random pix: depressed fox, terrific cops & slomed salads

Why is this children's character about to hang himself?!

Songyuan traffic police are terrific!

If this doesn't help explain plumbing in Beijing, nothing will.

leg #2: travel China, Shanghai (again)

After Beijing, we returned to Shanghai for about a day. We hit the Pearl Market again and went to a British bar for drinks, where we met a man that may have made my trip. He used to book bands, so he filled us in on where the good live music venues were in Shanghai.

My friend and I used to live together in the States, and at one point we were going to see almost a show a week. I absolutely love live music, and I haven't seen any since the day before I left for China. We went to the club that night and saw some great musicians, it was the perfect end to our trip.

Ben Houge

Daniel Hart

At the shows we go to in the States, the universe seems to have some unspoken rule, that there will be some Asian guy (likely the only one at the show) that will try to attach himself to me for the entirety of it. When Ben Houge was on, he said something that prompted me to yell, "You sound like you're from Wisconsin!" at him... and then it happened there too. This guy that was also apparently from Wisconsin, but working in Shanghai and of Chinese heritage, used that as his opening and hung out by us until we left. It cracked us up.

leg #2: travel China, Beijing

After Haikou, we flew up north to Beijing to see the Great Wall. I hadn't seen it yet, after nearly seven months in China, so I was definitely due, and it was on my friend's "must" list.

There are a few different places near Beijing to see the Wall. We didn't really care where we went as long as we saw the thing, so we just asked the front desk at our hotel if we should go in a tour group or just go by ourselves. They didn't speak great English, but they gave us directions by city bus (only one transfer!) and told us it would take an hour. And then they wished us good luck. Never a good sign...

We actually made it there without any problems, though it took two hours instead of one. We ended up at Badaling and actually passed two other spots to get on the Wall on the way. We were talking to ourselves/the driver the whole time saying, "Sir? Um, sir? I think you missed our destination... sir?" I actually would have rather stopped at one of the other places, as they were significantly less crowded, but Badaling had both newly restored Wall and old, decrepit, no-tourists-allowed-Wall, so that was cool to see.

Soooo many people. And it was a Tuesday.

Someone should tell them that this probably makes most Americans WANT to commit a nuisance.

Like so many other things that are really hyped up, it was cool, but still just a wall. Probably don't need to ever see it again. It was a really good hike though. The inclines and steps and whatnot were ridiculous. I managed in flip flops, but sneakers would have been the smarter plan.

Doesn't this look a bit like a roller coaster just before a drop?

Aside from the Wall, we hit 798 (we stayed at the art hotel down the street that I always stay at) and that was our two days in Beijing!

So, bathroom space isn't the hotel's selling point...

random pix: tighty whities, carmel corn & fduck

Why are people's faces blurred out in this restaurant ad like the perps on COPS?

I'm so glad my friend got to see this. This is in front of the McDonald's and the grocery store in Haikou. I put it about on par with adults going to the bathroom on the sidewalk in the middle of the day.

So gross. So, so gross.

Ever heard the expression "fuck a duck"? I wonder if it's related to this brand...

As an American, I am confused.

leg #2: travel China, Haikou

Our first day at the resort in Haikou it rained, again, so we were basically stuck indoors. We determined, after a thorough investigation of the resort, that we were two of maybe ten guests. We later found out that the whole place was basically just dead during the week; on the weekend there were a lot more people around, mostly Chinese, and more services/amenities were available. We preferred the dead times.

No one that worked there really spoke English, there was one concierge (Bruce), one front desk agent (Linda) and two servers (Doris and Jack) in the whole place with a basic grasp of the language. Jack cracked us up, the first time we met him, he said, "Hey!" as a greeting. It took a second to register that he had spoken English and said something really informal; when it dawned on us, we looked at each other and started laughing. Whomever had taught Jack English only taught him really casual language, so everything he said was completely inappropriate for a staff member at a five star resort, but really fun for us.

The place was pretty nice though, it had a private beach, hot springs and a huge spa, including pools with the fish that eat the dead skin off your body. I did the fish thing in Cambodia, but you can only do your feet there, not your whole body (which was very cool as long as there wasn't really anyone else in that pool).

These were some of the hot springs. I was a bit disappointed, I was expecting something natural looking, like pools carved into the rocks where the water came from. Not so much here though. The pools were all like regular pools, tiled and whatnot, with the hot spring water piped in; they just looked dirtier then regular pools.

The trappings of a great day: beach, beer and treasure.

We signed up for a three day spa package at the resort. We never did figure out if they thought we were dating or what, but they turned our package into a couples' thing, so all of our services were tandem, same room, same time. It was very romantic, lol.

The spa gave us these sweet, silk pjs to wear. That were huge. So we added pillows and wandered around sumo wrestling in them. The beauty of having a resort to yourself.

We mocked this card in our room for the disposable underwear, but we actually ended up wearing some after each spa service. They were ridiculous.

And yeah, these were in our room too. I think there miiiight be a typo.

We hired a driver for the day one day and checked out some local attractions. The hotel had a big list of things to see and do nearby, so we hit a volcanic geopark, a temple and an old shopping street. A lot of the other stuff on the list was way to expensive for what it was. Hainan is basically just known for its beaches and the hot springs.

Our driver that day was AWESOME. He didn't really speak English, but between his English and my Chinese we were fine.

Fist pumping to Chinese techno, ha!

view from on top of a volcano

inside the volcano

This is our driver riding a giant penis. WHY is there a giant penis at the geopark where many tourist go with their families? Who knows, it's China.

leg #2: travel China, intro to Haikou

When we got to Haikou, my friend was already kind of done. On top of the obvious and expected culture shock, we'd had a lot of people try to rip us off or screw us over, and then there was me and my general hot mess self at the time... altogether, the combination was no bueno.

We arrived, took a taxi to our hostel to settle in and hit the beach and then it started pouring. And the hostel was kind of depressing. And in an area of town with nothing to do. And staff that didn't really speak English. Blah.

So we wandered down the street, found ourselves some food and then went back to our room and said, "Screw it, this is miserable, especially for the beach portion of our trip, we're booking a resort." We found a reasonably priced five star resort (Chinese five star, mind you) and booked it for the remainder of our time in Haikou, so we'd only have one depressing hostel night. And thus my backpaker traveling mindset perished.

That done, we wandered the other way down the street to see what else was there was to see. Whilest traipsing around, I had to pee (I have to pee about every 15-30 minutes, it's ridiculous) so we decided we to sit, have some beers and people watch in a place with a bathroom.

As I said, there wasn't a whole lot around, but we walked up to what looked to be a restaurant not yet open for dinner. There was a table of people sitting there having a small meeting of sorts, so I asked if they had beer. One of the guys laughed and said yes. Another guy came out of the back and I ordered us two beers. Which we proceeded to sit there and drink.

After a while, we noticed that literally every single person that had been there was gone. The table of people had left, as had the few stragglers in the back. We were literally alone, in what was seeming less and less like a restaurant, drinking beers no one had ever asked us to pay for. It was just bizarre and funny. One of the guys eventually came back so we gave him some money, but I don't think it was a restaurant and I don't think they'd have been mad if we hadn't paid at all.

Eventually we went and had dinner as well. I ordered everything in Chinese and the proprietor was the sweetest and most accommodating guy. I was really happy that my friend was finally starting to get to see the things I love about the Chinese, not just the people that want to take advantage of a white face.

It got even better when we went to a produce market afterwards and were asking one of the vendors how to eat some fruits we'd never seen and he showed us how to eat them, gave us some and wouldn't let us pay. Plus, he had kittens for us to play with, which pretty much always ensures a good time when you're easily amused.

This, ladies and gentleman, is what mangosteen looks like. I see these all over the place but never knew what they were and I'd heard of mangosteen but didn't know what it looked like.

The texture of the skin was almost similar to corrugated cardboard, it was strange. The white insides were soft and in segments, like a citrus fruit.

This was the color of honeydew and tasted like it might be in the same family. The skin was much thinner though.

Because PBR really needed to get any lighter.

When we got back to our hostel, there were a bunch of Chinese sitting outside eating cake. Turned out it was the owner's son's birthday, so they invited/forced us to have some cake with them, take some pictures and listen to them playing guitar. They didn't really speak English, but they were nice enough. And there was cake.

Nooooot sure why they locked us in the hostel with a bike lock, but it took us a decently long amount of time to track down anyone that worked there to let us out the first morning.

random pix: camouflage, fortune telling & Obama in Shanghai

Why do all their clothes blend in to the walls?

You put a one kwai coin into this thing, choose your zodiac sign and it spits you out a Chinese fortune pellet. What this has to do with QQ (Chinese AIM), I'll never know. Nor why there was one on every table at a coffee shop.

Not sure if kids or monks put the little model city on this tree...

IXAT, duh.

Obama's got a restaurant in Shanghai???

random pix: amazing menus

These descriptions are priceless.

I'll BET Head Wang has a "classic" business package...

Flavor Grandmother?

Santa Juice closely followed by Love Juice? Confusing and dirty.

You better believe I ordered a Chinglish!