LeahAndMark.com

  Mark is in Phoenix right now and I miss him bunches!  I would’ve gone, but I’ll be in Baltimore next weekend for my BFF Lauren’s graduation.  She is getting her Master’s in Social Work and I’m soooo proud of her!  So many graduations are on Fridays, and Mark and I are already missing work the Friday after next for my brother’s graduation… so, I had to forfeit the trip to Phoenix because it wasn’t in the budget or in the time-off-from-work plan.  It’s hard to ask for more time off when you’ve just been in China for a month!

Actually, I feel like we’ve been so busy since being back here that I haven’t really processed everything we experienced in China.  I’m going to make some time this weekend to at least privately write down my thoughts.  People keep asking us, “So, tell us about China!”  And we both sort of falter…because we haven’t had the time to put the stories together, to pick and choose from the many that never made it on the website, and to find the right words to accurately convey what China is like.

I think a part of it, though, is that our life is so fantastically awesome right now that we’re more in the moment than ever before.   We had a wonderful time in China, but we’re having a great time here, too, so there isn’t the need to look back and go over all of last month.  Because then we’d miss out on enjoying all of this month!

Tonight I’m meeting up with some Yelpers for a Chinese Feast at Frank Ma’s in Chamblee.  It’s a large-ish restaurant in this big Chinese shopping center area and the owner, Frank, is always zipping around the restaurant greeting and talking to all of his guests.  Mark is bummed to miss out, but he gets his mom’s amazing cooking, so it’s sort of a wash.

So, as you probably noticed from all the China pics (oh goodness, we still have sooooooo many to go through! But we’re sleepy! And busy! I do hope we get around to that, though. In little bits’n'pieces….tangent much? anyhow…) the best travel hairdo for me happens to be pigtail braids. Yes, they make me look 10 years younger and I already look waaay younger than my 26.666 years. But- they’re easy and they get all my hair out of my face and when my hair is all dirty and gresay, you can’t really tell. And unlike a ponytail, pigtail braids don’t make my head uncomfortable when I try to recline on long bus, train, or taxi rides. Ponytails always create a bump in the back, y’know?

Convenience and comfort will almost always win out over fashion and style with me. But I did get really tired of having the exact same hairdo every. single. day. Because I prefer variety to all things, even comfort! It’s not just the spice of my life…it’s like oxygen. I can’t live without it.

Okay- now on the school front. I received some très awesome news today! I’ve been offered a coveted GRA (Graduate Research Assistantship) which means that GSU will be paying ME to go to school there! And work on a really awesome project with the Center for Restorative Justice, to boot. No loans! No debt!! No worrying!!! There’s even a slight chance that in addition to the GRA, which will only be around 12-14 hours per week, I might also be hired to work additional admin hours for the project for even more income. If that happens, I won’t even need to look for part-time work anywhere. How fan-freakin-tastic is that?

Yeah. Life is so good right now I just can’t stop smiling. Time to wake my fiancé up and get some dinner!

(Fiancé….heehee….)

I’ve been letting Mark do most of the posting since he’s also using the computer for work. But! I have a lot to say, too! So, we have some time while we’re in Lijiang waiting for our 3:00 appointment with China Construction Bank, and I’m ready to do some posting.

You might be wondering why we have an appointment with China Construction Bank. Well, Bank of America has some kind of partnership with CCB whereby BoA customers (me and Mark), don’t get charged a $5.00 fee for withdrawing Chinese money from Chinese ATMs. But only CCB ATMs. So we’ve made a huge Where’s Waldo type game of finding the CCB ATMs in all the cities we visit. Sometimes we are successful, sometimes we are not. And sometimes we succeed in finding one only to have our card rejected for an unknown reason. And then, sometimes…well, actually only once so far… sometimes the China Construction Bank ATM machine decides American cards are so very tasty and it EATS them.

When my ATM card got eaten this morning, I was not a happy camper. I kicked that CCB machine and cursed my bad luck. But fortunately we are back at Mama’s Naxi Guesthouse and Mama and Baba came to the rescue. Baba walked me to the big main CCB branch in the new part of Lijiang, and I think he got things straightened out. We’re supposed to go back at 3:00 and I will show them my passport and they will, hopefully, give me my card. *Fingers crossed*

Tonight we fly to Chengdu, home of spicy Sichuan food and the Panda Bear Research Center! We spent the past day and a half in the absolutely gorgeous Tiger Leaping Gorge. What a beautiful place…about 2.5 hours north of Lijiang, and 2 hours south of Shangri-la. So we stopped there on our way back to Lijiang and we hiked for a couple hours on Wednesday, spent the night at the Naxi Family Guesthouse with awesome mountain views, and then hiked a few more hours on Thursday before heading back to Lijiang via the bus/taxi stop in Qiaotou.

If you come to China and want to see the gorge, your first stop should most definitely be the Gorged Tiger Cafe in Qiaotou. Run by Margo, and Australian lady armed with an incredible wealth of knowledge about the gorge and all the options for trekking, sleeping, eating, etc., a visit here will be invaluable before heading into TLG territory.

Pictures don’t do it justice, but the gorge was indeed impressive and we wished we could stay longer. Alas, our time in China is too-quickly coming to a close- we have today in Lijiang, a few days in Chengdu, and a few days in Beijing before returning home. And then I’ll have way more to post! All the stories and reflections are easier to write when I’m in a quiet place and not distracted by all of China around me. Mark is better at focusing than I am…. so be patient, my friends! We also have 3,000 pictures to sift through…and a fast internet connection will enable much more media on this site. For now, China calls and I just can’t ignore it for very long. Zai jian!

So, after a 5 hour bus ride… which was only really bumpy for the first 2 hours, then we got on a nicely paved road… we arrived in Shangri-la. Only, this town is nothing like the paradise described in Hilton’s Lost Horizon. It’s a nice little town, at least the Old Town part, but the buildings are only 1/4 Tibetan, and a good number of the shop keepers and restaurant owners are Chinese. There are Tibetans here, too, but they mostly speak Chinese.

I’m hoping the monastery we visit today will be more authentically Tibetan. The view outside our hostel room this morning of the mountains in the distance is quite lovely, so maybe we just need to dig deeper into Shangri-la to find more of its beauty.

And speaking of our room…wow! So nice. I’m loving it- the heat lamps in the bathroom, the electric blanket on the bed, and the in-room heater are all luxurious touches. Cuz people…it’s COLD here! So different from the stifling humidity of Yangshuo.

This weird Chinese-Tibetan hybrid town in far northwest Yunnan definitely has something more to it… we just have to go out and find it.

Yunnan province has many different minority groups, and Lijiang is home to several, but primarily to the Naxi people. The Naxis are ethnically Tibetan, speak their own Naxi language and use a pictograph writing system- the oldest still in use, in fact. They are a matriarchal society, whereby the women inherit all property, can have multiple lovers, and are responsible for supporting their children, moreso than the fathers.

We’re at Mama Naxi’s guesthouse and have been lucky to experience Naxi hospitality and nurturing. Mama, who fills the main building (Bldg 3) with her loud voice and great food, has been awesome at scoring us the cheapest plane tickets ever, as well as arranging our transport to Shangri-la/Zhongdian today. She cooked a 7-course meal last night and we all sat around stuffing ourselves silly. And it only cost 10 yuan- that same meal would have cost over 100 at a restaurant! And it was so great. Picture!!

That was taken before the last dish came out. It was broccoli, wok-fried and flavorful.

Baba lives at the the building we’re staying in. He’s a much quieter, meeker, but just as hospitable, version of Mama. So, if you ever come to Lijiang, Mark and I absolutely recommend this guesthouse. But do try to get a private bathroom- the shared bathrooms aren’t very nice. That’s really my only complaint. Everything else has been wonderful here- great food, our laundry was done super-fast and cheap, all our travel arrangements were made in like 10 seconds and for a much cheaper price than I had budgeted, our room was even way cheaper than we had anticipated. It’s just been a great experience here!

Whew!  Leah here.  It’s crazy how a few short days without internet leaves me feeling totally out of touch with the rest of the world.  But we’re here in a Guilin until 1:00 today when we leave for the airport to fly to Lijiang by way of Kunming.  Hopefully the tickets actually are booked….getting them took way too long!  Avoid the China Souther Airlines counters in Yangshuo, people.  Head to Robert’s TravelWorld booth instead!

So, Yangshuo has definitely been overrun by tourists, but the villages surrounding the area are full of amazing scenery and very friendly farmer folks who still plow the fields with water buffalo.  There is a lot of development going on, though, and it’s starting to encroach on the farmer’s land.  One thing I liked about the Giggling Tree was that they employ locals, buy as much food and whatnot from the locals, etc., to support the village as much as possible.  The guesthouse has just 20 beds, so it can’t ever get as packed with tourists as the nearby hotels that cater to insanely large groups.  Being in Yangshuo was a big wake-up call as to my responsibility as a traveler, because tourists can have such an impact, and definitely not always a positive one, on the places they visit.

Mark has already talked about all the super awesome people we’re met, and I’d just like to second that.  Staying in hostels makes it that much easier to meet people, too.  The staff members have great suggestions of things to do, they’re so friendly, and the hostel guests are great, as well.  At least at the places we’ve been to thus far.  I love hearing about people’s lives, where and why they’re traveling, etc.

I’m so glad that Mark is enjoying his first trip abroad, not that I was ever really worried that he wouldn’t.  I used to like traveling by myself, but getting to travel with my best friend is even better!  Especially since he’s up for whatever.  And he has an awesome sense of direction that comes in handy when I get all turned around.

This was a funny restaurant…we sat on little tiny stools at a little tiny table.

Okay, I’m off to wander the streets in search of breakfast.  I think I’ll make Mark do all the talking, though.  Haha.  He needs to practice speaking Mandarin.  Tonight- we head to Yunnan province for more adventures!

Hello! After our awesome 24 hour train ride from Beijing to Guilin - where we met some incredible people, we were picked up at the train station and brought to our next hostel, located in the very tiny town of Aishanmen, just outside of Yangshuo - we’re deep in the karst peaks and rural farmlands. We have a billion pictures and video from everything since we left Beijing, but our connection here at the hostel is Dial-Up and it’s dark out here. DARK. Like, nighttime before electricity dark. - and it’s humid - and the mosquitoes are eating us up as I type this right now.

So. It’s going to be radio silence for a while and we’ll catch up at the next hostel in a few days - where for our blog’s sake, and my work’s sake, I will have a high speed connection.

Good night everyone, and to our new friends who we met on the train - you’re awesome and we will definitely keep in touch - with all of you - thank you for your kindness, and making this trip even more incredible than it already was - meeting people like you is part of the reason we went on this trip. Thank you. All of you.

 To all of our friends and family back home - it’s great here, we’re safe and tomorrow we’re exploring the karst peaks of the Yangshuo area - on bicycle!

I cannot describe how it feels to ride a mountain bike through the rural farmlands and the mist flowing through the mountains and enveloping everything. The fields, the people, the cows that plow the fields. It’s simply amazing to see, to experience, and to be fortunate enough to have seen this at all. We are deep in southern China and it’s humid. Close to Vietnam and the influence is noticeable. These next few days will be a sharp contrast from Beijing. This portion of the trip is what people romanticize about when they talk of backpacking and traveling without the luxuries and amenities of a hotel and working plumbing, and anything else that other ‘travelers’ think they need. I only wish I could truly convey what this is like.

-Leah and Mark

Pengyou = Friend, and yesterday was a friend-filled day.  First we went to the Dirt Market, Panjiayuan.  This place is only open on weekends and it is packed full of vendors, shoppers, and pretty much any Chinese art, souvenir, antique, etc. you could ever hope to find.  Some people get uncomfortable with the constant shouts of “Look here, I give you good price!” and by the sheer notion of having to haggle.  But these are people who have not yet discovered the pure joy of a truly great bargaining session.  So, here’s a lesson in Chinese Bargaining 101:

1. Learn the numbers.  Yes, the vendors have calculators.  You can use that, as well, for emphasis or to cover up your crappy pronunciation.  But you need to understand what they are saying, and you need to at least attempt to speak.  Always say your offer out loud FIRST, then show them on the calculator.

2. Learn these basic Chinese phrases:  “Tai gui le!”  (Too expensive!)  “Wo bu keyi”  (I can’t!)  “Qing gei wo pianyidianr”  (Please give me cheaper.)  Use these phrases each time they state their price, and be as animated as possible.  But in a lighthearted manner, never serious or angry.  This is supposed to be fun, remember.

3. If you, like me, are blessed with a youthful appearance, you can also use this phrase, which almost always brings the price down about 1/3 more than the vendor would regularly offer: “Wo shi xuesheng, wo meiyou qian!” (I am a student, I don’t have money!)

4. In order to determine how much to offer and how much to settle on, follow these guidelines: the first price they say used to be half as much as what you really should be paying.  But Beijingers have gotten used to foreigners and they are ready for the Olympic Onslaught.  They’re now saying prices as much as 3 and 4 times as high as what you should pay.  So, when they name their first price, depending on how high it is and what you are trying to buy, go low, low, low.  Example: they say 300 kuai for a pocket knife, you offer 25 or 50.  Yes.  Really.  They will act shocked and dismayed, but they will lower the price to around 270. 

You need to up your counter-offer, but just a little.  Employ one of the phrases I mentioned above, and then offer 75.  More shock and dismay, slightly lower price offered.  250.  Use another phrase, be extra-animated, and offer 90.  They will give yet another counter offer, this time even lower…maybe 200 or 190.  This is when you do the WALK AWAY.  You say “Wo bu keyi, tai gui le!” and slowly start to turn away.  They will grab you and give you an even lower price.  175.  You are SO CLOSE now!  Offer 100.  Use hand gestures to say that you really can’t afford more than that.  They will either give it to you for that price, or they will give you one final counter-offer.  Go 10-20 kuai higher than the 100, and they will agree.  Boom!  You have successfully haggled in a Chinese market.

Mao and I are proud of you.

So, yes, yesterday at the market I had a fabulous time and I even made a new friend, Wang Da Wei.  He’s already sent me an e-mail, in fact.  Yay for new friends!  These friend cards Mark ordered are coming in very handy.  So, the next time you are in Beijing and it is a weekend, please go to Panjiayuan and look for Wang Da Wei’s stall.  He sells lovely silk-covered journals, chopstick sets, fans, purses, and a variety of other items.  And if he doesn’t sell it, he will go and find it for you and the best price.  Tell him Leah sent you.  He’ll be a little scared at first of you superior bargaining skills, but he will certainly appreciate the business.

 Shout out to Wang Da Wei: Ni hao, pengyou!  Wo gaosu wo.de Meiguo de pengyou zai Zhongguo lai kan ni!

We also went to the cool artsy 798 area to meet my aunt Jill’s friend Alonzo Davis.  He’s a very nice guy, incredibly well-traveled, and also happens to be a magnificent artist.  We also got to meet his friend and Beijing guide, Claire, who is also an artist and has lived in Beijing for a year.  Hi to you both!  We really enjoyed meeting you yesterday, and checking out all the art galleries!!

Now we must prepare for an almost-28-hour train ride to Guilin/Yangshuo.  I love trains.  Woohoo!  Who knows what new adventures await?  We’ll be out of touch for a day or so, but don’t worry…we’ll be back with more stories and pictures!

Much love to all of you, thanks so much for reading and commenting!!

~Leah

Here are a few things I’ve learned - apparently, ANYONE and EVERYONE here can cook great food. Obviously we’re searching every dark alley for good food, but it’s simply everywhere else too - our hostel, the fast food places (seriously) and any place you can think of.

Another thing I’ve learned is that I really only need about a half cup of rice for any meal - and then the rest is the actual dish. So when I get back home, I need to remember that I am no longer going eat a plate full of rice along with the main dish.

Tonight we are going for some of that famous Beijing duck. Oh yes. You should be jealous.

Let me just tell you out loud - it is a great thing to be here and work on ‘work’. Even though the idea of having to work on ‘vacation’ seems like it would suck - whatever. I think it’s great.

Add to the last few days the fact that we’ve still got a substantial amount of the country to cover, to see, to write about, and to eat.

The above was and below was for breakfast yesterday.

Above: braised eggplant with bell peppers - we wandered through several hutongs looking for an appropriately run down place to eat at for lunch.

Below: A chicken dish that we will never know the name of - and yes, it was quite awesome.

Finally, since I’m telecommuting and doing a lot of my reports today, here’s what I had for lunch:

Today is an easy day for us… we’re postponing the Great Wall trip until the end of the month when we come back to Beijing after our travels to Guilin, Chengdu, etc.  Still adjusting to the time difference, plus all the walking, talking, language translation, etc. that takes up much more energy than a normal day in the States. 

Yesterday’s highlights were visiting the China Care Children’s Home and going to the Donghuamen Night Market.  Babies and food are two of my fave things.  China Care was awesome!  The babies were so cute, and I was relieved to see that they are also incredibly well cared-for.  They have very loving staff, and nice facilities, too.  It’s not really one building, but rather the Children’s Home is run out of several apartments in Shunyi, a suburb 45 minutes north of Beijing.  I was happily surprised that we actually got to hold and play with the babies!  The children have all come to Beijing from orphanages in other parts of China to receive medical treatment for various conditions such as cleft palates, heart problems, hydrocephalus, etc.  They get the necessary treatment and follow-up care here, and then they are placed in foster care once they are all better.  Or, for the few whose conditions are terminal, they are placed in a nearby hospice.  (Oh, there go the tears…. crying on the keyboard now.)  But most of the children have conditions that are easily fixed with surgery, so that’s the good news.  About 1/3 of the children currently are adopted.  They’re hoping that number goes up, up, up to 100%, of course, but in the meantime the children receive really great foster care, much different from the U.S.

Picture Time!

The night market was fun, too.  Some of the food was great, some….eh.  Not great.  But it was good times.  Mark will tell you all about it, I’m sure.  You’ll be glad to know we survived two absolutely insane taxi rides yesterday.  Not all the taxi drivers are crazy….I think most of them are pretty great.  But we somehow managed to find two on a suicide mission yesterday.  Happily, disaster was somehow miraculously diverted and we arrived safely at our destinations. 

Tea time!  I’m over and out. 

It’s nearing 2AM here in Beijing and I’m just up finishing some work and then posting really quick.

First, here is Leah saying good morning today before we went out and about. (tomorrow is my turn to be ummmm.. embarassingly awesome - we’ll get better as the days go on)

I was gonna do a quick run down, but I’ll leave that for the morning. Here are some shots from tonight - we walked around some hutongs and ate some street food - we were just way too tired after our great day to go to the real night market and get overwhelmed. That will be tomorrow night. But still, the dark dark alleys around our hostel are excellent. These are all unedited photos.

Goodnight.

It’s 6:30 am here, we woke up early since in Atlanta, it’s Wednesday afternoon and not Thursday morning. We’ll be here at the Red Lantern Hostel for our entire stay in Beijing - so it’ll be our base of operations. I like it, it’s down a dark alleyway and off of the main road and that’s always fun.

Plus, here’s our courtyard:

Also, we have running hot water, a private room, private bath, it’s just awesome. And WiFi - I’ll need it as this first week is my hardest one for telecommuting with all my projects due.

Oh man. I cannot wait for all the food today - and the sights. Today it’s most of the obvious tourist attractions and then who knows at night.

Have a great day everyone.