Raise your hand to the moon

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Full Moon Festival is to China, what Thanksgiving is to America, and Christmas is to Australia. Mr Lou kindly included me in his familys' Full Moon Celebration. Ping pong table laden with food, on the 6th floor patio, overlooking the river and downtown Jinhua, we watched the moon rising. Mr Lou's mother sent two daughters and oldest son-in-law back to the kitchen to prepare more dishes, because they had not prepared enough food for their vegetarian guest. Shu Yan (14yo nephew) recited "Raise your hand to the moon, bow your head and remember home" for my benefit, while Mr Lou's sisters quizzed me on how sad I was feeling away from family and friends on such an important occasion. After watching hundreds of Kongming Lanterns float across the city skyline, we then watched "The Voice of China" (Australian Idol equivalent).

Sharp Point Mountain has 1848 steps to reach the top. A constant stream of climbers pushed their children towards me, "Hello, Nice to meet you." then snapped a photo. Young men carrying Chinese flags raced past me, as their excursion on National Day. I was encouraged and supported by a number of local university students, taking a break from their schedules. The two girls who escorted me, patiently advised me to be careful in rough spots, and found me benches to rest on when I slowed up for the whole two hours it took me to get to the top. The girls who gave up seats to our party at the top, shared their snacks with us, and accepted my invitation to afternoon tea at my place. My guides turned out to be post grad students who took me back to their lab at the school of Physical Chemisty. All five girls showed up at my apartment on Saturday for afternoon tea, and are taking me on a shopping and cooking excursion next Saturday. Ah! Chance meetings.

Long you is a very small city of half a million people, one hours drive away, on the express way by BMW. The local food specialities include 3 types of chillies, and every restaurant has a view of the river. Scenic spots visited were a village of rescued manor houses being used as film sets for period piece soap operas, and a mysterious series of 26 hand carved grottos that could hide a large civilization that went unrecorded in 2000 years of local written history. Most remarkable was the 40 minute walk up a mountain to a village that until 6 years ago was only accessable by the pebbled path through the thickly wooded hillside. Persimmon trees as tall as three story houses, bamboo, chestnuts, corn and poultry are the staple crops of the village. Since the road was installed, the villagers have become more prosperous by opening their houses to show authentic rural peasant lifestyles and cooking meals for tourists. Our dinner was served in a small rotunda, surrounded by ancient trees with a view of sunset over the mountains. The stars twinkled in a black sky! Mr Lou, Shu Yan and Dee were excellent travel companions. Dee's parents, who had voluntarily given up their home in another isolated hilltop village (to be levelled to the ground on their moving out) welcomed us as their first guests for lunch, before that evenings house warming celebrations.

One more day of holidays before school resumes.

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Photos

Full Moon Festival dinner
On the balcony, under the light of the full moon

Sharp Point Mountain
The goal of my excursion was to climb to the sharpest point

Mountain Top
Goal achieved

In the Chemistry Lab
My escorts were Post Grad students from the department of physical chemistry

Dragon Lanterns
with my travel companions Mr Lou, Shu Yan and Dee /Jasmin

Making tofu
the old fashioned way

Comments

[Trees]

what an adventure
what an adventure..... how is the vego option going?? I m loving reading about your adventures, hows the language learning and speaking.....not to mention 'cultural etiqettes'? Seems like its only when you are immersed in someone elses culture that one begins to realise how very different it can be. xxtrees

[paid to travel]

cultural etiquette
from one well travelled woman to another, the cultural mistakes just keep rolling in. this is a shoes off, slippers on at the door culture, and when my uni girls came to visit, I bought what i thought were throw away shoe covers. was wondering why several went barefoot, until I realized that the throw aways were knickers, not shoes!!