Quick Trip to the Motherland

in my first two-a-day posting in quite some time, i felt it necessary to enlighten you all about my brief vacation back to shanghai. it was a quick trip with three ultimate goals...eating, drinking, and shopping...all of which were accomplished with a gusto.

keeping to promises made in a previous post, i will divulge some of the happenings and revelations my most recent visitation.

the eating is always a delight when visiting shanghai. for those unfamiliar to the demanding taste buds of my mouth, i can say with great delight that i was able to gorge myself on a plethora of delicacies...from hot pot to spanish tapas. it was wonderful to enjoy chinese food as it was meant to be...and not the knockoff fusion or americanized-asian foods found here in dc. it may be quite some time before i am able to fill my stomach with the goodness that i most crave, but that is just the way the stomach grumbles.

to compound of consumption of solid food is the unavoidable curse of partying and drinking in shanghai. it was without a doubt that i found head buried in a toilet...not once, but twice, while having sunday lunch with my family. thats right, i was able to survive my worst hangover ever in full view of my parents who laughingly offered me more beer to ease my troubles. but what can i say, i was simply a casualty to 5 bottles of grey goose. (some photos of that night can be seen here)

and to satisfy my professional need of wearing suits everyday, i went to shanghai intent on coming home with some tailored clothes...and what i ended up with was an entire new wardrobe. having come off a shopping/tailoring spree to have made any girl jealous, i now have 5 new coats, 5 new suits, 7 dress shirts, 4 extra pairs of pants, and 3 scarves in my collection.

so that's that...shanghai in a nutshell. due to my new work schedule, my trip was limited to a quick 7 days...forcing me to indulge all my desires into a week, leaving me exhausted and in need of another vacation.

All My Bags Are Packed

since my last entry was more of a farewell to the city of shanghai, i felt it necessary to at least remember those who made the experience what it was.

when i first came to china, i wrote about an "event" in beijing which seems to have become quite a common recurrence whilst in shanghai. as a going away party, our "crew" and few others threw down for one more night at guandii. and needless to say, it was quite a party. who really remembers how it happened or who made it happen, but i know i ended the night with my head buried in the bushes expelling what was left of dinner. nights like these are definitely going to be missed as i balk at paying 100 kuai for a damn drink.

*yes, thats a bottle of water in my hand, and as you can see...i'm semi-dancing, a tell-tale sign of a drunken andrew

but lets not forgot all those adventures to beijing way back when this journey was in its nascent days with vickie and cindy...to my revisit of historical beijing and hangzhou's west lake with namers...to climbing huangshan with derek and theresa...to the many many nights out with the crew and others...to tibet and jiuzhaiguo adventures. and of course, it wouldn't have been shanghai without my brother and lydia at good ol' one park avenue enjoying good times with the wii and good company with hundreds of dvds.

just wait...i'm sure in a few months, if not drawn by the beck and call of my mother wishing to see me for the xmas holidays, or pending the possibilities of an internship with American's next president, i will return for an abridged version of that past few months. see you all then.

Goodbye, Shanghai

it seemed so long ago that i reluctantly found myself trapped in your breakneck society...trying to avoid being swept aside by the ferocity of the constant reinvention of yourself...cursing your inhospitable amalgamation of reckless drivers, incessant spitting, and unbreathable smog.

but what can i say, beneath your developing exterior, you have also surprised me with the openness in which you have welcomed me...you have seduced me with your grandeur and potential...but most importantly, you have inspired me to experience and nurtured me to grow.

it will be nearly five months since i've joined you, but now we must part ways. but fitting to your temporary and transient nature, i will just be another momentary character in your continual existence. and i will also remember you as you are...a city of history, a metropolis of potential, a personality that has captivated my mind.

Justification...Part Deux

after barely containing my anxious self through a 3 hour plane ride, i sprung from my seat and bounded off the plane and instantly fell to my knees and praised my return to "modern" civilization. quickly finding my bag and dashing to the bus home, my face stretched wide in a beaming smile at the prospect of...not taking a long, hot shower, not worshiping the comforts of my private bathroom, not reveling in the sights and sounds of shanghai traffic...but the prospect of turning on my magnificent white Macbook which has been sitting, lonely, for the past 12 days.

oh the feeling of ecstasy when i heard that low "ddrrrummm" of the computer turning on and the freedom to jump from webpage to webpage with ease. after a few minutes of reading news headlines in an attempt to trick myself that i'm more affluent than i am, i quickly returned to blogs and xangas to dish on the latest gossips and lives of my friends. BUT to my immediate dismay, i learned that China has gone out of its way to protect its citizens from the dangerous influences of the blogsphere, as they have censored ALL blog sites. aggghhhh!!!!

but fret not, via some massive searching (my brother told me) i have found a way to evade the evil hands of chinese censorship...allowing me to blog about the remainder of my journeys. having divulged my Tibetan adventures, i will follow with descriptions of a wonderful hosteling experience, a unique panda experience, and one of the most magnificent scenic landscapes i've ever seen. so here we go...

hostels:
having used chengdu as our home base, we were forced to spend a few nights there. being the typical poor backpackers (excluding the fact that we flew everywhere and traveled via tours), we found ourselves hosteling for these few nights. and after having spent time at two different hostels, i will recommend both to fellow travelers.

i already described the first hostel in the previous entry, so i will move on to the other. instead of being in a quaint little part of old-town, this hostel is built in a renovated factory. The Loft, as it was so fittingly named, fits all the bills of a good hostel: easy access to food, cheap and clean rooms, a large common area with FREE internet, pool table, tv with ur choice of pirated DVDs and even a PS2...but most importantly of all, a great environment to meet and mingle with fellow backpackers. though...some things are still a little off limits.

pandas:
i'll just let the pictures speak for themselves here...but i must say, there must be some panda blood in me by watching the way they just lie there and eat. i can definitely find the resemblance. enjoy ur 'awwws' and 'so cutes'.

Jiuzhai Guo:
designated as one of the world's most protected and amazing natural wonders, Jiuzhai Guo is as awe-inspiring as they say (as long as the wind doesn't pick up and the water reflection remains crisp).

for the western world who may never actually see this first hand, please imagine the scene from Hero when Broken Sword and Jet Li are having their sword fight over the lake. for those of you who haven't seen Hero, WATCH IT...or at least look at these.

so thats that...for those of my friends who actually read ALL of this and the last entry, i applaud you for your loyalty...or i guess, boredom. but that is my trip, my justification for not returning to see you all sooner...was it worth it? it had its moments.

The Grass Is Always Greener...

ahh...a welcome return to the internet, however brief this foray onto the web can be. through a week of traveling, i have finally found myself in front of a computer monitor and a keyboard under my fingertips. it's a grand feeling to finally get the fix needed after a prolonged period of withdrawal...i suffered through my trip with momentary bouts of the shakes as i couldn't read about the inconsistencies of my beloved Lakers, the mud-throwing of partisan politics, or the newest details of Brangelina's new vietnamese baby. but fret not readers, i have but this brief moment to enlighten (or bore) you about my journey thus far...

*i'll rank each day on a scale of 1-10 (10 being pee-in-your pants amazing and 1 being kick-in-the-nuts painful)
day 1 (3.11)
Chengdu (the heart of China's Sichuan province and home of spicy cuisine) is the stepping stone for most Tibetan trips, and also the location where i planned to meet up with my travel buddy (who will remained unnamed per her...oops! sorry Theresa about the hin....DAMNIT!!). well anyways, we continued the day by finding a place to put our heads that night. and what we found was a little hostel nestled into this little hutong (an old alley way) with great character and a plethora of backpackers and street food stalls selling all kinds of bbq-ed meats, veggies, and seafood. eating and sleeping being two of my most favorite activities, i'm glad that that was pretty much all day one consisted of.
rank: 7

day 2 (3.12)
waking up before the sun comes up has never been a joy of mine...but being how our hostel was a good 45 minutes away from our flight leaving at 8am, we were forced to pull ourselves out of bed and into a cab at the wee hour of 6am. this is also where we thought we'd parted with our newly found British backpacker, James...who was planning on hitchhiking his way to Mt. Everest..hope you're successful man!!!

collecting new stamps on my passport is one of my favorite side effects of traveling, so imagine my disappointment when i realized that China has gobbled up Tibet as an autonomous region...hence, no stamp. but whatever, at least i was in Tibet.

our tour guide, AYG (his name is just too damn complicated) met us at the airport and transported us to our hotel. being the wide-eyed, ecstatic traveler, theresa began a verbal diarrhea of questions about the river, the rocks, the birds, etc., while i decided that my sleep was more rewarding than knowing about Tibet's geological makeup. AYG also advised us to take this first day to rest and get acclimated to the altitude, as Lhasa is a good 3,400 m (around 12,000 ft) high. i happily agreed to the condition as it meant more sleep, but theresa pouted until we left the comfortable confines of our room.

so we lethargically made our way into the city and stumbled upon the bazaar where we made our first encounter with Tibetan culture...which, is incredibly rich and unique. the rest of the day thus consisted of people watching and surveying...not to mention a surprise run in with our good friend James. but alas, AYG was corrected and theresa's breathing was hampered and her head hurt as altitude sickness caught up with her. i, on the other hand, was completely fine and was content to laugh at her misery.
rank: 6

day 3 (3.13)
i will again make an interjection about how i hate waking up before the sun is up, but in this case, the reason is valid (i guess). China, being one everything, has kept the entire country on one time zone. so though we may have been 3,000 some miles west of Shanghai, the time on the clock reads the same...so though it may naturally be around 6am, the clock shows 8am (i know that i slept the same amount, but i still somehow feel cheated out of my two hours).

having come in the offseason, we faced the benefits of fewer yappy tourists, but must suffer the less-pleasant weather which forced us to abandon our hopes at an adventure tour around the country as most places are too cold to enjoy. thus we were left with the luxury tour package, which is much more slow and relaxed (not all bad), but can get a little more dull (which is bad). but it is too early in the trip to be throwing doubts about 'what if"s in my head. so on we went...

the day consisted of an exploration of the Potola Palace, a religious center of the city and former home of the Dalai Lama. being as how our tour group was made up of a shanghainese couple, chinese-loving theresa, and me...AYG proceeded with his explanations all in chinese, leaving me a little out of the loop of understanding. but nonetheless, i wandered around the temples and shrines a few steps behind them, admiring the dedication these people have toward their faiths.

we left the palace a few hours later with a sense of culture and a stench of yak-fat. but so far so good as we made a guided tour around the bazaar again. this one with a disgusting experience with yak-butter tea (apparently a local favorite). so with a little bit more walking, a little bit more altitude adjustment, and yet another James run-in...day 3 was over.
rank: 8

day 4 (3.14)
leaving this morning for the prospect of a relaxing bath in some Tibetan hot-springs (hence the luxury tour), the majority of us were excited...theresa, however, was more than a little perturbed at the idea of sharing a bath with more than just her rubber ducky.

but a two-hour drive into the middle-of-nowhere, instead of the resort we pictured, our van turned into a construction zone surrounding what can only be described as a pool. so with our heads hung low, the consensus was to just return back to Lhasa, leaving the "springs" to the koreans and japanese tourists. and to add onto the disappointment of the day, we failed to make our daily James quota. maybe tomorrow.
rank: 5

day 5 (3.15)
this day was not much different from yesterday...as the agenda consisted of a 5 hour+ drive over what seemed like endless speed bumps to Tibet's second largest city, Shigatse. at least the drive was a cornucopia of Tibet's natural landscape occasionally pocked with ancient villages inhabited by herders and farmers of the land.

but like the day before, our goal at visiting the local monastery was deterred by bad weather (hence the low season). so we camped ourselves in the hotel as we hoped for better weather in the morning. and again, though this time a little more expected, no James to brighten up my day.
rank: 4

day 6 (3.16)
with the winds dying down enough for us to explore the monastery, we exposed ourselves to even more religious culture and societal experience. though not as majestic as the Potola palace, this monastery was more like a small city unto itself where buddhists of all strips would come and study for the ultimate test after years of prayer...failure not being an option, as this test can only be taken once a lifetime (maybe if the US tested like this, our scores wouldn't be so low...well, probably not).

besides enjoying the traditions, there happened to be these three obnoxious chinese girls who seemed to be touring along side us. now i may be chinese, but i stand out distinctively as a foreigner. so thinking that i didn't speak chinese, they would pass me and call me "monkey" (i guess since my ears stuck out of my beanie sometimes and...well, i don't know...do i look like a monkey??). so after maybe the 4th time this happened, i turned and called them alvin, theodore, and simon...but not knowing the chinese term for chipmunks, i felt the insult was wasted (not to mention they probably had no idea who alvin and the chipmunks are).

with the memories of alvin singing with theodore and simon, a strong rush of homesickness washed over me. maybe it was the spiritual environment, but my heart began to ache for the comforts of home...and again, thinking how great it would've been to be there instead of here; but the grass...well, the grass wasn't so green on this side right now. maybe it'll grow a little tomorrow.
rank: 6

day 7 (3.17)
upon returning to Lhasa, we were excited to have learn that it had snowed the night before. sad that i missed it, i was at least hopeful at the prospect of enjoying the snow for the next few days as we trekked (rode comfortably in a van) toward Lingzhi, Tibet's scenic hopspot. but i guess the snow froze the grass from greening as we learned the roads were shut for a few days and it would not be wise to risk our lives to make the journey. so thinking it best, the tour company decided to cancel that portion of the tour. leaving us to fend for ourselves in a city we seem to have come to know fairly well by now.

so theresa and i decided to leave tibet early and spend the extra time in Chengdu, where at least we can play with pandas and thersea can not be so fearful of local cuisine (the sheep lungs were surprisingly good).

so goodbye Tibet, you have opened my eyes to a culture previously only visited by my channel surfing past the discovery channel. thanks for allowing me to enjoy your atmosphere and experience. though not what i had hoped for, it was definitely not what i expected.
rank: 5
overall Tibet experience: 5.9

the rest of the trip will consist of some extra time spent in Chengdu and then off to JuiZhai Guo, one of China's most beautiful scenic landscapes. if you remember Jet Li's movie Hero, the scene where he is fighting Broken Sword on the lake is JuiZhai Guo.

so now i'm signing off for now, i'm sure by now you are wondering why the hell you read this much. but if you did, i'm glad...if not, i'll only refer you to this blog as your punishment for not reading this when you ask me how my trip was. and hopefully i can shake this feeling of wondering if the view is greener on the other side...

A Tibetan Journey

in a few hours, i will be embarking on my journey to the highest points of the globe. pushing the limits of my lungs, i will challenge altitude to a battle...pushing the limits of my culture, i will challenge my mind to open.

soon i will be surrounded by monks and llamas; eating...whatever Tibetans eat; smelling the stench of burning yak fat; and overall enjoying the adventure.

i will undoubtedly snap a few photos and lug back some Tibetan treasures (though i hear most of them are, like everything else in this world, made in china). so to tease you with the majesty of Tibet, here is a photo of Potola Palace.

of course my minimal photography skills will not provide nearly an artistic image as this. but my memory will be filled with both images of the grandeur of Tibetan culture as well as the poverty of Tibetan existence. hopefully both will fill me with wonder and appreciation.

so i'm off on another adventure. glad to get another stamp on my passport and another notch on my must-see-list of the world. so with my camera in hand and my backpack on...well...my back, i bid you adieu and hope to see you on the flip side.

10,000 Steps Later

so this adventure recently took me on an impulsive journey with a few new friends to HuangShan (Yellow Mountain), which is known for it YunHai (Sea of Clouds) and its natural scenic beauty. the evolution of this trip mainly consisted of a drunken agreement made two days before the departure...a mad dash to catch our train...a 10-hour train ride...a last-minute hop onto a tour group...and nearly 7 hours and a dozen kilometers (sorry folks, my residence in china has turned me to the metric system. here, i'll help u: 1 mi = 1.6 km) of the most grueling treks (okay, okay...a majority of the climb may have been spent on a cable car)...an evening of bad buffet and a bottle of "BaiJio"...and a 5 hour layover for another 10-hour return train home. all in all, the trip was a success and fairly enjoyable.

BUT...this will be where i unintelligibly connect my trip to one of the political hot topics of the moment, global warming. how, you ask, will i achieve such a task? to tell u the truth, this might not come off as eloquently as it played in my head. but hell, no one reads this thing anyways so who really cares?

for those who have been following the news at all, the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) released a report last week stating with 90% certainty that man (meaning mankind...didn't want to confuse you with the idea that men worldwide are producing flatulence at epic rates) is causing global warming. now the IPCC consists of hundreds of scientists and skeptics from numerous countries, thereby giving the best chance of a non-partisan report.

now i'm not one to overly criticize, as i drive the v8 engine suv that i love and power the heater when my nipples start to poke through my shirt. but i'm still socially aware enough (though maybe not personally dedicated enough) to know that major change needs to be done to slow down (not halt, as the process has already passed its critical mass) the effects of global warming. but what i don't understand is how long it has taken this administration to come around to address this issue and how major corporations can still rail against the scientific evidence of its existence. its has been reported that such big-oil interests groups (AEI) has started to bribe IPCC scientists to put out their own reports downsizing or entirely eliminating the claim that we, the energy hungry and environmentally unconscious, are ruining the planet.

so as the entire world heats up, i bring us back to the inspiration of this post: my trip to HuangShan. our uber friendly tour guide has mentioned that the seasons have been increasingly warm lately, resulting in less rain and snow and clouds that HuangShan is famous for in the winter. so after enduring the endless amount of stairs and the virtual carrying of Theresa up the mountain, we reached a peak without the gratification i was promised. HuangShan is supposed to look like the magnificence you see to the below.












instead, we caught the significantly duller image to the right. don't get me wrong, the sites we saw and the magnificence of the mountain are still amazing and worth the trip, but my fellow travelers and i were slightly disappointed by the lack of 'normal' weather.

but fret not fellow readers, i have changed my ways. to play my part in the curbing of global warming, i have cut down on my public flatulents in hopes of sparing the atmosphere any more poisonous gases. now...what will you do?