Creating a Face and Growing Bananas
In the process of creating a face.
The final product minus a few touch-ups.
Today I had two wonderful highs. For one, our afternoon cultural activity today was to paint masks like the ones used in the Beijing Opera. After trying Chinese dancing, Kung Fu, and singing, I was happy to finally do an activity that I'm moderately good at and thoroughly enjoy. First, the activity teacher showed us some videos depicting the art of making the face paint for the Beijing Opera. The first video was like a dramatic make-up tutorial with some pretty intense face painting going on. The second video explained the Beijing Opera more in depth with some dramatic music of course. The make-up and masks used for the Beijing Opera have roots that go back over a thousand years. The different colors used represent different characteristics that help describe each character in the play. For example, red, as with traditional Chinese color, represents positive traits of intelligence, bravery, loyalty, and integrity.
The activity teacher provided us with some images of masks. Some people decided to make more creative and modern masks, but I was feeling a more traditional look. I chose a mask with five colors and some cool looking swirls. My mask has a lot of blue and black color along with red, white, and a touch of purple paint. It took me forever to paint it, but I'm satisfied with the product. I still want to touch-up a few areas because I'm feeling my perfectionist coming out. The paint and brushes they provided us are the type you use in kindergarten, but they worked surprisingly well. On Thursday, we're supposed to bring our masks to do some sort of dance. I'm a little concerned about breathing through this mask because there are only eye holes; no nose or mouth holes.
In addition to the mask-making fun, I also went on a long and very enjoyable walk with my host mom. After dinner, my host mom asked me if I wanted to go with her and 吴璨 to purchase a USB drive. At the time, I was still working on my mask, but considering I don't have too much time left here in Chengdu, I want to spend more time with my host mom and sister. We first walked to this tiny computer store in our mini-community. There, my host mom purchased a USB drive, and then we went to a little outdoor stand where you can return goods purchased on line. This little stand was like a super small version of a post office. Afterwards, my host mom asked me if I wanted to go on a walk, and I said of course because why not.
I had no clue where we were going, but it didn't really matter. 吴璨 didn't come because she wasn't in a great mood, and she wasn't really enjoying the mosquitoes. The mosquitoes were a bit annoying, but I didn't really care too much. We headed outside the community and towards Wanda Plaza. Along the way she asked me about my family and about food in America. I asked her if she thought there was any other Chinese dishes I should try, but she told me that, since I don’t eat much meat, there are not a whole lot of other Chinese dishes I can eat. However, I’ve tried a whole ton of new vegetables and some Chinese specialties, such as zong zi. Out of curiosity, I asked her if they grow bananas in China, and apparently they do. I was expecting bananas to be imported from other countries and, therefore, be scarce and expensive. However, happily, that is not the case. Mangoes are even grown in China!
I asked her about her job and told her about my family. We talked mostly about food in China and America and about the the weather. My host mom apparently likes the warm weather because of all the fruit. I must say I do too. I told her about my love of cabbage and my newfound love of corn. All along, we walked every floor of the Wanda Plaza. It was a walk that lasted over an hour. I want to go on another walk like this next week with my host family. Even though I struggled at times, I spoke a lot of Chinese and learned a lot about my host mom. At the end of our walk, we went down to the supermarket and purchased some water and dragonfruit. I asked if I could have lychee one more time, but sadly they're out of season.