Bike Touring Greater Linfen

I hooked up with this bike touring group through a local bike shop in town. The owner and a girl from the group have been really great to me. I just finished my second trip with them today. Last weekend we bike about 35km (22 miles) north to a town called Hongdong（洪洞）. Today we did about the same distance in the opposite direction to a place called Dingcun (丁村）. This place had a nice little museum about the history and stuff. Biking around has turned out to be great fun, and this group does exactly what I was going to attempt on my own.

The Fen River

The Chinese built a lovely dam across the Fen river to give the allusion that a robust river runs through the town. But in actuality, not to far beyond the last bridge is this dam followed by the bed where the river used to be.





Went on a short bike ride along the Fen river yesterday, after which Linfen is named.

Synchronized Competition

The other week I got a phone call saying one of my afternoon classes was canceled because of some competition. So with no class to teach I thought I'd walk over to the sports field and check it out. Turns out all the freshman were required to compete in this synchronized movement competition. Group after group marched to the center of the field and performed the same movements to the same music counting from 1 to 8. I didn't quite understand the point but I watched a while, said hello to some of my students and went on my way.