Big Bad Trip, More or Less from the North to South of China

Hello, I just finished one Big Bad trip basically from the north to south of China. I dont really know where to begin. I feel like I just spent alot of money, but really, I think we kept it pretty inexpensive (other than a frivolous plane flight here and there in place of a 24 hour train ride). I was going to do one blog for the traveling part, and another for my description of the people and experience as a whole, but instead I think I will combine it into one big lump of words that will take you way to long to read and will bore you into closing it prematurely.

One other pre-emptive apology, is that upon reviewing my pictures, I found ( in addition to alot of really stupid ones) that I take too many pictures purposefully pointing into the sun or involving cheesy sunset photos. I am sure this is a huge faux pax to anyone who values photography, but its too late now to go back and retake. I will also try to spare you details on every single little place we visited because there are so many, which may not necessarily be interesting...so here goes...my story and my opinion:


Beijing


This was a quick trip when you take into account how much there is to see in Beijing. I met my first 2 chinese people that I didnt like here. I dont mean to imply by mentioning this first that this is all there is to Beijing, but they came in the form of:

1. A lady who worked at the subway collecting tickets- I rode the subway after being given specific directions by my teacher's friend. It was a successful trip going out, but upon returning, I exited my station to find things looking familiar, but not quite right...after walking around for 20 minutes, it occured to me that perhaps there were multiple entrances and exits to this particular station. When I tried to ask the lady who collected tickets at my incorrect exit (she was not standing behind glass), she looked at me, then stared straight ahead and pretended like I was a bad dream. I tried to creep my way into her line of vision, but she still ignored me...couldnt she see I was lost and trying to speak chinese? Who ignores people asking you to your face to help?!? It wasnt a matter of her duty, it was a matter of her being stupid.
   
2. Second was a girl maybe about 23 years old. I was supposed to meet my old teacher at her university at the south gate...but when I got there, there was no one there and my phone card was not working. I saw a girl who was text messaging. Side note, the Chinese are fanatical about text messaging. I even heard an ad on the radio saying (in english) to beware of thumb injury caused by too much text messaging. I dont think it was a joke. Anyways, I smiled and said, "Excuse me, do you speak english? (in chinese)" She looked at me, then shrugged and said "Uh." then put her head back down into the meaningless garbage that she was shoveling out of her little pink phone. ...am I bitter? Maybe.

So with that memory down, and a hundered more to go, let me say that I wasnt too impressed with Tiananmen Square (I hear that's because I didnt get the audio guide...Tiananmen is all about the history).


I didnt see Mao's pickled body (I will save that for next time).

Something interesting is that the tourists are always the ones carrying around the things that are stereotypically asian. It's never really the Chinese people.








I noticed something very early in this trip, and it would be realized again and again throughout the next month. There are alot of people who do not respect boundaries.

They let their kids climb on things that are supposedly ancient. In museums, they will touch everything. Some of the artifacts are either really polished or really dirty (depending on the material) where everyone has rubbed it. Some believe that rubbing these things gives you good luck or makes you wealthy, others I think just like touching stuff dispite the fact that there is a picture of a hand with a big cross through it: the universal sign for "NO TOUCH"

Anyways, I was very impressed with the Summer Palace. That place is fantastic. If you go to Beijing, you must see it. Pictures:


It covers 2 sides of a hill. Above is the mountain side... and below is the lake side.







May I also say, that I like when white people are around for many reasons. One of which is that all of the vendors focus their attention on them, and they leave me alone.

Really though, Beijingers are generally nice, and the food is good and not that expensive. However, I think there is a direct correlation between the population density of a place, and the likelihood that there will be more nasty people per capita.

I didnt have that much time to hang out in Beijing because my teacher Bian and I had to fly to...


Qingdao


Here we met my friend Maddy (mentioned in previous blogs), and Sabina (my part time chinese [but swiss] girlfriend). I would travel with Sabina for the next four weeks even after Bian and Maddy return to work. Sabina is my girlfriend not because of romance, but among many other reasons because she took care of me and put up with my crap.

1. Her luggage was huge, therefore, she had any product or medicine that I found myself without
2. We basically spent every hour of the day together, and I never got sick of her, which I suppose would be more than I could say about a real girlfriend. Hay Oh!
3. She always made me drink water to stay hydrated
   
4. Upon telling me that she thought I looked skinnier she would constantly try to feed me. Her suspicions were later confirmed when I weighed myself at a street vendor's scale and found that I lost 5 kg...or ~10 lbs.
5. Sometimes she would carry stuff for me in her backpack (like food), which was very nice, dispite my objections
6. She would listen to my rants and raves

Anyways, Qingdao is one of those places that is notorious in China for being nice...and it really was. It reminded me of parts of California, and the architecture is european at many neighborhoods because of the European occupation during the two Opium Wars I think. It is proud to be the site of the 2008 Olympic sailing events.

These guys will be there.

...and this guy. Note the floaties and intertube...and speedo.

...and if you still were not sure you were on a Chinese beach.

Another sidenote: China in general is all about the 2008 Olympics...so much that I wonder what marketing strategies companies will adopt once they can no longer say "Partners in the 2008 Beijing Olympics". Actually, they can probably say that for years even after it is over.

Dont put your hand in there.

Ok, so Qingdao, nice place, beaches are alittle dirty, cars are a bit dirty too. When you are on the streets you get quite a bit of pollution, but then you walk out to the coast and you get fresh ocean air...the first I have had in China. It really did remind me of the California coast at times.

I guess this could be a bus anywhere, but this one is in Qingdao.

An interesting and pleasant thing about China is that there are large areas where people go and do good wholesome family activities...like fly kites. We went to a nice seaside plaza where there were whole families...moms, dads, grandparents, grandkids, maybe an aunt or uncle, all hanging out playing with different toys. Toys ranged from kites, to this top that you keep spinning by whipping it with a long rope on the end of a stick. The top makes a loud noise, and the whip makes a crack like you are beating something. Good wholesome fun...and China feels incredibly safe (minus the driving and pollution).

Chinese people love to take pictures with Sabina. See the kites in the background?
There are many more kites than my camera could capture.

Oh yes, Qingdao is the home of Tsingdao beer...pronounced the same. Unfortunately, someone told us that the brewery was not in peak season, so it was not that interesting to see right now. We decided not to go, but now I am kicking myself for not going.


Yantai

Another famous beach town, but nothing that special (in my opinion). One place that was a nice surprise was this old canon fort that we happend to visit randomly. Actually this highlights a point: many of the places I enjoyed the most were pleasant surprises. That is, I really didnt expect much out of them, and they were not all that famous, but I really enjoyed them. More on that later.



I have no pictures worth showing of Yantai, so I will take this opportunity to have a couple cute kid pictures. This little girl was the daughter of the lady who was basically the stewardess on our bus. All busses have someone who rides along and collects money and helps with luggage and law and order on the bus. This girl rode 4 hours from Qingdao to Yantai sitting with her mom in the stairwell.

...and this guy was just sitting next to me in the airport one day.

On the bus ride from Qingdao to Yantai, I made a realization that would be horribly repeated throughout the rest of this Big Bad Journey, and probably the rest of my stay in China: the Chinese do not like anything without noise. Almost all busses have TVs and they fill quiet time with poor action movies turned really loud, chinese pop concerts also turned really loud, chinese comedy shows turned really loud, and in this case old hip hop music videos (actually to my delight) dubbed over with newer music unoriginal to the original video (to my dismay). The videos they were showing were Hammer, Heavy D, Will Smith, Boys II Men, and I think Bel Biv Devoe...all straight out of the 80s and 90s. It was great, but the music dubbed over was techno like, "boom boom boom boom, I want you in my room, to spend the night together, from now until forever...." Ok, I'll admit, it was really catchy, but this "noise" theme will be played out again and again...

Penglai


This was a pleasant surprise. It was an old fort, not like the canon fort in Yantai, but a really big fort that wound its way into the hills and cliffs along the ocean.

The amazing fort at Penglai; however, note the cable car,
then see my later rant about "bastardized"

There is another phenomenom that I would like to comment on. There is a special market here in China, enough of a market to merit stores that will sell matching men's and women's clothing. This way you can show the world that you are together.

I would throw a temper tantrum every time you tried to get me into one of these....
I wonder if it has ever been a topic of a fight between couples: "You always want to wear the black shirts. Today we are going pink!..and make sure your socks match my pants."

Here in Penglai I found my favorite pair of "unique lion statues" of the trip..maybe favorite yet.

In ancient China, the lions used to roll balls of dough and hum to themselves while they did it.



And this mom lion is just happy.

We were going to go to a island that was famous and nice, but we found out at the boat dock that Waiguoren ("outsiders", a word which I have come to hear alot in strangers' converstations in passing when they talked about us) are not allowed on the island because there is a military base there. So we modified our plans to go to this Nan Shan where a huge budda park was recently built. Again, this turned out to be a really pleasant surprise.


Nan Shan was put on the map when a local window shade company made it big. The company's owner then built these temples and this huge budda on a hill. There is a small museum under the budda as well as a hall with 9999 small buddas cast from the remaining bronze from the big guy. It was really, really nice.




Something interesting that I heard about the town around Nan Shan, is that it has a private unemployment program. If a resident loses their job, the big window shade company in town set up a plan that will give them unemployment, even if they didnt work for the window shade company. It is normal for those who are very successful to hook it up for their home town (which is in a sense, an extension of their family) Bian told me there was a corrupt governement official who hooked up his home town really big, but then because the government found out he was taking money, he had to escape to Canada, which granted him asylum on the grounds that if he returned to China, he would be executed...the Chinese hate him, but his hometown still loves him.


Weihai

This was the nicest beach town we visited. It was clean enough where I wanted to get in the water, and the people were very very nice. Nothing much to see, just a nice place, with nice people and an island with a bunch of tourist attractions because it marked a humiliating occasion where the Chinese navy was defeated by the Japanese. Strange to me that the Chinese government would make a museum for this.

Some interesting swimsuits in Weihai. I had to look hard at this one...

This was the view from our hotel window, but it seems to be classic of China.
-"Where should I put the gargage?"
-"Outside. Duh."

Here is where Maddy and Bian left, and Sabina and I continued on via over night train to...


Pingyao

First though it is worth noting that when Sabina goes anywhere, alot of chinese guys try to talk to her. The overnight train to Pingyao was no exception.


Something else funny, is that when Sabina (or any white girl I guess) goes places by herself, people stare at her, but when she goes somewhere with me (or I go somewhere with any white girl) people notice the white girl, then they stare at ME as if they are sizing me up wondering what I got. Poor mandarin skills. Thats what I gots.

Anyways, Pingyao, another place you (and I) have probably not heard of, but an extremely great place. It is supposedly the best preserved Ming Dynasty town. It has a complete wall around it and the architecture is very old, as are many of their ways. They lay soy plant out in the street to allow what few cars are allowed inside the walls and motor bikes to crush the plant to make the soy beans easier to harvest.


Although beautifully ancient, it is relatively touristy; however, the tourists go where there is something very nice. The buildings and many of the roads are made from old style bricks and stones. You can rent a bike and ride through the small back streets of the town, or you can get up on the wall and walk all the way around in approximatley 2 hours. Every small corner, alleyway and door of the town is photograph worthy, as are all of the old chinese people hanging out in the old streets in front of their houses. In China, there is alot of "hanging out".

Older people will gather early in the mornings and socialize. The old men will sit and talk, and generally the women will do tai chi. I think it is a good routine and keeps the mind and body young and the community together.

Massage and calisthenics are quite different over here. Often times you will see people walking around lightly punching themselves in the arms, shoulders, legs or chest...I have even seen a man belly slapping himself. This is for massage I believe. Sometimes I see people walking long distances backwards, and backwards up hills. When people stretch, they do so relatively violently and jerky. Many people here have their own personal flavor of excercise.

We met a very nice waitress who was patient and could modify her chinese to be more easily understood. We asked her about her job. She had one day off a month, and worked ~12 hour days, for 15 kuai a day. Thats less than 2 USD. We ate there twice and on the second time tried to tip her, but she would not take it. Even if she did take it, she said it goes to her boss. Finally we forced her to take a tip that was...well, it was a good tip, and we told her not to tell her boss...I hope it worked out for her. I think these wages are abnormally low though. I heard the average farmer will make 60-80 kuai a day (RMB a day).


From Pingyao, we back-tracked north. On the bus ride, I sat next to one of the more disgusting men I have met. First Sabina and I were trying to have our own 2 seater to ourselves, but the bus quickly filled and this man when finding out that I spoke english, asked me to move my bag and scoot to the inside seat so he could talk to me. We were too big for the 2 seats...no I take that back. We were big enough, he just chose to lean on me as he talked way to close to my face about all Americans having money and how he likes Bush. The thing that bothered me was the way he rubbed his fingers together and squinted at me when he said "money" in chinese. I told him that not all americans have money, I actually have none. Then he started eyeing the nike jacked that Zuzana gave me. I told him that my friend gave it to me and I didnt buy it. Then he started feeling the material between his thumb and index finger. I pretended to fall asleep with my sunglasses on. Near the end of the ride, I woke up, and was hot, so I took off the jacket. Then the guy started feeling the material of my old cotton shirt sleeve. ...After this bus ride, Sabina and I resolved to always sit next to each other. She had a smelly lady, but I think I had the worse deal with the creepy money loving, personal space invader.

Wutai Shan
...is a famous budhist mountain known for its plethora of Budhist temples, it receives alot of traffic from tourists in the peak season...luckily we were not in the peak season.

That's gold

Wutai Shan was very nice, but relatively litter-strewn. Wutai shan is 4- 5 hours from any large city. As you move away from the cities you get cleaner air, but more litter because no one is there to pick it up. Really its a nice place, just alittle litter down by the town.

Many of the monks are really really friendly. They enjoy talking to you. Sabina and I were just hanging out, and we were approached on 2 seperate occasions. Sabina was making fun of me in the picture below because I'm smiling too big and my teeth show through the smoke. I'm all, "Look! I'm with the monks!" It seems like there are alot of pictures of me in this episode...

This is may be one of the worse bathrooms that I have used, not really because it was dirty, but I saw a rat hanging out down in the pit.

We hired a guy to take us to the top of this mountain which is supposedly the highest peak in Northern China. We met him in front of a travel agency, and we were to leave the next day. When we walked to the travel agent's the next morning he wasnt there, but the travel agent who was apparently his girlfriend called him. He came in ~5 minutes wearing a policeman's uniform...I guess he was on duty, but took off work momentarily to drive us for two hours up the mountain. Luckily our hook up was able to get us past the toll booth for free because all his buddies worked there...I guess thats no different than in the US really.

This is us at the top of the highest peak in northern china. There is snow there.

My favorite temple here was one called Nan Si, or South temple. It was very large, very quiet and less touched by the tourists. This place was nice and quiet

Notice the cell phone antanae at the end of the roof line

One day while Sabina and I were eating lunch, someone carried in a lady who was dressed like a monk. She had a shaved head, decorated knife, wore robes, and was barely concious. The lady who helped her in ordered her some Qiezi, then left her sleeping at the table next to us. Gradually a couple of patrons noticed and tried to talk to her and get her to eat, but she was too weak to hold the chopsticks. Eventually they left her kind of slumped in her chair. Soon after, she went face down in her rice bowl with her finger caught between her cheek and the edge of the bowl. A little 3 year old girl outside the window was waving hello to Sabina, then she would point to the monk...like she knew something wasnt right. When Sabina and I got up to leave, we came around to her front side (she was sitting with her back to us) and saw that she really wasnt right. We asked the waitress (who was working as if everything was normal) what we should do. She said in very poor english, that I didnt particularly like in this case, "So sorry, but we cant help you...she is not from our town and the police they do not want to help". So that was it. 5 hours from any large town and no one would help. I thought, even if I perform CPR, what is the point? You are supposed to perform CPR in order to wait for more qualified help...which in this case wasnt coming. Sabina and I removed her face from the bowl, checked her breathing (which was faint) and Sabina had a pulse....but its like, who are we, and what are we going to do? We are really out of our element. We eventually had to leave her passed out on the table.

In the States, one may say, "gosh I would have done something" maybe, but when they say that, they are living in a completely different reality than the people they are criticizing. If this trip so far has taught me anything, it is patience and tolerance for those who are different from me, and intolerance for those who are more the same as me but criticize those that are different.

I hear that there is a sociological study regarding the alarmingly low value that the Chinese place on human life outside of their circle of family and friends. I dont know the details, but I feel as if it is true.

The 5 hour bus ride back to a larger city was the worst I have been on. I would like to take this opportunity to note that I would estimate that 95 percent of the males in China smoke alot, and they will do it in a building, in a restaraunt, or on a 5 hour bus ride, at least once an hour. ...and the bus's air conditioner didnt work.

Funny story, in the Wutai Shan "bus station" there was one of those kids without the crotch on his pants. He squatted in the station and pee-ed on the floor...then sat in it. Then his grandma lifted him back to his feet, he squated and pee-ed some more. Then his grandma wiped his butt off and they went and sat down. Given this story, I would like to say that I am a fan of the crotchless pants for kids, as long as the parent cleans up after them, similar to how we clean up after dogs. The western world creates waaayy too much waste in the form of diapers.


Xi'an


Story about the bus ride to Xi'an: It was 10 hours so the bus was very luxurious; however the bathroom door was locked and no one had the key. Because of these two issues, we made periodic bathroom breaks, one of which was on the side of a road. The guys just lined up outside, and the girls moved around to the front of the bus, which if you think about it, really is the best place to squat. This would have been more shocking, but Sabina and I have found that there are some Chinese people, I wont say "many" but some who prefer to use the public bathrooms with the stall door open. The guys I have seen using the stall either smoke a cigarette, or text message on their phones. So this mass-peeing on the side of the road was not a big deal.

Who says China is building?

Xi'an is ok. There is some nice stuff to see...the air was a bit dirty when we arrived...yeah, thats about it. Terra cotta warriors were cool...I was weak and bought a book because they have this guy sitting and signing them. He was one of the original farmers who notified the government of the initial find. Now he is famous, and spends his days sitting and signing books for tourists who snap his picture dispite the sign that says "no pictures"...and he smokes cigars while he does it.


Something notable about Xi'an though, is that it is here that I saw two notable firsts for me.

1. The first real courteous line of people that I have seen in China. The chinese are notorious for elbowing their way up to the front of a line. The only rules are that you dont get too physical, but really if there is space at the front then there is space for you. Here however, there was something close to a single file line waiting for a shuttle that stretched....maybe 100 meters. Amazing
2. I saw a man packing his left overs in a restaraunt. Not only did he not waste the food, but he brought tupperware from home. This is an absolutly amazing combination of concepts in China.

In Xi'an, the men rollerskate in public. They rollerskate like the wind.

Bell tower of Xi'an

Sabina had to go to Hong Kong for a night to fix her visa, so I took that opportunity to go to a nearby mountain for a night. Again, something with little expectations, turned out to be very memorable

Hua Shan

Not to be confused Huang Shan, this one is 2 hours outside of Xi'an...and I would venture to say that it was a harder climb than Huang Shan. However, there were less people, so that is great. The mountain is divided into 4 peaks. I went to all of them. Some of the sections are just plain dangerous too, consisting of basically a ladder carved into the cliff side and chains to pull yourself up. It is almost vertical at times, and the steps are only deep enough to get the balls of your feet on them.

This picture does not show the angle that well.

Something that one cannot grasp until they see it themselves, is just how many people the most populated country in the world has. There are products of labor in places that you would not imagine possible. So I climb my way to the East peak, where the guide book says there is a hotel...actually there is a hotel on all 4 peaks, but I chose the East so I could see the sunrise in the morning. Anyways, I climb for maybe approximately 5-6 hours, and I am defeated, but at the very top of each of these 3000 meter high peaks, there is a hotel. They arent really nice, but the point is, is that there are buildings up here...maybe you just have to see it to be amazed, but unfortunately I didnt take a picture because it was too dark and I was too tired.

I shared a dorm room with 2 chinese girls, Jiao Jia Yi (left) and Rachel. They ended up being my friends for the next day. They look young, but they are both ~23 and crazy because the next day they showed me this tourist attraction that I guess not many people know about.


Apparently on East Peak, you can rent this safety harness and climb down this 20 meter cliff to this pagoda out on this peninsula of a mountain ledge. Really though, this one was pretty do-able because some chinese guy had previously climbed down and put little indents in the cliff where you could put your feet. Someone also strung a huge chain and planted some iron posts at points into the cliff face. If I did not see the girls go first, I probably would not have gone.

East Peak Pagoda

View of the climb down

So East Peak was do-able, but the South Peak was the scariest thing I have ever done in my life. Yeah you get a safety harness, but what these pictures fail to show is that below the walkway, it is pretty much straight down. It looks like there is a ledge, but there is not. To get to this walk you need to climb down maybe approximately 20 meters on a poor ladder consisting of metal stuck into a mountain side again. Also, it is cold and windy. As the wind whips across the cliff you want to press your body into the cliff to become one with the mountain...





This is me near the far end of the walkway. You can see that I'm happy, but not really happy. At the end of this walkway, there is a little patch of solid ground. Apparently some guy came here 800 years ago and carved a cave the size of a closet into the rock. He put a picture of budda in it. I was told that he did this all to repent "a mistake", but I dont know what that mistake was. It must have been something pretty serious, because even with the safety equipment and "conveniences" put in place by some poor modern day chinese labor force, I was still very concerned for my life.

Remember how I said that there are many Chinese who do not respect artifacts? Well they dont respect fences or safety chains denoting boundaries either.

On the way down, it started raining, so everyone donned their ponchos.
This was a good mountain, and Craig was happy.

Guilin

Famous again, but not really that cool. Dont get me wrong, it was nice, but there are alot of tourists again. The food has the most western options in one place that I have seen yet in China, and the prices (if you chose to eat there) matched. This is the place where you see the "classic" chinese landscape paintings, with this hundreds of tall skinny mountains with a river running between them.

We got ripped off for the first time here. There was this english student who approached us in the morning wanting to practice his english...so we chatted, because I am too friendly...and he ended up following us around for the whole day. It wasnt so bad, because he did tell us alot. I talked to him about things in china from his perspective, and he helped us get afew good deals on tickets and stuff. As the day neared an end, the topic of food came up. I told him that one of our favorite dishes was Qiezi, or eggplant. He said that Guilin is very famous for good dishes, and he can take us to his favorite restaraunt that he goes to all the time. I said ok (and dragged Sabina into it also). The restaraunt he took us to was NOT one that he would normally go to. Also on top of that, I am pretty sure the lady over charged us, but we didnt have our wits about us at the time of ordering so we werent able to cover our asses. Then to top it all off, the guy did not offer any money.

So thats a scam there for you...dont let it happen to you. I'm not saying dont talk to people wanting to practice their english because this was really the first out of 100 that turned out bad, just make sure to cover your butt. I am more mad at myself than anything else because I should have watched the prices closer and put our foot down sooner.

Anyways, this whole trip has presented the need to teach Sabina a slang word....not too popular, but very applicable in our situations. That word is "Bastardize". The definition for those of you who dont know, is when someone takes something that is great, then makes it so commercial and cheesy that it is just ruined. This word describes alot of what is happening (in my opinion of course) to many of the things in china. I have looked at countless beautiful things and said to myself, "AH! They bastardized it!" Let me give you an example maybe if I can.

There are these huge caves in Guilin


There were stops along the way in the fantastic caves,
where they set up booths at which you could pay to have your picture taken

Big Goose Pagoda, Xi'an

Wutai Shan

I guess maybe this is what happens when a country's people jump from having alittle to alot in such a short amount of time. Maybe they skip the apreciation for nature. Revolutionize the old and naturally beautiful! Decorate it with lights and flags and loud music! Every building has flashing lights on it. Even quiet chairlifts to the tops of mountains have music blaring out of speakers that sound like megaphones.


There is another theme that I am quite tired of. Maybe I am over sensitive, but I am sick of hearing about the pursuit of wealth.

1. I have seen countless areas that would have been beautiful, but instead are littered with money and coins in order to hopefully bring the thrower wealth in the future
2. People push and shove to touch a lucky rock or statue's finger that if you touch once, will bring you wealth, twice happiness, and three times, a prestegious government job...isnt that last one funny?
3. I have seen people pay the equivalent of a month of begger's rations to ring a bell that if rung once, will do this, twice will do that....three times, i dont know...all the way to 10. I forget which one is the one that ensures you will have a government job.

Yangshuo

We took a 4 hour river cruise from Guilin to Yangshuo. It traveled down the Li River, through those picturesque famous mountains. It was fantastic, and we met a traveling couple, June and Steve. We ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the time in Yangshuo.


Yangshuo is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. It consists of those amazing mountains and a patchwork of rice fields and streams. I have never seen a rice field before, but none of them are the same color as their neighbor's. I'm not sure how that happens, but it is amazing to see with your eyes. My pictures do them no justice.


The town is super touristy, but you can rent a bike and pedal out of town very easily. In 10 minutes you will be in the country side pedaling through villages around mountains and through rice fields. It was one of the best places you could have chosen to take a leisurely bike ride.

At one point we stopped and walked out to watch some farmers harvest the rice. They let me do a bundle. People in the country are so nice and usually smiling.

the big harvest

On the way back through one of the towns...I was riding by a house and heard a loud "CHOP!!!" then a horrible horrible dog cry, and it kept crying and crying in the worse way I have ever heard. All the other dogs came running with ears up to see what was happening. If I had to guess, they removed a bad foot. It literally hurt my heart, but it also made me think of people in the states saying, "I wouldnt be able to take that". Although I know it is just a figure of speech, it made me start thinking to myself that, well yes you can take it. Its not my world and I know little about it. One really cant understand a people, let alone judge them until they have walked in their shoes, and even then you will probably never really know exactly what its like, the good and the bad. I have found bugs in my food (small ones) on 2 occasions. I picked them out, and continued to eat, just happy to have food. To be honest though, I am not that hardcore because one time I found a big black fly in our food. That one had to be sent back.

Here's another story: Sabina and I went exploring on our bikes on the third day. There are ladies who walk around the fields with their children, grandchildren or water buffalo. If you take a picture, they ask for 2 kuai, which is the equivalent of 25 cents. We havent determined if they go out looking for photo oportunities, or if they are going about their business and nosey tourists snap pictures of them so they ask for money. I think it is somewhere in the middle. Anyways, Sabina and I started talking to one particularly nice lady with a couple of water buffalo, and we took pictures, less for the pictures, but rather to just give her the 2 kuai. She was telling us about the mountains surrounding us and whatnot. I didnt really understand what she was saying (because I never understand anything anyone is saying) but I nodded and smiled, and she seemed to be happy. Then a group of tourists rolled up on their bikes, and started snapping pictures of her water buffalo. She went and asked for money and they kind of rudely said, "no money" and continued to snap pictures, then they got on their bikes and left.

If I had known how hurt she would be when she came back over to us, then I definately would have said something to the tourists. You could see in her face that she was really hurt. At the time, I was subconciously looking at things from a tourist's perspective: constantly hounded to buy something I didnt want, so I understood that they didnt want to give her money. However, what they failed to realize is that at some point you are being harassed by locals, and at some point you are harassing locals. She came back kind of looking like she wanted to cry, and said, "you are good people....they are bad people". I had to try and explain in poor chinese, that "they just didnt know. In the west, to take pictures is free, so when they come here, they dont know that they should give her money"....(or were too ignorant to realize it). Its just sad to see the negative sides of tourism effect people who already have very little to begin with. You always see the tourist in such a stereotypical situation but in this case you see it from the peasant's side of it...again, you can only imagine, but to me she looked really hurt and she felt helpless when these large overweight outsiders rolled in and then told her "no" to something that is generally common courtesy. You took pictures of her water buffalo, now give her 25 cents.

Anyways, look I put two ugly topics right in the middle of my section about one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.

Ok here is a lighter and cuter note, on our exploratory bikeride, we found a brick factory. We were walking around, when we heard this "Hello!" and this cute little girl and came walking over. She was followed by what must have been her boyfriend (just kidding). I didnt see any parents around, but this must have been their playground...a functional brick factory. At one point the little girl (in the yellow) was standing in the middle of the dirt driveway, and a huge dump truck came barreling down the road. It honked, and the little girl went running down the road as the truck followed closely behind her. He saw her and would not have hit her, but she was still running on short legs and it was funny. She turned the corner, the truck passed, then she came back. I wish I had a picture of this little girl running from this huge brick-loaded dumptruck.



At one point we hiked up this hill called moon hill. This was the first time that this has happened, but at the bottom, these ladies kind of start talking to you, then they start following you up the hill. They are carrying coolers of water and other drinks straped to their shoulders, and when you stop to rest they are right there fanning you. Then when you get to the top of the hill, they try and sell you drinks for an incredibly inflated price. This was our lady:

She was really nice. She is 75 and climbs this hill 9 times a day following tourists. I'm drinking the mango juice that Sabina and I bought from her at 3 times the price it should have been.

I forgot, at the bottom of moon hill, before we started a climb, we got caught by a traveling group of students who wanted to chat in english and take pictures...I'm not sure why they wanted me, because usually they want the white people, but whatever. They were an easily excitable bunch.

Side note: the american stereotype in china is white and overweight. FYI

We saw a show that was directed by that famous Croutching Tiger Hidden Dragon director, Zheng Yimou. It is a night show on the water, with lights and the spotlight mountains of Yangshuo in the background. It employs something like 600 local farmers and children and choreographs them into a beautiful syncronization with vibrant colors and lights, fire and visual effects. Sometimes there are ~300 people on the water at once. It is really nice on many different levels.

Sabina and I did get to see one example of chinese behavior at a live performance...for one thing flash photography IS allowed. Couple that with being asian, and you have to imagine that there were alot of pictures being taken and flashes going off. Second, there was a group of girls (performers) that would sing very close to the front row. People would run down the aisles to get in these girls' faces and take pictures. Third, they didnt clap at the end...as a matter of fact, a couple of rows got up to leave even before the last song was over. It kind of bummed me out because I thought if there was any group of performers who need to be shown appreciation, this was it. But anyways, I think it is a good thing for the community. I hear they are paid well and it is very inspiring that he was able to choreography so many "uneducated" farmers into such a beautiful show.

We also went on something pretty touristy: cormorant fishing. You go on a night boat and watch these guys fish using pet cormorants. It is something that the locals used to do. I am not sure if they still do it, but I dont think so. Now I hear they just poison the river and pick up the dead fish. The guy had a group of 5 birds that hang out on the boat (actually they are tied) but then he lets them lose and they all paddle around. The birds stay near the boat and dive for fish. I think there is a rope around their throats with allows them to swallow the small fish, but they cant swallow the big ones. When they get a big one, the fisherman scoops them up and pulls the fish out. It really was pretty fun to watch because the birds looked like they were enjoying it.



Then our boat caught on fire, or started smoking or something. The captain put it out, then light a cigarette and calmly waited for the smoke to clear. It was so classic.



Last we went to this cave called the Budda cave. I had low expectations going in, but ended up being very happy that we went. Since the caves in Guilin were bastardized, this makes up for it in a big way. This cave was used as a hideout during the Japanese invasion. Some people stayed in the cave for 6 months, which would be more amazing if you had seen the caves. None of the caverns were that large, but the cave wormed its way down deep into the mountain. We crawled under areas where you had to squat-walk your way through the tunnel, and you would constantly test your hardhat against the ceiling above. At one point we came to the end of the first section and the guide said, ok you can either turn around, or you can go through the "small hole". We were all, "how small is the small hole?"

Turns out is was a pretty small hole, but only like 3 meters long. The thing was that you could not see through to the other end because the hole did not go straight, but up and down. You had to put your belly down, and worm your way through it.


Perhaps you are wondering why we are wearing swim suits. Deep inside the cave there was a mudbath which we were skeptical to go in (who knows how many people have exfoliated in here...and the water doesnt circulate) but after I did, it made me a fan of mudbaths.

The chinese will catch you at the strangest times and ask you for a picture.

Crawling through these caves was 3 hours of pure enjoyment. An experience because it is something that one could never do in a country with overzealous liability issues.

Yangshuo, one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.

So it was a great trip. I am keeping places in the back of my mind to perhaps plan the master trip in the summer, that I'm hoping many of you may be able to make it out to.

Places to still see: Sichuan, Harbin Ice festival, Xiamen, maybe the silk road and definately Tibet and Napal.

Thanks for reading and please stay in touch.