I’m sure most parents have heard from their kids by now, but just as a very quick update, we’re back at Cornell! Yay!

Just a quick update for anxious parents… we landed in Vancouver and we’ll soon be on our way to New York.

There’s a bit of a layover because they’re cleaning the plane for the last leg of the journey, but we should be on our way by 3:50pm EST.

If you’d like to know more precisely when our plane will get there, check out the following website:

 http://www.flightstats.com/go/FlightStatus/flightStatusByFlight.do?&id=121953600&airlineCode=CX&flightNumber=888

We’ve finally arrived at the last day of tour. All that’s left for us here is the end-of-tour group dinner.

There are many many stories to tell that have not been posted yet, and some of them will be posted after we get back from tour (I’ve been promised quite a few blog posts… we’ll see how many come through).

In the interim, here are some videos I posted to Google Video from different places on tour:

• Singing “All My Trials” on the Great Wall
• Playing hand games with Chinese students
• In a taxi on the streets of Shanghai

Abe Cantwell ‘10 (Bass 1) is currently acting as our recording engineer on the tour. Last Sunday, the Chorus and Glee Club sang at the Centennial Hall in “Beida” (the Chinese nickname for Beijing University), and Abe recorded our performance. Here is some of what he recorded:

• 01 - Hebrew Songs
• 02 - This is the Day
• 03 - O Danny Boy
• 04 - Ave Maria
• 05 - Chen Yi Folk Songs
• 06 - All My Trials

We set out for the Great Wall on Monday, early in the morning. The three hour bus ride was more exciting than planned — apparently, road lines separating us from oncoming traffic are merely suggestions in China. Cars, buses, and trucks all pass each other frequently, even when it doesn’t seem safe to do so.

We finally arrived around 11am, and the weather was gorgeous. The sun was out and there was a cool breeze blowing through the air. Seriously, a perfect day.

We hiked up a path to the Great Wall and then hiked up the Great Wall itself for about a half a mile. I chose to do my hiking without shoes, which I would highly recommend. The feeling of those cool, yellow, really old bricks under my feet is one I will never forget.

The steps on the wall were really small, and climbing them was not easy. Other sections were smooth inclines, which was a bit easier to walk.

I finished my upward hike to find some Glee Clubbers and Chorus women in a circle singing “All My Trials,” an American spiritual that is part of our tour repertoire. All of us were proud to be standing on that wall, bringing our music to the other side of the world.

I stood on top of one of the towers, and I stared off into the distance at the Great Wall, which stretched endlessly through the mountains around me. I thought back to when I was about six and I would dig holes at the Jersey shore with my family, hoping that if I dug deep enough, I’d eventually reach China. Well, a decade and a half later and I have finally made it. So to all the kids out there, if digging doesn’t work, learn to sing.

Aaron Rubin ‘08
Vice President Emeritus

So the “Day 1″ Beijing post was rather misleading, it seems, as we have definitely not been posting daily. But here we are again, with any delay due only to our touring schedule, not to problems accessing the Internet.

Since the last post, we’ve given three concerts, walked on the Great Wall, toured Hangzhou (near Shanghai), seen Buddhist temples, gone on an 11.5 hour train ride, and been on buses for far too long. You can see why the blog hasn’t been updated frequently.

We’ve now been in Shanghai for a full day. Last night (Tuesday), we gave a concert at the Weiyu High School. It was actually very nice — their choir sang to us before we performed for them, and it was really informal. Plus, we got to hear Tucker try to speak in Mandarin.

Today was even better. We had no concert or rehearsal, so we actually had time to explore and rest. We spent the day in Hangzhou.

First, we toured the Linyin Buddhist temple, which was a collected of several different buildings on multiple levels within a huge park-like area. Outside each building were places to burn incense, and many people were doing so, performing some sort of ritual.

Next we had some free time for lunch. I grabbed a huge bowl of beef noodles and a drink for 12 yuan (that’s less than $2!). After eating, most people went shopping a little bit, but we were somewhat pressed for time.

Then was a boat ride on West Lake (still in Hangzhou). The tour guide said a few things about the different places around the lake, but most seemed content just to enjoy the ride rather than worry about listening to such information.

After the boat ride, we stopped at a town which was known for its tea. Everyone participated in some tea tasting. As part of the tasting, the “hosts” spent around 30 minutes convincing us that the tea was very good quality, giving out cups of it and speaking to its health benefits and so forth. Then, of course, they sold it to us (quite successfully, I might add).

Lastly was dinner. As seems to be customary in Chinese restaurants, the dinner was split into many different dishes which were set out for each table throughout the night. The foods are placed onto a table which is spun to pass food from one person to another. Highlights of this particular dinner included congratulating those who have birthdays throughout the tour.

So, hopefully I’ll post daily from now on, but no promises or anything. Video on the blog itself seems rather unlikely because the video we’ve been taking has been mostly short clips, which are no good unless strung together into something mildly entertaining. Hooowwweevveerrrr, you can check out some of the pictures we’ve taken here:

Me (Mark Thomas ‘10): http://flickr.com/photos/kramtark/sets/72157604166092733/

Abe Cantwell ‘10: http://picasaweb.google.com/cantabe/China

Enjoy.

After just arriving in Beijing, we made our first debut on American soil at the U.S. embassy. Due to limited space, only a small subset of the choir attended, composed of twenty seniors.

We made it through security and were greeted by the Ambassador’s fuzzy friend, Whiskey. They assured us that he was very friendly, but somehow his muzzle didn’t convince me.

Inside, the walls were decorated with simple but elegant art and pictures of President George W. Bush could be found at every turn. The Ambassador was actually the college roommate of President Bush, but he didn’t share any good ol’ college stories with us!

The Ambassador welcomed us with a short address and introduced his home as not the most elegant residences in the world but one rooted in history. About thirty-five guests arrived–mostly people involved with the U.S. foreign service or members of the Cornell Club of Beijing. We shared a short program of our joint repertoire and, of course, come Cornell songs, hopefully bringing some warm memories of The Hill back to the alumni in the crowd.

After our performance, they pulled sliding doors back to reveal a beautiful spread of both Eastern and Western foods, including hot dogs, chili, noodle dishes, salad, and apple bars. We mingled over food and wine, captivated by the stories of many who had traveled the world with the U.S. foreign service.

It was also interesting to hear about Beijing from the perspective of Americans who bike to work each day through sand storms, pollution, and heavy, aggressive traffic. They all described their time in the city with a sparkle in their eyes.

I was especially excited to meet a 1979 Cornell alumna who sang with the Chorus for four years. “We toured Washington, D.C. and Montreal. No Beijing though!” she said, “Beijing is such a wonderful place to be. It’s always changing, always things happening.” Part of the Cornell Club in Beijing, she considers the time she had spent with the Chorus precious.

Even though it was only our first full day in China, our schedule was packed. Wake-up call for us was at 9am Friday (that’s 9pm Thursday for anyone reading this from New York), and we left the hotel at 10.

Our buses took us to see The Temple of Heaven, a huge area with an impressive temple and interesting architecture. It was built in 1420. The main architectural marvel was known as the Altar of Prayer for Good Harvests, a 3-roofed building atop three levels of huge marble stones.

After viewing that first altar, we were given a short lesson in Tai Chi. We learned just some basic rules and moves, including six different forms. It’s hard to describe, but pictures and video were taken, sooo as soon as we’ve got some time I’m sure that’ll be up.

There was also the Circular Mount Altar, where apparently the emperor of that time prayed to heaven. At the center/top of the Circular Mount Altar was a stone known as the Center of Heaven stone (supposed to lie at, you guessed it, the center of heaven). If you stand on the stone and talk loudly, your voice will echo because of the way the altar was constructed.

We then left the Temple of Heaven for lunch, after which we visited an older section of Beijing to see some of the architecture and so forth. After that was an early dinner (which took us all off guard given our lunch only a couple hours before).

Finally, we went to rehearse the Brahms with members of the International Festival Chorus (IFC) of Beijing. The rehearsal lasted 3 hours. It was a lot fun to sing with a bunch of people who live in Beijing. Most, if not all, members of the IFC spoke English as well, and it was nice to be able to converse about Beijing and so forth.

Tomorrow we wake up pretty early (7:45am) so we can leave at 8:30 for a dress rehearsal in the morning.

We made it! The entire China Tour group had arrived in Beijing at last, after several years of planning and much rehearsal.

The trip to China was a long one. The majority of the group left from Cornell at 12:30pm (EST) on Tuesday. We started with a bus ride to JFK in New York City, which took 6 hours. Then was the flight from JFK to Vancouver, which was another 6 hours. From there, it was across the Pacific to Hong Kong — 12 hours. Finally, we flew from Hong Kong to Beijing, which was a final 3-hour flight. All told, that’s 25 hours of travel time, not including layovers!

Time-zone-wise, we are now 12 hours ahead of New York, since we crossed the international date line. This is absolutely the most difficult time-zone transition possible, and it will be very interesting to see how this affects our performances in the coming days.

A bunch of us have already taken tons of video and photos, and they will probably be posted/linked to as soon as we have some time to process them.

 [Ed.: This post is from a little while back, and was also included in the fall 2007 Glee Club and Chorus newsletters.]

A nine-day all-expenses-paid trip to China. What better way to end the summer before starting my second year in the D.M.A. program, right? Mind you, my summer was winding down just fine, as I hung out with family on the shores of Otsego Lake in Cooperstown and took in the season at Glimmerglass Opera. But duty called …. yet another fine example and all.

So, to the skies I took. For a long, long flight. Eastern China is literally halfway round the world – twelve time zones — from our East Coast (but you probably knew that). Fifteen hours after take-off from Newark, we began our descent into Beijing. I looked for the Great Wall on the way down, to no avail. That bit about its being visible from space is a myth, it turns out, and maybe I was looking in the wrong direction (which can happen when you fly over the North Pole and what was north all of a sudden becomes south).

My travel partner, Wei-Li Woo (’08 member of the Chorus, and head of the China Tour Team), arrived an hour later from Chicago. And right on cue, Glee Club President Matt Perkins, in Beijing on a summer internship with G.E., showed up at the airport entrance and ushered us to the taxi stand. It was then that I got my first taste of Beijing’s code of the street, which as far as I could tell is, “Do anything you can get away with.” Manhattan taxi drivers would be no match for even the most cautious of Beijing motorists.

I’ll be honest: Those first four days in Beijing were trying. Lots of meetings, not all of them fruitful. Lots of harrowing cab-rides. (Note to parents: Your children will be safely ensconced on large modern buses during the tour.) Some “interesting” hotel inspections (I don’t think we’ll be staying at the place where the bathroom and the shower were exactly co-extensive, the drain being on the floor next to the toilet). And above all, the crush of 14.5 million people. There was a moment, on about the third day, when I wondered whether the tour would be worth all our efforts. But then I saw Tiananmen Square, and the stunning concert hall in the Forbidden City where we’ll perform the Brahms Requiem. And I suddenly realized what an amazing and important experience this trip will be for the Glee Club and Chorus.

From that point on, I only felt excitement about what we’re planning. Wei-Li and I took the 12-hour overnight train trip from Beijing to Shanghai, just as the choirs will next March. Shanghai is every bit as miraculous as the tour books proclaimed. And the Oriental Arts Center, where we’ll give our second performance of the Brahms, rivals Frank Gehry’s Disney Hall (in Los Angeles) in architectural and acoustical splendor.

Last stop, Hong Kong – the perfect place to wrap up the tour. Vibrant. Picturesque. And home to a very active Cornell Club that is already hard at work to support our visit.

Three performances of the Brahms. Several concerts/workshops with high schools and universities. And a trip to the Great Wall that I couldn’t see from the sky, in a country so fantastically different from our own.

I can hardly wait.