Jinan - Day 8 (11.20): Jumping Nandaos, Kiwiman!

The strangest thing happened during wushu class this morning. As I was going along the carpet the entire earth shifted about 1 or 2 feet straight down and then came back up again. It was very quick so some people may have missed it and perhaps it was localized just to my region of the planet, but it was very strange.

It happened again .. and then again. During the time when the earth dropped out below me I tried slapping my foot to see what would happen. Then I tried turning in place after a slight run. It was the weirdest sensation.

But then I realized what it was. It’s not that the earth was dropping out below me. It’s just that I had done my first jump front slap kick and jump inside kick in 3 years. It’s been so long I didn’t even recognize them (and odds are the athletes around me didn’t either).

That was the first of three main events in today’s morning class.

The second main event was my conversations with Li Chun and Zhang Ling (they’re both not practicing right now due to knee and foot issues). They were asking me a bunch of “are you married?” “do you have a girlfriend?” “is there someone you like?” type of questions. Zhang Ling asked me one that was almos disturbing though: “Can we call you ‘uncle mark’?”. The term ‘uncle’, while very nice of them to say (it means that they consider me a good friend) I was a little taken aback. Usually people call me ‘brother mark” if anything (”mark ge ge”) but I guess being 20 years older than them I’m technically of the uncle age. But they agreed that, since I’m not married yet, they would not call me uncle. I thanked them.

They also asked me another question which was “which of the two of us do you think is prettier?”. Now, I’m no fool so of course I avoided the question and ran off to the other side of the wushu guan to do wall sits. Zhang Ling also asked later for my cell phone number so that we could keep in touch. She said “We’re good friends now so we should keep in touch with each other after you leave Jinan” which was really nice of her. Making friends is cool. Especially wushu friends.

The third main event was starting in on Yuen Feng Ling’s nandao form. The interesting thing about her form is that she has an inordinately large number of sword thrust. When she broke the section down and I learned it slowly it seemed like it was just one after another, but when she does it at a moderate speed with the movements all connected the big picture of her form comes out and it makes way more sense. It’s a very fierce form and has a lot of passion to it. Some people’s nandao forms are very mechanical, and some are just kind of stale, but hers is very “alive” (not sure how else to put it) and while I’m not a huge fan of her flavor, I think she definitely has put a lot of time and energy into coming up with her form’s choreography. Hats off to her!

I learned about a section’s worth of the form after class and then hobbled (my back is giving me some problems) to the street-o-food and got some lunch which I ate back in my room. I took a bunch of pictures of this (different than the type I had before) bing just or Justin.

Another bing spot I frequent

After lunch I soaked my tired body in a hot bath for about 30 minutes and took a short nap before the afternoon class. I tell ya … nothing can make you groggier than a 30 minute nap in the afternoon (when you really needed about 2 hours).

I dragged myself to the afternoon class and even though I wasn’t able to participate as much as I’d like due to my back giving me some grief, it was still quite productive. I’m going to make it a habit that, even if I’m injured, I’m still going to go to wushu class. Even if I can’t physically practice, the mental practice and awareness that it provides me is equally invaluable. It’s like watching wushu videos, but … in person. I really learn a lot.

But, I actually did manage to do some working out. My legs were a bit tight even though I took that hot bath and kicking was a bit painful as compared to the morning. But strangely enough I was actually more flexible than in the morning. I’m not sure how that works exactly — more flexible but also tighter.

This practice I pumped out several sections of my nanquan. I’ve worked in the standing jump outside into the beginning of my form (for when I’m actually able to do it) as well as the jump inside (for when I’m actually able to do that as well). I also fixed some major things I didn’t like about the end of my 2nd and my 3rd sections. I’m much happier with my form now and I think it has a few more techniques. The previous version was probably a bit undertime too.

After class Yuen Feng Ling was asking me when I was leaving Jinan. I said Friday and she asked that, if she is free sometime can she come over to my room to hang out. I said “of course!”. It’s nice being by myself, but occasional company wouldn’t be so bad either. However, she was busy tonight studying English so she said it would have to be another night. I also asked her and Ding Hai Juan as we were walking out for the name of a good massage place and they recommended one for me that all the taxi drivers should know about.

As I walked back to my hotel I had visions of a 2 hour massage floating through my head. I quickly did some blog updating and took a shower before grabbing a cab for the massage place. Unfortunately I had totally forgotten the name of it so I just asked the cab driver to take me to a good “legitimate” (read: no “special services”) massage place. He took me to one place on Shan Da Nan Lu just up from Hua Yuan Lu, but it looked a little shifty (even though he said it was good), so I walked down Hua Yuan Lu for a bit and found another place. Not super nice or fancy, but it was okay. I got back and feet done. I still feel the need for more work though so I might drop by the doctor’s after the first class tomorrow and ask them to work on me for a bit.

On the way to the massage place we passed a restaurant with a sign that said they had “western food”. I was sort of jonesing for some western grub, but I was more interested in a massage at the time. However, on the way back to the hotel we passed it again so I told the driver to stop and I went in to get some food.

The place was called “The Kiwi Corner”. It was a restaurant / bakery / coffee shop. I saw a bunch of people sitting in the coffee house area but I wanted some food so I sat down in the dining area and ordered a steak. They had all sorts of food on the menu; lasagna, lots of pizza varieties, pasta, sandwiches (even grilled cheese), and a good selection of coffee drinks as well.

An older woman approached me and introduced herself. It turns out she was two thirds owner of the restaurant. She was from New Zealand (hence the “kiwi” reference) and was teaching English at Shandong University and another school as well. On Monday nights she had an English corner for her students there and I just happened to be there when it happened. They had a write-up in a local English-language magazine which I browsed while eating my dinner. She’s been a busy woman. She’s lived in Hokkaido for a long time (her ex-husband is Japanese), and London, originally from Singapore and has a son in Spain and a daughter in the U.S.

The Kiwi Corner Monday Night English Corner

After I ate I perused their baked goods and got a few cookies and breads (baked fresh at the restaurant) to take back to my hotel for the next day’s munching. She also invited me to a Thanksgiving event they are having on Thursday evening. 50 RMB for a buffet with some thanksgiving themed foods. No turkey of course, because that would bring the price to about 500 RMB, but she said it should be pretty good. I’m guessing Jennifer and Wang Wei wil need to have dinner with the relatives, but in case that doesn’t work out or we have some free time maybe we’ll drop by and say howdy. Always nice to meet an ex-pat in a new place.

After dinner I grabbed a cab back to the hotel (passing a decent looking massage place on the way — I wrote the cross streets down this time) and did some laundry before writing up my blog and hitting the sack. My body is still pretty sore but a good night’s sleep should help.

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