Last night, when in the middle of prepping for a dinner party, my friend suggested to me that I join him for a breakfast meeting on the following morning, I (foolishly?) agreed. After all, I had been trying to schedule a meeting with these guys for more than a week… logical, right?

Well, I wasn’t agreeing with myself very much when I woke up this morning a mere 4 hours after going to sleep (it was a great dinner party, and no, not just because I’m a fantastic cook, it was mostly because of the great friends who came along). One look outside made me regret my decision entirely, but, I figured that it’d be better to get the meeting out of the way and know once and for all if I were working on an upcoming project or not.

Actually, even though transportation the whole day was awful, the meeting was great (I’m officially working on the parade for the Inner Mongolia Pavilion for the World Expo in Shanghai this May!).

As an added bonus, I wandered over with my friend to the Beijing Exhibition Center to check out the amusement park convention. The snow-covered theme park rides out front were frankly quite creepy, but I had enormous fun playing with the various toys and games inside. Definitely a good way to pass a Sunday morning

Mind you, I spent most of the afternoon napping/watching Grey’s Anatomy and The Mentalist (my two current tv show favs, but thats mostly since Fringe hasn’t started in on the next season yet). And I even feel vaguely productive as I’ve mostly prepped for the press event tomorrow at Huatuo (my first as the VP on International Affairs!). Is it a good thing that my life makes me giggle at the ridiculousness of it all?

Good night everyone… I need more sleep!

~ Elyse 柳素英

This has been a crazy week, time has flown by faster than ever, and yet I feel like I haven’t gotten half of what I needed to do done.

As you may have previously noted, I’ve started work on a new play, SanYuanSe (there will be a Chinese and English version) and also I’ve started up recording shows at CRI again for my Laowai Kandian program. All of this whilst balancing the responsibilities I have for this consulting gig I’ve picked up. Eep! … However, there’s some great events on tonight, which I’m sure will help me get over my work-related guilt (see below)

In the meanwhile, Cheeky Monkey is proud to welcome the newest member of our staff, The Intern Viola, who will be working with Cheeky Monkey thru the Summer. Yay! Ok, now to run home to get changed into a cute qipao or something. Zaijian!

~ Elyse 柳素英

TONIGHT: International Women’s Day 2010 Benefiting the China Education Initiative
Mentoring Future Women Leaders Friday, March 12, 2010 7:30pm | Yishu 8 (Tel: 6581-9058, map attached) 200 RMB Beijing, China 2010年国际妇女节 美丽中国基金会赞助 2010年3月12号（星期五）晚7:30点 艺术8 北京朝阳区建国路郎家园8号尚8创意产业园 (电话: 6581-9058) www.intlwomensday.org

3月12日晚10点！就在今晚！

唐会迷城期待您的光临！

我们诚挚地邀请您和您的朋友参加唐会迷城俱乐部重装开业大型派对！

大牌国外乐团F4Ache现场为您演奏funk、嘻哈、雷鬼、拉丁音乐。唐会迷城俱乐部邀请您亲临派对现场，开怀畅饮！我们可以免费提供2杯酒水，免门票。音乐与美酒令您陶醉其中，流连忘返！

Tang invites! Mar. 12, 2010!

Tang club together with you！
COORDIALLY INVITES YOU AND YOUR FRIENDS TO THE GRAND RE-OPPENING OF
TANG CLUB.

The biggest party in Beijing!Huge concert of foreign F4 band playing Funk, Hip Hop,Regaetton, Latin music. Tang club invites to cheer two free drinks and enjoy the party!!!!

Chaoyang Park west gate Block 8 Tang Club
朝阳公园西门八号公馆
唐会迷城俱乐部

This past weekend, I had the wonderful opportunity to spend some quality time with some good female friends of mine and to expose myself to some fantastic feminine art at the YuanFen New Media Art exhibit up in 798, The Secret Language of Women.

A fantastic exhibit, definitely worth making the effort to go over and check out. 798 is a bit of a hike from the rest of the city, but now that the weather is warming up, its a pleasant way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

After enjoying the art and wine, we ended up sitting down at the Cave Cafe and spent most of the rest of the afternoon chatting away happily over our cafe lattes…

Jessica Du (pictured right) is a fabulous girl that I met last year during a fun photo-journalism project with China.org.cn Bringing in the Niu Year at a Temple Fair thanks to a fellow tarheel Celine Chen. Since that fateful day, lots of great collaborative projects have happened Jessica was also one of the models for the Kung Pao Shakespeare T-Shirts, and more recently has joined up with Cheeky Monkey Mandarin Improv, thus becoming an essentially part of my posse

Another great lady of the Beijing social scene worth mentioning, Sarah Hansen (pictured below) was also a great addition to the afternoon. I met her, incidentally, with the Beijing artWALK a couple years ago (really wish we could bring that back!). With her fashion industry background and sharp humor, the afternoon was spent in a savignon blanc induced haze of conversation on careers, faith, men, biological time bombs and self-mockery.

I blame the great multi-media art works from YuanFen, as they inspired the wackiness of the conversation, and of course 798 for the artsy vibes, ha. Its also great to have so many different perspectives at one table.

And the timeliness of the topics at hand was of course lost on no one, as International Women’s Day is an official holiday in China (unlike in America, irony much?) and there’s a lot to say about how far women have come, and how far we have to go (and men along with us!). On that note: there’s some great articles that I’ve linked below, hope everyone (both men and women!) had a good time on Women’s Day

~ Elyse 柳素英

International Women’s Day Website

A good article in the HuffPost about laws and legislation on women’s rights…
Huffington Post: Women’s Rights: A Matter of Peace and Stability

A great note from a self-entitled feminist man (further evidence that Cory Doctorow rocks!)
Happy Women’s Day from BoingBoing.net

Cheesy humor aside… Happy Women’s Day folks! 女人节快乐！

1/2 a bottle of Xanadu white wine from The Wine Republic
a whole bag of Pepperidge Farm orange Milano cookies
fantastic piano riffs blasting away on my stereo
and working on a new play script for 3 hours in a row…

… had to film it, worried the muse would be gone by morning.

Its a beautiful day in Beijing, and I’m happy to announce that the Virtual Playbill from the ShiFen Theater Festival’s February 2010 performance is now up online: http://www.cheekymonkeytheater.com/shifen/shifen2010/shifen.html
北京的气温已经逐渐变暖，十分戏剧节2010年2月份的所有演出信息和电子节目单也已经发布在我们的网站，大家想了解更多的信息，请登录：http://www.cheekymonkeytheater.com/shifen/shifen2010/shifen.html

Thanks to a couple of folks who had cameras on hand at the event, we’ve got some great photos to share with you as well.
Another big thank you goes out to the volunteers and performers who made the night such a success.
非常感谢一直全程跟踪拍摄的媒体，拍摄了非常多的照片与大家分享，也非常感谢现场的表演者和志愿者，成功的演出谢幕与每一个参与者都密不可分

And of course, none of this would have been possible without the support of the community (that means you!) and the local businesses who donated the wonderful raffle prizes.
I’d like to give another shoutout to Penghao Theater, The Wine Republic, Fubar, Cando360.com, Plastered 8 T-Shirts, Greening the Beige, Capital M, Maison Boulud, China Travel 2.0, Kocoon Spa, Beijing Postcards and The Global Times.
当然，没有北京的各大媒体宣传支持以及赞助我们抽奖活动的很多团体公司的支持，我们不可能取得如此成功，在此我们也要非常感谢蓬蒿剧场、宽度网、云门酒业、创可贴、北京明信片、中国旅游2.0、福吧、废成绿、环球时报等媒体、团体、网站的大力支持

If you are interested in volunteering, performing, sponsoring or being involved in next year’s festival, please email me
如果你有兴趣参加明年的十分戏剧节，志愿者、表演、赞助以及媒体宣传，请发给我们电子邮件

Cheeky Monkey’s got some great shows in the works for the next six months, so I hope to see you there!
顽皮猴子在以后的6个月内有更多更好的演出节目信息。希望在那时可以看到你

~ Elyse Ribbons 柳素英
Cheeky Monkey Theater Productions

http://www.cheekymonkeytheater.com/shifen/shifen2010/shifen.html

Yes, its a beautiful thing indeed to see that stereotypes can transcend cultures in such a colorful way… these delightfully tasty fried noodle snacks are flavored with real Mexicans (or so the packaging would have you believe). Either way, cutesy sombrero and dancing cactus aside, this is thus far one of the few Wacky Chinese Products that I’ve really enjoyed trying.

***

and in other news: it looks like I’m not the only one with this weird desire to try things wacky-flavored. Thanks to Boingboing.net for introducing me to the wonderful world of Kit Kat Flavors.

I knew that there were wacky Kit Kat flavors (its common to see milk, melon and strawberry variations here in Beijing) but to know that I’m not the only one that suffers from this disease for actually wanting to try them *all* well, thanks guys!

~ Elyse

Wacky Chinese Products: Lay’s Kiwi Flavor (chips)
Wacky Chinese Products: Maple’s Love (beverage)

This month, ChocoJing is very happy to bring in the Year of the Tiger with an evening of chocolate-making that will leave you giddy (from both the truffles and the chocolate liquors, hehe). And, as per usual, there is a limit to the number of participants, 20 at the most, so please RSVP to reserve a space!

Lin Zhong of The Fig Tree has kindly invited ChocoJing to have a private class and learn how to make chocolate truffles from scratch!

Weds March 10th @ 7:30pm
. 3月10日 @ 7:30
ChaoWai SOHO Bldg A Unit 702 #6B
朝外SOHO A座 7F 702室
Please RSVP to confirm!
chocojing@iheartbeijing.com

.

本月巧克京欣喜地带来虎年令人眼花缭乱的巧克力制作之夜(从truffles*面饼和巧克力酒, 呵呵). 同以往一样, 参加人数有限, 为20人, 请回复以便预定位置!

The Fig Tree的Lin Zhong诚邀巧克京参加一项私人课程, 从开始阶段学习制作巧克力面饼! 课程成本为100元, 此举无异于”窃”! (这个价钱你根本无法从别处尝到新鲜的面饼!) : )

~ Elyse 柳素英

***
and in other news, Oprah (obviously a ChocoJinger at heart) had her entire set recreated in chocolate a couple weeks ago… evidently Godiva sponsored this undertaking… I wonder if maybe they’d be interested in sponsoring a ChocoJing some day…? Either way, just thought I’d share that I’m not the only chocolate-fiend out there, hehe.