TravelStream™ news feed for member bryanjenkins on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/bryanjenkins en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Tue, 23 Sep 2008 06:21:37 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1222162260/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1222162260/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1222162260/tpod.html Tue, 23 Sep 2008 06:21:37 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Shaowu, China

Hey y'all.  As I get ready to go leave for Thailand this weekend (more on that later), my experiences in Shaowu are increasing daily.  When I said before that I was starting to feel at home in Shaowu, it's not like I was lying, but I guess I really meant it seemed like a very manageable place.  I mean, other than ties to family and friends, Bel Air is hardly the sort of town I'd PICK for a home, but it's still just that a home.  But, each day I spend here, the more I get to like the city.  As I talk with more people in and around the city it's becoming more clear to me that this IS the local big city.  I frequently get asked, "So do you like living in a big city?" Or if I'm used to living ina huge city like this.  I guess China is a little bit smaller in the mountains of Fujian.  Last week I started my calligraphy classes and I've had 3 so far.  I was also introduced to the art department.  Considerring art education in the states, I was a little blown away.  Their "office," where I now go in between classes for tea and cigarettes, is more of a studio bigger than the space given to art professors at St. Mary's.  And for good reason.  Somehow, this school has attracted some of the most popular artists for government comissions in the province, and surely the biggest names in this several-million person county.  They have one teacher who does huge turn of the century-style romantic oil paintings.  And, of particular note, the calligrapher who's now my calligraphy teacher is phenomenal.  The first class he gave me a large scroll with 学无止境 (an idiom for endless study) on it.  My classes are a lot of fun, and I'm improving a lot.  Getting a better feel for the brush and starting to understand the aesthetics of calligraphy.  Each class he gives me 4 more characters which I practice for 1-3 hours a day, depending on how much time I have.  I think I'll be all right by the time I come home.  He's also an extremely interesting guy, very good to talk to and a very good resource for my research here.  We have plans to go to a 1000-year-old, still-active temple an hour away together when I get back.  Looking forward to that quite a bit.Also, I've met and hung out with a group of 5 high-schoolers I'll be tutoring 2 hours a week (for $60 a week) when I get back.  They're a cool group of people.  And, despite them only being at most 6 years younger than other Chinese friends I've been making while here, they're teaching me a lot about the younger generation.  Whatever they say about high school life, my assisstant teachers (about 25) always just say "I'm so old."  Apparently things change even quicker thn I realized.  For their first class I asked what they wanted to read/ talk about, what they're interested in.  The most popular answer was singers.  So, for their first class we're going to listen to and talk about some American and British pop and rock stars from the last few decades. Given the flamoyance of the Korean stars that are all the rage with young Chinese (think glam-rock, without the rock part), I think the more dramatic musicians will be the primary focus.  One of the guy's Chinese name literally translates as Prince and they keep trying to get good translations for the Chinese word for "lady-boy" (like the Thai kind), or someone who always "plays the girl," so I figured Prince would be a good starting place (including watching a bit from the chapelle show on Youtube.  Other popular contenders are Madonna, David Bowie, Bob Dylan (or The Band since I have a concert video of them on my computer), a punk act like The Clash, a rapper like Jay-Z, Mos Def, Outkast or maybe Nas, maybe the Stones, Beatles, Elton John, Paul Simon, Paul Simon, Bob Marley or Toots, etc.  Any suggestions, send me a email.Anyway, this weekend, they took me to their grandparents' house (they're all cousins), which is basically a little day retreat for city folks looking to relax in the countryside.  I won a game of Chinese chess, got embarassed once, and played all right but lost another time.  We also played some tennis and pool (both of which I won!) I also went with one of the assisstant teachers.  It was a good weekend.  Getting to know people better and my language is adjusting to the area, so I'm understood more often when I speak.  As I get to know the city better I'm finding more and more places to entertain myself.  Still haven't stayed out past 10:45 though...  Also, I found out they'll be getting a 3rd foreign teacher finally, so I can drop thee extra 4 classes (grades 1 & 2) they stuck me with last week.  Which I'm rather happy with.  Especially, grade 1, they're cute but just too wild and know too little English for me to really do anything with.  I really like teaching grades 3 and 4, but the little ones are just too much for me.  I think I'm just going to have a friend who teaches Kindergarten in Suzhou to send me some lesson plans so I can survive the rest of the week.So maybe Shaowu's a bit of both, a little bit of big city and a little sleepy country.  Bottomline though, I'm really starting to be particularly GLAD I ended up here.I did get some worse news this week - my artist friend Etu from the Gambia just got back to Gambia this weekend from the Beijing, where he had been for 5 weeks doing an exhibition...  I sent him an email a few weeks ago and got no response, which I thought was a little odd.  Now I know he didn't respond because he was in the same damn city as me, but without email, for at least 3 damn weeks.  I would have loved to see him and his exhibition.  I even saw the posters for a big African art exhibition in Beijing while I was there, but it never occured to me to get in touch with him.  O well, hopefully I'll see him again.O and Thailand...  I'll be heading out for a whole week vacation next week to see SMCM friends Hannah, Nick, Peter and Danny who are studying abroad in Chiang Mai (don't worry, not the place with huge protests and lots of troops).  I'm really looking forward to see some St. Mary's folk, a litte slice of home, the beauties of Thailand, and be as unprofessional as I've had to be for the last several months.  Should be a lot of fun, they're having a great time.  Also, if I find a way to get back from there early in the day on the 5th, I'll be able to cross two more countries off my list since they're going to the Golden Triangle (the interesection of Burma, Cambodia and Thailand) that weekend.  If not, I'll be heading back via Hangzhou (huge city an hour from Shanghai) and meeting up with some of the other Buckland teachers and maybe seeing Hanshan (Cold Mountain) on the 5th.  It should be a very fun (if not the most restful) of breaks.  Also, since I'm flying discount airlines (total trip price should be around $400-$450) I have to fly out of Shenzhen - the booming free economic zone on the coast opposite of Hong Kong.  I'll have about 18 hours there, which will be my first glimpse of a truly modern Chinese city.  Should at least be interesting.  Buckland dropped the ball on my visa, forgetting to get me the extra entry entry I paid 100 bucks for, but Owen says in Thailand I can get a toursit visa back into China and then will update my visa AGAIN (will be the 5th time) once I get back to Shaowu, all on his dime.  Assuming everything works out like he said, it'll actually save me some money.  If not, I'll get some extra time in Thailand and it'll be his fault.  Either way, expect a post from me recounting my Thai adventures in a week and a half or so.But like I was saying, too much time in Thailand and I may actually get to missing this place.  Anyway, enjoy the "Beautiful County" and god bless.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221478740/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221478740/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221478740/tpod.html Mon, 15 Sep 2008 08:06:30 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Shaowu, China

China's never really been a wine-drinking country.  Only since they nationalized Qingdao 50 years ago has beer even become popular. Nowadays, the favored drink alternates between beer and baijiu (a very strong rice liquor, ranging from very cheap Erguatou ("two frying pans to the head") to extremely classy hundred dollar varieties), and in more cosmopolitan areas, whiskey stretched out with green tea.  And for some reason, Hennessey is the most expensive, classiest whiskey in most places.  But anyway, wine, not so much.In Yantai, we payed a visit to the Changyu Winery, China's oldest and most reputable wine company.  The tour presents Changyu as a superior, French-level snobbish wine, on par with the best wines in the world.  They charge several hundred RMB a bottle (usually about $30-50), but it tastes more like the worst of slightly vinegary table wine that sell for $5-10 in the states.  Only, now that I've gotten to Shaowu, I've discovered people often follow the French's (I guess?) lead and wine is often the choice at classier functions.  Only their wine is overpriced and kind of sucks.  Although the store in Changyu did carry very reasonably priced bottles of the South African wine called Pinotage that was so great for drinking on the beach and o so cheap in the Gambia.But on with my story.  Keeping this in the back of your wine (any wine is wine here, and thus considered a bit on the classier side) I made an interesting discovery today in the grocery store.  After picking out all the essentials for restocking my kitchen - spicy peppers, eggplant, leaks, cabbage, cauliflower, red onions (they have no yellow onions or not spicy peppers in Shaowu), eggs, tofu - I headed over to the baijiu and tea section to buy a little beer to keep around the house.  Much to my surprise (and delight), along with the local Chinese beers was one American brand - Pabt's Blue Ribbon.  In half liter cans no less.  Certainly not what I expected, but I was glad to have this taste of American college life in China available.But then, in with all these very classily-marketed Chinese wines, was one American vintage - Carlo Rossi.  If you aren't familiar, check out the website carlorossi.com where their motto is "jug simple."  They used to have an amazing flash animation with a black and white cut-out screaming in a high-pitched voice about the month-aged grapes and sugar that make Carlo Rossi a king among wines, or something ridiculous like that.  It comes in gallon jugs for 10 bucks a pop in American and is usually the centerpiece, next to National Bohemian, of a relaxed, thoroughly classless night of drinking at St. Mary's.  Rich shouldn't be allowed to hold them because they frequently end up on the floor, in pieces, with the sweet fragrance of sugar-filled vinegar wafting through the dorm.  Only in China, it doesn't come in a jug, but a very nice-looking liter bottle that sells for 275 RMB (that's 1/3 of the volume for almost 3x the price in America).And this, dear friends, is why I always ask for cold beer at nicer Chinese functions.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218451320/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218451320/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218451320/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 10:50:27 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Beijing, China

Today, Max, Jeronimo, and I payed a visit to 798 Art District.  Formerly a factory, this complex now houses the homes, studios, workshops, and galleries of China's cutting edge artists.  Some was almost indistinguishable from similar western avant-garde art.  Some was beautiful.  Some was ugly.  And a few galleries aimed at revealing something truly beatiful and distinct about the culture, atmosphere, and turbulence in the modern era, and I ate it up.  I guess, overall it was like any day spent perusing modern art.  First we visited the 798 museum, a very well-done retrospective on the development of the post-Open Door Chinese art scene. The space, having once been a warehouse, was perfect for housing some VERY large installations.  Most memorable was the entrance, a 30 m long windy wunnel filled with a few hundreds TVs playing a wide variety of TV channels.  Of course when I was there, they were mostly Olympics.One other gallery I'll mention specifically is the 798 photo gallery.  Apparently one the oldest galleries there, they have a long tradition of presenting both beautiful and thought-provoking photography of China.  And in th back room were the stacks - containing most of the photos they've ever showcased there.  The current exhbit while we there was a series of mash-ups of giant Chinese construction sights and traditional Chinese painting subjects, temples, trees, people, etc. looking small against a beautiful green and blue background.  The effect was spectacular.  You really had to look to notice what the elements actually were, froma distance of more than a few feet the scenes really looked like traditional Chinese brush paintings, but from a short distance these shockingly large piles of earth, polluted rivers, and black skies revealed themsevles. Really impressive stuff.  The previous exhibit, of which they still had a few pictures hanging, was all on Tibet.  Capturing the dramatic landscape with very romantic representations of the people of Tibet and their hardships.Worth a visit if in Beijing.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218802380/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218802380/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1218802380/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 10:44:11 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Beijing, China

I count myself lucky to have been in Beijing for 3 of the handful of sunny days Beijing gets all year.  And on these glorious sunny, blue sky days, I made the short trip from Qianmen to the Temple of Heaven Park, still within the old Ming City.  I wasn't so much interested in the temples and sights, they were just as nice from the outside so I didn't pay the extra 5 bucks to get the complete entry ticket.  Instead, I wandered into the less-traveled sections.  There I found a wide selection of young and old locals similarly just hanging, enjoying the weather and doing those things Beijingers are famous for - Taichi, outdoor gyms that look like playgrounds, singing Beijing opera, playing chess, old people playing hacke sack (!), and just plain sitting.  It was excellent, as peaceful an atmosphere as you canever hope for on a day like this.  I sat down as well and spent the afternoon drawing and doing a bit of wandering through the beautiful old manicured woods, around the less popular buildings.Finally the sun set, and I saw my first real sunset in Beijing.  Great.  And as the sun set, a full moon rose on he opposite side of the park.  Now, more and more locals flocked in, did their thing, hung out, flew kites, etc.  O and that picture of the Temple of Good Harvests - it's reflecting the setting sun to the west and the full moon the east.  pretty cool right?  Really proof that the Olympics didn't rip the whole soul out of the Olympics.  A day well spent doing nothing.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221396420/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221396420/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221396420/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 09:21:04 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Shaowu, China

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival.  So I'm not gonna say that much about my last two weeks, mostly because there's not that much to say.  Some biking (pictures in the first entry), lots of dinners, walking about, etc.  This is a long weekend on account of the holiday, so I believe I'll be going out for a beer and some pool in a bit.  I met the only non-Buckland foreigner in town last week.  Canadian who will be teaching at a private English training school.  He's a nice guy and a bit more fun to hang out with than the other teacher I'm here with.  He plays a bit of pool, so that should work out just fine.So, how have I spent my holiday weekend?  Well, each night there's been a good ole Chinese feast.  Some generous soul, usually the parents of students from wealthier families have treated their kids teachers to a giant meal.  The food's great, and a bit unique.  They have some surprisingly European dishes - pot roasts, what basically amounts to black pudding, duck and chicken frame soup.  That good hearty sort of German, Polish, and English food.  When I'm eating out on my own, I've established myself as a regular at this great little noode place a few minutes walk away.  There's a little back alley intersection where four little walking streets meet and on each corner corner is a very similar noodle place.  This one place has some very firendly, curious kids from my school hanging out at it, an extremely nice owner, pretty good dumplings for south China, and the best fried noodles.  Some people are just better businessmen.  O and people are always playing some pretty intense Mah Jong right outside.  I just wished more people played Chinese chess around here.A quick note on formal dinners in China.  Somehow, Chinese civilization has managed to make drinking at formal occassions and drinking games basically the same thing.  Strangely reminiscent of such games as "Drink the Beer" and "The Greatest Game in the World."  Everyone uses the itty bitty 3.5 oz. glasses.  Basically, anytime someone wants to take a gulp they propose a toast with someone else.  And China being the capitol of face, politeness, and honor, it would be extremely impolite not to partake.  So "ru xiang sui su" (their version of "when in Rome").  These dinners are a raucous affair, with much spicy food, yelling, backslapping (in a more metaphysical sense) and heavy drinking.  If anyone at the table feels like getting drunk and can hold their licquor, everyone elseis going down with them.  This is kind of a circular tradition: drinking and holding your drink is important because business in China is conducted over such dinners, so a good tolerance is a respectable trait.  It makes sense in that circular sense.  it's important to hold your licquor and drink heavily to show your uprightness because responsible activities are done while drinking.  Basically I walk home a bit tipsy after each of these affairs, but I'm glad college has prepared me well for my time in China.  My counterpart, Basem, is not much of a drinker at all and can't stand beer.  So he usually ends up pretty stumbly near end of the night.  He thinks it's hell, I think it's kind of fun.  Maybe it's the age difference.So on Friday night, after one of such dinners, one of my assistants showed me a pool hall and set me up with a friend of hers to play pool.  Well, I haven't played pool in about 3-4 months, and the drinks definitely didn't help because he ended up clobbering me the first few games and won the last 4 by a ball or two.  I guess that's something else I can practice while I'm here.Yesterday morning I did some biking in the opposite direction from the usual, very pretty, I followed the road that runs along the river.  Unfortunately I have no pictures of this.  Today I went out and took advantage of the Mid-Autumn Festival sales and picked up some new stuff.  Mostly to be given as gifts, but I got a shirt or two as myself.  I'm sending some gifts to friends in the Gambia, so I got the buying of those taken care of today.  Should send them out some time this week.  Funny thing happened though - Mohammed asked me to pick him up some "Nike gear."  I told him that there's no Nike here, but I could get him one of the Chinese famous brands that make pretty nice stuff.  He's really into shoes, so I picked out some Li Ning sneakers I thought he'd like.  I told them size 11, but when I got home I found they were European size 41 (US size 8).  Again the 4, 10 thing.  11 is said the same as 4-1.  Those were not gonna cut it for Mo's feet, so I took them back and explained the mistake, expecting a simple fix.  Well, I was promptly told with a laugh that "Oh, Chinese feet are not that big."  So after about 15 minutes of digging in the back, the shopgirl comes back with the only pair of shoes bigger than a size 10 in the store - big black basketball shoes in size 12.  I figure Mo doesn't really have any of these, not that they'd exactly be his favorite, but if I didn't want to waste 30 bucks, I didn't really have much ofa choice.  Hatab and Baboucarr were easier - cheap Chinese-style shirt and a cheap mp3 player for hatab and 2 nice shirts for Babou.  I just hope they fit Baboucarr, he's got a few pounds on the average Chinese guy.  I did realize today that I will not be getting my largerand taller friends and relatives shirts as gifts from Shaowu. There's always a ton of stuff that fits me, but I just realized that's because I'm the upper end (XXL) of how big most Chinese people get.  Like there's always 50 XX's in American stores but no Mediums when you find something you like.This coming week should be good.  Got another meal with parents tomorrow for lunch, and prolly for dinner too.  Plus, now they've added on 2 hours to my schedule since the other teacher they were expecting didn't end up coming.  O well, the more the merrier I guess.  It will give me more time to mingle I guess.  It just might be problem with watching art classes.  O well, I'll make it clear that that's an important part of why I'm here if it's an issue.  Plus, I'll theoretically be starting Chinese class by the end of the week, so I can't really argue with them.  Planning on another bike ride tomorrow morning, so goodnight, good morning, go slowly, whatever.Bryan
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220099220/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220099220/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220099220/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 08:36:10 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Shaowu, Fujian, China

So this is where I am now.  This will be my 2nd to last catch-up entry.  I'll admit, I was impressed by how pretty the city is at nice. A river meanders through it (although I haven't dared to try swimming yet), it's nestled up in the mountains, really a sleepy little mountain town, but a decent enough transportation hub, sufficient shopping, great for bike-riding, nice people, very unique food.  This coming week I'm supposed to start my Chinese lessons, although I've yet to meet the teacher and meet up with this art teacher who's supposedly the bomb with calligraphy.  maybe he can give me lessons on that.  Things are looking better every day as I settle into my new home. I'm feeling lazy, so here's an email I sent to my parents to recap the first week here - Like I was saying, my new situation is pretty good.  It's nice to be all settled down, even if my apartment is pretty old and beat up.  It's about the same quality and size as my townhouse at St Mary's, minus the 2nd bedroom.  I like the town a lot.  It's really sleepy but it has this really old river quarter with all really old, somewhat beat up, but still liveable all red brick houses.  And that areas gorgeous.  The only old city gate still standing is one block towards the river from my house and you can go for a walk along the whole length of the town amongst these old houses.  Plus I've been doing a bit of biking outside.  A 10 minute ride lands you in the middle of mountains, farms, and forests, it's really beautiful.  I've seen more birds in the last 10 days than I saw in the last 3 months combined.    Nightlife in the city is pretty nonexistent, but this is a good hub for travel and train and long distance bus travel is really cheap.  I'll probably head up to see a friend in the Shanghai area at some point, and I also plan to catch one of the highspeed trains to Beijing over a holiday sometime (about 50 for both ways), plus I want to see some of the other teachers in South Hunan province.  Besides the high speed trains, a trip will cost me maybe 30 bucks both ways if I take a train, even less if I take the long distance sleeper buses.  O and I still plan to head over to Thailand for the National Day break (27th-5th).  Flying those discount airlines that trip should cost me around 350-400 total.  Not bad huh?  The flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai (Think Baltimore to Boston) is only $15.  How crazy is that.  Also, I bought an acoustic guitar for about $35 so I figure I can easily occupy myself for an hour or two a day trying that out again.  My fingers ache with calluses right now though.  There's no oil paint to be found, but there's an art supply store with watercolor and calligraphy supplies.  I plan on meeting up with an art teacher who lives in the building next door for some talk about art and maybe some help with working on my calligraphy.  The lack of things to do, besides eat, I think is sticking me with a need for quite a few of hobbies.   I'm meeting some cool people around here too, and my Chinese is getting a challenge.  I really need to work on my pronunciation because I can understand them, but they have no idea what I'm saying a lot of the time.  They've got a really heavy accent though, so I guess it's not that surprising.  The teachers I work with are cool, because it's primary school I get a teaching assistant for every class, they're all young 20-somethings, and all teachers who are just in their free period and are on the bottom end of the schools pecking order (as opposed to my Foreign Affairs Officer - obviously at the top because he's an FAO that doesn't speak a word of English is prolly in his 70s doesn't come to work until 2-ish and has a few beers before showing up.  He's an awesome guy though, really funny, I have a smoke and a cup of tea with him every day when I finish classes).    O right, but my classes...  They're a lot of fun, the kids in most of my classes are pretty well behaved, and they've been enjoying the class a lot.  They're English ranges from literally just in from the countryside, not a word and like half the alphabet (but they're improving rapidly, mostly thanks to my brilliant teaching methods...) to knowing greetings, some adjectives, counting, the alphabet and writing (kind of) some really simple nouns like dog, cat, pencil, etc.  But none of their listening or speaking skills are particularly good, save maybe 10 kids total (out of my 480 total)Funny thing though, the better the classes English, the worse the behavior.  I have one class with 45 guys and 15 girls and they've been studying English for two years - imagine how well they behave...  I really wouldn't be surprised though if the less experienced classes are better than my "advanced" classes by the end of the year.  I'm glad they're not little shits like I'm sure middle schoolers would have been.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220004600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220004600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1220004600/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 06:36:29 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Yangshuo, China

So here's a little bit on one mountain of especially large note.  Moon hill gets its name because at the top of this relatively large hill has a huge like 30-ish m high, moon-shaped hole in the top.  Plus you can get to the very top pretty easily, an the view is spectacular.  So naturally, we formed a biker gang to go see it.  By we, here, I mean myself and Chris and Aaron, the first other Marylanders I've met.  When removed entirely from their natural environment, Marylanders really do stand out, we have a special quality to our attitude and a surprising number of little accent habits that boggle the unfamiliar.  It was fantastic to be in like company.  Also, we really do get a bit louder on a regular basis than the other people around.  They're both from College Park, and of course we were able to BS a good bit about the sort of people Maryland breeds, and how happy we were that most of them weren't here.  I heard some very interesting comparisons between southerners (Aaron went to school in Athens, GA and is still living in the south).The bike ride there would be a bit of a, well, ride, so we embraced our laziness and hired 3 electric scooters to make the trip.  First we ate some cheap grub in Yangshuo, mostly except the "beer duck."  Beer fish is a local delicacy which is basically a whole local fish from the river fried up with lots of beer.  Sounds like a hit, right?  Its is.  Beer duck, though, is apparently just a big wok full of beer with a whole bunch of left over duck parts thrown in.  When deep-fried, the head, feet, and wings are pretty tasty, but it wasn't even possible to get the meat off the beer duck parts.  And It all just tasted kind of like hot, sour beer. O well, a dollar better spent next time.So then we headed down to the main toruism drag to rent some scooters.  This was an EXCELLENT idea.  Aside from a near-miss trying to pull out of the alley we rented them from thatdefinitely scared the owner to death, they were easy to ride and a lot of fun.  Naturally, I felt like a badass in aviators on a motor scooter flying (sort of) through the most beautiful landscape in the world.We almost missed the turn in to the bottom of the trail but were helped by some nice old ladies.  Of course, it's their job to be nice, they latch onto foreigners, sell them drinks, etc. all day and help them do their toruisty stuff.  But no mind, they were really nice and really did help us.  They hiked up with us chatted with me and taught Chris and Aaron a bit of Chinese.  Good fun. The view from the top was excellent.  I mean, unbelievable, breathtaking, etc.  I think a trip to China would be worth it just for that.  Also, there was a metal pole at the top with little climbing rungs that I think had no other purpose than for climbing even higher than the mountain.  At the top, I bought a drinkfrom one of the ladies and ran into one of my first snafus from learning Chinese in the north and applying it in the south.  In the north 10 and 4 are, quite sensibly, pronounced differently.  However, in the south they use the word 4 for both.  So when I asked how much the water was, she told me 4 kuai, not the best price, but not exactly the most opportune place for bargaining.  So I handed her 4 and she said no, and gestured 10 kuai with her hands.  Damnit.  I'll have to keep that in mind in the future. We also, met some Brazilians who have been travelling Asia for something like a year now.  They were quite nice and tipped me off to the way to find cheap airfare around Asia.  This should cut my planned Thailand trip down from $1200 to a little under $400.  Thanks!After descending and having a bit of a ... falling out... with our saleswomen, we headed back to the Yulong, about 25 minutes away as the scooter flies, for some backflips and unwinding.  The back to Buckland for a send-off/ job fair barbecue at Buckland.  And then of course the bar.  All-in-all, one of the best days I've had in China.  Yangshuo, I will miss you too.  And I'll say to anyone coming to China, Yangshuo is a spot you cannot miss.O and a point of interest.  While we were talking about some books (Hunter Thompson, Kerouac, Tom Wolfe, Burroughs, etc.) Aaron made a very interesting comment.  Most of these authors that we put so much stock in really appeal primarily one demographic - young people, mostly men, who aren't so keen about the idea that there's anything we're SUPPOSED to be doing.  Think about that for a bit.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221386580/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221386580/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1221386580/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 06:04:32 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Beijing, China

I got back to Beijing on the 7th, the day before the biggest day in itsrecent history.  Unfortunately, they cleaned up the city too much, nogrilling outside, closed nightmarkets, put up walls blocking views ofthe older, more aged areas of the old Ming city, really took some ofthe soul out of the city.  But still, I love Beijing.  The history,culture and character are very vibrant - the people are excellent.  Ihad a woman take her daughter by the hand and baby on her chest sprint3 blocks to show me a bus stop once.  The area I stayed, Qianmen in theold Ming city, right next to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City,was incredible.  Extremely bustling, mostly with Chinese people, andthe architecture was all in the old style built in winding mazes ofHutong alleys.  I loved staying there, always someone interesting totalk to and at night I could get beat awfully at Chinese chess by oldChinese men outside.  I'm getting a lot better. Of course we tried out some of the bar districts.  The usual collegestudent haunts were largely closed because they didn't pay thegovernment the Olympic endorsement fee or something, so that was a realbummer.  There's a great cheap student bar and pizza scene aroundBeijing University (called Wudaokou) and two particularly good places -a sandwich place with a happy hour from 8-10 and a really good pizzaplace (as in better than most pizza I've eaten in the states) with ahappy hour from 10-12.  These places usually make good starts to anevening, but, unless we wanted to go all the way across the city for a$8 cab ride and drink at the expensive foreign expat bar area, that wasusually it (other than watching some Olympic highlights at any placewith beer and a TV).  We went over to the other area twice, but thatwas definitely enough.  Drinks are expensive, it's kind of anover-the-top gimicky torusit scene there (Sanlitun), and the peoplegenerally sucked. Maybe if I'm ever loaded a few of the bars seems allright, but not right now.If you look in the right place, there's still some of the classicessence of Beijing lurking around the winding curves of undevelopedparts of the Hutongs.  The people who find out you speak a littleChinese and will tell you the whole story of their life in Beijing, orthe ins-and-out of what busineses they run (i.e. how they stay popularwhile still making money of the tourists.  My favorite part wasdefinitely the large Ouigher population in the city.  At least everyother day I'd sit and watch the Olympics at a Xinjiang resteraunt Ifound while wandering down some old alleyways and eat the best food inChina.  Barbecued bread dumplings, "Big plate chicken" (the literaltranslation), lamb and sweet rice, the Xinjiang version of Pakistanimilk tea.  Mmmmmmmm I'll miss Ouigher food.  Wang Laoshi, my classesChinese professors, treated us all to Beijing roast duck at one of thebest resteraunts in the city the day before Adam and Jeronimo left. Beijing is a fun city, and China is a fun country, and the most funpart is always the eating.  The food is so good, and relaxing, eating, and drinking is such anintegral part of their culture.  Its the highlight of the day.  It'salmost like all the years of hardship have conditioned Chinese peopleto love every single second they eat, and they really eat like they'llnever see food again.  But you know, it is Chinese food, so one secondyour so full you can barely walk, and an hour later you're starvingagain.  Max and I found this one resteraunt aptly named The StomachExplodes Oil.  This is really just a mistranslation of the name ofthese roasted bread things filled with delicious oily mutton that theymake there, but it's also an accurate description of what happens inyour body when eat them.  When you bite into these things, this lambgrease just explodes out ofall sides an invariably a lot drips on theplate, the table, and sometimes yourself.  Within a minute, this stuffhad solidified into a solid half inch thick piece of gelatinous lard inthe bottom of my bowl.  And I ate like a dozen, so imagine thathappeneing in your belly.  I really felt like I had to be rolled out ofthere.  Food coma doesn't even come close to describing the feeling ofbeing so full you feel drunk, like all systems shut down.  Max and Itook a cab to go 2 blocks to meet a friend because we couldn't walk it,and once there I promptly just took a seat on the sidewalk.  O thewonders of eating Chinese food.Thankfully, the weather did clear up for the Olympics and we gotsome clear, beautiful days.  You could actually see all the way to themountains the Great Walls runs along to the north from the the northernpart of the city.  I spent a lot of time on these days drawing andwandering around the nearby Temple of Heaven park and the new and oldSummer palaces in the north.  They were actually having a huge lotusshow in the Old Summer Palace.  You can see all three in my pictures. Also, when the sun sets all the locals fill the Temple of Heaven to dotaichi, excercise, talk, sing, and hang out.  It was really excellentto see how many come out at night to enjoy such simple pleasures. Again, the right time of day, Beijing turns from a modern city swampedwith tourists into a home for the locals.  I'll put up a little entryon each place of note I went mostly for the pictures.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219761660/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219761660/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219761660/tpod.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 02:26:47 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Yangshuo, China

Here's a brief interlude, with what I came to be thinking about one night.At night, Brent turned in a bit early every night.  So I sat down in the hostel's family room with the family who ran it and read and chatted a bit.  So here's one for you - one of our teachers in Beijing (keep in mind a highly educated, skilled woman) had never heard of what happened in Tiananmen Square until she met foreigner students.  And she was 6, living in Beijing when it happened!  It apparently took some convincing, but now she's aware.  But still - you know what she says?  "What's the point of history? Why worry about what has happened in the past when no one is alive to tell you?"  Is this China's modern challenge?What can it possibly mean to have hope for the future with no knowledge of the past.  It seems it's an obvious contradiction - how can you hope for improvement if you don't know what you're improving FROM?  Maybe this is some kind of modern religion.  But really, it seems like the opposite of a religion. Religion grounds you, locates you in space and time, and in a community.  By looking forward it seems like you'd distance yourself from the eternal.  I happen to be reading Bulgakov, who's quite intent on reminding us that a loss of persepctive, an overemphasis on the role of man and country can quickly lead to chaos when the more ever-present forces of the world intervene.  Could people really forget the nearly unending history of China to a gloss of prosperity?  Prosperity, affluence, success, are all essentially bounded by the idea of time, they need a temporal aspect to be understood, but more universal terms, concepts, knowledges do not.  History, knowledge, man, community, God, devil - these words all carry the increased weight of a lack of temporal ties.  "Men are mortal, sometimes suddenly mortal."  One touch of the immortal and the unbounded makes, schemes, control, plans all crumble, makes prosperity and the hope for it seem nonexistant.  My whole time in China I've had this image of a whirlwind, a whirling, terrifying flame wrapping around these ancient buildings and landscaping.  Maybe this is an image of history, of the ghosts of generations waiting in the wings while China takes off.  The ghosts that only need to casually blow through a life, a city, a country to make us forget the dream of control or hope.  But I guess I'm waxing a bit metaphysical and definitely long-winded.  I should prolly just paint it and get it over with.What I really wanted to talk about was, as all these lofty thoughts were banging around in the space between my ears the son and his father who owns the hostel I was in were sitting laughing, watching a Jacie Chan flick and eating peanuts.  Seems familiar, right?  other than the language, there really isn't too much different than my dad and I when I was a kid.  So maybe I put a face on why China, especially in the big cities and affluent areascan be unsettling.  I'm sure the sacrilege will work itself it out in China and America alike.  What's more important is seeing this humanity.  These things that are holding us together.  Who cares if they forget history for the time-being.  Just like history is immortal (in a weird way) and TV and cranes aren't, the basic way we live doesn't change, only the little details, like Jackie Chan.  I really hope the Chinese people, and people of every country, rectify their problems on their own, but what I can actually DO is bathe in just how awesome it is to be here with these people, living their lives in whatever the circumstances in this incredibly interesting time in the world's largest country.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219588140/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219588140/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/bryanjenkins/1/1219588140/tpod.html Sat, 13 Sep 2008 10:40:47 -0400 Plastic Tables of the Middle Kingdom, or how I spend my time in China

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Yangshuo, China

As this is the land of mountains and water.  I'll describe one of each in greater detail.  Chronologically first is Yangshuo's less famous river,the Yulong.  I met two repeat-teachers having a bit of a xiuxi (rest) in yangshuo before heading out to their school's - Shawn, Orlando's finest, and Pete, from England, a for all intents and purposes, career English teacher in China.  Both were excellent guys.  We sat under the tent in the shade for hours a day and smoked cigarettes.  Also, Pete greatly improved my ping pong game over the course of just a few hours.  On Sunday, my last day of freedom before teaching class, we, along with Pete's Taiwanese friend from his hostel, Ethan, headed out to a swimming hole.  It was raining pretty hard but hell, it was still hot, and what's wrong with rain if you're gonna get wet swimming anyway.  Plus, the rain kept most everyone else away so it felt like we weren't anywhere touristy at all.  It was a 20 minute bike-ride to this swimming hole in the middle of some fields with a lot of surrounding mountains.  It was great because an irrigation dam ran across the river so the water was a good 10 feet deep and there was a 7 or 8 foot high bridge across the dam perfecting for jumping from.  We spent the afternoon doing backflips and hanging out.  Then we went over to check out this little sub-dam kind of thing all these kids were playing over.  It was a slab of concrete with an inch or two of water rushing across the top.  The local kids, naturally, were playing king of the hill - wrestling each other off this super slippery dam into the water on both sides.  We joined in and it was good fun - despite getting creamed by these 7-12 yr old kids.  They're like little water monkeys, they must do this all day, everyday.  We tried that sumo-esque push-wrestling thing and they could just slide us, theoretically grown men, all the way across this algae-covered thing without slipping an inch.  We chatted with them a bit in Chinese.  A good time was had by all.  This was the closest I've been thus far to saying forget graduating, I can just stay in China the rest of my of life.  Don't worry, I won't do that... probably.
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