Snow and pandas

Mmm...I am so happy. I just finished a delicious dinner of hotpot. This is definitely my favorite Chinese food, mostly because it is both an activity and a meal. At hotpot, a large steaming bowl of chili oil and broth (the hotpot) is put on a hot plate in the middle of the table and a wide variety of vegetables, tofu, meat etc. can be ordered. These are then brought out and dumped into the boiling bowl and then each participant gets to fish out the food with their chopsticks and then dump it in delicious bowls of peanut and garlic sauce. It's good fun, and very steamy and spicy. Perfect for a cold day.

The hottest hot pot I've had so far was one I had in Chengdu the week before last. Chengdu is in the Sichuan province (maybe you've heard of it?), and is known for its very spicy food. This is the province where gungbao (or we might say kungpao) chicken originated. I really liked the food there, but was not so much a fan of the rampant use of peppercorn. Peppercorns in China are small little black balls that you hardly ever notice, but when you happen to eat one, you will know, because your whole mouth will go numb. That's not an exaggeration either. They aren't really spicy but give your mouth and unpleasant tingly/numbing pain feeling that really is not desirable. At least not to me.

The week before last my students had testing. Due to my inability to speak Chinese and do anything useful, I did not have to participate in this. Therefore, I got a week off and Lili and I took a trip to Chengdu, which was awesome. The city was beautiful and had a lot more culture and charm than Zhengzhou. It was also very interesting to see people other than Han Chinese, as that is who makes up 98% of the people in Zhengzhou. There is a large Muslim population in Zhengzhou, but that's about it as far as minority groups go. Zhengzhou is very industrial (yay, textile capital of China!) and there is little architecture that would strike you as "Chinese", but Chengdu was full of old buildings and temples. It is a city that has very strong ties to Buddhism, and is located in the province next to Tibet, so these two cultures have had a strong influence on the city. At least it appeared that way to to me. It is also one of, if not the only, province in China where pandas can still be found in the wild. The panda breeding and research center is located just outside the city of Chengdu. Lili and I visited the center, and you can see numerous panda photos on my photo website. I'm sorry, they are just so cute, I couldn't help myself. I also shelled out the dough to "hold" (sit next to) one. Totally worth it.

Lili and I also visited Emei Shan, which is one of the four sacred Buddhist mountains in China. It was really beautiful. The mountain is located about two hours outside of the city, and unfortunately we didn't end up getting there until a little later than we'd originally hoped. So we hiked maybe 15 km up the mountain, and spent the night in a monastery on the mountain. This was really interesting and my have been my favorite part of the trip (besides sitting next to my friend Ling Ling of course). I'm not so sure Lili was as excited about the idea as I was, and the hike up to the monastery ended up being a bit more than we'd anticipated. But at least we had the help of "Monkey Lady" who followed us part of the way with a big stick to scare away any monkeys. After the night in the monastery, it became clear we weren't going to make it hiking to the top, so we hiked back down and took a combination of buses and a cable car to the peak. I felt a little lame not actually hiking to the summit, but we just didn't have the time. I'm so glad we did decide to go to the top though. At the "golden summit" there was a giant multi-faced statue of Buddha riding on the back of elephants. I'd seen pictures of it, but had no idea how huge it was going to be. The view from the top was also amazing. We'd been warned by other travelers that going to the top might not be worth it, since the views at this time of year are often obscured by clouds. But we were lucky and had the most amazing view. We could see all the way to the first peaks of the Himalayas. Seeing the view, I could understand how Buddhist monks used to throw themselves from the summit in ecstasy. Though I was fine settling with just a bunch of pictures (again see my picasa album). My final word is that if you ever find yourself in China, I highly suggest Chengdu.

Hmm. I'm in a half coma from all my hot pot, and can't think of much more to say. Except that last week we had a "giant" snowstorm in Zhengzhou. We got about 8 inches or so of snow, which is pretty unusual for here. I think an inch or two is common, but they don't usually get much more than that. It was also super wet and heavy snow, so trees and power lines were down, as was internet and electricity. Anywhere else might just call it a loss, but not China. Thursday morning I showed up to school and ate my breakfast (which must have been cooked over a fire) by candle light in the cafeteria, and knew I was in for an interesting day. We had no lights or heat or running water, but we still had school. I had to wear a hat and gloves and could see my breath in the dark classrooms, and yet still I had to teach 6 classes to about 200 students. So I ditched most of my lesson plan and just played Simon Says, because at least it kept the students warm. I think that may have been one of the more difficult things I've had to do. I got home and was asleep shortly after 8:00 pm. At least by then the heat was back on.

Well, I guess that's about all I've got to say. I'm hoping that my English isn't getting too terrible. I spend most of my time speaking at half speed using the simplest words possible and repeating everything at least two or three times. I'm going to come back home and sound like English is my second language. It doesn't help I've ran out of books that I brought, and now have to read whatever romance novel or werewolf story I can snag off someone. This is not helping my feelings of mental decline. Thanks goodness for http://www.sporcle.com/. Thanks to which I can now name all of the countries in the world (well except Asia, that's the continent to tackle next). If you are bored you should check it out. Best way ever to waste time.