Just another day (6)

First some pictures from yesterday! Pictures are awesome, a lot better than the huge posts ;-). I'm sorry about those, by the way. The temple of Heaven was quite amazing, especially how regal and gigantic it is!

I must say I admire the style! 

In the middle of big-apartments-messy-Beijing you find this huge park full of watered grass and carefully kept trees. In it: every now and then a building in red, green, blue and gold, with wonderful details like gold-painted dragons and other dragon-heads everywhere. I still have to look up the exact history of the park- I want to be able to tell something about it- but for now I only know it was a place of offering and praying to the sky (of the Ming dynasty?). Sky is tiēn in Chinese, the character is 天. The cool thing about that is that I actually know that character and the pronunciation. Around the main buildings there were exercise areas where old men did things that I have seen few young men do on bars (VERY impressive. We didn't take any pictures, so as not to offend). 

Dragon head (click for details).

There were also many (older) people playing cards, seated close to the buildings. In the wide park areas, people practised something that we think was tai-chi. That was quite a sight as well. When we went out at night we went to the traditional place for the students to be on wednesdays. They seem to go out any day regardlessly, but wednesdays are 'special'. And let's just say that 2 students didn't show up for the class this morning. And the teachers knew why, too. It's not quite the same mentality as school (no-one really minds if you don't show up), but it isn't quite university either (they do try really hard for you to understand, and are extremely patient). Most awesome thing that night was beating a table 'Fußball' champion (undefeated in Beijing!). That was highly irrelevant to the rest of the storyline, but I couldn't resist.

Does anyone know whether this is tai-chi?

Maybe the most complicated thing is getting what you want here. For example (the people who know me should actually know this) I'm a HUGE plant fan. No, I'm not kidding and yes, I dare admit it. But where can you possibly mǎi (buy) plants? The only site I can find online if I search in English is that of a very well known flower and plant mega-shop about 10 subway stations away. Plan is to go there with a shoebox and bring back as many plants as humanly possible- you gotta do something for the hobbies! Also, I haven't been quite able to find anything that looks even remotely like ham yet. So I eat bread with American cheese every morning. Cheese. Me. On bread. God if my Dutch friends read this they're never going to leave me alone. Today after school I went with some friends to a crossover market-shopping centre with lots of very cheap and very unrealistically copied posh clothes. People suddenly speak English there! I wonder... I still have some studying to do (sigh... I don't recall working this hard for school. No teachers on here, right?) so I'll just leave you alone again. Oh, if you read this, would you mind just commenting, once, so I know more or less who is around? A simple 'hi. (your name) here. see ya.' would be enough! Thanks! Love from the Northern city, Soof

My slightly more decorated wall
(you can't see the grey spots as much).

That's me! Nice warm weather!
(Just to prove I'm alive...)