On the Road Again

Today was crazy. I spent the morning cleaning my house, met some friends for lunch, went to school, then met some more friends for supper. Then we walked around a bit before I went home and cleaned some more. Tomorrow I'm going on vacation (woo-hoo!!), so I was trying to get to the point where I could come home to a nice, clean house. :)

I didn't have any classes today, fortunately. Why, then, you may ask, did I go to my school? Well, today was the last day of the Asian weightlifting competition, and since it was held at my school (BIG honor for my school and town!!) I couldn't miss it entirely. Fortunately I had some friends who were volunteering who could get me in for free. It was really interesting, as it turned out. A Chinese guy won (big surprise, no?). Those men are HUGE!! And they can lift a LOT of weight. There were about 20 countries participating (besides China) from all over Asia, so it was a pretty big, international event. I even looked it up on Google, and it's in the news and everything. I was excited that I actually got to watch some of it live.

So next week is our "spring break" so to speak. May 1st is international Labor Day (we just have to be different, so we hold it in Sept.) and the whole country gets a holiday for a few days. So, in order to give students a whole week off of school (since there are only 3 official vacation days...) the students have to make up the classes that they miss during the vacation. (And why, again, do we have a vacation if we still have to do the work??) Fortunately I already made up the classes I would miss, and that was somewhat by accident. :) All that is to say, next week I have a whole week of vacation!! Yay!!

So what will I do? I am going to one of the famous cities in China - Xi'an. It's famous for being an ancient city (along the Silk Road, I believe), and the seat of some ancient dynasty. But the big tourist attraction here is the "Terra Cotta Warriors/Soldiers". The little warriors/soldiers that some farmers found by accident and dug up thousands and thousands - row upon row of these guys. Anyway, I'm going to go see them sometime during the week. I also have some friends in the city who I'll be able to hang out with. Other than that I just want to chill and rest, see the city, eat western food, get some groceries, etc. I'm looking forward to it!!