|
|
 |
I'm way too behind. I"ll try and catch up, but I think I'm screwed.
Where did I last leave us? Somewhere on the Great Wall? Well after trekking the strenuous 10 km and landing in the "Lonely Planet Restaurant" (how annoying is that), we drove three hours back to the big city, lost those annoying Yanks - and went to relax but, wait now, I had made a plan with the movie star to go out - for dinner? drinks? wasn't too sure - so put on the "nicest" clothes I had (like 70s football jersey and jeans) and headed off to the World Hotel - our meeting place. Kiyomi stayed in like a lame loser. When I hooked up with Yuan Quan and Xiayu they were lookin pretty good. And we went around to all these cool different places in his slick car. I felt really really weird. We went to a place called the Loft - which was like the Beijing equivilent of one of those posh restos the girls go to in NY on Sex and the City. Actually, one of the bars we went to was called "Sex and the City". It was actually nice though, not too themey either. We bar hopped a bit - although, not drinking - just perriers and ice cream and stuff - to all these little spots in an area called Houhai (pronounced Ho-hi). There is a lakey-river thang in the middle that is dotted with little red chinese lanterns and torches. It was so beautiful at night. There is actually a bar in the middle of the lake that you can take a gondola to. Very nice. Some people recognized them and bugged him for autographs, which was mad weird. They were really embarrased about it - and so modest. It was a pretty bizarre experience in all.
The next day was our last and we were exhausted from the Great Wall. We tried to go to the Summer Palace, but failed miserably at being good site seers. We took a paddle boat out to the middle of the lake, saw a dead turtle, sang Mr. Big's "to be with you" at the top of our lungs and went back. Felt a big too lazy to check out the rest of the sites, so hopped on a bus to go back to the hostel. Not such an easy task. The ride was like an hour on the way there, but this time we had no seats. We got off cause we decided that it was too hellish on the bus, and bought some things. Then we attempted a taxi to Ti'anamen. This proved a little bit difficult, but we managed. Got to T.Square for sunset, which was beautiful and kicked the days ass. The kites were flying, people were having a good time, and then we saw a group of Tibetans just sitting there. Yomers took some flix - it looked a bit like a silent sit in - nothing huge, they were really beautiful. The sky was pretty killer too.
We walked back to the hostel and bought some presents on the way in the alleys. Went for dinner in the alleys with the best lady ever. And hopped on a train to Qingdao. All in all, it was a nice trip - apart from the odd Kiyomi-assholeness, we had a good time.
Friday - we get back, are in the taxi on the way to the apartment and I see all these people looking in one direction. Some guys are running in that direction.... and then I see this fatty Chinese dude - kicking the shit out of, well another Chinese dude (Everyone is Chinese really - and it's not so relevant). But brutally - the kind that makes you feel awful and you heart race. Like mad blood running down his face, and trying to run away while the dude drop kicked him in the back and stuff. It really disturbed me. Of course this stuff goes on - but you just wonder what would make someone do that to someone else. I'm sure the bloddy guy did something awful, but it's so grossly real to see it up close man. Anyway, now - everytime I pass that place I get a weird feeling and think about seeing that.
That night, we went to a party that we didn't know much about. It was brutally ridiculous Chinese stuff at its best man. My roommate Soph is friends with these like GnR/Mr.Big/Meatball fanatic Chinese band dudes and one of them (whose name is Tom because he is a movie director and thinks he looks like Tom Cruise, so we just call him Tom Cruise) works for some sort of shipping container manufacturing company. And this company decided to hold a little "English Party" and had us whiteys bussed in from Qingdao. I'm not joking, it was me, Kiyomi, Colin, Matthieu, Soph, Martyn and Eryn (don't ask why Aussies all have y's where i's should be) - that's SEVEN of us, in a huge bus - that would hold like 40 people - to drive us, way the hell out in the middle of nowhere's industrialville. We walk in and it's a giant echoing hall with banquet style tables set up and a stage with big - hand done - cut out letters proclaiming "The Passion of Life"....and further along "English Party". oH and the excitement that exploded when we walked through those doors, let me tell you. On the stage, was Tom Cruise and his charismatic band - of cute, wailing, mullet sporting, chubby singer friend, and his heroin-skinny, long straight rocker hair having, crop-top and leather jacket sporting guitarist. And then they summoned Kiyomi to the stage to do a little rendition of Take Piece of My Heart and Mr. Big's To be With you. Two words my friends - HOLY FUCK. You've never seen ANYTHING like this. The drunken Chinese office workers were really letting their guards down and saying all kinds of things like "you shoulda facka me! mwahahahahaha" to my really sweet friend Eryn. Or (Charlie): upon finding out that Colin was my fiance (just playing with them guys...) saying "Colin you are a very lucky man" and then whispering into my ear "and you are a very lucky girl!" Big smiles - think Dr. Evil style. We have a bit of video footage of Kiyomi playing, and of OH! THE BOSS PERFORMING. Unreal. He was hilarious. Singing this old school chinese love song (that according to Charlie - "is about two people who want to have sex and so they do - all the time every day and all day too! mwahhahahahaha" This little shrimp of a drunken business man performed the song - with a huge smile on his face doing little like, hand gestures oh man. it was gold. Pure gold.
The bus back was a bit of a blast. We made sure we got use of the free beers they offered us - and brought a couple cases on the bus - the way back - had our other German and Aussie friends that had been there earlier than us. So we were all on the bus, and then Charlie and all the other drunken office workers. We blasted the music dancing in the aisle and drank beer. (one night a week mom). and one office worker - the one who was bothering my sister and Eryn - started pukin' all over himself. NICE! not. The night carried on with this sort of ridiculousness. At one point we were on a pub crawl booze bus that the Redstar (my magazine) organized, at one point I was doing the "salsa" with some dudes from Cameroon and another I was in an insane Chinese disco - while a stripper danced on this dude from the audience and dropped her on the floor while my "homo" sister was a jerk. It was a night of total insanity. But I have finally caught up on all the excitement, and don't feel so guilty. Kiyomi left the next day and it was sad because I don't know when I'll see her again. I love her.
The past week has been a lot of schedule changing and stuff cause the summer is coming for kids. The next three months are gonna be really intense working and stuff. the magazine has given me a lot of assignments for the next two months so I'm really busy with that too. Which reminds me, I really gotta go. So! Thanks for reading, if you do read it, can you drop me a line cause I'm trying to get an idea of how many people are checking this out.
Zai Zhen.
Ceexoxo
Oh yeah - I"ll post some pics and stuff this week.
Posted at 5:23 pm by CJ.
When I've really been meaning to catch this shizzle up.
So, the first day of Beijing was fab...it was pouring rain like crazy and we had planned to check out things that were all outdoors. Being the scheduler of the duo, I was extremelely disappointed...especially when Kiyomi said, "Didn't you plan a rain plan B?" Ummno... "You're always supposed to have a plan b in case of rain" Oops. So regardless I was intent on seeing Tianamen Square regardless of rain, although Yomers wasn't so keen on this.
We borrowed umbrellas from the hostel and trekked it through the Hutong on our way to the square. Beijing, like many Chinese cities avoids the whole trouble with pedestrian crossing, which make sense, cause noone would get anywhere if they didn't. But if you are new to a city like this, it's kinda jarring when you approach a road to cross and there are no traffic lights, and an actual metal fence blocking you from actually attempting to cross the road. Then you notice the staircases going underground on each corner of the intersection...ohhhhhhhhhhhh.
So we made our way over to the square, and it's POURING and WINDY. The umbrellas are blowing inside out and sideways, backwards and forwards...whatever you can imagine. It was RIDICULOUS. Anyway Kiyomi starts bitchin' but I'm quite intent on at least taking a peek at the famed square. We're laughing hysterically but mad frustrated...anyway, a few bitchy comments later we end up in McDonalds for 4.5 kuai coffees (the cheapest in China) arguing about what to do next.
We decide that we should go for lunch and try and find a restaurant that doesn't feature a photo essay of Mao's life history on the walls, but arrive at the conclusion that this is impossible. God that dude must be smilin' away from his domain at the Mao Mausoleum just steps from all of these restaurants. Yeah, did you know that? Did you know that you can go and see DEAD MAO? That's right, all preserved and shit. We of course didn't have the time, the hours are super weird and apparently you can only shuffle by with the Chinese masses who also would like to get a glimpse of their 70% right and 30% wrong super cultural hero.
Enough about that....
I'm listening to Toronto CBC morning news while writing this and it's super strange...like there's a busted water main?mane? at College and Spadina and traffic lights aren't working at Dunn and King........bizarro. and the little Korean girl beside me is posing and giggling away for the boy at the other end of her webcam conversation...
The second day in Beijing was actually spent three hours outside of Beijing on the Great Wall. And not to show any love to Nixon, but it REALLY is a great wall man! It's SPECTACULAR. I truly reccommend it. Honest - it's in the top three. There was a small group of horrendously irritating suburban americans on the bus with us, and we walked with them on the wall, cause they had hired a Chinese mountain biking guide for their full three week bike tour of China. Way to do it guys! That way you don't have to interact with the locals at ALL!!!! We stopped in a public bathroom on the way back to the city - which consisted of three holes in a tile floor - hilarious. No dividers. Okay, do you want to know what these little blonde hi-lighted bitches did? Put Vicks Vapo-Rub on their upper lip so they wouldn't have to smell the chinese bathroom. That's right ladies....30 seconds of human piss is better than intense Eucalyptus muscle rub on your FACE for three hours....retarded.
Anyway - so we trekked 10 km on the wall which was rough but really awesome at the end. I got so sunburnt didn't have sunscreen and am not used to clear sunny days here.
That night I met up with the movie star couple to go out for dinner...but I can't write any more now cause I'm exhausted and starving. So more soon...
peace.
Posted at 8:32 pm by CJ.
I would tell you all about Beijing, but I haven't seen anything yet because my sister is on the msn chat with her girlfriend, even though one of the world's oldest most fascinating civilizations is steps from where we are sitting.
Posted at 11:26 am by CJ.
Ye-hah.
So it's eight in the morning and Kiyomi is awake! We're off to Beijing for some hardcore Chinese touristing. or is it touring.....
We couldn't get sleepers as usual, so we're off for a 10 hour hard seat ride...wooo hooooooo!
I'm fully exhausted from being up late watching sister make fun of aussie and frenchman that i live with till the wee hours. So ...not too much to say.
peas and queues
www.thesedetails.com/chloe/clokiyo.jpg
Posted at 9:29 am by CJ.
So I go back with Colin at 6:00pm, and do you want to know what the douchebag tells us?
"You can't exchange tickets here, you have to go to the train station"
^$%#%^$@&^#$^*%#$$^#$%%$.
Posted at 8:29 pm by CJ.
Omigod.
Okay, sorry. Me and Kiyomi are going to buy tickets to Beijing, I think, no problem, can't be anything like Xi'an - because tomorrow isn't a national holiday. So we're all excited, get there, and of course there are no hard sleepers tomorrow night, nor are there soft sleepers. There are however hard seats. Of course there are hard seats. So, what about Monday night? no luck. We end up buying hard seats for Monday morning, which sucks because it means we waste a day on the train. Then the guy tells us that these are new trains from Qingdao to Beijing, and the hard seats are actually pretty good. So we walk out and then talk to Colin, and he says if the seats aren't bad, why don't you just take them on Sunday night, when you originally wanted to go? Good idea.
So I go back and the seller is now sitting outside the ticket booth at the lottery booth. I stand at the ticket booth for five minutes and he ignores me. Then I say, 'hello?' and he yells at me in Chinese and points at a sign that seems to be informing of the opening hours of the train ticket booth. I yell back that I don't understand, and storm out. The booth closes for HALF AN HOUR. And the freakin guy will not go back in for two minutes to change the ticket. I have to stand there for 15 minutes while he sits at a different booth (which by the way has NO customers) doing nothing. It is things like this that DRIVE ME CRAZY about China.
Posted at 6:48 pm by CJ.
I've been messing with the blog features, and have realized now that there are possibly people reading this who don't know me. That's pretty interesting - I wanted to keep the blog a sort of just friends and family thing, but the more I research blogs the more I like the idea of people reading this. Anyway I'm intersted to know who reads this who doesn't know me, so I've added that tag box, or whatever they call them to see what turns up there.
(OMIGOD, there's totally a chick beside me belting out the words to a Chinese dance track that she's listening to on her computer earphones. Completely oblivious...)
So Kiyomi showed last Sunday and her hair is freakin' long. IT's so funny a shaggy mess. But I got used to it and now it looks good. She even rocks a ponytail, for those concerned...Soso.
We've been chilling out - nothing intense as she's still really weak from catching bird flu or something in Cambodia. It's so awesome seeing someone close from home when abroad. I mean, I don't know, I prolly wouldn't be able to survive without Colin. And how can I complain - I met people when I was in Xi'an who are living in the in the ghettoist of ghetto industrial all chinese towns and are teaching English there and that sounds reallly really alienating. I couldn't do that, I would go mental, but that sounds like what Maggy did when she was in China, and she hated it. I mean it would prolly be good for the personality development. Man I sound like David Brent from The Office (which is the best fucking show ever).
So Yomers and I will prolly go to Beijing for a couple of days, check out the sites a bit. I don't know when else I'll go to the great wall. I'd love to go travelling with Colin, but that doesn't really look like it's going to appear on the agenda. Shoot I'm outta time. I'll never catch up. Well, I'll try for more soon.
peas.
Posted at 11:44 am by CJ.
I never know what to title these things...
Alright. Here goes. I have nothing to do today, my brain is completely gonzo, I will attempt to do this. I know, it's been too long.
So I'm gonna go backwards. Last night was awesome. Colin is attempting to redeem himself after being a total asshole loser last weekend, ditching me AND the skaters to hang out with his dumb girlfriend in the middle of a stellar evening. So, anyway, the redemption...he's doing a really good job. We had the BEST time last night. Started out by heading downstairs to Timemart (the charming 24 hour store that at no point has less than 8 people working in it) where they sell us beer and open it for us. Next to time mart is the internet cafe - my second home....come to think of it, they really could make internet cafes more atmospherey - I have to pay extra to sit at the nice computers with the nice chairs. ANYWAY...sorry, I should have warned you, this is gonna be so RANDOM - and you will soon see why. So Timemart, outside the internet cafe - they host a ping pong table, and you can play for free, and they especially let us play for free cause we're white and everything and that's good publicity. I brought my discman and speakers and we were blasting The Darkness while playing drinking ping pong which means you put your beer on the table and your opponent tries to hit it and if they do, than you have to drink. Colin and I couldn't stop thinking about what honkies we looked like, being white, drinking beer and listening to cock rock. It didn't particularly help that these African dudes we know kept walking by us on the way to the bathroom.
Colin: Ummm, maybe we could change the music?
Chloe: Why? Do you want to listen to some hip hop?
Colin: Uhhhhh....I feel like a loser
Chloe: Yeah...okay after this song
So....then everyone came down from the apartment and we eventually headed out to downtown. We went to this bar called Kelala Bar, which I've always admired from the outside, and then it turns out that they have 10 kuai beers (like $1.75). Nice place, my Chinese sidekick, Helen, came - she's the best, I love her. She's like 17 and is my hairdresser and is half North korean half Chinese - and is so cool. She goes to the Chinese Disco every night - and dances. And here the word for e is Head shake - because they just shake their heads. Helen shakes her head like crazy when she dances, but she doesn't take head shake. I don't think anyway. She dances the best, I love going dancing with her. It's so retro the way she moves, like an eighties movie. She's awesome. I'll try and post a picture of her.
So we hung out at Kelala bar for a bit, and then me and Eryn took off to Corner Jazz - Helen went home to her salon. (she's my hairdresser and many people live at their work here, or just sleep there). Oh, by the way, i straight permed my hair and it's awesome - you don't have to do anything to it when you get out of the shower....it's just straight! It only cost me 80$ canadian. At my aunt's hair salon in Florida, the same treatment costs $900 US DOLLARS. Can you believe that? That's so ridiculous. I have a friend in San Francisco who paid like 600 us. So You can see why I couldn't turn it down here. Anyway - so Corner Jazz Bar - the shittiest bar, that everyone goes to, and that's the only reason it's good. Generally it sucks and is lame. So everyone was there, got hammered didn't dance cause the music was totally crap. Colin and the other boys finally showed up. We went to Hot Bliss - the Chinese disco. OKAY...let me tell you. There was no dancing, because there was a performance. Yes, a giant dancefloor with 'crazy' light and a little middle aged chinese man dancing and singing in the middle. SINGING - with that echo feature they can turn on and running around, STANDING ON HIS HEAD SINGING WITH THE MIC ON THE FLOOR IN FRONT OF HIS MOUTH. OMIGOD. YOu have to realise the dance floor is REALLY huge and so he looked even smaller - and it didn't so much resemble a stage as it did a ring. Anyway, there was this wasted Canadian girl there who really seemed to want to dance with him, but there were security guards surrounding the parameter to prevent this sort of thing. But that did not stop me, I mean her, from constantly attempting to get into the giant dance ring with the strange singin and dancin man. Finally, the security (and I'm talking full out camo gear and walkietalkies) guards had to call the manager, because the foreign girl refused to cease her attempts at dancing with the little man. THe manager came down and was yelling and she was yelling, but she stopped him from being mad anymore by rubbing his head and giving him a big hug. This got a smile out of him. and then we left.
There's a costume party tonight and the theme is things that start with P - so me and Colin are going as punks. Should be good. I just want to put make up on him.
Xi'an was okay. It was really interesting seeing CHina outside of Qingdao, but I definitely wouldn't want to live there. It was especially bad cause all of China was on vacation and most haven't seen whitey before, so it's kinda lame having 1.3 billion people pointing and laughing and staring at you.
So I left off at the terracotta warriors. Of course, when we got out of our bus into mudslide of a parking lot, did the fearless aussie leaders go in the direction of the ENTRANCE? NOooooooooooo! Why? Because the logical method of entering the second most visited site in China is by hanging a left in the directions of umm mud and nothing! Why did I follow? I do not know. No desire to rock boat I guess. So after half an hour we arrived at some gate where Chinese were yelling at a guard to let them in. They let us in, but only by opening the gate a crack and I had my backpack on backwards to protects its contents from the rain and pickpocketers and couldn't fit really but everyone was treating me like I was pregnant although it was just a bag. So ridiculous. Next we went to ummm the hot springs, but we didn't go in. Instead we took a cable car to the top of a mountain which was hella scary because the wind was blowing hard and I don't trust anything in China except that people are often dishonest. We arrived at the top and the lonely planet said there was a cool museum but we realized once we got there that we'd have to pay another 30 kuai to get in which is only like 5 bux but we didn't want pay on top of everything else so we just hungout and checked out the fog which did an amazing job at blocking the view and then headed back down.
Back to the hostel - where our host, Kane, was waiting for us. Or just waiting for any travellers. Yeah, anytime you walk into the compound, he comes bouncing out of his restaurant and tells you to go inside. "no thanks kane, i'm gonna take a shower"
Kane: That's okay! that's okay! you come later.
you: umm okay.
He was hilarious. Refused to play anything except U2 the strokes and the beatles. But really only the U2. Every morning, on schedule you would hear the intro to Beautiful Day as your breakfast was served. And then everynight when the beers were arriving ...duh duh duh (hear Beautiful Day intro) no fail my friends.
So we missed our train back to Qingdao - thought we'd "conveniently" fly back, but could only get flights to Jinan - which is the capital of Shandong province - where I live. Thought - ahh, we'll just catch a bus to Qingdao. YEah. So off we went to the Xi'an airport, which is beautiful. Happily playing asshole, drinking beers. I guess there's a lot of beer drinking, but it's now the only carb i'm consuming. yeah i said it. fucking annoying, i don't want to hear anything about it.
Got on the plane, flew to Jinan (1 hour) and arrived in the crap airport there. Fought with a hundred taxis who didn't want to take us to the bus station because it was "closed" and they could drive us for a simple 1400 kuai, even though the bus is only 100 each.
The bus didn't leave until 7 the next am, and it was 11pm, so we had to find somewhere to stay. I called this dude Munna, a pakistani med student I met in Qingdao who lives in Jinan, to ask him if he knew what we should do. He sent us to a bar called the Pyramid - which is WAY cooler than Corner Jazz, plays better music, has great food and is just better. The problem is, it's in Jinan WHICH IS FUCKING LAME. Total industry town, even dirtier than Xi'an, which gave me a cough that I still haven't gotten rid of.
So we found a hotel at 1 am, talked her into giving us a room for fifty each - which is expensive and we were only there for 5 hours or something. China should not be carpeted in any way. With all the spitting and disgustingness that goes on, carpets are NOT cool. But this hotel was carpeted and featured long, unlit hallways in tune with The Shining. I couldn't sleep cause I kept thinking bad guys were going to jump through our window and rape and steal from us.
Anyway the bus ride the next day was totally high class - there was a flight attendant and a movie - Shaolin Soccer - you should check it out. It's HILARIOUS. The flight attendant did a whole speech thing at the beginning on a mic that fully had that echo effect happening even though she could speak normally and everyone on the bus would be able to hear her.
I was so happy to be back in Qingdao. It seemed strange 'coming home' to Qingdao. Although, I really do love this city. It's great, and anyone who accidentally ends up here is lucky.
My current fave song is Arrested in Shanghai by Rancid - check out their album Indestrucible. and I'm loving the darkenss.
Okay, that was really long...gotta go
peace in the middle east. (really)
Posted at 4:19 pm by CJ.
I'm sorry an update took so long. I don't really know where to begin hold on, I'll see where I left off.
Okay, Xi'an - I can't really remember day by day. I do know we went to the Terracotta Warriors the next day. I also know it was pouring rain. And I know that the whole day was an absurd laughfest. We arrive at our first tourist site - Emperor Qin's tomb - which hasn't been excavated, so in actual fact is a big hill. You're meant to climb to the top and think about the amazing stuff that is probably underneath you and check out the view. After hauling ass to the top - we realize that this is prolly not the best site to visit in the windy, pouring foggy rain. You couldn't even see the bottom cause of the fog, and all the umbrellas were blowing inside out Poppins style. It wasn't so comfortable.
So next stop - Terracotta Warriors...one of my draws to China. I was really really excited to do this. Okay, don't go when the entire Chinese civilization is on holiday and it's raining. Because everyone runs indoors and it's very moshpitish, except people's breath doesn't smell like beer and smokes as they would at an punk concert or something, but like the wonderful revered scent of Halitosis. What is Halitosis? Well, it makes me welcome Colin's onion belches in my face. The official word for bad breath, but not just bad, like - unbearable breath. It's so DISGUSTING. And I just decided I'm going to write something about it for Redstar.
Shoot.. you know what I can't do this right now. I have way too much to do. I promise I will come back tonight and write this long thing out.
Cee
Posted at 12:24 pm by CJ.
May First - Xi'an, Shaanxi
Thursday morning....awake at 6am to catch train to Xi'an. I was so stressed about having to sit on a hard seat for 22 hours, I wasn't even looking forward to the trip. I got on the hard seat car by myself but not without an audience. There was never a moment that at least one person wasn't staring at me, talking about me, laughing at me. I prayed that my aussies would find a way for me to hang with them in the hard sleeper car. After ten minutes of squirming and pretending to sleep Martin showed up to escort me to their car. The trains are awesome. Well I generally love trains but in China they're awesome. The people are so sweet. I love the Chinese. (this opinion WILL vary, there are good days and bad).
Our conductor was SO fucking funny. I haven't met a Chinese with this kind of sense of humour before - really weird and awesome. He comes over to us and says "do you like my pose?"
(we had a translator) and then proceeds to pose in front of us, and then "I'm not allowed to socialize with passengers" Later on he pops back in and makes a really weird grunting noise and says "Don't look at me I'm shy!" super meanly. Such a freak. I loved him. And he helped me find someone who was willing to sell me his bed for a small fee. Martin and I got into the beers around dinner time and continued until midnight. He's replaced my dad for a Gin rummy partner and my girls for a beer drinking companion. I really gotta quit the beer. But it's so cheap! fuck.
I was convinced that the train would be really late because most of the ride was spent in Shandong province (where Qingdao is) and there were two more to go. But sure enough at five am the ticket lady poked me awake (I shouldn't say poke I should say jerk really hard) and we had about 5 mins to get our shit together and get off the train.
Arriving at the station was a litte chaotic, but had nothing on Mexico City bus station or airport. It was five thirty and we headed over to the hostel. It's a really nice place, super quiet and relaxing, clean too. They have a nice cafe with proper breakfast and internet (that's too expensive). Yesterday we just sort of checked out the city - there are old walls still up surrounding the city, and if you pay ten kuai you can go up on top of them (they are about 12 meters high and 14 meters wide - you could drive a car on it if you could get it up there) and walk around. We met up with a 19 year old auzzie guy named Adam who's a friend of this guy Peter who I'm travelling with. Adam's living in Xi'an teaching and studying Chinese. He'a little abbrasive but cool. He has the same syndrome as Colin, where he acts like he's Chinese - and almost demands to be treated like a Chinese, but not really. It's kind of fucked up and I'm still analyzing it myself. Speaking of Colin, I feel really bad about writing that stuff, but I'm frustrated with this situation a little bit . I miss him, and can't wait to get back to see him.
Anyway so Adam took us on a wild goose chase of the Muslim market and I really got that dick waggling feeling again - girls following a bunch of guys around who don't know what the fuck they're doing. It's really frustrating. I'm PMSing which really sucks, because I'm embarrased of my bad moods around people who don't really know me. I feel extra bad, cause I don't want the Australians to think I don't like them. These guys have great great senses of humour. This one dude Peter absolutely kills me. We've been laughing a lot.
Oh god - and I forgot to mention - DON'T WORRY MOM - the first cab we get into in this city (not counting the one from the trainstation) gets in a fucking accident two blocks from the hostel. I thought he was driving a little crazy (which in normal terms means extremely fucking recklessly) but then shrugged it off untill homeboy smashed into the van in front of us. Eryn smacked her face on the bars that seperate the passengers from the driver, but that was it. There was no blood, or even swelling - a little shock. I was convinced that it was one of those scams there they blame the foreigners and then make us pay so I suggested we get out and walk away, which we did and the cabbie didn't really seem to notice. It's like in Flirting with Disaster - "They bump your car and then when you pull over they mutillate you and steal all your money"
So basically we spent the day exploring the city - it's really dusty and you constantly get shit in your eyes and the city is so much dirtier than Qingdao - I didn't realize everyone was telling the truth when they say "Qingdao is beautiful? Yes, it's so clean!"
I got my sister a cool little gift and I will get her more, it was her birthday yesterday so
H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y Y O M E R S ! ! !
She's supposed to come next week and I'm so excited. China is dope man. You gotta come here. Yes, you! Everyone. oh! they have these like taxi bicycles here - like three weelers with a bin in the back for you to sit in. it's hilarious...last nite there were four of us in one and three in the other - drinking beers in the night on the back of these things with a tiny little chinese dude pumping away. The traffic was terrifying, but we were all laughing our asses off at his little clenched butt working hard to haul our white asses across town. Adam said, one day he was in the mood to chill out and see the city so he just hired a guy to take him from one end to the other for thirty kuai - 'pparently it took about 3 hours.
What else? The bus that was supposed to take us to the terracotta warrior tomb was 'broken' so we can't go till tomorrow, a little suspicious - I feel like maybe there weren't enough people going. hmmmmmm....
Anyway, that's all for now, I gotta go crash for an hour before meeting the kangaroo heads downtown for lunch.
Can someone tell Niksic to call or email me already? I got her an awesome present.
peace and love to everyone - I miss most of you.
Posted at 11:56 am by CJ.
|
