Quick Update - classes, biking, teaching, mahjong, etc.

I just got back from such an awesome traditional Chinese medicine class. We were at the hospital with our teacher and we were learning about cupping and he performed it on us, then he let us perform it on each other. The same with acupuncture; it was a really awesome experience! At first, we were pretty bad at acupuncture and couldn’t really puncture the skin too well, but messing up on each other didn’t really hurt. Then after we gained confidence, we were able to perform it on each other without too much pain. We also got really good at cupping, a process where you take a glass cup and suck the air out using a flame then immediately place the cup on the skin.  The doctor then allowed us to do something that surely in America would not be proper and let us perform cupping on some of his patients. Really cool experience.  The process was really cool and I feel much more comfortable with needles being in me now (not too comfortable though).

Also, this weekend’s cycling race went really well; I took fourth! I credit some of that bump up in ranking to the fact that I didn’t have to race against too many sponsored guys. It was really fun and I cannot wait to race again.

So, I started my second internship; the first one hadn’t worked out as planned. I was an English conversational teacher at a sports high school (Jet Lee went to the one I was briefly a teacher at..)  Most of the kids there were on national scholarship or were foreigners who paid to attend. I was going to conduct research about vocational athletes and compare it to America, but unfortunately it did not work out. The national games are starting soon and they have upped their training regiment.

So now, I am leading the English club at Beijing Sports University.  At first, I was under the impression that I would be teaching athletes, but I guess at the sports university not everyone is a sports major; in fact, all of my 111 students (split up between two different classes) are English majors and do not participate in athletics. Not to worry though, they are awesome kids and my research project shall end up being more of a narrative and observation based report. I am really excited and they are really enthusiastics to learn. There is so many stories I have already about them, but more will come. Next lesson is based around poetry;  if anyone has any personal work or just favorites to recommend please do.

This weekend I have my rural home stay. It is harvest season, so were going to be out in the fields. I don’t really know much more than that except that we are going to be learning how to play mahjong - just what the LeBaron family needs, another form of gambling.

I fall even more in love with China each day. Much love to everyone!