First Day in Lijiang

Well, since I just sat around the hotel room and recovered yesterday, there’s nothing much to report.

This morning we took a flight to LiJiang which is a 50 minute flight northwest of Kunming. The descent was a bit choppy since we are in mountainous region. These hills and mountains are perhaps the precursors to the Himalayas which for certain start in Tibet. We are definitely closer to Tibet and you can see that by the architecture and there’s yak butter and yak yogurt for sale everywhere which I think is common in Tibetan diet.

We checked into a lodge that is decorated in the Naxi (minority) people’s style. There whole hotel seems like it’s one big wood carving. It’s beautiful, rustic, and it’s only $20 a night! And it’s located in the old town of LiJiang which is a reconstruction of what it looked like hundreds of years ago. It’s so peaceful and quiet here.

Day 2 and 3

Here's what happened the next few days....

After the Super Bowl was over, we went out to find the local climbing gym. It’s located in an old courtyard community and we were really able to spend some time wandering the streets. I have never just walked into those very Chinese neighborhoods. Places that westerners live tend to be modern with modern facilities. There were fruit stalls, butcher stalls, tailors, people playing mahjong. When we finally located the very tiny gym, it was obvious no one was around and when we asked some people if they had any information about when the gym would be open, they replied that it was a Monday. Here's what one of the courtyards looked like. This is traditional Chinese housing... comfortable housing.... us westerners wouldn't make it a day.

We walked to a Yunnan inspired restaurant that was horrible in my opinion- bad service, dingy, not so tasty or fresh like Yunnan food is supposed to taste like. Chase ordered what he thought was beef and he got duck tripe. I ordered eggplant and corn. More on this later…

We made our way back to the park that is by the hotel and sat in the sun and planned out the rest of our vacation. Then we went to the oldest Buddhist temple in Yunnan. And that how Buddhism first came to China, through land and through Yunnan. The temple itself is undergoing huge renovations but as we worked our way back through the courtyards and minor halls, we found ourselves watching an afternoon prayer service, full of monks, Chinese Buddhists, and some tourists. It was a beautiful thing to watch and the chants were similar to Sanskrit chants in their rhythm but of course, not in sounds. Here's a picture of one of the side halls where it shows Siddhartha renouncing his religion, caste, and position as an elite member of society by cutting of his hair. You can see his clothing and embellishments are Indian. And then a picture of him enlightened. That's great art and I really appreciated it for a few minutes.

In the morning the next day my stomach was waging a war and I knew something was up. I didn’t want to make a big fuss about it so we went to buy tickets to Dali or Lijiang, where we planned to go next. The train station was a ZOO. Everyone in China will tell you, as a foreigner, avoid the train station during Chinese New Year holidays. And now we know why. Every single family travels back to their hometowns and it’s beyond crowded. There’s just no space to even move and there’s total chaos with people moving around, sitting down, eating, sleeping and they all have 7-8 bags each that are either hoist on their heads/backs or are sitting around. Some of what they carry are gifts from the city for the country folk. One such popular gift we saw was an electric stove top. Just a single top that plugs into the wall, but just think about how that will revolutionize cooking for their family member, grandma, aunt, whom ever, in the countryside.

Chase and I couldn’t secure tickets until the 13th so we opted for going to the Stone Forest which is 60km from Kunming for the day. It took us about 1 hour to find where the minibuses were to take us but by 11am we were on the road.

We spent the afternoon wandering around the Stone Forest which is a beautiful collection of limestone karsts. It was awarded UNESCO National Heritage Site status. The main part of the park is very touristy. The pathways around it are completely cemented and there’s non-native grass growing around the karsts. Chase and I took the route as far away as we could get from them. Then we were in heaven. The breeze was light, the sun shining, and we couldn’t hear the crowds anymore. Chase was like a kid in a candy shop because he wanted to climb all the boulders and get to the tops. I was just enjoying breathing the fresh air and take some shots of him and the scenery. Here's what I think is a great shot. I know you aren't supposed to shoot into the sun (it's bad for your lens) but it was worth it.

And that’s when it hit me. Those of us that live in Austin or have immediate access to the outdoors really take for granted what we have. I can’t remember a day in the last few months at least where I was surrounded by nature and its noises. No cars, trucks, people shouting, firecrackers, they have all become the background noise to my life and even when I practice yoga or meditation in my house, I am always tuning out those noises. How stressful on the nervous system it is to live in the city!

By this time, my food poisoning as it turns out was getting worse. We stopped into a pharmacy at night to finally get some medicine for me.

I had packed a First Aid Kit, but the only item I managed to forget was some Immodium. The pharmacy lady recommended three kinds of medication and it seemed like a lot. Chase inquired about the price because we thought maybe it would be too much. To our surprise it cost only RMB 9.90. That’s less than $1.50 people! The same medicines that you can find in America, you can get here for so much less. For example, not that I think that antibiotics are good to use, but Amoxicillin is an over-the-counter medication! I guess it stems from the fact that 99% of all drugs are manufactured in China.

Anyways, the medicines are working and I do feel better and hope that I will be back to normal by tomorrow. We have a flight to LiJiang which I am excited about.

Day 1 and 2

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We ate at the Bluebird Cafe in Kunming on our first night. Here's Chase enjoying his curry and yes, I drank one beer. Come on, I was on vacation!

So here's the official start of my diary from this trip. I couldn't keep up so while this is written in present tense, you will see in a couple of days that I will switch and just give you summaries.... with pictures.... yeah!

It’s the 2nd official day of our vacation and we are sitting in our hotel room in Kunming, Yunnan watching the Super Bowl with Chinese commentating. We don’t get to see any of the commercials, though. At least it’s better than our home where we don’t even have Chinese cable television and we would have to watch it streaming from our laptops. We went down and ate a yummy Chinese breakfast which for me consisted of a make-it-yourself noodle soup and they were kind enough to go in the back and get me some boiling water instead of pork broth.

So yesterday we got on our flight in the afternoon which we almost missed because we couldn’t get a cab on time and the one we did get was not a regulation cab and tried to scam us. (People around Chinese New Year will do anything to get themselves more money so they can go back to their families in the countryside and look good.) On the way down, we were able to see the mountains come into view and the plateau in which most of Yunnan is located. The hills are definitely barren, no more trees from years of deforestation hundreds of years ago, but nevertheless, we could see clear skies and that made us both happy. A baby began to cry during the descent and wouldn’t stop because his ears were plugged. The mother, tried to talk over it and made many attempts to soothe the baby. After about 10 minutes of the wailing, she became frustrated by her efforts and began spanking the baby on the bottom, shouting at it, and shoving it in the father’s hands only to take it back after a minute to repeat the cycle. It was a poor display but an accurate one of many Chinese parents. They have babies because they know they are allowed to have one according to law. But they have no nurturing spirit or sense of what it takes to be a loving parent and most of do not have the patience required. I just kept thinking that all she needed to have prepared was a bottle of juice or, if a child is old enough, a piece of candy to suck on. And if that wasn’t possible, at least massage the sides of it’s jaws. One of the main purposes of my work with parents in my classroom is to help counsel them on parenting issues like this one. However, I think that it’s common sense and I couldn’t believe she was not able to help her baby. Furthermore, her insults towards her child were purely to “save face” in front of all the other passengers who at this point were beginning to take notice of this tiresome situation. I hope that in my work here I can at least affect some parents to treat their children respectfully and with love.

Kunming is really pleasant. The air is so clean here, the trees and foliage are lush and the town seems really laid back. We went to dinner at Thai/Burmese/Chinese restaurant then took a walk and spent some time in two bars. One was a tavern-style Chinese bar with live musicians. The first one was singing jazzy Chinese favorites and after the DJ came on for a few minutes to play hip-hop, and then that was followed by a female singer. During her set, the lights went out and while we thought it was a fuse that was blown we later found out the whole city was in a blackout. A blackout! The only other place I know that happens is India. So it just reminded me how close we are to the developing world.

But honestly, Yunnan seems more “free” than northern China where communist rule and fervor is still imprinted in the culture. So people here seem to have more freedom and don’t see us westerners as such a spectacle. Tourism is their most important industry, so maybe they are just used to us.

Alright, it’s time to get back to the Super Bowl. Chase has begun to commentate play-by-play so that he doesn’t have to listen to Chinese for the three remaining quarters.

Yunnan!

It's been a few days since we've been back from Yunnan and I've enjoyed relaxing in Hangzhou. The weather's been great and it is going to get warmer in the next week or so!

So for the next few posts, I will be sharing with you our wonderful week in China's frontier land. Did you know Yunnan wasn't even a province during WWII? So it's as far away as you can get from China. It feels pretty wild there actually. There are many ethnic minorities who still call this province home and people from Vietnam and Thailand trace their ancestors to this region.

Chase and I had a great time. Quick summary: a couple of days in Kunming with unsuccessful attempts to find rock climbing, I got a stomach bug, went to LiJiang, and had a couple of attempts to go to the Tiger Leaping Gorge and finally made it there for a two day trek, almost adopted another puppy, a day in Dali (China's Goa, if you know what I mean), and back to Hangzhou.

Oh and I've got pics of it all! Love the new camera...

Slight Oversight

I thought I would be able to take our new camera on this trip, take pics and download them on to the blog for your viewing pleasure. However, I forgot that we are still in good 'ole China. The Great Firewall will block me from accessing my blog since I will be laptop-less.

So I guess I'm signing off for a week or so and when I return to Hangzhou I will have a splendid recount of what we did, who we saw, what we ate, and all the juicy details.

Stay Tuned.

And until then "Chun Jie Kuai Le!" and "Gong Xi Nin!"

(That was Happy Spring Festival and Happy New Year!)

Change of Plans

Chase called me at work on Friday, (well several times) and finally when we talked he told me that Yangshuo was going to be cold and rainy the entire time we planned to be there. So that would mean no hiking, climbing, and spending time outdoors in the sunshine and enjoying fresh mountain air, etc. So we decided to change our plans last minute and have chosen to go to Kunming, which is the capital of Yunnan province.

It's a city of about 8 million people on the Yunnan-Guizhou plateau. So that means the elevation is around 6,000 feet. It's the high-altitude training center for most athletes in China and many from around the world. And therefore, it has plenty of sunshine and because of it being so far south enjoys a tropical climate. Basically, it's very lush. It's the city from where you can take side-trips to see China's ethnic minorities up close. Hopefully we won't get sucked into some tour or destination where it's a Chinese ethnic minorities "themepark" but we hope to get off the beaten path and see the diversity in culture.

In southwestern Yunnan, there's a lot of Burmese influence since it shares a large border. This is evident in food as well. There are lots of places down there where you can get a glimpse of the different kinds of peoples.

In northwestern Yunnan lies Dali, Lijiang, Tiger Leaping Gorge, and the "Shangri-la" of China. All of these are supposed to be beautiful cities and the gorge of course is the deepest one in the world. So we are going that route and will worry about booking train tickets to Dali and Lijiang once we get to Kunming on Sunday. Hopefully it's not sold out and mayhem at the train ticket office because everyone's trying to get home for the holiday.

We also chose to go to Kunming because there's supposed to be some climbing outside of the city and Chase is definitely excited about that.

Finally, I am excited because Yunnan cuisine is fresh, earthy, and they use a lot of various kinds of mushrooms in their diets. You haven't eaten mushrooms unless you have come to China to taste their cuisine. It's amazing how many different kinds of fungi and mushroom grow here and the different preparations of them. In fact, Chase and I were at an early dinner tonight and I had wood ear mushrooms. YUM.

Yunnan cuisine also includes a fair amount of bamboo, pineapple, and banana, which I love to eat as well.

So I hope to take some pics with our lovely new camera and post them.... speaking of.... we went to the electronics market today to crack my Iphone to use in China, bought a case for my phone, a case for our new camera, and 8 DVDs, and the total cost - $25 USD. That's all. In America, you can't even buy the case for the Iphone for less than $20.

Then our dinner: 2 cold appetizers, 1 vegetarian entree, 2 meat entrees for Chase with a coupon for $10 brought our meal to $10. That was 50% off our meal.

Man, I love China right now.

Quick Update

It's a lovely Friday morning. I'm enjoying a whole pot of chai. I've started to increase my caffeine intake because the weather has been so poor in Hangzhou. I just don't have energy to wake up when it's day after day of no sun, gloom, and constant drizzle.

But the tea's excellent, had a bowl of granola, and listening to my current favorite song: A-Punk by Vampire Weekend. It's a happy tune and it gets me going.

Today's the last day of the term for the children at my school. Thank GOD. I made it. Hahah.

We have two weeks off for Chinese New Year, sometimes called Spring Festival. Chase and I are going on our first domestic trip of more than 3 days. Can you believe that? All of our other trips have been international, so far?

Crazy. I thought we came here to see China.

There have been fireworks going off for weeks. You just have to experience the excitement in the air. It's hard to explain. Everyone in the country travels home so I hope our decision to stay in the country was a good one.

We are going to Yangshuo, a climbing destination. It's known for it's tall towering peaks... yes the ones you have seen in landscape art and scrolls.

Oh, and the other day I cooked my first full-course Indian meal, desert included. I made dhal, rasam, cauliflower, and paysam. It turned out all right... except for the rasam, which I just can't make just like my Mom's. I guess that's how it goes though. Mom's cooking will always be the best.

Alright, I'm late for work now and have been every day this week. Yikes!

Bye.