All the Good Smells: Peace, happiness and Pink Floyd

"This week will bring you peace and happiness." That could be the message of a fortune cookie, but sums up the past week pretty well. While my classes have been getting steadily more and more difficult and mid-terms are just around the corner, overall I feel like the past week was a "good" China week. Of course, study abroad has its ups and downs, and it's easy to let the downs become overwhelming at times. Nevertheless, my lack of illness, BEAUTIFUL weather (highs in the 60s and 70s, no rain) and a few nice cultural activities thrown in have made this week unexpectedly nice, and reminded me that study abroad isn't all bad, after all.

Right now, I could be writing any one of several essays due next week regarding Hangzhou's history, the developments of the Chinese missile program in the 1950s, the Chinese housing market, or the Pepsi-Cola company's future prospects in China. Instead, I'm going to pass on a few snippets of what made parts of this week so great, and others pretty darn amusing.

Making "Twin Happiness" 双喜 paper cut-outs with Chinese third graders... so cute! The MIC program took us all to an elementary school on Tuesday to play with and attend class with the students for a couple of hours.

1. Nutritional awareness- 11:45 pm, Thursday night

My roommate (smacking loudly on some sort of dried fig): "Xia xin, it seems that you don't like fruit. I never see you eat fruit. This is bad, because fruit is good for you."
Me (in pajamas and crawling under the covers): "I love to eat fruit, just not in this dorm room."
Roommate: ".....................oh. Well, you should eat fruit in the room. Fruit is good for you."

2. It's a mystery...

About every ten-thirty minutes in Hangzhou, very loud military-looking jets of mysterious origin fly over the Zhejiang University of Technology campus. Actually, another one just tore through the airspace outside my dorm as I sit here typing this post. I broached the issue during my "One-on-one" class, where the sound of supersonic jet engines was making it difficult to hear what my teacher was saying about the Long March 2E rocket.

Me: "Feng Laoshi, why are there always military jets flying over our campus?"
Teacher: "What military jets?"

Hmm.

Feng Laoshi, my one-on-one class's teacher, is actually really awesome. When we're not discussing developments in the Chinese space industry, we have had some nice, long talks about the nuances of punk, rock, and "lo-fi" British music. He's into indie music, but is also a fan of Coldplay and Pink Floyd... LOVE IT!!!

3. The Temple of Soul's Peace

The Lingyin Temple was built in the third century AD and is the most important Buddhist area in Zhejiang province. I was sent there on Wednesday for my Hangzhou history class, and the scenery was so beautiful- it was about 70 degrees, bright, and all of the flowers were blooming. It was so lovely that I ended up buying a small black beaded bracelet from one of the souvenir shacks outside the temple. "What is the meaning behind this bracelet?" I asked the shopkeeper. "It will bring you peace and harmony," she told me. Who doesn't need more of that in their life?