Security Guard Triangualtion, German Cereal Triumphs, and "Frenzied, Desperate" spinning

Earlier this week I found myself triangulated by three security guards in the park by my school. I was lying down resting when I thought I heard something. I didn't see anything, but then I heard something again. I sat up to see three security guards watching me from three different angles about five feet away from me. Yikes, how long were they there for I couldn't say. They asked me questions, one of the only ones I could understand was "are you American or Canadian?" I wondered if I replied that I was Canadian they would let me stay in the park. But in flirting with the risks of park deportation, I told them I was American. Long story short, I came to understand they were worried I was sick, and wanted me to sit on my book (people don't tend to sit on the ground here. IES buds, remember squatters? People squat on streets and sidewalks everywhere all the time). Now when I go to the park, one of the security guards comes and sits next to me and we have little chats. Then the other day another one of the three came up to me and asked me questions while feeling the grass with his hands around me. He left and returned with two large, poster-sized maps of the park and lay them on the grass for me to lie on. I am very grateful and fortunate to now have park friends! I no longer necessitate guards radioing in for back up like they did the first time! hahahhahaha

Speaking of back up, Caitlin and I have learned to be resourceful in finding back up breakfast plans. We are the female versions of Jerry Seinfield, we are cereal addicts. So much so, that back home, if on those rare occasions we don't eat cereal for breakfast, we find our bodies calling for it and find a way to eat it later on in the day. But American cereal is really expensive here, some kinds can cost as much as 82 kuai, which is the equivalent to buying a box of cereal for twelve dollars in the states! We go to an expat grocery store to treat ourselves to cereal from other lands, which is comparatively less expensive. Now our shelves are lined with Australian "Wheet-bix" (sort of like a frosted mini-wheets but without the frosting and more flaky) and German cornflakes, hands down the best price we have seen thus far at 17.20 kuai per box. Our new plan is if we go home, we are returning to China with suitcases lined exclusively with cereal and paper towels.

It may be less important for me to have the breakfast of champions as I will no longer be running the Beijing marathon--still aching over missing this one! Registration is full and closed, I totally missed the boat. I tried emailing several people about still trying to register. Then someone emailed me back and told me if I could get to their office by 5pm that day, I could register as it was the last day to register in person. But I had to work so I sadly missed the boat again. But I have my eyes on another marathon in Dalian in June, and that way I have enough time to train.

Caitlin and I have both been sick for a while and I have only run outside once here! We were 45 miles north of Beijing visiting Auntie Sue and Uncle Paul's new country house. (Auntie Sue is my mom's cousin). Its absolutely gorgeous there. Their house is in a farm village of 350 people, the same number of people that live in my hometown in NH--actually, last I heard we are up to 351. In any event, Mutianyu is tucked just underneath a jagged portion of The Great Wall, and you can see The Great Wall from every room of their house, including the pantry and their shower outside. It never got old for me. Caitlin and I would be brushing our teeth and I'd go, "Hey Cay, it's The Great Wall!' Or we'd in the kitchen getting a glass of water and I'd point excitedly, "Hey, there it is again, it's still there!" We climbed it while we were there for the weekend. Too many steps and too many people to run on it, but I did run in the village and as I was on my way back, I was running with The Great Wall in plain sight, I couldn't believe it--I still can't.

So in lieu of running outside, Caitlin and I are taking spinning classes at our gym, and it's really funny because she looked up the characters for one of the classes and it translates as "Intense, Frenzied, Desperate." hahaha, no intimidation there! I don't think I have never sweat so much before, but its fun because our instructor is this incredibly merry, constantly smiling, massively muscular Chinese trainer and he cheerily sings along to all the songs and makes us happy. We are buds, Cay calls hims the Jolly Chinese Giant. The CD he plays has one American song on it, and he gives us a shout out each time he plays it. Are you ready to guess which song? Of all the songs it could be, I am sure "Who Let The Dogs Out?" was not your first guess:) Yesterday after he played the song in class he pressed the pause button and and goes, "Megan, what does this song mean in Chinese?" And the whole class, dripping in sweat, turns to me for an explanation. So I stammered out my best Chinese explanation: "Ummmm, okay. So there are dogs. And people let the dogs go outside to run. To ummm, run....run and play. But the people want to know, who is the person that lets the dogs go outside?" Oh wow. hahaha, I think you had to be there.

They also use a disco ball for each of the classes with a strobe light! YES! It really does give the class an extra special something:) We took a class from another trainer but it just wasn't the same. He didn't speak but he would occasionally hang from the pipe on the ceiling above his bike--I was jealous because it looked like fun but we didn't have pipes. It was also amusing because he was shirtless, which is fine and perfectly commonplace, but I couldn't help but think hey, if you are really hot, maybe you don't want to wear long denim shorts with a belt next time:)