Beijing Part 1

Hey everyone! Sorry for the radio silence, apparently this site is also blocked in China, and it took a little bit for met to get it to work.

Anyway, today is officially my last day in Beijing, tonight we will hop onto a sleeper train and travel to the city of Xi'an. I could write about a one hundred page novel on everything I've seen and done in this city. But I don't really think that anyone wants to read it. So, instead, I will post a bunch of pictures and some of the key highlights!

The old Summer Palace, which was destroyed by the French and British during the Opium Wars.

The old Summer Palace was internationally known for combining Western and Eastern design elements, into an architecturally stunning complex. This is located at the very center of a stone maze.

Every stone surface was beautifully carved, and there were so many wonderful trees planted throughout the grounds.

This is the new Summer Palace. It is absolutely huge, and amazing. What you can't see in this picture is the giant lake and grounds in front of the building and several temples located behind the building.

Behind the Summer Palace was a stunning Buddhist temple, which was completely covered in dozens of these ceramic sculptures.

This is at a local temple and stone carving museum that Natalie and I stumbled across on our first day together.

The courtyard was filled with giant statues of animals and important historical figures.

There were also countless slabs of stone inscribed with famous sayings, government reports, and obituaries for some of the priests buried there.

And finally, the Great Wall. No picture can truly give you an idea of how truly massive this structure is. It is absolutely mind boggling that the ancient Chinese managed to build such a huge structure on some of the roughest terrain in the world, using limited technology.

Obviously, this not all I've been up to. The next post will contain even more pictures and descriptions, and I will have that up just as soon as I finish editing the photos.

Heading Out!

Hello everyone!

First off, in case you didn't see the news on Facebook, the wonderful people at the UW-Madison International Internships office found me an internship! I was honestly completely blown away with their generosity and effort on my behalf. My advisor worked endlessly with a million different agencies, working every connection that UW-Madison holds throughout China, and even covered all of the application costs for me. And so, thanks entirely to the wonderful people at UW-Madison, I will be spending the second half of my summer at BioFarm outside of Shanghai.

BioFarm is one of the thriving organic farms in China. They began in 2004, working to rehabilitate a poor stretch of land just outside of Shanghai and distribute vegetables and agricultural awareness to Shanghai business people and children. Since then, they have worked extensively with a local agricultural college to develop new methods for growing a variety of plants, increasing sustainability on the farm, and participating in outreach for schools all throughout the area. This farm is known for distributing delicious seasonal produce to residents of Shanghai through their incredibly successful Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program, and their participation in farmer's markets throughout the city. Beyond that, they also engage in agricultural outreach to students, by inviting them out to visit the farm, providing schools with organic seeds to start their own farms, and doing exchanges with students from two local universities and Jane Goodall's Roots and Shoots volunteers.

Whatever your personal view on organic agriculture, CSA's, or the locavore movement, I think that we can all agree that BioFarm is providing a truly unique opportunity for countless people who may have never really thought about where their food came from. Agricultural outreach and education will become increasingly important as our agricultural industry faces the problem of feeding an ever increasing population with decreasing amounts of land and diminishing profitability.

As for my contribution to the farm... well... I'm not exactly certain yet. I have been accepted as an intern for the coming months. I presume they are going to train me on the specifics of their farming methods, what research projects are currently underway, and how to help out with the daily chores on the farm. Beyond that, I think I am either going to join in on a specific research project, or possibly develop my own. From what I've read, past interns have had a variety of experiences on the farm, but they all seem incredibly positive about whatever experience they have had.

BioFarm's website link