one night in bangkok (parental guidance suggested) [this is like ira glass saying it on this american life. it's not that dirty, but be warned.]

and the world's your oyster. Indeed, this may be true. After killing myself in Siem Reap with a bicycle and the most famous temples in the world, I was looking forward to some relaxation and craziness. The craziness began straight at the Thai border, where I was picked up by a madman driving a minibus. Now bus drivers in Asia, if I were to generalize, are much more willing to take risks than their Western counterparts. I have grown accustomed to that fact, and it doesn't much bother me when a bus driver takes a blind corner at high speed while overtaking a car. This is because the bus drivers are involved in what they are doing and mindful of doing a good job. A good job here means not killing anyone.

This bus driver was different. At the beginning of the trip, he took interest in another passenger's hat, and for the rest of the journey, he was putting it on, taking it off, and playing with it as he drove. He also spent a good amount of time texting, much to the dismay of most of the passengers. He stopped about 8 times, often in quick succession. He would stop to buy himself a snack, and then ten minutes later, he'd stop so he could go to the bathroom. He didn't let anyone else out, mind you, he just went on his own. At one point, a German lady asked him to drive more carefully, at which point he started driving at about 60 kph, leaving us vulnerable to rear end collisions. Then the German woman said you don't have to drive slow, just more carefully, and he went back to the way he was driving before. At the end of the trip, he hit a curb, and that was it. I plan to complain, but I'm not sure who to complain to.

But we all arrived at Khao San Road with no bodily harm. Khao San Road is the haven of all backpackers in SE Asia. It was built up quite a bit. I expected craziness from all sides...which I got, just not the type of craziness I expected. We arrived at the tail end of Thai New Year or Songkran. This means a giant waterfight. People armed with water pistols (big ones, like super soakers) and waterbottles with holes in the top push through the streets spraying anyone that catches their eye. That means if you're soaked you've been attracting attention, which I think is cool. The other side of this is the flour. Vendors are set up along the street selling bowls and little hard pellets of flour. You take some ice water, which is set up in giant coolers periodically down the street, and mix it with the flour to make a paste, which you then smear on others. I took it as a blessing, but there were some tourists who didn't go with the flow, and ended up screaming as they were sprayed with water and plastered with flour. When in Thailand, do as the Thai.

Then we went to Gulliver's Travels, a bar, for a fellow traveler's birthday. Now, I'm a bit awkward around working girls. I will remind you of a quote from a woman I met at Eric Weisbrod's 21st birthday party: 'What do you think this is, a library?' If you don't understand the context of that quote, please email me, and I'd be happy to explain. So the bar, at it's peak, about 90% of the female population was probably not there for pleasure. They were there for business. Well maybe they were there for pleasure, but not theirs. Or maybe they are...it depends on who you talk to.

Nevermind.

We were having fun, dancing and drinking, and at this point of the night, most men in the bar are paired up with one of these women. Now this thought has crossed my mind before, but not often: I'm afraid I'm an uptight, northeastern prude. I mean, you can do what you want, and I will not judge you. But man, the thought of a barful of people watching me begin courting someone explicitly only after my money leaves me cold. I can't do it.

So after perusing the bar for a bit, I thought I had found three Thai girls who were not there for business. After dancing a good long time with the three of them, one of the girls asked if I worked at the bar. This was a strange question to ask, but I told her the truth. Then she told me that they all worked for the bar. I bolted.

Now upon reflection, I wonder if what they meant was they were servers, or barbacks, or bartenders on a night off. If that's the case, I regret leaving them high and dry. But as I like to say, and you know I say this all the time, 'Err on the side of caution.'

'One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble.'--now if you don't know this quote, get Chess, the original cast recording, and listen to Murray Head wail. He is a legend. Legend.

cambodian smackdown

Phnom Penh is quite aggressive with its poverty, at least with the backpackers. Getting off the bus, I was given a choice between two places: the cheap and the not as cheap. I chose the cheap, and a tuktuk took me to a travelers ghetto on the side of the lake. Once you reach accomodation, the guest houses are very relaxing, many of them with wooden decks out over the lake. To get there however, you must travel through narrow streets with touts whispering about girls, marijuana, ecstasy, cocaine, heroine, and crystal meth. I am still shocked that enough foreigners decide to do crystal meth in Phnom Penh to make asking that question a feasible endeavor.

After checking in and relaxing by the lake until sunset, I decided to get further into the city. I walked down the back alley from my guest house and at about 15 feet from the alley's entrance a dark heavy bass beat begins to strike the brick walls. Echoing and reflecting down this tiny alley, it seems absurd I couldn't hear it from my room.

Turning the corner, I'm faced with a group of 12 young Cambodian males standing around, bashing their ear drums in. For good measure, there is a 8-year-old girl destroying her ear drums as she dances innocently to an ugly back beat. Past them tuktuk and moto drivers will take you anywhere you want to go...this phrase is more literal than it usually is.

To tell them you're walking is a crazy enough answer to avoid any further question, aside from drugs and prostitutes. Clearly, I have not cultivated my school boy innocence enough to avoid these queries.

The smart, blond-haired 10-year-old offers books for sale. Here is where I become torn. It is terrible that she is out at 9pm on a school night bartering and bantering with foreigners, but damn! she's selling books and speaking pretty good English, albeit a bit catchphrasey for my taste.

I just hope she sticks with her literary pursuits.

oh the malaysians

Instead of burning on the beach today, I decided to take a ride out the other side of town...maybe take some pictures of the landscape, get away from the tourists. I ride out, pedaling furiously, as I do, and I pass a guy who was dressed in the fashion of a Chinese tourist wearing a Beijing Olympics cap. I didn't yell at him, but I wanted to.

After spotting and stopping for a nice photo op, he passed me, and at that point I yelled at him, 'Are you Chinese?' in Mandarin. He answered no, but in Mandarin, which is better result than I might have expected. He told me he was off to see a pottery village, and invited me to join him.

A more invasive tourist than I am, he was a joy to travel with. Where I would never presume to take a picture, he would snap away, allowing me to grab a few quick, discreet shots while the locals were distracted. We watched the locals make handmade roof tiles--awesome process--and throw pots. Then I threw a pot. My high school art classes did not fare me well...although, they didn't really fare me well back then either.

Then we went to the wharf, where we watched fisherwomen boil herring? sardines? some small fish. For the measly cost of 1,000 dong, I had the pleasure of eating a whole fish, with my Malaysian cameraman snapping away. It was a great trip, but ended sadly. I stopped to snap a pic of some nice blooms I saw on the edge of the road, and by the time I was done, he had gone. Weird.

Still, all in all, best tourism day yet.

vietnam list continued.

6. Coffee. Unlike the coffee in China which is either instant or exorbitantly priced, the coffee in Vietnam is everywhere and delicious. I spent a few rainy afternoons sitting in a cafe watching the motorcycles go by.

7. Water tabacco pipes that are actually used for tabacco. Who knew? Seems like a terrible idea, but pretty interesting to see a Vietnamese dude on the side of the street take a tabacky rip straight to his dome.

8. I walked around with a tag on a new pair of pants and no one noticed. Sure, you say, 'maybe they noticed and didn't tell you.' I'm an optimist. Leave me alone.

time flies when you are having fun...

So, I was planning on being a bit more proactive with the blogging, but it's been a bit hit or miss with the energy at the end of the day. Miss mostly. In Hoi an now, I've traveled through Ha Long Bay, Hue, and the DMZ.



Ha Long Bay was one big party. I should have seen it coming, and perhaps a part of me did. It was a lot of fun, but without the trekking I was hoping for. Met a good group of people that I've met up with along the journey throughout. Much like the karst of Guilin, Ha Long Bay's main feature is the limestone islands jutting out of the bay covered in green. Beautiful, if you can see it. Our first day, it was pea-soup, so we didn't. The kayaking was the highlight of my trip. Out in tandem kayaks, our group explored the karst overhangs and caves. At one point, we paddled through a cave to a pristine bay...the quietest place I've been to in ages.

The rest of it was swimming and drinking and having fun.

Hue was not a great spot for me. Near the DMZ, it has little historic value of its own, but for a citadel of the Ly Dynasty. The touts riding cyclos (a bike with a chair on the front) were quite persistent in trying to get you to do illegal things. I hate peer pressure. The best one is when they say, 'Hey, friend! What's your name? etc. etc. Hey, I give you a ride for free. We're friends, free ride!' I always made it clear I was happy to walk (which drew some curses, by itself) but I saw an unfortunate Frenchman dealing with the same tout, shouting, 'You said it was free!' Poor bastard.

The DMZ tour was interesting. It's always interesting to see things from the other side...the Viet Cong valiantly pressuring the Americans to leave. Very heavy, but I'm glad I saw it. Part of the tour included a cave system that the North Vietnamese used. It was only for air raids and attacks, but it seemed like a terrible way to live for even part of six years. It also made me realize I have to read more about the Vietnam war...I'm not sure if I understand it from my country's side.

The food in Hue was good, though. There was a very meaty pork soup that was delicious, albeit some unpleasant after effects, and a chicken embryo, which as very much like a baluut, although not as far along.

Now I am in Hoi An, taking it easy. The beaches are lovely, the vendors friendly, and it was a great place to spend Earth Hour. All the lights in the city were shut off, and all the Vietnamese and most of the tourists gathered around the river. Using paper boats, people put lit candles on the water, making such a beautiful spectacle. When the lights were turned off, a bonfire was set alight--which was a bit ironic to me: it's Earth Hour! Let's get those carbons up in the atmosphere. The people danced and sang, and we were luckily invited to join. After the dancing ended, a game of Simon Says began. Playing Simon Says with a good caller can be difficult, but I will argue playing it in Vietnamese is harder. Inevitably, the three foreigners in the group messed up (mostly due to not knowing what 'simon says' is in Vietnamese) and were hustled into the center of the group. We were then made to hop like bunnies around the fire in a chain with a few other unfortunate Vietnamese. Great fun was had by all.

Although Hue was a bit of a bummer, Vietnam is still my favorite Southeast Asian country I've visited.

vietnam: the happiest place on earth?

There are a few reasons I am proposing this:

1. The food here is ridiculous. I have been eating every three hours like clockwork, and I don't feel weighed down, like I would in China, or god forbid the US.

2. The vendors, while bugging me all the time to ride their motorcycles and buy their fruit, don't bother me too much. It's a fairly mellow type of hawking that suits my style. They look at me, smile, point to their motorcycle, pineapple, holographic decal, etc. I say no, they smile and ask again, I say no again, they might ask me again, I say no, they go away. If these events happened in China, I'd flip out. I don't know if it's the way they do it, or just that I'm Chinaed out, it doesn't bother me.

3. Hanoi has these great horns that instead of honking a straight, piercing note, modulate between two tones. This makes honking mellow, as well. Instead of turning around, staring the driver in the eyes, and walking slower across traffic, I turn around, smile and wave at the driver, and walk slower across traffic. It's great.

4. I had my three favorite Vietnamese dishes, pho, bun (rice vermicelli), and banh mi (a pate and pork sandwich on a bastarized baguette) for about 5 bucks. (author's note: while I am pretty sure I could have, I did not eat them all at once.)

5. Walking around the night market, I stopped to watch street food being made, as I am wont to do. A cute girl was getting a handful of what I will call mini banh mi, which are made with a small baguette about the size of a breadstick and filled with a tiny bit of pate and dried meat. It looked good. The girl then turned to me, and with pretty darn good English, asked me if I wanted to try one. This is the part that makes me love Vietnam. Before I could order it myself, she took one of hers, handed it to me, and walked off. I shouted thank you at her, but she didn't even turn around...random act of kindness. It was awesome.

Preliminary verdict: Vietnam is mellow, and so am I. Let's see how the next 68 days of my trip go.

travel options

The basic hard sleeper trip is this—you get on the train, you make friends with your compartment-mates, you eat a meal, lights out at ten, you wake up, share breakfast, and if you’re lucky, you’ve arrived by eleven. 

The soft sleeper has none of that.  You get on the train, you get in your bed, you plug in your headphones, you watch tv, some dude turns out the lights.  If you’re lucky, you don’t wake up. 

On my way up to Harbin, on the hard sleeper, I had a great conversation with my bunkmates.  They told me what to see in the city, that Harbin girls were, “beau-ti-ful” (which was pretty self serving, as they were Harbin girls). I told them about the States, and they gave me the required compliment on my Chinese.  Just say nee how to anyone here, and they’ll compliment you on your Chinese…just as long as you aren’t of Chinese descent—god help you then—your Chinese better be good. 

My way back, I rushed on to the train just as it pulled out, out of breath.  My bunkmates (there are only 4 bunks in the soft, as opposed to six) were all sitting on their beds looking at the wall.  I threw down my bag used the restroom and returned.  It was then that I realized they were all watching television.  Man, I love that effing box. It always stimulates conversation so well.  So I jumped in my bunk, and no one said a word to me.  I opened my book, and tuned out. 

On a hard sleeper, I often don’t have a chance to open my book.  You start talking to one Chinese person, and then the rest of the people in the car come over to introduce yourself.  At the time, it can be a bit frustrating, but sitting in my 4 person cube of solitude, I missed it. 

One thing that is nice about a soft sleeper compartment is you have a door and control over your lights.  If you had for buddies going on a train trip, it would be a pretty sweet deal.  Otherwise, they just go out whenever the person sitting closest to the switch wants.  There is no communication, so no discussion.  I have my own reading light, so I don’t complain.

Let me explain why I was traveling soft sleeper.  1. It has been a life goal since I was 24 to travel all four classes on the Chinese trains.  Hard seat, soft seat, hard sleeper, soft.  I have finally crossed that monumental goal of my list.  2. It was the only space left on the last train out of the city.  3. I am a sucker for Chinese television. 4. The beds in the soft sleeper are so much nicer.  5. The high class company.  6. The no-snore guarantee.  7. Stimulating conversation.  8. Control over my own lights. 9. A locking door.  10. Did I mention complimentary headphones?

As you may guess, the first 2 are the only reasons.  The last 8 are very sarcastic.   I missed the first train I had a ticket for because I misread the ticket.  Luckily, I ran into a scalper that had tickets for the last train, and since I was most likely going to be the only one buying, gave me a good deal.  Not bad for finishing a life goal.

By far the worst part about the soft sleeper was the snorer in the bunk below me.  It was incredible.  Huge racking snores, punctuated by fairly articulate sleep talking, broken up by stints of just not breathing.  I was supposedly on the most comfortable compartment offered by a Chinese train, and I slept for all of two hours.  I was super pissed. 

No one else seemed to be bothered.  I don't understand.  Maybe after another 3 years in China I could sleep through that too.  

8 grand traditions of chinese cuisine: guangdong (cantonese)

To be honest, I'm not sure this counts...dim sum is certainly Guangdong food, but by eating these delicious lunchtime snacks, am I missing what makes Guangdongese food Guangdongese?  I have to reevaluate menus and wikipedia, and I'll get back to you.

Disclaimer aside, the food was great at the Gloria Plaza hotel.  We had a wide range of dim sum dishes, including the requisite Char Siu Bao, or pork buns (fluffy dough stuffed with sweet sauce and meat), Hargao, or shrimp dumplings, and Char siu sou, a flaky pastry stuffed with pork.  

Everything was to my expectations, and this is part of the problem.  With Anhui and Fujian food, I wasn't sure what I was getting, or I didn't realize that this food was from those regions.  Dim sum, however, my experience runs a little deeper.  The one thing that was new was the durian sou, which was a sweet pastry stuffed with that bizarre fruit, yes, you guessed it, the durian.  

Every time I pass a durian on the street at my local fruit stand (well, no longer, it's out of season) I was too intimidated to pick one up.  The large spiky shell and reports of its off-putting aroma always kept me from purchasing it.  If this flaky dessert type thing is any indicator (which I am definitely unsure it is), I would have enjoyed it.  

I'll have to get some back in the states.  Until then, I will be pondering whether I should go to another Guangdong restaurant, or leave it be.  Thoughts?

8 grand traditions of chinese cuisine: fujian

So, I have about 3 weeks before I leave, and I'm already almost halfway done with the 8 Grand Traditions of Chinese cuisine.  I am very impressed with myself.  

Fujian food was good, but didn't eclipse Anhui.  We had a broad range of dishes, ranging from Iron Pan Chicken Balls to Jellied Seafood.  The Iron Pan Chicken Balls--balls of Chicken meat, I'll have you know--were served mixed with onions, peppers, and oil.  This was a dish that I have had and enjoyed before, without realizing that it was Fujian dish.  

The Jellied Seafood was a bit disappointing.   The texture was very provocative, but as an American, with a somewhat limited appreciation for what the Chinese call and I translate as, "mouth-feel", it wasn't very flavorful.  However, it was served with a delicious sweet chili sauce that was very reminiscent of Thai food.  Is eating sauce with a spoon wrong?   

My favorite dish of the night was the sweet and sour pork balls.  Like most Americans know, the balls were served fried under a bright orange sauce.  It reminded me of Tasty-Goody's 2 lb. meal deal, but of much better quality.  The sauce, although it didn't look subtle, had a nuanced taste that I have yet to experience in an American restaurant.  In addition, the pork balls were stuffed with water chestnuts, which added texture to the dish, something I often find lacking in its American counterparts.

One of the more bizarre dishes was a tofu and egg dish (upper lefthand dish in the photo).  It was simple--cubed tofu and egg in clear sauce--but I have never had an egg prepared this way.  The egg was unrecognizable to the foreigners at the table, tough and lacking flavor.  It could have been soft cartiledge, for all I knew.  Again, it's a question of mouth-feel versus the tastebuds.  In my mouth, the tastebuds always win.

Another chicken dish (the lower lefthand dish), this one cold, was served in a red sauce, with a hint of baijiu.  There were guesses at the table that the flavor came from fermenting either the sauce or the chicken. That hint of baijiu was enough to bring back many a night (and terrible, terrible mornings-after) in Ningxia, getting drunk on baijiu with officials and heads of ngos.  It was at the cusp of putting me off, just due to my history with the infamous alcohol, but I decided it was good, and ate the majority.  I wonder how someone who had never had a baijiu hangover would feel about the dish.  I imagine pretty good.

But all in all, it was a delightful dinner.  Next up, Guangdong (Cantonese) food.  

(photo credits Adam Hines)

real winter

So yesterday, I talked about the beauty that is the Beijing winter.  Snow encrusted trees and signs, black tar beneath my bike tires, blah, blah, blah.

Then I rode home.  

Travel note: Heading west along the train tracks, fully into the wind, on a cold, smoggy night is not the best idea.  But as the sand and crystalized snow found every unprotected crevice of my person, I started to enjoy myself.  

Almost no one was out.  And those of us who did brave dirt-blown night were bundled up into anonymity.  Still I felt there was a communion here.  Passing the fully wrapped girl  in the pink parka, crossing paths with a man in black walking in the street, the boss bringing in the pots from outside his store, there was some connection.  Clearly, I did not stop to ask them about their day...nor did they me.  But I felt at one with Old Beijing.  

Riding down a dark alley, the Chuar man flipped his collar up as his charcoal flame sputtered in the harsh wind.  I have the romantic idea that this was what Beijing used to be like.  No laowai walking around, just locals braving the cold and filthy gusts to do what they must.  

I imagine they're weren't nearly as many Audis back then, but who really knows?

all sorts of precipitation

Snow has finally fallen on Beijing, and finally I am content.  It is no longer a grumpy, long-in-the-tooth fall I'm experiencing, but actually another season.  Where tires tread, the snow is blacker than coal, but resting on the plastic, lightbulb filled characters of various stores, the snow is almost peaceful.

The bike-riding is a bit more hazardous, but if you take it slow, and follow the trail that has been worn through the snow to the pavement by cyclers ahead of you, it's not too dangerous.  Riding my bike through the snow-covered leafless trees in the embassy district gets me very pre-nostalgic.  

I've had a good run in China, it's been a good time, and the snow almost makes me want to stay.

The key word there is almost...

anhui food and the other 7 chinese grand cuisines

Before I leave China, I have one single goal: to eat the eight grand cuisines of China.  These are the provinces that were around back in the good old days, before the...well, before.  

The list is: 徽 (Anhui), 粤 (Cantonese), 闽 (Fujian), 湘 (Hunan), 苏 (Jiangsu), 鲁 (Shandong), 浙 (Zhejiang), and last but certainly not least, 川 (Sichuan).

Last night, we experienced Anhui cuisine at the Anhui Hotel Restaurant, which is run by the Anhui provincial government.  A light, spicy group of dishes, consisting of, and I quote:

"Mutton Noodle Hotpot"

"Three Rivers Slightly Fried"

"Hakka's Attrition Bean Curd"

"Casserole Celery"

The mutton noodle hotpot was your normal noodle hotpot suspended above canned heat.  Which is quite good...It begins as a lamb noodle soup, but as the meal moves on, the broth slowly evaporates, and imbuing the noodles and lamb with a delicous flavor.  

I'm not sure what the three rivers in the second dish were, but one of them was dou ban, or a type of tofu...I think...whatever...it's flavors were subtle and the kick was in a pleasant aftertaste.

Anhui is known for it's tofu, and if this restaurant is the bar, they should be famous for it.  The texture (tofu is certainly not known for it's taste) of the tofu was the lightest I've had.  It was like biting into a soft custard.  The sauce over it was tasty as well, but I was too focused on the delightful texture.

Finally, the Celery Casserole.  I have never seen celery like this.  As thin as grass, it looked like someone had fried up a cow's favorite meal, and sliced some incredibly spicy peppers on top.  This long grass looking stuff, if examined closely, did have the curvature and tubular structure of celery.  It was incredible.  And extremely spicy.  A nice clean crunch followed by some strong spice.  My favorite dish.

This meal was a homerun.  If the rest of these meals are as good, I will be a happy fellow.

beijing rain

As the drought wore on, the weather got warmer, and Beijing became livable--walking outside was pleasant with a light jacket, and groups of old folks were beginning to loiter outside my apartment building again, lending a sense of community to my concrete block.  

Then they seeded the clouds.  At least, I think they seeded the clouds.  That's what the newspapers say...but I have met a few ex-pats who don't believe it.  I think the idea of farmers firing rockets full of chemicals into clouds is too sci-fi for them.  I love the idea of weather control...as I like to say, "we live in the future."  

Just where I want to be.

The existence of futuristic weather control technology aside, the rain sucked.  It brought the temperature down, slicked the streets, made everyone miserable.  Damn the Chinese government for caring about the well-being of their farmers and food supply! (For the cadre who is no doubt scouring this long defunct blog for anti-Chinese sentiment: That was sarcasm.  I am glad the government is caring about those things.)

But it did make life a bit more difficult.  First, midway through the gray morning, my power went off.  Wind blow the powerlines down?  No.  Ice storm?  Nope.  Unpaid electric card?  Nailed it.  

Every so often, I need to travel to the bank and reup my electric card.  You give them the card and money, they add it to card, then you slide it in to the meter at your apartment.  So I ransacked my house looking for my electric card (they are expensive to replace) and then rode my bike to the bank.  That all went well, no hitches, and then on my way back I took a corner too fast, and slid out, giving my arm a bit of road rash and my new jeans a bit of character.  As with my other bike accidents in Beijing, no one seemed to concerned.  I like to think that it's because I'm always sure to jump up immediately, to show how unfazed I am by the pavement, not that the Chinese people as a whole don't care for my well being.  

*this gets a bit heavy here*

On the flip side, the rain did finally wash away the bloodstain from the accident outside my house.  I left my house one day on a quick errand and passed a crowd of people, and ambulance, and a poor man lying on the ground, his sleeve soaked with a fair amount of blood.  At that time, I was able to hope the man was okay, that he would survive, it was a bad break, but he'd survive.  On my way back 5 minutes later, the crowd, ambulance, and man were gone, leaving behind a hat sitting in a pool of blood.  I think if that hat hadn't been there I would have been much more hopeful.  From then on, every time I passed that spot, the base part of my human nature searched out the stain, and I would utter a refrain of horror under my breath--"Oh god, oh god, oh god."  But now the rain has come and washed the stain away, and hopefully, it'll turn back into a just another stretch of street by my place.  

*end heaviness*

The rain also pushed me into a little hole in the wall serving Guilin noodles.  A new experience, and a delicious one.  What really made appreciate the place were placards over each table, much like no smoking signs, warning people of the hot pepper sauce.  A rough translation:  Our hot pepper sauce is really hot.  Please be careful how much you add to your noodles.  

It was spicy, but I'm not sure a sauce could ever be spicy enough to warrant such a sign.  Makes me think of the overly litigous society I come from.

This rain was yesterday, and today it is clear, bright, and beautiful.  Makes me happy that yesterday was yesterday, and I'm in today now.

skiing

As we approached Nanshan, I'd have had no idea I was nearing a ski mountain, were it not that I was on a ski trip. Everywhere was a deep winter brown--grass, trees, and buildings all. Beautiful.

Nanshan is an hour and a half outside of Beijing. It has maybe 6 or 7 real runs, all of them pretty short. The snow is completely manmade. But it does boast two mogul runs--both maintained by hundreds of farmers with shovels*--and a pretty sick snowboard park. There are 5 or 6 bunny trails besides the 'real' trails, and that's where I spent the first half of my day, smacking my incredibly hungover body against the slushy snow again and again.

I am not a snowboarder, nor do I claim to be. (That might have been a bit redundant there.) But thanks to someone who wanted to be sure he wasn't the worst snowboarder on the mountain, my alcohol enfeebled mind was convinced that I should slip into a snowboard instead of skis. Horrible, horrible choice. I bounced and flipped down the bunny trails, cursing my convincer, then I got up, popped one foot out of a binding, and tried to use the rope tow. Couldn't even do that right...fell out of the tow, which made the cable bounce and land on my shoulder, which through my clothes was able to give me a nasty steel cable burn.

This is the way my morning went. I made about 4 'runs'.

When we stopped for lunch, I was miserable. Luckily, through some smooth talking, I was able to procure some skis (caveat: the equipment is not great). The day was 1000x better from there. I miss skiing, and I like to think the terrible time I had snowboarding made it that much sweeter. Swishing through the slush, passing those in the very flattering wedge tuck position, it was nice to be riding parallel to the ground instead of intersecting with it.

As you might have guessed, there were a huge number of ski patrol at Nanshan--many more than I've seen at any other ski resort. They seemed to outnumber the skiers down at the lodge. Great thing was, once you got on the mountain proper, there was not a patrol to be found. Makes it great for horseplay and dangerous jumps.

The one rule of Nanshan that was enforced was 'put the bar down!!!'. The chairbumpers (who incidentally could not ski or snowboard) would chase down chairs and scream at people to put their bars down. Hey, don't worry about the 6 year old kid careening down the sole black trail out of control--you better get that bar down. You might fall off--or worse. We all saw those mortifying pictures of that dude (but I guess that had little to do with the bar).

My one real complaint, as it has been throughout, is the lack of lines. Man...and I thought the bus was bad. Instead of queues, everyone just crams in where they can.  When you have something attached to your feet it gets very political...whose skis are on top? How far are your skis between the legs of the person in front of you? Could I push you down without anyone really noticing? I am not a big fan of Western lift lines. Chinese lift lines made me want to scream.

But besides the BS, it was a great day.

For those of you traveling to Beijing in the winter, this is a great deal for you. 350 RMB (50 bucks) for transportation, tickets, rentals, and a beer and a burger when you return (the dinner alone is worth 100 RMB). Check Cityweekend or Localnoodles.com when you arrive.



*estimation by one George Scott--it might be a little high and/or completely incorrect.

guess who's back

back again...After an extended, shall we say, sabbatical, I am back again, writing like my life depends on it. Besides a self-conscious worry about the boring nature of my day to day life, I have no excuse. I guess a blogger really needs to be able to put those things aside.

So what has happened in my life since the last post over a half year ago? Nothing much...my Mandarin has improved substantially, I've gotten used to Beijing, and I have decided that I still have no idea what I want to be when I grow up. But at least it has been a character building experience.

Now I have less than a month to go in Beijing before I begin traveling throughout Southeast Asia. I'm getting prenostalgic, and so I figured I'd start blogging about my thoughts before I start my trip...the things I'm gonna miss--my friends, my landlady, be able to eat to bursting on less than five bucks--and the things I won't--getting black stuff on my handkerchief after blowing my nose, lack of lines, people trying to sell me sexydvds (yes, that's one word).

So let the writing begin, and god help me stick with it.