homeward bound

I don`t seem to be able to type without this keyboard reverting to Japanese so forgive me if the message is brief and messed up.  We just left Hangzhou and now are in Japan.  Luckily the typhoon was hitting the town a few hours after we left.  When we got up this morning it was beautiful sunny and 36 degrees.  By the time we left at 10.30 the winds and rains had started.  We flew threw some of the storm on our way to Narita.

 

I am not sure if it was time to leave so i was losing my patience or i was losing my patience so it was time to leave.  Yesterday dad and i were sitting enjoying a cup of tea when a "gentleman" beside our table decided to clear both his nostrils and his throat and deposit all the muckus on the carpeted floor beside us.  Turned out I was done with my tea at that point.  Then this morning it was all i could do not to stand on the table and shout at everyone "That`s right i am white, a little large, and not as stylish as you thought i should be, so please stop staring and just eat your stinkin` breakfast."   So probably best if i come home before starting an international incident.

 

See you all soon.

 

t

nobody puts baby in the corner

We cruised down the yangtze for three days.  it was a little like dirty dancing only without the dancing part.  we had an odd cruise director named Christof.  He came to here from Germany 27 years ago and never left.  He is about 5 feet tall and has a nice little mole on his nose.  And, he loved Aiden, who got to go meet the captain privately and see the wheel house.

 

Early morning starts with afternoon naps and mai tais at four make it the most relaxing three days of our journey.  Plus they did all our meals for us so we didn't have to try to decipher any menus. 

 

We cruised thru the locks from the Three Gorges Dam.  Man, do they need the power.  When you see the country you can understand why they are doing the project. Shanghai needs most of the power they generate just to keep their neon working.  Got some great shots.  Seems like it is daylight in the night there are so many lights.  The temperature gauge in the town square didn't dip below 29 for our entire time.  We thought it might be broken, because with the humidity it didn't seem hotter than 35 or 37.

 

Drove the Hangzhoug and found a Starbuck right by our hotel. Must be closer to home.  We all gave a little cheer when we noticed it, because they have nice potties as well as great smoothies.

 

see you all on sunday.

 

chongqing

We are off to a new place tomorrow.  Kunming was cool, but we did as much in three days as we could.  Treesa, Jerry and I went out to buy some toothpaste for Kathy last night and promptly got lost.  We ended up walking along a great river bank and had a lot of locals amazed.  I don't think white tourists end up at local markets very often. 

 

Today we went to a Minority Village.  If you can imagine a bastard child of Epcot and It's A Small World you will be able to picture what we saw.  Only we got to see Bai Nazi and a few other local minorities.  It was neat to see the dress and find out a bit of the culture, but the "minorities" didn't seem all that happy there today. 

 

One minority that got a lot of looks was the large white family.  We had so many people trying to take our pictures and talk to us that our guide finally started to move us on every time he noticed someone noticing us.  Jerry figures we will be sold in the night market on DVD tonight.  Not many of us make it up here so we stand out especially when we group together.

 

Saw Diachi(spelling wrong) Lake today.  It was a colour that does not occur in nature.  I have never seen anything so polluted in my life.  As we drove by Aiden asked "who cut the cheese?"  very polite.  Our pour guide thought he was serious and started to tell us that there was no cheese for lunch.  Not all english translates.  We will be out of touch for the next four days.  We head down the Yangtzee.  Looking forward to seeing it. 

 

You cannot believe how many people there are here.  It boggles the mind.  Every inch of space is used for something.  There are either growing something in the land or building something on it. 

 

t

pandas

They are so cute.  I just want to take one home.  Not sure how the government would feel about it.  Wanted to wrestle them, but the panda wresting program was closed the day we were there.  Either that or our stellar tour guide could not figure out how to translate that and just told me that it was closed.

I think we may have seen a million bikes by now.  The road we drove down today was two lanes and we shared it with cars, trucks, bikes, oxen, and people wearing crazy hats carrying goods to market on their backs.  From all we have seen i would remind people to buy their fruits and veggies from local suppliers.  The corn and pomegranites were grown beside the coal mine.  We haven't seen blue sky since we climbed the Great Wall with half a billion chinese folks.  Aiden is a rock star here.  I think strangers have taken more photos of him than we have. 

Saw the worlds largest sitting buddha today.  We had to hike down 303 stairs and stares.  Felt like we had landed in the wall less people zoo.  I was waiting for someone to start throwing popcorn at me. 

And let me tell you popcorn would have tasted pretty good.  Treesa and I are engaging in vegetable porn.  We imagine salads with dressings (and even naked sometimes), fruits that have not been grown on the side of the road and rice from a patty no one has peed in.

Off to kunming tomorrow.  New adventures await.

t & t

chengdu

 

We are here in Chengdu.  It is great.  We had the best meal we have eaten here.  Turns out one of the dishes we ordered translates to Kung  Pou Chicken.  Who knew.  When we were in Datong we had a soup made by boiling rabbit head.  That seems to have caught up with me.  I am now on The Pink.  Here is hoping that everything slows down a little.  We had a great time in the last city.  Not sure what it is called now.  I will have to follow up with that later.  We saw a Chinese Tung Opera and some crazy bamboo flutes and drums.  Then we had a dumpling dinner.  The dumplings in Vancouver have been better.  Although the pumpkin one was great.  The city is Xi'an.  I liked it a lot, but it was odd having read Confessions before made me more cautions about my opinions. 

We saw a rock show in a park today.  The band was excited about having tourists there and played a song in english.  Dad was confused, because he could understand what they were saying.  Then we all went to Starbucks.  I hand it to globalization.  It may destroy culture, but it brought a great toilet.  Treesa went earlier and regretted it.  Her experience included no walls, no TP, no dignity...  I got my one stall and what could pass as a sitter (Yeah me).  Mine was a 6 dressed up as a nine. Treesa's was a 0 dressed up as a 0.

china rocks

You will have to excues the typos as i am under extreme conditions here.  I just finished seeing the terra cotta warriors and then saw how they made silk.  There were not children involved, but they did put aiden to work pulling the silk out.  Beijing was incredilble.  They are not afraid to have their buildings stand out.  And the number of people was overwhelming. Treesa got to see a kite being flown in the Square and then we walked and we walked and we walked.  Oh yeah, did i mention we walked.  Saw so many things don't even know where to start.  After we headed up to Datong and visited buddhist caves.  They may be a topper, but we will have to see.  I just found out that i may be able to wrestle baby pandas.  While it is a bit colonialist i think i might have to be done.  Treesa is going to get my health paperwork up to date in case they turn on me. 

 

The kids are doing well.  Food has been good, but potties leave something to be desired.  I will refrain from saying they are crappy....