Breaking Through the Great Firewall

I'm FREEEE! I think, yet to see if it fully works but we might be in luck. As you all probably know, internet usage is heavily monitored in China. This means a heavy firewall on internet activity preventing access to a lot of sites that we use everyday in America. No Google (or Google products! So no Gmail, Google photo backup, or this blog that runs through Google!), Facebook, and so many other services. What this has meant so far is doing pretty much all online work exclusively on my phone and typing on a tiny keyboard. This is mind-numbing. I was using a friend's VPN but for some reason it wasn't working here in China. (A VPN basically hides internet activity from China and connects to another country that would allow me to access these sites.) Today though, Duncan ran into a similar problem with his VPN so his brother sent him the link to a super powerful one. It worked for him...so I signed up...and viola! So as far as the internet is concerned I'm in South Korea typing this AND! (Probably more important than the blog itself) my phone can finally back-up photos I can put into blog posts. No longer will these things just be walls of text! It's been a productive morning, for a Sunday. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

Friday I felt sick as a dog but with a test in my first class of the day, I drank probably two thermoses of tea and sucked it up. I had plans to slink away after the test and go back to bed but after seeing how bad our teacher was sneezing too I felt too bad trying to leave when she had come into work. The test was relatively straight-forward, most of the listening and reading pulled from the work book so content was easy enough to understand. Where I struggled was with English-to-Chinese translations. I can do the reverse easy enough, but I struggle the most with speaking and writing in Chinese and less figuring out English meaning. I did get an A though!!! We just got the scores back. After the test class could not have gone slower as I was just really, really looking forward to the noon nap I was planning. I picked up some ramen noodles for lunch and had an easy lunch in with a couple other guys.
For culture class we had to do another presentation about our life goals like we did last Friday. Today's official topics were what we wanted to achieve with unlimited resources and some role models. I was able to bring the DRC into my speech so I've considered it a win. After that, I met with my language partner to deal with the mountain of weekend homework and got all the translations done. Now all that's left is memorization and studying for Monday's dictation. Luckily, the day was saved with an epic climbing marathon Friday night. We got to the gym around 6:30 and didn't leave until 9:30-10:00ish. This time we had a larger crew go as some of the girls joined in and we all had a blast. The climbs are the same but I've been able to do some harder over-hangs and wall traversal. I also thought it was time to throw $10 in for a chalk bag, they had better ones but this has the Gym's logo on it. A practical souvenir! (I'm hoping to attach a photo of the gym to this post.)
We all went out to hot pot following the climbing and could barely hold our chopsticks. They fit all eight of us around a tiny table and the resulting chaos luckily didn't leave any burn victims with the boiling hotpot.
By the time we were done and home and showered, contemplating going back out it was midnight and everyone lost interest in favor of their beds. Duncan went out and came back with a 6-pack of Delirium beers. I think I've seen them before, but never thought to try one. If you're reading this Dad, they're worth trying. Anyway, we had a couple with some street meat skewers and had a blast well into the morning.

Saturday started earlier than any of us really wanted it to, but we did have a two hour bus ride to the Stone Forest to recuperate some of the sleep we felt we were missing. The Stone Garden is this beautiful area of free-standing rocks that were once submerged in an ancient sea and over the millions of years the water left the area and different ancient people moved in. Some communities have remained in the area making Yunnan the home of many of the minority groups present in China. We started out all together, but soon some groups had split off to search the forest for themselves. I stayed with the tour guide along with a lot of others, until Matt and I ended up lost after following a side path and spent about an hour trying to find our way back to the group. WE had a great time exploring and venturing to places we hadn't been, but it sounds like the main group had to remain somewhat sedentary while they tracked us down. I got a lot of good pictures though, including a couple of me! Some I didn't even take... So there's this big thing here where people will constantly take pictures of/with us because we're not Asian and while some people in our group love it, I'm a little less enthused about the constant attention. For example, I was walking over to a rock formation and someone was following me with a camera and another person was walking quickly behind me trying to get in the frame. Before I knew it I was arm and arm with an entire family smiling for a photo.
After the Stone Forest we headed to a very fancy Kunming meal complete with Kunming Roast Duck. It was served with plenty of rice, tea, and other vegetable dishes. The duck even included the head! William tried eating it, but found there's not much meat in a Duck head. We were then hustled back to the bus and on to the next stop...Jiuxiang Scenic Area, home to massive karst caves.
We traveled through these huge caves full of fancy lights and plaques talking about the area. I think all the security cameras and fancy lights took a little away from the majesty but they were still totally cool. At one point we came across this huge open area that concerts have apparently been held in! Underground! The caves wove in and out of massive canyons too so some parts were covered bridges crossing over rivers far below and open to the outside before plunging back into darkness. When we finally got to the bottom and the only thing left was a massive staircase back to the surface, we rounded a corner and were faced with temptation of a level unmatched. There were local guides offering rides up the staircase in plush chairs for only $10. I considered....considered...and then realized I could probably use the exercise. So I climbed up and felt very accomplished when I finally reached the top. I like to think the playing kittens were there at the cable car station solely because I decided to walk, but either way there were these adorable tiny kittens duking it out while we waited for the rest of the group. Also waiting for others, I couldn't believe my eyes at first and needed to ask Matt who was with me at the Stone Forest if it was true, was the family who came up to me that morning! The whole clan noticed me about the same time and started waving back, at which point Kyongnam informed me they were Korean tourists. So that was interesting.
Duncan and I ended up in a car together and posed for the camera as the cable car crested a hill and I bought the printout! So that's something else that is mildly entertaining. Everyone passed out on the bus ride back home so we were are marginally ready to go do something that night. A group went to

go sing Karaoke, another camp decided to go out for Japanese food. I'll let you guess who I went with. After we got back from the restaurant we sat in the hallway between rooms and just played cards until we all got too tired to continue. Then, we slept.

Today was relatively tame in comparison. After a late start around one, Duncan and I headed out to an Indian Restaurant for lunch where I had "Spinach and Cheese" according to the Chinese with a healthy serving of Naan. After that we went and studied in the Elephant Cafe for a while before coming back and doing some laundry, by hand!! I've decided I'm glad the Washer Machine was invented.

Here are the pictures promised!
In posted order: Now Climbing Climbing Gym
                          A Boat cruise before entering the Caves
                         Brandon and I in the Stone Forest
                        Jonathan and Duncan at a nearby Korean Restaurant