A Rosen in China: March 2008

Monday, March 17, 2008

Last night

So Laura and I took a bus during the day from Lijiang to Kunming. I read two books while on the 8hour+ bus ride. When we arrived in Kunming we had an early dinner at a hot pot restaurant before catching a cab to the airport.

Sunday night was a special day in the Chinese New Year, and a midnight people celebrate (like CRAZY) by setting off fireworks EVERYWHERE. We did not know this. The plane arrived at 11:40pm and we got a cab around 11:55pm, and our 45 minute cab ride was filled with explosions of color in the sky. The fifth day, Po Wu (破五), is the birthday of the Chinese god of wealth. So on the night of the 4th (or at midnight on the morning of the 5th day of Chinese New Year), people use fireworks to greet a god fortune, and fireworks are supposed to encourage the god to bring wealth to one's family.

Of course we did not know this. 50 minutes of fireworks, all across one of the biggest cities in the world was simply one of the most surreal and amazing experiences I've ever had. Despite being exhausted the next day in work, taking the late flight on Sunday night was worth it, hands down.

Friday, March 7, 2008

Day 4: Lijiang

Saturday morning we woke up around 8am and had breakfast at the hostel. I tried explaining “scrambled eggs” to them, but they really only know fried eggs. We had some trouble deciding what to do, but finally decided we’d rent bikes and bike to Baisha. Laura had found a great place to rent bikes, where they provided a hand made map of the entire area which included how to get to Baisha, Snow Jade Dragon Mountain, etc. Originally Laura and I both wanted to go to Snow Jade Dragon Mountain, but the cab ride alone would have cost about 100RMB each way, and the entrance fee to enter the mountain was even more expensive. Since Laura was more on a strict budget, we opted to walk to the bike place and pay the 15RMB for a bike for the entire day.

I really love biking in China. I am thrilled that I’ve had the opportunity to explore such interesting (not necessarily attractive) places by bike. It’s empowering when you transport yourself and don’t need a car, train, bus, or whatever to see something. I know I took a plane to get to Kunming, and a bus to go from Kunming to Lijiang, but biking around Lijiang was awesome. Surrounded by mountains and breathable air, the atmosphere was quite refreshing, especially when compared to the snowy, rainy, cold, poorly heated Shanghai that I had left earlier that week.

We had trouble finding the actual entrance to Baisha. Maybe people wore “traditional” clothing which consisted of a blue type dress and a white apron (I believe), but I’m skeptical as to whether it is genuine or if they just wear it for show to help the tourist industry there. Laura’s book spoke about Dr. Ho (pronounced heeh) who is supposed to be a miracle worker. We find his home to be covered in magnified newspaper articles, clippings, letters, and business cards from travelers all over the world, including Michael Palin (from Monty Python’s Flying Circus). In Baisha we wanted to go to an area that was known for its mosaics or paintings, or something, but we were unable to find it. A lady in Baisha immediately greeted us when we entered, and kept trying to have us follow her to her home to drink tea. While a bit flattered, Laura and I assumed it was just a way for them to make money. We weren’t sure if you were supposed to give them money afterwards for the tea or not, so we just kept telling here we weren’t thirsty (in Chinese), and she eventually found some other tourists to invite to her house. Before leaving though, she did show us a guestbook with people from all of the world—written in a variety of languages. Because we had a big breakfast, we skipped lunch and accidently got lost after leaving Baisha. To ride to Baisha was about 8k and it would have been another 8k back. We had originally wanted to go to a temple which was another 10k or so, and as much as I wanted to go, Laura wasn’t comfortable going that far on the bike since she hadn’t been biking in awhile. While I was disappointed, we reached a semi-compromise by just biking on a random path that went through orchards, farmland, cows, etc. When we reached the main road we saw honey vendors. The bees were behind the small shack of a building where the shop (and I’m assuming their home) was set up. There was a fancy building next to the honey place and the back part of the building had a beautiful garden. We tried going down the dirt road to see more of the garden, but it was protected and sectioned off by barbed wire. This was not the first time we had seen barbed wire during the trip. At the park we went to on Friday, there was barbed wire on the bushes/greenery that prevented you from going into the woods off some of the paths. I can understand barbed wire to prevent people from going onto your property, but barbed wire at a park? Ridiculous!

When we biked past the bike place, there was a huge stage set up in front of the Mao Zedong statute in the main area. Some girl was singing. We slowed down but kept going because we had originally wanted to go to the Lion pagoda. Unfortunately either our book was wrong, the map was wrong or the pagoda just did not exist. People didn’t give us clear directions of how to get there, nor did they really seem to know where it was. So we gave up and returned the bikes to the shop.

Following that we ate dinner at a restaurant recommended by my book. While the food was good, the service was SLOW. We had an amazing tofu dish that used a specialty tofu from the area. It was a light dish served with red and green peppers. I think this was the most enjoyable tofu dish I’ve ever had, unfortunately I just don’t remember the name.

After dinner we decided to go to find a bar and have a few drinks, but most places had ridiculously loud BOOM BOOM music, and I’m sure it also had expensive drinks to boot. We found a decent looking place with live music, but the only table that was open was right next to the speakers, so I couldn’t hear myself think let alone hear Laura. I was being a bit of a wet blanket, so we didn’t drink anything. Instead we walked back towards the main square in the old city, arm in arm since it was cold. Next thing we know, about 20-25 Chinese people come running towards us. They surround us in a circle, hand-in-hand, and start running around us in a big circle while chanting, “sing a song! Sing a song! Sing a song!” Laura and I looked at each other like, “oh my goodness what the heck is going on?!” but we complied and sang Happy Birthday to them in Chinese. They laughed and clapped, and just like that they broke the circle and dispersed. Befuddled, Laura and I looked at each other and I just said, “Let’s go get a drink”, and we did. We found this hole in the wall bar near our hotel. It was lovely because it had pillows and sofa type seating, but was fairly small. We explained what a vodka red bull drink was, and we negotiated a price with them. Everyone else there was (for the most part local) Chinese, so they were delighted and surprised when we sat down. The owner of the bar had two dogs—a little puppy no older than 6 weeks, and another dog who couldn’t have been more than a year old. The owner of the bar started it so he could play his music… and that’s what he did. Laura and I had a drink or two and just listened to this guy play the guitar for an hour or two. Despite the ambush after dinner, listening to this man play the guitar in a small room with two dogs and many random Chinese people really was the best way to spend our last night on vacation.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Naxi Music Performance

Let's see if this video works!

Day 3: Lijiang

The bus arrived at 4am, and of course I was exhausted. We stayed on the bus until 7am, when they woke us up. We wearily dragged our luggage inside the bus station and called our hostel. We had told them we’d be checking in around 7/8am, so they were expecting us. Originally we stepped into a cab but the driver told us he could not drive us to our hotel because it was in the old (pedestrian) part of Lijiang. The hostel’s phone number originally did not work. We must have woken up someone because they called us back after we tried calling them a second time, a person called us back. They said they were open and that we could check in. After negotiating a cab ride and getting lost in part of the back alleys (not creepy back alleys, but quaint large cobblestone path alleyways), we arrived. We wearily checked in. Our room was on the second floor. The outside hallway had various chairs and tables, so after dumping our luggage in the room, Laura and I just drank some hot water and watched the sun rise with a gorgeous mountain backdrop. It was quite bisque at 7:30am but the view was spectacular, especially with a warm cup of water in our hands.

Instead of sleeping in, our book suggested walking around the city before 8am because tours begin to swarm the city after 8am. So we walked through the cobblestone streets, over bridges that went over small streams/canals. Some of the streams had hundreds of orange and white fish! I walked past a place with these glass containers filled with YAK YOGURT. It looked like the delicious yogurt I had while in Beijing, so I immediately bought a glass and it tasted SO GOOD. After finding the main square, we were welcomed by many touristy shops. We wandered around some more, uphill towards a park that supposedly had an entrance fee, but we just walked a bit and watched more of the sunrise in an area that overlooks the entire city. It was gorgeous.

We then walked down the paths and headed back toward the main square. By this time there were many tourists. Our stomachs were rumbling so we stopped at a local place for some noodles. We returned to the hotel and decided to rest a bit before going back out and exploring. After napping for an hour or two, we walked towards a local park. We decided to purchase tickets to a Naxi (a minority group) music concert for that evening. So on our way to the park we bought the tickets in case they sold out. We assumed it was going to be a “tourist authentic” version of music, but we wanted to listen to it anyway. The admission to get in was 80kuai (so expensive!) but Laura’s Lonely Planet book spoke of a free entrance that was another 5 minute walk away. We followed the instructions, got lost, then found the second gate, The guard let some Chinese people in but when we approached he stuck his head out and tried to make us pay. We pretended to just want to know where the museum was (which was right next to the park), so he pointed to the building. Past the building we saw a path and a small footbridge that led straight into the park. There were no guard buildings. So, we just walked past the museum, walked over the bridge and into the park. We wandered around a bit, but were exhausted from the bus ride and all the walking we had already done that day, so we sat down on some stone stools. I had playing cards with me so Laura and I just played card games at the park by the water for maybe an hour or two. The sun started to set so we headed back towards the old city.

We decided to go to a Tibetan restaurant for dinner. The food was a bit expensive but good. We had a potato dish, dumplings, some sort of vegetable and rice. We arrived a bit early to the Naxi music performance to get good seats. The music was similar to a Chinese Music Ensemble performance you’d hear at Wesleyan- they had erhus, gongs, drums, and various other instruments.

The problem with the building was that it wasn’t heated, so as it became darker outside the room became colder and colder. After two hours we left early—we were exhausted so we headed home and at the hostel we just bought two beers and played some more card games before going to sleep.