Calm Spirit / Ying Yu Jade China Trip 2009
Guangzhou Shopping
This is the rainy season in Guangzhou, although every time I've been here it's the "rainy season". I don't melt, although my hair frizzes dreadfully, so I went to Shamian Park for tai chi and to see what's going on. Again, mostly hackey sack! Some dancing, lots of singing, a few tai chi players. No one swimming in the river this time, maybe they outlawed swimming because it's a filthy and not very safe river.
The day before we dropped off some of our clothes at a shop across the
street from the hotel that does laundry. Most days we get so filthy that
we can't wear the same clothes twice. We know we will go out and get filthy
again, but we just can't put on those same clothes from the day before!
The laundry was less than $2 per pair of pants, so we each left two pairs.
They were supposed to be ready in the morning but the shop was closed
up tight. We hoped the shop owner didn't make her daily profits on the
sale of our well made Western clothes!
Then shopping. The luckiest "find" being the crystal etched
pendants I'd been trying to get a new supply for three years. We walked
into a huge, huge indoor wholesale market that has thousands of shops,
9 floors, and the very first shop had the crystals and a great price,
what luck! You can't imagine this market, it's the biggest, most crowded
and packed place I've ever seen. It is so overwhelming that I had been
having nightmares about trying to find those crystals there, and then
to find them right away was a miracle.
Yes, there are Christian churches in China
Fortunately, the shop where
we left our laundry was open, and we have clean clothes for tomorrow.
The lack of sleep really caught up with us this day. When people ask if
we had a good time in China, I have to say that yes, it was a good time,
but when I'm so tired from not sleeping and time is "backwards",
I'm thinking in English and Chinese, trying to interpret situations not
only Western, but by Eastern thought, and everything we buy is cash only,
merchants don't take credit cards so there's the brain always converting
currency to make sure I'm getting a "good deal", AND then bargaining
for everything. I don't want to miss anything going on, as I do try to
be present in the moment, and then I realize I'm missing great photos
for the web site. You'll probably notice that some days there are fewer
photos, and the reason is that I'm appreciating the moment instead of
taking photos of it!
Guangdong Victory Hotel, this
is the main building and
we stay in the smaller building you can see in the rear
The internet in the Victory Hotel doesn't work after about 8 AM, so instead
of trying to upload to the blog I watched a Chinese style reality show
for foreigners, "Guangzhou Today", which teams of two, a Chinese
woman and a Western man, perform cultural tasks, and the team that does
the worst gets "fired". They do these tasks in Guangzhou, and
it's really interesting and amusing. Another thing that's interesting
and not amusing is that all the electrical things, including the lights
and television are operated on a bedside console that is not in English.
One of us always has to go around and turn everything off because we can
never figure it out. If you ever stayed in a Chinese style hotel, these
systems are really common. And when you get it all figured out, then leave
your room, the staff comes in and "does something" in your room,
and changes it all around again. The room key card inserts in a slot inside
the door that turns on the room's electricity, and when you leave you
take it out so the electricity is turned off, which also signals the room
is vacant. One time we left our room then realized we forgot things and
returned but didn't put our card in the slot, and it appeared from the
outside we were gone, and the room attendant came in (because they ALWAYS
come in as soon as you leave) and we startled the heck out of each other!
