The ‘ight’ wall in a Great City

It is hard to believe that it is already September and we are already done with our first week of classes. As each day passes, it becomes more and more like home here, as the sights and gates and sounds become more and more a part of who I am. My ability to speak and listen has gotten exponentially better in the short time I’ve been here, and will only continue to grow as I decided to take Chinese class that is 10 hours a week.

Yesterday, some of us decided to take a field trip to the Great Wall of China aka one of the 7 wonders of the world. I’d been there once before when I was younger, but obviously did not remember most of it. Some of us chose to walk to the wall which required walking up a pretty steep mountain via stairs (stairmaster: real life). Ironically, once we reached the top, we were presented with even more stairs as the wall it self travels the path of all the mountains in the area. What is really interesting to me is that the stairs on each wall to get to each tower are not the same size, which was to prevent intruders from being able to attack as easily when they arrived on the wall. The guards of each tower would memorize the pattern of the stairs so they could quickly notify other towers if an intruder were to actually get atop the wall.

After enjoying a wonderful picnic lunch of subway atop the wall, it was time to return to the base. A lot of my friends decided to take a sled comparable to an alpine slide down the mountain, but 2 other people and I decided to stair master it down the mountain to enjoy the sights and sounds. Safe to say, my legs hurt very bad today as I’m writing this. It’s hard to imagine that this wall that is so old is still standing today for tourists like us to walk on and enjoy.

Then, at night, we decided to rally and go to a pub crawl. The amount of international students here is actually amazing, and it’s weird to think that I’m finally a cool international kid. The pub crawl was for the Beijing Ardvarks, which is a rugby team, and went around one of the expat areas of China. We got to go to a rooftop bar for one of them! Despite the fact that I got us lost. In one of those moments where you realize how hard Chinese is to learn, I had the taxi drop us off somewhere, and then we walked the wrong way. Then we decided to get into one of the pedicabs (or cabs on bikes) and he definitely over charged us. To dodge traffic, he drove on the sidewalk, and then dropped us off about 3 blocks in the wrong direction. After walking for 15 more minutes, we finally made it to the first bar. Interesting experience for one of my first nights out in China, and I may or not have been convinced to join the rugby team, but hey, when in China.

I’ll save the day in the life blog for another post, as I’m still trying to figure out exactly what classes I want to take and I’m still trying to find my day to day routine. Trust me though, the difference of life here in all aspects from food, to mannerisms, to working out are some that are worth mentioning.

— Finally got my American number working, so I actually can text now. Technology baffles me, and I feel like I’m growing so old. Anyways, I love to hear from people so stay in touch! If anyone is actually reading this 🙂

Until next time.