Chinese New Year-In China!

Happy Chinese New Year!  It is officially the Year of the Ox now, make sure you thank them for plowing your fields on your way to work today!  

Chinese New Year in China is crazy.  Firecrackers go off almost ceaselessly, while fireworks light up half the sky.  That's probably why they banned them from big cities like Guangzhou and Beijing.  

Here in small town Xizhou, it's fine to blow them up wherever you want.  So we did what any person would do: buy as many as you can hold.  Bryce, Peter, Adrian and I bought Roman Candles (the tubes that you hold while lit-up balls fly out of it), sparklers, bottle rockets and the biggest one we could find (dubbed BIG BANG on the front).  

That night, we took all of it outside of our Centre to out blow everyone else.  Unfortunately, our choices were pretty bad: the 3 foot long sparklers burned for about 30 seconds before dying on us, the balls from the Roman Candles flew a few feet in the air then exploded in our faces, and the bottle rockets all landed in our pond, leaving us a surprise the next morning.  

The Chinese definitely out did us.  Their commercial-sized fireworks and 5 minute long firecrackers put us to shame.  Chinese New Year for most people goes like this: they attend any performances during the day, which can include dragon dances, local "talent" shows, and anything else happening in their village.  Then they get together with their families for a big homemade dinner.  At 8 PM, the firecrackers start booming throughout the whole valley.  But that's only some of their stash.  After some of their arsenal is used, they go inside to watch TV (with the whole family) and then come back out at 12 AM to blow up the rest of their fireworks/crackers.  

We watched in envy as these went off.  But there was still a trick in our sleeve...  The BIG BANG!  We put this in the middle of the small cobblestone road running outside our home.  The first shot went up and BANG!  This was a real firework, it blew up in thousands of pieces of light probably showing for thousands of miles around.  The reason why the sun rose so early that day in the US was because it was scared of our fireworks!!!  

Local Xizhou Wedding

Last week, the whole staff, along with my family and 5 others (for a total of 16 people) walked across the Xizhou fields to a musician's son's wedding.  The musician, along with his band, are some that we frequently invite to our Centre to play for our guests.  We had soon found our way by following the red signs, which led us to an alleyway where the wedding was.  Inside the small courtyard, about half the size of a tennis court, were probably 100 people, all crammed tightly together.  

Here's how the Xizhou wedding works.  You go into the courtyard, giving your wedding present to the bride and groom.  Find a table among the 10 others, then sit down and eat.  After eating all you can, you get up and leave, while another family takes your space.  

Our whole group took up two tables, and we stayed a bit longer than most people (we created quite a big people jam).  Looking back, that's the only way they could have so many guests.  The house was too small to fit all those people, and what better way than having a (free) all-you-can-eat-buffet!

Hue

Hue is the formal imperial capital of the Nguyen Dynasty.  Coming from Hoi An (see last post) it was a major change.  No cafes, tourists and little trace of Westernization.  There isn't that much to see in the city itself, except for the Old Town.  In reality though, the "Old Town" is not very old, except for the Purple Forbidden City inside it.  The Purple Forbidden City was modeled after the Chinese Forbidden City, though built only 200 years ago.  Unfortunately, so many temples and buildings inside have been destroyed by bombings, there isn't much to look at.  Overall, it was sadly underwhelming.  

A related experience was visited the DMZ (De-Militarized Zone) with my dad.  While riding the bus through the Vietnam countryside, we spotted countless bomb craters, now being used as fish ponds or mosquito breeding grounds.  We then reached the tunnels.  These 4-6 feet tall burrows some 20 feet underground were used by the Northern Vietnamese to escape artillery from the South.  Families lived holes not much bigger than your average bathroom, and much shorter in height.  We moved in and out of the tunnels, sometimes along the sea, other times ducking and weaving through the claustrophobic spaces.  There was a kitchen, a maternity room, (where at least 2 babies were born) and even a place to watch movies and sing!  Sorta makes you wonder what they watched...
Hue was definitely interesting city.  It felt like China in a way.  Friendly people, bad drivers and Forbidden Cities.  

Our last few days in Vietnam were spent lounging around Hanoi again.  We tried limiting our visits to Highlander this time, but we couldn't help it.  I think we ate their 10 times already...

The night train out of Vietnam was horrible to say the least.  Following the great Chinese tradition of doing things a bit weirdly.  We were required to wake up at 2 am for customs, stand outside in the cold weather for half an hour before boarding the train again to sleep...at least until they wake you up 2 hours later for baggage check.  This raises two questions: why are these things separate, and why can't we do it before we get on the train?  Well, "It's China."  (With some Vietnam.)

Hoi An

Our second destination in Vietnam was Hoi An (pronounced huay ahn).  Being 2 miles from the sea, it's a very popular tourist town.  The whole "downtown" area is only a few square miles, and you could see all the sights in a day or two, along with going to the ocean.  But our hotel was a 15 minute walk from that whole area, which was very inconvenient.  (More about that later.)  

Our hotel supplied free bikes for their guests, but the bikes were more akin to broken tanks from the Vietnam war, and every single one had at least something wrong with it.  

The highlight to our visit to Hoi An was going to the beach.  We took some "bikes" from our hotel and took a nice cruise down to the water.  The ride was beautiful, it guided us across fields of rice, along a lazy river and down to the ocean.  There I made a sand castle, my mom and Bryce ran around looking for shells, and Peter and my dad took lots of pictures of us doing these things.  Unfortuatly, the rain decided to ruin the party and we winded up having to leave early.  

The rain was a nuisence the whole trip.  It attacked us again while we were hanging out at a cafe, eating ice cream and buying even more bread.  It saw us ready to leave without our bikes, so decided to crash the party.  It didn't give us a small spring sprinkle, more like a tropical monsoon!  (Ok, maybe not that bad).  

The rest of the days were spent hanging around our favorite cafes, shopping around for a blazer to fit Peter, and just seeing the sights.  The days in Hoi An were fun (if not rainy) and we had our fair share of cafes and bread.  But the expidition wasn't over yet - the final destination on our Vietnam trip was the formal imperial capital, Hue.

Hanoi

(Continued from previous post)

The bus ride to Hanoi, Vietnam was tedious: three hours to the China-Vietnam border, two hours of standing in line at customs, then three more hours to the city itself.  Our hotel was situated in the Old Quarter of Hanoi-a place with heavy colonial European influence.  Everywhere you look, whether it's down a small alley tucked away in some hidden corner or around the enchanting Hoan Kiem lake, you're bound to spot some form of Westernization somewhere.  The French have certainly left their mark on Vietnam ever since they occupied it in the 19th and 20th centuries.  Cafes dot the city with their tasty baguettes and relaxing atmosphere, while Western architecture also adds to its charm.  

The days there felt slow, schoolwork in the morning and cafe hopping in the afternoon.  Our favorite cafe was The Highlander, which sat three floors above the hustling traffic of Hanoi and offered a panoramic view of the lake from the outdoor balcony.

One day we visited the Vietnam War Museum.  Tanks stare at you while you enter, followed by helicopters and artillery.  In the middle of this all was a towering statue of downed airplane debris.  Pretty intimidating if you ask me.  An interesting piece of info stood in front of every weapon and vehicle.  It would tell (supposedly) how many people this gun had shot down.  One piece of artillery destroyed 2 bombers, another pistol shot down 4 US troops.  These signs were in Vietnamese as well as English and French, which makes me wonder if they mean to do it for extra information, or payback for the war.  

Our trip to Hanoi wasn't the most exciting vacation we've taken; we dined at The Highlander half a dozen times, and ate lots of baguettes too.  But maybe that would change in our next destination: Hoi An, a city with beaches, cafes and bread - exactly what we wanted.  

Guilin & Nanning

We were on a train heading to Guilin , listening to carols and cracking open chestnuts.  It was Christmas day.  And that was our Christmas dinner.  (If only there was an open fire!)  The train ride was 17 hours long, but we were lucky enough to grab a soft-sleeper cabin.  Soft-sleepers have 4 beds, one above another on one side of the wall, and the same configuration on the opposite side.  And the beds actually have some padding (compared to hard-sleepers "board of wood") and you can lock the doors.  

The train arrived in Guilin at noon the following day and we went out in search of a good lunch (we found some bread).  

Guilin is called "cinnamon forest" in Chinese, probably because the city is just full of cinnamon trees.  But that's not the only forest around the city.  The other one is made of stone.  These towering rocks are scattered throughout the landscape, rivaling office buildings in size. While eating dinner in a U.B.C. coffee shop, we tried to count these giant boulders before our pizza arrived.

The next day Bryce, Peter and I took a ride to the Seven Star Park in downtown Guilin.  This is one of the main attractions of the city, having parks, caves, a zoo, pandas, waterfalls and wild monkeys.  Five years earlier, Bryce and I sat on a tiger there; this time though, he wasn't there.  Instead, there were monkeys.  Peter had to get a picture with them, and at 75 cents (5 yuan) it sounded like a good deal.  The two primates jumped on him, stood on his head and bit his hair.   The 2 poor guys had little ropes around their skinny head, and mini clothes that were probably made for a baby.

Our next stop was the panda exhibit.  This part wasn't completed yet, but the pandas didn't seem to care, they were munching and crunching away at bamboo the whole half hour we were there.  

For breakfast the following day we ate McDonalds.  The McDonalds.  Chinese love their fast food.  Whether it's Dicos, EFG, Kung Fu Fast Food or Ramen, they can't get enough of it.  And the number of overweight people in China is rising fast.  It's cheap, tasty and fast food restaurants are sprouting up like weeds.  In fact, the number of overweight and obese people in China increased 28 fold between 1985-2000.  

When we got up there, (McDonalds is on the second floor) what did we see?  More foreigners.  Well, Peter got a Big Mac and I bought a McChicken.  And so there we sat, my mother and brother eating fries, while Peter and I were eating our burgers, glancing over every now and again to see what the Americans were eating. 

But even weirder then that was the place we ate dinner, McFound.  A cross between a Chinese restaurant, a diner, and a log cabin, this place was certainly interesting.  The food was actually good though!  The meat was fantastic, along with the sauce.  But to top it off, the toothpicks tasted like cinnamon, which always gets points in my book.  

We woke up the next day ready for our trip to Nanning.  The train ride we took was only 4 hours long, but the seats were very, very, hard.  The trip is especially bad when you are sitting next to 4 other guys smoking.  

Nanning was dreary; rain clouds and smog clogged the air as well as our spirits.  But fortunately, our next destination was sunny Vietnam, something we were really looking forward to.  We met our dad in Nanning and hopped on a bus going to beautiful Vietnam.  (It was raining there too.)

(Continued in next post)