Saturday was a really good day even if I did wake up at 7:30. I foolishly went to the coffee shop that is somewhat near my house. As you can see coffee here is not the same as in the US, it is not something you use to help you wake up in the morning, it is someplace you go to be seen using the free wireless.



We hopped on a bus to outside the fifth ring to go to the paintball place. I decided not to bring my camera once we got there which turned out to be a poor decision because they supplied us with lockers and I could have taken a picture of the Rambo posters and the guy who was way too into the military who was running the place.

The games turned out to be really shitty and really fun. The first game they gave us guns and the amount of paintballs we had paid for then ushered us onto the field to shoot theses paintballs at each other. What made the game kind of useless was that there was no point to it. If you got hit you just kept shooting until your paint was gone. Basically it was a scam to make us buy more paint. The only exciting thing that happened was me getting hit in the face by Xu, one of my mentees. He loved that and made sure to let me and everyone else know how much he loved hitting me in the face after the game. Maybe I am teaching him too much. That sort of reaction strikes me as a suspiciously Justin type of reaction.

After we bought more paint we played capture the flag which was a lot of fun. If you got hit three times you were supposed to leave the field. I hit a bunch of people and managed to avoid getting hit at all myself. The one drawback was that none of the people I hit three times left the field. I know what you are thinking right now cause I was thinking the same thing, what a bunch of cheating bastards. As the new mature Justin though I just swallowed any comments I had and sat out the next game with the rest of the people who had decided to sit down by now. As an aside how shocking is that, me not yelling like a two year old when I get all competitive and what not. I continue to be shocked by this development.

As we were in the bus heading towards the spa I realized that I was actually doing what you were supposed to be doing in a morale event. Meeting people in your team you don’t normally talk to and strengthening friendships across sometimes different teams. Another shocking development.

At the spa place we got to have hot pot buffet which might be the best thing ever. They give you your own hot pot and unlimited food to put into it. I managed to miss the first helping of meat though because it disappeared in ultra quick time so I loaded up on ducks blood and decided this might be the food I miss the most when I leave here. Yet another shocking development, but don’t worry this was not the last.

After eating we hit the springs. This was the last shocking development of the day, I got to see every one of my male co-workers naked as the day they were born and them me. To be honest it was slightly surreal. The springs themselves though were like a day at the beach. If you took away the sand, women under 55, waves and beach. And if you added brown, really hot water, Chinese medicinal herbs and sand storms.

It is just pools of varying hotness that you sit in until you are too warm and then you get out for a while. Then back in, then back out, etc… Most of our group ended up hanging out in the medicinal spa which also happened to be the hottest pool. It was relaxing hanging out and doing nothing for the day. The most bizarre thing though was the dust storms. We are sitting in this spa that is kind of sheltered watching these huge clouds of dust pass over the open areas of the hotel and coat everything in orange. Talk about surreal.

After this though we headed home and I showered getting ready to catch this opera / acrobatics. I was not quite up to it though as I was so tired so when Sarah called and said she was tired I did not complain much, actually at all. I talked to people back in the states until 10 PM at which point I feel dead asleep. I know I said I was done with the shocking revelations but this one continues to bother me. I have turned into one of those people that wake up before their alarm. This bothers me to no end. Maybe I will get back on a proper night time schedule when my mom and aunt are here and we are partying till the wee hours.