So, I haven't posted in a while. Part of that is becuase my camera is busted. Sad I know. My documentation efforts are seriously hampered. Until I find a camera we're back to just text. What a shame.
Well, the good news is. I finally broke in my kitchen. The stove is propane and it took a lot of stuff to get it going.
First, my wok was messed up, so I bought a new one.
Then I realized I needed a new hot water boiler, cause I wanted to be able to wash my dishes. (No hot water = no clean dishes)
Then I taped my kitchen fan, (Which is just a hole in the window with a fan in it) to the window because it was falling out.
Then I realized that I was out of propane, so I bought some from the propane guy who walks around outside.
Then I realized that the attachment to the propane tank was busted, so I went and bought a new one.
Yesterday I finally hooked it all up.
And today, I made carrots, spinach and peppers. It was a little spicy. Mmmmm.
Lets just say cooking in a wok is one of the funnest things I have ever done. I highly recommend it.
I've seen people do it enough that it actually was pretty easy.
Next dish to conquer is fried rice. I should have that one done within the next couple days.
PS have I mentioned lately that I love China? Wo de fan hen hao!
Sleeper trains- When you want to travel really far, you take a sleeper train. Pretty self explanatory is that you can sleep on the train. The trains that cover big distances usually have a few cars of hard or soft seats. They also usually have a few cars of hard sleepers and maybe 1 or two soft sleeper cars, obviously a sleeper is more expensive than a seat, and soft is more expensive than hard. The seats are what you'd imagine them to be. The hard seats are kind of nightmarish. Some people will take the hard seats for 1-30 hours and sometimes they stand the whole way. So compared to that, I was in the lap of luxury. The Sleeper cars were rally awesome. They were just like bunk beds everywhere. It's pretty tight, you can't sit up on any of the beds except the bottom ones (There's top middle and bottom), but it's comfortable and I had no problem sleeping through the night, which is good since we were on a 27HOUR TRAIN RIDE. That's probably the longest anything ride I've ever had, and it was way fun.
Sleeper Bus- A friend once told me never to take a sleeper bus. Ideally, a sleeper bus works like so. You get on at night, go to sleep, and wake up in a new place. We wanted to save time since we only had so much for vacation, so once we got to kunming and had seen the stone forest, we decided to take a sleeper bus to Li Jiang. Good idea? Hard to say. Li Jiang was awesome, the sleeper bus was, well..., an adventure.
I posted pictures of the train and the bus. The bus is the one with all the metal bars the the yellow bed sheets. The train was about a billion times bumpier than anything I have ever imagined riding (Including a giant armadillo). Not only that, but it rolled you side to side into the bars through out the night. And we went with John and his two kids (Toddler and Baby). Didn't sleep much that night. We got on the bus at about 830pm. I fell asleep at about 11. Woke up at 12, and at 1230, I heard Brooke laughing a couple beds over. Someone said, "What's up with Brooke?" and Brooke said,
"Sorry guys, this is the only way I know how to handle this is to laugh."
This was followed by a lot more laughing and a lot less sleep. I'm pretty sure every Chinese person on that bus hated us by the time we were done. Stupid loud Americans, and yes, we were.
The train pics are first. The squatter toilet is on the train. I used it. Squatted and everything. You proud? After the squatter pictures are the bus.
I will say, I do still love to travel.
More to come.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
I put as many pictures as I dared when sending an email from Gmail (that's how I update my blog) and even though it doesn't give a full experience, it should be a good taste of what I saw.
First off, it was way touristy. Which causes some problems. I don't think Chinese people see White people that often, because every where we go people stare at us and take pictures of us. Especially when I travel with little white kids, it's amazing how people will gather. It's especially amazing how Chinese people's personal bubble's are significantly smaller. A lot of Chinese people will come and poke and prod the kids. I guess that's not weird here.
Second off, it's really normal for people to spit here. So apparently going green means using spit bags instead of spitting on the ground. I guess spit isn't biodegradable or something. We got a big kick out of those.
Third off, I'd like to tell a short story. So towards the end of the day we figured we should probably start heading back. We were traveling the outside of a big loop that went around some of the denser parts, and I saw a path going in to center again. I'm thinking, hey we're on the outside far away from the entrance let's cut through the center and make this faster. Even though I'm usually really good with directions, turns out this wasn't one of those times. We totally got lost, which was ok, because getting lost in Zion or Eden isn't really a bad thing, and after an hour plus of wandering at the end of a long day, we popped out pretty close to where we went in. Any time I suggested a short cut for the end of the trip I always heard Boo's in response. But, turned out to be an awesome day.
Overall, the Stone Forest outside of Kunming gets 5 Stars. It's amazing what good company and beautiful scenery can do to boost your happiness meter.
I still have a few more posts to cover the rest of our holiday. Stay tuned!
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
The one thing that really made the difference for me though was the people I was with. I don't know how I always get so lucky with friends, but even in China my friends have made a big difference for me. This trip was a great example for me. We hit some pretty crazy conditions in a couple spots and we laughed about it and pushed on through and it has turned into one of my greatest memories (and it's not even over). The pictures above are the people I traveled with. I traveled with three girls, who have kind of turned into little sisters, and a married couple with their two kids. The one thing that really got me thinking about this was how easygoing they all were. Even in the crazy circumstances they could all roll with it, make it work, and laugh it off. Whether we hadn't had enough sleep, or we hadn't eaten, my new friends were patient, nice, and supportive.
I think a good friend can make all the difference. Some of the sights I saw were breath taking, but having the other people there and even the kids I traveled with just made it something completely different, and in a good way. I think that people often cross our paths and we just have to realize that we can be a good friend to them and vice versa. I really am amazed at how much sweeter my travels have been because of the people I went with or the people I met. This is probably the same kind of joy I hear some married people mention every once and a while (my dad).
The pictures above are the friends I spent the crazy week with. I write a blog about the trip and some of the stuff that happened to us really soon. Thanks for reading, I love to hear from all of you.
Sorry it takes me time to write back, lately it's been easier to update the blog than write everyone back, but I'm working on it.
And yes, I grew a beard.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
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