I can't believe how many things I did. I look back at my pictures and it seems like a lifetime ago I was sitting in Tianjin watching the Olympic soccer games. Basketball semi-finals, gymnastics, track and field, beach volleyball and indoor volleyball...that was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Then starting school, meeting all these new people and going on a two week trip to the middle of China. I rode camels in the Gobi Desert, watched the sunrise over sand dunes and travelled to historical parts of China. We saw giant statues of Buddha carved into stone hundreds of years ago. We saw the Terracotta Warriors, we stayed with Mongolians on the grasslands. I rode a horse for my first time and loved it. Then going to Qingdao, Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Suzhou. We went to the International Beer Festival in China, were awed by the skyline in Shanghai and enjoyed the beauty of West Lake in Hangzhou. Suzhou was kind-of like Venice but in the Chinese way. The trip to Guilin was probably the most beautiful place in China. The mountains and river cruises and the water fight with friends were the greatest memories I can take away from that trip. I learned to cook all types of Chinese food and enjoyed eating it too. Going to Hong Kong and Tokyo was the most risky trips of the semester. The two weekends before finals, back to back, missing a class or two...it was all worth it. I never expected to love Tokyo so much and Hong Kong was an interesting and colorful city. And of course there was Beijing. A city of so many people, I got to know as if it was my hometown. 798 Art District, Houhai, Sanlitun, Pearl Market, Silk Market, Yashao Market, Temple of Heaven, Summer Palace, Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, hutongs, Lama Temple, and all the other sites we saw. There's no other place in the world to experience those things that have so much history and influence in Chinese society.
The one thing that I will miss the most was what we called, "Our Family." Our Family had developed over the past six months to be mostly our group of people that lived in building 5. First there was Jim and I. We had known each other for the past two years mostly through the Chinese classes we took at Fordham. Every Wednesday night taking a ram van down to Chinese class at our Manhattan campus and then sitting through 3 hours of foreign language until 10:30 pm. Going to China was a great time for us to get to know each other outside of the classroom and after living with him, I can really say that he's become one of my really good friends. Next in the family was Collin and John. These two were hysterical. Every morning, I'd walk over to John's room before Chinese class and give him the "2 minute warning" that meant we were leaving for class. Or, sometimes he would come into my room when my alarm didn't go off and yell at me that I was going to miss Chinese! Collin was always telling me that I was too full of myself and had a good ability to keep me down to earth when my head seemed to start blowing up. Being neighbors, Jim, Collin, John and I always had to rely on each other to keep entertained when the Beijing smog was too thick to go outside and play. Like the time we tried to pop popcorn using our cell phones...It doesn't work. (If you don't know what I'm talking about click here!) The last two people that lived on the penthouse of building 5 were Jeff and Ryan. (The Penthouse is the 6th floor that we all lived on. With no elevator, those six flights of stairs gave us all buns of steel, a six pack, and a killer cardio workout!) TBC couldn't have picked out better roommates than Jeff and Ryan. Probably the two most laid back applicants of TBC, we could always count on Jeff and Ryan to be burning incense and watching a bootleg Planet Earth. If you ever needed a break from reality, walk into their room and listen to Ryan practice guitar or wonder where Jeff had mysteriously wandered off too. Jeff was the only one in the family that took Advanced Chinese, and he could put all of us under the table in tones and vocabulary.
If you went down to the 5th floor of our building, Brittany and Devon were always there being the protective mothers of us guys. Always adding that element of stability and reality, the girls were never shy to let us know when we were being ridiculous or when we needed to stop being hooligans. Brittany was always there to offer advice and have a laugh with us. Or to just sit back and watch the entertaining nights when she had papers to write and the rest of us just ignored our school work. Devon was a friend from Fordham who I had known for two years also. She lived on the floor above me freshman year and we had always hung out together having mutual friends and some classes together. I am so glad I had the opportunity to study abroad with her because she is a great person to know and hang out with.
On the 4th floor of building five was Dan and Sean. Sean broke his arm halfway through the semester outside of the Forbidden City. And even though he was crippled for half the semester, it didn't stop him from joining in the shenanigans of building 5 life. Growing up in Los Angeles, Sean has that west coast vibe that I can relate to and I always enjoyed having deep conversations about life just to discover we have an unusually similar ideas and outlooks. He promises one day, he's going to turn me into a brand: Regis®. He has all these ideas which were hysterical and great and I can't wait to visit him in CA. Dan was Sean's roommate who was pretty quiet but when he came out and had fun he was a good guy to have around. He would never add in his two cents, but when he did it was worth more than a dollar. On the 3rd floor was Matt. Matt begin the trip with freshly cut hair and was one of many participants of "No Shave November." Our only friend from the "Great North," Matt's small town Alaskan attitude taught me a lot about sitting back and relaxing. He could always take a joke too far and cross the line, but he was such a good guy that no one seemed to mind. Next to Matt was Devin. Boy-Devin and Girl-Devon were the names we used to distinguish who was who, but Devin...I can't say I've met anyone like him. His nickname was "Long-hair don't care" and he was just a carefree person who was open with himself and wore his feelings on his sleeves. Maybe he offended some or took some time to warm up to, but he was a great friend who was loyal to the end. He was a frequent patron of Jeff and Ryan's penthouse suite to play the guitar with Ryan and sing songs. He was a great performance.
Then there were those people that lived in building 6. I wish I would have gotten to know building 6 people more but I'm glad I got to know Jessica and Lauren. Jess and Lauren only added fuel to the fire that kept building 5 always alive with excitement and entertainment. They were loud and always laughing, which was perfect for our weekend "get-togethers" or mid-week work siestas. We would always meet them for dinner or a night out at Ke Feng's Dumplings. Jess and Lauren were another set of remarkable roommates that I'll definitely miss.
Ling and Femia were the greatest kiddo's in the TBC family. Ling was always getting annoyed, being Chinese, when locals assumed she spoke fluent Chinese. I would love going out to dinner with her because the waitresses would always go to her instead of me to take the order. Both Ling and Femia were tiny, no taller than 5'5" I think, but they added a sense of maturity in the group and added too many memories to count. I'll never forget the first time they went out with us to Houhai and how that night ended up being one of the best nights our family's ever had.
All in all, besides the people, I can probably say I'll miss Ke Feng. I remember the first time I ate at his dumpling place I knew I was going to be eating there a whole lot. Cheap, quick and convenient, his dumplings were out of this world. I remember introducing myself to him and getting to know him when the place wasn't crammed full of people. The place was a little dingy but I was soon to discover that he served more than dumplings. Fried rice, fried noodles, noodle soup, and tons of other stuff, I felt like I was at In-and-Out burger ordering from the secret menu. Ke Feng worked at the dumpling place for 4 years. He was 22 years old, which meant he started when he was 18. He grew up in Hangzhou, the beautiful lake town near Shanghai, and had moved to Beijing a while ago. The dumpling place was only 6 years old, and I think it was started by the man in the back that sometimes helped Ke Feng make dumplings. There was also a woman in the back that did most of the cooking and Qiu Lijian who was the table cleaner. Qiu was one of the most shy people at the dumpling place. The others would always be willing to say a quick "Ni Hao!" but Qiu would just sneak by and smile. Whenever he got embarrassed a huge grin would creep across his face and he would disappear into the back.
I'm also going to miss the bike guy and the drink guy and all of the places I frequented. I built relationships with all of the people, saying Hello, asking them how they're doing and making an effort to say good-bye on my last day in town. I'm going to miss the Chinese friends I made and all of the Chinese people that have influenced me so much. They have such a different lifestyle that their insights and opinions would often make me take a moment to rethink some of the things I had thought. Although China has a lot of progress to be made, it is good to see them changing, slowly but surely. I probably won't miss the smog or the bitter cold or the humid unbearable heat, but I'll miss the familiarity of the roads, Sanlitun, and Houhai. The night of Armin Van Buuren was something I've never done before and I'll never forget that. I've made a lot of memories in China that will always come back to me and I think our whole family realizes that we've had a life changing experience. The best part about my time abroad was now I've made friends across the US. Collin is from Chicago, Sean & Devin from L.A., John & Jim from New York, Jess lives in Florida, Lauren & Dan in Boston, Matt in Alaska, Devon in Philadelphia and Brittany in San Francisco. We're already planning when we can get together and see each other next. With technology these days, I'm lucky that my friendships don't have to end in China, they only just began there.
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| Final Goodbyes |
On a final note, I would like to thank everyone who read my blog. There were some pretty long entries...sometimes I'd forget to write for a week or two and the pictures were...maybe not few but sometimes far between. I hope I gave an accurate description of everything I did and I tried not to be biased or excessive. I've already received many thanks for writing this, but I felt like it was something I had to do. I know most of my family will never be able to go to Asia and this is as close as some of them will ever get to experiencing the things I've done. If I didn't do this, I would feel guilty for having this opportunity and not giving others a chance to share in it too. As I head back to New York for another semester, I probably will have to end my journey here. This blog will always be open to review and re-read, but for now, this chapter has ended and it is time for me to begin another. Thank you very much! I hope you enjoyed My Chinese Adventure.
