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    Last Post of Wudangshan


    2010 - 06.18

    Tags: , , , ,
    Posted in Wudang | No Comments »

    Before this gets too out of date, I am posting the text. I need a lot of upload time on china’s bandwidth to get the pictures up and the display plug-in working, so I’ll likely just upload everything when I get to Japan. but here is the reading… :)

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    I left Wudangshan this morning and am now on the train to Shanghai. My leaving felt… curious; as we pulled away from the school I felt some pangs of loss at the knowledge of how to navigate these streets becoming unneeded, regret that I would not be able to prove my tough skin 1000 times a day with the sights I was passing. It felt very strange, like perhaps, having given myself permission to feel how I felt about China that it no longer held sway or power over me. Maybe like the Buddhist distinction between suffering and pain. Seeing distressing things, I was able to say to myself, “There is one of those things I don’t like to be exposed to” instead of “there’s an onslaught of those things that I have to force myself to enjoy or approve of if I want to think of myself as a good person”. The thing is the same, but my self-honesty has moved me out of a suffering place, and thus I can begin to appreciate the appreciable in Wudangshan and China in general. I don’t think this means I’m leaving too soon, but I do think it has taught me a valuable lesson about “wherever you go, there you are” and “the grass is greener on the other side” and other clichés of travel.

    I also think this shift was helped by my visit to Wudang Mountain yesterday (more…)

    Getting honest about China


    2010 - 06.13

    Tags: , ,
    Posted in Body, China, Growth, Wudang | 3 Comments »

    There has been a pressure building since I arrived in Hong Kong that in my attempts to be mature, reasonable, politically correct and tough I have been suppressing. Thanks to a Yoko Kanno playlist inspired cry, I have remembered myself and my goals, and this has allowed me to get honest.

    I don’t like it here. I really enjoy the people at the school, foreigners and Chinese alike. And surprisingly, I enjoy the training sessions a lot. I thought they would be the aspect I would have to push through to allow myself to get what I want out of this experience, and they’re not. I am going at my own pace, a pace that I am setting for myself as slightly faster than I usually think is possible for myself (Piaget would be proud- ZPD), and I am meeting it. I am sore and muscle-exhausted, but feeling alive and accomplished after a session, and I am learning every moment—the training is exhilarating and rewarding and physically difficult but emotionally doable. I have complaints about the school, but they’re not a big deal; overall, everyone is kind and accommodating and supportive. I feel confident that I will be able to take 90% of what I have learned with me into my life, which was one of my main goals. I have learned that I don’t necessarily need a residential kung fu school to move me forward, but I can see at some point of fitness and expertise me wanting to do the residential route again. Overall, I am pleased with my experience at the school. It’s China I can’t stand.

    (more…)

    Guangzhou and Train Ride


    2010 - 06.02

    Tags: , ,
    Posted in China | No Comments »

    Today has been a day of big thoughts, and I don’t think it’s just because I’m reading Neal Stephenson again. Man, do I love his style- I feel my brain expanding to align with the depth/breadth of his universe… good stuff.

    So the last few days have been pretty crazy, though in the end, relaxed, somehow. On the train out of Hong Kong I realized I left my camcorder and iRiver  underneath my bunk in the hostel. I was trying not to wake up the others, as I was leaving at 5am, and I remember thinking, “I should do a last check back in the dark underbed spots”, quickly followed by, “Nah”. Well, maybe I’ll be able to get a claim from my traveler’s insurance, or the hostel found them (they’re attached to each other in little sleeping bag pockets) and set them aside and I can wire the money for them to send them to my school, we’ll see. The hostel manager said she’s willing, so perhaps it will work out. I’m finding that the greatest losses are not the equipment itself, necessarily, but the recordings from group I put (only) on the iRiver, and the convenience of having my own camcorder (although my still camera does movies of acceptable quality, too). The school might have a camera they let me use, regardless. So besides running around trying to catch a train in HK, that’s how my day started, and I did not have as good an attitude about it yesterday. (more…)