Update

Here's the next big update of what's been happening on the otherside of the world.
We had a great time this weekend, we went exploring with a group of the guys we've met down here. First off we went to The Pearl Market, which is basically a massive indoor market where can get pretty much anything. I bought a tripod, at last, which i bartered down from 150quai to 50quai (about £3). Next we moved on to The Temple of Heaven, we didnt see much appart from the outside as the temple itself was under repair. Still the buildings (etc.) we did see were bloody amazing and the grounds its on are huge.
From The Temple of Heaven we moved onto Tianamein Square (sp?), which is a huge public square surrounded by huge super posh buildings and monuments to the revolution etc. Hard to describe just how impressive it was so you'll have to check the picks once iv'e uploaded them.
Lastly we went to the Night Market, which is on a massive street full of expensive shops etc. and a McDonalds the size of a large block of flats.
Anyway it's hard to explain just how mental these places are so hopefully youll get some idea from the pics.
We had the best meal ever last night too (i know we keep saying that but this was soooo nice). We had 5 noodle dishes, 20 kebabs, 4 nanbread (which are nothing like you get in the uk, these are properly nice) and a few beers each (11%). All of this cost 16 Quai per person, about 80 pennys - what a ripoff.
Anyway, we had a nice long sleep to recover from the hectic saturday. Today we moved across to the campus dorms, which are alot nicer than where we were staying and larger too (which is alot better as our old room was only designed for one person, and no more cockroaches yey!). We are also with the rest of the foreign students now, but still immersed with the chinese as they live in the dorms too.
It's been good to have a days rest, my right legg was a bit buggered during the week as i think i pulled something but im ready to start training again now.
I'm not going to blab on too long; i need to start uploading the photos now and ill post them later.
Laters everyone!
The 'Groovy Gang'
At the park
Again, the park (its about 2km squared)
Tianmen square
Taking down the flag, happens every day, and there are that many spectators every day.
The night market, insanity
Skewed Scorpions still alive....(no we haven't tried them.....yet)
Our new dorm rooms (me left, Nathan right, (you STARTING mate?!))

FOOOOOOOOD.

The food here is psycho, for breakfast me and James had dumplings and soup, which was super nice. It cost about 20p for each of us so now we are bankrupt :( Lunch was lots of things, but we mainly found out that all the Chinese students eat LOOOADS! We all took what we thought was a smallish portion except Antonio who took a lot. But we took way too much and couldnt finish it, while the chinese were eating way more, even the tiny girls ate more than us. Last night for dinner, it was funny because we spent literally 10-15 mins trying to comunicate what we wanted in a restaurant, and when it arrived, it was all just bone, literally, and it was meant to be chicken. It was pretty much the ligaments and things of a chicken. We also ate the dessert at the same time because they looked like spring rolls so we got stares and laughs from the Chinese, it would be like a foreigner eating chocolate fudge cake and steak together or something. We ate about 1/3 of the meal cause you get SO much, but a lot of it was inedible. It was a proper meal in a slick restaurant and it cost about 2 quid each.....so EXPENSIVE..... We will try and post pictures in the week as we have some pretty cool ones, so hang in there.
Food left AFTER each meal......yup


The Canteen where we eat ///Tai chi taking place on the campus

IN CHINA

We arrived at nine yesterday (am) and we were both pretty nakered for that day so not much happened apart from julian slept for about 20 hours. Today we've had an orientation day and we are looking forward to lessons tommorow when we will get to choose what forms we will be doing. We will try and upload some photos soon as but i'm writing this from a net caffe so i can't atm.
The weather has been mentally hot but hopefully it should cool down over the next month so i dont die from dehydration.
Me, Julian and four other guys we just meet are on a mission to get a fridge for our rooms at the moment, we are going to look round the shops etc. see what we can find.
It's completely weird being here, it will take a while to adjust and we keep getting looked at by all the people.
Anyway gtg, see you all in four months - just another 120 odd days.
(It's 4:49pm on monday here just incase your interested)

Training

Heres some quick snaps from a recent outing, all of Jin because Owen, MSJ etc. had left already and the ones of myself are a bit amazing!

Anyway, as you can see from pics it was a pretty much a perfect day for training and i'm hoping the weather will hold out over the next few days so we can get a few last sessions in before we are of to beijing, which is this SATURDAY. I'm going of to wet myself in anticipation now, laters!

(sorry for any shitty spelling mistakes - got back from last ever complete huntington gym group about an hour ago. As jin said 'It's the end of an era')