How's everyone getting along?

Things have been going pretty well on the Shanghai front. It's getting colder now, which is a nice change of pace from... never being cold. We experienced a bit of that back in February, but it'll be interesting to live in a cold climate for the first time in 8 years or so.

Speaking of, this (somewhat) shorter entry is about when I first came to China, in little old Hangzhou. Ella and I made a day trip out there over the weekend, the first time she's been. And the first time I've been back in, well, since I left. Oddly enough I first came to Hangzhou in November, so it's almost the 9 year anniversary since I left the US. I'll save the big reflections for next year, but I was curious to see if Hangzhou is the place I remember.

For the most part, yes. But better.

Back in my day (old man voice), living in Hangzhou was nice but sort of inconvenient. In other words, more convenient than almost everywhere in the US save NYC. Food delivery services hadn't taken off yet, there was no metro, and you had to put the public bikes in the docking stations. Now Hangzhou's metro is coming along nicely, with about 5 lines, the ever-ubiquitous-in-China dockless bikes, Didi, etc.. Plus now I actually know some Chinese, and with Ella in tow. But before that, let's do a little "before and after", separated by almost exactly 9 years.

So. Thoughts. In the first pic I look kinda fat. I blame that on leaving America about 1 month prior, and the couple of layers of clothing. But still - better now. The second pic is big improvement since Ella is in it. But also, my hair! Oh man. Low maintenance for sure, but nah, that's too short. I don't think I want to do that again.

Now, on to the more famous sights in the city. So the first destination was one I can actually name now, Hefang Street. Hefang Street was where the bus from my little district of Xiaoshan terminated, so it was the jumping off point for all of my Hangzhou excursions, back in the day. Well I'm pleased to say, it's same same but different. The biggest thing is that they cleaned it up a bit. For example, the food street I was looking for was just a series of carts on the sides of the alley, with communal tables in the middle. Now Singapore style, they've moved them into a covered building, like a hawker center. I get why, I suppose. But I miss the ambiance of rubbing shoulders with a random stranger, chowing down on bamboo rice and xiao long bao. But it was a nice intro to Hangzhou, because it still is quite pretty, and one of those places you can sort of get lost in.

The next spot was a place I had never been before, Hu Xueyan's home. I'm not expecting anyone to know who that is - I didn't. But basically he was a super rich guy, who, I gotta say, has a pretty nice taste in making a Chinese home. It's what you'd expect from a rich Chinese dude, with lots of courtyards, ponds, fancy woodwork, etc.. But what I did like is that he had a lot of caves in and around, which even on a temperate day were a good few degrees cooler than outside. I can see these being super nice to have during the summer, and were just cool to explore.

Then we get to the star of the show, Leifang Tower. I really like Leifang. Even though it's a modern reconstruction of the original (which collapsed around 1920 or so?) it's quite pretty and has a great view of West Lake. At a fraction of the price and a better view compared to Wuhan's Huanghe Tower, it's really the way to go for your Chinese tower experience. I remember years ago, standing at the top of that tower, looking at the islands in West Lake, and thinking "I wonder how you get there?" And then giving up because I spoke no Chinese and the English resources available were hard to come by and outdated.

Well, I'm happy to say this time we did make it to the largest of the islands, Three Ponds Mirroring the Moon. Yes, that's the name. Also there are 4 ponds. I don't get it either. If you don't believe me, I present Exhibit A:

Sure looks like four to me. Maybe they mean the lantern things.

Anyway, there's not much to do on that island. It's a pretty place to walk around, what with all the ponds full of koi fish, large lillypads, and bridges. The main draw though, is the southern view which is what's on the back of the 1 yuan note. You can see how mine compares.

After that, we wanted to go to a tea plantation. I had been there before (I think?), but it was honestly getting too late in the day. Instead we opted to go downtown to get some food, and maybe check out a night market nearby. The night market was pretty forgettable, selling the same sort of phone cases, clothing, etc.. We stopped at a restaurant nearby though, and I had tomato bamboo noodles - definitely the meal highlight of the trip, they were amazing. After another train ride back, we didn't get home until around 11 o'clock. An exhausting, busy day for sure, but we'll definitely be back to Hangzhou. Now that the big tourist stuff is taken care of, there's a couple of friends still around that I need to catch up with.

Ah, rabies. My old friend. But we'll come back to that.

For National Day, Ella and I decided to take a trip to a place we've always heard about, but never been. In fact, way back in Thailand-days, we were discussing where to move in China. And one of the places on that short list was Wuhan. Because we had both heard lots of nice things about it, it's pretty centrally located, it's pretty consistently warm year round, and... well, that's all I guess. So off we went to have a look.

To start, Wuhan is a city divided by the Yangtze River, and it's pretty much in the dead center of the populated parts of China. It was where the Wuchang Uprising happened, which started the downfall of the Qing Dynasty, and establishment of the Republic of China (the one now controlling Taiwan - not the mainland People's Republic of China). Other than that, it has a long history as sort of the "hub" of China, Silk Road, railroads, yadda yadda.

But what is there to do there? Well, we didn't much know ourselves, so this would be a trip of discovery. It's about a 4 hour train ride from Shanghai, and we arrived around dinner time. Our hostel was in the heart of a massive outdoor market/pedestrian area, truly the largest I've seen outside maybe Taiwan's Keelung's Temple Market. Blocks and blocks of food, shops, and more food, I don't think you need to go anywhere else to get any Chinese cuisine you want. Western though is another story, and throughout this trip I was surprised at how few western brands there are in Wuhan. And I don't mean like, White Castle, I mean like anything. There aren't even many convenience stores. It was a bit of shock coming from Guangzhou and Shanghai, where you can't walk for more than 30 seconds before passing another place to get a drink. It's more of a reminder of what I remember China to be when I first moved here, that if you don't know how to find what you want, you're going to be pretty miserable. Like, coffee. Good luck with that. But we did eat a lot, from Wuhan's famous Re Gan Mian (Hot and Dry noodles - with peanut sauce and pickled vegetables) to the not so famous Cheese and Sausage Stick (which was amazing, btw). Overall I found Wuhan's food to be really plain. Not that it isn't made well, just that their dishes tend to stick to very few ingredients, with one of them a starch of some sort. Like, brown sugar cakes - literally just a rice cake with brown sugar on it. Or Chinese donuts (you tiao). It's just fried dough. They do what they do well, but I'd prefer something with more variety.

But anyway, for the first stop we went to the Hubei Provincial Museum, which according to the internet is one of the better museums in China. Now, this is now the 3rd "one of the best" provincial museum I've been to (Guangdong and Hunan before this). I gotta say... provincial museums, I'm not feeling you. The Hunan one in Changsha was probably my favorite of the three, but nothing there blew me away. And the Guangdong one is sort of special because Ella reciprocally-proposed to me there. Hubei's... meh. They have a nice sword. I liked the sword. The coffee shop on the roof was nice. Other than that, skip it. Internet, you have lied to me.

BUT, next to the Hubei Provincial Museum is the Hubei Art Museum. The internet had glowing reviews for it, including "Not worth the 10 yuan", "Maybe stop by if you're passing, but otherwise skip it." "So-so museum". Internet. You sit on a throne of lies. The Art Museum is waaaay better than the provincial museum, and I hate art. This place had cool art. This is like, top 5 art museums I've been to, and per Ella's interest in them, I've been to a lot. I actually took pictures of art. Do you know how rare that is? Also, it wasn't 10 yuan ($1.40) to get in, it was free. So, definitely go to the Hubei Art Museum, and skip the Provincial Museum. Unless you're super into old swords, I guess. It was a nice sword. But not worth the trouble to see only that.

So, next we went to a place that could only exist in China. This mall called "City of the World" decided that they have way too much money lying around, and that it's high time they live up to their namesake. Maybe you are thinking "Oh, it's sort of like Epcot, with little touches of different regions, and samples of the world's cuisine." And you would be wrong. By "world", they mean Europe. And only a few parts of Europe, possibly because they got that far before finding out how ridiculous this is. But they managed to finish a Little Italy, Little Spain, Little France, and Little Germany. It sounded just bizarre and worthy enough to take a look. What would follow is one of the weirdest things I've seen in China. (until we go to Fake Paris near Shanghai - look for that in the future) It was the uncanny valley of western culture. It was like, 99% there, but that 1% missing just made it seem like something was... off. Maybe it was The Cathedral of the Burger King, I dunno. Then again, maybe it was the T-rex on top of the German Beer Hall. While I applaud their grand vision, the thing that sullied it was there was not a single damn foreign food restaurant in the entire place. We looked. In person, and on the internet. The closest was a super fancy French restaurant about half a kilometer away, in a mall. That German Beer House? Full of noodles, rice, stinky tofu, and milk tea. Why? I don't know. Such a missed opportunity, but then again, the fact that so much effort was put in to miss the opportunity makes it unique and special. I will miss you, weird Europe. But you probably want to see more pics, so here they are.

The Cathedral of Saint Burger

Keeping with the weirdness, another site was a temple. I know, I know. "You've seen one temple, you've seen 99% of them.", says I, many times. Well, I suppose this was the 1%. It's a Buddhist Temple that was made to look like a Christian church. Why? I don't know. I've given up on Wuhan making sense, they have this weird thing with making things look European somehow. Even the buildings in the city have a sort of European vibe to them, which they actually pull off in a way. But this temple... whew, where to begin? It was made in what looks like an old parking lot of a working class neighborhood, but there were still a fair number of people there. Mostly posing for photos. Still, it had a kind of "half done" sort of look. It is worth it for the photos, but not much else.


If you look on any travel guide of Wuhan, the #1 attraction in the city is Huang He Lou, or Yellow Crane Tower. No doubt your search will show countless images of a beautiful, ancient looking Chinese Pagoda, maybe lit up at night, looking all majestic and cool. What they don't show you is that to get that photo, they had to shoo about a million people out of a place the size of a Starbucks. In truth the $10 ticket gets you more than the tower, it gets you access to a park. oooOOOooo, a park! With tourist things to buy! And overpriced food! And well, we didn't go. I'm not entirely surprised, it being national holiday, but I've been to other Chinese pagodas before. Leifeng Tower in Hangzhou, for example. It's taller, prettier, and has a great view of West Lake. Huang He Lou has a view of the back of someone's head, most likely. But otherwise a Chinese city. Anyway, we saw it from a distance, which seems good enough. Cool architecture.

Other than that, a lot of our time in Wuhan was just checking out the city. As mentioned earlier, they have a lot of European inspired architecture. I don't know if that's a leftover from past colonial missions, or they just want to be cool, but it looks a little different from other Chinese cities. Around the cobblestone street area, there's a lot of little restaurants, and even a couple of cafes. Now several days without coffee, we stopped by one to get a very overpriced but very much needed coffee. And this is where our stupid story gets interesting. This cafe had a lot of cats. Like, six? Seven? As we were enjoying the break, one cat nearby was being very playful. So I wagged my finger around, and he decided that it was a thing to be destroyed, as cats do. I didn't notice until later, but he had actually gotten me to bleed a bit. But I just washed it out and went on with my day. Then Ella mentioned the "R" word. This had not crossed my mind, but I thought more about it, and it seemed quite ridiculous. First, I had a rabies shot 5ish years ago (stupid monkey, I will never forgive you). They supposedly last 5-10 years. But more importantly, the owner knew these cats, it wasn't really a bad cut, I washed it out, cats rarely have rabies, and it's usually from a deep bite. But it's one of those things that when you get in your head, it gets really, really hard to push the "What if... death?" out. I was reminded of the time when we had just left the house for our trip to Indonesia, and Ella said "I wonder if I closed the refrigerator door." THANKS, ELLA. But really, I'm glad she said something, just to know we're looking out for each other. Anyway, I've just been dying to use my new health insurance, so off we went to a clinic to get a rabies and tetanus shot. The poor nurse working there at night during national holiday, who was probably straight out of med school and drew the short straw, said Wuhan actually has a bit of a rabies problem now, so I guess it's for the best. Plus now I'll be all up to date, and I shouldn't need many shots this time.

BUT, here's where the story gets really dumb. First, this nurse wanted to give me one of the shots in my ass. Huh. Well, that's new. Fortunately, the clinic we were at was pretty quiet, because this trip has been full of us passing people in the street and me getting stared at, with people whispering "psst pssst foreigner psst psst" under their breath. So I am glad my butt did not become the center of attention for the 5th People's Village Clinic of Wuhan. Second, and far more destructive, is that I am under strict orders to not have zero alcohol and only light caffeine for one month. I find this instruction dubious at best. I mean, I can understand not drinking a bottle of vodka while getting the shot. But caffeine? A beer once a week? When I go to another, proper hospital for a follow up in Shanghai, I have promised Ella and myself that I will follow whatever the doctor says. Ella is so wonderful, she said she'd join me in this. Let's see how long that lasts, for our joint sanity.