Wednesday morning I got up for tai gi and qui gong. I convinced Scott to have breakfast in the dining hall with me. He usually has breakfast in his room. He brought his chocolate powder down so I could have chocolate oatmeal.
We had stance training this morning in shaolin. We had to hold a 'horse stance' for 7 minutes, but I think it was more like 9 because Sheifu wasn’t paying attention to the time. We had to hold about 5 other stances as well. My legs hurt so bad! The second half of morning class I learned a part of the first form. There is a floor spin that I have to do and I look awful trying to do it. I fell a few times or I get stuck half way through my spin and have to push myself with my foot.
I was so hungry for lunch, I could hardly wait to eat. After lunch I rested in scott’s room. Afternoon class was san da. I love san da its fun. But it was soooooo incredibly hot and the humidity must have been 90%. I was sweating so much. It was so hot Sheifu had us practice outside behind the building in the shade.
The rest of the day I stayed in Scott’s room, finished my book and tried to rest because Thursday is power training.
Thursday
On Thursday mornings my shaolin group does Qi Gong and "conditioning". We walk about 2 miles to the river and each student finds a rock to sit on. After meditating for about 30 minutes our Sheifu calls us up and we walk to the bridge to do moving qi gong. Clement shows me the moves to do, but it’s hard to remember. I have so many forms to memorize its hard keeping track of everything.
Once we finish qi gong we have to punch and kick each other for conditioning. Good thing I don’t bruise easily because my partner hit me pretty hard a few times. We then had to find a rock to use to gently hit our shins. The purpose of conditioning is to get out bodies used to the impact and our bones stronger. I had to punch the cement wall for a while also.
Since we have power training in the afternoon we don’t have the second part of morning training on Thursdays. Power training was really, really hard. We did our usual run before class and headed to the training hall. Master made us do 7 minute planks with our legs up on the stretching bar. I had a hard time holding my plank. During the 7 minutes Master would stop us and make us do 20 pushups. He did that about 3 times. After that we had to sprint across the training hall, do frog jumps, and bear crawls. We did abs exercises and class was over, I felt like my body was dead.
I didn’t think I would be able to make it down for dinner. I was sore from stance training yesterday and I knew I’d be sore from power training. The only thing that got me up to dinner was my hungry tummy.
Dinner was really good, I don’t know if I like the food because I’m always hungry from training, or if the food really is good.
We have to walk up the big mountain tomorrow. Wish me luck.
Mountain Walk
On Friday afternoons the students are required to go on the mountain run, but every 3 months or so they have the students go up the big mountain. It takes about an hour to walk to the base of the mountain. I was having such a hard time walking to the mountain I made Scott, Sam, Max (British guy in Scott’s Wing Chung group) and me last. Well, almost last, a lot of students decided to turn around and go back to the academy, but Mathieu and Will (American guy from Jersey) were still behind us so we weren’t THAT slow.
It started to rain while we were walking which was nice because it wasn’t too hot. We finally made it to the mountain. There was this rope that you can climb, kind of like a tight rope. Scott went first then me, Max and Sam. Max and Sam started jumping on it to make me fall off. It was funny but scary. There was netting around the rope, but I could see myself falling through the rope so I went back and walked across the bridge instead
.
There are about a billion stairs up the mountain. Halfway up the mountain Mathieu, Will and my sheifu caught up with us. Mathieu and Will sat on a rock and my master stopped to talk to them, but we kept going up the stairs. Every 100 steps or I’d have to stop to catch my breath. Scott called out to my sheifu and told him in chinese that "I’m bad and lazy." My sheifu yelled at me “FASTER”. Omg! I was going to push Scott down the mountain if my sheifu started chasing me up the mountain. But thank God he didn’t. We reached a resting point with benches and my Sheifu came up and offered us chips. I sat for about a minute took a chip and started up the mountain again. I didn’t want him to think i'm weak, even though I felt like it.
The rain was coming down hard for a while, by the time we made it all the way to the top I was cold, soaked, hungry, and my legs were covered in mud. We’d stop every once and a while to snack but the boys kept reminding me that we were last so they didn’t want to stop for too long. As we were walking up we saw a few people start walking down. At the top the students and sheifus were eating and sitting. We weren’t up there more than 5 minutes and the sheifus told us to start walking down. Oh man… my legs were giving out on me. I actually fell once on the stairs but I didn’t get hurt.
Halfway down the mountain is a slide made out of marble. You can take the slide as a fun short cut. There is a cost of a couple coins to do it. I wanted any kind of short cut there was.
There are about a billion stairs up the mountain. Halfway up the mountain Mathieu, Will and my sheifu caught up with us. Mathieu and Will sat on a rock and my master stopped to talk to them, but we kept going up the stairs. Every 100 steps or I’d have to stop to catch my breath. Scott called out to my sheifu and told him in chinese that "I’m bad and lazy." My sheifu yelled at me “FASTER”. Omg! I was going to push Scott down the mountain if my sheifu started chasing me up the mountain. But thank God he didn’t. We reached a resting point with benches and my Sheifu came up and offered us chips. I sat for about a minute took a chip and started up the mountain again. I didn’t want him to think i'm weak, even though I felt like it.
The rain was coming down hard for a while, by the time we made it all the way to the top I was cold, soaked, hungry, and my legs were covered in mud. We’d stop every once and a while to snack but the boys kept reminding me that we were last so they didn’t want to stop for too long. As we were walking up we saw a few people start walking down. At the top the students and sheifus were eating and sitting. We weren’t up there more than 5 minutes and the sheifus told us to start walking down. Oh man… my legs were giving out on me. I actually fell once on the stairs but I didn’t get hurt.
Halfway down the mountain is a slide made out of marble. You can take the slide as a fun short cut. There is a cost of a couple coins to do it. I wanted any kind of short cut there was.
To slide, they make you wear covers over your clothes and you slide down. Sam, Scott and Jeremy went before me. When I was trying to go down I kept getting stuck so the lady threw me an empty flattened soda bottle to sit on. It helped a lot and I soon I was going fast! It felt nice to sit for a minute.
At the base of the mountains we saw the Sheifus sitting and waiting for the students. The walk back to the academy seemed to take forever. All I wanted to do was sit down. My calves were so tight I was walking funny. When I got back I took a shower and could barely get up to go to dinner.
After dinner I sat in Scotts room and watched a few movies on my computer.
Tomorrow we are going to Yantai.
Xoxo, Kc
At the base of the mountains we saw the Sheifus sitting and waiting for the students. The walk back to the academy seemed to take forever. All I wanted to do was sit down. My calves were so tight I was walking funny. When I got back I took a shower and could barely get up to go to dinner.
After dinner I sat in Scotts room and watched a few movies on my computer.
Tomorrow we are going to Yantai.
Xoxo, Kc
Stance Training- Charlely (circus guy)
Qi gong spot
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