Current Events

Again, I apologize for the incredible infrequency of updates lately -- I have not had as much time as I would like for detailed posts. Please accept this offering as a teaser while I work on the post about the mountain village! :)

Things here have been going quite well. We truly have been enjoying ourselves. It's hard to keep track of all the little things I'd like to share, but I have a few little stories in addition to the numerous amount of pictures from last weekend for you!

First of all, my sinus infection is gone (though one ear continues to pop randomly, and is doing it now). It was a few days of relatively clear breathing before I even noticed how much better I was doing. :) The ear thing is really annoying and will no doubt be even more so on the plane, but it is lovely not to be carrying wads of rough, scented toilet paper (some things, China, I will simply never understand) around in my pockets anymore.

Also, last week I went to the post office with Alex and one of our student guides, Vivian, to mail our erhus home -- they are too big to fit in our suitcases. I was rather skeptical, but it went surprisingly well. The China Post employee actually made us each a box to fit our instruments out of a completely different cardboard box. I wish I had been able to film it -- it was quite impressive! It cost just over 100元 ($15) to send it by sea. I'm not 100% positive it will make it in one piece, but we'll find out sometime this fall!

Last week we were taken to a fancy Chinese medicine building for Chinese massage and acupuncture. It was the first full body massage I have ever had. It was pretty good; I was awfully stressed/overwhelmed that day and was having trouble letting go and just enjoying it, and some of it hurt -- in part of it she was pushing tendons in my fingers across the knucklebones or something, and it was incredibly unpleasant. We were also fully clothed, and my sports bra got in the way of what would have been a great back massage. They were also playing 12 Girls Band in the background, which I am familiar with, so that was distracting as well. (It's also a bit too peppy for a massage, in my opinion.) Workers were answering phones and lights were shining in my eyes, too . . . so, in short, it could have been a little more relaxing.

The acupuncture was interesting; they told me (in Chinese, and through our group guide for the day, whose translation skills are somewhat lacking) that I was too cold. My hands and feet definitely were absolutely freezing, but that's not uncommon for me, and I didn't think anything was actually wrong. They decided to put heat lamps over me and go ahead with it, but through the mistranslation I was not able to tell them where specifically anything hurt, so they just put a needle in each of my legs. I'm glad I did it, but I'm not sure it was my thing. :)

Finally, here are some more pictures of the red pandas!