好球！

I'll get to the title later. The last few days there has been less to write about, which I anticipated. As I spend more and more time here, more and more will start to become routine, and thus uninteresting to talk about. However, I am sure there are plenty of surprises ahead of me, and I have no doubt I will have things about which to write, even if it becomes less and less frequent.

Class has been going well. I have to admit, I find it much easier here in Beijing than at Pomona, but perhaps not because the content is any easier. At Pomona, the hardest part about Chinese is the weekly tests, which are basically huge translations both from English to Chinese and Chinese to English. I don't like them because they often require the combination of complicated grammar structures that we honestly never learned how to use, except in isolated forms. Additionally, they always required working into the next class period to finish. I always had class right after, so it was quite annoying to be frequently late. Here at IES, they use a different approach, which is to have a small quiz each morning, with emphasis both on the previous day's and that day's lesson. Additionally, the quizzes don't usually contain translations. Instead, we do translations and longer writing pieces as homework each night. I like this method better because it better facilitates daily studying and learning, rather than having a weekly test that encourages studying mostly the night before. It also is a bit of an unfair comparison, though, because here we only have one class, whereas at Pomona I'd have three other classes.

Friday night, I went with some classmates and a few of the Chinese roommates to Sanlitun, which is in the area of Beijing that contains most of the foreign embassies. It is a really popular place for expats to go, IES students included. It is about a 20 minute cab ride from Bei Wai, which costs about 40 yuan, so it is very easy to reach. We had a pretty big group, so we had to catch multiple cabs. Now Beijing has plenty of cabs, but flagging down one and convincing them to take you is a whole different story, especially if you aren't Chinese. Why a publicly licensed cab driver can refuse to drive certain people to certain places, I don't know, but anyway, it's a bit of a tough task. Getting back is much easier, though, because there are far more foreigners in the area. Anyway, we all got there eventually. It was fun, but it was definitely geared towards Westerners, and lacked any real Chinese culture. Also, it was Friday night, so everything was jam packed. The one cool thing about Sanlitun is that it contains many foreign stores, from Versace to Apple to Adidas (the largest Adidas store in the world, actually). A few weeks ago, there was actually a riot at the Apple store. Something  about the new iPad.

Saturday, I got to sleep in and then spent the afternoon studying. At about 5 I grabbed dinner and then headed over to east campus to try and find a pickup basketball game. This was pretty easy, as many Chinese (especially college students) love basketball, and also because starting in the early evening, people flock to parks to enjoy the cooler weather. Even though I was the only foreigner there and spoke limited Chinese (especially colloquial Chinese), it was easy to find a game. As I have written previously, even in the most informal settings, I have found Chinese people to be very hospitable and friendly. I didn't even have to ask to join a game, I was just invited. One of the first things I learned while playing is that although the rules are pretty much the same, basketball here in China is much different than in America. Rather than playing to 11 or 21, games are usually played first to 5, make it take it. This shortens the game greatly, and sometimes you lose after only 2 minutes of play. Another difference is the actual style of play. Most shots tend to be close to the basket rather than jump shots. The game is also much less physical, and more fouls get called than when I play back home (this is probably because people don't get angry when you call a foul, unlike the USA). Perhaps the best thing about playing is the opportunity to meet and talk with different people, as well as learn new words and phrases. The most common thing you'll hear when playing is "好球" or "hao qiu" which literally means "good ball". It is surprising how relatively friendly people are when playing. There is relatively little trash talk, and pretty good sportsmanship, but occasionally people do get a little upset. However, I think that people genuinely recognize that it is just a game, not the NBA, so winning and losing isn't all that big of a deal.