagoda):

As a field trip for our literature class, we visited the Small Wild Goose Pagoda 小雁塔. We’re all still a little confused as to why we went here, but none of us (including our teacher and our program directors) had ever been here before, so it was good, new experience for everyone. Similar to the Large Wild Goose Pagoda, Buddhist scriptures were stored and translated here as well. This pagoda is younger and, obviously, smaller, but has held up extremely well considering it’s weathered at least three large earthquakes. Somehow during construction in the early 8^th century, the builders made a large bowl-shaped base that allows the entire pagoda to rock with the earth vibrations and dilute the shock waves. This sounds rather difficult to do now, but over a thousand years ago!? However, the tower has sustained some damage, as the fourteenth and fifteenth floors have fallen off and there is apparently a large crack on one of the sides, though we were unable to find it.

Walking through a small courtyard on the way to the pagoda

“It’s THIS big!”

There is also a small museum located within the grounds that houses an intricate layout of Chang’an (as Xi’an was known when it was the capital during the Tang dynasty). There are also dioramas of different building and smaller sections of the layouts, but most of the exhibits lack any form of identification. Some at least had Chinese, so we could more or less understand what was in front of us.

  Large scale wooden 3D blueprint of Tang-era Xi’an

Wooden model of what we assume was the imperial palace

第二个周末活动 (Weekend Activity Two)：

We attended a “dinner theater” show of Tang dynasty inspired performances. Since the dinner tickets were rather expensive, we only bought seats; however, the food being served to other tables didn’t look very filling, so it all worked in the end.

The performance itself was broken up into three parts: an instrumental ensemble showcase, four dance numbers, and a showcase of the Chinese panpipe, as apparently their musician is particularly renowned and decorated. The ensemble also played throughout the entire show, which was rather impressive; the conductor’s hat resembled small rabbit ears, and so he was also fun to look at.

The dance numbers were all interesting. The first dance used long (longer than a person!) sleeves in a way similar to a ribbon-baton or rhythmic gymnastics. Needless to say, having half a dozen to a dozen girls on stage with these long sleeves arching to and fro in synch was impressive. The second dance was inspired by some ritual ceremony and thus contained a “priest” figure (though his costuming was rather warrior-esque and animalistic) and a troupe of either demons or attendants dressed to scare away spirits. The music was drum heavy and the movements very dramatic; the dancers also were blacklit and thus “glowed in the dark,” making the dance seem all the more demonic. The third dance was another female dance; the inspiration was a dream of a heavenly host of winged women, thus the feature woman had feather-like appendages on her arms and the rest had large feathered-fans. The fourth dance was allegedly (according to the narration of the performance) created by a general as a commemoration for his courageous and valiant soldiers. Fittingly, the dancers all had armor and weapons and danced in a stylized martial style; there were also three monk figures who did some form of dramatic and exciting martial art as well.

The Chinese panpipe performance was set in an imperial garden. According to the legend, this instrument grew famous because it was used to imitate the sounds of birds. It did sound very similar to bird chirping, though it went on longer and got much shriller and higher-pitched than any bird sounds I’ve ever heard. Maybe some Chinese birds sound this way… The performance then concluded with a large dance number that was supposedly a parade for the emperor, who graced us with his presence and a small dance himself with his queen.

Very entertaining, though part of me wishes the performance were more true to actual Tang style dancing; unfortunately, apparently the style in vogue then was rather slow and deliberate, and so probably not nearly as fun as seeing sword-dancing or aerial somersaults.

第三个周末活动 (Weekend Activity Three)：

We went cooking! We visited the Shaanxi Tourism Cuisine Professional College (陕西旅游烹饪职业学院), which apparently is one of the only schools of its kind in all of China and has even hosted such famous people as Laura Bush! We were shown some demonstrations on a few noodle dishes, some appetizers and a fish dish. Naturally we were able to eat all that we made. :)

 Master chef at work making a dim sum dumpling

Since there were a limited number of ingredients and counter space, we took turns trying to make the food; I tried my luck with the deep-fried meat stuffed eggplant and hand-cut noodles. The eggplant appetizer was not very difficult luckily, though I sliced my eggplant shells too thickly, which meant I made less to eat later. The eggplant we were using is completely different from the purple, squash looking vegetable I was used to in the states. This was green and harder, so that we sliced it into small shells, very similar to a taco, though finger-sized. We then stuffed a little bit of a meat and vegetable mixture—we unfortunately didn’t make this part, so I have no idea what was in it— into the eggplant shell, coat in batter— again, do not know the ingredients— and then drop into a pot of boiling oil.

The hand-cut noodles were being prepared for a noodle dish that had some vegetables and meat. The noodle dough is taken in its “loaf” shape and placed on top of a small wooden board that rest on the cutter’s shoulder. Using a special knife that looks like a gardening spade with the end flipped up, you slide the blade down the length of the dough and cut off a long, thin noodle. When the chef did it, it looked really easy, but of course it’s not. The dough was a lot harder than I thought it would be— I’ve never worked with noodle dough before, only bread dough— and you had to the hold a certain way otherwise it would refuse to cut. We made a lot of short, wide and misshapen noodles, but they still tasted good (mostly). Apart from the food which we all thoroughly enjoyed (we ended up making five of the fish dishes altogether, so this little trip ended up being my dinner), we also were given pamphlets about the school and aprons. They also offer classes on Saturdays for the public, which would be a lot of fun to attend, but I think my weekends are going to be rather busy with possibly still volunteer teaching English, working on end of the semester projects and papers, and practicing / performing 相声 (xiangsheng).

排练相声 (Practicing Xiangsheng):

Originally, Andras and I were asked to perform by one of the roommates; we at the time did not know what were possibly doing or when. We later found out that we would be performing 相声, which is a type of Chinese comedy originating in the northeast that features two people talking with each other and cracking jokes through word play. This is a lot easier in Chinese than English since there are a more limited number of sounds that comprise words, and so puns are rather easy to make. We then found out that this was a part of a foreigner’s competition. Andras decided he didn’t want to participate after we found out another foreign student at our university wanted to perform. He is Vietnamese, but I only know his Chinese name, Chun Jiang 春江.

Well, things have recently become interesting. Our original script was a little over three pages long. We had just memorized the skit almost perfectly when the next day we met with a Chinese friend to help us work on our performance. I was looking forward to this, since I still don’t quite understand everything that we’re saying, so I don’t always know how I’m supposed to be expressing myself. Also, this script contains a lot of references to well known 相声, but I, being an American, am highly unaware.

We actually went to the new campus to meet with this friend (I’ve forgotten his name unfortunately). The new campus is about thirty minutes by public bus away from the main campus where I’m staying and is much larger and more spread out. There are a lot more trees and greenery and the buildings are massive. The library is larger than any library I’ve ever seen, and is literally the first thing you see when you walk through the main gate.

But back to the 相声. We actually received very little direction in terms of acting, though we did go over some expressions, how we should be sitting for the performance, and the always helpful reminder to deliver lines to the audience, because over two more pages had been added to our script. Our performance was not intra-college like I had originally thought, but rather an inter-college competition. So Chun Jiang and I are representing our university. But that wasn’t the surprise. Apparently, all the other teams from our province have dropped out, meaning Chun Jiang and I get to go straight to Beijing to compete... While he is rather excited about this— his Chinese is much better than mine and I would venture to say fluent; he definitely speaks as quickly and confidently as all of the native Chinese people I’ve met— I’m a little bit terrified as I don’t know if:

1) I’m going to be able to pull through and perform well as I still have difficulty articulating certain tones

2) I don’t really know how we’re supposed to get to Beijing; also, no one really know when the competition is somehow. (UPDATE: Sounds like it’s going to be at the end of November, paid for by the university, and with a chaperone.)

3) I don’t know how well we will travel together, as he knows no English and my Chinese is still rather poor, especially for casual conversation.

But, if there was ever an opportunity to take advantage of being in China, this would be it. I’m finding that when I’m thrust into new situations like these, I immediately withdraw a little bit out of feeling overwhelmed, but fairly soon become more comfortable and a lot more receptive. I’ve noticed my listening ability is strongly affected by my comfort level, in that if I’m uncomfortable in a situation, I find it extremely difficult to understand what’s going around me. I guess it’s a little like skiing: you have to let go a little bit and follow how the course wants to take you in order to really appreciate the run.

等等 (Et Cetra):

The day that I found out about all the changes in the 相声 was a highly eventful day. The day, this most recent Saturday, November 5, had my emotions yo-yoing. The day started with the Xi’an City Wall Marathon (西安墙城马拉松赛). I have been training with Cora for the past three weeks, which has been good since I haven’t run much since high school and Cora has never run a race of this length before. We obviously were not prepared for the marathon length, but rather were both running the 5K (3.1 miles). My best 5K time was 19:27 my freshman year of high school, so I figured if I ran under 25:00 I would be proud of myself. Despite running around 10:00am in the rain on a November morning on top an ancient city wall, I was able to run under 23:00; I don’t know my exact time, as I didn’t see the time when we started the race, but know I finished around 33:15 (the timer had started for the 13.7K race and the last I saw was around 7:00). 

 Victory pose and still dripping wet from the sweat and rain

So the day started on a high note. However, when Cora, Karen and I went out for lunch that afternoon, the restaurant we tried was rather crowded, took a while for our food to be made, and we unfortunately didn’t really know what were ordering. Usually that works out fine, but we somehow ended up getting three pepper-based dishes. None of them were especially spicy, but it was a little more than I think any of us wanted. A little after lunch I went with Chun Jiang and Karen’s Chinese roommate who has been helping us practice to the new campus and learned about our script change, so I was feeling a bit more down then. However, later that evening was a pumpkin carving activity that ended being a lot of fun; we also got a good number of the roommates to come out with us dancing, which was a good pleasant surprise as well.

Now, we’re all aware that Halloween already happened, but we were told that the group is just a tad disorganized. We actually were “tricked” into advertising for this group one Saturday morning. Its goal is to educated Chinese people about different cultures around the world and to help foreigners at the university have a more organized way of meeting Chinese people. We were told that we were going to be attending one of their events, which turned into introducing American culture a bit, which actually was standing around their booth and trying to get students to join the club. I ended up sitting at the booth and was told to ask people as they walked by, “你想加入吗？”(Do you want to join?).

This Halloween event was the first event we heard about since that day, so we were all excited to help teach Chinese people how to carve a jack o’ lantern. It was a little more difficult than usual because the pumpkins were relatively small and we had some rather bad knives; luckily no one seriously injured themselves, though there were a few bloody fingers. Each table was given two pumpkins to carve. One of ours became a cute panda face and the other one was a more traditional jack o’ lantern face. However (not surprisingly considering eighty percent of the participants were girls), the panda face won first place and earned our table some candy. 

The “other” pumpkin, given to me as a gift

After pumpkin carving, we played a game called “007”. Without explaining how to play, whenever someone messed up, they had to grab a post-it note from the jack o’ lantern and perform whatever “punishment” was written on it. Luckily everyone was a pretty good sport about it, and some of the punishments were rather hilarious, such as making funny faces or pretending to walk down a runway. Afterward, I was literally swarmed by people asking random questions and asking for my name (they were always impressed whenever I wrote it in Chinese, even though I should be able to since I’m in China…) and email, so maybe the club is successful in bringing together people from different cultures after all.