Goal two, check.

Peace Corps Volunteers aspire to fulfill three main goals of service. Our first goal is to provide skilled individuals to inviting countries. Our second goal is to share our culture with the host country; when fulfilling this goal, it is important to remember to inform, not indoctrinate. Lastly, we PCVs hope to share some of our cultural learning of our host country with fellow Americans (and, in this global age, perhaps any other world citizens) back home.

I believe that more goals exist, goals that extend far past the first three, but those three are the most important (and published) goals of the PCV.

Last night, I went to my local gym to get in a work out. I was excited because I knew Mr. Yang, my casual personal trainer, would be there to lead me through a solid leg workout. The past few days I had worked my arms, back, and core during the day, when the weight room, dance hall, and yoga den are nearly devoid of life or movement. Yesterday, though, I found time to exercise at night, which is preferable becasue the gym is alive, swarming with yogis, meat-heads, belly dancers, and the odd gangling teenager. And, of course, Mr. Yang, with his deadly workout routines.

Anyways, back to the goals. Sitting in the men's changing room last night, a youngish chinese man greeted me (He said 'good morning' even though it was 7:30PM) and took interest in my Ipod Shuffle. I forget the words that were exchanged, but the conversation culminated in us swapping Ipods for the evening, his older shuffle model for my newer brushed steel clip. My model lacks the normal buttons of an Ipod, eschewing them in exchange for weight and size reductions, so I had to teach my new friend to us the remote control built into the headphone wire. That was an adventure in pantomime.

In the end, we swapped Ipods for the better half of the workout. It was great, I was listening to older US stuff like Linkin' Park's breakout album and some new Chinese music, while he was jamming out to Bruce Springsteen, Xavier Rudd (I recommend him highly), and about a dozen Dave Matthews albums.

Cultural exchange is not simply watching ethnic minorities practice their ancestors dances, or what they think are their ancestors dances. Culture is dirty, grimy, and in this case a little sweaty and shaped like an earphone.

Goal two, check. And, seeing as you're reading this, check off goal three, too.

Culinary Adventures Update

Last night I at pig's huff. Fantastic! Aside from the huff, I've also eaten such exotic items as:

A variety of intestines, chicken, pig, cow, and I think goat.
A variety of stomach linings, mostly pig and cow.
Eel.
Pig's ear
Pig's brain (My host mother says "Pig's head is good for your head!")
Fish eyeballs
Pickled chicken foot
Duck foot (very different from chicken foot, due to the webbing between the toes)
The root of a lotus plant
Pickled duck egg
Tofu that smelt (and tasted, i think) like gym socks

I am pretty sure I haven't eaten dog yet, although I can't be certain. It's quite popular around Guizhou, I've heard.

A walking tour of Xingyi

My mum always said that running is the best way to discover the ins and outs of a new area, and I whole-heartedly believe her. There is something about foot traffic, pedestrian pursuits, that allows you to gain a fuller expereience of an area. For starters, I suppose, you are not in the bubbled, enclosed, airconditioned atmosphere of a four-whevehicle. Secondly, you're moving at your pace, slowing when you want to see something, and speeding up when you want to escape the fumes of a street vendor's wares. Lastly, when you run, or in my case briskly walk, you can go pretty much anywhere. Humans are built for long walks, and the world around us is built to be walked upon.

I have been exploring Xingyi mostly by foot, for the idealic reasons above as well as the practical reasons enforced by the PC and the environment. I can't ride my bicycle until I recieve my PC issued helmet, I can't ride a motorcycle at all due to PC safety standards, and I can't communicate with taxi cab drivers well enough to get anywhere in a decent amount of time and for a decent amount of money. Long story short, walking is a great last resort.

A few days ago I grabbed my camera, my money, and my aviators as I headed out for a walk. The skies were semi blue, and I hoped to get up to a park in the middle of the city that would afford some good views of the surrounding area. Xingyi has a few parks, and this one is by far may favorite. Its a limestone peak, not a mountain and not a hill, in the middle of the city. Its rather developed, with terraces, wide staircases, two pagodas, something that looks like an abandoned temple, and small grove of statues commemorating (I think) influential Chinese individuals. The photo to the right shows some of those statues, with the nicer of the two pagodas in the background, and a lollipop salesperson in the foreground.

The pagoda was really neat, to use a worn colloquialism. Its three stories tall, with a steep spiral staircase acting as its spine. Every inch that isn't covered in terra cotta tiles is decorated in vivid geometric hand painted designs. Very cool. Furthermore, the pagoda reaches up over the treetops are offers a five view of parts of the city. The pictures below show the view and the designs, respectively.

Basketball and hot pot

No classes today, so the morning was little lazy. Here's an adventure from the evening:

At four, after my nice, long, daily nap (they are mandatory), I woke up and donned my basketball gear. I'm getting pretty good, and the sport has more or less eclipsed running for me here. The streets are HECTIC and the pavement is a little slippery, so running is extra adventurous. Anyways, I went down to the courts, shot around, and waited for the usual "Holy-crap-there's-a-foreigner-playing-basketball-lets-go-watch-and-play-too" crowd to show up. We got some good three on three going, it was a good few games. I'm not that great at the sport; I make dumb passing mistakes, my shooting is a little off, and my ball handling is akin to that of an enthusiastic but uncoordinated child. BUT, I am large, tall, and rowdy, so my lay-ups looking more like bowling then they do basketball, and my usual position is directly under the net, hands skyward, catching any rebound God sends my way. These tactics have delivered limited to adequate success.

Anyways, after the games I showered up, and headed out to get me some food. I was planning on going it alone; the site mate was elsewhere and I had no other plans. Some of my students/basketball team mates grabbed me, though, and took me out to bean hot-pot (delicious) and took me for a walk (relaxing). I love China.

Thats all for now. More... later.

Played that for a while, went back to the flat, showered, and headed out to get some food alone. One of my students/team mates saw me, and we managed to communicate the idea of "dinner" through our mutually broken chingrish (chinese english, I'm not sure where the "r" come from). We met up with about 7 others, all of which were extremely delighted to meet and speak with a foreigner. Right now, there is only about three of us in the entire city. Got to restaurant, they took to long, so we straight bailed, walked right out, and got to another spot that served a local delicacy, Bean Hot Pot.

So my sitemate, Homer Wells, and Dan Brown walk into a bar...

Here in the PC, some volunteers serve at post with another volunteer. These volunteers are referred to as site mates, because the inhabit the same post. Living with a sitemate is often dependent on the school's need for teachers and the PC's ability to meet that need. That said, let me tell you a story...

So, I have an awesome sitemate. PC rules state that I can't tell you her name on my blog, its a secret, but I swear she exists. She lives upstairs in a flat that is enarly identical to mine, but with a few minor differences (my kitchen is better stalked; her ceiling looks cooler; she has a washing machine that doesn;t sound like its about to explode, attack you, or both). We share stuff, like English books and bad ideas, and sometimes we cook meals together if we really don't feel like braving the street of Xingyi.

So yeah, she's awesome, close to me in age and situation, and I think that we've developed a solid working relationship. I'm talking about the kind of relationship that lets you share embarassing college stories, fart in each other's proximity, and drink from the same bottle of wine, sans cup. When we need help, I think we are there for each other. For instance, if I need help lesson planning, I know she'd be there. And if she needed help breaking into her appartment becasue she looked her keys inside, I'd be there for her. Well, actually I was there for her. When she did just that. Yesterday.

Yup, my awesome site mate was locked outside, so she came and grabbed me. Of course, I was glad to help her after a momentary laugh. Actually, I was super stoked onthe situation; I grabbed some twine, some laundry clips, a beer for us to share, and said "Hells yeah, lets get these keys!"

We stood on her outsie, 4th floor patio and surveyed the situation. The keys were across the livingroom, on a table of sorts, gaurded by an Ipod and a set of speakers. The windows were open, but barred for safety (damn safety...). We tied the laundry clips to the string for weight, and started shooting for the elusive keys After the better part of 40 minutes, my sitemate decided to change position and toss the keys from a different vantage: the window above the locked door. She climbed on a chair, stuck her head and arms through the window took aim and...

said "Hey, I can reach the doo knob from here." And she did. Very anticlimactic. Moral of the story: there is fun to be had everywhere.

In an unrealted note, I just finushed John Irving's The Cider House Rules and Dan Brown's The Davinci Code. Both were good in their own rights. I've rediscovered my love for Irving's prose, and I want to reread A Prayer for Owen Meaney. I finished Brown's book in 24 hours, and I'm kinda proud of that.

Sobreity of distance

Brace yourself, I'm going to wax philosophic, with a touch of whiny emotion.

In this world of the new, in the wild river of the unfamiliar, I instinctively reached out and grabbed what I could. I looked for a rock, and found that most were too slippery grab, and some were jagged, only offering razor sharp handholds that would do more harm than good. As I was swept downstream, as my family, my home faded in the haze and distance, I found something to grab onto. It wasn't a rock, or a low hanging tree straining the river's surface. Rather, it was another hand, then another and another, all reaching frantically for something familiar, just as I was. I wasn't alone in the river, there were others in my same predicament; we had never known we were neighbors before, but looking at our past lives retreating on the same upstream horizon, we realized how similar we are. Instead of grabbing on to a rock, or swimming for shore, we created a human raft, a series of bonds that gave us strength as we navigated the holes and the hydraulics of the river of change. Once we had each other's strength, we could lift our heads above the froth of the waves and see the beauty around us. We started laughing, and enjoying the ride, even when the ride was painful, even when the journey was frightening.

Now that we have have navigated the first section of that river, the first rapids behind us, we've drifted into a large pool. This river of change has dumped us into a calm, but ahead there are more rapids. The river has spilt, though, and no longer runs as a single channel; a variety of separate waterfalls await us. We know we must split up, the hands must let go, but our voices will carry across the seperate rivers valleys. Our journeys will be more, although not entirely, individual. We'll drop each other's hands, but the support will not disappear, it will just be different.

And now we'll return to reality...

Joining the PC, and making my way to staging, was an ENORMOUS change for me. Never before, not even my departure to college life, involved such change. I left my family, my friends, my routines behind. Everything that I loved was back home, and in front of me was a cacophony of new-ness. When I arrived in China, roughly 8 weeks ago, everything was different. Actually, when I arrived in San Francisco for staging, everything was different. By the time I made it to China, things had begun to normalize. After 7 (or so) weeks at PST, I've gotten lax. I have grown accustomed to the food, the company, and even the minor pains are relatively comforting in the regularity. Most of all, I have found great comfort in being able to run to my American friends for support, camaraderie, and activities. Its great to be frustrated and sit around with 19 of your best friends, bitching about the same thing as you live in a alien world. Unfortunately, that all will change.

My site visit has shown me just how large China can be, especially for the ground traveler. The friends I have made during PST, all my folks at CDU, and the others at the other campuses, will be split up. We can visit each other, and the promises fly now; the validity phrases like "I'll see you at Christmas" and "At some point I'll travel to your site" will be tested. It is sobering to know that the friends I have made will be so far, so distant. I mean, really, traveling by bus and train from the northern most site to the southern, one would need at least 60 hours to make a one way trip.

I will try to see as many of my friends as I can. I will remember how great you all have to me. Without each other, who knows where we'd be.

Restless Legs

Its August and I feel it in my legs. I am subconsciously antsy, anxious, awaiting the winter. I've felt this before, the sensation is familiar, and in past years even welcome. I'm day dreaming more, drifting out of language class, envisioning snow on each steep pitch I see. More and more often I am replaying different ski runs in my mind, imagining what they would be like in different conditions. A minute ago I was racing down Gondi line, my skis arching big GS turn over fresh, responsive corduroy. Now I'm picking my turns through the trees at Saddleback, dodging the pines in Thrombosis, floating on 14 inches of new snow. The situation changes, but the sport, the spirit, the want stays the same.

Unfortunately for my ski-happy spirit, this new situation has landed me in southern, subtropical China. Turns out there very little snow, although no lack of steep peaks.

In past seasons, I have taken a very American, consumerist approach to quelling the angst: shopping. Usually around this time, from July through September, I'm hunting for new gear. Last year I bought an ill, super warm Sessions jacket and some new Spy goggles. They year before that I invested in a telemark setup. THAT was a blast; I purchased new Black Diamond planks, new G3 Targa bindings, and a pair of used Garmont boots.

The fall that I bought that tele gear, the fall of Junior in college when I was living in the yellow bungalow in Maine, still brewing beer and riding longboards, me and my house mate Andy were stir crazy for snow. It was September, we laid out a white polar fleece blanket, and tried on our gear. There we were, two dude in shorts and tee-shirts, but from the calves down we were skiers. I buckled up the boots and even dropped a few knees. In September. In my living room. The anxiousness got that bad.

Around the same time, on a warm afternoon, we threw on our snow pants, grabbed some beers, and sat around watching ski movies. Yup, we stay classy in Maine.

This season, as far as gear goes, I keep thinking about about the Icelantic (a ski company) Nomads or Scouts, the Full Tilt all-mountain boots (the ones with three different lasts for different conditions), and Marker's Jester bindings, those things look burly. That would be my wish-list for this next season.

So yes, I've been day dreaming, much to the dismay of my language class. I admit, I haven't been all there during some of the sessions. I need a release, another activity. I've been running, but its never been the same as skiing. Basketball is a little better, but it still lacks the necessary qualities. I need to get stoked on something. Don't get me wrong, I am happy here in China, and I am excited to be serving, and I am excited to teach, but there is no STOKE. As my buddy Johnny Tsunami would say, I've got to find the gnar (root word of gnarly). I haven't found my gnar here in China yet, but I think I've got a lead.

Near my site there runs a river, the Maling (or Malinghe) river, through a gorge of the same name. The gorge is known for its beauty, its size, and its international rafting competitions. They do some commercial rafting there, but it looks a lot different from rafting back home (for instance, they pole their way down the river and the customers don't paddle).