The Great Wall and Chengdu

So now a little bit about our AMAZING study trip....

So we left Beijing on Monday morning and went to the Great Wall. It was crazy and really different that I expected it to be. We had to first hike up the mountain to get to the Great Wall and then hike about a mile on the wall to another path where we could hike down the mountain. Once we got up on the wall, we had a beautiful view and we were able to stop at one point and have a picnic lunch. I have no idea though how they had battles on the wall. The steps were all completely uneven and there's all these things you have to climb. We were sweating to death by the time we got to the end. It was a great workout. I have some awesome pics, I just haven't had a second to upload them yet. I also stole a piece of the Great Wall :)

Then we drove about an hour and a half to Chengdu where we stayed in this really cool hotel. During dinner they sang Chinese songs and danced for us. By the way... the food is AWESOME! After dinner we just kinda hung out because we were really tired from the day.

On Tuesday, we woke up early and we went to the Mountain Palace in Chengdu, which is like a vacation home for several of the emperors that has a giant lake and garden. It was beautiful, but it would have been a lot more fun if it were warmer than 10 degrees Fahrenheit! That's what we get for being so close to the mountains!

Next, we went to two different temples that were very beautiful. Seeing the temples involved a lot of hiking and climbing stairs, but once we got to the top we had some really, really amazing views! The last temple we visited was the Puning Temple, which is a Buddhist temple. In the temple, there was a giant buddha statue that's about 70 feet tall, gold plated, and weighs about 110 tons.

Last night after dinner we went to this "Chinese Party" in our hotel, which was basically a performance. There were some professional acts but all of a sudden they made us get up on stage and perform. Our group decided to sing lean on me. It was pretty fun. After the performance, we went downtown in Chengdu to a karaoke bar. Karaoke is huge here and the karaoke bars are pretty cool because they have separate rooms. So like 20 of us went and we had our own room with mics and a stage and all the songs were 90's pop songs which was so much fun! Last night was also the first night we stayed up to a normal hour, but the jet lag is still pretty bad.

We got back to Beijing around 1PM, had lunch, and then I picked up my book for my Chinese class. I'm really excited about taking Chinese! My class is pretty small so I think that I will be able to learn really well. I should be meeting up with my professors for my independent studies soon, if not by the end of this week, then the beginning of next week. The program advisors have been really helpful here.

I'm really glad to be back in Beijing. The pollution was really bad in Chengdu. It's not too bad in Beijing, but even on a good day you can't really see the sun bright and clear. It's pretty funny because the streets and the buildings and everything are so clean, but there are smoke stacks everywhere. I can't imagine what it was like before the Olympics, because apparently it was a lot worse!

I am doing great! I am really happy here and coming back to Beijing from Chengdu today actually felt like coming back home! Love love love my roommate... very nice change from last semester! Food is great! can't wait to tell you more about it!