tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-201698432009-02-21T11:49:25.218+08:00A detailed account of my Study Abroad experience in China, with numerous pictures.John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1157363196712348952006-09-04T17:41:00.000+08:002006-09-04T17:46:36.716+08:00

I'm really sad about Steve Irwin.  It's hard to believe that he's dead.  It's especially hard to believe that it was caused by a stingray.  They're supposed to be really pretty harmless, especially compared to all the other deadly things in Australia.  He was swimming at the Great Barrier Reef near Port Douglas, which is where we went on our Australia trip.  Apparently, the stingray stung him in

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1154315133331200062006-07-31T11:05:00.000+08:002006-08-06T06:31:53.260+08:00

This was originally an email I sent to Jon and Julie, cowritten with KP. We wrote this in an internet cafe at the Hangzhou train station, the night before we left for Shanghai.We decided to go to Huangshan after all, so we took a bus out to the Huangshan Youth Hostel in Huangshan Si. It turns out Huangshan Si is quite a ways from the actual Huangshan mountain. Woops.When we got to the bus

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1154314009796134852006-07-31T10:32:00.000+08:002006-08-07T05:06:52.540+08:00

Well, it's time to post some pictures from Australia. I have had very little time for this blog lately, and I apologize. I just started working for the X Prize Foundation, and they have me 10 hours a day, with a two hour commute (round trip)...there's not much time left for anything else. It's a great group of people though, and they're a lot of fun to hang out with.Anyway, let's get back to

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1152925433104184022006-07-15T08:55:00.000+08:002006-07-15T09:04:16.926+08:00

This time, I'm back from Australia. I performed in the Chapman Wind Symphony at the Sydney Opera House, and then flew up to Cairns and snorkeled at the Great Barrier Reef and then visited a tropical rainforest. It was a 7-day nonstop trip and very tiring. My roommate from China, Nick Miller, was in Sydney and he actually saw me perform at the Opera House, but I didn't get to see him, which I'm

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1149662377672498282006-06-07T14:32:00.000+08:002006-06-07T14:41:42.183+08:00

I'm building a new website, which will provide a base for my freelance film/television business. It replaces this website at www.jstarrdewar.com. This blog's direct address is now http://home.earthlink.net/~jstarrdewar/ or you can use the easier-to-remember http://www.jstarrdewar.com/travelblogI'm not done! I am planning to add a post with a recap of my trip and my favorite pictures from each

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1148150842506499702006-05-21T02:44:00.000+08:002006-05-21T02:47:23.226+08:00

I just measured my official trip-distance...20,261 miles from my house to every destination in China and back, although I taxied around Beijing for three months, which probably put on another 400 or so.

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1146929315584675572006-05-06T22:56:00.000+08:002006-05-06T23:28:37.000+08:00

Well, the blogging has really broken down now that we're off on our own. It's too hard to put up pictures without reliable wireless internet access. But I thought I'd update everyone on my travels.Right now I'm in Yongshuo in Jiangxi Province, which you can get to by bus from Hong Kong, so it can't be too far from there. Yongshuo is famous for its karst peaks, huge limestone monoliths riddled

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1145878749671012542006-04-24T19:28:00.000+08:002006-04-24T19:39:09.686+08:00

Well, I'm in Dali, Yunnan Province. In an hour, I'm catching a sleeper bus to Kunming. We'll spend the day there, and then we're flying back to Chengdu. I didn't particularly want to fly, because there's a train, but neither of us are feeling too great, and flying for an hour is a lot easier than a 19-hour train ride. Also the tickets were discounted to around $50 and the train was about $30,

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1145332571379293962006-04-18T11:53:00.000+08:002006-04-18T11:56:11.390+08:00

Well, we're off on our five week trip around China. I've posted some pictures. Click the links below to go to a separate photo page.Going to Xi'anTerracotta WarriorsGoing to ChengduChengdu

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1144165680963439082006-04-04T23:46:00.000+08:002006-04-04T23:48:01.030+08:00

Grandpop said he wanted me to write in Chinese.  Well, I finally learned how.  This is the story of the previous post.我跟女朋友去王府井大街吃晚饭。我们在小吃街上逛。我们吃了羊肉串，糖葫芦，玉米棒。我们看到了蝎子。我很想吃，于是我买了一串三个。工作人员 烤了给我。我把蝎子吃了。我的女朋友给我拍了照片。很好吃！

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143393185157507292006-03-27T01:04:00.000+08:002006-03-27T01:13:05.166+08:00

Last night, the core four of us — Juli, Jon, me, and KP — went to Tian'an'men Square and then walked down past Wanfujing Dajie to the night market. At the night market, I resolved to eat a scorpion. But as you can see from the video, I almost lost my nerve. It was tasty though. Very similar to shrimp, or pumpkin seeds, depending on which part you eat. It's crunchewy, so the body tastes

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143117069765659712006-03-23T20:29:00.000+08:002006-03-24T21:04:46.003+08:00

I didn't realize that it was such a long journey to get to Peking University from my house, but in fact the total journey is 6,650 miles, according to Google Earth. So in addition to my 10,000 mile trip, I have to go 6,650 miles to get home. So it works out to a grand total of 23,600 miles...plus about 400 to Pingyao and back brings all the traveling to a nice round 24,000 miles.BeijEnglishThis

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143084796652416922006-03-23T11:17:00.000+08:002006-03-23T12:02:40.216+08:00

What is Lush? Lush is a smell, a noise, a quality of light. Lush is life.Or maybe it's just a nice little bar in Wudaokou.Me, I'm tired of Lush. The smell is cigarette smoke, and the noise is made by drunk people and bad singers. But some of our students still go every single day. And I don't blame them. Lush is a comforting bastion of spoken English in a Chinese world, and the alcohol is priced

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143032366669497942006-03-22T20:25:00.000+08:002006-03-23T12:13:28.826+08:00

Recently we had an interesting Saturday. The program arranged for a demonstration of Chinese painting and calligraphy by a modern master, Xu Qingping, son of the great master of China Xu Beihong at the Xu Beihong museum near Houhai.As it turns out, even great calligraphy is pretty boring to watch. Especially if you can't read the characters. Still, it was pretty cool, and he wrote a poem for

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143029907962931792006-03-22T20:12:00.000+08:002006-03-23T11:15:40.360+08:00

There you have it. Probably the nicest example of the infamous Chinese toilet. They think it's a disgusting idea to sit where someone else's naked butt sat. But a recent study revealed that there are only 42 bacteria per square inch of toilet seat in public restrooms, compared to 10,000 per square inch on a telephone receiver. So it's all perception folks. Another barrier to Western toilets is

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1143012085559971372006-03-22T14:50:00.000+08:002006-03-22T17:59:40.596+08:00

There are only two and a half weeks left before we take off for parts unknown. So today I'll give you a guided tour of our planned route via the magic of Google Earth.This is a "Da" (大-big) Trip! We will cover a grand total of almost exactly 10,000 miles over the course of 5 weeks!Dr. Sun told us an ancient Chinese proverb: "To be a truly educated man, one must read 10,000 books and travel

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1142350245633186972006-03-14T23:03:00.000+08:002006-03-16T14:17:42.370+08:00

I never got around to posting my first couple of week's photos, so I'm going to work on catching up.It was the first week, the second full day in China, and they got us up early to go to see the sights of downtown Beijing. Everyone piled into the bus. Lots of police vans run around in Beijing. Sometimes you see them with all kinds of deadly looking weapons inside, but it turns out that their job

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1140669839925089642006-02-23T12:30:00.000+08:002006-02-23T13:40:14.876+08:00

For class, we're reading Lin Yutang's My Country and My People. I love it. It's certainly not politically correct, but at the same time it's certainly correct. And I just hit this passage and decided I would share it with you.There is no doubt that the Chinese are in love with life, in love with this earth, and will not forsake it for an invisible heaven. They are in love with life, which is

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1140460523728299632006-02-21T02:30:00.000+08:002006-02-23T13:41:32.406+08:00

Time to break out your funky red and blue glasses!Make sure that your 3D glasses' red side is on the left ey and the blue side is on the right eye, as pictured above.These are parallel analglyphs. When the blue image is on the left side it should appear to be in front of the screen, and when the blue image is on the right it should appear behind the screen. The trick to seeing this kind of

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139978874155958092006-02-15T12:43:00.000+08:002006-02-15T12:47:54.170+08:00

I promised you video, you got video.This is a little video in the style of Direct Cinema. Allison and I go out to see the Lantern Festival on the last day of the Chinese Lunar New Year.This is best experienced with a good pair of headphones. The really impressive part is the sound.Click Here for the Show.If you get gobbledygook or want to save the video on your hard drive, you need to

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139760931614451442006-02-12T23:50:00.000+08:002006-02-13T00:18:31.893+08:00

Today was the last day of Spring Festival, the Lantern Festival. Allison and I were almost blown up by a giant firework. I have video. But that's not what this post is about. This post is about a sidetrip we took a week and a half ago to another Spring Festival event, the Temple Fair.Looking across the street to the entrance of the temple.It's the Year of the Dog, so everything is dog-themed

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139415637944963522006-02-09T00:04:00.000+08:002006-02-10T16:08:30.946+08:00

After Monday's snowstorm (which was beautiful — I took a lot of pictures, but it'll be a while before I post them), it's been quite crisp and clear in Beijing, and for the first time, I have been able to see past the apartment buildings across the street. I discovered that there are mountains in the distance, and that you can see the summer palace from our window:On Tuesdays and Thursdays I

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139037789651549162006-02-04T15:08:00.000+08:002006-02-09T20:04:43.093+08:00

After we left the Qiao Family Compound, we drove for about an hour until we got to the ancient walled city of Pingyao. The city claims to be 3000 years old. They're very proud to be a world heritage site, and it's created a major tourist draw for them. As a result, it's a bit too touristy — every restaurant boasts that English is spoken and Western Food is served (and western food in China is

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139036369659609622006-02-04T14:44:00.000+08:002006-02-04T14:59:29.673+08:00

After we left Jinci Temple, we went to see the Qiao Family's Compound. This is where Zhang Yimou filmed Raise the Red Lantern. At first we got a little lost, went down a street full of flags and ended up in a strange courtyard full of gourds. It was a bizarre little museum in the end, with a lot of posters from the movie and wax figures, and traditional furniture with televisions sitting on

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20169843.post-1139026264851004662006-02-04T11:57:00.000+08:002006-02-04T14:35:15.500+08:00

The next day, we hopped in the bus and kept driving. It didn't take long for us to reach Jinci Temple. We got out and walked through the front gate, and found...A very vocal camelAfter that we walked through a park area and came upon an enormous statue of horseman-warriors. Then we continued into the actual temple area.Here I am in front of the statue.Tall Nick and John Bike (nicknames to

John Dewarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12012350926484913818noreply@blogger.com3