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It has been an exciting week, the conclusion of which brings me to the four month mark! 

On Monday, we got to make 饺子 (dumplings) in our culture class! It was fun to cook with the cafeteria Ayi's again, and the dumplings were simply delicious! 

Tuesday was the Christmas Eve assembly (晚会 or "party")  in which I performed with the choir, singing "This Love", "Silent Night", and "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". There was about 3 hours in total of IB Chinese performances including dances, plays and comedy routines. It was awesome to see some of the hidden talents and passions of my schoolmates. 

That evening, we got to watch a movie during our normal night study time (6:30-9:15). We watched the Bollywood film "Three Idiots". Even though it isn't directly related to anything christmas-y, in my opinion, it is one of the best movies in existence. Luckily my NSLI-Y classmate Paris shared this sentiment and bought the DVD at a local video store. Everyone on planet earth should watch this movie. Period. 

We also exchanged our NSLI-Y "Secret Santa" gifts! Brady got me the perfect gift: a t-shirt that he had seen me eying when we were at TianZiFang. See the design of super cute pandas performing all the 太极拳 (Taiqi) moves below.

Our Resident Director Shasha also made us all "granola bars" (basically oatmeal cookies with tons of oatmeal in them), which were great! And Tilden's grandmother also hand-knitted us all socks! They are pure coziness! 

Wednesday (Christmas day), the school treated all the international students to an amusement park trip. We went to Happy Valley (欢乐谷), which is the biggest theme park in Shanghai at the moment (they're currently working on a Disneyland that'll be larger). It had some pretty wicked roller coasters! There were also some bizarre themes such as a haunted house and old mining town which were all a riot!  We also met a man from Djbouti dressed as a Santa selling sticks of honey-covered fruit who tried to convince me he was Russian because he thought I was. 

It was all in all a great time: I enjoyed some really wonderful tears-of-laughter and front-row-hands-up-roller-coaster screams. 

Wednesday evening, we all got to go to KTV (a private karaoke room) and sang and danced our hearts out. It was rad to hear Smiley (from Korea) rap the entirety of Gangam Style and Eric, the Norwegian go hard to "Livin' on a Prayer". Such a blast! 

Friday was the international student speaking performance, where Luca (from Italy) and I were the hosts.  

There were so many great essays  and poems written in Chinese on the topic of our "impression of China". 

I ended up reading my poem 五味中国 (The five flavors of China)!

Saturday, I went back to the XinTianDi Y+ yoga studio for a workshop taught by Jessica and Stéphane (friends from the U.S.) and translated by Duoduo. It consisted of an excellent physical practice based on the five elements (土，火，水，风，空间：earth, fire, water, wind, and space) and then a great sutra lesson on the 8 limbs of yoga with relation to Buddhism. 

It's always was very enjoyable for me to study these philosophies, but it was even more cool to do it in Chinese!