DAY FOUR, PART TWO:

Note: I'm going to just post pieces when I have time. This is the next part of DAY FOUR, but it isn't the rest. Sorry for the wait! I'm getting so far behind!

We started up the Great Wall. And climbed.

And climbed.

And climbed.

And climbed.

And climbed. Until finally we climbed some more. I could go on, but I'm sure you get the picture. You look at the thing and think "Hey, that's not so bad. It's just a bunch of stairs." Hohoho, my friend are you right on the second, but depressingly wrong on the first. It's a enormous, uneven bunch of stairs, and it's anything but "not so bad" as you naively put it (if you did indeed think that). The first bunch wasn't so awful, but unfortunately there were about 50,000 more where that came from. While you contemplate that, I'll tell you something that will disappoint you; you can't actually see the Great Wall from a satellite. It's all a big myth.
We climbers tried to cheer each other up by making light of the situation.
"This isn't so bad," I told Ash, breathing hard, face purple.
"Not at all," she shot back breathlessly. "We could make this a workout routine."
"And one, and step, and two, and step. One more time!" I said with a gasp. I tripped over a slightly taller step.
"We just need some lame music." Suze passed by.
"Hey, Suze, isn't this a piece of cake?"
"Oh, yeah," she responded.
"I mean, I do six of these before breakfast." I could feel my lungs explode.
"Twelve before lunch," she continued my idea weakly.
"A couple before bed to cool down," Ash finished for us. Even the really fit kids in choir were having trouble. I was dying.

We stopped to take a break, and I realized I'd left my water back at the table. I moaned in abject despair. Ann, being in a similar position, moaned as well. "Here," Ash said, "You can share mine. We're only supposed to take little sips." I took as small a sip as my thirsty body would allow and handed it back. Ann took a small sip, and sighed.
"Okay, I'm ready to move on," she said brow furrowed in determination. I nodded as well, too weak to speak because my life-blood was dripping from my pores; that was the only liquid left in my body.

I believe I skim over the part where I nearly died, and the part where Ann dropped to the ground, telling us bravely to go on. I'll skip the part where Ash proclaimed "No one gets left behind!" and urged me to help her carry Ann up to the summit. I'll simply have you picture us all, brows wet with perspiration, shoulders thrown back in victory, and arms in various strong-man poses.

We rested for a little up at the top, and lifted our jubilant voices up to God with the Irish Blessing. It was a moment I'll never forget. Not to mention the view. We wandered around on top for a while feeling like pretty hot stuff, and we saw Camp, ecstatic about being able to juggle on the Great Wall. I took a video of him, and he was happy. And I saw that it was very good.

The way down, unexpectedly, was almost as harrowing as the way up. Because, you see, someone had stolen the bones in the choirs legs. If you just so happen to see someone with a lot of leg bones, report them. I grew more back, but it wasn't fun at all. Ann discovered at the top that she had to pee. I started to go down with her until someone stole my bones, Apparently having to pee makes you invulnerable to such nuances of China. I met up with Jewel and Will. They were holding hands because the bone thief had struck. I told Will (the main victim) that linking arms with both of us would be better, and he listened. We proceeded to go the rest of the way down in that fashion. At one point he felt pretty comfortable and started to take a step without looking. "WILL!!" Jewel and I both yelled. He looked down.
"Oh, Lord." The step was about three feet tall (no joke!). He was a bit more careful after that.
We finally got to the bottom, and I got Edison a shirt that says "I climbed the Great Wall of China." Who cares that he didn't actually do it?