If there's one thing that continues to surprise me about Beijing it's how large it is. I've taken some 3-4 hour walks where I feel like I've covered a large amount of distance, but when I get back to the hotel and google maps it, in the giant checkerboard of Beijing I would have walked only one square. The checkerboard analogy is mainly a reference to just the metropolitan area. To stick with this analogy, the entire city of Beijing is like the table that the checkerboard is on.
I held my first camp on Sunday, where I had only about 8 kids (the usual is between 15 to 20 campers). They ranged from not being able to hit the rim when shooting to being able to dribble between their legs on the run and only messing up half the time. In short, the skill levels were all over the place. We got through the 2 hours without too many bumps. We'll see how it goes next week, I'll probably try some new things and keep a few of the old ones. Also, the gym that the camp was held in is located in one of the really good sports/martial arts schools in Beijing. There was this huge mural sized plaque that was full of names of Olympic participants and champions who attended the school, as well as national champions. One of the names happened to be Jet Li, apparently this was the school that he got trained at before moving on to become a Chinese martial arts champion.
Yesterday Sun Qiang (or Jonathan, his English name - he's been helping me out by meeting me pretty much every day and taking me to eat and showing me around the city) brought me to the office where I met my coworkers as well as the big boss man. They were having their weekly meeting when we walked in and when Sun Qiang introduced me they all started clapping and cheering, it was a little awkward. After the meeting, Sun Qiang showed me to my desk and told me that we were going to play basketball later that night. I had to go back to the hotel to get clothes, then come back to the office. I surfed the web for a while as there was no work for me to do, and then we went to Ren Da (a shortened name for People's University). There were 4 or 5 other Lao Wai (foreigners) there, some Chinese guys (include big boss man), and some Chinese girls who must have been Sport University students because they were pretty good. We had some good 5 on 5 full court runs and I got some exercise which felt really nice. Unfortunately by the end I was sweating like crazy and dreading the bus ride home. Afterward, big boss man invited me and some others to go eat and drink, and I got my first taste of what going out drinking with Chinese people means.
My t-shirt was sweaty and I had taken it off to play, and since I didn't want to put it back on, I just zipped up my shell jacket bare chested and went to dinner in that. Big boss man and his friend ordered enough food for at least 12 people, and lots and lots of beer. In China, they drink out of small glasses (maybe 4 oz). I think this is because they just enjoy cheersing a lot and enjoy downing their drinks and refilling them. Also, there is no break. You must keep drinking, and if a Chinese person sees you have no beer, they order you more. This goes on through the whole meal, however long that is. We went through a lot of beer and great food and big boss man told us stories about Beijing, the origins of the camp, and Chinese culture. By the end I was stuffed and full of beer. I took a taxi home and went to bed.
I'm not sure what my plan is for the rest of the week. I have to go into the office tomorrow, and I should be moving into my apartment in the next few days (I think Sun Qiang said that they have the place finally and are just changing some furniture). I haven't hit the tourist spots yet (i.e. Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven etc...) but I will in the near future I think. I should probably get back to studying Chinese, I have a loooong way to go. Bye bye.
I held my first camp on Sunday, where I had only about 8 kids (the usual is between 15 to 20 campers). They ranged from not being able to hit the rim when shooting to being able to dribble between their legs on the run and only messing up half the time. In short, the skill levels were all over the place. We got through the 2 hours without too many bumps. We'll see how it goes next week, I'll probably try some new things and keep a few of the old ones. Also, the gym that the camp was held in is located in one of the really good sports/martial arts schools in Beijing. There was this huge mural sized plaque that was full of names of Olympic participants and champions who attended the school, as well as national champions. One of the names happened to be Jet Li, apparently this was the school that he got trained at before moving on to become a Chinese martial arts champion.
Yesterday Sun Qiang (or Jonathan, his English name - he's been helping me out by meeting me pretty much every day and taking me to eat and showing me around the city) brought me to the office where I met my coworkers as well as the big boss man. They were having their weekly meeting when we walked in and when Sun Qiang introduced me they all started clapping and cheering, it was a little awkward. After the meeting, Sun Qiang showed me to my desk and told me that we were going to play basketball later that night. I had to go back to the hotel to get clothes, then come back to the office. I surfed the web for a while as there was no work for me to do, and then we went to Ren Da (a shortened name for People's University). There were 4 or 5 other Lao Wai (foreigners) there, some Chinese guys (include big boss man), and some Chinese girls who must have been Sport University students because they were pretty good. We had some good 5 on 5 full court runs and I got some exercise which felt really nice. Unfortunately by the end I was sweating like crazy and dreading the bus ride home. Afterward, big boss man invited me and some others to go eat and drink, and I got my first taste of what going out drinking with Chinese people means.
My t-shirt was sweaty and I had taken it off to play, and since I didn't want to put it back on, I just zipped up my shell jacket bare chested and went to dinner in that. Big boss man and his friend ordered enough food for at least 12 people, and lots and lots of beer. In China, they drink out of small glasses (maybe 4 oz). I think this is because they just enjoy cheersing a lot and enjoy downing their drinks and refilling them. Also, there is no break. You must keep drinking, and if a Chinese person sees you have no beer, they order you more. This goes on through the whole meal, however long that is. We went through a lot of beer and great food and big boss man told us stories about Beijing, the origins of the camp, and Chinese culture. By the end I was stuffed and full of beer. I took a taxi home and went to bed.
I'm not sure what my plan is for the rest of the week. I have to go into the office tomorrow, and I should be moving into my apartment in the next few days (I think Sun Qiang said that they have the place finally and are just changing some furniture). I haven't hit the tourist spots yet (i.e. Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven etc...) but I will in the near future I think. I should probably get back to studying Chinese, I have a loooong way to go. Bye bye.
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