Ellie in China!

Wednesday, December 5, 2007 - Chengdoodlydoo!

As it turns out, we ended up having a Thursday and Friday off during November because of a sports competition that they were having at school and broadcasting CCTV. So did we stick around to be on TV (because we're whiteies, they wanted us to be on TV)? PSSSH... NO. J and I decided we'd pack up again and hop on over to the capital of the adjacent Sichuan province, Chengdu. Ticket prices were deliciously low, at about $30 each way but getting there proved to be harder than expected when our plane was delayed 2 hours and, instead of checking us in, the woman pointed us to the swarm of Chinesers screaming to the attendants about how they wanted to switch their tickets and what not. Luckily we ended up checking in and after our 2 hour wait, we ended up in Chengdu with the lovely ladies from Sim's Cozy Guesthouse waiting to pick us up. We were apparently the only Chinese-speaking whiteies they'd come across and we talked with them all the way back in their REAL car with LEATHER seats. It was sooooooo cool to be in an actual car again :]. We stayed the night and on Thursday morning we set out for the bus station to go to Leshan. It was only a 2 hour ride and when we got into town a woman got on the bus with a sign that had the characters for Buddha on it and was basically saying if we wanted to go, they had a minibus that could take us there. We hopped out and it was a great idea, only costing us 2 kuai a person and it shaved off the time it would have taken to go to the bus station and then take a 15 kuai cab ride to the buddha! Well, we got there and had a little lunch before heading in and having monkeys jumps on our heads. It was a great time and we saw a lot of SE Asian statues and the Da Fo was just amazingly massive... totally humbling. That is until the monks in front of us took a million pictures of J and I instead of of the Buddha. haha... oh, being white in China...

Well after that we came back and I suggested we go eat at this restaurant that Sim had recommended called Peter's Tex-Mex Grill. He was a little hesitant but hungry so agreed. We went there and oh. my. god. it was a total culture shock for me. After not being in the states for 5 months, going to Peter's was like a trip home. The place was decked out in Texan chatchkies and there was even an map with Texas and part of Oklahoma on it. J got a burger (Texas Whopper) and I got some chimichangas and the only way to describe how good it was is with this picture of J's reaction to the food:

Some margaritas and ice cream rounded out our first amazing day in Chengdu!

Day 2 we got up early and went to the Panda Breeding Center. We got to see lots of pandas but the highlight was for sure holding a 1 yr old panda! They plopped him in our laps and he ate his little apple and held my hand! They're so furry and smooshy, you just want to gnaw on them! We also held red pandas which were like giant funny looking cats. haha! So fun! Then when we were getting ready to leave, some old Euros were complaining how they wanted the driver to leave and not wait for anyone else so we translated that to their driver... they were surprised and slightly embarrassed that culturally retarded Americans rock China better than they do! Americans: 1 Euros: 0!

After that, we chilled out in the room for a bit (after lunch at Peter's!!!) and went to a temple and walked around a parky area in the temple. There, we met Mike from Lonely Planet who said that we should do his Sichuan Opera tour because regular Sichuan Opera is "mmm... not so Chinese!" in his opinion. HAH! Boy, we live in China, we don't need you to show us how to be Chinese. smile_tongue So he talked to us about the NBA for a while and then we went back to Sim's. That night, we went to the (not so Chinese) Sichuan Opera which was very Chinese haha. It was so interesting! We took video of almost every act, so I'll show you it sometime when I get back if ya want :].

Day 3 was our last in Chengdu. It was ultimately lazy. We talked to Sim's ADORABLE daughters and took some video of them spinning in circles and the youngest showing us her markers. Then we went to a curio market and bought a couple buddhas and a chess set. After that, we went to a big park and took pictures with some Chinesers and walked around being generally accosted. Some woman tried to get us to dance in the middle of the park but we got scared and scampered off! Well, one of the things to do in Chengdu is have tea in this park, so... we did! It was all nice and everything until we noticed what was going on around us... EAR CLEANING! Yes, that's right... people get their ears cleaned in the teahouse with metal rods, and this so beyond unsanitary I don't even know what to say except:

grooooooossssss!!! They didn't even clean the rods going from one person to the next! Well after some more pictures, we got a sugar dragon on a stick and went off to do one of the last super-Chengdu-y things on our list; get some mapo doufu (tofu with chili and minced meat) from Chen's, which is supposed to have lineage to the originator of mapo doufu. Well, it actually wasn't bad! But that was of course our starter meal, we ate at Peter's... again. hahaha.

Here's the links to our Chengdu pictures!

http://picasaweb.google.com/sictransitvelouria/Leshan

http://picasaweb.google.com/sictransitvelouria/Chengdu

heart elisa

Labels: Chengdu

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8:21 AM

Okay! Long overdue, so here we go! I haven't posted since the Shangri-la trip, have I?! Well! Halloween came and went and we went to a pub crawl with all the other whiteies in Kunming. Christina was a hippie, J was a dead guy, and I was Messi/a Messi fan ;]. The next day, Christina, Casey, Liz and I had a girl's day to go buy tea and wander around Carrefour. Then, on Halloween, we went to Kevin's goodbye party at Mazagran's Cafe (we miss you a lot, Kevin!!!) then Christina was lame and stayed in, so I was a jungle cat (maybe a cheetah?) and J was a hunter, complete with his toy gun we got him for his birthday and painted on scratches. We went to Shuoba (Speakeasy) with some of our other buddies and had a great time!!

After that, things got somewhat back to normal as we buckled down on our schoolwork... it really gets in the way of enjoying the day! But then along came a music festival (Nov. 11) put on by the local celebs, the French-Canadians. Dan, David, Mark and I invited our whole class - including our teachers - to come to it. So in order to get ready for it, and because we're just crazy, J and I went out and cut and dyed our hair. He got a blue fauxhawk and I darkened my brown and got purple streaks! So the concert was great; about an hour outside of Kunming in the middle of the "doonbas" as mom would say. So we were there for about 4 hours or so, looking at other weirdos and entertaining our teachers. I'll post about after Chengdu things after my next post... which is about the Chengdu trip!

Here's the pictures from Halloween/Music Festival

heart elisa

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7:31 AM

Thursday, October 11, 2007 - Shangri-la-di-da!

This is long but ya know... you can just skip to the pictures if you want!

So J and I set off from school around 5 am and the city was absolutely empty... for once! After our one hour flight from Kunming to Zhongdian (Shangri-la) we flagged down a cab and had him take us to Dragoncloud Guesthouse in old town so that... we could get to old town. From there we walked down the street - past a lot of doggies! - to Shangri-la Traveler's Club, a hostel that Lonely Planet loves. We had some coffee and some French toast and eggy-weggs then went to the bus station and bought a couple tickets to Deqin. We got directions from some cabbies to the other bus line then went to Songzanlin Si (Ganden Sumteseling Gompa) which is a 300-year-old Tibetan monestary. We walked around for a while and watched the monks eat in the dark and whatnot for a bit, then headed back to the station to start our 6 hour bus ride to Deqin.

We past some of the most beautiful scenery along the way, as the road teetered on the edge of a mountain. And when I say that, I mean that there was one narrow road with no guardrail and a sheer drop down the gorge. But it was great! :] We were eye-level with clouds and little waterfalls would trickle down the mountains through a sea of red, orange, yellow, purple, and green bushes and trees, from evergreens to redwood-looking trees (haha I have such an extensive knowledge of trees, you know...) to cacti and elephant ears. As we rounded the bend toward Deqin we got our first look at Meili Xue Shan and the other 12 peaks. Even though the mountaintops were obscured by clouds, they looked massive. and impressive. Massively impressive, in fact. Deqin is in a valley and is heavily Tibetan as it is the last stop overland from Yunnan into Tibet. Once we got off the bus, a gal from Tashi's Mountain Lodge accosted us - but in a good way - and gave us a flyer. The lodge it turns out is in a village inbetween Deqin and Feilai Si, which is where I wanted to go early the next morning. It sounded pretty good, so we hitched a ride with her to the lodge with a couple of backpackers who had just started learning Chinese in Kunming - one was a computer nerd, the other a passive-aggressive who'd get upset that J and I could speak Chinese. Whatever, weirdo...! We got a room on the 2nd floor with a great view down the valley and after tea and dinner, we planned the next few days activities with the girls who worked there who gave us great advice on how to make the most of our time. We got to our room and went to sleep pretty quickly, until J suddenly sat up in his bed and said "don't get out of bed!" I was so confused, I figured that our space heater must have caught my blanket on fire or something, but as it turns out there was a big ol' bat hanging over my head. While I hid, J got our rooms switched and we ended up staying downstairs.

Monday morning we got up just before 6 and went to Feilai Si, which is a village (and also a temple) that has the best view of the sunrise over the mountains. It was a bit cloudy (maybe there were Japanese around? (okay, side note... Chinese people hate Japanese and it's a saying that if you go to Feilai Si and can't see the peaks, it's because there are Japanese around! Horribly racist, I know... haha)) But the clouds eventually burnt off long enough for us to get some shots and see the sun illuminate the peak before a thick fog rolled in.

We headed back to Tashi's for breakfast (aka dinner plus some rolls) and drove down toward the Mingyong Village. We got our cab driver's number so we could call him and have him pick us up the next day. Then we went to see a man about a horse. A man being a whole village. It's a 5 hour hike uphill and with my asthma and lack of stamina, riding a horse was definitely my only choice. Poor J... Chinese horses are basically donkeys so he couldn't ride them... but I did get some funny pics of them trying to put him on one!

So for 5 hours I rode and J walked, thus he became my hero! We stopped along the way to refuel with hard-boiled eggs, zanba (a roasted Tibetan flatbread) and - of course - yak butter tea! That was an experience... at the first stop, J liked it, but at the 2nd, I thought it tasted a lot better. There were beautiful sights along the way (see the pictures!) and after a rest at the peak I ditched the horse and we headed down the other side in our converse and new balance and street clothes... a funny sight for all the hardcore trekkers we met along the way. Speaking of, we were the only foreigners there so it was a great chance for us to practice our language skills. We had my horse lady call us a hostel before we started heading down and when we arrived we had the last room - no heat, electricity, a holey-fence seperated our room from the next and the door could neither lock nor open all the way. We napped until dark and then forced ourselves out of bed to eat. Scrambled eggs and tomatoes, beef and onions, rice and tea... our meals for the next few days! We watched some gals from Guangzhou play a Chinese version of 'go fish' and laugh at us until they realized we could understand their crazy canto-mandarin accents and we chatted with them a bit before heading back to bed and sleeping in our coats.

In the morning we awoke to a beautiful rainbow landing on the mountains. We ate our freshly pulled noodle soup and met a group of girls who were from a city just outside of Shanghai. As it turns out, they were also headed to the waterfalls after breakfast. We decided to join them since they seemed to know what they were doing a lot more than us so we grabbed some tiny red bulls, said bye to the piggies, and headed down to lower Yubong Village. It was a fairly flat and easy trail for the first hour or so and we strolled around stacking 'wish stones' and leaving little offerings on trees and boulders. It was a nice experience going with them because we got a little cultural insight on things along the way that we never would have got on our own. And they definitely knew about the whole 'Japanese people mean you can't see Meili Xue Shan at Feilai Si!' thing which is interesting, because we thought that only old people thought that. Of course the trek got harder and we had to walk up a (barely flowing) waterfall to get to the next stage. From then on, it was uphill. It would be flat for a bit and we met some friendly yaks that let us take pictures with them. We finally got to the waterfalls and ran around at the bottom, cooling off and just being ecstatic that we FINALLY made it!

We hurried back and after eating lunch at the crazy hostel we started back on the 7 hour trek. It wasn’t as bad the way back and we ran into the two weird treehuggers trying to climb the mountain. The poor computer nerd was lagging behind and his friend wasn't even waiting for him. Turns out the "experienced hikers" had brought too much stuff! We called our taxi driver when we were a few hours from the bottom of the mountain and met him around 8 pm. Then, we arrived back at Tashi's at about 10pm. Worn out and smelly, we got the very last room - a cottage, in fact, took a cool shower (the warmest you can be expected to take) then had dinner. They were completely packed with pseudo-intellectual backpackers who think that because they're traveling in another country, they must be the coolest people ever. haha! but it's not like we don't meet people like that all the time anyway...So the next morning we left Tashi's and went into Deqin with a couple kiwis and got our bus tickets for the trip back to Shangri-la. We grabbed some breakfast and then made the trip back. This time... wasn't so comfortable. We were in the very back where they have five seats and the guy next to me had his kid in his lap, so...yeah. But we had music and books and our own AMAZING personalities, so it went by quickly :]. Once back in Shangri-la, we went to a couple hotels, but since it was National Holiday, they were both booked up. So, we asked our cab driver if he knew of anywhere and we ended up with a great room with a bathroom and computers with free internet! After resting for about an hour, we went to the town square, where I had read on the Lonely Planet message boards that everyone in the town goes to dance at night. When we got to the town center, it was amazing. There were so many people just dancing around to Tibetan techno music - young and old alike. They were set dances too, that everyone knew the steps to and for two hours every single night, the whole town comes out to dance. It was great... we watched them for a while, then went and watched them from a second floor restaurant. After a good night's sleep, we woke up early and headed to the airport, thus concluding our not so restful vacation to Shangri-la!

Things I learned on the trip:
1. 20-year-old Tibetans look like they're 50, 50-year-old Tibetans look 800.
2. I have the mathematically impossible ability to fall while standing on flat ground. Countless times.
3. Chinese people think that J is King Kong.
4. Yak butter tea can be quite tasty!

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9:36 PM

Friday, October 5, 2007 - J's Surprise Party!

Well! So much has been going on, but I guess I should start with the week before National Holiday, since... that happened first!

So J's birthday was on Sept 26th so Christina, Kevin and I decided we should throw him a surprise party the day before. After all the necessary planning (inviting everyone, buying supplies, ordering a cake, making a giant card, etc) we still had one task... getting J's room key so we could sneak in and set up everything. Christina and I came up with an elaborate Plan A and B, but Plan A went so smoothly, we didn't need the backup. I told J I was taking him to a birthday dinner on Tuesday and during that time, Christina and Kevin were supposed to get into J's room and decorate it, letting everyone in before we got back. But of course, J decided that that was the day that he needed to hang around his room an extra hour before coming up to meet me for dinner! I was huddled by the window waiting for him to leave his room and Christina and I were making calls to everyone telling them to hold off on coming over. Once J finally came up, I demanded his wallet so that I could "look at his ISIC card" and Christina lured him to the computer. I switched his room key with mine - leaving his under my pillow for Christina to get when we left - then we headed out. Dinner... was another hour just to choose a restaurant! Kevin gave us wrong directions so we wandered for a long time and then I had to rush him through dinner. After conferencing with Christina via texts, we were walking up to his room when the fuwuyuan wished him a happy birthday. He thanked her then was like "wait... how did you know?" and I waved my arms around which is apparently universal for "shh! it's a surprise!!!" so she said that no one told her, she just knew.. haha! Anyway, so we got to the room and he tried to open the door. of course it wouldn't open and realized it was my key, but as soon as he pointed it out, the door flung open and everyone screamed and shot silly string all over him/us. It was amazingly perfect. So yeah! Here are pictures from the party.

A couple days later, Bailin and I went to eat lunch and were out walking and decided that we should wander over to Green Lake park. After chang liang-ing for a while (a Chinese phrase for strolling around a park) we sat down by some people playing violins and singing. I got really anxious and after one of the guys put down his violin, I went over and asked if I could play it a bit and he said I could! It was really exciting but I was so full of nerves I could hardly play anything. Every single person that walked by HAD to stop because they had definitely never seen a westerner in the park playing violin. About 7 couples took pictures of me, that I noticed anyway. Hilarious! Anyway, props to Bailin for putting up with my weird tendencies of accosting Chinese people and demanding that they let me play their violins. :]

Shangri-La trip on the next post!

Labels: Christina, j, kunming

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12:40 PM

Saturday, September 22, 2007 - Kunming... business as usual

Well I've settled into classes and it's really been business as usual! I have 18 hours of Chinese class a week, but only 12 hours transfer, so it's kind of a gyp. Anyway! Not much has been happening. I'm in the process of getting my residence permit and student ID, and taking it easy... napping and doing homework then eating lots of yummy food and watching 90 cent dvds! The only exciting thing I've done lately is get my hair done! I usually judge a salon by the products they carry so walked into the salon next to one of the movie theatres that advertised a lot of American and European brands. I talked to some people there for a while, explaining what I wanted in Chinese. After we all consulted, we were in agreement of what I wanted and then the craziness began! They got me some tea then had an average of 3 people working on my hair at once, with the manager watching over them and a couple random workers watching. At one point I had 7 people chattering around me and lifting up sections of my hair, debating what they wanted to do... I had so much foil in my hair I could have simultaneously picked up HBO and blocked CCTV! Well after the color was done I got a head massage and then the manager guy who they simply called "ershisan" (that's Chinese for the number 23) gave me a trim and straightened my hair while practically the entire store watched. It was hilarious but it was great... I've heard and seen some horror stories with Chinese salons, so I'm glad mine turned out all right! I ended up getting blonde highlights with a couple red pieces underneath to add some punch.

Since then, it's been pretty chill, we got some mooncaks in class which I thought was a pretty sweet idea until it turns out that Yunnan's specialty mooncakes have bacon in them! BLAAAAAAH!!!! CAKES ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE OVERLY SALTED HAM IN THEM! haha... but it's China, and it's crazy.

Christina and I have been clothes shopping but man... girls in China apparently don't have hips so it's ridiculous to try and find pants! I've picked up a couple tops and hoodies that look super Chinesey but I don't care... I think that some of the stuff they have is awesome... just not this:

unless you're a 14 yr old wannabe punk or something! Other than that, all that's happened is Christina and I wearing Jay's hats, Bailin and I building forts in the dorm, and watching the Europeans plan to play the game where you run around "shooting" people with bananas. I don't know, it's just life in China!

Here's the obligatory picasa link!

<3
elisa

Labels: hair, kunming, mooncakes

3 comments

9:08 PM

Monday, September 3, 2007 - Getting Settled in Kunming

Well, the weather in Kunming is pretty fantastic, just a bit chilly though... it's 63F right now, which is what it's been for the majority of the day. I've met just about everyone from the Vermont group, and they're all really chill. Christina, Jay and I have hung out with them a couple times, and I see plenty more in the future!

It took us just about a week to get our internet set up. After asking 5 different people then taking 4 trips to the computer store, Christina and I can FINALLY be on the internet at the same time! We've unpacked all our stuff and are pretty comfy here. We have a big room, desk, bay window, awesome view... if our internet was faster, it'd be perfect!

On Saturday morning, Christina and I went to Salvador's Coffee House for breakfast and wifi when Larry called saying that they were heading to the hot springs around.... now. So I hightailed it back to the dorms while Christina skyped with her smooshy wooshy bear. We piled into a van and had some lunch before driving to the mountains just outside of town. When we got out, we were at a resort-ish place and it was drizzling a tad as we checked in. The steamy pools mixed with the cool rain was great! Since I didn't have a swim suit (just wore shorts and a tank) I only planned on getting my legs wet but yeah... that did last long since BOYS LIKE TO SPLASH. haha... it was for the best though, I finally got in at the rose petal hot spring and it was amaaaaazing! After the inevitable rose petal fight, we went to a tea spring (that looked like pee!) and after the boys cooled off in the regular pool, we made our own laowai (foreigner) spring and had the staff turn on the water in an empty pool for us. We frolicked there until a little girl with massive boogers came in and we all ran out! We finished off by going to the radioactive mint green pool and then headed back to Kunming.

School is pretty good thus far. My classes are at a challenging enough level without being horribly hard. In the fourth week of classes we get to choose 2 extracurriculars, so hopefully I can get in some nifty ones! That's about all there is on my end so far!

as always, here's the link to this batch of pictures!
<3 e.

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3:42 AM

Wednesday, August 29, 2007 - Leaving Shanghai

Well the time had to come... after an amazing month in Shanghai, the program ended. We had a spiffy little graduation ceremony where everyone hooted and hollered for each other as we graduated from Shanghai Da Xue. There are some pics of my teachers and classmates at the graduation.

Jonas left on Friday after the graduation and we were all sad to see him go. After being gloomy for a while, we met Anthony, Sam and David who go to school in Liverpool. We invited them out for dinner and karaoke, which is always a silly time. (Pics of that too!)

On Saturday, we did... so much. Went back to Yu Yuan to pick up postcards and haggle for other random things. I even haggled for a stuffed panda for some Frenchies :] Then we picked up my coat, which is sooooo awesome and then went and got some fake purses and some Gucci stilettos. The rest of the night was spent sleeping and packing!

Sunday we packed because Lucas and I were leaving on Monday. Sunday night though, I got my nails done all silly Chinese style. I asked for white tips and got them... plus flowers with rhinestones! haha... Then we headed to the Pearl Tower to see Shanghai at night then headed to Park 97 for dinner and dancing with the Brits and Marina :]. It was a good end to the trip and I was really sad to leave. I've met so many wonderful people from all around the world, and it's so weird to think I wont ever see like 95% of them again. I missed saying goodbye to Marina in person but talked to her on the phone in the cab and we were both all teary eyed and saying how much we'll miss each other and... man! I wish the program were longer!

Coming to Kunming, I was excited about the weather, but that was pretty much it. I was still pretty upset about leaving my new friendsies when we landed. I read some of Catcher in the Rye in between plane naps and looking at the AMAZING view below. I can't even describe how awesome it was! LUSH green valleys with rivers winding through it, with as many trees and there are people in Shanghai... and that's a LOT! When I landed it was raining and my luggage was soaked, but by the time I got to the school, it had cleared up. Oh yeah, even though they SAID they'd pick me up... they didn't. So I took a cab who took me to the wrong school before the right one and then I had to wander around 'til I found someone who showed me where the international student office is. I put my bags in the holding room then turned around to see... CHRISTINA!!! I was like "KJSFHKKJGSHHJKGS!!!" and practically jumped on top of her. It was amazing luck. We then started the admissions process and were directed to where to go to get my housing. Then Jay came into the building and I was like "SHJLGJSD!!! yay!" and he slung my 30 kg luggage over his shoulder like it was nothing and walked with us to the international student hotel. Thank GOD he was there... I'm on the 5th floor, rooming with Christina, and there's no elevator. It would have taken about half an hour to get my luggage up there without him, so I am forever in his debt! After conking out for like 5 hours, Jay woke us up for dinner (haha). We went to a little place with him, an Irish guy named Eoin, and a French guy named David.

On Tuesday, we went to get Christina's passport pictures taken and ended up EATING DONUTS!!! Lucas knows how much I wanted donuts in Shanghai, so I was super glad to eat that sugary goodness. We did some more errands then met some of the guys in the Vermont group, Owen, Larry, and Justin. We went to a yummy Thai restaurant and Larry showed us a nifty skate shop with a cheap massage parlor above. They've been here for about 3 months, so we're counting on them to show us around! I have been too lazy to take pictures as of yet, but rest assured, there's plenty to come. In the meantime, look at a couple pics from the end of school... I'll post more once Lucas sends them to me!

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7:50 PM