So unfortunately the previous entry I had was kind of the last in regards to the trip I had when my pals were here. The next few days I had to work, so they were left to their own devices for the next two. The good news is that there is another group of friends that should be arriving in June, so expect more hijinx to ensue. It would be twilight zone creepy if we went to the same places and recreated the same photos. Something to consider.

Right well, this is the point where I would mention my trip back to Cincinnati. I don't really want to talk about that since it would just be depressing. But it did give me perspective on how crazy of a place China can be. After a brief stint of normality I find myself back in wonderland. Where people spit, toss things on the ground, and traffic rules are determined by whomever want it more. But here I am until November, so let's make sure I enjoy it. The most recent sojourn was a trip to a mountain in Hangzhou with my roommate and a friend of ours. It worked out well - David is leaving in a few weeks, and needed some gifts beforehand. Our friend, a native named Christina, has a family run business near this mountain. Her brother in law offers to give the 3 of us and her aunt a lift.

Her brother in law is a way cool dude named Hillin. I'd imagine there's an apostrophe after his name, because he's just that cool. Stylized hair, fashionable clothes, sunglasses, love of American music, and drives crazier than any taxi driver I've known. That basically means he treats the road like his own destruction derby, tearing around hairpin turns at 70 kph while rocking out to Lady Gaga and laughing like a maniac. What I'm saying is I dug this guy.

So we make it to Hangzhou in record time, and David purchases some nice jewelry while acting like a fool in women's sunglasses. Before we tackled the mountain though, why not pray at some traditional Buddhist yadda yadda yadda. Jeez, I'm sure this place has some sort of history, but for god sakes (ha, puns!) what place in China doesn't have some sort of history?

We get to the temple complex with incense in hand, because you have to pray at all 6. Otherwise I guess you'll anger the gods, who will make you sit on your keys. Anyway a guide stops us offering to help. My attitude was "Nah we've got this, stop trying to scam us." Christina on the other hand, is quite gullible and was overjoyed that a nice man would show us around out of the goodness of his heart. So we're shuttled around to all these places, and of course the last place we go is a shop. The guy is trying to sell us on all these other things to buy for the temple. This one will give you money, this one will give you love, etc. David and I aren't believing any of this bullshit, but Christina is just eating it up. She comes out with a shopping bag full of fancy paper she burns at each temple. Ugh. Glad it wasn't my money.

Now it's off to the mountain, which happens to be through a tea field. Christina told us that you can pick your own tea here, dry it on these hot coals, and take it home with you later in the day. I thought this was awesome, and it may be something to try. Another very convenient feature of this mountain was the cable car going to the top. This is where I learned David is deathly afraid of heights. Oh, I'm sorry. He's just deathly afraid of cable cars. *cough*bullshit*cough*.

So now we're hiking up this mountain in record time. It is actually a great view from the top, but there's not really much else to do aside from a few photos. It's time for dinner, and I'll be damned if I walk up this mountain and I don't get on a Chinese cable car. David says he'll meet us at the bottom and off he goes.

It turns out going down the mountain is much faster than going up, and we more or less meet David at the same time we get to the bottom. After a quick dinner, we all meet up with Hillin who takes us ontop of his family's shop. Their maintenance sheds are those fancy looking buildings on the roof. In short, I dug him and the place where he works. After a full day of exercise, religion, and food, back we go to Xiaoshan. Of course with Hillin behind the wheel, in record time.

Photo explosion!

... would make a good band name.

I'm going to combine the next two days here, because I wasn't present for a lot of them. I had to work the next day, and the rest of the crew didn't get back from Shanghai until that evening. As to what went on there, you'll have to ask Dan, Aaron, or Lindsay.

So that evening the crew roll back into Xiaoshan, and went to KTV for the evening. Now as you've heard karaoke is big in Asia. When you went to go out with friends, you don't go to a bar. You go to karaoke. Of course karaoke is an evil Japanese word, so here they call it KTV, as in karaoke television. You get your own private room, and go nuts. We got the foreigner special, which includes a bunch of beers and a tray of fruit they did not charge me for. They don't have an astounding collection of English songs, but they do alright.

After KTV we pretty much called it a night in anticipation of the hike we were undertaking the next day. Up to Xiaoshan's mountain, the only sort of famous Beigan. Along the way we stopped at a park that I've walked by many times but never went inside. Something I did not know though, was that they have a "Special Room for the large-scale masterpiece sky propping stone". Did you know the entire sky is held up from this room? So you better thank Xiaoshan that they have taken upon this terrible burden to hold up the sky. Do you want the entire sky crashing down on your head? I don't.

YOU'RE WELCOME, PLANET EARTH.

Right, so off we go to Beigan proper. The start is a large set of stairs with a stone obelisk at the top. It's supposed to be some monument to Chinese soldiers who fell to the Japanese. (seriously, they hate those guys) There was actually some school assembly going on as we arrived, which dispersed soonafter. So here there are running away from the scary foreigners, along with a look at the stairs we just climbed. As far as Beigan's other interesting spots... not too much! It's just a mountain to hike on. There is at the end an old fort from the WWII era that you are free to walk about, and do what you will at. No tours or anything like that, just an old building in the woods. It is slightly creepy, and probably would be really creepy at night. There's also a neat bridge you cross over emblazoned with the motto "XIAOSHAN IS MARCHING TOWARDS THE WORLD". What they don't say is that the world is marching the hell away from this crazy city.

Of course the proper ending to a day of hiking are drinks at the 5 star Jinma Palace nearby. I quite like Jinma. It's a 5 star hotel with nowhere near 5 star prices. They make a killer martini that they could easily charge $8 for, but they only charge $4. Dan got a something something rainbow drink, which looks like Care Bear poop.

We had a little bit more time before I had to run to work, so we stopped off at Tesco to see what we could find. Aaron found a billion tea bottles that he fell in love with. I found T-shirts with Engrish on them. We were going to eat dinner at an amazing Szechuan restaurant around the corner, but I had to run back to teach a class. Yllen and I met everyone after that for a late dinner. Seriously though, this Szechuan place has the best sweet and sour pork you will have in your life.

After another full day of excitement, we decided to go back home. I tried to convince the cab driver we were Mao Zedong's kids, who did not seem to believe me.