Stone Forest

Quite possibly one of the highlights of spring festival was the Stone Forest in Kunming, Yunnan Province. It was an outdoorsman's dream. Really. When outdoorsman dream they imagine this place with awesome paths to follow between and under massive rocks going straight up. It really is so amazing it looks fake.

I can't get over this place. At times it felt like the scene from the Lord of the Rings with the Dead mean from Dunharrow. That was a burst of nerd, but look for it next time you see the movie and you'll know what I mean. If we didn't have so much else to see on that exciting vacation I would have staying there for days. Camp, climb on rocks, pretend. Whatever. It was so cool.

And one of the best parts was that for whatever reason we didn't encounter to many people. For what ever reason most of the visitors didn't go beyond the beginning of the park. Perhaps they preferred to view it from the golf cart that circled the perimeter of the park. More park for us.

I did the math, calculating the amount of time we were in the park with the amount of pictures I took, and it came out to about one picture every 30 seconds. That right there is a testament to whether I like the park or not. And lastly, if I can get this excited about one place on earth then it makes me wonder what the new earth will be like when I go hiking with Chris.

The Kingdom of the Little People

Where to begin. Well we made it into Kunming and ate over/under/crossing the bridge noodles. Which is like make-your-own soup, for freshness' sake. Those were good and then we needed something to do with the rest of the day, we had just eaten lunch. I remembered a very strange place I read about on the internet that I was only half-hearting joking to go see. The kingdom of the little people. It was a supposed land of all little people who put on some sort of show and "live" in little mushroom houses.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold it right there. Nope. No chance. It's wrong to exploit these people just because they are different. No way they'd do that. In America, sure, but here... first, understand this: China is a developing country, not a developed country. In a country where a job and not just the right job is hard to find, when an offer comes up for a guaranteed job with good pay, and accommodations suited to you, you take it. At least these people did. Now they put on a daily variety show which includes singing, dancing, and even a tight rope walker. The situation is played up, trying to show you a 'kingdom of little people' to the point that a king with a gold cape makes an appearance.



From the looks I saw on the performers faces, they were split, some looked bored of the same routine, some loved to be entertainers, some seemed lifeless, and some flat out didn't want to be there. Take it for what it was, some good some bad. But memorable for sure.

Chengdu part duex: The rest

 Welp. The rest of my pictures cannot fully do justice to the beautiful Chengdu. We saw many things with the rest of our time there. Sichuan Opera, a variety act going back hundreds of years including puppets, shadow puppetry, singing, music, many combinations of the two, as well as a comedy routine I couldn't understand.

We cruised the downtown looking at the recently made ancient style architecture (which is slightly oxymoronic, but it works). We ate hot pot again, which is rapidly becoming one of my favorite meals, especially because I love spicy food. We even stumbled upon a Catholic church which featured elements of both European and Chinese architecture. That really means that it looked like a temple without the trimmings and had a chapel slapped on the side.

Maybe now is a good time to mention Andy. and his beard. Andy grew a beard ever since the beginning of No-shave November and by the time our trip started it was looking pretty medieval. He was called by many different people name different names such as: Jew, Swede, Russian, Galileo, Dmitri Mendeleev, and probably others we couldn't understand.

Lastly, I might add, one of the side effects of living in China is of the many things I saw, many would probably interest you but they have become so common place for me that I forget to include it. This isn't really a boast but a misfortune, so if you do see something in a picture, or have heard something comment or email me and I could very well post about it next for the benefit of the readers as far as my limited experience can go.

Black and white and cute all over

After our train ride recovery which included hot pot (spicy stew-your-own-food) and a massage, we made plans to see the famous pandas in Chengdu. The next day we were immersed into the world of pandas and I probably heard more "Aww, how cute" than you'd hear next to a group of high school girls looking at a smiling baby monkey next to a sleeping kitten. But they are strange animals to be sure and they really do just lounge around and eat. To the point that they almost looked set up in certain positions in the park. They will go where the bamboo is and they will just chow down. But they were just so cuuute. There was a moment when a baby panda was stuck trying to climb up, little back feet clawing the air for a foothold that just wasn't there, or when one looked over the edge too far and fell down three feet off its platform, only to be joined by his friend who didn't want to be alone up there. Way to go pandas.

I myself was satisfied with seeing them from a fairly close distance and getting some great pictures of them. But if you really wanted the full experience you could have dropped one thousand kuai (over $120) and gotten a picture while holding a baby panda. Worth it? To some. Not to me. After we seeing the adult pandas and the babies, we moved on to see the red panda, related in name only. It looked like a legitimate Pokemon. That's all  I can saw about it.

At the end of the trip was a museum of the history of the pandas in China, with a very horribly done taxidermied animals section, where eyes appeared to be rotting out of the head of the animals and a flying squirrel was placed on the ground with arms and legs splayed. Not realistic and not even necessary, but then again I couldn't read anything, so maybe there was some relevance to a stuffed ram and a stuffed flying squirrel in a panda museum. My guess is that it was just trying to balance out the cuteness factor of the real guys.

16 Hour Standing Room Train Ride

Well, well, well. They say don't quote the French if you don't know French but I can't help it. This, my friends, may very well be my Pièce de résistance, a masterpiece as far as I'm concerned, on an event which I will continue to tell for years to come because of the struggle and the pain. The memories on it were priceless, and you really can see how long a good mood can last and what it takes to kill it.

This exciting episode actually began the day we set foot in Xi'an. We had decided to get tickets the first day we got there. Man, we were so smart. We went to the ticket office which our hostel had kindly shown to us and we asked for six hard sleepers. Those are the six beds in a room ones, perfect for our party size. They were sold out. In fact, they only had standing room left. A slight chill crept over us all. We had been told by the veterans to avoid standing rooms tickets at all costs. I boldly let fly, "Let's get 'em, I've always wanted to do standing room, just to experience it, ya know?" What a fool I was. Had I so quickly forgotten the stories of ankle smashing carts parading through the aisle every fifteen minutes, smoke stench, and humans crammed in so tightly that even a sardine would feel claustrophobic and a clown car would seem roomy. But we decided to go directly to the stain to get tickets because that was where the real seats were at.

At the station, our hopes were handled like Moe handled Curly: a eye poke, a hair yank, and a slap in the face. In other words: not well. Six standing rooms tickets. Fifteen hours (later we would find out it was actually sixteen). Oh, well, we still had three days before we'd have to worry about that so we just put it on our minds' back shelves and took in Xi'an.

When the time arrived, we had that nervous giddyness/happiness that comes right before something big. We went to board our car, because that's as much as the ticket said. no row. no seat. just a car.

But our car was so full already we got moved to the next car over. Which really just meant they had already crammed everyone in. We walked in and then stopped. We were in, that's it. Bags in hand, the train started off. Fifteen minutes after the train started we finally go the bags stowed away, and we broke out the stools. Little dinky green stools that kept you off the ground. So I'd sit down, put my head down, and- time to get up a cart's coming through. Okay, okay, now put the stool down, sit down, head down- wait guy has to use the bathroom. That happened more times than I can remember. But at least in our trio, Brian, Lauren, and I, spirits were high. While the others had already experienced a stool breakdown before we hit the two hour mark. The sitting and standing. For me, it was basically stand until you wanted to sit and then squat/sit on a stool until my knees ached and then stand again. But all was not complete hell. We had bought great snackies for the ride, I had a pack of oreo's, a snickers, and a 3:00a.m. Budweiser. And there was intense people watching. The section we stool close to was a pack of vagrant men, they smoked right in the middle of the car, played cards loudly very late into the nights, and threw seeds on the floor which usually got me in the back, because I was so close to the ground. But even they were not void of mercy, after the halfway point they allowed Cale and I to sit in one of their seats while they were doing other things.

One of the things we were looking forward to was the fact that logically, in our minds, once the train started, people would continue to get off, leaving towards the end of the journey, whole rows upon which we could lay our sore bodies. But no, when the train stopped, the impossible did a triple-axel. More people got on a seemingly max-capacity train. I held to this thought at times, oh, the memories that will come from this, and it's just once, right? That allowed me to hold out a fairly happy although exhausted mood through the entirety of the trip. And after what seemed like ages and then some, we finally arrived in Chengdu and knew that everything that day would be a little sweeter because of what we had come through.

But if you'd rather just see a video,

Xi'an Part III: Mountain, Muslim, and Miscellaneous

This guy makes kite-flying look easy.

After having seen the place most people will mention when you travel to China we refocused ourselves of what else Xi'an had to offer. There was the might Hua Shan mountain but it was out of our price range so we settled for our next stop Li Mountain. Less grand and picturesque but a great mountain nonetheless. We made the cold climb to the top after we were dropped of by cable car of course, and found out that we weren't so cold anymore after a couple thousand steps. There was a temple on the mountain that strangely spoke of a goddess who made men out of dirt and instituted marriage. Sounds familiar. hmm. 

Hearty lamb and bread soup

     The rest of out time in Xi'an was spent looking at the free things/nearly free things it had to offer including a mosque which looked nothing like what you'd expect, but rather more like a Buddhist temple. We walked around in the Muslim quarter and ate great food. And we eyed up the many knick-knacks for sale and walked past giving them a thousand "no, thank you's" and "bu yao" (I don't want). A pagoda topped it off and we were ready for the exciting phase of our journey.

Looks like we have a photo bomber on our hands!

Warriors of Baked Earth

 Thousands of those guys, no two faces alike. Amazing and yet kinda gives you a funny feeling at the same time. Often times the things we hold up to praise in the ancient times were just the money blowing dreams of a rich guy. The Pyramids, Taj Mahal, Hanging Gardens, and now this, countless faces made for a man's tomb.

   That fact aside, the amount of culture that has been left behind with the whole process is an example of the good coming with the bad. Everything from weapons, hair styles, building design, and battle tactics was preserved in the place that some peasants accidentally stumbled upon when digging for a well. It was a impressiveness that grew on you as you went through the grounds building up to the uncovered army standing in rows. Even more impressive and slightly frustrating is that we see only about one fourth of it. The rest is still underground awaiting better excavation techniques!  Pretty neat though on the whole and made for some great pictures, too.

Commercial

We (actually, I) interrupt your regularly scheduled blog posts to bring to this awesome news from McDonalds in Wuhan, China.

Bacon Mashed Potato Double Beef Burger from McDonald's

It's like tasting a home cooked american meal and a
hamburger--at the same time!

There are no words...only letters, mmmmmmmm!

Xi'an part I: A Good Start

Me, pre-disaster.

There we were, three friends getting ready to embark on the journey of their lives. We had thought our seats were going to be worse. Apparently hard seats in this area were niiiice. I stashed my bag and plopped down in my reclining chair and started reading. I was feeling good. Everyone who had told me traveling in China was easy had apparently not traveled with me. Check, check, check. The finals calls were being made when all of a sudden I heard Andy conversing with a man about his seat. Shanghai, the man said. Foolish man this train is headed for Xi'an, I'm going to see me some Terracotta Warriors. Right? Wait. I felt it, that rush of chemicals your brain sends out along with a chill when you realize something bad is afoot (score, slipped afoot in there).

We were on the wrong train. Andy hurriedly grabbed his bags and scrambled out the door. Our grins of comfort morphed into the grins of foolishness as we ashamedly gathered our things. I was following Andy out when I heard the beeping. The beeping that says the doors were going to close. Then -Shhhhhlllopp!

The doors sealed closed on the train headed in the completely opposite direction of my vacation. "Hey", I said. That was it, Hey. Like that was going to do anything. But it was enough, the conductor who had probably seen plenty of confused foreigners in his time speedily sent word via his walkie that I wanted off. The doors whipped back open and I tottered off. Darin somehow also made it off the train and we hopped on the correct train this time. Sadly this was more like it. A rigid bench that although giving the appearance of comfort actually is one of the most torture-some devices ever created. The seats are surprisingly rigid and no matter what position you may try, you cannot get comfortable for long, especially when you come in anglo-size. But I had books and my imagination on my side which did an amazing job of blocking out my body's signals such as discomfort, hunger, or sleep. Fifteen hours later we arrived in Xi'an, with several pages under my belt and a horibly sore neck, back and bottom. But we were there and that isn't even my worst travel story yet...

Don't miss: Xi'an part II Warriors of Baked Earth

I'm back!

That's right, ladies and gentleman, I'm back in the cold embrace of Wuhan after a month long journey traveling Asia. I'm back like Han Solo from Carbonite, or Gandalf from that long fall, or Edmond Dantes from the Chateau d'If without all that revenge stuff.
At any rate, I've got over 3,000 pictures and a veritable ton of memories/stories I think you'd like to hear. So come sit around the warm glow of your internet device and read of my adventures for the next few evenings as I tell you my tales.

       Oh and here's a few pictures, because I didn't want to start writing yet tonight. I just started school again, which if you've ever traveled for a month or even a few weeks is a very hard thing to come back to, student or teacher. Besides it'll build interest. Because you know this last month and a half of stagnancy did nothing for that.