Mystery Beijing and Ice-Scooting in HoHai

Well, with classes in swing, and our first full week of school almost over, everyone's starting to get into the swing of things!  Orientation week came and went, and we all feel like a pretty united group of kids over on this hemisphere.  The RAs planned some great excursions into the city to explore, "Mystery Beijing" set us out in groups trying to get as many pictures as possible in a scavenger hunt all around Beijing! My group visited both the old and the new Summer Palace, stopping to play American and Chinese chess with one of the full year students.  We managed to gather a crowd and had some help from a local moving the Chinese chess pieces in order to complete the challenge.

Later that week, a small group of us, led by another full time student, head out for HoHai, a town in Beijing filled with older looking cobblestone streets, and cute shops and interesting snack choices, including cotton candy bigger than our head! We spend the remaining hours of daylight scooting around a frozen pond on ice-chairs and an ice-bike that I've never seen before.  The speed you get is incredible, and we just had such a good time racing, taking pictures, seranading random couples, and just spending time together on the ice.  It was a great time had by all!

Now that we have so much studying and homework to do, things are settling down on this front... but not for long!  On Friday we're off to YunNan, towards the south of China to spend 12 days backpacking around this great country.  Until next time!