Tuesday 3/17
Tyson drove up from his mother's house to visit the Retreat Center. After about 5 hours on the road, he finally arrived around 2:30pm, just in time for mountain running. It was nice to see him again. Being one of a few friends from high school that I keep in contact with, I was glad when he told me he was interested in visiting. Even after three years of not hanging out with him, it didn't seem like much had changed. Well, nothing much except the fact that he seemed to have changed into a giant. When I went to go pick him up at the Miranda exit, I got out of the car to greet him and right as a stepped down, BOOM! All of a sudden I found myself looking up a good three or four inches at him. Weird. Last I remembered, we were the same height. So.. either he grew or I shrunk :\ Anyways, his arrival was almost perfect timing for the beginning of our training. We drove up the mountain, got out of our cars, changed real quick, and headed down to catch up with everybody else. Tyson spent the rest of the afternoon training with us in all activities, then sat through lecture with us too. At night, before sleeping, we stayed up a bit and talked about the past and then how each others lives were going. So much as changed. It seems as if neither of us remember our high school days very well. However, there were still lots of great stories and events to be remembered and reminded of.

Wednesday 3/18
Shifu asked Tyson the night before if he wanted to be treated as a guest or as one of us. Tyson answered enthusiastically, "one of them!" Which meant punishment for being late for meditation. 6am mediation, Tyson. That means set your alarm for 5:50 at the latest. NOT 6:50! Luckily you have friends like me who don't want to see you punished and will wake you up :P

After meditation was tumbling practice. When Shifu asked us to practice kip ups, I was impressed to see that Tyson was still able to do them. About four years ago, he had spent two nonstop hours in his basement learning how to do them. I had a moment of pride to see he hadn't lost the ability. What impressed me more was later on in Chinese class though. He was able to quickly read through a short story Shifu gave him. I guess studying Chinese for two and a half years and spending a semester in China really paid off.

After lunch and after our break, Shifu allowed us to run the path around the property instead of the regular "up the mountain" road. Patrick and Farai (apparently that's how it's spelled) decided to join us. So, at 2:30, we packed a couple knives and a few machetes and started our adventure. Yes, adventure. We had decided midway through the run that we wanted to explore the property a little more to search for a good spot for a shooting range. So, with Tyson leading the way and machetes in our hands, we tread through what seemed like miles and miles of vast "jungle" land. We ended up spotting three potential locations, some bear poop, and a couple of old beer cans which had probably been left behind by the people there before us.

After our hike, Tyson cleaned up and said his goodbyes, promising to be back in the future sometime. I hope so. I feel bad for not have taken a picture of his visit. Next time! :)

Thursday 3/19
My good mood from Tyson's visit was soon shattered the next morning by some very upsetting news. I received an email from my mom stating one of her best friends had passed away the night before. I was saddened when I heard this because our two families were very close and she was like another mother to me. In my parent's group of friends, there are a number of families that have stuck together for many years. So, when I grew up, it seemed as if I didn't just have one mother, but 5 or 6. So needless to say, when I had problems, advice or nagging didn't come once, but many times.

The events of Wednesday night got me thinking. What if my parents were to get ill while I was here at the Retreat Center? I hope I would not have to stop my training, but I would have to go home to take care of them. As much as I don't like to think about it, I know there would be no hesitation in leaving the program of these events were to come. After twenty-one years of taking care of me and putting up with my crap, it would be the least I could do, right? I also began to think. I am growing older, but so are they. Is it fair for me to be here? I feel that I should be spending time with them as well, as their lives could end suddenly. But then I thought, "no." They wouldn't want me to sacrifice a part of my life for them. What makes them happy is to see me be able to grow up and mature on my own.

So, thank you. Mom and dad. For understanding and supporting me for the past, for now, and for the future.


Friday 3/20
First day of Spring! Also, first complete year of being here! Last March, Patrick and I arrived at the Retreat Center to begin our testing. It's weird to look back and see how far we have come. It feels even more weird to realize that a whole year has gone by. It seems as if only a couple of months passed. Time is a funny thing.

Some stuff

• Scott can no longer make it to the Retreat Center. Oh well... hopefully he'll be able to come out some time in the near future :)
• I got an email from Mr. Gene Ching from Kung Fu Tai Chi Magazine. Apparently my first article should be out soon. May/June edition?
• Shifu started talking about building a new training facility. He plans on building it outdoors. It will have a roof so that we can practice there when it rains as well. He wants it to be large enough for a floor area (for forms) and for bag area. So.. we're currently looking for donors. Ricardo is working on making a 3D model of it to be posted on the YMAA website. Hopefully we will receive enough funds for it soon (hint hint). Shifu says there may be a plaque posted on the side of the training area with the names of donors.

Upcoming events

• New candidates will be coming in April. I think there's one from Germany coming on the 5th and another from Italy on the 15th or so.
• I think Craig and Rii will be coming at the end of April sometime to help us with video production. We currently have two projects. Taijiquan Applications and Fundamental Conditioning.
  
• My mom coming at the beginning of May to teach us Chinese and how to prepare food/cook for large groups (aka seminar people).

Monday 3/9
A new guest arrived from Los Angeles this afternoon. His name, I'm not exactly sure how to spell... but it's pronounced Fah-rye (or at least I hope so ...that's what I've been calling him). I guess I'd better double-check and make sure. He's really nice and is extremely funny. He will be staying with us for about a month.

Wednesday 3/11
In tumbling, we tried doing front handsprings off of objects (by objects I mean each other). One person would crouch down in the middle of the room while everybody else would run, put their hands on his back, and launch off of him. It was a lot of fun and easier than I expected it to be. Maybe more of this Saturday morning? I hope so.

Today
Finally... another one of my goals was reached. I was able to run the entire mountain without stopping with 50lbs. Now, all I have to do is cut the time down, little by little :)

Shifu wants us to be able to run from the creek to the house with 50lbs on our backs in 10 minutes. Seeing the improvement from the beginning of last semester until now, I'm thinking it may be possible for a few of us (hopefully). We still have about a month and a half to go before our next test. So.. I guess the next few weeks will be painful ones :P

Also, a new goal (or possible challenge) for jumping was brought up. Shifu said he could used to vertically jump onto an object around chest height from a standing position, no run. Ricardo and I have decided that we must beat this before our training is over and are aiming for shoulder height (at least! :P).

Looking forward to...

• Possible ping pong tournament this weekend? I think Shifu may join in this time. I'm wondering what it will be like, with his reaction speed and everything. I guess I should expect crazy spin on the ball each time and should probably be ready to dive for every return hit. Maybe I should start thinking about buying some elbow and knee pads when we go out this weekend, too... just in case.
• Tyson, an old friend from high school and previous YMAA Andover member may be coming to visit next Tuesday/Wednesday. He will be on spring break and will be visiting his mother in California. He said he would stop by and I'm hoping he does because I haven't seen him for almost three years now.
• YMAA Amesbury director, Scott Tarbell, might be flying over from the East coast to come train with us in April. Last I heard of this was in January. I hope his plans have not changed.
• My mom will be visiting in May for a little over a week. She will be teaching us how to cook for large groups. I'm wondering what types of food we will be preparing. Apparently my dad has had the prividge of being her test subject at home and has put on at least 5 extra pounds. More gym time required. Less TV/computer! :)
  

After some thinking, I noticed that it makes more sense to post events in the order that they happened. This way readers won't get confused when reading down the page, and also won't have to go to the bottom of the post and constantly scroll up.

Also, sorry for not updating for so long. Like I said in an earlier post, I usually sit down with intentions of writing but either get distracted or can't come up with anything to say. So.. without further delay, here's some stuff from the past couple of weeks.

Saturday 2/21
We spent the morning training Taijiquan and reviewing Chinese as usual. However, this Saturday would be a little different. In addition to cleaning the house and cabin, we had an extra task to accomplish. After doing our chores, Patrick and I spent the rest of our afternoon putting together our new ping pong table. It should not have taken so much time, but when we opened up the package, the instruction manual was missing. We had to guess which pieces went where from the pictures on the side of the box. It was an interesting experience, but a fun one as well. Patrick and some stand-up comedy on his iPod, so we put that in and got to work. After a few hours of putting pieces in, taking pieces out, having the table almost fall on top of us, and putting pieces back in, the table was finished. We had a few extra screws and things laying around but they didn't seem useful.. the table was standing and was ready for use. So, after dinner, we started playing.

After a few warm up rounds, we began our first Retreat Center Ping Pong Tournament. It was 6 intense rounds of professional-like table tennis: Tiny orange balls flying in every direction, blurs of paddles being whipped from side to side, and players running around 20 feet away from the table... maybe it wasn't that intense, but it seemed like it (okay, not really). We had a great time though and it was different than our usual Saturday night activities which often include a television, a couch, and various movies.

The standings:
1st - Ricardo (3-0)
2nd - Tom, Patrick, Me (3-2)
3rd - Mike (0-0) ...but I guess he's technically undefeated too.

Tuesday 2/24
We found a dead deer on the side of the mountain path while we were walking down to the creek. It had been covered with twigs and leaves and looked like it's neck had been broken. It's neck/chest area had been chewed open as well as it's behind. Justin came over to take a look and suspects a mountain lion or a group of dogs. We're not really sure. Patrick and Ricardo dragged it off the road, and threw it down the side of the path. Xiao Hu almost got to it and I think he craves some deer meat. Everytime we go down the mountain now, he always tries to be the first one there and also tries to sneak off the road to head back to the body. (There are some pictures.. but I don't think I'll be posting them :P)

Thursday 2/26
One of our media teachers, Rii, came to visit us this weekend. She came to help us with some video projects. When she arrived, we were taking a break from taking pictures for Ricardo and Mike's articles and were down the mountain some admiring the sunny day (one of maybe 5 since Shifu left). We heard her car coming up and stop in front of the house and decided to sneak up the mountain to her.. ninja style. So, we all started climbing up slowly and quietly. We got to the edge of the house and discovered she had gone inside. We took this opportunity to move around the side of the garage and made a single file line next to the doorway and waited for her to come out... The door opened and Ricardo appeared with, "HI!" Some words I can't type (due to the age range of some readers) came out of her mouth before we exchanged greetings :P Afterwards, we went to her car and unloaded the equipment she brought: A camera, a tripod, a box with supplies for lights, and some sandwiches for dinner. Yes, sandwiches for dinner.. and they were so good :)

Friday 2/27
Because Rii was here, we focused mostly on our projects and any other work she had for us. So, after our morning meditation, Qigong, breakfast, and some pushing hands, we got to work. The day consisted of reviewing our project ideas and shooting footage for our videos.

Saturday 2/28
We spent the whole day filming for our Taijiquan applications video, which we hope to put online at some point in the future. We had many shots and had to get creative with some of them... using the truck, my skateboard, and even a wheely chair from inside the house.

After a long day of filming, we were able to relax. Rii put the day's footage onto the computer while dinner was being made, then Justin came over with a movie, which we watched while eating. It was a pretty entertaining movie: Born to Fight.

Sunday 2/29
This Sunday's activities consisted of lots of editing of the footage we had shot and conducting interviews. It was interesting because we were given the opportunity to interview each other this time. Not only were we required to ask questions, but we took turns operating the camera as well. Rii took out the lights and we learned how to set them up, too.

I thought it was nice being able to interview each other and realized that Craig and Rii probably know more about us than we do each other. Some subjects came up that we don't usually talk about and it was interesting to learn more about everyone else and about their thoughts on the program, Shifu, new candidates, and me.

After the interviews, we had dinner. And after dinner was the best part of Sunday. Rii had worked the whole afternoon making some sort of fruit bread thing. I don't know what it was, but it was awesome. I think I ate more than I should have :P

Monday 3/2
Shifu was supposed to come back Monday afternoon. However, the East Coast got a huge snow storm and his flight was canceled. This gave us a chance to go into Garberville because Ricardo and Mike needed to send pictures out for their articles. While we were there, I was able to chat online with one of my high school teachers. He brought up the importance of keeping in touch with people and I noticed I have not really been doing such a good job with that, not even with my parents. I guess I will have to try a bit harder and give it more a little more attention. So.. yes mom, I will try to call home more often.

Tuesday 3/3
Shifu's flight was scheduled to arrive at 3pm, so Ricardo, Mike, and Tom, having some errands to do, left for Eureka almost immediately after Chinese. Shifu called about 10 minutes after they left saying his flight was delayed an hour. Dang. The guys now had an extra hour in town to do anything.. lucky :P Patrick and I stayed at the house to clean up a little more and then work on our video productions.

Everybody arrived around 7:30pm, just in time for dinner. In addition to our normal group, our friend Jeff Baker had come back. Jeff had helped Shifu drive across country last year and was planning on applying for the program before some personal things came up causing him to withdraw. However, now he is back to train and to reapply for next year's group :)

Wednesday 3/4
Nothing too much. Jeff's first day back at training. And.. Shifu says we can go out to see Watchmen this Saturday. Woo :P I think we will be going to Fortuna with Justin in the late afternoon. I am excited (by the way). I just hope it is as good (or almost) as the graphic novel.

Today
A few weeks of trying to fulfill this goal and I finally did it. What was it? For the past month while Shifu was gone, I had been trying to jump over a certain section of the banister. It is about up to my neck/face when standing even with it and I had to jump with my knees to my chest, boost myself with both hands, and get over without making contact with it with my feet. I think I could have done it in a sooner time but we have had a lot of rain recently. Because of this, we couldn't train outside on the banister, with it being too slippery. Also, a few weeks ago, my knee was feeling a little funny so I had to take a break from the jumping exercises. (I did not write about this on purpose because I didn't want my parents to worry.. they tend to do that a lot.) It feels a lot better now and I am doing everything normally again. I feel that after that, the only thing keeping me from doing it was a mental barrier. Every time I approached the banister I had negative thoughts which kept me from bending both legs. It wasn't until yesterday that I began to overcome my fears and only skimmed the top of the wall with my feet, leaving some dirt behind.

During lecture Shifu brought out two of his pistols for us to see. He asked Ricardo to go over safety precautions to holding and handling them. No ammunition inside the magazines (so no need to worry, mom.) Afterwards, we were able to get a feel for them and got to try out how to check them safely.

And.. another comic! Yay.