Warning: Do Not Eat While Reading This Blog

Lots to tell so I won't bother being poetic or as funny as Jon would like.
We certainly tapped into the Tibetan experience in the past few weeks. After deciding not to go to Tibet proper, we found a few tiny Tibetan towns that made up for it.

First stop: Xiahe. Don't worry, we can't pronounce it either.
After a tumultuous time taking two buses, tagging along with 4 Australians who were as clueless as us, and trying to get the bus conductor to charge us the same as the locals instead of a non-existant insurance scam, we made it. The town was high up enough to feel the effects of slight altitude sickness. The main draw to the town is the monastery, which is the largest outside of Lhasa. Around the monastery was a 3 kilometer circumambulation (my favorite buddhist-related word) of prayer wheels. We walked around that one day, following all the little old Tibetan pilgrims as they walked and turned the wheels and prayed. Another day we rented some bikes and rode out to some grasslands. I don't think we actually made it all the way there but we stopped in a nice spot along the river. En route, we were waved down by some friendly monks who were interested in the bikes so I let them have a go. They had no idea what they were doing or how to steer it but it made for some good pictures. On the way back, a buddhist nun sitting with her friends flagged us down and we sat with her for a while. She was so curious and rambled on with all the English words she knew, saying over and over "can you drink milk?" She had no idea what that meant and I tried to explain the difference between "drink and eat." She wanted me to take pictures of her with her cell phone and umbrella (see pics).
Another day we took a tour of the huge monastery which was gorgeous. It was a bit difficult because there were about 50 people in the tour, but, thanks to our buddhist education in Bhutan, we knew what we were looking at.


Stop #2: Langmusi. Easier to pronounce.
This was just like out of the American western movies, dusty, men riding on horses, and pigs running amok. Our main purpose here was to go on a horse trek. We spent a day in town looking around a visiting a few monasteries. Lucky for us at one they were making a mandala. This is something I have always wanted to see and we were standing there for so long watching that the monks were laughing at us. There were 5 of them huddled around a table, reproducing an image of a painting. They sketch it out first on a big, white canvas, build it up with yak butter, then carefully put colored sand on top. Using conical copper instruments, the put the colored sand in then rub it and it slowly comes out a pin-sized hole. It takes enormous amounts of patience but it's fascinating to watch.
The horse trek turned out to be the highlight of China so far. It was just the two of us and our guide, Djama, who spoke no English except for "yak tea" and "ok." We trekked through grasslands and over mountains. The scenery was incredible as we passed through nomad camps, yaks, sheep and wildflower fields. Our first stop was for lunch at a nomad tent. It was a little odd because we just sat in the tent for a while and all we could really do was smile and accept the yak milk tea, which I pretended to like, then slipped what I couldn't drink to Jon. He'll eat anything.
We got to try our hands at milking a yak, which didn't yield anything. It's like yanking on rubber but nothing came out. After a few hours it was back on the horse to our home for the night in another nomad community.
The family we stayed with was really sweet and we taught the little boy "tic tac toe." He had a collection of coins from all over the world which other travellers gave him so we drew maps and taught him where they belong. We helped use a machine which turns the yak milk into butter. The women seem to do most of the work. They get up at 3am to milk the yaks, then collect dung and spread it on the grass to dry with bare hands, something I was invited to do but politely declined. Then they rake the dried dung from the night before, which I did help with, as fuel for the fire. They cook, tie up the yaks, help with the slaughter. All the men seem to do is hang out with the flock in the fields all day.
Their tent was make of yak hair and oddly enough they had a solar panel on the roof so they could get electricity. Now about that yak dung...there is a gigantic pile of it in the corner of the tent because every 15 minutes you have to add more to ther fire. It went like this: grab the dung with your bare hands, put it in the fire, make the tourists dinner. Not a bar of soap in sight. I learned not to cringe after the first time. I figured if they're still alive...
We visited another tent, the "neighbors," to have the ubiquitous yak tea. Eventhough it is impossible to communicate, there is a lot of staring at each other and smiling. We got to have some traditional tsampa, which is barley flour mixed with yak butter an kneaded by hand. It's akin to eating raw dough with no flavor. Did our ruthless guide wash his hands before creating this delicacy for us? Nope. Again, we go with the flow. Maybe that's why I have had a cold ever since.

Next day, instead of getting up at 3am to help with the chores like we should have, we slept in. We noticed the men were hearding the sheep and caught two by the horns. Our guide was feeling around their sides and I naively assumed this was to see if they were pregnant. Later I would realize he was checking to see which has the most meat. They let one go and kept the other, tying its horns to the tent. I then saw the guy sharpening a knife, hoping it was for the vegetables. I asked our guide what was happening and he made the international sign for slitting the throat. At that point I went into the tent and didn't come out until the nomad man brought in a skinless, headless carcass and hung it up on the rafter. His hands were bloody and he gave me a sympathetic smile knowing the tourists weren't used to this kind of thing. After that, the entire family joined in, taking apart the rest. I didn't investigate further. Although I was completely turned off by all of this, I certainly understand that they rely on their animals for sustenance and income and how they live their lives is completely natural. They have very hard but very simple lives.
I think Jon's favorite part of the journey was being tucked into our sleeping bags by our guide. It was an amazing experiece and not as touristy at all as I expected. We were with these people and their daily lives and nothing was sugar-coated for us.

Which brings us to Disneyland a la China: Lijiang
After an overnight train and a 7 hour bus ride during
which most people were vomiting, we are in what is
essentially a bastardised "naxi" cultural mecca. The main attraction is Old Town which essentially is really beautiful and well preserved, but ruined with all the tourist shops and wall to wall with Chinese tour groups. It's so expensive and is quite a rip-off to see any of the sights around town, not to mention it hasn't stopped raining. But we are going to a "Naxi Orchestra" show tonight so that gives us some points in the culture department.

On a culinary note, we finally saw the elusive dog meat on a menu. We were walking around trying to find a place to eat and saw "dogmcat." Realizing things are never spelled correctly in English, we knew what this meant. We ran away fast.

Hopefully we will be in India next week.
Keep an eye out for pictures as soon as we can read chinese to figure out how to do it.

We enjoy all the comments from everyone!

Gay

One more Bhutan video

Here is a quick video of an archery competetion in Thimpu, Bhutan. They do a funny dance after someone hits a bulls-eye.

More food ramblings

I just read Jon's previous blog post and I though it was a little harsh. Which is funny because all I do is bitch and moan all day about the people staring and the smoke and the spitting and the smell of the bathrooms. So I guess he is justified. It's really not such an awful place but we have only been in big cities and it's just a culture barrier I'm sure. I've tried to come up with some positives about this country so far:

1. It's quite easy to be vegetarian here. We just use our book to point to some phrases of dishes they may have and we've only gotten strange stuff once. In Shanghai we ordered "corn cakes." Sounded simple, similar to crab cakes, right? What came out was something akin to a funnel cake you get at a carnival. It was an absolutely gigantic, fried 3 inch high disc of crunchy something, with some corn kernals on the bottom, covered in colored sprinkles and sugar. The kind of sprinkles you find on ice cream. Not the kind of thing you eat with eggplant and rice. We couldn't stop laughing and weren't sure how to go about eating it. We ended up ripping bits off with our hands and using chopsticks afterwards.

2. Food is cheap. In most situations we average $2 or less per person per meal. And we usually only eat 2 meals a day.

Ok, most of you at this point have noticed most of our writings and pictures revolve around food. For those of you that know me well, did you really expect anything else? For me, this is first and foremost a culinary adventure, as most of my life is. Why I don't weigh 500 pounds is a mystery. Somehow we managed to eat a great meal at a street vendor in Shanghai right after we walked past women at a similar stall stripping the skin off live frogs. Some people say you can judge a country by the way they treat their animals....

That's my random 2 cents for the day. I know my mom likes when I write. Big shout out to Sheryl.

Gay

Telling you how I really feel, China

Hello...
We're making our way through China and should be shortly going into the Tibet region. China has proved to be hard country to travel in and the cultural differences and the heat have made it down right shitty most times.

China, it's like this
I've realized you can get swallowed and eaten by a country. We were swallowed by Japan but in a good way. We were slurrped through it's mouth like a hot bowl of udon noodles or maybe like a cup of rosted green tea. We travelled warmly though it's inards finding nice places to stop along the way. We were then finally deposited like a healthy BM into a clean toilet with comfortable ass warmers on the seat. China isn't like that. China is sucking us like we are shrimp meat through a half open carcass. Then chewing us, mouth wide open for everyone to stare at our struggle. Or better yet, like we were a big ball of flem, China is hacking us into it's mouth with that gut wrenching "hocking" sound that EVERYONE in this country has perfected. Then it will spit out us out onto any old place at any old time. Yeah. China is a bit like that.

When travelling in China, we've realized that you have to check certain things at the door when you come into the country. For instance, forget about anything we know of in the west as manners. Forget about proper lines or queuing, forget about blending in as everyone stares at you unabashedly, forget about little old ladies not pushing you out of the way to get out of a train, forget about people not spitting or coughing everywhere and on everything. Forget about English, forget about clear instructions on any train or bus ticket, forget about friendly customer service forget about not fearing for you life everytime you ride in a cab or attempt to cross the street.
It's probably the heat that's doing it to us; the 35-40 degree weather we've been getting has been adding this "What the fuck are we doing here?" kind of layer to all situations. The constant staring is also another factor that can get on your nerves. For the most part it's not an issue, and it's sometimes even fun when a child is looking and you wave and they smile and eek out a small "hello", it's kind of nice. But when you're walking around frustratingly trying to find something or just trying to eat and people are staring, it gets a bit annoying.

There's another side to it all though; as Gay and I try to fit in to how things work here, I get a certain satisfaction out of playing the game. It feels good on some level to push people out of the way as I exit a train, to physically shove someone's arm away when they attempt to cut in front of me in line. Cab and bus rides are now a thrill ride to me and I've even noticed Gay and I eating a little quicker and our mouths are a little more open when we chew and, hey, why not just stare back a little longer than you probably should. When in Rome...right.

Personally, I feel it's the really frustrating and difficult moments of travel that end up making you a stronger person. It hasn't all been bad really and we haven't been in any considerable danger, it's just the little annoyances thay can get to you.

Alright, I'm done venting for now..Pics coming soon...
Jon

Japan Pictures

Hello...

Here are some (76 in total) pictures from Japan. Can someone let me know if you can't see them? I can't view the blog in China.

Thanks, enjoy...

China, so far...

Hello,

We've been the last 6 or so days in Bejing and today is our first day in Hangzhou。 Beijing was OK. We got a chance to hike on the Great Wall and also saw some really nice sites. We're a bit city'd out at the moment having been to Tokyo and Bejing back to back and it gets a bit taxing. We're looking forward to seeing more of China but right now were hoping for a more relaxed atmosphere. If Bejing is any representation of the country, I have a feeling a relaxed atmosphere is not really the Chinese thing. People everywhere, no proper queues, not very clean yadayada..I think we got spoiled in Japan.

Gay's Paradise
You know in the Simpsons where Homer has a dream about a whole world of chocolate and he walks around in a daze eating anything and everything, even biting the ear off of a little chocolate rabbit. We'll that's a bit what it was like for Gay when we found a resturant specializing in vegetarian buffet. Literally about 80 or 90 dishes of all-you-can-eat vegetarian goodness. Veges and saten and soups and even deserts. So I would be doing the vegetarian traveling world a disservice if I didn't mention this place, in the hopes that someone does a google search for "vegetarian, Beijing" They'll find this page. The unfortunate part is I dont rememeber the name of the restuarant only that if you take the metro, get off at the Lama Temple stop. Then in the little alley directly across the street from the Lama temple entrance you will find this place. Good luck.

Gimmie some Communism
As the last real Communist stronghold in the world, China (at least Bejing) is not very communist at all. There are tons of private companies, a stock market, homeless people begging, expensive stuff to buy and I even saw an advertisement for the 2007 Chinese Entrepreneur Summit. So I guess there is such thing as a Communist entrepreneur. Truthfully I was hoping to experience a bit more government opression. In fact the only proof of any government control is the fact that I cannot view my blog. But even that's not entirely oppressive since I can still post to the blog.

We'll try to get some pictures up soon. We have heaps from Japan still to post.

Jon