Beijing Halloweeeeen

It's 11:30pm and I have to present in lab tomorrow. I have no slides completed. But I had planned on spending three hours tonight doing flow cytometry until my advisor told me that an alternative--and much faster/cheaper--method for determining nanoparticle uptake would suffice. So it's like I have three FREE hours tonight --> I'm writing a blog post instead of finishing my presentation three hours early and actually sleeping tonight.

It's Halloween! I've heard that eastern Beijing (the international part of town) actually has festivities, but at Beida, I haven't seen so much as a fake cobweb. I don't even love Halloween that much (though my favorite costumes growing up include X-Men's Cyclops where I wore sweats and safety goggles, a homemade zombie outfit [it was awesome to rip up an old suit], the hiker guy from Double Rainbow, and "change you can believe in" where I glued coins to my shirt.) but it was a great opportunity to share a lil culture with my friends. and eat copious amounts of candy.

Kai and I rode bikes to the vast underground supermarket, Carrefour, in search of pumpkins. Not totally surprising, they had no jack-o-lantern-sized pumpkins, but just baby squashes for eating. Actually, at first we couldn't find those and considered carving watermelons (which actually might be awesome/more delicious). I also raided the candy section and got gummies and chocolate.

Ok, I'll just stop writing and just post the photos so that I can work on my presentation.

Lemon cake. "But wait," you say, "there aren't ovens in China!" Well this is a microwave lava cake!!!

Room mate Bobby (yes, the 2nd Asian Bobby room mate I've had), Tanu, Lab mates Kai and Jie.

spook.y.

Lab mate Kai.

Then we watched a scary movie. No, not The Grudge (for obvious reasons).

Happy Halloween!

dawn of the panda hat

When people make a to-do list for a visit to China, I think that the list goes like

1) hike the Great Wall and ponder the engineering feat

2) consider our quests for immortality while reviewing the Terracotta Warriors

3) OHMYGOSH PANDA EVERYTHING.

Well upon our arrival in Chengdu, we immediately booked our trip to the panda breeding center (in my opinion the video provided excessive details regarding techniques to ensure progeny). After ooh-ing and ahh-ing over pandas (!) for a few hours, we exited through the gift shop. A certain panda had quickly caught Tanu's eye and she bought it without haste. For me, however, Jim Carey's "The Mask" taught me to distrust any potentially enchanted masks/hats--and anything panda is most certainly enchanted.

True to Hollywood, for the next few days we had an Indian panda with us. Tanu transformed and would often speak in the third person--er.. animal: "panda is hungry" or "panda is tired" or "panda wants to do jump shot."

feed panda!

panda must hug prayer wheel!

panda loves cheesy Chinese poses (we actually did see this pose)

The hat eventually wore my defenses down and I tried it on. But hungry for my soul, it took me about three steps too far:

Not sure what I was thinking. Oh wait, I wasn't thinking- THE HAT WAS CONTROLLING ME.

I guess my parents'd trade me for a panda any day.

Just like my almost-was addiction to World of Warcraft, I was able to pull off the monster pretty quickly after this fiasco and returned to normal (for me).

Now it sits in Tanu's room, perched on the top of her book shelves, waiting for another host...

Jumpin' Jiuzhaigou!

Tanu and I are basically rock stars.

Proof:

Exhibit A: Amazing Jump Pic abilities

During National Holiday (where everyone in China goes on vacation for a week, making it impossible to import some cells that you really really need for research), my parents, Tanu, and I visited southwestern China, including the national park, Jiuzhaigou. It used to be home to nine (that's the "jiu" part of "jiuzhaigou") Tibetan-esque villages dotted among gorgeous landscapes of waterfalls and lakes of vivid colors.

At one lake, some hawkers offered traditional Tibetan clothing to prance around in. Initially we poo-pooed the idea, but after seeing how much fun the Chinese tourists were having in fur-lined garments, we donned the robes (much to their delight). And as ambassadors of awesomeness, we effected cultural exchange by introducing jump shots to our pictures.

Judging from the gasps in the crowd, this was an entirely new concept for them. Now, the Chinese are very inventive when it comes to poses, but we got similar reactions when we'd add some air into our shots.

this is a lil twist on the jump pic. think pairs' ice skating.

okay, so sometimes our timing is off. but even olympic synchronized swimmers make mistakes!

These observers came over afterwards to look at the pictures.

At one point, the crowd was especially interactive. First they observed.

Then one woman tried some herself. We jumped in for support.

This spawned others' jump pictures.

And one novice hopper requested I document her glee.

All in all, I would say it was a successful day: we got to see beautiful natural scenery and start a photographic trend in China!

entr'acte

Life has been very busy recently: in addition to being a full-time student, I've become a part-time tour guide for my parents who've come to visit. It's been fantastic having them here, but it means that my other part-time occupation as blogger has taken a back seat.

But rest assured that highlights of our experiences will be posted soon. To whet your appetite, here's my current favorite photo. It comes from the album, "When we mimic poses that others really actually do."

Also, Tanu may have brainwashed herself into believing that she's part panda.

But more on these things later.