February 18, 2007

• China Blog: Day 178. (Backpacking China: Day 39) 
  
  10:12 Beijing Time
  
  Phrase Of The Day: Xin nian, Zhonguo zuofeng! (New Year, China Style!)

  
  OK, now that I’m fully rested I can get back to telling you about my phenomenal New Year’s expeience in Kunming, Yunnan’s provincial capital and my favourite large town to date.

  After the disasters leading up to and in Chongqing (I even failed to find a bar inhabited by another westerner, although I did spend a great evening playing pool and chewing the fat with locals), I decided that Kunming would be my first real rest stop, and that I would just relax and try out some of the local food which is reported to be some of the best Western chow in China.

  Why this sudden obsession with Western stuff? Anyone familiar with the movie Serenity may know this quote: “It can get awful lonely in the black”. That’s kinda how I’d been feeling after the Yangtze Nightmare. Since leaving Shijiazhuang two weeks ago, I’ve not had a face-to-face conversation with another Westerner. Now, this has been AWESOME for my Chinese, but fairly limiting on the conversations I can have. I just wanted to sit down over a pint with a bunch of folks and talk about stuff, share war stories (AKA awful Chinese public toilet stories), et cetera.

  So when I read that there was a pizzeria in town that reportedly made “the best oven-baked pizza this side of Italy” I had to check it out. You see, any traveller in China can tell you that the Chinese cannot make pizza to save their lives. Seeing as how pizza was my staple diet at University, you can see why I’d been craving this stuff. So, I went to find it.

  After walking for 45 minutes and ending up staring at the same parking lot (And cursing LP’s maps for their indecipherability) I arrived at a conclusion: It Had Been Bulldozed. You know the scene in Platoon where Chris sinks to his knees and screams at the sky? That was me. Just without the helicopters, explosions, and body count.

  In pizza-craving desperation, I tried the number in the LP, and lo-and-behold….it worked! It turns out they’d moved to the other side of the city! Hallelujah! I could fulfill my cheese-and-tomato-based desires! I have never hailed a taxi so quickly in my life. As I reclined and waited, I dreamed of the melted mozzarella goodness, the crispy deep-pan pizza base… and had to wipe the drool off my chin.

  Upon arrival I was greeted by Alex and his wife, Wei. Alex is a  Dutchman who has lived out in Kunming for 12 years now, and opened Wei’s Pizzeria in 1995. He’s an incredibly knowledgable bloke, and his restaurant is a haven for expats and travellers alike. In Wei’s, I found a home away from home. He invited me back that evening to drink and play pool with some other Waiguoren, to see in the New Year.

  Quit your gaps of horror. Yes, I spent Chinese New Year drinking with a bunch of foreigners. Allow me to explain. Chines New Year is NOT a vast public occasion, like it is back home. It’s more like Christmas where the country shuts down and everyone spends the day with their families. Now, I’d received several invites to stay with families across China- Michelle in Shijiazhuan, Li Fan in Zibo, and a few others in Wuhan and Yichang, but I am on a reasonably strict schedule and couldn’t make it. In Kunming, I was alone. Family-less. I was a Ronin, a Grey Man, a mendicant, and other phrases describing someone with no family ties. So I found myself a family for the evening, in the form of:

  • Matthias, a German studying in Beijing,
  • Mercedes, an Argentinian journalist,
  • Willie, a Belgian living in Kunming for reasons I could not ascertain,
  • Gary, a scouser teaching in Fujian,
  • Alex
  • Wei,
  • Ato, their son,
  • and Meimei, their daughter.
    

  The first real drama of the night came while I was walking back to Wei’s that evening. I’d stopped to take some photographs of a little fireworks display in a square- just some kids with sparklers and such. I took one of a family with the dad and two kids. As I was talking to the father the boy let his sparkler touch his helium balloon, which went up like a torch. He was wearing one of those flammable jackets, so the minute I saw the balloon go up I shoved past the dad, grabbed the balloon and pushed the kid out of the way. The dad smothered the fire on the boy’s arm while I stamped out the balloon (scorching boot and jeans in the process). Luckily, the kid just had soome minor burns on his knuckles and wasn’t badly hurt.

  It could have been a whole different story.

  After that I made my way to the pizzeria and met my family for the evening. We chatted, drank, and ate and generally had a great time. Wei’s is an open restaurant so Arto set off fireworks, and we all had a really good time discussing CCTV9  (and how bad some of it is), travelling, music, and anything else that came to mind, and then we closed up and went to find a bar.

  Now, the bars in China only ever pick up REALLY late in the night, so we went to two: one called Masks which wasn’t great but was quiet (despite the setting off of firecrackers all night- I thought several times that I had been permanently deafened), and then Matt, Mercedes and meself went to a club, resplendent with dancing girls (I had to push Matt’s tongue back into his mouth at one point) and drunken young Chinese on their third bottle of beer.

  In all, it was a different way to spend New Years but I made some great friends, and when we finally parted either that night or at the bus station the next day, I felt really bad for a few moments. Travelling buddies come and go, but I find there is a much tighter bond between travelling buddies than their is among casual acquaintances back home. The “supporting cast” for this adventure keeps growing, and in my own way I miss all of them. Still, I have a long way to go, and I need to get moving before I miss my bus to Qiaotou.

  Tiger Leaping Gorge, the reason for this whole trek, is only 80k away, and I plan to be out on the trail tomorrow at dawn.

  I’m kinda nervous- this is the longest solo trek I’ve done for a long time, and therefore there’s more than a hint of danger. If I never blog again after today, you know that I’ve bought the farm in the gorge. Therefore:

  If I should die,
  Think only this of me;
  That there is some corn’r of a foreign field
  That is forever thinking “Well, that was a bloody stupid thing to do!”
  

  If the worst does happen, I need this last statement to be recorded. Colin, you are wrong. Your customers were wrong. Everything you were ever told is a lie. Because EVERYONE knows that bacon sandwiches are by superior following the application of ketchup. 

  Zai Jian, guys! 

  
  

  • 9:59 pm
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