Rumbling. Excitement.
Intrigued.
Dark. Lights.
Cramped. Imagine. What? How? Where? With? Who? Ahh!
Breakfast. Eye goo.
Ah China!
Curiousity. Crazy. Smog. Pollution.
Landing.
Rumble.
Landing.
Rumble.
Excited! Blurred vision. Unclear. Destination unkown.

New. Overwhelmed.
Where?
Difference. Gap. Reach. Experience. Question. Answer. Learn. Share.
Deep. Find. Explore.
Visual. Express. Gestures. Many gestures.
Involve. Smile. Jump. Break. Enter.
Accomplish.

Lose. Gain. Wonder. Overthink?
Listen.
Utilize.
Appreciate.

Menu. Question? Curious. Surprise.
Generosity. Reserved. Efficient.

Karaoke!
Culture.
Energy.
Laughter.
“Special moment”
Exploration. Reflection.

Oddity.
Look.
Different.
Western.
Intrigued.
History. Culture. Humbling.
Take a look around.
Absorb.
Jump.
Immense.

Fly. Land. Look.
Worlds
Apart
Question?

Apprehensive but excited and intrigued, these, my thoughts as we flew for ten hours towards China. At first, I noticed the differences. Between London and Beijing there is five thousand and fifty-nine miles of difference. The city is vast and its boundaries are undefined. People have so much depth to share through their traditional tales. Places are unfamiliar and the people are diverse, though strangely, I am comforted by the similarity that is around me. Curiosity and kindness is multi-cultural.

BT Tower to CCTV Tower.
Trafalgar Square to Tiananmen Square.
London to Beijing.

One world one dream.

Worlds Apart?

Well we are all back in the UK now. I'm now inundated with work to try and support our attempts to secure various bits and bobs to do with China projects. Fingers crossed that something comes out of all the hard work Roseby has put into this. It was great to see what actually goes on behind the scenes at National Youth Theatre to secure the seasons events. Roseby really does pull everything out of the bag to get external companies, local authorities and government departments on side to enable National Youth Theatre to get maximum exposure.

Now thats enough bigging Roseby up! lol! Now on with the video editing and promo work! Keep your fingers crossed!

Mark.

Ni hao!
im am currently typing from inside our personal karaoke booth listening to the ever so delightful sounds of our very own pete collins, mark beasely and the roseby. I think this whole trip was worth it just to hear them utter oh so sweetly the lyrics i am hearing right now lyrics "i am sixteen going on seventeen...need someone wise to tell me what to do...i want to depend on you". im sure it will forever ring in my ears..thankyou. and oh my oh my - i didnt think it could get any better - pete and roseby have just taken hold of the mike again and are singing "this is my moment, this is my perfect moment with you" - oh wow - i wish you could all be here to share this moment with us right now! the facial expressions, the dulcet tones and sheer sincerity whilst singing have truly made this a night to remember. and now mr martin stirling, inbetween his shout outs of love for his new chinese lady friends, is wowing everyone with his high pitched reverberations. thankyou. and finally the mike has been handed back to our chinese friends - they love their slow paced and what some may call a tad cheesy chinese pop songs. so not much different to a night back home ay? the cheese is indeed a worldwide phenomenen.
So if any of you are wondering why we are at karaoke and not working away - my answer would be because it is friday night and our last night with the guys at CAFA. Its great that we got invited to experience how they have a night out. All I can say is that they love their karaoke - and are always up for a sing song in the confines of the booth. Its real nice to see them all let go and enjoy a bit of a boogie! Refreshingly they do so without any consumption of alchol - usually it would take people a good drink or three to get up and sing in front of people back home.
And now to close the night Mr Fei Jun has taken the stage to sing us what i can only guess to be one of his favourite songs - as the eyelids have shut and the body swaying of everyone has begin. Fei Jun is the man behind the internet gaming/social networking that has swept the world recently - "Second Life". For those who are thinking of getting involved with NYT Digital - you will hear of this programme in times to come..
So until then my friends...

So, we’re in Beijing! After passing smoothly through immigration and jumping in an interestingly overpriced taxi, we arrive at our base for the week, the Westin Beijing.

It’s the final few days of the trip and I think it’s safe to say that all of us have been totally engrossed by the depth of the Chinese people. It is clear that the students that we’ve been working with (which we are now fortunate enough to called our friends) have so much tradition installed in their culture. We have learnt so much from our travels around the city and the discussions at CAFA. The information we have shared, gathered and discussed is all invaluable stimuli for this week and the project ahead.

As we head back to the hotel in the taxi each night, it becomes clear very quickly that the driver is usually lost in both translation and direction. The plus side to this is that it gives us time to reflect upon the days events and appreciate everything we’re experiencing out here. This is a hugely exciting project and I can’t wait to see how we transform this week’s ideas into the end product. The last few days are a busy few. We will be taking the CAFA students’ thoughts onto the streets of Beijing, checking out some of their suggested hot spots and singing our farewells tomorrow night at a Chinese karaoke bar!

As I write this we are flying over St Petersburg, Russia. The time is 21:45 GMT and we are landing in approximately six hours. Myself, Martin, Seda, Peter and Mark all met at Heathrow at 14:00 earlier this afternoon and talked through our expectations of what the far East is all about! Just how great will that wall be?...was food for all out our thoughts for the next ten hours of flying. Our British Airways flight was delayed by over an hour giving us the opportunity to catch-up, get to know each other and begin to video our ideas for work we are to do around Beijing and at CAFA throughout this week. All of these fundamental things form the basis for our cultural exploration! The group has been formed and as we fly to China, all of us are excited to see what cultural exploration is to follow.

An exciting start to an exciting project. Since our arrival we've been trying our best to bridge the language and cultural barrier using some good ole NYT games and loving. We have been working with students from the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) around Beijing playing around with ideas and possibilities. Inevitably there are difficulties with any creative collaboration but it has been highly successful methinks.

Today we experimented with ideas on how to creatively use audience interaction with a film which proved to be very productive. We want to incorporate playful ways in which the an audience in London can interact with an audience in Beijing such as a tug of war game or throwing a ball to each other. We don't have long left but we'll be looking to recruit some more volunteers when we return so if you have any cool ideas or just want to get involved with this project then let us know and keep checking back here for updates. This is a great opportunity to get involved with some of the more innovative projects NYT has tucked up its sleeve and to be a part of the Olympic celebrations in 2008!

It's an amazing experience so here in Beijing. Language barriers are a huge problem but i'm learning new words everyday! Glad I bought a phrase book before I left the UK! Yesterday i took taxi ride by myself. The Taxi driver tried to start a conversation with me but it kinda fell flat after Hello! lol.

Today myself and Peter went to an electrical market, which was basically 6 stories of small electrical stores, all after our business. As we walked in we were mobbed by about 30 - 40 people all shouting at us and trying to get us to go to their stall. No one spoke English. It reminded us both of the market scene in Jesus Christ Superstar! (How theatrically minded are we?! lol) We eventually managed to communicate what we wanted and were whisked away by a man to the 12th floor of this building and told to sit down! A lady then emerged who spoke fantastic English. We then had to barter them down in price to get what we wanted. Contrary to belief, electrical goods aren't all that much cheaper over here. There was some strange satisfaction about knocking them down in price. I can imagine how easy it is to be ripped off. We were lucky that we were warned before we went and prepared ourselves.

We are now back at CAFA (Central Academy of Fine Arts) trying to sort out the way forward with the project and beyond.

Mark.

So we are in Beijing. Can we believe it? Not yet no. Since we've landed in China we have already experienced many a thing and have quickly picked up the cultural differences and similarites. We experienced the local cuisine on our first night - which set us back 5 pounds - for 5 people - and we couldnt even finish our plates.

So onto things more creative - today was our first full day at CAFA with our new Chinese chums. For the first half of the afternoon Andy, Martin and myself flipped through a book of Chinese characters, picking out the ones that appealed to us the most. Of course we had no idea of the meanings at the time, but it was really intresting to see the origin and evolution of each symbol-as most of the characters began as almost mini drawings for that action/object. It was little crazy that we all inadvertantly chose Chinese characters that provided us with an action (stab) , location (forest) and time (New year's eve). Theatre students...

-Seda