Eating Scorpions

Here's the first of many videos that I'll be uploading to YouTube.

This video is of Hannah and I eating scorpions in a food market in Beijing! The scorpions were put live on a stick, then fried in grease and oil. They tasted like greasy peanuts!

Eating Scorpions

The Wandering Man (Jason Skinner)

Hey All, I was having a latte before dinner, and as I sat outside across the street from our hotel, I wrote a brief tale about a wandering man. Inspired by Chinese folklore, and in response to the rest of the group giving me crap about my dirty feet (I've been wearing the same pair of $2 flip flops the whole time in China), I decided to write a classic short story. The story relates to my relationship with the natural world; I read to the group this story before we ate dinner and dedicated it to one of my greater friends, Jake Lau, because I wrote it on his birthday.


I have on my mind a story of man, similar to me, who sought the world beyond the trees; through the greatest woods he would travel, if it were not for the unbearable essence of the forest spirit that burned his feet. The young man needed only a thin layer of protection beneath his toes to protect his soul from being blinded by the forest spirit.
The young man asked the prairie and the young man asked the sea for something to nourish his soul and shield his toes, something so thin it wouldn’t weigh him down during his travels. The sea knew of no such item, as all of its visitors preferred the salts of the sea to bless their soles. The prairie, confused, did not understand why any creature would want to distance himself from the very soil he arose from. Still, without his answer, the young man walked to the horizon to ask the mountains.
Unfamiliar with the ways of the woods, the mountains had no advice for the man; however, to show appreciation for the man’s determination, the mountains offered the young man a pair of sandals to slip his toes into and protect his feet from the sharp and jagged cliffs – for the climb down was not an easy one.
Upon returning to the forest, the young man discovered his feet no longer burned, but were instead warmed from the floor beneath him. And so, as long as the sun and the moon continued to nourish the Earth, the warmth of the sandals brought comfort to the young man as he wandered through the woods in the world beyond the trees.

Great Wall of China

Today Hannah, Alli, and Colin went to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. What a view! The section was recommended to us by some folks who we met the night we got into Beijing on our way to the hostel we are staying at- the biggest selling point being that it was less crowded, which was great. The weather was very clear and refreshingly cool- great for taking photos. We took a ski lift up and rode an alpine slide back down for lunch at a local cafe.

After a 2 hour ride back to Beijing we went for a walk down Wangfujing Street and encountered none other than a guy selling scorpions to eat. Being the careful eaters they are, Hannah and Alli of course said heck yes. The scorpions came four to a stick and were alive before the vendor ended their squirming lives in a deep fryer. After making the vendor take the first bite, Hannah and Alli dug in as a small crowd watched on. They were crunchy.