Hey there.

So, been a long time. I want to explain what's been going on with me for the past 3 months. Unfortunately it is something I am not happy about, so we're going to keep this one low-key. No photos, no social media sharing. But I need to write it somewhere, so here it is.

I have been doing the final module of the Cambridge Delta. I've mentioned it many times on this blog before, but basically it's a big teaching certification Ella and I started about 4 years ago. Fortunately it comes in parts, and I finished the last part just recently (well, I think I did anyway. We'll need to wait a few months for the final result, but even a fail means I just need to re-do one task). I'm going to write a whole entry sometime later on the process for people in the "industry" so to speak, but this is more of a personal take (spoiler alert - I have a pretty low opinion of it).

Something about this final module that the other two don't have is that it is a more traditional school experience. You have weekly classes with homework, of sorts. In comparison, the other two were a large test you cram for, and a big research paper to write. But those are entirely on your own time. Additionally, the other thing that is different from this part and the others is that it is a lot of work.

A.

lot.

of.

work.

I mean, the others weren't nothing. But I felt they were achievable. For this one, I did the less intensive, "part time" schedule for people who also have a job. I would say that was a giant mistake on me, but really it's a giant mistake on THEM. Because you cannot accomplish this on a regular work schedule, unless you're A) So qualified and knowledgeable you don't need this cert anyway, or B) Your job has an incredible amount of free time, like working a night shift desk or something. Now, despite my job being very chill in comparison to any full time job ever in the US, there was nowhere near enough time to do everything.

This was uncomfortable for me, to say the least. I am not a procrastinator. I hate to be late for anything. Heck, if I'm more than 10 minutes late to meet friends I feel like I've betrayed them. So I've kind of structured my life around doing things as early as possible to never get in that situation. So then I get this course, which requires me to write a research-heavy background paper, a very detailed and technical lesson plan, and to prepare to teach a class on it. Overall, probably about 30 pages together. Also you have one week to do it, keeping in mind your entire Sunday is taken up by classes.

Yeah. It sucks.

Thankfully that is not every week, but that is the timeframe you have. And this does not mention the mountain of other work you have on top of that. Again, this is the PART TIME pace. Full time is double that. So consequently, in those 3 months, I saw my friends 3 times. My life was going to work, coming home, working until I slept, and every weekend, working nonstop. My only source of entertainment was browsing Reddit during the taxi ride to work, and watching TV when eating dinner. And I really mean that. There was no "squeeze in an hour for a game", or "grab one drink Saturday night". There was really nothing. Ella basically took care of all the daily house stuff, and helped where she could. Even we didn't really have any time to speak for that time. As you can imagine, this did WONDERS for my mental health.

By wonders, I mean it was terrible.

I commented to Ella during one of my many, many mental breakdowns, that this was the low point in my life. And I absolutely believe that. Somewhere mid September to mid October, I was the most unhappy I have ever been. It sounds weird to type that out. But it's true. Certainly there have been times where I was more unhappy, but they were for a much shorter period. In terms of counting up the misery scale of my life, Sept and Oct 2022 will forever be up there as a time as a terrible time I will never want to visit again.

And perhaps you, reading this, will think "C'mon, it couldn't have been that bad." or "Okay, you're being over dramatic, it's just an online course". I hear you. I would think the same. But I know how I felt. And if there is any silver lining to this whole program, I learned a lot about how my brain works. First, it does not do well with tight deadlines. However it is more complicated than that. I have definitely missed deadlines before, like at work for example. Although this usually is a conversation with the boss that goes like "Look, I'm sorry. We just can't accomplish this in the time allowed. We need a Plan B" And, in my mind, I don't "care" about work. I do of course, but I know that as long as I'm trying, things will be okay. Or if not, my position is incredibly in demand, so no problem. For this program though, it's all me. Now, more than ever, I know that I never want to be the boss of something. I need some downtime, and if that means I make less money in life, so be it. I'd rather be poorer and happy than rich and miserable.

Second, is that this is almost assuredly where my professional development ends. Partially because Delta is really, just about the highest you can go in the English teaching world. I mean, I have never met anyone else in this field who has done it. But also, because I am not cut out to be a student anymore. I'm not sure how much of this is Cambridge's completely insane requirements of writing and in general, how they go about things. But I find navigating the instructions, research, writing, and just the whole process, incredibly frustrating. And it becomes more frustrating the older I get. Perhaps I will consider some other professional development, but it will be much lower stakes and on a short timeframe. And almost certainly not with Cambridge.

Third. And this is a big one. I think how we talk about mental health has been a "kidding, maybe not kidding" sort of thing. Like, "Oh yeah, I have crippling anxiety, haha." And it is hard to tell if this is just people putting themself down for a laugh, or if they really mean it. I think it's unfortunate that that's become the way we talk about things. Because as for me, I've been incredibly lucky to never have mental health issues until now. So I was completely unequipped to handle it. That means when people, even my instructors and classmates asked me "Hey how's it going?" in a "hello" kind of way, I was straight up honest. I'd say I was doing terribly because xyz. Based on the surprised looks, I think this definitely bucked some social norms. Is this a good strategy to speak to people? I have no idea, it's new to me. However, in the future, if people do a "kidding not kidding" answer, I think it would be a good idea to keep the mood light, but follow up with a "Okay seriously though, are you okay?"

So, yeah, lessons learned. I guess if I look at this experience as "You learned more about yourself, and to be more empathetic", it sounds like a good deal. However the amount of suffering I had to go through to get there was... terrible, to say the least. But really, I did not get through it. Ella pulled me through it. You know when people give acceptance speeches or whatever, and say "I couldn't have done this without my wife/husband"? Maybe they're just saying it to be nice. But if they are sincere, this is the first time I really understand what they mean. Ella did everything for us, because I did not have the time or mental capacity to. I know she suffered as well, to have to pick up the slack for her husband, who, despite his unbelievable effort, was still falling short. Her love and support was unbelievably valuable, and this whole experience brought us closer together than ever before. I can never thank her enough.

That being said, let's never do this again.

As always, me complaining = cats

The summer travel train keeps on going.

I am going to title this entry "Full of Surprises". It has a short backstory to it, and it's my blog, so I'm going to tell you. Ella really wanted to visit a beach this summer, so after the last entry in Ningbo, we had planned to go to some islands near Shanghai for some island life. BUT, it turns out, because we are black sheep from Shanghai, we faced a series of "Nos". To start, I feel I need to shortly remind people that China is a bit crazy with "dynamic zero COVID". You need to show a travel code to go everywhere which shows where you've been. And, after the lockdown we had, everyone is terrified for any case pops up on their watch. I mean, aside from the public health reason, almost assuredly it will be career ending for the local authorities that let it happen. Still, we were already in the province, had checked official regulations, and just to be extra safe have been testing every 48 hours. So first, the island hotels said "We don't think you can come here.", which is not great. And a call to the port confirmed it - somewhere along the chain had decided nobody who has been to Shanghai within two weeks can come. Ugh. Fine. The city with the ferry, Zhoushan, has some nice beaches as well. We'll just go over there. And it turns out yes, you can go there. But the area with the beaches, again, someone decided you are not allowed there, unless you have been out of Shanghai for one week. Argh! One week was 4 days away, and we did not really feel up to waiting around for our Shanghai travel code to clear. Fine. You don't want us, we don't want you. Zhejiang is on the sea, there are beaches, right?

Our research says yes, but they're probably not worth it. We found one about 4 hours away, and the photos made it look kind of muddy. We also considered the worst case scenario that we would show up there, and some overzealous security guard would not let us in. So we just decided to cut our losses, decided this whole beach thing is not worth it, and we'll just go home. However, I did have a Plan B, although I wasn't exactly thrilled about it. You see, Shanghai actually has a beach. (I mean, its name, "Shang" means "on", and "Hai" means "sea".) But here are some of the amazing things I have heard about Shanghai's Jinshan Beach:

"Muddy cesspool"

"Crowded mess of terribleness"

"Cheap copy of a beach"

"You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy"

Especially after living in Thailand for years, I was expecting to be extremely underwhelmed. But still, I thought, if we went with friends, we could make it fun, at least poking fun at how bad it is. So we packed the cooler, met up with good people, and headed out.

First surprise - There is a train almost directly to the beach from Shanghai South Station, which operates basically like a metro - so no checking in, no buying tickets online, or anything. After some initial confusion on where the entrance was, it really was easy peasy, although the trains leave about every 30 minutes as opposed to the metro's 2 minutes. It's a high speed line, and despite the coast being about 55km away from the city, it only takes about 30 minutes from end to end. The train was really comfortable and pretty empty - we even got to share a table to sit together. It cost us all a whopping 10 yuan ($1.70). We arrived in the afternoon, and checked into our hotel.

Second surprise - the hotel was actually really good, way beyond what I'd expect. In truth we didn't have many options on hotels that accept foreigners that were near the beach, so it was more or less this one or one much further out. I know Ella and I would be okay with it no matter what, because we are absolutely not fancy travelers. I mean, motels would be fancy for us. I was a bit worried out traveling companions though, because well... they probably have higher standards. Turns out no, this hotel was pretty affordable and quite nice. It even had a robot butler, which, I am glad that's a thing in China now. It also had the longest straight hallway I have ever seen in my life, which I was pretty excited about. While that is all well and good, it was very new and clean, with a pretty decent Chinese breakfast buffet that we took advantage of the next morning. But now, it's off to the probably very underwhelming beach.

Third (and best) surprise - the beach was way beyond my expectations. I guess it was because everyone undersold it so much, but honestly, it was really nice! Heck, I've been to worse beaches in Thailand. I've also been to considerably better beaches in Thailand, but still I'd give this beach a 7/10. Supposedly they imported all the sand from Hainan island in the south, but hey, who cares - it's here now, and it feels soft and nice on my feet. There was a breakwater offshore, so the waves were pretty small, but still, you had the beach sound. You could even go swimming, which is like "Duh?" but honestly, China is strangely weird about that. They had lifeguards in chairs on stilts literally about every 10 meters, that I think if you started to drown they could just reach down and pick you up. You also couldn't go too far out, maybe chest deep at most. But hey, it's a beach! And a pretty good one! Even though it was a Tuesday, there were a fair number of people, but it wasn't super crowded. Fortunately we took a walk just 100-200 meters away from the gate, and we found a spot with plenty of room. After the sun went down and people started to filter out, we had a big stretch the beach basically to ourselves. Heck, they even have a few restaurants near the entrance, which are a bit overpriced but did sell seafood BBQ. And hey, this is still holiday, right? We got a few very large sticks of grilled squid, which was surprisingly good. But not wanting to make a full meal out of it, we tried our luck to order delivery from a restaurant outside. They delivered it, along with some beer, to the gate, again with no fuss. We spent the afternoon and evening chilling, eating, and drinking a ridiculous amount of beer. It was honestly one of the coolest holidays I've had in China, sitting right here in Shanghai this whole time.

But unfortunately, at around 9 an employee came up to us to tell us the beach is closing. After hanging out there for 5 hours though, that was fine. We went back to the hotel to decide what to do next, and thought we might as well go to a bar. Truthfully, Jinshan is not a night life place, so our options, again, were few. But with the girls wanting to rest, the four guys went out to the one bar on the map nearby.

Hello surprise number four.

This bar is not a place foreigners come to. In fact, I would bet money we are the first foreigners who had ever been there. It is very nondescript, sort of hiding under an apartment building next to a bridge in an unassuming part of town. There were only three customers in there, although, again, Tuesday night. The owner spoke in broken English that he has Kirin on draft. One of my friends ordered a large, which you would think is a pint or so. Nope. It is Oktoberfest style large, one of those giant steins as big as your head, for 30 yuan ($4.40) I had already consumed a ridiculous amount of beer that day, and saw he had bottles of liquor, so I asked for a gin and tonic. He said the other bartender is not here, and he doesn't know how to make it. I mean, despite the name also being the instructions, I really did not want beer. So I jokingly asked "Can I make it?"

"Okay!"

So here I was, behind the bar, searching for his gin, which I finally found hiding behind some other bottles. I did eventually find it, but more surprisingly I also found a dog. He was a very friendly and old dog who probably would sprain his tail from wagging it so hard greeting new people. Now up one self-made GnT and a new friend, the surprises did not stop. It turns out the bartender, the owner, was from Inner Mongolia and used to play in a band. He went up on stage, got a piano, guitar, and belted out a mix of English, Mandarin, and local dialect songs. He completely killed it, which, wow, did not expect that! He asked if any of us play, which, one of our friends definitely does. Said friend is quite talented actually, and gave a great performance for the three very surprised Chinese people in the bar, and then eventually just us, because we shut the place down. As the owner was turning out the lights behind us, he walked us around the bar, showing us all the posters of his band from their glory days, and all the art he made that he decorated the bar with. Truly an awesome dude that would fit in so well in Thailand.

We tried calling a Didi, but after waiting about 10 minutes, there were no takers - unsurprising given the time and place. We had resigned to a 30 minute walk back, unless we lucked out and found some rental bikes. (Small) surprise number five. No sooner than when we said that, we turned a corner and there were exactly four rental bikes for our group. After a very ridiculous bike ride back, and a rougher morning with a lot of coffee, we got back to Shanghai a little after lunch, almost exactly 24 hours after we left. 

In fact, we liked it so much, we did it again about a week later. Still the same procedure, although even better this time we all got to the bar. It was essentially a repeat of last time, with some new friends. So yeah, I guess you could say we're a fan of Jinshan City Beach. Who knew? It gets a bad rap, which is undeserved, at least for a weekday. I suspect on the weekend it will be nuts, so maybe that's not the best time to go. But I'm going to be the lookout for school holidays that are not work holidays, because it's a great and convenient getaway.

 

So, summer travel is over. Time to settle down and get back to work, right?

Nah... there is still time left, even though a giant deadline is looming large. Not only is the semester starting soonish, I'm also booked to do the final module of the DELTA. I've mentioned it occasionally on this blog for the past 4 years (oh god, we started that long ago?), but the DELTA is a Cambridge English teaching certification. This is literally the highest you can go besides a PhD I guess, which I have no plans on doing. Actually, starting this one, and knowing what the other two modules were, has been filling me with an unusual amount of anxiety. I'm going to be doing it while working, which I would only attempt because I'm taking it on a more spread out schedule, and I'm teaching the exact same classes as last year - so no need to prepare things again. Still, maybe as I get older, I have less and less desire to be back in school or do professional development. So I am eager to finish this one, only because, again, there's really nothing higher to aspire to. Not to say I'll never do another cert, but, certainly none as intensive I hope.

While there is a lot I need to get done before then, that is still 3 weeks away. So let's start by wishing Ella happy birthday! She wanted to go to the zoo, which I was also pretty keen on. We had visited the zoo once before, years ago, in the winter when my parents visited. Honestly, not the best time to visit, but then again, the middle of summer also isn't the best for different reasons. But still, with plenty of sunscreen and water, we set out, and saw some cute things... and not cute things. Of course pandas are often the main sight to see in China, but after Chengdu I doubt any other panda encounters could compare. And yeah, I was right. Go to Chengdu to see pandas if you can, because that is a pretty great experience. Pandas in other zoos just kind of sit there and eat bamboo. You might say, well, "what else would they do?" and fair point. But the ones in Chengdu were quite active and playful, so, yeah, that's a better than a zoo. I mean, look at this guy - kind of okay I guess, but just eating and chilling. Fine I guess, but do you know which panda is cuter? Red pandas. I'm going on record here, giant pandas are dumb bamboo trash bins. Red pandas on the other hand? Adorable cat bears. Science, I know you're busy with things like, curing cancer, but if you can find the time to make house red pandas I'd appreciate it.

Anyway, for dinner that evening we went to The Cheesecake Factory, which was incredibly indulgent as always. I know that may sound weird to many Americans, but getting a giant plate of things cooked in pounds of butter is not a regular thing in Asia, for better or worse (probably better to be honest). Stumbling home with a full stomach and a box of leftovers, I was still eager for a holiday somewhere else. But of course, with China being China, our choices were limited to the provinces that will accept us black sheep. In truth things are a little more open now, but we had talked about visiting this place when things weren't, so by golly we're sticking to it. It's not exactly a far away destination, the next door province of Zhejiang. Obligatory, "I've been there before." In fact, I lived there before. Zhejiang is the province the city of Hangzhou is in, my first home in China. Ella and I have been to Hangzhou before on a day trip, and although there is a bit more to see there, we decided it's probably not worth the time just to see the scattered sites that half of us have seen already. So instead, it was off to Ningbo.

Alright, actually, I've been to Ningbo before as well, although I have to go waaaaay back in the blog to find that entry. And to be honest I don't remember much about Ningbo. It was a quick day trip 10 years ago with some coworkers, and we had a local that more or less shuttled us around. As fast as China develops, a decade ago is basically the same as saying a century ago. I remember seeing a temple in the mountains. Nice at the time, but by now I've seen enough temples for several lifetimes. Now Ningbo is a town of 8 million, not far behind Hangzhou's 12. The first day we arrived we took a nap before heading out to see the night markets. The first, at the drum tower, is pretty nice with lots of food. It is small though, and seems to just be a place to eat more than anything. We then went to the South Bank walking street, which was architecturally a bit more interesting but pretty sleepy. Finally we went to Mr. Box, an eclectic art and drinking sort of area made out of shipping containers. Unfortunately most everything was closed on Monday, and we got caught in a downpour. We took refuge under a bridge until we found a place that had a sign, in English, that said "Barbecue and Beer". And just like The Sound of Music, ~these are a few of my favorite things.~ That BBQ and beer place would turn out to be one of the best kept secrets of Ningbo. It was Korean style where you cook at your table over hot coals, with cheap draft beer to go around. Now full of meat and beer, we went back to the hotel only to be given a complimentary cocktail for the night. Yes I will, thank you. After a night's sleep, we set out to see what Ningbo really had to offer.

I think our favorite thing was probably the Ningbo Museum, which was really well done and one of the better museums in China. I would have been happy with just that, but when we got there we saw their temporary exhibit was the dinosaurs of China. A big yes to that!! They had a lot of animatronic dinosaurs moving around, so I was beyond thrilled. I don't care how old you are, a roaring T-Rex robot is just pure happiness.

After being a little disappointed with the lack of Ningbo nightlife from the previous night, we took another shot and went to the Old Bund with low expectations. It turned out though, that this is where all the cool stuff was hiding. First it had an Art Museum which Ella of course liked. There is also a very nice looking church that was actually having mass when we arrived. That's pretty unusual in China nowadays, as most have been closed apparently for COVID reasons. After mass a woman talked to us a bit about the history of the place, which was nice. For me though, the view of the river and the packed bar street was the draw of The Old Bund. The bar street was really busy and full of cool places, even on a weeknight, so that was a pleasant surprise. We managed to find a bar owned by a very outgoing Italian guy who has possibly the largest, fluffiest, and most friendly dog I've ever met. Honestly, it was so fluffy I don't know where fur ended and dog began. Ella was thrilled to pet this fluffer, who was also eager to pose for photos. On top of that, the food and drinks were great and pretty inexpensive. Later the whole family came back, and the owner's daughter of about 3 years old gave the dog a big hug, and practically disappeared into a pile of white fur.

But we managed to see a few other places in Ningbo, like the Ningbo Bang Museum, basically about how Ningbo people are great businessmen and women. It was a very nice building and put together well, but hard for me to get excited about how one Ningbo native started the largest matchstick company in Asia. There was also Tianyi Library, which is the oldest library in China at over 500 years old, containing writing over 1000 years old - which I do appreciate, for example when I look at a badly weathered inscription and think "This is 5x older than my entire home country is." But practically nowadays it's just a little Chinese garden, which I have seen countless of. And unfortunately I'd say those were all the noteworthy sites in Ningbo. It's a nice place for a day, two days at most. And for us, it's pretty convenient to get to. However, it isn't really a destination in and of itself. Which actually, I want to sidebar and talk about for a bit.

 

 

 

 

I feel a lot of places in China I have described as "nice for a day or two". In fact, if I were to make a list of places that would fit that mold, it would probably be: Changsha, Haikou, Wuhan, Dongguan, Zhuhai, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Guilin, Quanzhou, Kunming, Xi'an, Chengdu, and probably several more I'm missing. I don't think China is really so unique in this, honestly Cincinnati, Colombus, and Cleveland would probably be described the same way, however I do think they have a uniqueness to them. Conversely in China, I think things are getting to be very samey, and I'm starting to get over it. I have seen enough temples, gardens, local art galleries, and provincial museums to last a lifetime. And most are not bad really, they're just... well, more or less the same (except for robot dinosaurs, of course). Part of the reason is just being limited to domestic travel for the time being, I'm seeing a lot of them together. But even if they were spaced out, I think if I put all my "Chinese temple" photos together without labels I would not be able to tell them apart.

So that begs the question why do it? In fact, after feeling a solid "eh it's alright" about Ningbo, and also after a few beers, I had a really long think about that on this trip. In the end, I think I have a pretty multi-faceted answer as to why I travel. The first is that I have a sort of completionist personality, so I want to "finish" seeing China, as ridiculous of an idea as that is. But even so, I feel we've done a bang up job so far. There's few people outside of China, or even within, who have been to more places in the country than we have. The second reason I want to travel is completely shallow, that I want to be wordly. If I meet someone from Ningbo, I like to be able to say "Hey, I know your hometown, The Old Bund is great." It's an instant way to appear as a cool person with stories, and also make an instant connection with the other person. The last reason is that I like to see/experience unique things. That's why I loved the bamboo bird pirate from Guangxi, because it's such a ridiculous thing that I'll remember for the rest of my life, and it's a good bar story.

This last reason is most important though, because it's the most inherently fun. That list of places in China earlier...none of them really had that weird, ridiculous moment, so unless I refresh my memory on this blog they'll probably all blend together and again, feel samey. So, what next? Do we keep traveling? And yeah, probably. Given the current circumstances, I don't think I can really change that. Normally I'd say it's time to shake things up and take a holiday to another country, but right now that's a very troublesome, expensive, and lengthy quarantine process. But who knows, it may get to that point. The other option is to leave China permanently, which I'm not opposed to, but then the question is to where? It's hard to beat the salary versus cost of living, not to mention the comfort of Shanghai. Then again money isn't everything. I don't think anything is going to change any time soon, but I do think after this lockdown, and the lack of exciting domestic getaways, it's time to keep my eyes open.

I have yet to see a wookie.

While Yangshuo is pretty well known in China, I feel "the place where they filmed Kashyyyk for Star Wars Episode 3" may be the fastest way to give people a picture of what it looks like. It's a small town about an hour south of Guilin, completely surrounded by tall, nearly vertical mountains. It's pretty interesting because you can just be walking around and then boom, there's a sheer rock wall as tall as, well, a mountain. It's almost like someone used the landscape tool in Sim City 2000 to just drag a square of land as high as it would go. It's a very unique looking place, so this entry is going to be a little more picture heavy than normal.

To start, the cultural center of the town is West Road. It's not particularly unique by itself, many Chinese cities have "old streets" full of shops and restaurants. This one has a more "Thailand" vibe to it though, full of foreign food and bars with live music - a rare sight in Chinese cities outside of Beijing / Shanghai, and really unheard of for a small town. We got some German food for lunch, and was a bit blown away to find a stream through the road, which ended into a waterfall near the river. I can see why this place has a reputation, because it is quite beautiful. And we're only getting started.

 

 

 

 

 

The next day we rented a bike to go out to Shi Li Hua Lang, which is like a national park known for a mountain with a hole in it. The ride there was pretty, but a bit nerve racking being Ella's passenger. Maybe it's how exposed I was on the back of the scooter, or the mood I was in that day, but I was really not loving it. Fortunately the mountain is beautiful, and is a nice 30 minute hike to the top. It reminded me of my mountain hiking days in Taipei, where you're always greeted with a wonderful view of the town below. Funnily enough, President Nixon walked the same trail during his trip to China in the 70s, and so they named it "Nixon Trail". Per the information, he asked if the Chinese made the hole in the mountain by shooting a missile at it.

 

Nixon was weird ya'll.

 

Another stop on the list was actually a village about 30 minutes away. Yes, we went from a huge city, to a smaller city, to a town, to a village. Xingping is not known by name, but everyone across China is quite familiar with it, as it is the site of the picture on the back of the 20 yuan note. (Then again, in ten years probably nobody will remember what a "note" is. Seriously, I touch cash maybe once every few years.) But regardless of why we're here, this is seriously one of the most beautiful places I've been. I don't know where in my previous Top 10+1 list it would fall, but it was really awesome and nice to see. After lunch, we took a boat up the river to take in some more views. Along the way, a guy in a bamboo raft came along side, suddenly boarded our boat, and offered the chance to take a photo with his birds for 5 yuan (~$0.80). I do not know why this dude makes his living this way. However, I do like photos of me in ridiculous situations, and "paid bamboo pirate a buck to hold his birds" has got to be up there. So, here's some photos of this place, along with, I think, one of the best photos I've ever taken.

 

The note in question.

 

The site it's supposedly from, with some liberties.

 

 

 

I really like this picture.

So this is the point where we were going to go home, but of course, something had to go wrong. Ella's health code suddenly changed to red for entering an area in Shanghai that day... which meant we were stuck. For anyone not familiar with China - you need health codes now to travel (and sometimes to enter places). Red means that you were in a high-risk area, as in an area with someone who tested positive for COVID. However, this was certainly a mistake, because A) Obviously, we were not currently in Shanghai B) We had not been to that part of town, or even that district, in even longer, and C) My code was still green, and we've never not been together. So inevitably, this meant bureaucracy and waiting a day for it to get sorted. A slightly annoying hiccup, but eventually, after filling out forms and waiting, it all worked out. That meant an extra torturous day of coffee and food in a very beautiful place. Could definitely do worse.

I don't know if I've ever wanted to travel more than I do now. After months of being locked inside, I was beyond eager to get out of Shanghai. But exactly because of that lockdown, our options were limited. Many provinces required quarantine between 3 and 14 days on arrival. While 3 would be doable, it would be better to, you know, not. Fortunately the city of Guilin came to our rescue by being more chill, with nothing needed except a negative test.

Unless you're from China you've likely never heard of Guilin. It's got quite a reputation for being naturally beautiful, with lots of ancient writers saying things like "Guilin is heaven on Earth." Back when travel was more a thing, it was a backpacker destination not unlike Bangkok. Of course, different times now, and the streets I've heard that were filled with young foreigners now has only one, less young foreigner.

Me, I'm talking about me.

A Guilin specialty, Beer Fish

Which is a change compared to Shanghai for sure. I was much more of a Z-List celebrity in Guilin, even stopped and asked by people if they can take their photo with me. It's like when I first came to China over a decade ago, although thankfully I didn't have a baby shoved into my arms while walking down the street (which actually happened once in Xiaoshan). But anyway, how's Guilin?

It's nice. Actually Guilin city is not particularly renowned today, because it's a medium sized Chinese city of merely 5 million people. It was always more of a "jumping off point" for the surrounding region. Still, it has a bit of beauty left in it. You can see the nature showing through however, with large, nearly vertical hills that pop up between the buildings. Guilin city is more of a staging area to explore the region, which is what we plan on doing. But we decided to stay a day or two in the city, because it does have some things to do.

For example, Zhengyang Walking Street and East West Alley, which are connected pedestrian areas with lots of food and shops. But they're actually quite nice and don't feel like the tourist traps other pedestrian areas around China do. In fact, we mostly saw high schoolers, old folks, and families pushing around strollers. Honestly, with tourism in China being non-existent right now, I'd bet we were among the very few non-locals. We had a meal and went on to see Jingjiang Palace, which you know, is a palace. It's alright. It does have a hill in the middle with a cool view. But after climbing up that mountain, we needed to rest before checking out Sun Moon Lake, one of the sights you see on all the Guizhou stock photos. It's just a lake with a park, but has two large towers, one silver, one gold colored. Actually I thought they were really pretty, although Ella seemed less impressed. Then again, Ella was following the directions to our hotel, and it said "next to the clock tower". When she saw it, she quipped "You call that a tower?" I responded "Well, I don't know what else you would call it." I'll put a photo of that below, so you can judge for yourself if Ella has very "high" standards for towers.

There was one thing in Guilin I really wanted to do, called Reed Flute Cave. It's actually one of many caves in the area, some even being downtown. But we took a 15 minute car trip to this one, as it's supposedly the best. To be honest, it's fantastic and I'm very glad we went. Something they did though was really lean into the artificial lighting, which makes it look especially unique. Although simultaneously I was wondering if the rainbow lighting just "Disney-ified" the whole experience. Well, you know, aside from the movie projected on a cave wall and souvenir keychains. But lighting or not, it is a super impressive cave. Not that I'm a cave expert, I've seen maybe... 8? But this was one of the best. The rock formations seemed to be all named after animals and food, which, gotta tell you, it takes a LOT of creativity to look at this rock and think "Yup, that's a lion." Maybe their idea of a lion comes from Shanghai's Natural History Museum. Anyway, here's a bunch of photos:

 

After the cave, there was another "stock photo of Guilin" to see, Elephant Nose Mountain. Supposedly this rock formation looks like an elephant dipping its trunk into water. Fortunately it's free and right in the middle of town, so it's not at all difficult to get to. Which was good, because free and 0 minutes is how much I think it's worth. What I'm saying is, we were both very unimpressed. Look, I've been to hyped tourist sights before. I can look at something and think "It's not my thing, but I can get how others would appreciate it." But this thing had so much tourist infrastructure around it, not to mention the crazy crowds. Like, when we were coming back to the Guilin airport at the end of our trip (more on that next time), I saw street signs that were "50km to the Elephant! 40km!" I mean, all this just to see... that? I don't get it. At best, it's a pretty symmetrical arch, although I don't know how much was man made. It was so blah we didn't even want to take a photo, but since we were there we thought might as well. I'll let you be the judge - the spitting image of an elephant, or useless tourist trap?

Anyway, that was about it for Guilin city. It's quite a nice place that most want to get out of as quickly as possible to explore the region. Which is a shame, because I think it's definitely worth spending at least a full day there, probably two if you don't want to rush. But with Guilin now checked off, we were off to the Star Wars planet of Kashyyyk to see some mountains and wookies.

I probably have not mentioned we're free.

So, we're free. To be honest, I am sick of the lockdown stuff and want to move on. But also, it was quite an impactful time in my life, so I feel it is necessary to write everything down for memories sake. Anyway, sorry for being a bit boring lately. I hope the next entry will have more exciting travels.

So, how did this go down? All in all, it took about two and a half months, from mid March to June 1st. We were (un)lucky enough to start ours about 2 weeks before most of everyone else, I suppose because there was a positive case in our compound. This turned out to be good in a way, because we were able to stock up on some things before the rest of the city got locked in. There were delays in getting packages, but it wasn't too bad - we're talking an hour or two delivery instead of 30 minutes. In retrospect, we should have gotten a lot more. Although at the time, it did not seem like it was so necessary to stock up. At the gate, they had an official notice with a release date a few days in the future. And when we got near that, that was moved a few more days, and a few more. Then they said they were going to close the whole city for 48 hours. That 48 hours turned out to be 2 months. So of course, people were caught unprepared. We had a couple weeks of food. Supposedly the grocery stores were able to deliver, but everyone was jamming the apps the moment they opened. With few drivers and low stock, we were not once able to order. 

When we were down to maybe 5 days, we had a moment where we said, "Alright. We need to go figure this out." I swallowed my pride, went to the community office, and on the way ran into truck unloading stuff. I asked how to buy it. Turns out it was a truck for Haidilao, a pretty well known hotpot chain. The lady just gave me a giant bag of rice, greens, and potatoes, for free, and said don't worry about it. I insisted on paying something, and she eventually charged me a pretty fair price overall. While this would be good for a few days, I still went to the community office, who got us in on the group buy. Basically you sign up for the vegetable set, the meat set, etc.. Then a few days later you get it. Of course there is no choice in the matter, but it was alright. I got to learn how to cook vegetables I had never heard of before, like celtuce and water bamboo (look them up if you'd like, pretty interesting).

Now I will say, for us, things were boring but smooth sailing after that. In fact, the aforementioned veggie shop in my last blog opened around that time. That was joined by another 5 or 6 shops, so really you had everything you needed in our compound - shops just run out of apartments or in front of them. This time and before it were also where the not so great stories you saw in the news came out, about people not having food. Is it because they were out of options, or because they tried to do it themselves like we did and failed? I don't know. But also around that time, we started to get lots of government care packages. I will say this - this is the only time in my life I ever felt worried that I would not be able to eat. I knew it would not be dire - there are like 5000 people in my community - but I was embarrassed I was going to have to ask people for help. It turns out it was not a big deal at all. Like when I went to the community office, their attitude was more like "Oh, you finally finished your ramen noodles! We've been waiting for you!" I can only hope everyone else was as lucky as we were. Still, it left an impression on me. I'm not going to turn into a hoarder or anything, I still hate having things in my apartment. But for the rest of my life, I probably will keep a little more food on hand than I would in the past.

Anyway, these group buys, work care packages, and government care packages, were of course, giant. And the days they came were a big chore. Basically, we had to wash, chop, and freeze as much as we could. Everything that wouldn't fit in the freezer, we'd need to plan how to eat it before it went bad. Basically in addition to my regular full time job (which was fortunately more relaxed now), Ella and I had another full time job as kitchen managers. Choosing meals around "what random ingredients will go bad first" is not great. I think for a month, I never got to choose what I wanted to eat over what I had to eat. To be honest I still get annoyed by cooking, although I expect that will pass once I get tired of takeout every day.

And that was our life for a while. We basically worked, did kitchen stuff, and I snuck in some video games. Every 48 hours, the nucleic acid test workers came by and called out your building with a megaphone. You'd go down, scan your code, and get a mouth swab. I took this time to throw out some trash and go for a 20 minute walk, just for some sunlight and exercise. We'd also feed and play with the stray cats around the community. About a week before the end, they came by and said we could go out tomorrow for a few hours to go to the grocery. Ella asked me to go first. Going out that day was surreal. Everything was still shut down, and a city of 25 million was surprisingly empty. Still, it was refreshing that everything was the same, and it really improved my mood a lot. A few days later, Ella got her chance. But it turns out it was not as necessary, because just a few days after that, they announced that tomorrow, everything was over.

And that was that. Now, things are not 100% back to normal. For one, you cannot dine in restaurants, although many have set up outdoor tables. You need to get regular tests, because to go anywhere or do anything, you need to scan your code. If it has been more than 72 hours, sorry. The only place you're allowed in is home. Fortunately, it is quite convenient to get tested. There are booths every block or two, and even our community does it twice a day. Some are 24 hours. It takes like 5 minutes to stop on your way, and it is free. The first day we were free, luckily enough, was Children's Day. That means it was a day off for me. I went downtown, got Five Guys, and basically walked for hours. I even got to meet a friend for coffee. That evening, we went to a bar, which was again, surreal. It looked like it always had, but I know that everyone was in the same situation as me, that this was the first time they've been out in months. Anyway, over the past two weeks, things have felt surprisingly normal, almost like the lockdown was a distant memory. We even had our 4/8 year anniversary (4 years married, 8 since we met), where we got to eat some great pizza and go around the city.

So, that leads us to today. What have I learned? Well, like I said before, I will stock a little more food than I did. Also, after the first few weeks, Ella and I are surprisingly good at being in isolation. At the beginning I was pretty bummed out, and I got sad here and there when they said there was a new case in our community (which turned out to not matter at all). But overall, we dealt with it really well - especially Ella. She is a rock, and I don't think it bothered her at all. We didn't get too sick of each other, and the few times we got on each other's nerves we'd just talk about it. I think the biggest lesson I learned was do not set a date in your mind that things will be over - because it is soul crushing when you're wrong. I think this was far more impactful a time for Ella. It reminds me of when I was stuck in my apartment in Vietnam, where I looked at my life and said "Hm.. I should be with Ella." She looked at her life and decided teaching teenagers is not for her. So she quit her job after this semester, and is taking her life in a completely new direction. I don't think she knows what that direction is. Then again, I was a BA Psych major turned IT tech turned kids teacher, so I certainly didn't know either. She has some ideas that sound very exciting, and I am very proud of her for making the jump.

Whew! That was a lot. There weren't many photos of that time for obvious reasons. But here's what I have, which seems to consist mostly of stray cats.

I've never made a frittata before but I impressed myself.

One of many, many tests.

Our first of many encounters with our friendly stray, Jerry.

I really like this photo.

We made a toy out of string and a branch. She loved it.

This kitten was apparently Jerry's daughter. Fortunately someone adopted her.

My view for a lot of the lockdown. Tales of Xillia, btw.

My hair was really getting long.

First time out in months!

So strange to see this street empty.

Ella, like a rock throughout the whole time.

Meeting another person!!

The first jailbreak meal.

So strange to be on the metro again. It felt like a Disney ride.

Happy Anniversary, Elly! Love you!