Saturday - arriving in Chengdu SD card search

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Saturday morning came round and we were still on the train. I woke early but managed to go back to sleep and then finally headed off for breakfast with Stuart who had a hangover lol. He had been woken up by the kids who were pulling his pillow and duvet off his bed, well that's what you get for playing with kids when you are drunk :-) I had the same meal as I had for tea as I knew it was ok.



We finally got off around 12.30 and finally sorting out all the issues with the tickets we made our way to the exit and were me by two guides, Vicky and Kid. We had to hand in our passports to Kid who took them to the hostel and Vicky accompanied us on the metro to the hostel, Mr Pandas hostel :-)



We got our room keys and divvied up who was sharing with who. This time my roomies were Nitzan, Stuart and Frank. We had a couple of hours to shower and change and chill out. However no rest for me as it needed to go on the hunt for a new SD card for my camera. I got a map and directions from Vicky to where she thought I might be able to get one. So 1.5 hours later and after asking for help at a mobile phone shop I found an electrical retailer and managed to get 2 x 8GB cards as that was the only size they had and I thought they would keep me gaining until I could buy a bigger one.



In the afternoon we had the opportunity to have a mandarin and/or got for a massage by a seeing hands blind person. I wasn't really in the mood for learning mandarin and had had plenty of massages, one by a blind guy in Koh Rong, so I wasn't bothered about having the massage.



At 6.30pm we gathered to go for a Szechuan stew, the restaurant was just up the road. We sat on two tables. There was a large hole in the table with a gas burner in the middle. In it was placed a large copper bowl containing two soups, one looking ominously spicy. Dark in colour with lots of chill is and chilli seeds floating in it and a smaller one in the middle which was very mild and contained vegetables. We were also brought small bowls and plates, a tin of oil, a dish of garlic, one of coriander and of spring onions.



Basically you placed some of each ingredient into your bowl and mix it all up. You then cooked various meats, fish, vegetables and other weird and wonderful stuff (tripe, ducks blood which is a bit like pate, brains and pigs ears etc) the other table tried the blood and tripe. We had fish, assuages, beef, pork dumplings, pumpkin, quails eggs which taste like normal eggs and some odd looking vegetable which was the colour of a potato but tasted yuk. You put each item in the bubbling soups ( spicy and none spicy) which is being kept hot by the burner in the middle of the table. It takes a few minutes to cook each item then you fish them out, drop them into to mixed in your bowl and then you eat with rice or fried rice. Our guide Vicky said it usually takes about 3 hours to eat as the courses are interspersed with conversation and drink when family and friends get together. We also had endless supplies of a drink which was quite sewer and reminded me of flat coke a cola.



After dinner we took a walk to one of the big squares in the city. This was a very large square surrounded by tall buildings many of them light and performing light shows. To one side was a large white statue of chairman Mao. In the middle was a huge cut out circle with a statue representation of the yellow river in the middle. The river is very important to the people of the Szechuan province. Down inside the circle was a small shopping mall and entrance to the the tube. In the pavement were rows of lights with carvings in the paving stones.



The square was busy with friends and families and couples milling about taking in the atmosphere and sights and sounds. Kids were playing with ribbons on sticks like gymnasts use and also people playing with illuminated balls which you throw up in the air and then they float back down gently. All around the traffic flowed and of course the sound of car horns could be heard.



Around 9.30pm we walked back to the hostel, and saw some street food for sale, pigs ears and heads, intestine and small crabs on sticks, mmmm yummy not! ordered breakfast for the next morning and then headed to bed.



Xxx

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