Memories of China
Thursday, July 21, 2005 at 7:30pm
It’s been a long while since my last post (too long, as I’ve been told) and I have since left China, gone to Italy, left Italy, and came down to Atlanta. The summer has been pretty amazing and by the time I leave ATL, I’ll spend a month at home before I have to come back. Well, I’ve been keeping a journal of the all the things I’ve been doing, without having the chance to update everyone sans internet for more than 15 minutes at any amount of time since I’ve left Beijing. I am now just bumming at Jenn’s place by Emory, which she is renting out for the summer with Emily and Leuwam.
Given, it seems, so much time has past since everything that instead of a laundry list of everything, here are the things that really stayed with me from each experience. And it’s only those experiences that matter anyways.
For the rest of China:
Xian
Saturday, June 25th. We went to see the terra cotta soldiers in the morning. Looking back, that’s hardly important. A lot of drama started morning of, and somehow when it starts, you feel like it’s the start of something bad that won’t go away from the rest of the trip and would continue to affect everyone involved to the very end. We were all afraid that the trip would end up leaving a bad taste in our mouths by the end of Hong Kong, forgetting all the good times that we’ve had. It actually started that night on the overnight train to Xian. It seems that when you care for everyone that’s somehow caught up in the whole mess, and you’re not really on any side, I don’t know. It was the first time I had to deal with something like this and I wondered back on the many times I’ve believed that things are just black and white. Emotions come in and everything becomes a shade of gray. What was looking to being one of the worse days for a lot of people on the trip luckily experienced somewhat of an upturn. Late at night, a bunch of us went out together. I wanted people to just talk to each other, and they did, which brought me a kind of relief I had never really felt before. It ended up being one of the best nights we’ve had in China. We got food at the street that had vendors and restaurants open till 3am and afterwards walked around the city we were to get familiar with that night, singing throughout the streets, doing as we pleased, riding on motorcycles for 4 yuan around the block as fast as the motorcycle guys could go, trying to bribe the guy at the city wall to let us in, and staying awake to watch the sunrise back at out hotel. A day built on so much tension ended being the best night in China.
Hong Kong
Tuesday, June 28th. We left Xian and flew to Hong Kong. Leave the bad behind and take to good with you I guess. Former groups dissolved and new groups formed, and that’s just the way it goes.
Wednesday, June 29th. This is the infamous day we decided we wanted to go karaoke, and since there seems to be so many in HK, we’d go check it out, and found out that karaoke club=whorehouse. After going into one, and being the first in line among the group, two guys working at the club ran up to me asking “How can we help you?” in cantonese and with unease as they saw the lot of us standing at the entrance hall where I could see a huge poster inside of plain naked missionary on the walls. At this point, we understood why there were scantily clad girls posing next to all the karaoke signs in the streets of Kowloon. We dutifully checked out 2 more places, you know, just to make sure, and yup-no question about it. They’re all shady. The night however did end well as we found a place called Chasers with an awesome band that played our type of music, blend American pop, hip-hop, and R&B. We definitely went back the next night.
Friday, July 1st - Saturday, July 2nd. Everyone all went to Ocean Park, an amusement park akin to Six Flags, but on a less grand of scale. I’m so glad Monica and I share the same sentiments on most of the rides. Afterwards, Monica, Adam, Claudia, Yeou, and I went apart from the group to do the Dragon’s Back Trail at Shek-O. Monica ended up not feeling well, so I ended up being the four of us, taking the train and then the taxi to get there. This is yet another infamous day that cause about a week’s worth of suffering. We got dropped off in front of the map telling us how to get to the trail, and seeing both routes, we took one to discover it too impossible, full of thorns, vines, and a trail that loses itself amongst the foliage. Many mosquito bites later, we went back to the map to check on the second route, with about similar conditions but at least it somewhat of a trail leading up to the bike trail that leads to Dragon’s Back Trail. Yeah, view was great yaddy yah yah. When we got down to see the map once again, both routes we tried were definitely labeled as “impassable routes” dotted lined and everything on the map and the really trail was a little further down on the left of where we started. Retarded. And we encountered a sign that said that advised us to wear long pants and stuff since the mosquitoes on the trail had a chance of giving you Dengue Fever! Yeah, well I’m still alive, though the day after I was ready to go all Lieutenant Dan on my legs. On Saturday, last day for me in HK, day went by so fast now that I think about it and then I was at the airport with Monica, JoJo, Yeou, and March saying goodbye to that part of my summer.
It’s been a long while since my last post (too long, as I’ve been told) and I have since left China, gone to Italy, left Italy, and came down to Atlanta. The summer has been pretty amazing and by the time I leave ATL, I’ll spend a month at home before I have to come back. Well, I’ve been keeping a journal of the all the things I’ve been doing, without having the chance to update everyone sans internet for more than 15 minutes at any amount of time since I’ve left Beijing. I am now just bumming at Jenn’s place by Emory, which she is renting out for the summer with Emily and Leuwam.
Given, it seems, so much time has past since everything that instead of a laundry list of everything, here are the things that really stayed with me from each experience. And it’s only those experiences that matter anyways.
For the rest of China:
Xian
Saturday, June 25th. We went to see the terra cotta soldiers in the morning. Looking back, that’s hardly important. A lot of drama started morning of, and somehow when it starts, you feel like it’s the start of something bad that won’t go away from the rest of the trip and would continue to affect everyone involved to the very end. We were all afraid that the trip would end up leaving a bad taste in our mouths by the end of Hong Kong, forgetting all the good times that we’ve had. It actually started that night on the overnight train to Xian. It seems that when you care for everyone that’s somehow caught up in the whole mess, and you’re not really on any side, I don’t know. It was the first time I had to deal with something like this and I wondered back on the many times I’ve believed that things are just black and white. Emotions come in and everything becomes a shade of gray. What was looking to being one of the worse days for a lot of people on the trip luckily experienced somewhat of an upturn. Late at night, a bunch of us went out together. I wanted people to just talk to each other, and they did, which brought me a kind of relief I had never really felt before. It ended up being one of the best nights we’ve had in China. We got food at the street that had vendors and restaurants open till 3am and afterwards walked around the city we were to get familiar with that night, singing throughout the streets, doing as we pleased, riding on motorcycles for 4 yuan around the block as fast as the motorcycle guys could go, trying to bribe the guy at the city wall to let us in, and staying awake to watch the sunrise back at out hotel. A day built on so much tension ended being the best night in China.
Hong Kong
Tuesday, June 28th. We left Xian and flew to Hong Kong. Leave the bad behind and take to good with you I guess. Former groups dissolved and new groups formed, and that’s just the way it goes.
Wednesday, June 29th. This is the infamous day we decided we wanted to go karaoke, and since there seems to be so many in HK, we’d go check it out, and found out that karaoke club=whorehouse. After going into one, and being the first in line among the group, two guys working at the club ran up to me asking “How can we help you?” in cantonese and with unease as they saw the lot of us standing at the entrance hall where I could see a huge poster inside of plain naked missionary on the walls. At this point, we understood why there were scantily clad girls posing next to all the karaoke signs in the streets of Kowloon. We dutifully checked out 2 more places, you know, just to make sure, and yup-no question about it. They’re all shady. The night however did end well as we found a place called Chasers with an awesome band that played our type of music, blend American pop, hip-hop, and R&B. We definitely went back the next night.
Friday, July 1st - Saturday, July 2nd. Everyone all went to Ocean Park, an amusement park akin to Six Flags, but on a less grand of scale. I’m so glad Monica and I share the same sentiments on most of the rides. Afterwards, Monica, Adam, Claudia, Yeou, and I went apart from the group to do the Dragon’s Back Trail at Shek-O. Monica ended up not feeling well, so I ended up being the four of us, taking the train and then the taxi to get there. This is yet another infamous day that cause about a week’s worth of suffering. We got dropped off in front of the map telling us how to get to the trail, and seeing both routes, we took one to discover it too impossible, full of thorns, vines, and a trail that loses itself amongst the foliage. Many mosquito bites later, we went back to the map to check on the second route, with about similar conditions but at least it somewhat of a trail leading up to the bike trail that leads to Dragon’s Back Trail. Yeah, view was great yaddy yah yah. When we got down to see the map once again, both routes we tried were definitely labeled as “impassable routes” dotted lined and everything on the map and the really trail was a little further down on the left of where we started. Retarded. And we encountered a sign that said that advised us to wear long pants and stuff since the mosquitoes on the trail had a chance of giving you Dengue Fever! Yeah, well I’m still alive, though the day after I was ready to go all Lieutenant Dan on my legs. On Saturday, last day for me in HK, day went by so fast now that I think about it and then I was at the airport with Monica, JoJo, Yeou, and March saying goodbye to that part of my summer.