It's been a LONG time since the last time I've posted... China has been keeping me busy! Somehow, in a blink of an eye its already half way through my 2nd semester.
So this post will be a brief overview of everything that's happened so far.
Last semester ended quite well.  We had a big Christmas party for the students.  A time to bond and to share the Christmas traditions as well as other winter holiday traditions. The students loved the ginger bread cookies and the sugar cookies. Unfortunately due to the lack of ingredients we couldn't frost the cookies, but still it was a big success!
My university had a different grading system compared to what I am familiar with in America. My university as well as many other Chinese universities counts their final exam score as 70% of the overall grade. So you can expect that the students went crazy studying for the final exam.  I also went slightly crazy as a result of grading them and giving out grades to all of my 250 students.  However, soon enough the winter vacation came and majority of the students returned to their hometowns and I went to Chengdu for my Peace Corps In Service Training (IST).  It was great to see all the other volunteers after so many months. It was amazing how some of us met up after 5 months but clicked as if we were never apart!
After having met all the 19's and 18's again during the training, some PCVs and I went off to travel around the Yunnan Province, a south east province which is closest to Thailand. Within the Yunnan Province we went around some major cities such as Xishuangbanna, Dali, Li Jiang and Kunming. During our travels, we met several other PCVs who were traveling through as well as other traveling foreigners.  We spent the Chinese New Years in Dali and set off fire crackers with all the other foreigners. Everywhere we went after the New Years, there were people still setting off fire crackers.  It was beautiful yet annoying. I jumped every time I heard it go off and sometime lead me to having hiccups the whole day.

Just some fire crackers that's being sold on the streets.

I was able to see some influences from Thailand in
Xishuangbanna since this city is on the border.

These are the sleeper buses we took between cities over night. I was on the last row so I had to share the space with 4 other people.

One of the most memorable and empowering part of this trip was when we hiked up Hu Tiao Xia aka. Tiger Leaping Gorge. The hike was pretty difficult since I have never hiked a mountain before. We hiked up the mountain for about 8 hours and lodged at a hostel called the Half-way Hostel. Although it is called the Half-Way Hostel, it really isn't half way. It is located much closer to the end of a 2 day hike.  Our second day was about 3 hours and we arrived at Tina's Guest House where our bus had brought all of our luggage to for free.  We could have gone further on the hike and pass the Tina's Guest House and into the Shangri La city which would lead to a 3 day hike but we were on a tight schedule.

The better road in the later part of the hike.  Yes, we had to go "over" (through) that small water fall. 

The hike gave us a chance to see how beautiful China is (although every train ride tends to remind me of this). It was a pretty intense hike therefore, having accomplished it made me feel really empowered. I was able to recognize that I am able to do anything which I put my mind to. The whole trip was fantastic and the lovely people that I traveled with made it even better.
Once this trip was over, I hoped on a plane and went down to Thailand for a 10 day solo travel. I had a chance to visit Ayutthaya, Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai. It was a trip on self reflection.  These 10 days allowed me to learn a lot about myself and my relationships with others. I will definitely have to go back to Thailand for a more in-dept travel.
Now my second semester has begun.  My classes and my students are all wonderful as well as my colleagues. This semester is filled with transitions from the 18s to the 19s regarding leadership positions. Also, in general the 19s now become the PCVs who have lived in China for a year while the new 20s are still trying to get adjusted to China. There is a lot of emotions and a lot of hopes and dreams for this semester and the upcoming year. I'll have to come back to write about that next time... Just saying that China has been amazing so far and been a true learning experience.