So while I have been in China, I have been teaching at a kindergarten twice a week just mainly to get myself out of my comfort zone to be honest. Each and every time I go I get absolutely destroyed by the kids, just because I run out of things to teach very quickly when surrounded by 30 three year old kids who would rather just go mental and run around than learn what 'brown bear' can see.... I was asked by the teachers to bring a few friends to help out at Halloween, and AFTER getting them to say yes, I told them we had to do a dance in front of the school.....haha they werent best pleased. So we got there and then were asked 'what dance have you prepared'....clearly none since its me they are asking. So we were lead to a room, some music slapped on, and then told 'ok you have half an hour to prepare'. What ensued was the most retarded and unco-ordinated dance that has graced that kindergarten, complete with me and Tom doing a backward roll into each other.
Anyway, just thought i'd post it up because it was a funny day and we got some funny pics out of it.
The past week has been National week here in China, which basically translates to an opportunity for travel to many people, including myself. So, using the recently purchased touring bikes bought specifically for this kind of time, Tom and I decided to undertake a trip to Huang Shan, the Yellow Mountains. It turned out to be one of the most intense and tiring but ultimately rewarding weeks ever for me and Tom, with it consisting of virtually nil planning and things somehow coming together in our favor when all was uncertain. We originally planned to travel by bike all the way to the Yellow Mountains, but discovered while cycling that it was actually double the distance and time that we had anticipated and we didn't have the time to add another week onto our current one since we had classes the following week and a degree to be working for! So we cycled about 100 miles south to the nice city of Tong Ling to catch a bus from there on to the Yellow Mountains. This trip gave us a much bigger insight into the more average living situations for the chinese people and we saw a lot of smaller towns and villages which just made us appreciate where we live in Nanjing just so much more. Here is a brief summary of each day: Monday: Cycle about 100 miles 10am till 1am, sleep next to road (and mosquito lake...) Tuesday: Cycle about 50 miles from 7am till about 2pm, sleep in hotel (very soundly) Wednesday: Catch 7am bus to HuangShan for 2.5 hrs, hike 8 km to top, sleep in hotel lobby Thursday: 5am for sunrise, hike back down, 8hrs of waiting and bus riding to back, sleep in hotel Friday: Cycle back about 200km to Nanjing from 10am till 3am Here is an unedited bit of footage of the trip, i didn't film any of the yellow mountains because the camera was hassle to take around.
Looking nice and fresh from Nanjing, the bikes "Mergatroid" and "Mutti"
The first nights sleep, the tent collapsed at about 3am so we slept on it,
Even just buying fruit brought a fairly big crowd in the smaller towns, who were amazed that we could speak (very bad) chinese
A village church literally out in the middle of nowhere, odd sight
Some kids we met who were on their way home
The only guy out of about 20 willing to get a picture with me, probably cos i smelt bad
The first 3km of the trek up the mountain, food and drink for the days on back
Lookin' fly on the mountain
What can i say....except 'you have legs!'
A view we found very much off the beaten track, absolutely stunning views from the rock side
Compulsory pose on a rock no' 1
Compulsory pose on a rock no2
This was a small jump i did to the thin rock, with a pretty gnarly drop either side, needless to say i was pretty psyched after that!
Sunset or the second coming?
This was very funny, since our plan to sleep on the mountain was foiled by the fact we didnt actually bring a sleeping bag and it was very cold, we asked to have half price for sleeping on a mattress that was stacked at the side, assuming they would drag them into a room, but the guard just dragged them onto the floor of the lobby and left us to it!
One of the hyped kids who didn't let us sleep much haha
simply.
Sunrise at the mountains at about 5am, really the best natural thing i have seen
I love the colours of this, just looks like a painting or stencil, was just before the sun started to appear, and when it did, people went absolutely crazy, there were more on the mountain at 5am then during the day! Well it looked like it...
To cut a long story short, as of the last few weeks I have put my faith in the bible and Christ. I say the last few weeks because unlike what I expected, when I made a commitment to Christianity, I felt nothing revolutionary, in fact it was a huge disappointment. But I have come to realise that like in anything with life, practice and time is needed to understand things, so although I have many questions that I am struggling with, I have made a commitment to this and to search within it. Its been a thing that I have been questioning for two years now and I feel that I need to choose whether it is the truth or not, and through many different influences and looking at different forms of evidence and views I have chosen to try and give myself to God. Like I said I still have many issues with it that i struggle with, but to keep it short, I have chosen this as my path. I think all of us who practice parkour are looking for something in life that has meaning and is something above and beyond what the world and society offer. Parkour has brought together many of these types of people looking for something true, so I just want to say, don't let your search stop at parkour, but think about why you are here and what life is actually about and what your purpose is. Don't let yourself drift through life without considering what is above and beyond what is on offer here, because as we all know, the best things in life are free (eg parkour) and not a product that man can offer. I wanted to just shout it out on here since it has become more than just a blog for training to me, but somewhere to say whats happening in my life in general also.
Aside from that, China is going well, start lessons next week. Will keep updates on here about what is in the works and what is going on for those interested. If anyone wants to talk at all of anything just email me,
Well, today is my last full day in England for almost a year. I am actually off to China tomorrow as a sandwich year for my chinese studies degree course. I must say, it has come round so fast. I only just got my visa yesterday, and i am completely not in the mindset that i am leaving, its just dawning on me. However i am really looking forward to it and have lots of plans for while i am out there, so i will definately be kept busy enough. Just want to say to everyone, i am really going to miss you all, and its been a really great summer for me and just another massive thanks to all those who supported the crawl, big plans for the future with New Foundations that you will be kept posted on. Be sure to keep checking back here for updates from China, i'll let you know whats cracking with the parkour scene and how training is out there, as well as all the travelling.
Right, Sorry for the lateness of this post, I havent had much time or access recently so it had to wait. Well, on the saturday of the 11th, it was the day of the crawl. I moved it forward because more people were available to help get money out of the public, and there was more public to get money out of also. First of all, it was probably the physically hardest thing I have done, which just shows I need to be pushing myself more everywhere else. I started at around 11:20am and finished at about 4:30pm. I didnt manage to finish the entire 4 miles unfortunately because I was feeling extremely worn down and during the last 20 minutes began to throw up a fair amount and started to find it extremely hard to stay down and crawl from nausea and my head throbbing. I am fairly happy with the distance I did do however which was about 3.6 miles, and I did go as far as I have ever gone physically and mentally, I almost felt like crying toward the end. We managed to raise a really suprising amount of money on the day, amounting to £475.46. Overall more than £2,500 has been donated to New Foundations. Here is a map of the route, the red line is what I crawled, and the blue line shows the last part which I didn't do: Also, here is a short video of the day. Unfortunately my last 30 mins of agony were not captured so you cant see me in my personal hell haha.
Thanks so much to everyone who supported me and donated money. I appreciate everyone's generosity so much and am glad with the positivity which has come out of all this, thanks so much everyone.
This is how happy they were to do a dance...LOL
"How to scare the shite out of kids for dummies"
Preparations going swimmingly,
Freestyle!!!
Yippppeeeeeee!!!!!!
