Finally China

Well, its been a long time since my last entry, but you can blame China. I was completely blocked from facebook and my blog site. I am safely home now and my last two weeks were spent in China. I started in Chengdu, then Xi'an, and then Beijing. China was a breath of fresh air after India and Nepal....not that the air is clean, but its just more modern and clean.....at least the big cities I was in. I met a wonderful british couple that I spent the entire two weeks with and it was so much better than travelling alone, which can be quite trying. Getting to China was quite a journey from Kathmandu. If you ever have to go to the Kathmandu airport and you get scared because you feel like the driver is taking you somewhere to kill you, don't worry.....to get to the airport you are going through small neighborhood streets, and it seems such an unlikely place for an airport to pop up, but eventually it does. Small and unorganized though it is. I delayed my plane leaving because I didn't hear the guy announce my flight boarding....one person in a crowd of hundreds without any speaker calling the "air china" flight, how can I be blamed? Well, I made it and was happy to arrive in China.

Our first order of business in Chengdu was to see the "Grand Buddha." It was a long journey. First we had to take a city bus to the long distance bus station, then we got off at the wrong stop and it took a while to find the station, then we had to buy tickets (difficult when you don't speak the language), then we got on the minibus for two hours and fortunately it took us directly to the grand buddha. It was really a great statue! Right next to the water and carved into the mountain.

So to get back to the city we had to get on another city bus to take us to another station (we had no idea where to get off the bus). We had to make some friends on the bus to help us, and when we got off at the station we had just a few minutes to catch the next bus and our new friends helped us to buy tickets. It was really nice to have help! Chinese buses are so nice and orderly compared to India and Nepal. And clean too!

Second order of business....Pandas! Chengdu has one of the worlds largest panda research/breeding facilities....its NOT a zoo so I didn't feel bad about going. I wasn't allowed to take pictures but we DID get to see two babies. They looked to be about 15 - 20 lbs each and were sleeping....so cute though!

Big panda yawn! Look at those chompers! According to a film we watched, panda's were at one time carnivores and slowly evolved to be lazy bamboo eaters!

This is the red panda.

This was one of the best chinese meals we had! It was at a vegetarian restaurant and we had noodles, some spicy soup, fake sausage (it had me asking if there was REALLY no meat in it), some really strange hot bean drink, a not so delicious rice dessert, and some lovely spring rolls. YUMMY! All this for only about $10

This is chinese Jasmine tea. We were at the peoples park, and since Chengdu is famous for its tea houses, we decided to try it out. I do not like green tea, I do not like Jasmine tea, I do not like it in a park, I do not like it on a bus, I do not like it on the sea.......I DO NOT LIKE CHINESE TEA! From Chengdu we took an overnight train to Xi'an. Once again, we had to make friends to tell us when to get off the train.....always an obstacle when travelling. For those who don't know, Xi'an is home to the Terracotta Army! This is a street that was near our hostel. Very cool architecture.

The city is surrounded by this big wall and this is the south gate.

These are fun little street treats. I don't know exactly what they are, but I think they are like a little cran-apple or something. THey are candied so the outside is very sweet, but the fruit inside is quite tart and bitter with tons of little annoying seeds.

This is the bell tower in the center of town at night.

Terracotta army. Some are really perfectly preserved and others were piles of rubble and some looked like they had been pieced together. How tedious! It was just massive! This is one of three buildings, but the largest one. I just can't imagine finding all this under the dirt! It was really beautiful and I'm really glad I got to see it!

One of my admirers. Its funny how many people want to take their picture with you. I can't figure it out. It gets really annoying, but the best thing to do is just laugh and go with the flow.

I thought this was a really hilarious piece of art. Don't get me wrong, it was pretty cool, but it made me giggle on the inside.

Me and Sarah ordered latte's and got a fun little surprise! The bunny actually made it taste better!

This is the monument to the "people's hero's" at Tianmen square. Its cool to walk around the enormous square and think of the history that happened there. From the north end you can see the gat to the forbidden city.

Cute little guy running around in this awesome outfit. Forbidden city from Tianmen square. Forbidden city.

By the end of my solo trip I have perfected the art of self photo's and actually turn down peoples offers to take pictures of me. This is much funner.

Inside the forbidden city. It wasn't quite as magical as it was the first time I went, but it still is an amazing place to visit!

This is Suzhou street at the Summer Palace in Beijing. This is easily one of my favorite places in China. The first time I went here was in 2005 on my first trip to China and I remember being in love with it! Its like the chinese fairy tale come true! Its such a peaceful, quaint little place!

Another one of my successful self portraits. These are my friends Sarah and her husband Toby. They made my time in China soooooooo much fun!

Temple at Summer Palace.

Ahhh, my last breakfast with Toby and Sarah, and my last day in Beijing! I had an amazing adventure and a lot of good times and some bad times as well, but thats what makes travelling such a potent experience! I met so many wonderful people, and experienced SO many things. Travelling always reminds you of how much you appreciate home. Its so nice to come home after a long journey and it makes you appreciate all the things that normally annoy you, like doing laundry, running errands, etc.