Radiance, Rock, and Recess

Well hello there again. I need to backtrack to Friday October 6th for this post. This day was the Moon Cake Festival or Mid-Autumn Festival. A group of us went to Longtan Park to see the biggest light show in the city. Stewart’s roommate Wang Zhan told us that the park would only sell 30,000 tickets and he made it sound like this was the only park with a light show. We didn’t understand how it could be possible that there would be only one park that all 15 million people in Beijing would want to go to.

We got to the park when it was still light out, so the lights weren’t turned on yet. After eating dinner we went over to the park and saw that this was like a huge carnival that wrapped around the lake with lots of light displays reflecting off the water. There were lots of weird displays too, like this statue of a little boy pissing on everyone. Most of the little shops were selling snacks, but we saw a couple of them selling unconventional things. One of them was selling toys, food, hammers, screwdrivers, baseball bats, and shovels. I can’t even begin to understand why someone would decide to sell tools at a carnival or why someone would see a hammer and feel the sudden urge to buy one.

Anyway as we were walking around the lake, we saw a huge fountain show going on, but unfortunately it was on the other side. We watched for a little while as we walked around, but when we got close it ended. At this point everyone in the park started leaving and the pathways were just seas of people with a few white guys towering over them. We just made our way through the crowds while holding our arms in the air so we could keep our eyes on each other.

That Saturday CET didn’t have any events planned, but they were giving out bigger reimbursements than usual because there were a lot of things to do in Beijing that weekend. That night a bunch of people decided to go to the Beijing Rock and Beer Feast. Yes, all the advertisements said Feast, but I think they meant to say Fest because there definitely wasn’t a lot of food to feast on.

I didn’t have my camera with me, so I’m going to have to try and get some other people’s photos. The stage these bands were playing on was immense. The first band that was playing had a singer, two guitarists, a bassist and a drummer and I don’t think anyone of them were standing within 30 feet of each other. None of us had any idea how popular any of these bands were, but it was pretty easy to pick out the crappy ones. The first band had a girl singer and was playing some bad pop rock songs, so they were kind of like Evanescence. While they were playing we watched the mosh pit in front of us get bigger as all the guys on the outside of the circle would hold hands and run as fast as they could to widen it.

The next band was more of a death metal band, but their first song was really bad and unusual. They just laid down a heavy beat with an occasional guitar riff while the singer essentially talked to us in growling Chinese. Eventually they would reach the chorus and actually play something. This probably went on for 8-9 minutes, so we got bored and decided to join the mosh pit. The Chinese guys loved this and soon after one of us got hoisted into the air and began to crowd surf. We were standing pretty close the front guardrail, so it wasn’t long before this kid was dumped over into the arms of all the security guards. Once I saw this I knew that any minute we were all going to be in the air. I think I was picked up fourth and there were still a couple of us to go. I knew my friends could hold me up, but the people in front of us were facing the stage and didn’t look ready to catch someone larger than usual. The guards did a good job of catching me though, so everything was cool. In a matter of minutes 8 or 9 of us were picked up and put over the railing, so I guess the guards told the last kid that went over that because we are Americans we would be arrested if we did it anymore. That pretty much ended the moshing for the night.

There were two more bands before the last band came on and they had their moments. It was easy to tell that the last band was more popular because I think people were yelling out song titles. They were definitely better than the other bands and even played a cool instrumental section. It was a really cool trip.

Last week when we were in class we found out that because lots of people were getting sick, the administrators decided that we would have a mandatory 20 minute recess between our second and third classes. I can safely tell you that recess is still awesome. We’ve been getting some good basketball games going. Then on Friday, instead of having our usual weekly test, we went to the park and had a picnic. After eating we played a Chinese game that was essentially a harder version of Duck, Duck, Grey Duck. I also found out that only people from Minnesota say Duck, Duck, Grey Duck instead of Duck, Duck, Goose. I really have no explanation for this and my friend Stewart from Iowa said there are lots of things in Minnesota that he doesn’t understand. After playing this, we rode bumper cars, jump-roped and hula-hooped. It was really great to do a bunch of stupid fun stuff with the whole class.

This will have to end this entry, but I have another one coming with last weekend’s events. So long for now!