Lina in China

We decided to spend the weekend camping in a bamboo wood near Chongqing. But in order to camp in a bamboo wood we have to get to the bamboo wood of course.

Chongqing is built on many hills and the area around Chongqing is as well full of hills and mountains. So in order to get to the bamboo wood for camping we had to drive through Chinese country and mountain roads.

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME!!!!

The Chinese traffic and the Chinese roads are safe – unless there is an accident. And there are many accidents. Still all over again my Chinese friends are telling me that the Chinese roads are safe (unless there is an accident – I add usually).

We are driving to in the mountains

We started by fighting the usual Chongqing rush hour that seems to last from 6 am to 10 pm… Driving in a Chinese city seems to be more dangerous than it really is as everyone is driving quite slowly. The cars are being driven by a chaotic system that still seems to work on Chinese Roads.

Basically no one obeys the rules but no one expects that the other obey the rules, either. Until today I did not find out why China has traffic signs and traffic lights at all since they seem to make no difference to anyone.

My Chinese host – being a lawyer – likes to keep to rules. But when he stops at a zebra crossing the pedestrians will give him a sceptic look. No one stops for pedestrians at a zebra crossing in China unless he fears he would kill one. My host is an exception.

Chongqing city road

From the Chongqing city roads we drove a short distance on the highway. Driving on Chinese highways is easy. There are usually neither pigs running free nor farmers drying rice nor many holes in the ground. Still you have to watch out for slow trucks overtaking even slower trucks and for road work – just like in Germany.

But when there is an accident on the highway it usually ends with death as the allowed speed is 120 km/h but many people are much faster and basically no one wears a seatbelt.

Chongqing Mountains

Also the Chinese toll system is very complicated. On the Chinese Highways there are many toll stations and they give you a piece of paper or a plastic card. After some driving in China you are swimming in cards, papers and receipts. When you are unable to show the right card to the right toll station in the right moment on Chinese highways and Chinese country roads you have to pay a lot of money. I could never figure out why we had to show witch paper at what moment to whom and why we sometimes paid nothing, sometimes 5 Yuan and sometimes 160 Yuan. Even my host had trouble at times finding the right papers or cards.

On the Chongqing Country road we saw the first accident on this trip. A truck and a Taxi were involved. We did not see corpses. The truck driver appeared to be fine, trying to collect his load of water. In the taxi there was much blood. Probably the taxi driver was insured and send to hospital. Police was standing around, no idea what they did.

Street repair of chinese mountain road

Then we started out on the mountain roads. We were often driving inches from deep valleys and in my mind I saw us falling oh so many times. In some areas there was a fence fixed. But that these fences are more for nice view then for actually preventing accidents I saw when we came across a Truck that had fallen about 5 meters right into a fish pond. The driver probally drowned unless someone had pulled him out on an instant.

Even on the tiniest Chinese mountain road dangerous as it people are overtaking, using the opposite traffic line at frightening speed. The road is sometimes used to dry rice. And if you drive on drying rice you are deemed as you can neither steer nor brake.

The street has many holes, unsecured road repair, pedestrians, bikes, self-build wagons, men in wheelchairs. We almost drove into a herd of pigs.

Chinese Mountain Traffic Jam

The further we got into the mountain the worse the Chinese mountain roads got. But the view was terrific.

One time we had to stay in one place for 10 minutes or more because a truck loading some charcoal was blocking the whole road causing a long traffic jam in this lonely area.

The Chinese take this with the same patience as everything else. If there is no way around we wait.

I had the opportunity going for a little walk. I watched Chinese charcoal workers and wondered what kind of life they must have. I saw some Chinese houses in this lonely mountain area. They had electricity and running water!

I watched some goose in a bamboo cage; some children were playing and the men were black from the charcoal dust.

I was told that we might have to leave the car and walk but luckily we were able to get past the trucks.

The road got even worse after the charcoal mine. We were jumping up and down in the car. Then finally we arrived on the parking of the bamboo wood. It felt like returning into civilization. Yet there was no other road so each nice rich-men’s car on this beautiful parking space must have come the way we were.

So in the morning we were leaving the nice small city of Mianyang (only 6 Million people ) for Chongqing. I must confess I had never heard the name of this city before only to find out now that it is the largest city in whole China and even the world!

I thought he was taking me to yet another nice small town near Chengdu. Well not quite… !

When my friend told me that we will be driving for 5-6 hours in order to get to Chongqing I started to wonder.

When I saw the first thing I saw of Chongqing was the traffic. Chongqing is unbelievable chaotic. If the traffic in other Chinese scared me, the traffic in Chongqing terrified me.

Then the Skyscrapers came into my view. Chongqing is unbelievable gigantic and chaotic. It is (at least in summer) hot, humid, loud and chaotic.

My friend took me immediately to some Chinese party in some Chinese hot pot restaurant in the middle of Chongqing. It all just got too much for me. 100 strangers were introducing themselves murmuring names that I would forget the same instant.

All faces looked the same, everyone was a lawyer (must have been a lawyers party) and the Chongqing food did not look very tasty to put it nice.

Indian Food in Chongqing, Foreigener Street

Luckily the Chinese tend to be very good and caring hosts. He saw that I was totally overwhelmed by the city, by meeting 15 loud, celebrating Chinese lawyers around one pot (Chongqing hot pot, “Huguo”).

So we sneaked out and my Chongqingnese friend took me to the foreigner street. This street is a mixture of foreign restaurants and a fair with carousel and such on one of Chongqing’s many hills.

We had some very delicious Indian food: Bananas wrapped in special bread. The Indian Cook was so happy that I greeted him with “Namaste” and spoke English to him, that he gave me my portion for free.

European Coffee, finally!

Then we went to the Café de Paris and had some excellent French Coffee. We were sitting on the a second floor balcony with a beautiful view on Chongqing by night. The coffee in Chongqing’s foreigner street tasted just like at home. And the Chinese girl working in the Café de Paris at Foreigner Street in Chongqing even spoke some French! Unfortunately her French boss was not home.

So Chongqing greeted me with some foreign specialities that I had been longing for for a long time.

Chongqing has several foreign supermarkets. One of them ist he American supermarket chain „Walmart“ and one – I was surprised to learn that – is a German supermarket.

So in the morning my hosts took me to the German supermarket metro in Chongqing. They must have been guessing once more how much I was longing to see a European “longnosed” face in this strange China Adventure.

Oh how dear can be a piece of German cheese when you are so far away from home? How much can you long for some taste of home in your China Adventures.

The German supermarket in Chongqing had several German brands like “Spreewaldgurken”, “Ritter Sport”, “Spekulatius” and oh Cheese!!!!!

I got a piece of Edam Cheese that costs a fortune in China: 70 Yuan = 7€. This is even more expensive taking into account that a lawyer in Chongqing usually earns no more then 5000 Yuan (500€), A teacher maybe 3000-4000 Yuan.

Address: No.101, Baihe Road, CETZ, Chongqing

The earthquacke of Mai 2008 in the Sichuan province of China also partly destroyed the famous Qiqushan-Temple on the Qiqushan mountain in Zitong, Sichuan, China.

The temple of Zitong is in the official list of China’s historical monuments in Sichuan. During the earthquacke in Mai 2008 in the Mianyang are of the Sichuan province of China Zitong was badly hit by the earthquacke. Some halls of the Qiqushan-Temple got partly destroyed by the earthquacke.

In September 2008 when I visited the temple on Mt. Qiqu (Qiqushan) much repair was taking place. But in some halls rubble of ancient stones from collapsed ancient stone walls could still be seen.

Wooden hall of the Kuixing God, not destroyed

The Hall of the Kuixing God is very famous and ancient. It is three stories high and was build on 46 wooden pillars. It is 33 meters high.

The Kuixing god is the god of students and pupils in the Buddhist belief. Even today school students still go to pray in the Hall of the Kuixing God before exams. This historic room was luckily survived the earthquake almost undamaged. This is probably due to the fact that it was build in the historical way as a wooden structure. Wood proved to be more flexible when hit by an earthquake then stone.

Zitong temple earthquacke destruction

The Qiqushan-Temple lies in an ancient Cypress wood containing more then 20 000 ancient cypresses. The temple was build during the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties. It contains 23 halls covering more then 13 000 square meters.

1996 the Qiqushan-Temple was asses to the list of Chinese national important historical sites.

During the earthquake several of the halls got partly destroyed. When we visited the temple repair had began but in places walls had collapsed stone railings broken and only the most ancient wooden halls had survived almost undamaged.

This morning I was to be taken at 8 am to a city called Zitong. I did not really understand what it was about all I understood is that my friends in Mianyang have to work during the day. So as it is I just followed someone with broken English because the friend of a friend had said in broken English that I should do that.

By German standards it was a long drive to Zitong, Sichuan. We where driving for maybe 1 ½ hours through Sichuan. Due to the earthquacke parts of the street are still destroyed. Whenever the driver crosses these it can really give you a startle.

I did not sleep much since the Karaoke in Mianyang the night before had taken us so long. So I kept falling asleep, and was awakened by cracks in the road and sudden stops.

After we arrived in Zitong I got the feeling that we are hurrying somewhere. Just I did not find out where. We ate a hurried noodle soup and I finally achieved to get some hot water for my morning coffee. Then we hurried on.

Suddenly the 3 men I was travelling with brought me to a preschool / kindergarten that had been partly destroyed by the earthquake in Sichuan and was rebuilt.

They brought me in the office and communicated that we would play some with the children and take pictures. None of the employees of the Chinese kindergarten, not even the director of this preschool had ever seen a foreigner. So the excitement about my visit was great.

Playing with the Sichuan children

I was lead on the court for playing and singing and picture taking on the kindergarten courtyard. I soon got the impression that this is probably one of the best preschools in Sichuan. It was clean, colourful, the classes not to great and everything done and planed with a heart. Even they toilets were very clean for Sichuan standards where even luxury restaurants usually have unbelievable dirty toilets.

I was given a wolf mask and should catch children and there teachers. I was asked to sing an English song (I believe none in this Chinese kindergarten understood that I am no native English speaker). Happily I knew “If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands!” And this was very good since the clapping, stamping of feeds, shouting and so on the children could take place in.

The school even had an English teacher even though her own English was hardly sufficient for communication.

Then I was brought to a preschool class of children about 6 years old I guess. I was asked to play a game with them and was really at loss as I had not expected such a thing. So I tried to play “Montagsmaler” the Chinese kindergarten children. In this game the Chinese children should guess what I am drawing. Then they asked me to teach “some English sentences to the children” I tried: “The dog is on the house” which proved to be too hard.

Sichuan Preschool Class

Then came the picture taking. They tried to place crying children in my arms and I did not know how to hold them. Chinese preschool children are carried in front of the breast one hand under head or shoulder the other under the legs and never on the hip like German children. Trying to carry a Chinese child in the German way does scare them as they do not know it.

After this class I was sweating and tired and it was opened to me that 5 more classes were to come…

So they decided to make it shorter. In the second class I taught some English words and pictures were taken, in classes 3 and 4 just a general greeting and picture taking, classes 5 was just greeted, in class 6 I volunteered to sing the “If you’re happy” song once more. Then came class 7…

Rebuilded Sichuan Preschool

After we were done they lead me back to the kindergarten office and offered me some bottled green tea. So I took my chance trying to communicate weather I may see the school. They showed me the dining room and the kitchen, a sleeping room and the dance room. Of course they selected to show me the best. But I also peeked through some windows and in the whole school the hygiene standard was high enough that I would have sent my child to this school with no worries.

All was prepared with love. They showed me one sleeping room (Seems like they are also a boarding school. I asked if the children have parents, they said: “of course” so it is no foster home). Children where sleeping on two stories in the room. There was something build like a giant two stories bed for the Chinese preschool children of the boarding school. Everything was need and tidy, the same for every child though. The children sleeping upstairs had a slide to leave the bed in the morning. They had paper stars and moon hanging from the ceiling and everything smelled like fresh wood.

Lunch in the Preschool

The dancing room had a projector, every class room a computer (I don’t know if they have internet) and a TV. Most rooms had air conditioning. All together a very need school.

Back on the school yard there was some more greeting and some more singing. In almost all classes except with the little ones the children where able to say “good morning teacher”, “hello”, “thank you”, “we love you” and “good bye” so I guess these Sichuan children are prepared for the international world or at least for a good school.

After walking around some in the city we returned to the Chinese kindergarten once more in order to have lunch there. The food was good, clean, and diverse.

Introducing young Chinese to „spin-the-bottle“

The Chinese play a very complicated dice game: Each person has 5 dices, there is some lying about what you have and in the end the winner gets to ask the looser a question. As I did not get the game I suggested to play spin-the-bottle”. In spin-the-bottle you spin a bottle and the one it points on is either asked a question or must do something.

Young Chinese are drinking a lot of beer but concerning everything around men and women they are pretty shy. They found the game very interesting. We asked things like “when did you get your first kiss”, “about witch girl in the room you have fantasies” and let the looser act like a monkey, let the guys wear lipstick and first hand kisses where exchanged, then kisses on the cheek and the highest was that I (female) had to kiss another girl on the corner of the mouth. I hit back by letting the guy who had given me that core by letting him kiss another guy.

One of the most famous Sichuan foods is the Hot Pot. In general Europeans should be warned that at times Sichuan foods are so hot (spicy) that they can make you cry.

The hotpot is not unlike the European fondue. Since little children and people with stomach trouble (and some tourists like me) can’t eat so hot the Hot Pot has two seconds. In one there is a red broth witch is unbelievable hot, in the other there is non-spiced broth. I usually stick with the baby-version of the hot-pot ;-).

Then the food comes in, in our case we decided for a meat hot pot as I don’t like fish so much. So they brought different types of meat: Beef, Pork, Whatever, Beef stomach, some intestines of a small animal, some filled noodles and Chinese meatballs. All are thrown by the Chinese Service women into the Hot Pot. Only exception are the small animal intestines witch should not be cooked long. The intestines are served on a plate and you grab them with your chopsticks and hold them in the hot pot for like 30 seconds. Luckily I got away with saying: “These have never been my favourite food and the meatballs are so good…”

They also served pumpkin cakes that were very good. The good thing about cakes and sweets in China is, that sweets in China are not too sweet, they are even less sweetened that German sweets.

When the meat was done we started eating by fishing meat and noodles by chopsticks or a little net from the Hot Pot. You have to be lucky to catch something that is done and that you like. If you catch something you don’t like or just spices you drop it.

The meet is then dunked in a mixture of sesame oil, balsamic (or similar) vinegar, herbs and garlic.

When you believe you can eat no more the vegetables come. Now you can fish for mushrooms, Chinese cabbage and others. So vegetarians have to be patient and whoever intends to eat some veggies in the Sichuan Hot Pot should leave some space for them in the stomach.

In the evening after eating interesting Sichuan food (made me cry) we decided (they decided and I accepted whatever the plan is) to take a walk and then go to disco. In the Centre of Mianyang there is a large place with a small temple or large shrine (not sure some said it was a temple, some said it was not).

On the place a western standard rhythms were played and the Chinese, mostly senior citizens, some younger and some children danced a mixture of western standard and Chinese Folk-dances.

There were several women, each owning a Hocker offering massage for 6 Yuan (60 eurocents!!). The massage takes about half an hour. Now you can guess what they are earning.

I was invited by my laughing Chinese friends for such a massage. As all Chinese massages it was quite tough – almost brutal. Chinese massage takes you to the border. The massage goes on until you think you can take it no more and usually the masseur is skilful enough to stop in just that moment. If not better stop them.

Wellness in China is not comparable to wellness in Germany. Chinese wellness is massage and massage is brutal.

She started by massaging my head and face. She was very gentle with my eyes but the rest was tough! She banged my head in massaging until I wondered weather this will improve my ability to think or the opposite.

She massaged my back, my arms, my hands and fingers. She was pulling and twisting each finger until they cracked. The Chinese woman pulled and twisted my arms, massaged my shoulders until I had to shout. Chinese Wellness… She banged on my back until I almost tipped over. She massaged my legs, my feet.

All the while a Chinese Group of spectators (mostly farmers visiting Mianyang Centre) gathered watching me watching them. Of course they are used to seeing Chinese Massage. But they are not used to seeing it performed on a western girl. Yes they had never seen a western woman (or man) before I was told.

The Chinese Wellness feeling of my massage was a little spoiled by the fact that I began to feel like a zoo animal as more and more people gathered to watch me. My Chinese friends all the while almost laughed tears and took pictures. Luckily the Chinese Sichuan Farmers owned neither cameras nor cell phones with camera and so they took no pictures…

In the end I was happy when the public wellness massage was over…

Today we went to the Panda Research Base in Chengdu. In order to get there we had to take a bus from Chengdu Centre for about 30 minutes.

Once we arrived for a log time we saw no life Giant Panda but pictures instead: Pictures of Panda Babies and Panda Mothers, of newborn Pandas and old Pandas. Every picture came with some facts written in Chinese and English, some facts about the Giant Panda whose natural habitat is around Chengdu in Sichuan, were even written in Japanese.

Then we came in a room with some video installations and some signs telling about the history of the Panda Research Base in Chengdu. It was founded in 1987. But since I was there with Xiaoping, his wife, her parents and aunt and his daughter we were hurrying along and I had no opportunity to read the rest of the story.

Giant Panda Feeding lazylz on Bamboo

Then we finally saw the first real life Panda. It was lazily feeding on Bamboo. But no matter what a Panda does somehow it is always sweet. Here I was also taught what to call a Panda in Chinese: “Chengma” and to make it sweet for the little daughter of Xiaobing we called Chengma Mi Miiiii….

Then we wandered on. The next life we saw some goldfish. Wherever in China there are Goldfish in a lake or pond you can see people see feeding them. Feeding Goldfish seems to be as irresistible to the Chinese like feeding ducks to us.

We came onto some bamboo woods and for me the Panda Research Base was the first time I wandered through a free land bamboo wood. One time I sneaked of the main path to stand between and under the bamboo. It was almost dark between the bamboo stalks and I could here strange sounds, maybe made by insects.

Sichuan has also very big butterflies. They are so big I thought at first that they are small birds. I also saw many other strange insects in the Panda Research Base.

Then we found some more Pandas, I believe they where the young adult Pandas. Berlin used to have one Panda and now has two. But I have never ever seen the Berlin Pandas do anything but eat and sleep, eat and sleep. Maybe these Pandas in Chengdu were more agile since they were young.

The two young Pandas where playing with each other, climbing up and down the Panda Playground, yes these Panda bears were even running. I did not know that a Panda can climb and run and all…

Unfortunately it began to rain now. So we stayed under a tree. The Chengdu family I was in the Panda Research Base with probably assumed it would be a short rain. But rain kept falling and so we covered our heads with plastic bags. Xiaoming even took his whole shirt of to cover his little baby daughter. Chinese men are so caring with there children like I have never seen in Germans.

So anyway we ran for shelter into a nice restaurant. After we had eaten we headed home.

Crossing a Street during Rush-Hour in China

Crossing a street as a pedestrian in China is not easy for a German. We Germans are pretty used to everything being in order. In Germany cars stop at red traffic-lights and a green walking light means that you really have the first right to go. Not so in China’s Traffic. That you as a pedestrian have a green traffic-light in China does not mean much.

Zebra crossings seem to have no meaning at all. Neither at a zebra crossing nor at a green pedestrian light a car will stop to let you pass.

The traffic police standing with a flag and a whistle at every important crossing in Beijing whistles and shakes its flag – I could detect no influence a present traffic policeman had on the traffic in China.

When you are in the middle of the street and a car is coming you can either boldly jump in front of that car with a stopping hand movement or you decide to stay where you are. In the later case you will be caught in the middle of a Chinese street with cars coming from all sides. This is not a nice feeling.

When I finally thought I got the hang of crossing streets today this situation happened that proved me once more that I as a German women am simply not prepared for Beijing’s Traffic:

I wanted to cross the street standing behind a parking car. Looking for traffics coming from whatever direction I did not watch for the parking car and he just drove backwards and bumped into me.

I slapped on the car real hart so he knows I am there. I was not hurt but in total shock standing on the street crying. And he just drove away. This behaviour I have been told about and could never believe. But it seems to be common in China. You are trying not to get noticed for any price. And no one wants to be the one who hit an Olympic Visitor with his car of course.

I was in complete shock and just sad down at the edge of the street crying and crying. After only a few minutes or so a very nice Chinese man with surprisingly good English came towards me and asked me what the matter was.

First thing was of course he wanted to call an ambulance. But I refused. Then he wanted to bring me to a coffee. I had just been on my way to a bank. And it was short before 6pm. So he led me to a bank in order to have me my money exchanged.

Then – I was still in shock – he brought me to a coffee and bought me a drink. We had some most interesting conversations.

And even though the moon festival had not begun yet he let me try the first mooncake of my life.

Then he brought me to a nice restaurant, helped me order something and had a quick drink. While I was eating he ran to the pharmacy for me where I had tried to buy medicine for my inflamed toe without success.

I feared that he would also want to pay for my food (it is very hard to obtain the right to pay the bill in china) I paid while he was gone. Earlier we had discussed about that Europeans are in China often allowed to go against certain rules. For example because the Chinese fear the language problems etc.

So I told him, “I can just leave the restaurant without paying” and walked away. Of course he tried to go and pay then and we had a big laugh when the food was already paid for by me.

He did not leave me until he was sure I knew the way home. As merciless and uncaring Chinese can sometimes seem in certain situations like the traffic or rushing to get a taxi as nice they are when you meet a Chinese face to face.