[:en]Nothing is too bizarre in the world. I have never had such an experience in the school until last Thursday afternoon. Around 2:30. I was grading student’s assignments when one of my senior students ran into the classroom, urging me to go to help her math teacher immediately. I asked her what kind of the emergency it was, she waved her hands in the air, trying to describe her math’s acute back pains. The math teacher and I both share several IB students in different class periods. When our students saw him suffering from the back pains so badly, they all recommended that he ask for my help. So the math teacher sent this student to my room (forgot that she just had a foot surgery a few weeks ago, still had to hop on one leg without the clutches) After she finished the story, I picked up my backpack (I always keep the slapper and other tools in it) and wasted no time, went downstairs with her.

The students were doing the math problems, they giggled when they saw me entering the classroom. The math teacher (Robert) was not standing or sitting there to teach, instead, he was lying on the floor on his belly with the four limbs of body spreading out like a tortoise. I quickly knelt down next to him, pulled up his clothes, and asked him if I could press a few acupoints along his spines and on his hips. Before I started to do anything on him, he checked with me if he should peel off the pain relief patch that he had on the lower back. I said yes. While he was doing so, he told me that his lower back pain started right after he felt a sudden sharp pain shooting up from his right leg last weekend when he took his daughter out for a walk.  The pain became worse each day. It was so painful today that he could not stand on his feet. That is why that by the end of the day, he was totally “knocked down” to the floor. I recalled that Dr. Zhang Zaohan’s original-points therapy could be very effective in treating such acute pain. So I decided to try the original-points therapy first before any paida and lajin. I knelt on the floor again, bent my elbow, and started to press the original points on his lower back and hips from the both sides of his body. He was quiet when I worked along his spines, but he burst into a loud scream when I pushed and pressed several points on his hips, especially on the one point so-called Huantiao (literally means “Jumping Round”). Students were amused not only by their math teacher’s scream, but also by his spreading arms and legs which made him look like a flying bird. I stared at them and made sure that they understood that no one in the room should take any photos and then put them onto Facebook to make fun of their teachers.

To save some time, I asked two male students to kneel down next to their teacher, to slap his both knee pits. But the bell rang shortly after, so I took over the Paida job, dismissed the class. Seeing very few marks appeared on his skin, I told Robert to stand up so that I could slap his legs from different angels. I was hoping that the Sha would come out quickly. He was back on his feet skeptically, but suddenly he smiled at me and said, “Amazing, I had to roll and crawl out of the ground all day long, but didn’t you see just now? I was back up like that, I can’t believe it.” “Your both knee caps must have been hurting from hitting the hard floor when you were on your tummy like that. I couldn’t slap too hard. Now that you’re standing up, I am expecting to see more Sha coming out soon if I hit harder. Do you trust me?” “No problem, go ahead and do whatever you think it works. I don’t want to make an appointment with either chiropractic, acupuncturist or family doctor. I just want a quick pain relief.” He assured me. Just in a minutes, under his red skin, surged some “blueberries.” I took the slapper out of my backpack, hit his both leg’s back and sides even harder. Soon, his legs were covered with dark purple “grape shaped” Sha. The bumps on the swollen skin made it look more like the skin of a toad. He looked down over his own shoulder, watching how I got those mysterious Sha out of his body. “Don’t worry!” I assured him that he wasn’t bleeding. There were no ruptures of capillary blood vessels through this kind of good-will Paida action. I invited him to join us for the next day (Friday) after school presentation to learn more about the self-healing theories. He was interested, but the family duty called. So I promised that I would send him some files emails to get him started on learning this self-healing method. Before I left his room, I didn’t forget to show him how to do the reclining positioned Lajin (stretching) by using two desks against the wall. He tried the both legs before taking off to pick up the kid. “Thank you so much! I can’t tell you how relieved my lower back is. I feel like that I am walking on the clouds.” My heart almost flew out of my mouth, but I had to remain calm, “You are very welcome. Paida & Lajin are easy to learn, but difficult to master them. We didn’t have much time today. I wasn’t able to Paida you long enough. Although I freed you from the acute pain for the time being, the problems are still there. In order to get rid of the lower back pain completely, you need to practice Paida and/or Lajin for a long time, and to improve your body conditions by increasing more positive Qi inside. Tonight at home, you can try the stretching first.” He nodded.

The next day (Friday, yesterday), stories went on even more interesting. Early in the morning before the school started, I emailed Robert a handbook of Paida Lajin Self-Healing. He replied me right the way, telling me that he felt much better after getting home. He tried the Lajin stretching a little bit, but didn’t feel the same effectiveness as I showed him in his classroom. After getting up this morning, he felt some stiffness in his body. I emailed him back, “People who have bad back need to sleep on the hard surface bed or hardest mattress.” He sent me a short message that he was already sleeping on the hardest mattress since the back problems.

A few minutes passed 8:00 a.m., while I was teaching the class, our IB program coordinator Kathy (she attended Master Xiao’s seminar at Harrisburg last September) popped her head at my door, showing Robert where my classroom was. I arranged the students to do some reading first before I helped him to stretch on my Lajin bench. I set the timer for 5 minutes. He began to scream in less than 2 minutes. I was going to make him to finish the 5 minutes without mercy, seeing his face become deformed by the torture, I encouraged him to complete at least 3 minutes. He bit his lips tightly, agreed with big gasps. After I removed the ankle weights and set him free from the bench, he told me that his head was starting to ache. Meantime, he was very embarrassed for acting like a cry baby when he was on the bench. I comforted him, “Don’t worry. It is quite common for people like to feel the extreme pain on the pain. At least you know what your current limit is. The huge pain you felt on the bench was caused by the severe tightened tendons. Given some practice, you will be loosen up a lot more, then you will notice the improvement on the conditions of your lower back.” Regardless of how painful his first leg felt, Robert tried the other leg for about 3 minutes before he left my room.

Almost 1:00 p.m., I was about to teach my IB class, when a special education aid teacher (Mary) showed up at my door. She asked me if she could attend the self-healing presentation after school. “Of course, welcome!” I was happy to know that she wanted to come even she was not on my initial mailing list. She then told me that she had a stiff neck, very painful. Cheryl (her colleague from the same department) told her that I might have the ways to make her feel better. I showed her to sit down, massaged her shoulders for a short time to loosen up her stiffness. One student made fun of us, “Luo laoshi, this classroom is now turning into a clinic.” As soon as the bell rang, Mary stood up and left the room so that I could teach. After that class, around 1:30 in the afternoon, I had an artist visitor coming from Beijing, who was going back to China, and teach at a village school in the mountains as a volunteer for a month. She wanted to have a tour on our school so that she could introduce the American school system to that remote Chinese school. We stopped in front of our student store first. Some passersby waited there politely until we finished our video recording. Among them was our assistant principal Mr. Martin.  I introduced Jiahe to Mr. Martin, explained why she was here. He welcomed her and hoped she had a good tour in our school. Then out of nowhere, he looked me and said, “If I have lower back pain next time, please don’t hit me like that.” I was completely lost at the beginning, then suddenly I realized that he must have seen the bruises on Robert’s legs. So I joked, “Hay, Paida and Lajin are an easy fix, you know. If you are a real man, be a Man!” (my mind was drifting to the Mulan song “Be a Man” that our Chinese level IV class performed for this year’s Chinese New Year when I said “be a man.”) He could not help laughing out loud, pushed the doors and disappeared in the guidance office.

I then showed Jiahe around the first floor of our school, which included the gyms, indoor swimming pool, dining hall, arts rooms, auditorium, library, etc. Robert’s math classroom happens to be on the first floor. I thought it might be a good idea for her to take a few video clips or photos in a real classroom, so I opened his door. Same time the day before, he was on the floor groaning; now he was on his feet playing card games with a group of students. Robert was surprised to see us, (believe it or not, although we work in the same building, we merely see each other, 2-3 times a year in average. In the past two days, we have already seen each other three times!) He walked up to greet us. They had a little nice chat about what the math problems on the board were, and what the class was doing at the moment. Jiahe listened to him with great interests. Suddenly, she raised her camera and took a picture on the wall clock. I had never noticed until then that the hours on the clock were actually formulas of different math problems. Very unique indeed, first time for me too. While Robert walked us out his classroom, he said to me with a little hesitation, “I am sorry that I didn’t ask for your permission earlier, but I told many people how you treated my back yesterday. Later, when I thought about it, I didn’t feel it was right to do so.” I smiled at him, “I don’t mind at all. Actually the more people you talk to, the better. You are promoting this method. It is my turn to say thank-you.” He was very much relieved, couldn’t wait to tell me more. “I showed people my legs (I figured he must have done so because in my 7th period class, our mutual students told me that their English teacher (in 6th period) told them that the math teacher was beaten up by the Chinese teacher, and it also explained why Mr. Martin made fun of me just now) ; today during the lunch, some of my colleagues made a comment that Robert was finally back (I guess he was pretty out of shape in the past a few days, people were happy to see his spirit returned.)

It was 3:00 p.m., school was over. I was waiting for some people to show up for our first self-healing presentation, when Robert appeared unexpectedly.

“Don’t you need to go home and pick up the kid?”

“Sorry I can’t stay. But I still have a few minutes to spare before I leave. I want to do the stretching again. I was in such poor performance this morning…”

Robert lay down on the bench, allowed me to put the ankle weights on the both legs. He survived three minutes for each leg with great effort. He felt the headache again, but was able to calm it down by regulating his breathing. Before he left, Robert was curious to know where I bought the ginger dates tea that I gave him to drink this morning. I told him that I didn’t buy it, but made it at home. I then promised him that I would share the recipe with him later.

Three female teachers came to my room for the presentation. Mary was one of them. Because I was in a hurry to go to my son’s weekend’s camp, we didn’t finish the talk within an hour, which was more theories than actions. I hope we could do the similar activities in the future more often. They were very thankful that I spent time explaining things to them – It makes a lot of sense! They kept saying.

(to be continued)

[:zh]

 

Nothing is too bizarre in the world. I have never had such an experience in the school until last Thursday afternoon. Around 2:30. I was grading student’s assignments when one of my senior students ran into the classroom, urging me to go to help her math teacher immediately. I asked her what kind of the emergency it was, she waved her hands in the air, trying to describe her math’s acute back pains. The math teacher and I both share several IB students in different class periods. When our students saw him suffering from the back pains so badly, they all recommended that he ask for my help. So the math teacher sent this student to my room (forgot that she just had a foot surgery a few weeks ago, still had to hop on one leg without the clutches) After she finished the story, I picked up my backpack (I always keep the slapper and other tools in it) and wasted no time, went downstairs with her.

 

The students were doing the math problems, they giggled when they saw me entering the classroom. The math teacher (Robert) was not standing or sitting there to teach, instead, he was lying on the floor on his belly with the four limbs of body spreading out like a tortoise. I quickly knelt down next to him, pulled up his clothes, and asked him if I could press a few acupoints along his spines and on his hips. Before I started to do anything on him, he checked with me if he should peel off the pain relief patch that he had on the lower back. I said yes. While he was doing so, he told me that his lower back pain started right after he felt a sudden sharp pain shooting up from his right leg last weekend when he took his daughter out for a walk.  The pain became worse each day. It was so painful today that he could not stand on his feet. That is why that by the end of the day, he was totally “knocked down” to the floor. I recalled that Dr. Zhang Zaohan’s original-points therapy could be very effective in treating such acute pain. So I decided to try the original-points therapy first before any paida and lajin. I knelt on the floor again, bent my elbow, and started to press the original points on his lower back and hips from the both sides of his body. He was quiet when I worked along his spines, but he burst into a loud scream when I pushed and pressed several points on his hips, especially on the one point so-called Huantiao (literally means “Jumping Round”). Students were amused not only by their math teacher’s scream, but also by his spreading arms and legs which made him look like a flying bird. I stared at them and made sure that they understood that no one in the room should take any photos and then put them onto Facebook to make fun of their teachers.

 

To save some time, I asked two male students to kneel down next to their teacher, to slap his both knee pits. But the bell rang shortly after, so I took over the Paida job, dismissed the class. Seeing very few marks appeared on his skin, I told Robert to stand up so that I could slap his legs from different angels. I was hoping that the Sha would come out quickly. He was back on his feet skeptically, but suddenly he smiled at me and said, “Amazing, I had to roll and crawl out of the ground all day long, but didn’t you see just now? I was back up like that, I can’t believe it.” “Your both knee caps must have been hurting from hitting the hard floor when you were on your tummy like that. I couldn’t slap too hard. Now that you’re standing up, I am expecting to see more Sha coming out soon if I hit harder. Do you trust me?” “No problem, go ahead and do whatever you think it works. I don’t want to make an appointment with either chiropractic, acupuncturist or family doctor. I just want a quick pain relief.” He assured me. Just in a minutes, under his red skin, surged some “blueberries.” I took the slapper out of my backpack, hit his both leg’s back and sides even harder. Soon, his legs were covered with dark purple “grape shaped” Sha. The bumps on the swollen skin made it look more like the skin of a toad. He looked down over his own shoulder, watching how I got those mysterious Sha out of his body. “Don’t worry!” I assured him that he wasn’t bleeding. There were no ruptures of capillary blood vessels through this kind of good-will Paida action. I invited him to join us for the next day (Friday) after school presentation to learn more about the self-healing theories. He was interested, but the family duty called. So I promised that I would send him some files emails to get him started on learning this self-healing method. Before I left his room, I didn’t forget to show him how to do the reclining positioned Lajin (stretching) by using two desks against the wall. He tried the both legs before taking off to pick up the kid. “Thank you so much! I can’t tell you how relieved my lower back is. I feel like that I am walking on the clouds.” My heart almost flew out of my mouth, but I had to remain calm, “You are very welcome. Paida & Lajin are easy to learn, but difficult to master them. We didn’t have much time today. I wasn’t able to Paida you long enough. Although I freed you from the acute pain for the time being, the problems are still there. In order to get rid of the lower back pain completely, you need to practice Paida and/or Lajin for a long time, and to improve your body conditions by increasing more positive Qi inside. Tonight at home, you can try the stretching first.” He nodded.

 

The next day (Friday, yesterday), stories went on even more interesting. Early in the morning before the school started, I emailed Robert a handbook of Paida Lajin Self-Healing. He replied me right the way, telling me that he felt much better after getting home. He tried the Lajin stretching a little bit, but didn’t feel the same effectiveness as I showed him in his classroom. After getting up this morning, he felt some stiffness in his body. I emailed him back, “People who have bad back need to sleep on the hard surface bed or hardest mattress.” He sent me a short message that he was already sleeping on the hardest mattress since the back problems.

 

A few minutes passed 8:00 a.m., while I was teaching the class, our IB program coordinator Kathy (she attended Master Xiao’s seminar at Harrisburg last September) popped her head at my door, showing Robert where my classroom was. I arranged the students to do some reading first before I helped him to stretch on my Lajin bench. I set the timer for 5 minutes. He began to scream in less than 2 minutes. I was going to make him to finish the 5 minutes without mercy, seeing his face become deformed by the torture, I encouraged him to complete at least 3 minutes. He bit his lips tightly, agreed with big gasps. After I removed the ankle weights and set him free from the bench, he told me that his head was starting to ache. Meantime, he was very embarrassed for acting like a cry baby when he was on the bench. I comforted him, “Don’t worry. It is quite common for people like to feel the extreme pain on the pain. At least you know what your current limit is. The huge pain you felt on the bench was caused by the severe tightened tendons. Given some practice, you will be loosen up a lot more, then you will notice the improvement on the conditions of your lower back.” Regardless of how painful his first leg felt, Robert tried the other leg for about 3 minutes before he left my room.

 

Almost 1:00 p.m., I was about to teach my IB class, when a special education aid teacher (Mary) showed up at my door. She asked me if she could attend the self-healing presentation after school. “Of course, welcome!” I was happy to know that she wanted to come even she was not on my initial mailing list. She then told me that she had a stiff neck, very painful. Cheryl (her colleague from the same department) told her that I might have the ways to make her feel better. I showed her to sit down, massaged her shoulders for a short time to loosen up her stiffness. One student made fun of us, “Luo laoshi, this classroom is now turning into a clinic.” As soon as the bell rang, Mary stood up and left the room so that I could teach. After that class, around 1:30 in the afternoon, I had an artist visitor coming from Beijing, who was going back to China, and teach at a village school in the mountains as a volunteer for a month. She wanted to have a tour on our school so that she could introduce the American school system to that remote Chinese school. We stopped in front of our student store first. Some passersby waited there politely until we finished our video recording. Among them was our assistant principal Mr. Martin.  I introduced Jiahe to Mr. Martin, explained why she was here. He welcomed her and hoped she had a good tour in our school. Then out of nowhere, he looked me and said, “If I have lower back pain next time, please don’t hit me like that.” I was completely lost at the beginning, then suddenly I realized that he must have seen the bruises on Robert’s legs. So I joked, “Hay, Paida and Lajin are an easy fix, you know. If you are a real man, be a Man!” (my mind was drifting to the Mulan song “Be a Man” that our Chinese level IV class performed for this year’s Chinese New Year when I said “be a man.”) He could not help laughing out loud, pushed the doors and disappeared in the guidance office.

 

I then showed Jiahe around the first floor of our school, which included the gyms, indoor swimming pool, dining hall, arts rooms, auditorium, library, etc. Robert’s math classroom happens to be on the first floor. I thought it might be a good idea for her to take a few video clips or photos in a real classroom, so I opened his door. Same time the day before, he was on the floor groaning; now he was on his feet playing card games with a group of students. Robert was surprised to see us, (believe it or not, although we work in the same building, we merely see each other, 2-3 times a year in average. In the past two days, we have already seen each other three times!) He walked up to greet us. They had a little nice chat about what the math problems on the board were, and what the class was doing at the moment. Jiahe listened to him with great interests. Suddenly, she raised her camera and took a picture on the wall clock. I had never noticed until then that the hours on the clock were actually formulas of different math problems. Very unique indeed, first time for me too. While Robert walked us out his classroom, he said to me with a little hesitation, “I am sorry that I didn’t ask for your permission earlier, but I told many people how you treated my back yesterday. Later, when I thought about it, I didn’t feel it was right to do so.” I smiled at him, “I don’t mind at all. Actually the more people you talk to, the better. You are promoting this method. It is my turn to say thank-you.” He was very much relieved, couldn’t wait to tell me more. “I showed people my legs (I figured he must have done so because in my 7th period class, our mutual students told me that their English teacher (in 6th period) told them that the math teacher was beaten up by the Chinese teacher, and it also explained why Mr. Martin made fun of me just now) ; today during the lunch, some of my colleagues made a comment that Robert was finally back (I guess he was pretty out of shape in the past a few days, people were happy to see his spirit returned.)

 

It was 3:00 p.m., school was over. I was waiting for some people to show up for our first self-healing presentation, when Robert appeared unexpectedly.

 

“Don’t you need to go home and pick up the kid?”

“Sorry I can’t stay. But I still have a few minutes to spare before I leave. I want to do the stretching again. I was in such poor performance this morning…”

 

Robert lay down on the bench, allowed me to put the ankle weights on the both legs. He survived three minutes for each leg with great effort. He felt the headache again, but was able to calm it down by regulating his breathing. Before he left, Robert was curious to know where I bought the ginger dates tea that I gave him to drink this morning. I told him that I didn’t buy it, but made it at home. I then promised him that I would share the recipe with him later.

 

Three female teachers came to my room for the presentation. Mary was one of them. Because I was in a hurry to go to my son’s weekend’s camp, we didn’t finish the talk within an hour, which was more theories than actions. I hope we could do the similar activities in the future more often. They were very thankful that I spent time explaining things to them – It makes a lot of sense! They kept saying.

 

(to be continued)

 

[:]