Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Wendy in China



16 days traveling in China with my '16 reptiles'. An adventure that was amazing, fascinating, and an opportunity of a lifetime!

My first impressions of this massive country with 1.3 billion people was of a teenage boy growing too fast, too quickly. The heart, soul, mind, and joints can't seem to keep up. The reptilian brain is focused on food, fight or flight, fornication - thus I named my 16 heterosexual male travel companions (between the ages of 21 and 56) my reptiles. It was like seeing behind the curtain into the men's locker room.

The trip was organized brilliantly by Zhong Luo who was born in Southern China and moved to the Bay Area 12 years ago. His father is famous martial artist Grandmaster Mai Yu Qiang who taught his son beginning at age 3. Zhong (pronounced 'Jong' - 'zh' in Chinese is said like 'j' in 'judge') is my teacher's teacher (called 'Segong' in the Chinese martial arts tradition). For ease of understanding in this blog, I will call him Z. He is standing to my left in the photo above - with his arms crossed.

I took 443 pictures. It was difficult to select just a few photos for this blog - so if you are interested in seeing the full slide show, send me an email and I will forward you the link to the Walgreen's site.



We spent the first week in northern China. 3 nights in Beijing where we climbed the Great Wall. There are over 1,000 steps straight up at this pass - 7 of us (including me pictured at left) made it to the top. Very cold and very exhilarating. Went to the site of the 2008 Olympics, Summer Palace (where the Emperor 'summered' with his family when Beijing was too hot), Tianamen Square, the Forbidden City. The power of Mao Tse Tung and the Chinese military government are palpable. The power of the Qing Dynasty Emperor are equally felt. The constant contrasts of old and new world abutting are everywhere.

Additionally in the Beijing region, we went to a Chinese traditional medicine center, a jade museum, and a pearl factory.


We then flew to Nanjing and worked our way across by bus east to Shanghai, staying two nights in Nanjing, one in Suzhou (prounounced 'Sujo'), Wuxi ('Wushi'), and Shanghai. Highlights included seeing silk made at a factory, walking through an ancient village in Wuxi where the elderly live in a style that has changed little in 100 years, a gondola ride on the canal in Suzhou (named the 'Venice of the East' by Marco Polo), a visit to the Universal Studios-type site where many martial arts movies are filmed, the mausoleum of Dr. Sun Yat Sen (the first elected President of China and developer of the first Eastern/Western medical collective), the Yangtze River bridge crossing, Lake Tai, and lovely XiWi park ('Chiwi').

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The Buddhist temples are beautiful, reverent, red and gold reflections of the mysteries of worlds beyond.

Shanghai was the most international and cosmopolitan city we visited. I was reminded of an Eastern version of New York City. A bit frustrating to have just one night there, but this was just a 'taster' first visit. The hotel rooms were interesting. There was a huge picture window between the bedroom and the bathroom as the clerk said 'to provide the mystery of viewing the naked body'. Since all rooms were being shared by the reptiles - meaning me with a male roommate - we had to figure out that by drawing 2 shades in the bathroom nothing could be seen! I loved the night boat trip along the Shanghai Harbor ... a cross between the NY Circle Line and Disneyland.


From Shanghai we flew south to Guangzhou ('Gwanjo') for 8 days staying in nearby Foshan, Z's hometown. In the south the dialect switches from Mandarin to Cantonese and the energy shifts to many fewer visitors. Everywhere we go, we get stares and awe.

I love this picture I took in Foshan that so reflects the contrast of the old and new China.



Z stayed with his family in the south, so the rest of the reptiles and me were able to stay in the same hotel for a week (without packing and repacking each day) ... quite a luxury!

By now I was generally used to the food and could pick out the veggie dishes - as opposed to the chicken with head, fish with head and eyes, snake, eels, snails, and at one restaurant (that I missed by energetically misdirecting the taxi) that served endangered animal food (bear claw, turtle, `armadillo, dog).



The street food was yummy - anything you wanted stuck on a stick and cooked over the smoky fire. I liked the lotus roots, green veggies, tofu and mushrooms in a nice spicy sauce.






I did 3 demonstrations of my '5 claws golden dragon' White Eyebrow style kung fu set while in the south: at Z's mother's birthday party(photo shows Z's father seated), at a school competition in a square in Foshan, and at a school about 1/2 hour outside of the city.

Quite an amazing experience - and as a blonde, American woman unique!

Here is TK doing his cane set.


While staying in Foshan, we took a day trip to visit Guangzhou (which included a visit inside Sports Island where Chinese athletes train for the Olympics in barbed wire, prison-like buildings), another day in the country to relax in the natural hotsprings, and then had several days with some free time to explore Foshan on our own. One evening we took a boat ride on the Pearl River ... so calming!

I did not see the sun for 16 days - the air is very polluted. I also got used to squatting over bathroom holes. And then there was the moment in the Buddhist temple tea garden where we all ran for cover during a sudden downpour ... and I had a nonverbal, peek-a-boo communication with a 4-year-old Chinese girl. No words were necessary for our fun and laughter!


Some closing photos. Enjoy!