C.H.I.N.A.
Day 1
After touching down at the Pudong International Airport, we grab breakfast at Shanghai before going to the small-but-damn-packed city called Yu Yuan - yeah, the place I got lost in no thanks to the sea of people whose movement are like tidal waves that threatened to sweep you away to somewhere else. Not only that, this place has alleys, hidden nooks, more stores, and a long queue to some temple...naturally, tourists would get lost here.
LEFT: This golden tree's seen somewhat everywhere in China - but I just don't get the people' mentality to throw stuff onto the branches "for a wish come true". C'mon, those oranges are gonna go to waste.
RIGHT: The various decos up and around Yu Yuan, along with colourful polystrene statues of gods and goddesses, fishies, and lanterns...
And LOOK!
There's TWO Starbucks in this place! The one on the left is the one we saw once (and the one where the Chinese lady at the counter actually spoke FLUENT ENGLISH while I ordered the caffeine drinks for the family. I'm somewhat impressed. The other one is further in.
After a hectic people search, the family's whole again and it's off to Hangzhou...
...for a nice West Lake performance - first time I'd watch a musical. The earlier acrobats are not as good as the last - when the Kuan Yin story starts, it gets interesting until the grand finale. Most notable scenes would be the Butterfly Lovers story (the entire city REEKS of this story), Kuan Yin, and the 8-Girls-Band (as opposed to the 12-Girls-Band) that played while the dancers (left pic) dances on...
Day 2
LEFT: We went to this Hangzhou West Lake Museum for a little historical tour about Hangzhou (and now I know WHY people get put off for history - when you don't understand Chinese and don't know what the hell the tour guide's said, you'd drift. Did precisely that.)
RIGHT: A HUGE + detailed scale model of the land of Hangzhou. This is just one shot (and one angle) of the place. Compare its size with the people walking around it.
And then, it's to this place Xian Wu Tian Di (which is just down the right of this museum) where the small estate of bungalows house each a cafe/pub. And of course, Starbucks.
At this point, I was wondering whether there IS a Coffee Bean in China...I hardly seen it.
In the noon, we went to the REAL West Lake - y'know, the one made famous in the Legend of the White Snake. There's the Leifeng Pagoda where she's imprisoned in on the left pic; the right pic is one small scenery top before reaching the spot in the left pic.
And Nope, no thanks to the weather or anything, but the boat trip around the lake is DEAD BORING - dull sky, dull sea, grey mood, freakin' cold - it puts people off. A world of black and white is even better than this dull world of grey.
Day 3
This, is Wuzhen, some backward (REAL backward) village where we made a pit stop before advancing to Suzhou.
NOTE OF CAUTION - do NOT attempt to sample the food here nor EVER use the toilet. Hell, you can practically smell the toilet stench EVERYWHERE in this village. I don't even want to comment about the WC - just imagine thousands of people frequenting the loo, and the loo's flushing system broke down - YEAP, THAT BAD. HELL, I think our Malaysian public toilet's even better. And the food? It's beyond horrendous, to the point I'd started wishing this trip was over and I was back in familiar places - this, is one nightmare pitstop.
But ah, the scenery is another thing. Not SO bad, but due to the boring winter weather (and then the Dragon King refuse to give rain nor snow), the scene (left) lefts me not much to ponder upon. Added with the toxic air of cigarette smoke (those China uncles really smoke thick-concocted cancer sticks practically everywhere), this China trip starts to put me off =.=
But as we get to Suzhou, things drastically improve.
LEFT: This is their so-called Lion Grove. Pardon this citybred, but the stones littered everywhere in this pavillion-ish destination SO does NOT resemble lions - more like misshaped, mutated stone giants of, well, stones. Just because the boulders have weird holes in it (made naturally), and the shape looked (to them), "tall, proud, standing lions", they'd filled this pavillion with the same sort of stones, and called them lion structures.
Lion, my foot. Even if Griever did not resemble much of a lion (he's a HYBRID), at least I see some leonine features on the face/body shape. Here? Stones of lions? RIIIIIIGHT.
RIGHT: The nightscene in Hangzhou. The local tour guide (called Amy, pic not taken), knew our culture of "pasar malam". When she said that we're gonna shopping at the local night market, I HAD expected something like our "pasar malam" - but OH NO, it's just roads and roads of stores selling imitation stuff, food, (one block itself has 3 McDonald outlets), bags, toys (devil bands that lit up upon the touch of a button is a hot cake here), and more.
Day 4
The next morning, we visited the Suzhou Fortress Wall, of which I'd managed to spy this heart-shaped looking...thingy (suspected was root) growing out of the centre of the wall itself. A grisly metaphor of literally seeing a "real living heart of the wall" would have given those with a sharp eye a ghastly shock. I'm curious as to how the root took that shape, that's all.
Further in, there's this statue thingy (of some famous figure whose name I do not know), and then we had the boat ride aboard the small dragonboat (right pic).
Upon landing on the other side of this Suzhou canal (somewhere further down), we head off to one of the silk factory in Suzhou. Being a city famous for its silk (it's proven - the silk blanket I'd bought is luxurious to the feel), it's chaos inside the buying hall itself - imagine the crowd of Sungai Wang Plaza being squeezed into one small hall twice the size of our lecture hall. Yeap, THAT packed.
And after getting our purses considerably lighten, we headed to Nanjing, so-called bloodiest place in China due to the Nanjing Massacre.
LEFT: This be the fortress wall that had tried to defend the city of Nanjing from invading Japanese forces - but it was torned down, and painstakingly put back to get the wall we see today. The bricks itself (inset) has inscriptions on it, telling perhaps tales from the dead soldiers who died defending their city...
RIGHT: Nightscene at the river flowing in Nanjing. It's other mispurported "pasar malam" trip, and one that left me feeling so miserable (too many people, cold, night), I had, for the umpteenth times by this trip, wished this hellish vacation be over.
Day 5
This is Zhongshan Mountain, the one mountain that almost literally killed me. The giant temple on the left seats riiiight at the top of this blasted mountain, and it houses the tomb of Sun Yat Sen.
And the funny thing is, minutes after the attack, I'd saw
another twin of mine walking around.
I am the one holding the camera and snapping this pic. THAT girl is standing down there with her parents/guardians - and she was looking at ME, hence this shot.
Probably thinking the same thing as I was - WHO IS THIS GIRL WHO LOOKS LIKE ME?!
I KID YOU NOT - see the similarities?!
My dad once thought she was me (and thought I was ahead of him), but when he saw me coming up behind him, he looked back and forth and went, "EH?! I thought that was you!" And then, the two of us were wearing black coats - the only thing differentiating us would be, she'd slung her white bag over her shoulder.
So yeah, lo and behold - another TWIN (or now, more like, triplet, if we count SaintAya in) is walking around in China.
...what's that saying about meeting one's doppelganger and seeing one's doom?
...but it seems I'd experienced the almost-doom of my OWN life before seeing her...o.O;;;;
Aaanyway, after leaving this place (and my China twin is nowhere to be seen as I left the moutain...), we head to Wuxi - to see this giant Buddha statue and his hand, affectionately nicknamed the "Yi Fatt San Chiong" (Art of Buddha's Palm) by me after the Buddha martial arts of the same name - hell, it IS his giant hand.
And right in this middle of nowhere (this place's hidden waaaay deep into the mountains), is one hell of a technology that, if utilized in Malaysia, would have sent Japan weeping. Seriously. It's definitely strange to find such technology utilized for tourism, and much less used in this countryside instead of in the major cities.
1. What was seen as a stationary column thingy started opening up while the Buddha music plays and the waterplay starts...
2. As the petals are mechanically lowered, it revealed a young Buddha standing within...
3. At the climax of the song, the dragon statues below started spouting water as well (as though to celebrate the enlightenment of Buddha)...
4. And a lucky shot - to get a rainbow just as the waterplay dies down...
5. Whilst the Buddha statue rotates a full circle - managed to get this shot when he was looking this-a-way...
...it was a magical noon, alright, and I'd give my prayers for surviving Mt.Zhongshan.
The rest of Wuxi, after this, lefts much to be desired.
Day 6
The so-called movie-shooting place of Three Kingdoms, the structures on the left pic belongs to DongWu, while the pic of the right is the shot taken onboard the battleship of DongWu - there's the other mini-territories that's supposed to be CaoWei and ShuHan, but we didn't visit there - after eating the cold wind onboard the damned ship full of smokers, I'd lost the mood to go sightseeing =.= Smoking IDIOTS just do not understand the no-smoking sign plastered everywhere in this smoke-filled country.
Back to after that,we went to this The Bund Tourist Tunnel in where we see this time-machine-looking vehicle(left pic) and take a scenic ride through, well, a tunnel, but filled with pictures coinciding with the voiceover speaking inside this vehicle - the funniest moment woulda be when we entered the section called, "Paradise and Hell", and the evil laughter of some psychotic madman resounded within - but instead of inciting shrieks of fear from this tourist group, we'd burst out laughing and made our own mock-horror laughter. Reverse reaction, it seems o.O;;;
The Oriental Pearl Tower (right pic) is what made this trip worth it, because of the spectacular view of Shanghai at night - it's breathtaking, and considerably nicer than our own KL-Tower view.
What I'd pity most would be the liftlady who'd spoke the welcome speech in Mandrin/English for who knows umpteenth times till she lost her voice, and the English gets very warped (her English pronounciation is even worse than our TOA-Chinese-bred-England language. But god, the torture she'd go through just for this low-pay job...ya'd think there's no labour rights in this country.
The right pic shows the scene of Shanghai night as taken onboard ANOTHER boat trip - and once again, yours truly feeds upon the biting cold wind. I don't mind this boat trip, but when so-caled civilized Chinese people wants to get off the ship...they'd crammed the little hall in a bid to be the first outta the ship, and it was so packed (and no thanks to those bloody idiotic smokers), I shuddered to think what'll happened when the boat sinks ala Titanic.
But ah...at least this last stop of the night is a breather.
Shang Tian Di is the ONE and ONLY PLACE in CHINA to find Coffee Bean.
But THANKS TO THE FUCKED UP UNCLE FROM TAIWAN WHO'S NEVER BEEN TO COFFEE BEAN BEFORE AND BOASTS THE TIRAMISU HERE TO BE 5 TIMES MORE EXPENSIVE THAN THE ONE HE HAD BACK HOME AND THE SAME OL' FUCKED UP UNCLE WHO FORGET THE FUCKING LOOOOONG LIST OF FOODSTUFF TO BE ORDERED (and poor cashier boy hafta REPEAT the order - twice) AND THEN CLAIMED HE'D HAVE NOT ENOUGH CASH (at RMB621.00, the cashier boy lightly/politely said he can pay by card)-
-I'd lost my one and only chance to get a Coffee Bean drink in this goddamned country. THANKS to that Taiwan idiot. I mean, back in KL, ya'd be beaten and thrown outta the line for taking up to 10 minutes to order something, and this uncle from that godforsaken island takes 15 minutes, and THEN he forgets what he'd ordered (no thanks to his stupid adult children he'd brought along to add this and that when they saw the food counter =.=). The poor cashier-boy'd repeat his order (as customary for every order placed in Coffee Bean), but he'd suffered since he had to do it TWICE, and when the blur uncle seems not convinced, poor boy whipped out a menu-brochure and circled the items ordered...only to have the uncle saying he can't see the damned print.
UNCLE, IF YOU CAN'T READ AND ORDER QUICKLY, GET YOUR CHILDREN TO DO IT! DON'T KEEP THE CUSTOMERS WAITING!!
But I was too pissed off by then, due to the time constraints (we're only allowed 30 minutes to walk around this Bangsar ripoff area), and we'd wasted 15 minutes in queue >____< So we'd trudged the remaining 5 minutes back to the waiting spot to be brought back to the hotel.
Fuck, indeed. I detested the damned island, and I in particular detest the people (whose people are stupid enough to vote for a corrupted president. Good lord). Seeing one in real life itself who'd MADE ME LOSE MY COFFEE adds further hatred o'mine towards these goddamned country. Hell, if ever China's gonna war with this stupid island, I'd root for China to sink it ala Atlantis and wipe it outta the face of this planet =.= *hisses like a mad cat*
And onboard the plane, I'd kissed this C.H.I.N.A. goodbye and swear never to set foot upon the land ever again. One hellish trip's enough.
So yeah, it's a half good, half bad trip. Next year I wanna go somewhere hot and preferably with a clean air.
For now, let me soak my misery with the rain - sad to say, after this trip, I'm slowly but steadily sinking into depression again - I can tell the early signs. SHIT.
-Lammy-