Phil and Red's Excellent Adventure

Woke up at 515 and had morning practice. However, it was just me, Andy, YiShin, and Wong Sifu, and those two boys are lazy and Wong Sifu wasnt pushing them at all. So I didnt do much other than run and stretch. But Wong Sifu showed a bit of BaDua Jin. And I was like, I know that and showed him. He was all grufflike, "Where did you learn that?!" I was like, "Peace Holmes, I learned that from my Taiji Sifu, along with Chad, and gong fu magazines."
He was like, "Killer".
We walked back and chatted. Today is the last training day of Andy and YiShin. We will go out to dinner tonite at about 7 or 730 at a resturant down the street that they have discovered. Apparently, they have the best french fries...ever. I need to see this. We have to call ahead to make sure the food is fresh when we get there. And they know the owner because of their relations with Gweilos that sometimes the owner comes and picks them up. Crazy.
I grabbed a bit of breakfast and laid down for about 45 minutes before practice started.
Morning practice was ok. It was hard again. I like it hard like that. It pushes you. At first I thought all those smelly Italians were gonna join the warm ups and conditionings, but halfway thru it they all just buggered out and started doing there own things. YiShin was like, "those Italians are gonna get it one of these days." I was all, "Yea, the punks, totally disrespecting our teachers."
YiShin was like, "Yeah, ShinDi (Happy Sifu) is really angry. Very mad at all the trouble they caused."
I was all, "Yeah, I am mad because he vented his frustration by yelling at me yesterday when I was doing my best."
After warmups were done, Happy Sifu started teaching me, Rom, and Dola "Chang Hu Xing Yi Men" which is a very old and very famous Gong Fu from.
After doing that for awhile, Happy Sifu took me and Rom to wash our faces off with some cold water. It was at this point that he told me more of the problems with Italians. Apparently, that Oafish fella, thru his interpreter, told Happy Sifu's boss that his Zui Quan was very bad. Happy Sifu got in trouble and his boss yelled at him for teaching it to the Oaf. I was frustrated with that because Happy sifu's Zui Quan is the best as I have ever seen - other than Jackie Chan, who pretty much invented the stuff he put in the movie.
We practiced the form more afterwards. and its tough. ITs really long. The longest form I have seen and we just got down the first 6 moves. It looks kool though.
After that, I had some lunch with Josh and we just chatted about places to visit in China. He won a consolation prize at the competition. Basically its a Gweilo Award. A cheesy looking trophy that they presented to the couple of foreigners that were there.
After that I hit up the computer room.
Practice started at 3pm and boy was it tough. It was a warm day today. Outside, its not so bad, because there is a wonderful breeze cooling everything down, but inside the big training hall, its completely still. I tried hard to practice and to do everything to my best, but it was tough and we were tiring out quickly, Josh and I. Huffing and puffing. It was Andy and YiShin's last day pretty much so they weren't really doing much as usual, plus it was hot. But we had plans to go out tonite for the send off dinner at the french fry place...sorry, the Freedom Fry place. Rom and Dola went with Happy Sifu to Black Dragon Pool to either rest or relax or train or something. What did Andy Sifu have us do? At about 520 he told us to go run up and down the mountain. !!!! Yikes. If I wasn't out of energy now.
Actually, once we got outside, the Earth's yellow Sun's energy powered us, just like Superman. The breeze made all the difference. We felt great. This was the deal. We had to run up and then run down the mountain behind Tagou Xue Xiao, Mua Biang Ling (i think), in 20 minutes. There are a bunch of peaks in the Songshan mountain area and this is one of the smaller ones, but still, very beautiful, and very tough. For every minute that we were over, we have to do 10 push-ups. Groups of chinese people do this trek everyday and last week, Josh had to do it everyday for training before his Xanda fight.
I was like, "You should be able to get up this no problem." He just laughed.
Basically, what Josh said to do, was to walk up the front side, because its really steep. And I mean really steep. You gots to watch out for these giant black, red, and yellow spiders that make 3-D webs between the trees. He also said be careful of overturning rocks because there are scorpions under them sometimes and they are quick. Other things to watch out for are the red and yellow ants that are really big. They just look nasty.
Once you get to the top, you run across the top for a ways and then you jog down the other side cuase its a nice easy jog....yeah right.
We were wearing our wushu shoes which are basically heavily padded socks so we needed to becareful of the rocks that we stepped on. Ouch.
I damn near twisted my ankle many times. Afterwards my feet were sore from runing on the rocks and tripping a couple times.
The climb up was rocky and steep. The top was pretty flat, one other hill that we had to run up, but it was good. Thats where we ran alot and once the downhill started it was ok, because it wasn't as steep as the ascent. However, not by much. Some of it was just as steep and just as rocky and it was hard to fathom joggin down it without killing yourself.
The view from the mountain though was beautiful. Gorgeous. I need to video tape up here. We saw a Preying Mantis, long dead, stuck in one of the spiderwebs. Wow. Nasty little buggers. I saw one run by me as i was running up at the peak. Josh kept running and shrieking like a little girl when we were joggin downwards and he ran thru webs that he didn't see. So, it was good for me that he was in the lead. Plus, I had no clue as to where we were going.
As we got down to the base, the clean fresh gorgeous air gave way to the wretched stink of shit and garbage decomposing in the hot sun while Chickens and a Pig picked out pieces of food to eat. I swear to God, I hope those aren't the chickens they use for the meals. (shudder)
We got back to Andy Sifu and he was just shaking his head. OUr time, 36 minutes. Yikes, thats 160 pushups...there was no possible way i could do that, let alone 20 in the shape I was. Really tired. Sifu didnt force us to do it and I think he gave us way this one time because it was my first time. Sweet.
After that, we headed to the room to get ready for the dinner. As we were going up the stairs, Josh was in pain. The adrenaline helped him in the mountain, but walking up the stairs was super painful.
Outside, after being super sweaty and having water dripping from my shorts, I figured a cold shower would be welcomed, but once that cold water hit me, I shrieked like a schoolgirl after a boy drops a penny and goes to pick it up when his true intention is to look up her skirt.
While Josh was taking his shower, Andy and YiShin brought back his PS2. I was soooo geeeked. I haven't played videogames since I left the US. So, I plugged it in and started playing Tekken 5. Awesome!
After that, we headed out to dinner.
We got to dinner and oh my goodness. I never have eaten so many french fries in my life. They brought out about 20 heaping plates of french fries. They are THE BEST I have ever had. And fresh. There were about 16 people at the table. We got some beer and we were all hanging out. It was alot of fun. Lots of fun. All the teachers except for Andy Sifu and all the "real" students, none of the italians, were there, including the new German guy. Along with Andy's mom and her friend. Rom wasn't there because his Grandma wouldn't let him leave. What a nut. Another reason that I dont like her. Dola wasn't there either.
Then the rest of the food came out. Fried Pork cuts, fried dumplings, Sugar bananas and sugar apples. OMG! I filled up on the fries and just had a bit of the other things, but man, afterwards, I was feeling not so good in my stomach.
It was great to hang out with everyone like that. The teachers were awseome. However, Happy Sifu got a call from his boss around 8pm telling him that the Italians wanted him to come and teach them more stuff and Andy's mom wouldn't let him leave. It was great.
I chatted alot with Andy's mom and friend. Very nice people.
Afterwards, we came back and I vegged out a bit on PS2 before going to bed. WOw. Awesome.