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Published: October 7th 2009
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After Food...
Out for the count Traveling when you are sick is the number one ‘don’t do’ in any travel book. We all know we shouldn’t, but we always think that this time is the exception. Despite this fact, the thought of frolicking with big pandas was too much of a pull for me to not go to
Chengdu, the major city within the Western Sichuan province. I am not a person who makes mistakes, but this was a mistake. It all started with a small rash on my arm which I itched with vigor. Must be a few bug bites. As a few days progressed, this little rash began to engulf my body as Venom, the symbiote life form took over Spiderman. The wildfire spread across my arms, chest and legs in particularly gruesome fashion. My skin on my right arm grew up about 3 millimeters and the growths began to fill with a pussy yellow liquid. I was not a fan. The memories of catching poison ivy on my buttocks from wearing a kilt to Sasha and Bri’s wedding came to mind, yet the mystery of this rash was, and still is unknown as I am pretty sure I was not rolling around in all
manner of poisonous Chinese plants. Luckily, I had Sophie, a kind girl from the hostel was nice enough to take me to the clinic and after much debate with the doctor, I was prescribed some pills and a nice dose of a chalky liquid. Sophie and I connected instantly as she applied the white liquid to my disgusting arm in a park. What is better to become friends over than a serious medical condition. 😊
Having left
Xi’an, the 18 hour train journey progressed, my arm excreted ample amounts of liquid and I felt worse than I had done any time yet in China. I splashed out the $10 for a single room as I suspected nobody really wanted to see my mutilated arm and I set about the next 2 days applying hydrogen peroxide on an hourly basis to clean and dry out the wound while taking antibiotics which I had thankfully brought from the US. Turns out the pills prescribed in China were the same as what I had brought, but as expected from America, my pills were larger and I had more of them, I was quite content to be an American. I drugged up, wrote,
Fearful Panda
One of the many captured panda expressions and read while trying not to dirty up the sheets with my infected body. After two days, I was ready to see daylight again. I do apologize for not telling my mother about this, but I knew you would get way too worried thinking I would die an unsightly death in China. Fortunately, after 2 weeks, any poison which was existed in my body has dispersed and I am back to full health. If anyone reading this encounters a skin infection in China, let me know, I know what to do.
The next day I shared a panda cab to use my panda card to get into the panda sanctuary to hopefully see some pandas and complete the day with panda coffee and as Steele so nicely put it…finish with some panda pie.
Chengdu is the panda capital of the world and it is hard to walk around the city without constantly being reminded of this overly cute animal. Two Australians shared this experience with me, Steele and Amber had recently travelled from Indonesia where they had trekked through jungles catching fish with their bare hands, playing with orangutans, and lighting large fires to keep away wild tigers so
Hotpot
Sarah and I eating some hotpot seeing the docile panda was on all of our lists as a must see while in
Chengdu. We are one with the wild…more them then me, but still. We arrived at 8am, an hour prior to feeding. The thing with the panda is that it is quite a lazy creature who eats and then generally sleeps the day away. I found great comparison with the American college student. Please review the attached video for reference. But regardless of how lazy they are, damn are they cute. The 2009 Noble Prize in Physics was given yesterday in half to William S. Boyle and George E. Smith for their work on imaging technology. To not get too technological for everyone, because of their work, I was successfully able to snap 200 pictures of large black and white creatures within an hour. As many times as I put my camera away, I would always take it back out when the ‘ooohhhhhsss’ and ‘aaahhhhhsss’ sounded as a panda would begin to start doing something new. 100 more photographs later and I was glad to know I had captured every possible panda pose there is. The only thing which none of us decided to do
(even thought I could secretly tell Amber really wanted to) was fondle a panda. For a mere 1000Y ($130) you could have one of these beasts thrown on your lap to get the perfect photograph opportunity. In my past I have spent money on stupider things which probably have given me less pleasure than holding a large panda creature, but here, that amount of money keeps me fed for a month so I let the many other willing Chinese feel up this particular animal.
Sichuan is well known for the traditional spicy hot pot. A large vat of chilies with oil(more chilies than oil) gets placed in front of you and you dip meat, veggies, mushrooms and other such delights in. As much as I wanted to sweat and not feel the insides of my mouth, both times I ate hot pot, one time with Steele and Amber and the other with my fellow German teacher girls, we decided on the not-so-spicy-with-fish-head-floating-in-the-bottom-hotpot. I must admit that this has been one of my favorite meals in China so far. Having cooked your meat in the vat, you dip it back into your individual bowl of seasame oil, hoisin sauce, salt,
Red Panda
"Hold a red panda for a discounted price" - almost feels like the real thing garlic and spring onion. The explosion of this hitting your mouth can easily be explained in the uncommon term of an ‘orgasm’, for that is what it is.
Having missed out on Jiuzhaigou, one of the most renound national parks in China due to a certain skin infection, I am off to
Lijiang in the Yunnan province to meet up with a fellow traveler, Hugo, the Brazilian whom I met in Pingyao. From there we are off to the mountains of Tiger Leaping Gorge to hike.
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Alexandra
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Ok I changed my mind...I no longer want a parasol...I want a red panda please and thank you!!