http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8cNagcxhEs&feature=related

This Saturday our evening class was a little unusual. First we sparred, then we did throws, then Shifu had us practice a bunch of different falls and tumbling stuff. I can finally do kip ups! If you don't know what they are, watch this youtube video. I've practiced them before but never really got   it....I managed like 2 successful ones in my life. This time I just walked up there and banged out 10 in a row! I was surprised but also super excited, so excited in fact that I got carried away and ended up with a doozy of a stiff neck for the rest of the week. My neck was so tight that I was really dizzy for about 3 days afterwards. I think the muscles were pulling on the bones in my inner ear and if felt really gross. So I took it easy and got Mel to massage it for me every day. Kind of a waste of the rest of the week, next time I'll just do a few of them. Simon also massaged it for me yesterday and since we were staying in a hotel to celebrate my birthday, I took a bath afterwards. That finally fixed it and I feel all better now.

I really enjoyed getting away from the school for a day. It was so nice to sleep in a nice, soft bed in a lovely, clean room with air conditioning. It's wonderful to live like a westerner again once in a while. It's so far away but I'm already looking forward to December.

On Monday I celebrated my 31st birthday. I can't believe I've been alive for that long, it seems like the blink of an eye. In our traditional class, I'm the second oldest member but I rarely feel old. In fact, in a lot of ways, I feel like I'm getting younger and younger the longer I stay here. I'm sure I look older (especially with all the sun exposure we get) but I've gotten so much stronger, healthier, and more flexible that physically I feel younger than I did when I came here. Slowly old injuries are being healed and I feel vitality in a way I'd never experienced before. Don't get me wrong, I still get really tired sometimes and wonder if I can even go on, but the good days are starting to feel pretty amazing.

Friends my age at home are settling (or already settled) down. Buying houses, getting married, getting divorced, having kids, well into their career paths. I'm here with no stuff at all, with people a decade or more younger than me, just completely focused on myself and kung fu. I sometimes feel as if I should want more.....but I don't. I know that I'm in exactly the right place for me right now. Sometimes I want to leave but I know that dissatisfaction is a part of the process. Being here is very challenging but I know it's what I need to become the Brandi I was meant to be.

So I'm getting older.....and feeling more and more confident about my choices in life. What more could one ask for?

I just got back yesterday from a whirlwind trip to Shanghai to renew my passport. I left Monday afternoon, took the overnight train, stayed 2 nights and then another overnight train back. It was pretty crazy and I didn't have a lot of time there for much fun stuff but I did enjoy eating some delicious baked goods. Overall I found Shanghai really expensive (more than any other city in China) with not much to do. It was scorching hot though, otherwise I may have walked around a bit more. The food was also expensive though of a pretty good quality. I enjoyed a bagel with cream cheese and a beet juice on the side, butter croissants, and a lovely ciabatta sandwich with a yummy belgian beer to go with it. Everything else was...meh.

Glad to be back but still a bit worn out from so much travel in such a short time. We're starting ba xian gun (eight immortals staff) this week so I'm looking forward to that.

We finished learning spear last week, just in time too because it's been raining a lot an we've been doing most of our training indoors these past few days. It's a really fun form to practice but mine still needs a lot of work before it'll be up to par in my opinion.

Friday we had a stretching evaluation where our class, together with the Chinese students, showed Shifu a variety of different stretches and either got a 'pass' or a 'fail'. It was kind of fun to watch everyone do their very best stuff, pretty inspiring. Even though I technically failed a lot of them, I did my personal best on a lot of the stretches so I'm pretty happy with that. Shifu's standards are very high. I'm really happy with how much my flexibility has improved this year, hopefully it continues.

This week was our first week of the summer schedule. Spring here was quite cool and comfortable, normally we would change the schedule a month or 2 earlier. We now get up at 4:50, start class at 5, have breakfast and 7, train again 8-10:30. Then after lunch we nap until meditation at 3:30, dinner and 5:30,  and then we have class again from 6:30 till 9. Last year we were training later until 9:30 and even though it's only half an hour, getting a little more sleep this time is great.

Generally we don't like the summer schedule because there's less time for sleeping but so far everyone seems ok. We'll see how things are going in a month or so! Things can get pretty grouchy around here come July.

I find myself really missing home now. Summer in Canada is so nice and comfortable and I haven't seen one in several years now. Another 2 summers here and then I can finally come home.

mmmmm.... A friend brought pistachio chocolate from Turkey and it is delicious! It's so nice that people bring us treats when they come back to the school.

This week has been pretty alright, it's gotten very hot but other than that training is good. Feeling very flexible again too.

After the tournament we trained for a day and a half and shifu announced that we would start the 3 days of meditation. It didn't make any sense to me because between our trip to Guilin and getting ready for the tournament we hadn't meditated in almost a month. I think it showed too. Some of us had a hard time sitting still the whole time and Shifu was pretty disappointed in us as a class. So that spanned our usual day off and then we trained as usual for rest of the week and everyone was pretty exhausted. By the time the next day off came we were all right on the edge of breakdown. Add to that the fact that Shifu was so unhappy with us and it's a wonder we survived it....but we did! We made it and I had an amazing day off on Thursday just relaxing and resting a lot. I'm really happy to be on the other side of that rough patch. Hopefully next time we do the meditation, we'll be more prepared.

Summer is in full swing now which means, it's hot, humid, and buggy and the school is packed. We're learning spear too and a lot of the movements involve sliding the spear shaft through your hand or against your arm, pretty much impossible when you're coated in a sticky layer of sweat, sunscreen, and bug spray! haha. Grossed out yet? haha.

Here a few pictures from the competition as promised. It was a crazy time during which we had no day off then we got back, trained for 2 days, and shifu announced we'd do the meditation retreat so we again had no day off this week and meditated Wed, Thurs, Fri and back to training Saturday. I've been super busy and I'm also tired so I'll write a much better post soon on the day off. Until then.....I'm going to sleep!