Week 36 (6 September - 12 September)

I got up at 5:00 like usual which was much more difficult than usual because my standard rhythm had been effected by all the travelling. After the 5:30 line up I showed my parents around including the new platform they are currently building. After breakfast (one my parents wont miss) I relaxed a bit and at 8:00 I didn't train however Dan did train and my parents observed.

At 10:00 we sat outside the academy and talked a bit. After lunch the cabs arrived and we headed off to Siping, we had and hour to spare so we just waited at the train station for our train (#1528). We received hundreds of strange glances in the waiting room. The train was only 5 minutes late (good for Chinese standard trains), the train ride was pleasant and we arrived in Shenyang at 17:00. We had Mac Donald's for dinner which was the only "acceptable" looking "food" outlet at the train station. After the meal I got a cab and we bade each other fond farewells, it was only a few days that we had spent together but it was true family time.

After wards Dan and I went to the CRH waiting room which is for the #D (high speed) trains. Our train (#D177) arrived on time and we arrived back in Siping only an hour and 20 minutes later. Because it was already 20:30 we decided that it would be best to spend the night in Siping to recover instead of heading back to the academy and waking up at 5:30 feeling exhausted.

Who does this to their little girl ?

We went to the Jin Li Hao, it was Dan's first time there and we was pretty impressed by the cleanliness and luxury. We stayed there until 14:00 next day then took a hot bath and shower. I took Dan to Mister Lee's which is a famous franchise here in China it's logo is almost identical to that off KFC, but instead has a Chinese face on it. They serve really good portions of noodles for 10RMB very lean, low in fat and nutritious. We got back to the academy in time for dinner and relaxed.

Wednesday was really cold about 14 degrees and the training session was intensive, in the morning we ran to the T. Afterwards the 30 minute long warm up I was dripping with sweat, I then had to do 400 punch variations and 300 kick variations. I was so exhausted but despite that I had to go outside and do sprints and then hold upside down handstands. Afternoon training was no different we spent the full 2 hours doing extreme cardio exercises and my heart rate was constantly peaking. By evening training we were so exhausted we just relaxed. In the evening Josh left to go home for good, he was here for 11 months and was very happy to finally go back home.

Thursday too was intensive, after warming up we had to punch and kick the bags for 2 minutes without stopping we had to repeat this 3 times. Afterwards we had to do some sparring, after about 10 minutes Dan had sprained his toe and I had a huge blue lump on my right shin from kicking and blocking. For the rest of the day we just did the warm up and a lot of stretches.

The last training day of the week was very anticipated. I had to go and run through the 2 nearby villages. It is about 9km and I had made a mental note to push myself which is what I did. The whole run went really well, it was just the last bit back up to the academy that was mentally and physically daunting but I managed to keep going without stopping. If I have learned anything here it is the ability to keep going even beyond my normal limits, when pain from lactic acid build up is just telling you to stop. The run took 45 minutes, after the run my shifu forced me into various power stretches which were extremely painful. After training Thomas left to go home but he will be back in November. In the afternoon I just did some weights. The old shifu also came with his cousin to collect some of his things, we gave both shifus a slab of swiss chocolate.

On the weekend we blew up some more stuff, like an old broken toy helicopter.