Gang of 7

I've probably mentioned this before but i'll say it again anyway. One of my favourite aspects of being on the road is that i get to meet different peopleand travel with them all the time. Yingtze and I collected 5 other travellers along the way to Diqing county and we all banded together to trek around Yu-beng village. They were some of the nicest, most kind and generous people i had met while on the road. There was Qingmei -a cool, boho and spirited Zhejiang girl, quiet Ah Hui from Hongkong, Will and Hazel from Wales/Ireland respectively, fatherly "Big moustache" from Chongqing, and us 2 from Singapore.

Even though most of us were strangers at the start and there were some language barriers between the Chinese and the English-speaking folks, the overall chemistry in the group was much better than i expected. In 4 days, we developed a close bond, chatting and swopping travel tales as we walked, and shared dorms, meals, rations, sun-block. We marvelled at the scenery together, helped each other up a steep slope or two, and mostly just laughed and joked our way through.

"Big moustache" was always reminding Qingmei to eat her vitamins, and stuffing fistfuls of milk candy into our pockets. He had a wealth of knowledge and we all looked to him for travel advice. Yingtze was designated "wake-up call" officer and Hazel was the official instant coffee procurer. Ah Hui would drive some hard bargains for our large (and very penny-pinching) group for hostels and transport. We made a great team!

The motley crew

With Yingtze, Hazel and Will

Sampling the local cuisine

Small eateries and street stalls here offered a "real" taste of Chinese cuisine and atmosphere. They were noisy and rowdy (a sure sign the food is good) local hangouts that opened all day and late into the night. No english menufor tourists - just point and ask for whatever you want them to prepare. Here, it is ok to customise your noodles with lots of instructions (less chilli/more spring onions/no parsley! etc.) without getting a death stare from the chef. Best of all, they are easy on the budget traveller's wallet!

"You mean, you don't have this in your province?!"

I raised a few eyebrows in the shop when i had my camera out and the waiter had the kind of look that said "Which planet are you from that doesn't sell knife-shaved noodles?!" Finally he blurted it out and all the other customers in the shop waited with baited breath for our answer.

Thin slices of dough are shaved on the spot and flipped straight into a boiling pot of soup - hence giving it the name "knife-shaved noodles". This type of noodles originated from Shaanxi province but has since been exported to various parts of China., including Lijiang, where this photo was taken.

Our "Local-Chinese-visting-another-town" disguise blown, we then had to explain that this is a novelty in Singapore.

2 bowls of noodles and a beer for 9.5 yuan- thats about SGD$2, or USD$1.30!

Sometimes, we took a chance to try the food even though the shop doesn't look exactly very er, classy and discovered the best dumplings ever in this little dingy hole-in-the-wall. Fresh home-made and delicious dumplings sold by the dozen! And did i mention they were cheap too?

Me looking grumpy and hungry after getting off an overnight bus

Corner shop in Lijiang's old town selling brekkie. The Chinese here live on staples like rice congee, boiled eggs, noodles or fried onion pancakes, washed down with hot tea. After a month of this, i am craving and almost hallucinating about wholemeal bread, cheese on toast, and coffee.

Sichuanese-style barbeque stand in the town square of Zhongdian... Watch out for the chilli! The spices here pack a punch and you can end up tearing uncontrollably if you are not careful.

...And the glitzier and fancier night market version in Beijing, near Wangfujing

Meili Snow Mountain range

Northwest of Zhongdian, about a 7 hour drive away on some winding, bumpy mountainous roads stands the Meili Snow mountain range. The range is in Diqing, the most westerly county of Yunnan and consists of 13 peaks.

The 13 peaks of the Meili Snow mountain range

Standing majestically at 6740m, the Kawa Karpo is the highest and one of the holiest mountains in Tibetan Buddhism.

View of the range from Feilai temple. At dawn, several Tibetans can be seen here circumnabulating the stupas, praying and burning juniper as offerings.

The "Official" Shangri-la

"Shangri-la" was first mentioned in James Hilton's novel "Lost Horizon" where it was described as a mystical paradise on earth amidst the Tibetan mountains. This book is fiction by the way, but that minor detail doesn't seem to bother the Chinese government who have designated and re-named Zhongdian and the surrounding county as the "Offficial" Shangri-la.

Zhongdian (known as Gyalthang in Tibetan) county is indeed very beautiful - especially in this season. The mountains are awashed with trees and shrubs coloured yellow, brown and red. Yaks graze lazily amidst the golden fields while farmers stack bales of hay out to dry on big wooden racks . At an altitude of 3,300m, it enjoys a mountain climate of blazing hot sun during the day, and shivering cold winds during the night.

Fields of Gold- Zhongdian countryside

Ganden Sumtseling Gompa (Songzanlin) - a 300 year old Tibetan monastery complex

A Naxi tribe granny walking along the old town in Zhongdian, with a cow tailing behind. It is not uncommon to see yaks, goats and obstructing traffic in this part of the country as they seem to have a licence to roam free on the streets.

Tiger Leaping Gorge trek

The high trail took 2 days to complete - the trek was tough but the views of the gorge and the Yulong mountains were well worth it!

"arrrrrrrggghhh - Are we there yet?!!"

On the first day, we hiked about 18.5km - we were blessed with good weather but it was blazing hot! This was me taking a rest while climbging the 24 bends section - a steep and seemingly endless path upward!

I knew there was a reason why i came - it was for the great loo scenery!(For the record, the view was nice, but it wasn't the kind of toilet you wanted to linger for long at in the first place!)

We had to hike pass some waterfalls -pretty slippery.

The 2nd day's hike was an easy 7km trail to Walnut garden. It was relatively flat and we were rewarded with the view of the lower and middle rapids of the gorge upon completion. Yayyyyyy!!

Horseriding

Today we went horse-riding around an area called "Lashi hai". The Naxi horsemen led us through villages, past the small farmhouses, fields of corn, and patches of chilli and cucumber to the waterfalls. I was a little nervous at the beginning. Now, lets see- no helmet, no instructions, no safety guidelines whatsoever provided.. and the Naxi horseman seemed unperturbed when i told him it was my first time on a horse! He just threw the reins at me and said - "You'll be fine". And even added somewhat airily that "just yesterday, a 60 year old tourist rode on this horse". Gulp. Is that pressure or what?!

It didn't help that my horse was rather jumpy and liked to stray away from the horseman! Not that i blame it- if i were the horse, it'd rather eat grass then trudge up the hill with a sack of potatoes too! Anyhow, after about 20 minutes, i calmed down and started to enjoy the view around me, and the horse seemed to be alot better too - it probably could sense i was nervy at first! My butt was all sore in a few hours and seeing the rest of the people galloping off at top-speed in the plains didn't make me feel any better. I'm rather glad my horse crawled along at a steady rate, and just trotting occasionally -not trying to prove it was of some racing breed. I guess i just survived. yayyyyy!

Lijiang in pictures

Part of the old town was destroyed in the 1996 earthquake but the government took pains to rebuild it after seeing it had tourism potential.

All is quiet in the alleys around 8am, before hordes of day-trippers invade..

With Yingtze -obviously she wasn't put off enough travelling with me the last time in Hanoi to do it again in Yunnan! ;-)

Old Naxi woman along the streets. The Naxi used to inhabit most parts of the old town until tourism came calling. Lots of them then moved to the newer part of town and let out the shop space to the Han Chinese to set up souvenir shops and restaurants. Lijiang is relatively wealthy because of the high tourist traffic but several Naxi in the surrounding rural villages still depend on small-scale subsistence farming for a living.

Yunnan province

After spending a week in Beijing, i took a plane to Kunming to be reunited with Yingtze, my Hanoi travel-mate. We will be spending the next 2 weeks exploring Yunnan, southwestern province of China together, and trying to bag some nice mountain scenery!

Currently, we are chilling out in the picturesque Lijiang, a UNESCO world-heritage listed city -and with good reason! Lijiang is home to several minority tribes, including the Naxi. The old-town section is a maze of alleys full of beautifully preserved old wooden houses, stone bridges over the waterways and graceful willow trees lining the streets.

The day after tomorrow, we'll be going to Tiger Leaping Gorge for a 2-3 day hike. Check out the following:

http://www.tigerleapinggorge.com/

Photos to follow soon!

Mao and me

Modern art in modern China

Today i took a stroll in the art district of Chaoyang, where there is a slew of small galleries exhibiting modern Chinese art.

Surely this is irony at its height. This area used to be factory space during the communist era, churning out goods and machinery to feed the revolution, the party and its ideas. And now, it has been transformed into bougeoise art galleries for budding Chinese artists to display their creativity, their ideas and their intepretations of history to locals as well as foreigners. The painting on the top left corner is a Mao jacket in a mock salutation - i imagine it to be holding an invisible Little Red Book of Chairman Mao's thoughts. The painting at the bottom left showed a group of party officials grinning somewhat greedily at the banquet table. I wonder what would Chairman Mao have to say to this

"Seize the revolution, increase production!"

Some of Chairman Mao's sayings have been deliberately preserved here, perhaps as a reminder of China's communist past.

The words on the facade of this building translates into "Long Live the thoughts of Mao Tze-tung!"

[Translated loosely] Chairman Mao says, "The primary aim of workers should be to work, but they must also study military, government and cultural affairs, engage in socialist education activities, and to criticize capitalists".

Friendly reminder

In the first of what i think will be several installments of introducing "Chinglish", here is what i found in my neighbourhood.




"Punish severely all sorts of crimes". I would be so afraid ... except the cartoon policeman here is too darn cute！

Beijing

After 2 weeks at home, it was time to head out of the door again. This time, my folks are so blase they didn't even wave goodbye. They had an air of nonchalance when i announced i was leaving again. In fact, both of them weren't even in Singapore on the day i left! Oh well..

Beijing is my first stop in China, and its the second time i am visiting the capital. This time, i really want to explore more of the local hangouts, away from the major tourist attractions.

The weather is getting chilly in Beijing, but that doesn't stop locals from enjoying a hearty meal al-fresco. This noisy, bustling and chaotic eatery specializes in Hubei dishes and is so popular that you have to queue up to get a seat- nobody seems to mind -i guess the food is worth waiting for.

Everybody here makes a beeline for the house specialty - spicy fried fish served in a pan, with some thin, crispy deep fried biscuit to soak up the gravy. Just about every dish i had was served steaming hot and drenched with chilli.

And what better way to wash it all down with some TsingTao beer! - Hey, i'm just doing what the locals do!　

While on the subject of food (and following what the locals do), i might as well confess i tried some grilled chicken hearts 2 days back and beef tendons/ligaments (?) (yes, you heard me right） The first thing i noticed was that chicken hearts was the size. I don't know if they shrink to half their size or something when cooked but they were no bigger than the tip of my thumb. Such a tiny thing! - probably very prone to heart attack -if they weren't eaten before they hit old age . These were grilled on sticks (like kebabs or satay), Xinjiang style, marinated with lots of peppery spice and herbs. Verdict: a little too chewy and rubbery for my liking and i did feel a little bit like i was on Fear Factor while eating them - except i knew i wouldn't win $25,000 for eating them. Ugh!

This week in Singapore

After 2 months of cavorting around Europe, I returned home to find more changes in Singapore. What can i say, except "same same, but different".

Fresh from the glow and publicity of being the host-city for the recent IMF talks, the Tourism Board is hardly resting on its laurels. This quarter, they are proudly promoting the multi-cultural and multi-ethnic aspect of Singapore. Yes, its that time of the year again for gorging ourselves (ok myself) on mooncakes because the Mid-autumn festival is here! And, what's more, we are celebrating Deepavali (Festival of lights) and Hari Raya Puasa(Aidil Fitri) too. Haven't had a chance to make a trip down to Little India or Geylang serai yet though. I have been too busy gawking in Orchard road..

Orchard road has been decorated again (is it Christmas already?!), AND they have chopped off the lovely old trees next to the MRT station to make way for some new buildings. There goes the Sunday picnic shade for our foreign workers. As most locals would recall, that was also the dumping ground for a corpse in a grisly murder last year. They'd all just have to find some place new.

Balls-up in Orchard road...

What better way to distract lingering IMF delegates, tourists and would-be protesters/terrorists than with gift-wrapped trees along our shopping district?

Salvador Dali sculptures in town

The brilliantly eccentric Spanish artist famously said,

"... There is only one difference between a madman and me - The madman thinks he is sane - I know I am mad ... "

and,

"When I paint, the sea roars. The others splash about in the bath. "

Definitely known more for his talent than his modesty.

Protesting about protestors never gets you anywhere - except a broken torso and some spiders.

Remembering Auschwitz

Given all the major historical events we have seen in the 20th century, i find it ironic and terribly depressing that we still have wars, genocides, and atrocities being committed to this very day.

It has been more than 60 years since the end of World War 2. The fact that the disastrous outcome of WW1 where millions of people perished, and countries went bankrupt trying to outdo each other by building more sophisticated killing machines didn't seem to do anything to stop us from starting another war. And then some.

To what cause? It all boils down to the fight for power, resources, race, religion, the fight for supremacy over the rest of humankind. By the looks of it, history does not seem to have taught us anything.

Could we have avoided the genocides and mass murders in Cambodia, Rwanda, and Sarejevo? I think so. Was the Iraq war really necessary? Not really. As if hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, famines and droughts aren't enough for us to donate our time, money and effort to. As if there isn't already enough disease, poverty and despair in the world to keep us busy.

I suppose one can argue that it is precisely because there are limited esources in the world, that is why people, governments, countries are going to war and killing each other for it. However, it seems to me we are creating more problems than solving them.

Why do we need to divert already scarce resources to feed poor little kids in Lebanon and the Gaza strip, or patch up buildings and roads in war-torn countries? Or spend money repairing water pipes if they weren't bombed in the first place? Why couldn't we spend the money on sending poor African kids to school instead so they wouldn't be toting guns on the street? Or try and find a cure for cancer?

Its a bleak world, it is.

Tallinn in pictures

Bye-Bye Finland!

The bar was FULL at 10am on the cruise ferry to Tallinn. And no, they weren't having coffee.


Alexander Nevski cathedral

Town Hall Square - previously used as markets/ execution grounds. Now you can stroll around and enjoy that continental cafe ambience. Tallinn was first mentioned in the records in the year 1154.

From this in 1991...

...to this in 2006. Estonia, especially Tallinn has progressed on so rapidly from its ex-Soviet past in just 15 years. Nobody has to walk into a shop with a coupon to queue up for their rations anymore. Supermarkets shelves are abundant with food. This Viru Shopping mall offers the latest European brand name fashion labels, cosmetics, perfumes, electronics, and gourmet restaurants.

At the Kadriog park - wooded area with gardens, fountains, museums and the Kadriog Palace. This area is also home to the President of Estonia.

View of the old town - i had to climb the equivalent of a stair-case marathon to get to this! you can see the towers and parts of the old town wall on the right.

5 completely random facts about Estonia

My education in the skool of life continues in Tallinn, capital of Estonia.

1) WIFI

Tallinn is so advanced it offers free wifi at several cafes, restaurants, hotels and even petrol stations. Yep. I have seen the future and it is in Tallinn. You can get a car wash and check your emails at the same time. Soon, you'd be able to go ride a bicycle or go to the supermart to shop for groceries AND surf the internet. Now if only i have a darn laptop! At the airport, it had, you guessed it -free WIFI but no internet terminals. Grrrrr...

2) Toilet signs. (take note especially if you are visiting Estonia)

Male/female toilet signs are denoted by triangles on the doors. A triangle pointing upwards refers to female restrooms. And a triangle pointing downwards refers to male restrooms. Guess how i found out.

3) Beverages

The Estonian word for "Cheers" is "Terviseks!" and you have to look your beer-mates in the eye when you say it. It is forbidden to drink alcohol in public places, e.g. in the park. You may be fined 600 EEK (1 euro is about 15.6 Estonian Kroons) if caught. Hide well.

4) Storage space

Estonia has a teeny population of 1.4m people spread out in a land area of about 45,000 square km. (Ok, about 400,000 live in Tallinn alone) Compare that with Singapore, which has 3 times the number of people squished in only 680 square km of space.

5) Transport options from Helsinki to Tallinn/ Buffets

Tallinn is only 82km across the Baltic sea from Helsinki. It is 3.5hrs by ferry, or 18 mins by helicopter. However, i heard that there was a helicopter mishap just a few months ago so it isn't a terribly popular choice at the moment. I took the ferry simply because, you know, i wanted the scenic route and definitely not because there was one of those ubiquitious breakfast buffets offered for only 9 euros. Frankly, I don't see how the helicopter company can compete and counter that offer - i mean, how much can one eat in 18 mins?

Helsinki, Finland

My already-long list of "Places for return visits" is growing and i am adding Helsinki to it.

After stepping off the boat from Stockholm, i headed straight for the city centre to explore. It is a nice and cool temperature of 13 degrees celcius. I thought it would be impossible to perspire in this weather but a 1km walk with my rucksack from the ferry terminal to the city centre soon proved me wrong!

Me in front of Kamppi, a shopping mall built on top of the central bus station.

Uspenski Cathedral - Finland was once under the control of Sweden and after the war of 1808-1809, was ceded to Russia. here, you can see traces of Russian-style architecture - like the "onion domes" of this Orthodox cathedral. Unfortunately, a Russian visa takes 12 weeks to apply so i would probably have to wait for some other time to go.

At the Senate Square - The Helsinki cathedral, statue of of Tsar Alexandar II (with a bird perched on his head), and 4 other statues underneath him representing Law, Peace, Light and Work. This square is where Helsinki citizens usher in the new year.

Rudolph swimming in a cheesy bowl of soup! So it is true that Finns eat reindeer meat and it is a normal everyday affair. They also have it stocked in supermarkets frozen or canned. There was also canned bear meat for sale. Costs about 7 or 8 euros - definitely more upmarket than tuna then.

Actually, Helsinki is pretty cosmopolitan in its tastes. There are plenty of Mexican, Italian, Chinese, Greek, and Turkish restaurants around, and they are always crowded!

Street march on a Saturday afternoon. The ASEM (Asia-Europe) summit is taking place in Helsinki right now, and all the big wigs, like the Japanese and Korean prime ministers are in town. Protesters have timed a demonstration to coincide with the event. It is an all-in-one protest. Anti-war, anti-capitalism, anti-EU, anti-NATO, and even "Free Burma" causes were promoted. It was quite peaceful in the afternoon, but the riot police soon had some action as it turned a little violent later, as i saw on the evening news.