Another amazing day in China

Today was an amazing day. Now I do realize that starting today's blog like that will bring about really high expectations but I hope to reach them. We woke up early, had breakfast, and were off to the Kung Fu school for our long awaited lesson. The masters who would be teaching us welcomed our group and we began. The first thing to do was run laps around the courtyard. Now I am not the most physically active kid in the world so this was a very rough start for me. Nonetheless, when actually doing the running, it wasn't as hard as I expected. About ten laps later, we were back in the practice room and were ready to begin our training. For our first day at Kung Fu this was no beginer stuff. We were doing poses to mimic the master and they were so dificult. Most of them were done squating and our master squated with his knees at less then a 90 degree angle. I was having trouble maintaining even a 110 degree angle for our two hour lesson. The masters were very particular with our hands the entire time. Some of the stances contained your arms crossed with you hands in fists and our right arm always had to be first, if not they would come to correct us. Other positions involved squating while punching with fists by our side and over our head. There were often times when we had to balance on one foot or kick our legs up very high. All of the stances were very dificult and we had to hold them for a long time. The masters gave us a short break half way through our lesson and I ran towards my water to rehydrate from the excessive sweating I had been doing. The break did not last long, however, and we were then split into groups. It was now time to show off what we had learned. The first group was up so I was able to watch as they stood alone and preformed the moves that they were just taught. It was increadibly impressive to see us be decent at Kung Fu after just a little training. When it was my turn I gave it my all and I think, surprisingly, I did pretty well. The lesson soon came to a close and we said good bye to our teachers until tomorrow. Our group was then taken on a tour of the school's campus. The lunch room looked not that much different from the one at my school and the classrooms were just slightly different. The rooms had white boards and desks but they were just slightly older and less well kept then my normal ones at home. The dormatories were interesting, they were so clean and tidy. The students beds were made as if they were in the military and it showed the true dicipline of the students there. After our tour it was time to leave and go to our next stop.

Our bus drove up to our next destination, the Astronomical Observatory. This structure was built in 1276 in order for Guo Shoujing to prove that Dengfeng was the center of the world. At that time they believed that there was no world other then China and that the earth was flat and sky was round. After the astronomers studied the shaddows and the sun, it was determined that Dengfeng was the center of the world and the emperor ordered that the capital be moved there. It did not stay there for long, but, this spot was very important because the studies of the sun's shaddows helped determine the length of a day and the seasons. It is interesting to know that the ancient calculation of a year at this observatory is only 24 minutes off of what it is discovered today to be.

After discovering about the history of Chinese astronomy we had lunch at a local restaurant. One of the dishes they served was fresh fish. It came out steaming inside an aluminum foil bag that we had to pop. Inside was some of the freshest, most delicious fish dishes I have ever tasted. Of course the head and tail were still attached but we tried not to loose our appitites and enjoyed the delicious meal. When we finished our meal we had a little break at our inn to nap and then were off to the Grand Shaolin Zen Music Show.

The show was absolutely amazing. Before it began we actually had the opportunity to meet some kids our age who were studying Kung Fu and would be preforming in the show. It was really cool to see how dedicated they are to the art and how talented. The stage for the show was no where near typical. The stage was a mountain side and they had stage lights to brighten it up. The seats were put at the base of the mountain and there were things happening on the entire mountain. There were four monks at different locations the entire time sitting still and meditating while the action occured behing them. There was dancing and martial arts together with singing and playing instruments and dramatic lighting the entire time. The music was all melow and the show is intended to clear your mind and be in a state of tranquility. The show featured probably one hundred preformers and they were all so talented. There were groups of people on stage from 10 year old boys to dancing women doing increadible movements to the music. A few of the preformers we dressed in light up suits and seamed to be floating through the mountains while dualing with eachother using sticks and fists. The motions through the entire thing were so insinct it was phenominal. At the end a light-up moon and numerous light-up Buddahs came up from inside the mountain and all of the preformers reappeared in the orange robes that the four meditating monks were wearing. This display reinforced to us the real reason why the Chinese people, and us, learn Kung Fu and other martial arts. We are learning to become in touch with ourselves physically and spiritually and be pure souls on earth. The show was deffinately a great end to an "amazing" day. Tomorrow we need to wake up at 4.30 to experience a day in the life of one of the Shaolin Monks so it is off to bed for me now. Good night!