So this week still busy, very busy – 600 customers for the breakfast almost whole week, oh snap, that totally wore my legs off. But I will be adding some Japanese restaurant pictures from previous time – that wonderful taste those smoked salmon sushi left was incredible, I could have eaten more and more. Oh, and by the way, the wasabi here is the real deal – even back home I put almost tip of my pinky of wasabi, but here – bad idea, felt like I was out of air and couldn’t breath , that is how spicy it was. And, of course, a picture of a soup bowl – which included most major things you would expect – but mainly vegetables and tofu.
During the previous week, I managed to go to a sauna with my dear colleagues (and it was for free, as one of the previous colleague opened a sauna herself) – but it was something different – here I needed to put on clothes, which are quite tedious to remove afterwards, as they stick to your body from all the sweat. But the floor sure was scorching hot, couldn’t keep my feet on the ground for too long – imagine me almost walking on burning coal. This weekend I took a trip with one of my Chinese friends to Huonglonxi (an ancient town), which still has more structures from the past. But before we move forward, I wanna say – Danes, do you really think you like to drink? Well, so do the Chinese – so we went out (whole F&B department of my hotel) for a dinner (hot-pot, to be more specific). It all started out, by choosing the food you want to put into the pot, undoubtedly. Then it started with drinks – baiju, beer, some milk mixed in between to cool down from the spiciness – but I did not want to risk drinking too much, but always when someone proposed a toast (and it happened like 14 or more times), you either needed to go bottoms up (ganbei – included in Chinese drinking customs) or just „by yourself” and drink how much you want. And I couldn’t even finish my tofu, when someone else came by – luckily I was feeling okay, as I only drank beer. In the 1st picture, it also depicts a hot-pot, to which I was invited by my colleagues into their room – and you must agree, one piece of food looks like pinecone, right? It is not, but I can tell it is something from chicken – what specifically, I couldn’t tell.
So back to Huonglonxi trip – it took some time – around 3 hours to get there (with busses and metro included), but the town was HUGE – I could not even finish my sightseeing, as we needed to head back later on. 4th picture – kinda I was thinking – did I miss something from Chinese culture(??), I couldn’t really grasp what was that thing, until I noticed that a bit further was an amusement park and this was meant to be like a prop. 5th picture shows the Dragon (in Chinese it is pronounced as „Long”) river, which flows down through the town – passing down the vitality and wonderful aura, as described by information boxes. 6th picture – it is possible to go on a small boat tour on this river (and not by boat with engine, but a man who pushes the boat with a stick – almost as gondolier in Italy) and on the other side of the bridge, was the tail part of the „dragon”, where amateur artists (or even, who only had just begun their art programme in university) drew paintings – it is also where I saw llamas’ – you could feed them, but I was not convinced by the look on their faces (as we know, llamas’ tend also to spit). Walking around and seeing all kind of these interesting services (also ear cleaning – but that is one big no for me, as these metal instruments they had were like 20cm long, and I believe they would be more fitted on performing a surgery on me rather than cleaning), but it was the first time seeing them with these type of instruments, as they mostly had smaller ones, from my previous encounters. But moving along, near one small temple, was also an teahouse, which I really enjoy – the ambient atmosphere, as traditional Chinese music is played in the background and everything is so peaceful – it is understandable now, why Chengdu’ers are considered a bit lazy and relaxed – where is the rush? Nearby the temple was a tree, to which a lot of blessing had been hanged to – by couples mostly, as explained by my friend, a.k.a my tour guide – but I had heard that if you hang it very high – the love will be more lasting and will be much happier – and indeed, I saw one of these blessing almost at the top of the tree – and it was like 15 meters high. If you walk not on the main street, where all the shops are at, but go into the side streets, you will find the real ancient town, and it was not even crowded, unlike the shopping street, for which I was surprised. But better for me, could see more – saw even group of elderly people performing „martial arts” – and we need to understand, that even Kung Fu is not about fighting, but re-directing the flow of the energy in your body – and the moves they pulled off was quite amazing – quite a nice way to stay fit both physically and mentally. And one last thing I will mention, is the Dragon and Phoenix – of course these are part of Chinese culture, as even for the Emperors it served as a symbol of power, strength and good luck to anyone, who are worthy of it, and, of course, phoenix symbolizes grace and virtue and was more appropriate for Empress, as Dragon and Phoenix create Yang and Yin. My previous blog post text ran into some troubles, which I had not noticed before, but now it is available for reading. I managed to go to Zigong. When me and two of my colleagues had a free day – we went to one of the city, which had been affected by Wenchuan earthquake back in 2008 (2-4th picture). I could have seen still some cracks on the pedestrian walk. Walking along the small corridors of the city, there was a lot of these traders, selling different type of things – ranging from food to skulls to even huge knifes. Tried out some interesting sweet thing (5th picture) – it is something like cotton candy, but instead of sugar, it is made from flour and tastes like peanuts, and is sticky like peanut butter. Even when walking along the markets, one animal sure reminded me of home – this big rooster.
So the picture with the dinosaur in the 8th picture starts with the Zigong city visit. And the roar could have been heard even 1km outside the entrance, indicating that there really is dinosaurs present. The skull in the 10th picture, believe it or not, could fit me inside and just eat me whole (and do remember I am 1,89m). 12-17th picture is the dinosaur skeletons, of course – and you can compare how big they were, as there are people along them. But as you stand near them, you do feel puny, but it was sad that another building was under a construction, so not everything could have been seen. So in the next morning, we had some quick snack – like a meat pancake, which was totally awesome – even inspired me to make something like this when I am back home. Tried out also some dumplings – omg, the best thing I have ever tried out – so they are consisting of pork bun with truffles or dumplings with vegetables +with SOUP in them, and I have no idea how they got that ready. Then off to Mt.Tazi park – and I could have not wished for a better day, as it was sunny and the weather actually was pleasant (not hold or cold) and could see a temple too, but the problem was that it was locked and we could not go in. Anyhow, new week, new adventures – we will see what is in stores for us. |
AuthorOn a self-discovery in a country down under-ish! New Zealand! Archives
May 2020
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