Back From China -- Now for Ubin
Ten long days admist the freezing sleet and snow of Northeastern China, an array of fiery Chinese salesmen (nothing against them, of course -- they just drive a hell of a bargain), a dumpling feast involving a particularly bitchy and furious Chinese lady and a wide variety of tour guides boasting a wide variety of credentials but never really living up to them.
That little snippet above most aptly captures the essential gist of what happened during my vacation in Northeastern China, which for absolute nutheads at geography like myself lies just a few miles away from Russia. This means 2 things -- that firstly we'd be seeing plenty of Russian Sharapova wannabes, and that secondly (perhaps more significantly as well), the icy winds and barrages of snowy, er, snow that the largest country in the world boasts sort of spilt over into that particular section of the Rising Dragon. Cue four layers worth of clothing for the upper torso and 3 layers for my lower body. And surprise, surprise, despite all that hassle in donning jacket after jacket, sweater after sweater, it was still cold.
To adequately decribe, express the incessant shivering, the frosty gusts of winter wind creeping up any holes in your armoury of wool and cotton, permeating the so-called impregnable walls of your $90 jacket... would to say the least be impossible for even Shakespeare to accomplish. However, I'll attempt what I can in this respect, and tell you how you can begin to understand how I felt there without having to travel to China.
Firstly, empty your freezer of all items, necessary or unnecessary. Then, splosh icy cold water all over your body. Then strip nude and stuff yourself in the freezer. Close the door. Stay in there for a few hours, then come out. Rinse and repeat
Done that yet? Yea. The final two steps were meant to simulate moment of pure solace I found in exiting the freezer after spending time outside viewing absolutely pointless ice sculptures. And as your body begins to adapt to the warmth of the tour bus's heater, absorb the heat that surrounds you, the bloody driver drives so quickly that he reaches the next stop, and we get off only to see more pointless pieces of art that were bound to melt by March in any case.
So now I'm done complaining, I think you guys might wanna hear more about the marvels of Chinese cultures. Well too bad, you've come to the wrong place, because I don't like to think of my blog as an encyclopedia. You can get those off Wikipedia or something to that extent. Instead, I'll waste more space on my blog posting more violent ranting on a particularly bad tour guide we met in China
The first thing that struck me about this joke of a guide was his funny knack for laughing at his own jokes. At first I thought he was just a humourous guy whom I might be able to get along with, but then the intensity and frequency of his laughter kept increasing, it just became annoying. And I would've forgiven him, if his jokes were even good. Sorry to disappoint, but they weren't. And I won't even bother giving an example because they probably weren't jokes in the first place. In my opinion, the old coot was just another miserable bachelor forced into falling in love with himself because no one else would do the same.
So anyway, it wasn't just his laughing that put me off -- it was his sheer arrogance. He started with his self- intro by telling us not his name, but his old job -- an english teacher. He then went off on a long rant about how good his english was and how he loved the english language and how well the foreigners he'd led on tours could understand him. WTF.
And I might have accepted that piece of boasting if he could actually speak coherent English. Too bad, the deluded old freak couldn't!. His first bit of English was attempting to explain how Japanese aggressors attacked and stuff. The dialogue went something like this:
Na me, gong da wo men de ren jiu shi ri ben jun, aggresors, ah, you know aggressors? Xian zai jiu qu can guan yi xi zhe xie aggressors. Eh, wo men jiu getting out of the bus, ah xiao xin ni men fall into the ground. Floor is srippey, ah very fallable, and stimulating.
LOLs.
So we were forced to endure his English and his boasting about how good he was at it. Bullcrap of a guide if there ever was one.
I've run out of juice to write anymore. Have to go pack for my OBS trip tommorow, and hoping I can find a backpack large enough to store my stuff. Hoping I can wake up in time as well -- I've lacked practice, having woken up at 9 for the past few weeks. Ah well.
That little snippet above most aptly captures the essential gist of what happened during my vacation in Northeastern China, which for absolute nutheads at geography like myself lies just a few miles away from Russia. This means 2 things -- that firstly we'd be seeing plenty of Russian Sharapova wannabes, and that secondly (perhaps more significantly as well), the icy winds and barrages of snowy, er, snow that the largest country in the world boasts sort of spilt over into that particular section of the Rising Dragon. Cue four layers worth of clothing for the upper torso and 3 layers for my lower body. And surprise, surprise, despite all that hassle in donning jacket after jacket, sweater after sweater, it was still cold.
To adequately decribe, express the incessant shivering, the frosty gusts of winter wind creeping up any holes in your armoury of wool and cotton, permeating the so-called impregnable walls of your $90 jacket... would to say the least be impossible for even Shakespeare to accomplish. However, I'll attempt what I can in this respect, and tell you how you can begin to understand how I felt there without having to travel to China.
Firstly, empty your freezer of all items, necessary or unnecessary. Then, splosh icy cold water all over your body. Then strip nude and stuff yourself in the freezer. Close the door. Stay in there for a few hours, then come out. Rinse and repeat
Done that yet? Yea. The final two steps were meant to simulate moment of pure solace I found in exiting the freezer after spending time outside viewing absolutely pointless ice sculptures. And as your body begins to adapt to the warmth of the tour bus's heater, absorb the heat that surrounds you, the bloody driver drives so quickly that he reaches the next stop, and we get off only to see more pointless pieces of art that were bound to melt by March in any case.
So now I'm done complaining, I think you guys might wanna hear more about the marvels of Chinese cultures. Well too bad, you've come to the wrong place, because I don't like to think of my blog as an encyclopedia. You can get those off Wikipedia or something to that extent. Instead, I'll waste more space on my blog posting more violent ranting on a particularly bad tour guide we met in China
The first thing that struck me about this joke of a guide was his funny knack for laughing at his own jokes. At first I thought he was just a humourous guy whom I might be able to get along with, but then the intensity and frequency of his laughter kept increasing, it just became annoying. And I would've forgiven him, if his jokes were even good. Sorry to disappoint, but they weren't. And I won't even bother giving an example because they probably weren't jokes in the first place. In my opinion, the old coot was just another miserable bachelor forced into falling in love with himself because no one else would do the same.
So anyway, it wasn't just his laughing that put me off -- it was his sheer arrogance. He started with his self- intro by telling us not his name, but his old job -- an english teacher. He then went off on a long rant about how good his english was and how he loved the english language and how well the foreigners he'd led on tours could understand him. WTF.
And I might have accepted that piece of boasting if he could actually speak coherent English. Too bad, the deluded old freak couldn't!. His first bit of English was attempting to explain how Japanese aggressors attacked and stuff. The dialogue went something like this:
Na me, gong da wo men de ren jiu shi ri ben jun, aggresors, ah, you know aggressors? Xian zai jiu qu can guan yi xi zhe xie aggressors. Eh, wo men jiu getting out of the bus, ah xiao xin ni men fall into the ground. Floor is srippey, ah very fallable, and stimulating.
LOLs.
So we were forced to endure his English and his boasting about how good he was at it. Bullcrap of a guide if there ever was one.
I've run out of juice to write anymore. Have to go pack for my OBS trip tommorow, and hoping I can find a backpack large enough to store my stuff. Hoping I can wake up in time as well -- I've lacked practice, having woken up at 9 for the past few weeks. Ah well.
posted by Jumbiez at
11:28 PM
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