yanghsuo, part six

after moon hill, i hopped back on my scooter for another swing through the villages around yangshuo.  i passed through some large and dramatic new development before i found the countryside.  there, in the distance: a tire fire.

after some time i realized that it was getting late, i was by myself, and it was time to turn around.  not before taking a few more shots.

the next day, my last in yangshuo, was a slow one.  i finally managed to get a picture of one of these, well, chinese model t's.  twenty year old tractor engine dangling off the front.  i couldn't take a picture of the smoke, and noise, it makes when it's running.

before getting on the sleeper bus to return to hong kong, i took a stroll through yangshuo's main park at sundown.  passed by a soviet-style monument to the workers of china, blocky and concrete.  that's as communist as china ever got.

home sweet home.  skyscapers and twelve lanes of traffic.  what more could i ask for?

well, japan.

yangshuo, part five

there it is.  the infamous moon hill, so named for the half moon worn out of the hill.  after i parked my scooter, i was approached by a small, old chinese woman who spoke, maybe ten words of english.

she walked up the whole hill with me, right by my side.  

after ten minutes, i started climbing as fast as i could, to see if i could shake her.  i was afraid she might charge me 1000 yuan for a "tour" of the hill, or some other horrible scam.  at the end, though, she only wanted to sell me a bottle of water.  for about a buck fifty american.

those chinese.  anything for a buck.

the view halfway up.  

and from the other side of the hill.  the village in the distance is, in fact, yangshuo.

the peak!  limestone, jutting.

and the hazy-polluted view from the summit of rice paddies below.  i bumped into a few other backpackers, including one from the bar the previous night, going on and on about how "somebody nicked my trainers!"  

silly brits.

yangshuo, part four

nightfall in yangshuo. the street peddlers finally calmed down.

ah yes. we new this was the place for us.

i got a late start the next morning, naturally. ryan hit a fierce bit of food poisoning, so i left him behind, rented another scooter, and went off to see some more china.

some places were actually fairly clean, and nice. however, it was already growing late, so i made my way to the famous moon hill to get another perspective.

yangshuo, part three

after twenty minutes of haggling, ryan and i scooped up our scooters and beat feet for the hinterlands of southern china. naturally, ryan's scooter broke down after five minutes, but it was soon ready to roll. after half an hour of slicing through chinese traffic --- lanes are just an idea, not a reality, and anything with wheels, or feet, is welcome on the roads --- i was out in the countryside.

this was easily the highlight of the trip. i neglected to take pictures while i was driving --- far be it for me to try and be safe --- so some of the greatest things i saw i only captured in my mind: small duck farms, tomatoes drying in the sun, markets with unrefrigerated meat, the smell of burning tires, litter and waste. but, also, some of the most beautiful and unearthly scenery i've ever seen.

we road through empty villages, small neighborhoods of newly built brick buildings, either uninhabited or recently abandoned. the acres of trees covered with tarps were haunting.


we stopped over rivers for our best shots. as the sun was setting, we saw fit to return to town and begin our evening.

yangshuo, part two

we woke up four hours later, hardly rested but ready to take on the people's republic.  by night, yangshuo seemed like little more than a street with buildings and locals trying, desperately, to sell us a ride to our hostel.  by day, however, we saw that yangshuo was a bustling tourist town with local trying, desperately, to sell you anything they could.  

chinese plumbing.  i believe its also called "preserved water."

our walk through town was slow going, as we were stopped every few minutes for pictures, simply for being tall and white.  breakfast consisted of copy-pringles and dried plums, which were not pitted, of course.  around noon, we made it to the river and saw the scenery that we had come for.  really beautiful stuff, otherworldly, even, and ruined only by the constant requests for a bamboo raft ride.

those chinese, they are intrepid, unstoppable businessmen.  communists?  please.  

after taking in the view and a lunch, we wandered the tourists shops of yangshuo, stopping to look at fake antiques and knock off tshirts.  i purchased a small, painted duck from an old lady, simply because she did not pester me.  then i purchased a set of chinese playing cards from another lady, who, after we completed our transaction, let out a fierce and knowing "mwa ha ha ha!" cackle behind my back.

another stupid westerner, had out of, oh, a dollar maybe? 

we kept making friends!  she was practicing her english, and did a great job.  

at this point, with some afternoon left, ryan and i decided it would be best if we rented a pair of gas powered scooters and head to the countryside to get a taste of real china...

yanghsuo, part one

travel is over and i'm back in america.

a few weeks ago, however, i was in china.  the people's republic, not hong kong, which, i learned, is a very different animal.

my trip started in shenzhen, just across the border from hong kong.  though i saw very little, it was immediately clear that shenzhen was a very different place --- darker, dirtier, colder.  not a place i wanted to stay for long.  thankfully, the sleeper bus arrived quickly.  

not that the bus was much of an upgrade.  for the next ten hours --- the rest of the night --- i laid in a cramped, uncomfortable bed.  on a bus.  careening through the south of china.  

and i do mean careening.  our driver had some very clever ideas about when to pass on the "highway" --- curves, especially, and also in the face of obviously oncoming traffic.  highway is a misnomer, as well.  more like dirt road.  dirt road under construction.  not that that stopped our driver from trying to set a time-to-distance record that evening.

though i traveled by night, i was able to catch a glimpse of the countryside.  beyond the open space, in stark contrast to hong kong, and the miles of empty buildings, i was most struck by the slave labor camps near the highway.  i imagine the workers were receiving some small amount of yuan for their work, but i say, call a spade a spade.  in the cold night, they slept only in tents made out of thin acyrilic material, no fires, surely little clothes.

we passed through a few towns, and i could only capture the feeling of the ride with pretentious, blurry photography.  while i tried to fall asleep on the bus, i tried to come up with a suitable simile for china.  china is like cellophane --- it has some of the qualities of beauty, like gloss, clarity, lightness, but the whole is much lesser than the parts.  in fact, the whole is pretty icky when you get up close and touch it.

when ryan and i arrived in yangshuo, we stumbled around in the darkness until we finally found a hostel at which to crash.  within five minutes, a gentlemen who purported to be the manager of the hostel knocked on our door to give us a few tips about the yangshuo.  a few minutes later, it became clear that the tips were a sorry attempt to net a few round-eyes into paying far too much for a guided tour of the area.  it took a lot longer to finally chase him out of our room.

welcome to china.

yangshuo, prolouge

i'm afraid i won't be able to post about this last weekend's trip to inside the people's republic of china until... a while.  here's a taste of yangshuo.  beyond it's touristy middle, i was able to get a taste of real, undistilled china.

i like hong kong much better.  china is a dirty, ruthless place.