It has been 3 months since our lovely little daughter was born and we’ve started to wonder: What has happened to our lives? Did I even have a life before that? some of my relatives are asking. All that ‘free time’ (whenever that is) has been absorbed by a host of tasks designed to keep this little organism going – changing diapers, feeding, getting her to sleep. Heck, half of my baby time is spent just holding her. We have become adept at passing off the baby just before one of us has to go the bathroom.

Not that I am complaining, mind you. Holding my daughter is my new addiction. I can’t wait to get home just to pick her up and look into those blue, wandering eyes and pretend she is communicating with me. Her favorite spot is the changing table – it’s like magic. We put her on it and she becomes active & alert. Juliet and I do lots of ‘talking’ there. The moment I pick her up, she goes back into ‘the zone’ – staring off at whatever space has absorbed her short attention span.

I loved my life before kids. We were so active and had so much freedom (as evidenced by our many travel posts). Now that we have a child, we’re not as ‘active’ in the same sense, but she has become our new activity. Different pleasures. I love my life with kids, too.

As for Juliet, she couldn’t be better. I think we got spoiled on this one. All looks, very few cries, and generally a good temper. The girl likes to get her diaper changed and can spend at least an hour in the car seat without much fuss. She only occasionally needs the pacifier. I can see why some people stop after one – the next one can only be trouble.

• Tai Chi with two masters at the Temple of Heaven
• Forbidden City/ Tiananmen square
• Ping Pong lesson with the coach of several Olympians
• Hutongs (the old small alleys of Beijing)– riding rickshaws, cooking our own lunch in Mongolian hotpots (yummmmmm), learning calligraphy & Feng Shui with local families in their houses
• cooking class with a top chef at Du Wong restaurant
• Bird’s Nest & Water Cube Olympic venues
• toured an old factory town turned into a collection of art galleries
• camped at Gubekoi village (fan dancing, serious karaoke, dinner in a ‘Mongolian yert’)
• hiked about 10K of the Great Wall
• explored emperor’s Summer palace, little Buddah temple
• Longmen’s Grotto
• Shaolin Tagou Martial Art School & Temple – taught history of kung fu by the head monk
• Little Dragon Kung Fu school
• Morning prayer/silent breakfast/sweeping courtyard with straw brooms/ tour Pagoda forest
• Grand Musical Zen Performance – a nighttime show in an outdoor theater at the base of a canyon – dance, Kung Fu, music, drums
• Kung Fu routine

This seriously was two weeks packed with activities. What was my favorite part? I would have to say hiking the Great Wall was truly spectacular. It was surreal being able to touch history with our hands. We hiked (and I mean a real hike) about 10K of a section of the Wall that fewer than 5,000 people (including Chinese) have ever been on. We needed permits, and Communist hats which our guides provided so we appear friendly to the soldiers who patrol the restricted military zone we passed through. The landscape was beautiful and shrouded in a fog that set the mystique of the wall’s ancient past. It was exhilarating.

This trip was also full of unique experiences. Like attending morning prayer with the Buddhist monks at the Shaolin temple and joining them after in silent breakfast (they eat this way everyday). In Beijing, we got to visit the houses of local families in the Hutongs:  old, small alleys that remain from the ancient city. I think if I lived in Beijing, this is where I would want to live – kind of a cool, courtyard design and you’re right in the city, yet it was quiet in the alleys – no cars can go through.  One woman showed us how her house was designed around principles of Feng Shui. It’s basically a courtyard with several rooms around it and about 10 of their relatives live in various rooms. As many as 4 families may share one property. In another house, a gentleman who practices calligraphy spent about an hour teaching us how to write on rice paper with traditional ink brushes (which he gave to us as gifts). You couldn’t get this kind of experience on a regular vacation.

Kung Fu school was also incredible. I thought I was in shape before got a serious workout from these hardcore 17yr-olds who taught us a routine. It was the kind of thing where we felt completely like foreigners trying out this exercise we weren’t built for. The routine we learned was basic hand & arm moves and kicks; they told us it was you first learn if you know nothing about kung fu – yeah, that was us. One day they let us try learning a weapon routine. I was excited to be divided up into the sword group. They make it look so much easier than it is. I wish we had more time with it but it was fun even for just a half hour. Maybe Megan will get me a sword for Christmas.

Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/photos.DSA/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/bmharvey/sets/ click on China

Videos: in Facebook, search Discovery Student Adventures

Our experience truly was an amazing adventure. The students totally engaged in every activity and were curious to learn and experience everything. I loved traveling with them and was really proud of the way they represented our school. Here they are talking about their experiences:

Details (why I did this):

Discovery Student Adventures is a new partnership between Discovery and Ambassadors Group student travel. They are launching trips right now where teachers gather a group of interested students to explore other countries. Typically, about 5-6 students pay for a trip and a teacher chaperons for free.

As DSA is new, they wanted to host some pilot trips – where both teachers & students traveled free. I was fortunate enough to be one of nine teachers they selected from 170 members of the Discovery Educator Network who applied. Of the eight destinations they offer, the pilot trips included Australia, South Africa and China. On each pilot trip, three teachers brought four students each (3 teachers, 12 student). On our trip, I, along with my four students, met up with a group from Wisconsin and one from New Jersey.  We also had 4 other adults from DSA and a photographer and videographer.

One thought that came up in my mind was what if a teacher has a medical condition requiring medicine to be kept cold and close by, such as insulin injections. The nearest community fridge (which are allowed in limited numbers) may be on another floor or worse, in another building. And when the teacher asks for an exception to the policy, will they be pressured to reveal confidential health information?

Supposedly this policy was put into effect to reduce costs related to electricity usage. Yet they provided no clear, long-term energy plan or any type of data-driven estimation of how much they will save by making this move.

This is one more jab in the side by the ‘energy czar’ as the staff has dubbed. This is a district employee who’s role is to reduce energy usage using the most diminuitive means possible including driving to various schools sites, opening classrooms and turning off/unplugging everything in sight. This includes turning off pet lamps, unplugging USB cables, shutting off power to the main server on campus and yes, unplugging refrigerators. Ironically, these uneducated choices (who does that??) have cost the district thousands of $$ in lost server time (reentering attendance data), damaged camera film for photography classes, and replacements for dissection specimens in science labs.

One day while working late on creating an assignment, I walked down the hall to make some photo copies. While I was out, the energy czar struck like an overly-eager, under-giving tooth fairy! When I returned to my class, the computer was off, my USB port was unplugged (b/c of the little LED lights), and the monitor button was pushed in. Apparently, the czar had urgent business elsewhere, because she (oops, did I say that?) made no attempt to save my current documents. I sent her a polite email the next day explaining that she caused me to keep those machines running for another hour to recreate an assignment I had almost finished before she pulled the plugs.

I guess this answers my general frustration with why we are not moving towards 21st century education by equipping our students with access to computers – they don’t want to pay the electrical bill. Hey board members, let’s make a trade; it won’t cost you a dime to let students use their cellphones at school.

I did this except I didn’t need the stones because they were already under my skin in the form of my quadriceps muscles. At least they felt like stones after running a half-marathon. Last weekend I ran the Boney Mountain trail run as part of the XTERRA Trail Race series.  It with about 2,400ft. of climbing (that’s uphill running for the regular not-so-crazy you would do this kind of thing with your weekend crowd). Here’s what the profile looked like:

Normally I would endure such a trail run along with the accompanying heat and wind with vigor but I wasn’t completely trained for it, about 70% I would estimate. I had done several trail runs before including some steep switchbacks right here in La Crescenta but when you get into the race and people are moving fast you tend to forget your pacing and just go with the crowds. I felt good for the first few miles, even through the steeper climb from mile 3 to 4, passing several people walking on the switchbacks. But I overuse the quads in pulling up that climb that by the time I got up the long hill from miles 6 to 10, they were cooked. Cramps began to burn through my thighs. At least the last part was downhill, right? Except that almost hurt worse than going uphill. When I finally got to the last 1/2 mile we made a sharp right turn straight into 40mph winds – a final and literal slap in the face to humble you.

Megan also ran the 6K although she fared better. She had already eaten the complementary fruit and scrambled eggs (right on XTERRA!) and was wondering why I didn’t make my 2hour estimate. When I came in she wanted to talk right away but I would have none of it. Had to lie on the pavement in pain for a while and catch my breath.

After spending a few hours with Jen & Steve (cousins) in Newbury Park we headed home. We stopped at a Costco to return an item and as I walked in to the store my legs began cramping again – must have been sitting in the car for a while that got them. The customer service guy looked pretty bewildered as I used a hurried, bent-at-the-knees and hunched-over stride to get to the counter like I was bowling for a spare.

Five days and several liters of chocolate milk later, my quads are back to normal. You live, you cramp, you suffer. Oh and learn, yeah, learn.

After spending a few hours with my finger constantly on the scan button. I came up with the solution that on our next stop, we would find a music store, shop for a few CD’s and pick up some tunes that we both like. No sooner did I verbalize my plan to Megan when we came upon a service stop. These are actually quite convenient. These roadside exits have food, gas, and convenience stores all layed out in exactly the same way. They’re made for you to get off, consume what you need, and get right back on the motorway. After downing some much needed human fuel, Megan noticed on the way out that a convenience store had a whole wall of music CD’s. Great! We searched and eventually found several CD compilations that included numerous bands that we both liked: U2, The Beatles, The Police, and more. Three CD’s of actual music that we were familiar with. Only £6.99 for the set and we were on our way.

Track one was a Beatles song we were both familiar with, although it must have been a different recording that we had heard previously. Paul McCartney’s voice sounded uncharacteristically dry. Next track was the Cranberries famous Linger. This, too, sounded strange. We started to skip through the tracks and realized we what we had just purchased: British karaoke. None of these were the original artists. And not good ones. I would have even preferred Japanese karaoke. One guy made a dreadful attempt at Bono, then the same guy imitated David Bowie in the next track (though he sound more like Bowie during the hammering of U2’s Unforgettable Fire). In fact, not only were they covers, but some were covers of covers, like the cover of Guns N’ Roses version of Live and Let Die, originally by Paul McCartney. We laughed, but also cringed at some of the songs. We now have our next white elephant gift for the year. Needless to say, I’m done with British music. I’m tempted to stop at the next service station and buy a copy of a Radiohead compilation that I saw, but I’m scared: Will it really be Radiohead, or the Greatest Hits of Radiohead as sung by Danger Kitty?

We are currently in Kidderminster, where Brett served part of his mission. We’ve had a lovely Sunday catching up with the families here. Tomorrow we are off in our shoebox of a car to visit the English countryside and take the waters at Bath, where bathing was invented. Until next post, we’ll leave you with a timeless British fairwell. Cheers!!