catching up from china
so, guys, china had a block.
i was emailing the entries to myself, and i am expecting these to only be for me. you are welcome to read, however.
every time i go to shenzhen it's cloudy and smoggy. there are all these beautiful trees, and it's only an hour north of hongkong, but there is NOTHING about that city that makes me want to linger.
left hongkong about 11, got to the shenzhen airport about 3:30. there was much hesitation and double checking on the way, because it's been a LONG time since i made that trek.
i was really proud of myself though. i haven't forgotten as much chinese as i thought i had. my reading and listening aren't so great, but i'm still pretty good at communicating what i need. on the bus to teh airport i felt this sense of dread i'd been carrying (fear of what's to come, fear i won't be able to get around, fear i won't be able to speak, fear everything would be terrible and china wouldn't be the china i love) just kind of melt away. i coudl speak. i could understand. the busses and signs and people were the same. the smells were the same. it's still my china.
of course, i don't have a dictionary, and i can't read any of the food menus, so i haven't eaten more than bread and jelly yet, but i hope to change that today. traveling in the south has always been ard for me because of the pepper. maybe i'll find a nice muslim restaurant, or a buddhist one.
i arrived in kunming without any trouble (20y to the airport, 820y to kunming, 2y to the hostel, because i got lost), but once i got to kunming i started getting silly. i left my purse with my phone, ALL my money and cards in the bathroom and just walked out.
i am SO lucky it was still there when i got back. i thought i was about to die!
then i lost the people i was going to go to the hostel with, and i had a heck of a time getting to the hostel, but some nice ladies helped me get there.
i'm staying at the hump, and it's GREAT! 25y/night, and they squeezed me in even without reservations. it's epic, on top of all these great bars and restaurant. it's HUGE, and super comfy and clean and chill. a great great hostel.
met some dudes from austria and plaed set with them all night long. now we're going to brave the inclement weather and check out dian chi, and the dragon gate.
sweet.
kunming has been lovely. i made plans with the austrians (named florian and jerry) to meet up early tuesday morning for breakfast and touristing. i had hoped to be up by 7 so i could go watch the old folks at the nearby pagodas, but it was gross and a little rainy outside, so instead i just played on he internet.
also, there is apparently a block on livejournal on this computer, which is more than a little irritating. all my usual proxies aren't working, so i've been mailing these updates to myself. i'm certain all this will be one big huge post, so that should explain why it feels a little disjointed.
so we grab western breakfasts (i had the veggie breakfast of toast, hashbrowns, tomatoe, cornflakes and eggs, for 18rmb, which is a bit pricey, but it was for the socialization) and head out for dian lake (dian1 chi2). bus 73 too us to genghai park, which was probably pretty once. the trouble is the water is GREEN. not like, colored by the surrounding trees. like a layer of green sludge on top so thick all the debris floating on the surface was being pushed down by the weight of the sludge. so gross. also, the smog is so oppressive in this city. we couldn't even really clearly see the mountains that border the lack. yuck.
but we'd paid 30rmb to get in, so we were going to get our moneys worth. there was a green bathroom, with zero waste output, which was cool, except to cross to a garden in the park you had to take a bridge past the septic ponds, which was not so cool.
but we found a nice little lake, and some flowers and trees. a bunch of locals fishing, and a man playign the flute while a bajillion dragonflies flew past. so it was ok in the end.
we took the cable car across the lake to the xi1 shan1, which was stupidly overpriced at 40rmb, but it did get us halfway up the mountain. we then took the tram for 2rmb up to the dragon gate, and another 30rmb put us in the dragon gate complex. somehow we managed to miss half the temples and pagodas in the park, but we saw the important ones (like the shrine to the turtle god), the dragon gate, the greeting the morning pagoda and the miniature stone forest (this cool collection of eroded rocks that lines the tops of the mountains, and takes a billygoat to manouver). we enjoyed our time, well earned at the top of that mountain (even with the cable car and tram, there was still quite a bit of climbing involved. blech). then we started the hike down. we took a few breaks to rest, i taught them to play my version of mad dog 20/20 (the drinking and non-drinking versions), gave them a starter lesson in chinese, and realized i can't hear the difference in most german words. we bargained our way into a car to the bottom of the mountain (7rmb for 3), and SOMEHOW managed to get back to our neighborhood, mostly because very friendly people helped. (the 6 to the 82 took us to the market just north of our hostel). we stopped at the super market, and wandered through it's dizzying excess, bought some snacks and drinks, and set off in search of food. which took longer than you'd have thought, unless you know how hard it is to eat with me, adn then imagine that is mitigated by the fact that EVERY DISH in kunming is made with pepper.
but we finally found a spot, and the guys, being the geniouses they are, asked for extra extra spicy noodles. so they got what they asked for, which amused me to no end (altho it turns out the locals thought it was only medium range). and i got a fantastic flat glass noodle dish with tofu and veggies (i can eat bok choi again. it's amazing. 2 years of fasting has given me a new lease on the veggie). we had these huge cups of tea, and just as we were finishing our meal, all hell broke loose and a GIANT thunder and lightening storm came crashing down on us. so we drank some more tea, told our life stories, drank more tea, but eventually we ahd to give up and braved our way through the rain back to the hostel.
once back, we all took our time getting dry adn comfy again. i decided to not go to lijiang, to save both time and money, because i don't want to be traveling on the 8th (i actually plan to hold a baby panda for a million billion kuai). we played some pool, and then settled in for some real mad dog 20/20, and then kings. which is what ruined me. actually, what ruined me is the fact that i was drinking beer AND strawberry daquari. oye.
so i was totaled by midnight, and made my way to bed.
don't know what i'm going to do today. i hope to catch a sleeper train to cengdu, but that may not happen. and then if it does, i don't know if i'll be able to find a hostel, but we'll deal with these things as they come, won't we?
well, i didn't get the train ticket i wanted *grrrrr*. i wound up booking a plane ticket for 550rmb, because every other alternative would either have had me standing for 18 hours, or not getting to chengdu until 2pm on the 8th (defeating every plan i have)
so i spent 2.5 times more than i should have, but i'll be in chengdu by noon tomorrow, (gods willing). i've been hitting up a couchsurfer there, and hopefully i'll have a place to stay for free, or at least someone to go hang out with in the evenings.
today i went to cuihuyuan (jade green lake park), which is a BEAUTIFUL free park in the middle of kunming.
actually, first i walked up to yuantong se, the largest buddhist temple in kunming. it was beautiful, and it had the best smelling garden. there were legions of faithful minority women sitting around the temple to buddha (which was stunning in it's graceful and elaborate decorations, it's sheer size and care. i mean, it was a truly great temple, rivaling those in beijing) waiting for their chance to go in and pray and study. this is a very active temple, with male and female monks teaching lessons in little corners, mass prayer sessions, and people completely enveloped in study in every side room. i was really impressed. there is something sweet and romantic about a temple where you just see a handful of devout monks servicing those who come t gawk, but this was a truly inspirational experience, seeing an active temple full of the faithful living, eating, knitting, reading, singing, teaching and learning.
after i'd had my fill of contemplating the turtles, koi and frogs that had been released into the pond filling the center of the temple, and breathing in the sweet smell of the gui trees, i hopped a bus over to the park. which is maybe two blocks from yunnan uni. it's not often i regret not going t kunming like i'd originally planned all those years ago, but seeing the kunming campus, and then the park. well....it's nice. it can make one feel a moment of regret.
(not too much tho. beijing is still a better city)
the park was great.for every instance of gross and ugly and dissapointing i felt yesterday at dianchi, it was redeemed by lovely, charming, idyllic, and engaging in jade green lake park. a vast system of paths and bridges contain a giant lake (that was thankfully green because of the foliage and environment, and not nearly so much because of pollution). they bend and wind and come back on themselves. they lead under covered paths, into little nooks and crannies, past comfy teahouses sporting mockingbirds and other song birds, always with main paths that have incredibly comfy marble and ganite benches overlooking the swan pond, the GIANT lily ponds, the childrens paddleboat pond, the koi pond, and every other kind of pond you could want. and then i got even better, because every bend, nook and crannie was filled with solitary musicians practicing, choral groups practicing traditional folk singing, women practicing folk dance, people leading traditional dance modified excersize lessons, taichi and yoga lessons, and mass group performers (singers, full traditional band and traditional dancers in costume)
i mean. it was just amazing. every time i thought i'd seen or heard more than i could hope for i'd walk another 100ft, and there'd be something else to bring a smile to my face.
even the sudden thunderstorm couldn't bring me down. i just went into one of the tea shops, sat down on a huge overstuffed couch overlooking a lily pond, and drank 7yr old pu'er tea (15rmb. the older pu'er tea is, the better it is. at 7yrs, it wasn't great tea, a bit bitter an earthy at first, but with a delicious slightly sweet aftertaste. and BOY does that tea brew dark and brew forever. i drank more than a full pitcher of hot water and the leaves still brewed). i spent the next hour or two relishing the songbirds, inspecting the mocking bird (who has actually ever seen one? i think there was a cuckoo, too) and making notes in the lonelyplanet guidebook i have (so, my plan is to take the one i have now, and exchange it for the one they have here in the hostel. then when the next person picks up the guidebook, they'll have all the hints and tips i have for each city to help make their time better, and i'll do the same to the one i take, and exchange it out for another one when i get to another hostel with the same guidebook. i love doing this kind of stuff guys)
after the rain finally broke and the sun came back out (the first time i've really seen the sun in kunming) i went back to the temple to check out it's vegetarian restaurant. first of all: HELLA EXPENSIVE. the avg dish was 30rmb. considering yesterday i had a tofu noodle soup for 7.5 and it was more than i could eat, that's quite a bit.
second of all: it almost killed me. i ordered rice noodles with sliced pork and veggies (fake meat, of course). when it came out i took two bites (i was hungry!) and then immediately started flushing and coughing. they'd put a light pepper powder on it. i called them over and told them even that little bit of pepper was too much for me, and they said they'd fix it. when i came back out i took a teeny bite and it seemed ok, so i took a big bite and immediately regretted it. it turns out that my mouth was so numbed by those first two bites, i couldn't feel the spice in that 3rd bite. i don't know if they did anything or not, but it seemed exactly the same to me. at that point, i was suffering pretty bad, burning up, crying partially because it hurt, partially because eating pepper makes me tear up uncontrollably. so i told the i couldn't eat it. that i didn't want to make them try again just box it up, i'll give it to someone homeless and i'll pay my bill and go. they said they'd make me a fresh dish with no pepper, no charge. i said ok, i'd give it a try. when i came out, it was the same dish. it's just this light pepper spice people often use when making noodle dishes, but after that fifth bite my stomach hurt so much i was almost doubled over, really thinking i was going to be sick. i felt dizzy and was burning up and coughing without stop. so i just paid the 16 kuai, grabbed the food and stumbled to the nearest bun stand. i bought a GIANT rice bun and a vanilla ice cream, and that managed to calm my stomach down enough that i could get home without much trouble.
oye.
and then on the way home i saw a monk bend a piece of rebar using just his neck. sweet.
so, i got home, rinsed the offending noodles off, at a rather flavorless dish (because it also washed off the oils and salt and what not, along with the pepper) and now i'm trying to figure out how to get to the airport at 5am.
i was emailing the entries to myself, and i am expecting these to only be for me. you are welcome to read, however.
every time i go to shenzhen it's cloudy and smoggy. there are all these beautiful trees, and it's only an hour north of hongkong, but there is NOTHING about that city that makes me want to linger.
left hongkong about 11, got to the shenzhen airport about 3:30. there was much hesitation and double checking on the way, because it's been a LONG time since i made that trek.
i was really proud of myself though. i haven't forgotten as much chinese as i thought i had. my reading and listening aren't so great, but i'm still pretty good at communicating what i need. on the bus to teh airport i felt this sense of dread i'd been carrying (fear of what's to come, fear i won't be able to get around, fear i won't be able to speak, fear everything would be terrible and china wouldn't be the china i love) just kind of melt away. i coudl speak. i could understand. the busses and signs and people were the same. the smells were the same. it's still my china.
of course, i don't have a dictionary, and i can't read any of the food menus, so i haven't eaten more than bread and jelly yet, but i hope to change that today. traveling in the south has always been ard for me because of the pepper. maybe i'll find a nice muslim restaurant, or a buddhist one.
i arrived in kunming without any trouble (20y to the airport, 820y to kunming, 2y to the hostel, because i got lost), but once i got to kunming i started getting silly. i left my purse with my phone, ALL my money and cards in the bathroom and just walked out.
i am SO lucky it was still there when i got back. i thought i was about to die!
then i lost the people i was going to go to the hostel with, and i had a heck of a time getting to the hostel, but some nice ladies helped me get there.
i'm staying at the hump, and it's GREAT! 25y/night, and they squeezed me in even without reservations. it's epic, on top of all these great bars and restaurant. it's HUGE, and super comfy and clean and chill. a great great hostel.
met some dudes from austria and plaed set with them all night long. now we're going to brave the inclement weather and check out dian chi, and the dragon gate.
sweet.
kunming has been lovely. i made plans with the austrians (named florian and jerry) to meet up early tuesday morning for breakfast and touristing. i had hoped to be up by 7 so i could go watch the old folks at the nearby pagodas, but it was gross and a little rainy outside, so instead i just played on he internet.
also, there is apparently a block on livejournal on this computer, which is more than a little irritating. all my usual proxies aren't working, so i've been mailing these updates to myself. i'm certain all this will be one big huge post, so that should explain why it feels a little disjointed.
so we grab western breakfasts (i had the veggie breakfast of toast, hashbrowns, tomatoe, cornflakes and eggs, for 18rmb, which is a bit pricey, but it was for the socialization) and head out for dian lake (dian1 chi2). bus 73 too us to genghai park, which was probably pretty once. the trouble is the water is GREEN. not like, colored by the surrounding trees. like a layer of green sludge on top so thick all the debris floating on the surface was being pushed down by the weight of the sludge. so gross. also, the smog is so oppressive in this city. we couldn't even really clearly see the mountains that border the lack. yuck.
but we'd paid 30rmb to get in, so we were going to get our moneys worth. there was a green bathroom, with zero waste output, which was cool, except to cross to a garden in the park you had to take a bridge past the septic ponds, which was not so cool.
but we found a nice little lake, and some flowers and trees. a bunch of locals fishing, and a man playign the flute while a bajillion dragonflies flew past. so it was ok in the end.
we took the cable car across the lake to the xi1 shan1, which was stupidly overpriced at 40rmb, but it did get us halfway up the mountain. we then took the tram for 2rmb up to the dragon gate, and another 30rmb put us in the dragon gate complex. somehow we managed to miss half the temples and pagodas in the park, but we saw the important ones (like the shrine to the turtle god), the dragon gate, the greeting the morning pagoda and the miniature stone forest (this cool collection of eroded rocks that lines the tops of the mountains, and takes a billygoat to manouver). we enjoyed our time, well earned at the top of that mountain (even with the cable car and tram, there was still quite a bit of climbing involved. blech). then we started the hike down. we took a few breaks to rest, i taught them to play my version of mad dog 20/20 (the drinking and non-drinking versions), gave them a starter lesson in chinese, and realized i can't hear the difference in most german words. we bargained our way into a car to the bottom of the mountain (7rmb for 3), and SOMEHOW managed to get back to our neighborhood, mostly because very friendly people helped. (the 6 to the 82 took us to the market just north of our hostel). we stopped at the super market, and wandered through it's dizzying excess, bought some snacks and drinks, and set off in search of food. which took longer than you'd have thought, unless you know how hard it is to eat with me, adn then imagine that is mitigated by the fact that EVERY DISH in kunming is made with pepper.
but we finally found a spot, and the guys, being the geniouses they are, asked for extra extra spicy noodles. so they got what they asked for, which amused me to no end (altho it turns out the locals thought it was only medium range). and i got a fantastic flat glass noodle dish with tofu and veggies (i can eat bok choi again. it's amazing. 2 years of fasting has given me a new lease on the veggie). we had these huge cups of tea, and just as we were finishing our meal, all hell broke loose and a GIANT thunder and lightening storm came crashing down on us. so we drank some more tea, told our life stories, drank more tea, but eventually we ahd to give up and braved our way through the rain back to the hostel.
once back, we all took our time getting dry adn comfy again. i decided to not go to lijiang, to save both time and money, because i don't want to be traveling on the 8th (i actually plan to hold a baby panda for a million billion kuai). we played some pool, and then settled in for some real mad dog 20/20, and then kings. which is what ruined me. actually, what ruined me is the fact that i was drinking beer AND strawberry daquari. oye.
so i was totaled by midnight, and made my way to bed.
don't know what i'm going to do today. i hope to catch a sleeper train to cengdu, but that may not happen. and then if it does, i don't know if i'll be able to find a hostel, but we'll deal with these things as they come, won't we?
well, i didn't get the train ticket i wanted *grrrrr*. i wound up booking a plane ticket for 550rmb, because every other alternative would either have had me standing for 18 hours, or not getting to chengdu until 2pm on the 8th (defeating every plan i have)
so i spent 2.5 times more than i should have, but i'll be in chengdu by noon tomorrow, (gods willing). i've been hitting up a couchsurfer there, and hopefully i'll have a place to stay for free, or at least someone to go hang out with in the evenings.
today i went to cuihuyuan (jade green lake park), which is a BEAUTIFUL free park in the middle of kunming.
actually, first i walked up to yuantong se, the largest buddhist temple in kunming. it was beautiful, and it had the best smelling garden. there were legions of faithful minority women sitting around the temple to buddha (which was stunning in it's graceful and elaborate decorations, it's sheer size and care. i mean, it was a truly great temple, rivaling those in beijing) waiting for their chance to go in and pray and study. this is a very active temple, with male and female monks teaching lessons in little corners, mass prayer sessions, and people completely enveloped in study in every side room. i was really impressed. there is something sweet and romantic about a temple where you just see a handful of devout monks servicing those who come t gawk, but this was a truly inspirational experience, seeing an active temple full of the faithful living, eating, knitting, reading, singing, teaching and learning.
after i'd had my fill of contemplating the turtles, koi and frogs that had been released into the pond filling the center of the temple, and breathing in the sweet smell of the gui trees, i hopped a bus over to the park. which is maybe two blocks from yunnan uni. it's not often i regret not going t kunming like i'd originally planned all those years ago, but seeing the kunming campus, and then the park. well....it's nice. it can make one feel a moment of regret.
(not too much tho. beijing is still a better city)
the park was great.for every instance of gross and ugly and dissapointing i felt yesterday at dianchi, it was redeemed by lovely, charming, idyllic, and engaging in jade green lake park. a vast system of paths and bridges contain a giant lake (that was thankfully green because of the foliage and environment, and not nearly so much because of pollution). they bend and wind and come back on themselves. they lead under covered paths, into little nooks and crannies, past comfy teahouses sporting mockingbirds and other song birds, always with main paths that have incredibly comfy marble and ganite benches overlooking the swan pond, the GIANT lily ponds, the childrens paddleboat pond, the koi pond, and every other kind of pond you could want. and then i got even better, because every bend, nook and crannie was filled with solitary musicians practicing, choral groups practicing traditional folk singing, women practicing folk dance, people leading traditional dance modified excersize lessons, taichi and yoga lessons, and mass group performers (singers, full traditional band and traditional dancers in costume)
i mean. it was just amazing. every time i thought i'd seen or heard more than i could hope for i'd walk another 100ft, and there'd be something else to bring a smile to my face.
even the sudden thunderstorm couldn't bring me down. i just went into one of the tea shops, sat down on a huge overstuffed couch overlooking a lily pond, and drank 7yr old pu'er tea (15rmb. the older pu'er tea is, the better it is. at 7yrs, it wasn't great tea, a bit bitter an earthy at first, but with a delicious slightly sweet aftertaste. and BOY does that tea brew dark and brew forever. i drank more than a full pitcher of hot water and the leaves still brewed). i spent the next hour or two relishing the songbirds, inspecting the mocking bird (who has actually ever seen one? i think there was a cuckoo, too) and making notes in the lonelyplanet guidebook i have (so, my plan is to take the one i have now, and exchange it for the one they have here in the hostel. then when the next person picks up the guidebook, they'll have all the hints and tips i have for each city to help make their time better, and i'll do the same to the one i take, and exchange it out for another one when i get to another hostel with the same guidebook. i love doing this kind of stuff guys)
after the rain finally broke and the sun came back out (the first time i've really seen the sun in kunming) i went back to the temple to check out it's vegetarian restaurant. first of all: HELLA EXPENSIVE. the avg dish was 30rmb. considering yesterday i had a tofu noodle soup for 7.5 and it was more than i could eat, that's quite a bit.
second of all: it almost killed me. i ordered rice noodles with sliced pork and veggies (fake meat, of course). when it came out i took two bites (i was hungry!) and then immediately started flushing and coughing. they'd put a light pepper powder on it. i called them over and told them even that little bit of pepper was too much for me, and they said they'd fix it. when i came back out i took a teeny bite and it seemed ok, so i took a big bite and immediately regretted it. it turns out that my mouth was so numbed by those first two bites, i couldn't feel the spice in that 3rd bite. i don't know if they did anything or not, but it seemed exactly the same to me. at that point, i was suffering pretty bad, burning up, crying partially because it hurt, partially because eating pepper makes me tear up uncontrollably. so i told the i couldn't eat it. that i didn't want to make them try again just box it up, i'll give it to someone homeless and i'll pay my bill and go. they said they'd make me a fresh dish with no pepper, no charge. i said ok, i'd give it a try. when i came out, it was the same dish. it's just this light pepper spice people often use when making noodle dishes, but after that fifth bite my stomach hurt so much i was almost doubled over, really thinking i was going to be sick. i felt dizzy and was burning up and coughing without stop. so i just paid the 16 kuai, grabbed the food and stumbled to the nearest bun stand. i bought a GIANT rice bun and a vanilla ice cream, and that managed to calm my stomach down enough that i could get home without much trouble.
oye.
and then on the way home i saw a monk bend a piece of rebar using just his neck. sweet.
so, i got home, rinsed the offending noodles off, at a rather flavorless dish (because it also washed off the oils and salt and what not, along with the pepper) and now i'm trying to figure out how to get to the airport at 5am.