Delhi

Imagine dozens of Indian men, apparantly trying to be helpful (or to earn a hefty commission), following you saying "Madam, you need taxi?" "Madam, you need hotel?" "Madam, I take you to tourist office!". Then picture hundreds of cars, motorcyles, rickshaws and bicycles-- none of whom are following any conventional rules of traffic-- everywhere. The air smells like incense and spices (a pleasant change from China's aroma of cabbage and construction), which thankfully masks the odor of pollution (though not of the occasional puddle of urine). Add streets littered with garbage and the occasional cow blocking your path, and that's pretty much Delhi so far.

To be fair, there are many areas of Delhi, as there are of any city. Last night we happened to stay in the fairly dirty area described above (which for whatever reason is where the Westerner backpacker types stay). Today we've moved locations-- when we enter our hotel tonight we will no longer have to push our way around cows, motorcycles and touts.

We've been here for 36 hours and have seen strangely little of the city so far. Getting anything done here has been pretty hard, whether it was finding an acceptable hotel or setting up the travel for the rest of our trip. We were lucky to meet an American guy the other day who made our lives a lot easier-- walking around the city with him allowed us to be a little invisible, and random men seemed to ignore us a little more. Having him with us also allowed us to do things like take a taxi at night, which we would not have done without a man. Sad fact of life in this part of the world-- the concept of women travelling (or walking through a city, even) without a man does not seem to exist, therefore we're treated either as if we're incapable of doing anything for ourselves or as if we're sketchy, immoral women who dare to be without male escorts. Tasche's husband flies in to Delhi tonight, and I'm excited to have him with us for the rest of our travel in India.

Bangkok

I just had my second massage in three days-- I'm feeling kind of decadent. Because this is my last night in Thailand I shelled out a whole $10 for an hour-long massage at a fairly fancy-pants place (it's about 3 times more expensive than my beachside massage the other day!).

This morning we went to a Buddhist temple, and it was the only sightseeing we have done in a week-- thank goodness. After two weeks in China, we were both a bit done with the sightseeing-- it was nice to not have to think about our grant and just do what we wanted to do for a few days. We have basically spent the last five days eating, sleeping, relaxing, shopping and drinking lots of banana milkshakes. There were pedicures involved... and spring rolls... and an episode of "the Daily Show-- Global Edition". That's about it.

I have loved every minute of it.

China is a far distant memory and India looms large ahead. We fly to Delhi tomorrow morning...

Ko Samet, Thailand

White sand beaches... $24 beach-front bungalow... hour-long massages on the beach for the price of two subway rides in NYC... Not bad for a last-minute get-away!

Thailand

Life is so much better here.

Beautiful beaches, amazing food, friendly people, cheap accomodations. We're leaving this place WHY, exactly?

Appreciating the much-needed break. Photos to come soon...

Searching for a village we could not find

We went looking for the village of Fuling today. We were told it was 30 minutes away. Turns out, we rode for about 30 miles and never found it. So instead, we enjoyed the scenery...

(Note to my family: yes, I rode a bicycle for 30 miles. There was even traffic involved-- motorbikes, tractors, even a truck or two. No injuries, no incidents, no problems. Maybe there was something wrong with the streets of Toledo when I was a kid, not with me...?)

Number One Most Beautiful Tourist City on the Planet!

The Southwestern city of Yangshou has been our home for the past few days. We have seen it by bike, bus and boat, down two rivers and across numerous villages. We have been surrounded by Chinese tour groups and European backpackers alike (though the Chinese tour groups have been far more prominent). We have visited minority villages of the Yao and Zhuang people, traveled down the Yulong River on a bamboo raft, and had a private outdoor lesson to learn the basics of tai-chi. It has been a VERY busy couple of days in this relaxing place...

We're essentially in a vacation town, so it's obviously geared toward tourism. From what I can tell, everything in China is overhyped, so it's the Number One Waterfall and the World's Best River and the Most Beautiful Laser Light Show in Asia. Chinese tourists seem to believe the hype-- it's like the whole country is a 12 year old girl, desperately wanting to fit in and do whatever everyone else thinks is cool. This proves problematic for Western tourists who only want to see something that is actually worthwhile, not just because it might happen to be the Tallest Banyon Tree in China (because really, who cares?).

So, while the scenery is gorgeous, being here is draining. We're trying not to fall prey to anything, but at the same time, we're trying to stay true to the grant that paid for us to be here, which is all about studying minority cultures. We're certainly studying culture-- everything we do, from ordering breakfast to walking down a street, proves that-- but the "minority" part is hard to do without a guide, and even then it's hard to know what is authentic and what is just put on for us.

We're trying to squeeze in some time at a beach to truly relax, so we might cut short our stay in China and head to Thailand's beaches ASAP. It's possible we have had enough culture for awhile-- at least until we head to India...

Yangshao: Relaxation in Southwest China

We've been in Southwestern China for a few days now. Check out how beautiful these towns are-- quite a change from Beijing and Guangzhao!

The best signs in China (so far...)

Dragon's Backbone Rice Terrace-- Longshen, China

Exercise in Beijing

Beautiful, Wonderful, Comfort-ful...

... that was the toast of the evening last night. After a full day of sight-seeing in Guangzhou, our friend Hai Ying took us to a dinner party of sorts, at a not-quite-open hotel, on a pond, under the moon. We couldn't figure out exactly what was going on, or why we were there, but we were part of a fancy-pants dinner party and were served numerous dishes both delicious (pumpkin soup!) and less-so (omelet with sticky rice, canned corn and grapes, topped with bbq sauce, anyone?).

At one point we were entertained by a mask dancer and traditional music. Then Tasche and I were asked to sing for the crowd-- "Something like from Titanic, you know?". Clearly, we did not sing Celine Dion for the party (nor did we sing anything, for that matter). I think we disappointed them.

Guangzhou: city of food and babies

Guangzhou... formerly known as Canton... home of Cantonese cuisine. Now it feels like we're in China. Beijing was so oriented toward foreigners and the Olympics that it didn't feel like a real city. Guangzhou feels less crowded and more livable. It also has a few palm trees and is on the water, which makes it feel cleaner. I like it here.

Last night we went to dinner with our colleague Hai Ying, who was born here in Guangzhou and moved to NYC as a teenager. She took us out with her friends to an authentic Cantonese "hot pot" dinner. As we walked through the restaurant we passed aquariums filled with seafood and plates displaying every meat and vegetable one could think of-- all of which can be chosen to be dropped in the "hot pot", a cauldron of steaming rice soup that sits on the table, waiting to be filled. Hai Ying and her friends ordered us countless dishes, and it seemed like we were there for days, having our bowls and teacups endlessly refilled. It was delicious. It's so nice spending time with someone who knows the city and the culture-- Hai Ying is also going to take us around town this afternoon, which should be an experience.

The markets we have seen so far are filled with mounds of dried food, like starfish and mushrooms bigger than my head, not to mention bowls of scorpions and other insects. We walked through the dried-food quarter, which became the pets-in-cages quarter, and eventually turned into the electronics and red lanterns quarter. We'll see what else we find this afternoon...

Guangzhou is also the place of thousands of overseas adoptions. The neighborhood where we're staying, Shaiman Island, is located near the American embassy, and is filled with literally hundreds of American couples pushing Chinese babies in strollers. All of the stores in this area are filled with baby clothes and pampers-- it's like nothing I've ever seen!

Perhaps I misspoke...

I feel like I need to apologize to Beijing about misrepresenting its weather. I thought that the overcast skies and gray-hue were due to ever-present pollution, but today was sunny with a very blue sky. Apparantly the first few days really were cloudy and not just pollution-filled. Also, it seems we spent the first few days here in "old" Beijing-- what looks like Chinatown in NYC. Today we went to "new" Beijing-- it looks like the rest of Manhattan. So, I'm sorry, Beijing. I misrepresented you.

This morning we found an area that clearly was revitalized with the influx of Olympic tourists in mind. It's a very hip-looking row of restaurants and bars overlooking a lake in a beautiful section of Beijing-- one of the bars is actually called "Sex and Da City" (I kid you not). As we were walking there this morning, we were stopped in front of the Starbucks by two teenagers who asked if they could interview us about our feelings about Beijing, the Olympics and Chinese "etiquette". Basically, they wanted to know if we were offended by Chinese "customs" like spitting in the street and men walking around in hot weather with their shirts pulled up, revealing their bellies. We told them that we were frustrated by overly attentive wait staff (waiters hand you menus and hover over you until you order, not even letting you read the menu first-- it's so annoying!!) but otherwise, Chinese etiquette was fine. This seems to be of tremendous concern to the citizens of Beijing-- they are very worried about what foreigners (Olympic-related, of course) will think about some of their less polite customs. There appears to have been a massive education campaign telling people about things like waiting in line, not spitting in the streets, etc. (I wonder if that includes saying "Hello!" very loudly to every white person you see, as that happens to us 100 times a day). We actually saw a few of what we think are these signs, but of course we couldn't read them. The pictures looked like they could be, though...

People here are SO EXCITED for the Olympics. It is exciting to be here a few weeks beforehand, and see how much preparation the entire city goes through. The people of Beijing are so proud to have their city hosting such a prestigious event, and they're so excited to show off their city to foreigners. We have been so welcomed here, which of course is quite nice. But the impact on this city will be nuts, both environmental and otherwise. I have seen quite a few recycling bins, which I"m sure were just introduced here. And honestly, they were all empty (I'm not sure people know what to do with them), but at least they're here for foreigners to use. There are already 18 million people in this city, and with the Olympics an influx of 1.5 million more are expected. Crazy!!

We also watched some (government-run) Chinese tv news today-- fascinating perspectives about the Olympic preparations (the food is safe! the air quality is fine! everything will be ready! we welcome you!), their relationship wtih Taiwan (we love Taiwan! people from the island should visit the mainland!), and other fairy tales...

Mr. Good Price

We went to the Great Wall today. To save hassle we signed up for a"ride" there from our hotel-- we were told it also included lunch, and thought it would just be easier to go straight from our hotel. A snapshot of our day:

7 am: get on bus with 6 other English-speaking tourists. Assume we will spend the day going to the Great Wall, then to lunch, and back to the hotel.

8:30: arrive at Great Wall. Cloudy day, coupled with extreme pollution, made it so that we could barely see the wall. Horrible picture taking possibilities. However, we had our picture taken by Chinese children approx. 315 times.

10am: arrive at "largest jade jewelry store in Beijing". (WHAT??) Taken on a tour of jade-making facility, then given an hour to buy jewelry (note: we received almost as much time there as we did at theGreat Wall). (Second note: we bought nothing.)

11:30: arrive at Ming Tombs to see the tombs of dead Chinese leaders. (WHAT??) Spend almost an hour wandering around a site that none of our group had any interest in seeing. When getting back in the bus (finally!), we were hounded by the hordes of women in the parking lotselling bags of peaches. (Of course there had to be SOMETHING there to sell us!)

12:30: arrive at lunch, which is at the government-run "Friendship Store". Even though there were literally 54 empty tables, we were told we had to wait and were taken on a tour of the vase-making facility that was conveniently located there. After lunch, we had another half-hour to kill and were expected to shop at the "friendship Store".

1:30: arrive at tea-house, where we are given a demonstration and tasting of various teas. Afterward, of course, we are given the hard-sell, for both the teas and the pots they come in!

2pm: Best part of the day... they took us to a room (next door to the tea-house) where we were told to take off our shoes and soak our feet in boiling water. Then a"doctor" lectured us about chinese medicine and sent in students to massage our feet. While this was a good thing, I assumed the first foot would be free and we would have to pay for the second foot (what else could they charge us for?), but then they sent in the Tibetan expert who offered to read our palms and tell us what diseases we had. We were the most captive kind of audience-- one whose feet were being massaged (and who wants to leave that?!)-- so a few of our group had their palms read and were shockingly all told the same thing (apparantly everyone had high bloodpressure running in their families and needed better digestion). He of course tried to prescribe all kinds of herbal remedies for these ailments, but most of us were not buying.

It appears capitalism really has made a stronghold in this technically Communist country...

Day One

So, we're here in Beijing. This might sound weird, but it's a lot likeChinatown in NYC... I suppose that means Chinatown is authentic. I'mnot really experiencing culture shock as the food is familiar and theinsides of restaurants look familiar and the stuff sold on the streetis easily found on Canal Street. I'm sure the rural areas will be moreshocking, but as of now, I could be on Mott St. It's kind of odd...

We went to the Forbidden City today, and to Tiananmen Square.Tiananmen Square is huge, and all I could envision was a tank charging through and throngs of students protesting. We took pictures ofourselves under the huge picture of Mao and then stood in line to seeMao's frozen body in a mausoleum. People took it very, very seriouslybut we thought he looked like a wax figure. I mean really, they freezehis body 21 hours a day and put him on display every morning between9-12....While in Tiananmen Square a lady walked up to us with a camera. We assumed she wanted us to take a picture of her family but she actuallywanted to take a picture of us with her family-- her poor daughter wasscared to death of having to stand between the two white girls! The mom was so excited to see us, but the kid looked like she wanted to cry. That was really, really strange...

One of my favorite things today was walking through a park where we encountered dozens of small groups of senior citizens exercising--some were doing jazzercise, others were playing badminton, or hackeysack. But the entire park was full of exercising senior citizens-- it was like Beijing Leisure World!

There's construction everywhere, everyone getting ready for the Olympics. I can't imagine how all of this is going to get done in three weeks-- there are construction sites on every corner. It's nuts.There are all of these directives about not using cars after next week and making everyone who lives here ride bikes so that the air will be cleaner for the Olympics. But really, whose idea was it to have the Olympics here? There is a permanent haze over the city due to the pollution-- today was supposedly sunny but there was no blue in thesky whatsoever-- just a hazy, overcast gray. I can't imagine athletes breathing this air and trying to compete. It just sounds like a disaster.

Tomorrow we're going to climb the Great Wall...