thai ways

while the rest of the world and life-as-i-knew-it toils on outside of china, the rest of banna relishes this sunny sunday.

finally in a web cafe with access to blogger somewhere in an internet cafe in xishaungbanna, or banna for short. life has been treating me rough. but not in an unenjoyable way... but more of a caked-in-mud, sun-burnt, sweaty, dirty, dearth-of-good-relaxation type of way.

since my last post a week ago, time has flown by ever so quickly. my english has deteriorated so very rapidly, so pardon my lack of embellishment. i shall say it all in simple, succinct sentences, ie chinese-style.

on tuesday (1/8) , the 3 of us left alex at the bus station, 3 of us teary-eyed and despondent, eyes blood-shot from the follies of the night before. then, on the most dreadful mode of transport known to china : the sleeper bus.. *shudder*, we took an 11 hour voyage, supine, from kunming to jinghong (capital of banna).

on wednesday (2/8)- thursday(3/8), we took another 2 buses to menghun, from which aiwendan came to pick us up in his jeep. aiwendan, an inspiring altruistic village doctor took us in for 2 nights at his home, where he taught us the experience and knowledge 10 years of being a village doctor has imparted him. it was here that i

• rode on a motorcycle across the rice plains of banna, the sun setting in the distance, emerald hills in the yonder, eyes on the best scenery i have ever seen
• reached the 'whatever' stage of consciousness where there is no longer fear of danger /death despite the perilous circumstances, while riding as a passenger on a motorcycle in pitch-black darkness, down a rocky stone-laid mountain path, headlights revealing only 2m ahead of us, travelling as fast as our china-brand motorcycle could take us.
• hiked for 2 hours up to a pagoda, 1 hour of which was in tropical rain
• did not bathe for 2 and a half days (post trek and motorcycle ride)

friday (4/8), we met up with a bo and team to set out to dadugang. after food-shopping in the bloodiest meat-market in the world. (think fats, guts, hearts, heads, ears of animals - skinned and unskinned astrew EVERYWHERE) we took a 2 hour long jeep ride (love em jeeps) to the tea planatation of mr fu. there, a team of 9 of us (mr fu + wife included) toiled for 3 hours in the hot sun digging trenches for his tea plants. (think mud, mud, rain, mud, muddier）we survived, sweaty, rain-drenched, muddy, muscles sore and sun-baked, and made it back to his humble hut for a meal prepared by a bo...

"HCl! HCl is there for a reason." - jo, on food preparation of the meal at mr fu's.

...will be in lijiang (see map) on thursday. more updates soon..+ photos to follow.