Outings (7-7)

I’ve had some enjoyable outings lately. Two weeks ago I went to the 4^th International Festival of Intangible Cultural Heritage. I’d seen the Center for Intangible Cultural Heritage when riding the bus to Chengdu, wondered what was there, and thought I’d have to stop to see it one day. Then Roger, a student who comes to English Corner,  mentioned that he and his friends had gone to the festival; so I decided that that would be a good time to visit. And it was. I went on Tuesday, since I don’t have classes then and I thought it would be less crowded than on the weekend.

I arrived when the international dancers were performing. I always enjoy those. When I saw that they only have two performances a day, I felt lucky to have arrived soon after they started. Since it was not crowded, I was able to stand in the front row. 

After the  dances, I walked through the exhibit of intangible cultures around the world as well as in China. Then I walked through the shops, which I learned are open all the time, not just for the festival. This is good information, since they have some nice items. In another building there were special exhibits of crafts from around the country. Several artists were demonstrating their talents. (Photo: painting inside a bottle)

By the time I finished, it was almost time for the next dance performance; so I stayed for that. That set featured several Chinese groups.

Since I hadn’t seen the calligraphy exhibit I’d seen advertised, I returned to the festival on the following Sunday. Katy joined me, and we had a great time looking at the art work and some of the exhibits. The exhibit was Brush and Ink: An Exhibit of Chinese Calligraphy. Some of the art was calligraphy; 

some was modern art painted with calligraphy brushes. The latter didn’t look like it had meaning, but maybe it did. The festival was rather crowded, since it was a weekend and it was also the last day of the festival. So we didn’t do much shopping because it was difficult to walk through the area. 

We did stop at the food court area where I had barbecued squid. It was very tasty.

Last Saturday, Megan and I went to Floraland, a local theme park. Several students had written about it in an early assignment to describe a place and Meghan had told us about it; so I knew a little about it. It was fun to see it. We had a great day, as it was overcast and not hot. The entrance ticket includes 36 rides/shows. We went on four rides and saw the seal show. The rides are mostly in one section. The roller coasters and a few other rides weren’t working when we passed them, and a number of the rides are for children. 

The rides were fun but weren’t anything really fantastic.

The rest of the park is areas named and themed for different countries—Italy, Germany, France, Belguim, and China. The U.S. market was near the entrance and didn’t have much. Spain was a little strange, as it had a polar bear outside a building. But the other areas were very well done. Walking into Germany was like being in an old German town. 

Italy featured gardens and a plaza. We had pizza there. I asked for one with vegetables; the woman pointed to one in Chinese and we said OK. It was a fruit pizza with pineapple and a white fruit. At least it had cheese. It wasn’t bad but it wasn’t what we were anticipating. A final area is the Wetlands, which has figures of various animals. Most of these areas were for shopping and have stores with a variety of items. The Chinese pavilion featured shops and cafes. We had a great time walking around and taking photos of everything. And doing a little shopping.

When we left, we crossed the street to have a look at the Floraland Mall. It’s a work in progress, as most of the shops are not yet open and the indoor mall is still being constructed. The ones that are open are very upscale—expensive. The outside mall looks like something from Scottsdale, AZ. At the end of the outside mall is the water park, which we did not go to.

So it was a great day. Then we had to wait 50 minutes for a bus back to campus. When one came, we made sure that we got on it. And we were lucky enough to get seats.

Then on Sunday, Katy, Megan, and I went to Chengdu to go to the sports store, as Megan wanted a swimming suit. Our first stop was a shopping mall. Since it was raining heavily and everyone had very wet umbrellas, when we entered the mall, a woman was handing out plastic bags for the wet umbrellas. After a little shopping, we went to Starbucks. Megan was especially happy about that because it would be her last Starbucks for a long time, as they haven’t gone to South Africa yet. Next we went to Subway because Katy wanted a Western sandwich. I have to admit, the veggie sub was delicious. We each bought a foot-long one and took half home for dinner. Then we went to the sports store, which was very nice and has reasonable prices. I ended out being the big spender, purchasing shorts, a swimming suit, sandals, secret socks (foot covers that are hidden in the shoe), a shirt, and a small backpack. Katy and Megan also bought a few item each. So it was a successful and fun day.

When we used a restroom in a restaurant, there was a woman holding her baby above the sink so he could pee into the sink. I’d not seen that before. Katy had mentioned having seen a sign above a sink in a restroom that said “No peeing in the sink.” Now we know why such a sign was posted. Another restroom we used had my first automatically flushing squat toilets.

Wednesday evening we played badminton with Peggie again and had a great time again. She didn’t play much; so I think she went mostly for us although she seemed excited to go.

Friday we all went shopping in Wenjiang. Katy and Megan wanted to look for last-minute purchases to take home. Both bought several items. I didn’t purchase anything that day, but it was fun helping them shop and hanging out together. It was really hot that day; so Katy and I went to the pool when we returned. The water felt good, and it was good to be in it. I’m not much of a swimmer, but it felt good to do a few laps across the Olympic-sized pool. It’s open to the public; so it may be open all summer, which will be nice. I’ll go again.

  

Saturday we went into Chengdu to meet Sabrina, a teacher in Megan’s teachers’ class. The class had given Megan a tea set as their gift, and Sabrina had offered to take her to a tea house for tea tasting. She graciously included Katy and me in the invitation. We took the bus to the Wenjiang bus station and then the bus to Chengdu that stops at the metro. It was a really smooth trip. We didn’t even have to change metro lines.

Sabrina took us to a wonderful tea house near her home. It is beautifully decorated. A young woman prepared the tea. She shook it in a covered cup so that we could smell it. Then she added water to wash the tea. That water was poured into the teapot and then into the small cups to wash them. The first tea is poured out and is not drunk. Then she prepared another pot for us to drink. The tea was a mild green tea. We sat on our sofas and chatted and enjoyed the tea and relaxing music for over an hour. 

We learned that people can have a tea pet, an animal figure that they write their name on and leave at the tea house.

Next Sabrina took us to lunch at a local restaurant known for its delicious local food. It is in a lovely building that was formerly a house. We were fortunate to get a table immediately, since a group had just left. 

Sabrina ordered seven special dishes for us: beef mashed with rice, two types of twice cooked pork, pork/bacon slabs with bean paste between them layered on sweet sticky rice, potatoes and beans, a pot of bean and tofu soup-like mixture, soup, flavored rice. Although I don’t eat the meat, I had a small taste of each because she had selected these special foods for us to taste. The meal was wonderful and was enjoyed by all. Of course, we were not allowed to help pay for anything.

After lunch, we parted from Sabrina and went to Chunxi Road to see if we could find two more items Katy and Megan were looking for. No luck there, as the shops are more expensive and not in our taste. The area was crowded with people. It’s not a place I’ll need to return to. A highlight of our time there was a tea and snack store where Megan bought some tea and looked at some snacks. The saleswoman used her translation app to communicate with her, saying things like “This is peanut candy. It is sweet.” People are good about trying to help, and I’ve often had that type of experience.

Monday I leave for the Peace Corps Summer Project. When I return, both Katy and Megan will have left. I’ll miss the two of them, as both have been good friends. And it’s been nice to have Megan as an older (about 40) friend. We’ll see who comes next term, but I’ll be very surprised if anyone is over 30.

Summer Project is teachers’ training sponsored by Peace Corps. Participating is required for all those completing their first year, and we PCResponse volunteers are also required to participate. I’ll be joining the group in Luzhou. People at the school live in Chengdu and don’t know anything about getting places from Wenjiang and always say you have to go places from Chengdu. Yang had gotten bus directions for me, but the woman coordinating suggested that, if there is a bus station here, I can probably go from there. So, when we were at the station on the way to Chengdu, I asked about a bus to Luzhou and learned that there is one in the morning and one in the afternoon. That won’t save time getting to Luzhou, but it will get me on a bus that goes there an hour earlier than if I’d gone to Chengdu and I won’t have to change buses. So I was happy to learn about that. I'm kind of excited to do this, as I've enjoyed teacher training and it will be nice to meet some other volunteers and work with them. 

End of the Semester (6-28)

My first semester is officially over. Final exams for foreign teachers were in the last two weeks. Because oral exams take too much time for one class, we did half of the students each week. Katy’s written exams for her oral English classes are in the next two weeks, which are the official exam weeks. My work is finished except a brief report about the final exams—how many students received each grade and students’ strengths and weaknesses on the final exams.

Having completed the semester, I’m finding that I’m glad I’ll be staying another year. I feel like I’ll know much more about teaching here and will be a stronger teacher. One of the business English students told me that they had a meeting at which they talked about their teachers and students agreed that I am strict but think I am a good teacher.

After his exam, one boy took the opportunity to tell me how much he had learned from my class and thanked me. That was especially nice since he was not a student I’d had any special interactions with and he is a good student who had good skills to begin with. Another example of how you never know how you are affecting students and of teaching something you don’t know you are teaching. One of the girls started to leave and then returned to whisper “I love you” into my ear, which was very sweet.

Last week Paris, Ricci, and Cancer took Katy and me out for dinner since Katy is leaving. It was nice of them to include me. Paris had researched what kinds of food Americans eat and informed us that we eat a lot of meat, bread, and sweets. She had also researched to find a hot pot restaurant that has a not-spicy option. Diao Min said that all hot pot restaurants have that, but I guess Paris had never needed a not-spicy option before and wasn’t aware of that. Anyway, it was sweet of her to go to so much work to prepare for a nice dinner for us. 

The large hot pot with spicy broth had a smaller one without chili in the middle. They ordered a lot of meat, including shrimp and artificial crab for me, vegetables, and tofu. One special dish was pig’s brain. Katy had a very small sample and said it was OK. The girls enjoyed it. Everything was delicious. They ordered too much food, but it couldn’t be returned; so we had to eat it. We were there for an hour and a half. The nice thing about hot pot is that you can take what you want from the pot and don’t have to have everything.

In the conversation, I learned that both Paris and Ricci want to be teachers even though they are business English majors. They wanted to change their major but were told they can’t. When they finish their three years here (next year), they will go to another university for two years to get their bachelor’s degree in education.

Before eating, we all made toasts. They started by each toasting Katy and me. Then we toasted them. It was sweet. The whole evening was very pleasant.

Katy and I also had dinner with Diao Min after my final lesson for the semester on Thursday. We went to one of her favorite restaurants and had their special fried sweet-sour eggplant, tofu, and a chicken and corn dish. Now I know where that restaurant is and how to order the eggplant. I can probably manage to order the chicken and corn, too.

The other event last week was our party with the teachers’ classes. The original plan was for it to be in a large lecture hall and the teachers would provide food. But the day before the party, the Foreign Affairs Office decided to organize it (which was our original suggestion). The room was changed to a banquet hall, and they provided lots of fruit and some individually wrapped cakes. The dean and the university president came and spoke. Then certificates were given to the teachers who completed the course. Of course, many photos were taken. 

Each of us was given a nice gift by the class. Mine is a pair of pandas painted on leaves. They are quite lovely. Megan was given a tea set. And Katy received a double-sided embroidery. Meghan’s teachers couldn’t agree on what to give her; so she’s waiting for her gift. (They later gave her a hair comb, since she has long hair and had suggested that as a gift.)  My teachers stayed and chatted for a long time. Katy waited for me, and when we left, we were given all of the left-over fruit and cakes. There was so much that we gave some to Megan and Meghan.

Weather has been odd—very changeable. One day each week it was 37^o (98^o F). Two weeks ago that day was followed by thunderstorms for much of the night. I’ve not heard so much thunder at one time (at least not that I remember). Several girls told me how scared they were and that they and a friend had shared a bed for comfort during the storm. Last week the hot day was followed by a drop in temperature and rain. Both were followed by several cooler days before it got hot again.

They have been doing construction in our building, something to do with the electric line. What it means is that they have been drilling holes in the concrete walls. It’s very irritatingly noisy. Sometimes it has gone on for hours—sometimes from 8:00 to 6:30 or so. There’s also a lot of hammering. We had two new holes drilled in our walls; there’s another hole that Katy said appeared in February. We’re still waiting to see what they are for. The drilling and hammering have mostly stopped now, which is a good thing. The first day there was no hammering seemed eerily quiet. But is nice not to have the constant noise.

Summer solstice has come and gone. It gets dark at 8:30. I don’t know when it first gets light in the morning.

Qingcheng Mountain (6-16)

Saturday and Sunday Megan and I went to Qingcheng Mountain, which is about an hour from Wenjiang. We had planned to take a bus from Chengdu. Then we decided to take the train from Chengdu. We also decided to take the more expensive bus from the Wenjiang bus station instead of the city bus because it goes to a station near the train station. Then we decided to ask at the bus station if there was a bus directly to Dujiangyan, the city near the mountain where we would spend the night. We were very happy to learn that there is a direct bus. That saved us 2+ hours, since we didn’t have to go to Chengdu and then retrace some of the route. It also saved us money. So this was a great start to our adventure.

The hotel we stayed at does not have an English name; so I correctly figured that there wouldn’t be much English spoken there. Our original choice listed on c-trip does not have a license for foreigners. When I made the reservation, a woman called with this information and found a hotel for the same price. I had the name and address printed in Chinese for the taxi driver. This was also handy when we were checking in to confirm that it was the correct hotel. The receptionist wanted to charge us 100 yuan more for a room with a queen-sized bed than the price I was given. So I called c-trip and spoke to a woman who speaks excellent English. She talked with the receptionist and resolved the problem; she didn’t know about the online promotion. This was the second time I’ve used c-trip, and both times they were very good about resolving problems. But the receptionist still wanted 80 more yuan. A young woman we had chatted with briefly when we arrive had returned and explained that the extra money was the deposit. So all was fine.

The young woman had returned to invite us to go to the mountain with her and her boyfriend in their car. Of course, we took them up of the offer. Thus we met Karen/Gan and Zhu, with whom we spent the whole day. She is 25 and is just finishing her master’s degree in international business and will graduate at the end of the month. She has a job with an international company based in Wenjiang. He is 32 and works, but I didn’t learn what he does. The two of them have been dating for only half a month but seem to get along very well. They are both very nice and treated us extremely well.

Qingcheng Mountain is one of the major sacred Taoist mountains in China. It is said to be the birthplace of Taoism and has many Taoist temples on the front side. The oldest were first built in the 7^th century. An interesting factoid I learned from one Internet site is that the mountain is the one Kung Fu Panda went to in KFP2. It is 1260 meters/4134 feet high and has 36 peaks. This means that you walk up and down and around the various peaks on the way to the top.

Megan and I had planned to take the cable car up the front side of the mountain, our destination of the day, and then walk down. However, Karen and Zhu planned to walk both ways; so walking is what we did. The path is lined with trees, and the mountain is known for its gingko trees. 

There were thousands of steps up the mountain. Most were stone, and some were uneven and different widths; so climbing up the steps was not easy. Some sections were very steep. I missed the bamboo walking stick I had on Emeishan.

We walked for two hours and then stopped for lunch. On the way up, Zhu bought us each a fan because we were sweating. Later he bought us a cucumber. (They are snacks here.) He also bought lunch for everyone. Megan and I enjoyed having someone who could order food, as we ate better than if we had done it ourselves with our very limited Chinese.

At the temple where we had lunch there is a 2000-year-old gingko tree. 

After lunch, we headed up the mountain for two more hours. 

Then we finally reached the top. It was an overcast day, so we didn’t have stunning views. That seems to be my fate so far when I’ve been on the top of a mountain here.

Megan and I had decided that we would take the cable car down and pay for Karen and Zhu, as we were both tired and hot. We could have walked down if we’d had to, but it would not have been enjoyable after the rigorous trek up the mountain; so the riding option was much more appealing. Zhu and Karen drove us back to the hotel and then returned to Chengdu.

We decided to eat dinner before going to our room. A woman I asked about a restaurant pointed across the street. There was a whole street of small cafes. A group of people were eating in one; so we went to look to see if they had anything we might want. They were delighted to have us look and kept pointing to some of their dishes. Along with several meat dishes, they had a soybean dish and an eggplant dish that we ordered. I’d never had a meal of cooked soybeans. It had a little too much pork sauce for me, but the beans out of the sauce were good.

When we got to the hotel, the electricity was off in the area. But the mall across the street must have a great generator because their music was playing loudly and women were doing their aerobic dancing outside the mall. The electricity came on again after an hour and a half.

Sunday morning we checked Megan’s bag at the bus station and headed to the back side of the mountain. Megan’s friend had said to line up for the gold bus, but we didn’t see any and didn’t see any signs. So we asked. The first man pointed. Then we went to the information desk, and the woman pointed to the ticket-purchasing area. Shortly after we got in line, a man ran over to us and asked where we wanted to go. We pointed to the map on the wall where it said “back side of Qingcheng.” He took us out of line and up to the window and said “money.” I gave him the money, and he purchased our tickets and took us to wait for the bus. When it arrived, he took us over to it. We felt fortunate to have such good assistance.

We had read that the back side isn’t as crowded as the front side, that the path isn’t as rigorous a walk, and that the path goes along a stream with lots of waterfalls. I think it’s been discovered, as there were about as many people as we encountered on the front side and the path along the stream was packed with a steady stream of people. Qingcheng is an hour outside Chengdu and is the closest natural environment to the city. So many people seem to have driven out for the day. As for being an easier path, it was for the first hour along the stream, which makes it cooler. 

But then it ascended up the mountain steeply. However, the path is paved and the steps are even and are paved steps, not uneven stones. Since our calves were tight from the walk on Saturday, the uphill climb was difficult. It was farther and took more time than we had realized. 

After walking two and a half hours, we reached the cable car down. Since we needed to pick up Megan’s bag before 5:00, we were on a time crunch; so we asked how much farther it is to the top of the mountain and were told that it would take another hour or two. 

And since we were tired and the day was overcast—so no stunning views from the top, we decided to call it a day and take the cable car down. But first we had an ice cream and relaxed in a soft chair for a bit. 

On the ride down, it was fun to look down and see the stream and path we had walked along on the way up. 

At the bottom of the back side there is an ancient town. It’s mostly shops selling souvenirs. 

Many shops sell the meat that Karen had said is a specialty of Qingcheng. It’s pork that is smoked or something and is similar to bacon when served.

Back in Dujiangyan, we purchased our ticket home. There was a line to Wenjiang; so it was about 40 minutes till we got on a bus. We were glad to have a seat on a bus returning directly to Wenjiang, not to Chengdu. After arriving, we crossed the street and hopped on a bus that would bring us back to the school. Unfortunately, it broke down, but it was close to the school and we knew where we were. We took a taxi the rest of the way.

All in all, it was a good weekend. But we agreed that doing both the front and back in the same weekend was too much. Perhaps if we’d taken the cable car up the front, as planned, we would not have been so tired and had aching calves on Sunday. I think it would be nice to return in the fall when the leaves are changing. So I may get there again now that I know how to do it.