Hubei University Day 6

Today we had a pretty easy going day.
The morning began with a great breakfast, and then followed by our last History and Culture class. It was excellent, and became a little heated at times as we discussed Taoism. It was very interesting and it pretty much wore me out...but it was excellent information. The idea from Taoism of "leaving things alone" Zi ran wu wei "nature and inaction" or humans having minimum impact on the natural world, so that nature can take its course, brought up questions from some in our group of when do people step in to help others, say after a natural disaster...etc. It was a lively discussion with some very good ideas and thoughts.
My favorite part of Taoism is Zhong sheng yang sheng "live long but don't age." What an excellent way to view getting older.

I went out on my own during the lunch and rest period today. It was nice to get away and just ride the bus down the street a bit, eat lunch on my own, and I went and bought some Chinese children's books (baby books almost) to help with teaching Chinese speaking basics when I get back to school.

Our afternoon class was our second Chinese Art class. The best part of the art classes has been watching Mr. Hu Zhiyoung painting. He paints a little and then stops...looks at the painting and then waves his hand over the area he's picturing for the next strokes of his brush. It is almost like the wave of the pope when he is blessing someone...it is that sort of motion. He's visualizing what he's about to do. It is great stuff. Today we painted landscapes, mountain landscapes and then a bamboo scene. Mine were a little rough around the edges....but I saved them.

We left class and a small group of us 3 university students and 6 of our group went to see the movie THE RED CLIFF...directed by John Woo. It is about the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history, which was around the time that Caesar was taking over Rome. It was EXCELLENT! It was in Chinese of course, with English subtitles.
We came home and packed for our two nights on the river cruise down the Yangtze!