Man Man Zou

From Langmusi, five of us foreigners hired a driver for the 10 hour drive to Songpan, which is in Sichuan province. By bus, it would have taken 2 days to get there because there isn’t a direct bus.

The road between Langmusi and Songpan was hilarious. At one point, our strange driver turned off the road and drove through a pasture for about 20 minutes. It was a shortcut, because it brought us about 1 minute ahead of another vehicle we had been following. It was a tough 10 hours, but I was thankful that there was no smoking in our van, and no dust coming in through the windows because the terrain was muddy from the rain and snow.

We arrived in Songpan at night. I was so relieved that it was a tiny bit warmer than Langmusi, which had snowed that day. Also, we had lost a lot of elevation, so things were just plain better. I no longer had to go pee every half hour!

Songpan was kind of a nice little town, but it had a lot of tourists, which, unfortunately, has a severe side effect in China of overpricing things to a ridiculous level (8 Yuan for a beer in a restaurant, when it’s 3 elsewhere). I can’t handle places like that anymore, after seeing so many restaurants in Xinjiang province that had two menus- one with food written in English, and one with the same food written in Chinese. Guess which one was twice the price? I avoid those places as best I can, especially if they’re listed in guide books because they’re usually even worse then.

Songpan was a stopover town on the way to Jiuzhaigou (Nine Village Gully), China’s most famous and beautiful nature park. We woke up early to catch the 2 hour bus to Jiuzhaigou. Since it was raining, Kevin (from Yuanlin) decided to stay in Songpan for another day because his stuff still hadn’t dried from the horse trek.

The bus ride up to Jiuzhaigou took us straight over a mountain. It was snowing pretty hard, but we soon descended down to the park area, which was warmer than any other place I had been in the past week (still toque weather though).

Jiuzhaigou is famous for its many little colorful lakes and nice forest surroundings. We had to pay a fortune to get in- 220 Yuan + 90 Yuan for the bus to get around the park, that’s around 40 bucks each- perhaps more expensive than Disneyland! Since the park is around 30km long it would have been difficult to get around without the bus pass, but I was annoyed that they never checked our bus pass for the whole two days we were there. If I had known that, I wouldn’t have bought one. But at least I saved a little by showing them my university student card from 2002.

We spent two days walking around the park. Since it was really beautiful, I’d like to say that Jiuzhaigou was a great place- but it wasn’t. There were thousands and thousands of people there and 99% of them were in tour groups. Luckily, the tour groups meant that they stuck together in herds, and it wasn’t at all difficult to get away from them. But sometimes it couldn’t be helped. The tour groups never actually walked along the trails. They just got on and off the park buses to stop for a quick photo of a waterfall or a lake. It was at these places where tensions were high and I just wanted to kill the stupid tour guides with their dumb flags and megaphones.

Tour guides in China are among the rudest people I’ve come across. I automatically hate them now- whether or not they are a good person- because I’ve had countless bad experiences with them. I enjoy trying to make things more difficult for them now. I know they’re underpaid, and so on, but that doesn’t mean that they have to cut in front of me in a lineup to buy 30 tickets (which they don’t get away with because I push them and yell at them to line up). And during performances, since they don’t care to watch it they sit together with other tour guides and talk the entire time so it’s difficult to hear. In Jiuzhagou, when I set up my tripod in an empty area near a waterfall, a tour guide with her pack of tourists behind her came up to me and said, “Excuse me, can you move because we want to take photos.” Um, what do you think I’m doing, B@tch! That happened more than once. And another annoyance in the park was that we’d get on the bus and tell the driver where we want to be dropped off. Then, a big tour group would get on and take over. One time the bus driver wouldn’t even stop where we wanted him to because of the group that got on. We had to go a kilometer past our stop in order to accommodate the group. And another time, the bus wouldn’t go further for us because of a group that came on. That was a very big downfall of the park, and if I had known, I never would have gone. The whole park was catered to keeping tour groups happy.

But we did spend most of our two days walking down the excellent trails where we saw only several people. The scenery was perfect, especially since the leaves are changing color now. Since we could take a bus to the top of the river, the whole hike was slightly downhill. It followed a river most of the time, and every 4km or so was a beautiful little lake. The lakes were special because the clear water was very bright turquoise and full of calcium, so trees grew everywhere. The weather was cool and clear too.

After Jiuzhaigou we took a 10 hour bus to Chengdu. We went through some nice scenery, but soon after that the air became more polluted than I’ve ever seen. It was disgusting. Also, there was an accident right in the middle of 4km tunnel. A policeman stationed himself in the middle of the tunnel- instead of out in the open air at the ends of the tunnel- and directed traffic through, one lane at a time. Our bus was so fortunate that it didn’t have to wait idle in the middle of the tunnel because I think the air, full of carbon monoxide from all the idle cars, was at deadly levels. I was quite worried for all the other people, waiting for 15 minutes at a time, in the middle of the unventilated tunnel with hundreds of other cars. China is a little scary once in a while.

Chengdu is the biggest city I’ve been to in China. It was also the nicest. The people were very Taiwan-like (friendly), which gave it a really nice atmosphere. Even though the population of Chengdu is more than 9 million, I didn’t get that impression because it just seemed a little relaxed for a big city. The traffic was bad though! I also saw a McDonald’s for only the third time in my 10 weeks in China. I expected to see more of them. I still haven’t seen a Starbucks.

We stayed in Chengdu for 5 nights. We spent a while shopping for warmer clothes because we were so cold in previous high-elevation towns.

We visited a park devoted to DuFu, a famous Chinese poet. It cost 60 Yuan to get in (9 bucks), which is a lot of money in China. It’s too bad that only rich Chinese and tourists can afford to get into most places in China.

We also went to the famous Giant Panda Breeding Research Base. I had been looking forward to the pandas for the whole China trip. I researched it beforehand to make sure it wasn’t a ‘zoo’, which is often the case in countries like China. The place was quite nice. There are more than 40 pandas living there, including some babies. Seeing the panda baby was a highlight for me. They kept the baby, thankfully, in a quiet room behind a window that hopefully no one knocks on.

Since the government is under huge international pressure about its endangered pandas, they keep the park under pretty good conditions. However, I couldn’t help but feel really bitter about the huge signs I saw in the park- “Be a friend. Donate money and you can hold a panda”. Idiots! They had a similar thing for the red pandas as well- many people lined up for a photo holding a red panda. If the research center didn’t have that, it would have been perfect.

In this sign, I think the Chinese is translated to: “Clap your hands and yell at the animal as loud as you can. Be sure to give the animal some Doritos or cigarettes- whatever you’ve got on you”:

Good going, Microsoft:

Chengdu is the capital of Sichuan province, and Sichuan is the mandarin word for Szechuen, which people from Vancouver might recognize as the famous spicy Chinese food they see everywhere. We ate a lot of spicy Sichuan food, including hot pots (which weren’t quite as good as the ones we had in nearby Chongqing, where hot pots were invented). We also went to a vegetarian restaurant inside a temple. We ordered dishes with the highest number of chili peppers, and it was the best food I’ve had in China. Poor Mark threw up all night because of it though…

Some items on the vegetarian restaurant menu:

On our last night in Chengdu, we went to a Chinese opera/tourist show. It was pretty entertaining, with some funny parts. There was no live music, and everything, including the dialogue, was dubbed, but that’s China. One really amazing thing in the evening was the ‘face-changing’ act. There were people in masks that changed with the flick of their head. They could change their masks many times right before our eyes. It totally stole the show.

Our next stop was supposed to be a flight to Tibet, but after lots of talking, we decided not to go. In order to go to Tibet, foreigners need to go through a lot of crap and pay a lot of money. Foreigners are only allowed to fly in (even though there are plenty of roads), and have to pay around 500 Yuan extra for a permit that they never see. Some foreigners make it in by bus, but only after paying the police loads of money. I don’t agree with either of those ways. Also, once in Tibet the annoyances don’t stop there. Permits are needed to go to many places, and foreigners usually have to hire private transport to get to anywhere interesting. It’s just not my cup of tea. I like being free. So instead, we’ve decided to explore the border of Sichuan province and Tibet, in little towns that are almost entirely Tibetan anyway. It’s also said that these little towns are much less spoiled than the towns within Tibet. All in all, we’re saving a lot of money and hassles, so it should be good.

Do I sound too negative? Perhaps I am a little. It’s hard to keep my spirits up all the time in China, because I just deal with the dumbest things everyday. I don’t write about most of them here, because it’s just not something I wish to remember about China when I read my journal in the future. I’ve met plenty of backpackers in China who are just completely disappointed in the country- people who have traveled all over, and say that China is the worst place they’ve been to. We’ve spent nights talking about taking off down through Vietnam, or up through Pakistan- any other place would be easier than here. Even Kevin (who can speak Chinese and is well-traveled) is pretty let down and is planning on leaving to another country soon. We are going to stay in China for the full four months (until December), because while it has its downs, understanding China as best we can is our ultimate goal. It seems that it’s the local people who make China the most frustrating- they’re really not that happy here- but actually it’s not the people. I think it all boils down to the government. All the disgusting things they’ve done in the past, and even still in the present. And I can’t forget the future either- tearing down neighborhoods in big cities just to make room for stupid things like new office buildings or the Olympics. It’s a terrible thing, and I’m surprised this country isn’t in even more of a mess than it is.