Travels to a Village

Matthew and I are leaving this morning to travel to a small village outside of Dali. It will be an all day bus ride according to Jinpeng who will be meeting us there. He thinks it is important that we experience the live of a small village before we leave China. I am a little worried about getting sick in the village from lack of proper cooking and new bacteria which I'm not used too. I won't eat anything now that isn't cooked. When I was sick last time I really got knocked out and couldn't do anything for a couple of days. Jinpeng has never been to this village so I'm not really sure what to expect. He wasn't able to answer many of my questions.

Things I do know about the village: they have a population of people who had leprosy, they have some running water, no hot water unless boiled, no showers, there is a river which is near the village, they have electricity, they don't have western toilets but what kind they have is a mystery. I could be venturing out to the woods had 3 in the morning when it is pitch black and I have to pee. Matthew and I will be staying at peoples houses so there will be female and male houses. Who am I going to talk with? I don't even speak enough Mandarin to talk to people here and Mandarin will not be the dialect there so I won't even understand numbers.

Even though Matthew and I don't know that much about where we are going or what to expect we are packing up and heading out to a village, a days bus ride away, to join in the celebration of March 11 day of dignity for those who have leprosy. We will be traveling to the village today and in the village on Friday and leaving Saturday. Matthew and I are planing on stopping in Dali for a couple of days on our way back to Kunming. We have heard wonderful things about Dali.

I will do my best to really update my blog when we get back. That means even the stuff before we left Kunming.

Really Wednesday, Ice-Cream

What is this brand of Ice-cream? It says "Leading Premium Ice Cream in the U.S." So is there really a brand called Dreyer's or is this a different brand and they changed the name in China?

Carrefour

Matthew and I went out looking for shoes for him yesterday. I also saw a dress from the bus a couple days ago and liked it so we stopped and found it. I still liked it and even though it was an extra large, I tried it on. It fit me and so I got it. I think it was labeled wrong as it looked like it was the same size as the other dresses which were medium. Now I just need for it to get warm again so I can wear it.

We thought that maybe we would find shoes at Carrefour or in the area but everything was pretty expensive. Jade was 5000 yuan for a bracelet. They didn't have any shoes Matthew liked either. It is cold again here. I thought I was dressed appropriately but after we ate lunch it felt even colder outside. We went back to Carrefour, the grocery store part, and started looking for things we might take with us to the village. Jinpeng thinks we should pack some food to take with us in case we don't get enough to eat. I got a sweater and Matthew got some long underwear as it really cold. After we got out of Carrefour we were thinking of going to get my pants from the tailor but when I called her she said she was out and to come another day. Matthew was also wanting to get back so we got on a bus and came back to the apartment for an early night and a movie.

Today Matthew and I went and got lunch at Salvador's and picked up my pants. They fit well and I like them. I am hoping that they will still fit when I get back to the States and gain some weight back.Walking to the tailor's we saw a dog dressed in a leopard suit. It was pretty cute. A bunch of girls stopped to try and help Matthew take a picture of it. The dog would not look at him so the girls tried to get it's attention. Walking to the bus stop we saw a little shoe shop and Matthew found a pair of knock off Nike's. I saw some fake Converses I liked but my feet were too big. It was sad. The sun came out again and it started to get warm. Matthew and I decided that instead of going to Wal Mart to get some things we needed that we would go back to Carrefour and get them there just to get it over with.

We cooked some dinner and started getting ready for our trip to the village. Jinpeng says that it will be cold there at night so I am not sure how much to pack in the way of warm clothes. Also, Matthew and I have not decided whether or not we will stop in Dali on the way back so we are taking a duffel bag with a change of clothes.

Hiagang Park

Today Matthew and I went to look at the long distance train station. It was a mess. On the way there we saw a little kid pee on he sidewalk and his father pull him off as he was pooping. A nice introduction to the train station if you ask me. There were many people just sitting in the open space of the train station waiting for their train. It was overwhelming for me and we didn't see any English on any of the signs or train schedules.

When we left the bus station we went to Haigeng park on Dianchi. I liked this park more than Daguan, as it was on the lake and you could see views out across the lake. We strolled around the park along the lake shore. There was a fishing pier that went out onto the lake and we walked out. It could have used some repairs and when the waves came the would splash up through the broken parts. If there is a drought I don't know if the pier would have been above water if the lake came up anymore. Also along the pier there were old boats that had been rotting in the water. The strange thing about walking along the lake was that it smelled like salt water.

In the park the cherry trees were blooming and it was really beautiful. All of the natives were having their picture taken with the cherry trees.

The bus ride back was really hot and crowded. I had a little lady come and share a seat with me. She didn't smell very good. When Matthew and I got off the bus she took the seat and didn't share. The next bus was a long ride and it was very crowded. I finally got a seat and luckily had an open window as it was really hot. We drove by some construction and that slowed us down, but we did recognize the stop we wanted even though we hadn't been their before. It was good to get off the bus and back to the apartment to cook dinner.

Massage

Matthew and I finally got our massages today. It was nice. We had a room with two tables. We went to the Gingko Tree for our massages. They have a really nice facility and the massage was really relaxing. Unlike in Western massage they massaged my stomach. This would have been fine but it reminded my bladder of its function. Thus when the massage was over and I was very sleepy, my bladder didn't want me to lay there and relax.

The Gingko Tree also has a book exchange. As Matthew and I are planning on taking some long train rides it seems like a book would be a good thing to have so I picked out a book, Wild Grass. It is about change in China. We will see how it is. They also had DVD's for 3 kuai. They are used, but still a good deal. Matthew and I went through all of them and picked out way to many. Then we went through and put the ones we thought didn't look as good back.

When we finally left we went and walked at Green Lake. There were many many people playing music. Also a group was playing music with a choir and two people were dancing. It was very interesting to watch. We walked back up to Wenlin street and had dinner at the Vintage Cafe. It was not as good as some of the other places we have been but still it was food. Their menu was very hard to read as it was printed in type writer font all over the place.

After dinner we walked to the bus stop and since we were really on a roll buying DVD's we stopped in at a new place and went through their selection. We got so many that they gave us one free.

When we got on the 52 bus back, it was really crowded. It just kept getting more and more crowed too. So when we got to the government square we got off. The locals dance there for exercise at night. It was interesting to watch. If we had known the steps or gotten there when they were doing the easy dances we probably could have joined in. As it was we just walked around and watched. Even when we went to the next bus to get on it was still crowded. We took it back anyway and made it off without incidence.

Jinpeng and his cousin Kevin are helping Matthew and I with getting to Guillin and Beijing after we leave Kunming. Kevin is staying with Jinpeng until he moves into an apartment provided my his job. Jinpeng kept telling us what a good cook Kevin was before he arrived but so far we have not had a chance to try any of his cooking. Jinpeng has also invited us to go to a small village with him. His employer, HANDA, is having an event for Leprosy awareness. The village was a community for people with Leprosy when they were made to move away from the rest of the population.

A week in review

There are about three reasons I have not posted recently. One, I was sick last weekend. I will spare you the details. Two, I didn't really do anything interesting until Wednesday. Three, Tor has not been working for the last couple of days. When it does work it is really slow. It took 1/3 hour to load a page yesterday by which point I had forgotten about it and by the time I came back to it I would have had to start all over again.

So I will start with Tuesday, March 2nd. I was feeling much better but after having been sick for two days and not having eaten much I was pretty tired still. We walked out to the bank and got money for rent and then were going to take a bus to Wal Mart to get some food. We were out of rice. We waited and waited for the bus to come and I was quickly getting tired. When the bus finally did come it was so full there was no way we were going to get on. We walked back to the apartment and I took a nap while we thought about what we needed to get. As we were going to have to walk all the way to Wal Mart which seemed really far to me (it isn't very far at all), we decided to have dinner at the Brother's Jiang. We got a 16 kuai soup. The ingredients where a bit strange. There were also mushrooms which I picked around. It was not the best one we have had. The vegetable was mint and so the broth tasted of mint, that was alright. But eating the mint wasn't as good as the other ones we have had. I seemed to have more energy after walking there and didn't fall asleep in Wal Mart or on the walk back. Now we have rice which I am glad for.

Wednesday, we went back to the police station to make sure we were still alright to stay where we were and they said we didn't need to come so we went back to the apartment. I walked around in the gardens of the apartment and found a really strange flower. It grows on a vine. It is really very strange looking and not only that but it smells really strange. At first I thought it was something dead but it wasn't quite that kind of smell. Whatever the smell was I really didn't like it. Matthew was feeling a little under the weather so I went to the market and got some vegetables. I also went to the flower market and got some really pretty flowers. When I was walking back was right when the traffic is busiest. There was a police officer standing in the middle of the road blowing his whistle and the cars were listening, but it was a big scooter and bicycle free for all. The scooters go where they feel like and when they feel like. It doesn't matter if the light is red for them, they go. I don't know what is wrong with them.

Thursday, Matthew and I went to Green Lake but we ended up walking most of the way as we got off the bus way to soon as I didn't know where we wanted to get off and was confused. It was okay. I found a little shop which had batik which I have been looking for. That was really exciting. Matthew and I had a really late lunch at around 4:30pm. We tried a new place and got the lunch special. It turned out to be fruit pizza, french fries, a fruit salad, and soup. We got a soup we wanted but everything else they chose for us. It was really odd and we ended up not liking it all that much but we were hungry. After lunch we went down to Green Lake and I fed the sea gulls. That was fun as they would fly up and if I tossed the bread up they would catch it. All of the cherry trees were blooming so it was really nice. When we left Matthew asked a guy with one of the big kite rigs if he could take his picture. The guy nodded and took off the kite and put it on me. I didn't even know which kite I was flying. It turned out I was holding the kite that was really far away. A little dot in the sky. I could barely see it. The string on the kite was thinner than I thought it would be. It was two thin threads wrapped together. I think I might have let the string get in a tree as he wound it in a little to get it out. I really didn't know what I was doing. He finally took it back and I was really glad it hadn't crashed or anything.

We walked back up to the street where we know the buses and went to get bagels at Paul's if they had them. They did. I also went into a little shop next door which had cloths. They had pants and I wanted to get a pair if they weren't to expensive and they fit me. I lost some weight when I was sick and now my pants are a little big on me. I didn't find a pair that fit me but the woman who owns the shop is a tailor and she could make a pair for me. Her English was really good and she told me to think about it and come back when I made a decision. I talked with Matthew about it as we walked to the bus. When we got back to the apartment Jinpeng and his cousin where their. They had cooked some rice and beef and offered it to us. It was good and a nice little something to go with our late lunch.

Yesterday, Matthew and I went out and wandered around Kunming. Matthew looked a dentists, but didn't really feel confident. I decided to get some pants made for myself. We had lunch at Prague Cafe. We had breakfast food and it was really good. Other than getting measured for pants we didn't really do that much. We walked lots and lots. I keep seeing shops that have paintings in them, they are like the traditional paintings. I like some of them a lot. I guess that was good. It was nice to get out and walk but I was pretty tired by the time we got back to the apartment. We went to the market and got eggs. I think I might have seen the hundred year eggs, they were blue. I thought they were kind of pretty. But I don't think I would want to eat them.

A thing I have learned about Kunming recently is that it seems like they water the roadside with water from the sewer. No wonder it smells. I will be staying far away from the water trucks. Another thing is that Kunming has made some silly decisions about city planing. They didn't like the idea of outdoor dinning as they think it doesn't look good. It is really kind of sad there isn't more outdoor seating. Also, there are often metal grates in front of windows. They act as a place to put plants outside and a place people can hang laundry. The city says they must go, so there are crews of people taking them down. I really don't get it but okay. Whatever they say.

Really Wednesday, Sign

So Matthew and I are at a park and I see this sign. I had heard that the Chinese liked to use cute signs to keep people off the grass. This is good.