Day 1 at Camp

On the first day we all had to wake up at 7:30 and go for breakfast at 8:30. At breakfast there was coffee so I had some to stay awake cause it was going to be a very long day and it would not be good to fall asleep during the camp.

After breakfast we went to our first Peace Education session, this mornings topic was "What does peace mean to you?" We did a lot of fun activities. One of them was we saw a slide show of different pictures of different circumstances and we had to try and figure out what Peace meant to the people or animals in the picture. The first few were rhinoceros chasing a man and a lion standing outside a man's tent. The first ones were just for fun, but after a while there was more serious ones, like what was peace for two little children standing beside soldiers with guns. We thought peace for them was no more war and maybe some food. And we also made collage about what we thought peace was out of pictures or words from magazines. And we also had to draw and write on a separate piece of paper we thought peace was.Some people's pictures were very nice and had deep meanings.

After the Peace Education was over, we went to have lunch. We had a short break after lunch and then meet outside our cabins for a afternoon game called Orienteering. The point of the game is to find little flag post things with with hole punches beside them. Each team of two got a score card, a map, and a compass. We got about three hours to walk around the campsite and try and find the flag posts. My partner was from Korea but she had lived in China or 3 years so she could speak Chinese, so we used Chinese to communicate. When we had found all of them, we ran as fast as we could to the classroom that we were using to see if we had gotten all of the hole punches right, but we had gotten 3 mixed up. So we quickly went back out to correct them. When we finally got back our legs were all covered in little cuts because of the grass in the bushes that we had to climb through to get to the flag posts. After the three hours were up, we found out that we had successfully found all the flag posts, we were very happy.

After everyone had gotten back from the Orienteering, we went back to our cabins to have a good shower, but the cuts on my legs stung a lot. After my shower, since I was still very tired from the late nights, I had a very short nap while we were waiting for supper.

When supper was over, we had our evening activity which was playing the drums. There were 4 different types of drums, there were the wooden plates, a car hubcap (or at least I think that is what it was), an empty soy sauce jug, and an empty jug. I was one of the people playing the water jug. We learned a few simple beats, and it was a lot of fun. I found out that I am better at drums than I thought I was. When that was finished, it was almost 10:30, but we still had to have a country reflection time, which is where we had to split into our country groups and talk about what we learned that day. Then finally at 11 we got to go to bed. It was a fun day. My favourite activity was the the drums, and the Orienteering was fun too.

South Korean Peace Camp

Just came back from South Korean Peace Camp yesterday at 12 in the morning. It was a lot of fun. Since I did not have a computer at camp, I will update what happened at camp now.

Last Saturday we left from ChengDu at 12 in the morning and got to South Korea at around 4. We had some trouble at the border, so when we went to get our bags at the baggage thing we could not find them. So we walked all around the baggage claim areas, but we still couldn't find them. So we went back to the first baggage claim and found all of our bags piled in a neat little pile.

We got on a mini van and drove to a office and everyone but me went to one of the public baths. I stayed at the office and read a book I had found in their library. I also slept for 2 hours on a couch they had there, so in total I slept for 3 hours that night.

After they came back from the public bath we went out for lunch. Then when the Korean participants got to the office we set out for the 4 hour bus ride to the campsite in the mountains. My cousin and her husband also meet us there. When we got there we split into our cabins and rested for a bit. Then we went to the camp restaurant for supper. after that we had a orientation sort of thing and the Japanese participants also came so then the Chinese, Japanese, and the Korean participants were there. When the orientation was done, we went back to the cabins and split up the rooms and made up our beds on the floor. By the time we finally got to sleep it was already 12 again.

That was the first evening, so tomorrow sometime I will put up the first day. If you have any questions please post a comment and ask.

Better Than Da Shan!

You are probably thinking, "Who is Da Shan?" Well, I will tell you a little about him. Da Shan is a Canadian that was born in Ottawa, Ontario that started learning Chinese at the University of Toronto. His English name is Mark Henry Rowswell. His first Chinese language teacher gave him the Chinese name Lu Shiwei. Anyway, his Chinese was so good that he then went to Peking University. Then he came to China to learn more Chinese. Eventually, he became fluent in Mandarin and did a commercial in Cantonese. He was made very famous in China by a famous comedian that took Mark Roswell on as a student. Then his cross-talk comedy acts with the really famous guy, commercials, TV broadcasting all made him super famous in China. So now you see him face and hear him talking in Mandarin all over the place. But now he is older so you do not see him as much. Everyone still knows about Da Shan in China, and his name means Big Mountain. In the 2008 Olympics, Da Shan walked in with the Canadian Olympic team, and that earned a big applause from the Chinese crowd. So, now that you know a little about Da Shan, I will tell you how I am better than him.
At the beginning of July, our family went to our small hometown called NanChong. There we went to church, but my sister and I got bored because we could not understand that much of the sermon so we went outside to walk around. I saw an older woman also walking around. She saw us and then began talking to us in Mardarin, but since I knew she could speak the SiChuan dialect of Chinese, I replied to her in that. She was very happy that I could speak SiChuan dialect, so we talked for a long time. In the middle of our conversation, an elder man also walked up to us and started listening into our conversation. I did not mind cause it is not every day that he would be able to see a foreigner talking almost fluently in SiChuan dialect. There was a short pause in the conversation and the elder man looked at me and said, "Your Chinese is better than Da Shan!" At that I felt very happy, since Da Shan is famous and I am just a foreigner that lives in China. My mom said he only said that cause I was speaking in SiChuan dialect and that was the older man's home language. But maybe I am better than Da Shan, who knows. :)

Cinnamon Rolls

Since it is not summer holidays, I have a lot of time on my hands. We got a new toaster oven, so I wanted to try and make something in it. So I went onto the internet and found a good recipe for Cinnamon Rolls (or Cinnamon Buns). It was really fun making them, and I could not wait to try them. So I kneaded the dough for a long time until I could touch it and then it bounced back. I rolled them up and then put cinnamon and sugar on them. Then I put them in the over. The first time I took them out and tasted them, they were still not entirely baked, so I put them back in for a little while. When I took them out the second time, they were fully baked. Then I took some icing and spread it on top of the Cinnamon Rolls. Then we all ate them. They were good, but not the best. So I am going to practice making them a lot because it is summer holidays.

The Son of Neptune

For those of you who are Percy Jackson fans, this picture will affect you the way it did to me. This picture reminded me that there is still a long time till this book comes out. 6 more months to be exact. I usually want books to come out, but since the last book was a cliff hanger, this picture just makes me mad. Anyway, I am going to be counting the days until it comes out!

Solo and Enseble Results

I got the results back from the Solo thing on saturday. For Matchmaker I got a 2, 1 being to highest and 5 being the lowest. And for the song I played on my Saxophone, I got a 3. But for one of the comments for me singing Matchmaker, one of the judges wrote "I hope someday you can be in the musical somewhere". For those of you that don't know, Matchmaker is from a musical called Fiddler on the Roof, and it is a really good musical.
I was really nervouse before we got to the music festival, and I didn't get time to warm up, but when I got on stage I felt more confident and just sang my heart out:)
For next years preformance, I will begin practicing now, and hopefull get a 1 next year, which includes a medal:)

Solo and Ensemble

Sorry about not updating for a long time, but here goes another blog about what I am doing.
Next Saturday there is a music festival for all people from kindergarten to Grade 12. You can have either a solo or an ensemble. For a Solo you can either have vocal, piano, and instrumental. For ensemble, which was preformed by a group of people, you could have vocal, instrumental, and pop/rock. Each person participating can have up to 3 performances. I am preforming two different songs. One I am going to sing a song called "Matchmaker" from "Fiddler on the Roof". For this song my mom is going to play the piano as accompaniment. And the other song is going to be "Come So Far" from "Hairspray", but this one I am going to play on my saxophone. At the end there is going to be an awards ceremony. I can't wait till I get to sing but then again I am sort of nervous. Wish me luck!