At last!

So, I'm terribly sorry for the long delay on the end of my trip, but life has been incredibly busy with leaving China and readjusting to life in the States. Here are some pictures from the end of the trip:

 

More stories, photos, and reflections available upon request in person -- and you can likely expect a follow up post as the summer draws to a close, when it's been long enough that I can truly reflect on Life After China. I must say, if I could afford a plane ticket, I'd go back in a heartbeat -- not to Chengdu, perhaps, but certainly to other parts of the country. I've no doubt I'll return at some point.

再见，中国！

回家

Just letting everyone know I arrived home safely on Sunday afternoon. I'll wrap up the blog stories shortly as I adjust to being back in the States. :)

Bai Ma Village, Part One

Alright, here it is: the one you've all been waiting for! The trip to Bai Ma was by far the best field trip of the entire trip.

As usual, we were fed a vast amount of misinformation prior to our departure. We were first told that we would be spending the weekend in a "Tibetan village." Well, funnily enough, the Bai Ma (White Horse) people do not actually consider themselves ethnically Tibetan. We were also told that it would be a 5 hour drive; at 7am on the morning of our departure we were told it was actually a 7 hour drive (it took 12). We were also told that there would not be mountains . . . we knew this could not possibly be true if we were heading five seven twelve hours "West" (still not exactly sure where we went), and luckily, we were right.

The beginning of the drive was nice even though we had 14 people in a rather small van, and got even better when we reached the mountains after only about 3 hours. However, we stopped at an absolutely atrocious bathroom and "restaurant" for lunch. I'm trying not to remember just how dirty everything was, but I will say that we were served, among other MSG-laden things, an entire chicken in a bowl.

However, once we were back on the road it was much better. The mountain scenery and small roadside villages were absolutely beautiful -- many of them had been reconstructed after the earthquake in 2008. The drive was a little anxiety-inducing, as we took it rather fast and everyone passes each other in the oncoming lane while leaning on horn, but the scenery was lovely.

After a full day of driving (and a stop at a random temple that, while beautiful, halted our progress for 2 hours), we stopped briefly at a village on the way:

Several group members were excited when they discovered marijuana growing freely nearby.

 We stopped again not too long after when we rounded a bend and discovered a gorgeous, immense reservoir:

The picture doesn't even begin to do the colors justice.

Who knew there was an observatory tucked up there?

Unfortunately, we were stopped just around the bend. A crane was taking up both lanes for some construction. We were told it would only be 15 minutes; we instantly inferred it would be several hours. However, the weather was absolutely perfect and the view was sublime, so we didn't mind much. After only an hour we were moving again, taking hairpin turns at an incredibly terrifying speed, until . . . we saw a landslide ahead!

It turns out that it was artificially caused by a crane farther up the hill; it was just rather inconvenient for them to choose that particular time to do so.

A second crane pushed the debris down the cliffside to clear the path for us.

 We finally got moving again - it was now nearly 7pm and would soon be dark. But we were rewarded with incredible views once we made our way past the reservoir.

I'm having internet problems with uploading the last few pictures, so I'll have to leave the tales of our incredible-though-brief stay in the village until later. We're all feeling a bit melancholy that this is our last day together, so I'm off to try to make the most of it. I won't be long.

Current Events

Again, I apologize for the incredible infrequency of updates lately -- I have not had as much time as I would like for detailed posts. Please accept this offering as a teaser while I work on the post about the mountain village! :)

Things here have been going quite well. We truly have been enjoying ourselves. It's hard to keep track of all the little things I'd like to share, but I have a few little stories in addition to the numerous amount of pictures from last weekend for you!

First of all, my sinus infection is gone (though one ear continues to pop randomly, and is doing it now). It was a few days of relatively clear breathing before I even noticed how much better I was doing. :) The ear thing is really annoying and will no doubt be even more so on the plane, but it is lovely not to be carrying wads of rough, scented toilet paper (some things, China, I will simply never understand) around in my pockets anymore.

Also, last week I went to the post office with Alex and one of our student guides, Vivian, to mail our erhus home -- they are too big to fit in our suitcases. I was rather skeptical, but it went surprisingly well. The China Post employee actually made us each a box to fit our instruments out of a completely different cardboard box. I wish I had been able to film it -- it was quite impressive! It cost just over 100元 ($15) to send it by sea. I'm not 100% positive it will make it in one piece, but we'll find out sometime this fall!

Last week we were taken to a fancy Chinese medicine building for Chinese massage and acupuncture. It was the first full body massage I have ever had. It was pretty good; I was awfully stressed/overwhelmed that day and was having trouble letting go and just enjoying it, and some of it hurt -- in part of it she was pushing tendons in my fingers across the knucklebones or something, and it was incredibly unpleasant. We were also fully clothed, and my sports bra got in the way of what would have been a great back massage. They were also playing 12 Girls Band in the background, which I am familiar with, so that was distracting as well. (It's also a bit too peppy for a massage, in my opinion.) Workers were answering phones and lights were shining in my eyes, too . . . so, in short, it could have been a little more relaxing.

The acupuncture was interesting; they told me (in Chinese, and through our group guide for the day, whose translation skills are somewhat lacking) that I was too cold. My hands and feet definitely were absolutely freezing, but that's not uncommon for me, and I didn't think anything was actually wrong. They decided to put heat lamps over me and go ahead with it, but through the mistranslation I was not able to tell them where specifically anything hurt, so they just put a needle in each of my legs. I'm glad I did it, but I'm not sure it was my thing. :)

Finally, here are some more pictures of the red pandas!

Brief Update

Sorry for the lack of posts! We've been busy enjoying the end of our trip here in Chengdu. I promise I am still alive and well out here. :)

To tide everyone over until the long upcoming post about our trip last weekend, here's a picture of the region where we spent last Saturday night: