Chengdu you do

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it's 3 in the morning here and i'm wide awake. It's my own fault...i
haven't been able to stay up past 7 since we got here. we leave for the
airport in about 4 hours.....off to lhasa woo hoo.
Chengdu isn't exactly the most beautiful city in the whole world, but
it's not the worst i've seen either. it's kind of stuck in mediocrity.
There are lots of people, lots of tall buildings.....so original for a city.
For some reason the really young kids here have slits in their pants.
we saw a little boy being carried around on a chair of some sort and his
pants had a hole cut out for his unit. i guess it's more eco friendly than
diapers?
People here don't believe in planting things. From the road medians to
the parks to the ponds, every single plant is in a pot.
'thank you' in chinese (mandarin) is pronounced "shee shee." That's as
far as i've gotten.
People's Park is a nice little sanctuary in the middle of the city.....if
you can ignore the blasting kareoke music. we watched this guy playing
violin in the park and just for us he broke into a rockabilly dance
translation of 'jingle bells'. In People's Park, people come to ballroom
dance and to do some strange combination of tai chi and dance. They saw us
watching and made me join in. Afterwards a crowd of people huddled around
us and wanted our signature on a notebook. They were all speaking in
chinese and looking at us like we were exotic gorillas.
Speaking of animals, we saw some pandas yesterday. They were cute.
We have befriended an israeli couple. They took us to a really nice
local restaurant yesterday. Max has suddenly developed a staccato israeli
accent, even when he is addressing me. It's similar to the radio voice he
breaks out around new people.....but with more hand gestures and shrugging
and the israeli twang. i make fun of him for it.

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Photos

movin on up
more buildings to come for chengdu

i just wanna dance
the locals dragged me in and tried to make me learn the dance routine they were doing