Blue trucks
We're currently chilling in the mountains of southern China after spending a few days (and nights) travelling from Guangzhou. The landscape has changed along the way, and we are now in thickly forested hills in 30 degree heat!! On our way here we passed many terraced rice (and wheat and canola) fields cut perfectly into the hills and slopes in beautiful contours.
There are tell-tale signs we are nearing Laos and Thailand - the temples are different, the food is different, signs are written in a scrip similar to Lao (actually called Dai), and you can buy t-shirts saying 'Thailand'.
Yesterday we hired bikes and went for a leisurely tootle around town and some nearby villages - it is so nice to be warm! Today we spent a relaxing day in a huge botanical garden in Jinghong where we're staying, full of sago palms and rubber, mango and jackfruit trees. As this is the most 'rural' we've been in China, it is also interesting to observe a lovely phenomenon we haven't seen in the urban areas - siblings. Apparently the one child policy does not apply to rural areas and minority ethnic groups.
As we near the end of our stay in China we have a few thoughts. (Those not particularly interested in our thoughts can stop reading here.) Firstly, Chinese characters, which looked so incomprehensible to us at first, have actually started becoming recognisable as you stay here for a bit. We probably know about 25 by now, so there's only another 5575 to go before we can read a Chinese newspaper. And a few thousand more if we want to be well educated.
Secondly, we have felt very safe here - for some reason the places which would seem seedy in other cities do not seem seedy here. This is a marked contrast with Russia, where sinister vibes seemed to lurk everywhere.
Watching someone make handmade noodles is a great way to spend a lunchtime. Getting a haircut, hairwash and full head, shoulder and back massage is the BEST way to spend an afternoon - and is embarrassingly cheap.
Finally, is it REALLY necessary for 90% of the trucks to be the same shade of blue?? Big trucks, little trucks, old ones and new ones....always blue. I don't know why that's so annoying, but it is.
There are tell-tale signs we are nearing Laos and Thailand - the temples are different, the food is different, signs are written in a scrip similar to Lao (actually called Dai), and you can buy t-shirts saying 'Thailand'.
Yesterday we hired bikes and went for a leisurely tootle around town and some nearby villages - it is so nice to be warm! Today we spent a relaxing day in a huge botanical garden in Jinghong where we're staying, full of sago palms and rubber, mango and jackfruit trees. As this is the most 'rural' we've been in China, it is also interesting to observe a lovely phenomenon we haven't seen in the urban areas - siblings. Apparently the one child policy does not apply to rural areas and minority ethnic groups.
As we near the end of our stay in China we have a few thoughts. (Those not particularly interested in our thoughts can stop reading here.) Firstly, Chinese characters, which looked so incomprehensible to us at first, have actually started becoming recognisable as you stay here for a bit. We probably know about 25 by now, so there's only another 5575 to go before we can read a Chinese newspaper. And a few thousand more if we want to be well educated.
Secondly, we have felt very safe here - for some reason the places which would seem seedy in other cities do not seem seedy here. This is a marked contrast with Russia, where sinister vibes seemed to lurk everywhere.
Watching someone make handmade noodles is a great way to spend a lunchtime. Getting a haircut, hairwash and full head, shoulder and back massage is the BEST way to spend an afternoon - and is embarrassingly cheap.
Finally, is it REALLY necessary for 90% of the trucks to be the same shade of blue?? Big trucks, little trucks, old ones and new ones....always blue. I don't know why that's so annoying, but it is.
posted by Wednesdays at 3:41 AM
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