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Friday, December 29, 2006

Here are some thoughts on china!me and michelle spent lunch swapping stories on my china & her korea trip, which got me feeling abit obligated to myself to pen down some stuff on my trip, so I'll at least remember most of the little details when I think back on it next time:) this is a summarised version though, to spare you the boredom of reading through it all.

ehh..where to start. memorable places in yun-nan were the gorge, and the stone forest, which was really cool if you think about how it was formed:) it's literally a forest of huge stones formed over millions of years cos of some special minerals in the rock:)




then we lucked out cos we got to see the very first day of snow:)


everything was very pretty:) trees were half-covered in snow and there was a misty magical feel in the air:) amazing how plain water can look so beautiful in different forms.


oh by the way, the adorable little pup in the background was one of many roaming the streets..there were so many cute little stray puppies there! I felt so sad when this one pawed at my feet and we had to hurry on our way..weird thing is, there are many many pups..but so few big dogs..chris's theory is that they don't get the chance to be big dogs cos they're chopped up for meat before they even get the chance to grow up :( my sister did warn me to ask for sure what meat I was eating before I put anything in my mouth :(

ok speaking of food..this simple-looking dish is called 'guo qiao mian xian'..which literally means 'crossing bridge noodles' I suppose.


haha in my opinion the chinese just have this habit of dressing up simple things with fancy names..what with buddha jumps over the wall and other weird names. let me tell you the story of the crossing bridge noodles. apparantly a long time ago there was this man who had to eat cold noodles everyday for lunch cos the winter days were so cold that by the time his wife brought over his lunch from home it was icy cold. then one day his wife accidentally poured in too much oil into his noodles and he realised that by lunch it was still warm cos the oil had insulated it from the cold or something. then they experimented dropping in raw pieces of meat and realised that the soup under the oil layer was even hot enough to cook the meat. so basically the trademark of the noodles is cooking the raw meat under the layer of oil. oh and it's called 'crossing bridge noodles' cos his wife had to bring him his lunch over a bridge. I don't know how much of this is true..ohwell but the noodles were nice:)

anyway my point is..china is full of silly but interesting little stories like these:) then there are the heavier and more historically interesting bits like how this temple came about and how people are still living on the streets in the same way as they were a hundred years ago..sorry but I can't describe it nicely enough in words:) think it's the sort of thing you have to see in person to appreciate:) so that was just a few elements of yun-nan. lots more I learnt but then I don't want to bore everyone:) thanks for reading though if you made it up to here:)

back to the now! like I mentioned, been spending this week thus far having post-christmas celebrations and meet-ups and lunches..spent a lovely today with ruth and michelle:)


only annoying thing was the weather which makes it really depressing to be out on the streets..but christmas lights always make it better for me:) sigh. feel better soon ruth!
~me~ at 2:27 AM