Enough of the fan letter business, I know that you are all dying to know what I did this weekend, because I am dying to know the same thing. I kind of forgot. Oh yeah, this weekend everyone in the program all went to the “Nong Cun” (that is Chinese for country side, or village area, or Chinese ghetto, whatever explanation you understand most). I know what you are think, why would anyone want to go to the Nong Cun? I asked the teachers that took us the same question, but even though we were in the Cun all weekend it was still fun, all except for the part when we got lost in the woods and our guide left us in the middle of nowhere. But that part of the story comes later.
On Friday night, we all took the night train to Wenzhou, Wenzhou is actually the city my roommate is from, but we did not go to the area that he lives, which is supposedly nice. We went to the outskirts of the city, something like instead of going to Boston to go have fun, you go to Middlebury. Because we took the night train to Wenzhou we arrived hella early. Once we got to we all had to take a bus to go to the actual place. The bus ride to the Nong Cun was filled with beautiful scenery and sights off the local people hard at work. I don’t actually know any of this for fact because I was doing this:
But I heard it was really nice. And the few times that I raised my head from my wonderful slimber, probably the best sleep I got all trip, the scenery was really beautiful.
Once we finally arrived to the Nong Cun, I was disappointed to see that the snow had continued to get heavier. However, I was not disappointed to see the Nong Cun that we were staying at. It was actually really nice.
This picture does not do it just but the scenery around the Cun was nice and the snow gave it a little flavor. The best part about the place was all the animals that were running around randomly. They had geese, chickens, dogs, and cows; they probably had other things pigs before we came. But I think that we ate most of them for lunch and dinner. Here is a randow cow and her calf running around the Cun, like they owned the place or something.
Those cows are like I don’t eat red meat. But anyway, after some free time on our own we all assembled to go on a hike through the mountains of this Nong Cun. Some people came well prepared. For example her:
I didn’t realize how well hospital shoes helped with hiking. I don’t really know how the helped but she seemed to think that they would help in some way. Maybe because hospital shoes have a lot of traction on the bottom.
The start of the hike was not that difficult. It was actually a nice relaxed hike through what seemed to be just he hills behind the Nong Cun. Here is what the start of the trail looked like:
But I was very mistaken. The path started to get steeper and more slippery as we went future and then finally. There was no path. At first our awesome tour guide with the super sweet sunglasses:
Was leading the way for us. Then all of a sudden he disappeared. It was like he was some guest with leading us through the forest with really awesome sunglasses to protect his eyes from the snow. But since he left we decided to follow the train of others that came before us. I don’t know what kind of route the people that came before us went on, but it was like they were on crack when they decided to chose there direction, and we are dumb asses for following them. This is what the route looked like:
Because the route was not really a route, and more like Tarzan jumping around through the forest, many people lost their footing on the trail Here is Cahill biting it.
And here is Jamie in the same spot as Cahill, doing the same thing.
But the funniest part about Jamie biting it is that she took people out with her. You can’t see it in the picture but Jamie took out this little Chinese girl that was standing in front of her. After a while we finally caught up with the group who’s path we were following and our tour guide.Some how he knew what direction we were going and meet up in front of us with the other group. I tell you he was some guess type creater, creter, crater, creyter, he was some ghost type thing. After we finally meet up with the rest of the group we took a snack break.
Yabazaba, you’re my only friend. When you are hungry, let me tell you a snickers really does satisfy the hunger. When the break was over, we finally descended down the mountain, but this time through a much better trail. The best part of the descending was any time that we got to flat land that was safe enough to walk on. People started ambushing each other with snowballs. It was like World War 0.0001 with snowballs.
After that we all went back to our rooms for a little while to kill time before dinner. The best part about the Nong Cun in freezing cold weather when you are all wet, is that there is no heat. This me chillin the bed with the girl that Jamie took out, and me trying my hardest to catch a cold. I succeed too.
After sitting freezing in the rooms it was time for dinner. I never realized how much that Chinese people love American Republican leaders, and the really like Jordan too. I mean, Jordan did score 63 points in a single game, who wouldn’t love Jordan. And apparently, I look like Jordan. Maybe its my bald head, but you decide.
Because I too love our American Republican leaders, I tried to imitate my favorite one of them all.
Do you think I look like him? I mean he is my cousin on my mother’s uncle’s brother’s father’s sister’s mother’s dog’s roommate’s side of the family. So I should looke like him a little bit. After dinner we all went a did the tradition thing that everyone does a hike. We went and roasted marshmallows. No, I am just kidding we are China, chinese people don’t roast marshmallows. We did something better, we roasted goat meat and sweet potatoes.
I didn’t really roast anything but my feet as you can see in the picture. I most admit, the roasted sweet potatoes where pretty damn good. I didn’t really eat much of the goat meat because I was afraid of getting the la duzi again. I am just no starting to gain back weight. I can’t let myself look like a cancer patient again. After roasting the meat, I went to bed. The bed that I slept in was pretty awesome.
I think it was a traditional style Nong Cun bed but who knows. The bed was nice and soft, but the only thing was the room was cold as hell, so I didn’t get much sleep that night. The next morning was great because the sun finally came out and it stopped snowing.
The Nong Cun looked nice in the sun light, but I was ready to get the hell out of there and go to a new place. We ended up going to a different Nong Cun. It was the rival Nong Cun. There is often rival gangs fights between these two Nong Cuns. Here is the gang colors of the other Nong Cun we went to:
I think there gang colors are flipping sweet. I really want to get a suit like that. I like this new Nong Cun better than the one we stayed in, it has water front housing and with majesticalestic mountains in the back. Majesticalestic means majestic with a little cal and estic added to the back. Here is my roommate stand on some water front properity.
This Nong Cun is really famous for its honey. Everyone was afraid but I went and spoke with the bee keepers about there honey making tactics.
But once everyone saw that I didn’t get stung they all came over to have a look too. Unfortuately, Clark got stung on the nose and his nose swelled up like a ballon.
The rest of Clark swelled up because of the price of beer in China. And maybe all the Chinese food he has been eaten contributed to it too.
I really liked this Nong Cun for another reason. I reminded me of the summer I spent in the South with me grandma except everything in the Nong Cun was Chinese. But this Nong Cun had a lot similars to the south for example, this Church in the middle of the fields with one dirty road leading to it.
Jesus Walks, even in the Nong Cun of China. Another thing that reminded me of the South is that families just sit on the porch and talk on Sunday afternoons.
I though that this Nong Cun was a really cool place. It had a really peaceful feel to it. After going to that Nong Cun we went to this place with beautiful scenery and lots of waterfalls. The water falls and the mountains were like something I have never seen before, probably because it was a place I had never seen before.
At the every top of this mountain waterfall area was another Nong Cun.
It also had this bull. This bull really didn’t like foreigners. Everytime we tried to walk by it, it started going crazy. Finally, I challegened him to a butting heads contest, but he didn’t want to ram with me. He got scared.
Maybe because I wasn’t wearing red. After the waterfall place we caught the train back to Hangzhou.
And yesterday, I went to Xi Hu (West Lake). Xi Hu is a really famous like in China. It is supposed to be one of the most beautiful lakes china has to offer. It really reminded me a lot of Lake Washington. Here are some the pics. It was a cloudy day today so the pictures might not be that great, but enjoy them anyway.
And today, my only plans are to have dinner with Golze’s family. I wish my family and friends were considerate enough to come visit me or ate least give me a call or write or something. Well anyway, I’m out.
Oh yeah, I heard that the phone number people tried didn’t work so here it is again.
This is the cell number: 011-86-137-3823-1315
This is the room number: 011-86-571-8881-7128
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