Here we are, back for another semester.

I know nobody is interested in my oh-so-exciting work life, so I will make this brief. The school is trying to implement a STEM based curriculum. In theory, I am for it. However they have simply decided that the STEM will be one month during the middle of the semester, so roughly a third of our classes. Why in the middle? Why have we been informed two weeks after the start of the semester? Why after we have already planned our curriculum? What science can we teach kids that have just learned how to say "She wears shoes."? I have no idea. This whole thing stinks of a marketing stunt.

Alright, so for more interesting travel things. We're slowly widdling away at the sea of marked points on our map of Guangzhou. This time our adventure was to Liwan, a district a bit to the west of town. It's often overlooked by visitors, because there's actually not that much there of interest. We had been there once before, to the very beautiful Liwan park. But other than that, it's just a regular living area, albeit a little upscale.

In fact, it has a very famous resident you may have heard of, Bruce Lee. His father was born here, and trained at the different art academies around the area. However I was a little disappointed that any sort of historical value has been more or less removed. The home is mostly just a shell, and inside is just a bunch of empty rooms. The only thing they did to spice it up was to rent it out as an art gallery, so there are different photos hanging around for the current exhibit. Aside from the sign outside, you would have no idea this place was anything except an old renovated house with art. Too bad.

Also on our path in Liwan was Qingping Market. This place is super weird. Maybe not for Chinese folk, but for me it was like a grocery store on Mars. You know when you hear about Chinese people paying big money for snake tongue, seahorse tears, or unicorn poop? This is where it comes from. Its an odd place, full of preserved and dried animals, or bits of animals. Most of it is used in traditional Chinese medicine more than actual cooking, but there are plenty of puffer-fish bladders to go around. I can't imagine what this stuff would ever be used for, but without a young person in sight I have a feeling this type of stuff is on the decline. Anyway the market itself is about 5 floors of... things, but mostly each vendor is selling the exact same. So in short, it's worth a look for a minute or two, but then you've seen it all. Unless you know a guy on the 3rd floor which has a great deal on starfish mouths.

And last on our Liwan tour was Hua Lin Temple. I know, I know. I am a total hypocrite, in that "You've seen one temple, you've seen 99% of them." Well this mostly was part of the 99%, with only one thing of note I suppose. They had a hall of statues that has the most number of buddhas I had ever seen in one place. So I'll go ahead and say it was alright to see, and if you're a visitor to Asia, worth a look. But if you live here, I'm pretty desensitized to buddha.

Alright, enough about Guangzhou. We also made a trip outside of Guangzhou with two coworkers (Josh and Alex) to the little city of Huizhou. By little, I mean like 4 million people. Anyway, Huizhou is about 2.5 hours away by car. It came about because I mentioned to Alex we saw a fake Austrian-style town that they made out there, because, China. Turns out his girlfriend lives near there, and he visits her most weekends. He invited us along, so off we went for the weekend.

Huizhou is is pretty typical for a medium sized Chinese town, and reminded me a lot of Qujing. It has a few malls, a pretty park area, and a few KFCs. We started in the pretty park area, oddly enough called West Lake. It turns out it was also designed by the same guy who did Hangzhou's West Lake, so I got to see my old home's sister city of sorts. It was pretty. There were some small, one room museums. Kids were playing. We took photos. You know the drill. But it honestly was quite picturesque, and was a good start to exploring the area.

And next on the list was the fake Austrian village. Now, your first question may be the same as mine, which is "Why?" And I don't have an answer for you. It's about 15 kilometers away from the town, and is just sort of plopped in the middle of nowhere, complete with impeccably maintained townhouses around it. Why would anyone live out here? I have no idea. But the "town square" is basically a place now where people come shoot wedding photos. There honestly isn't much to it, with just a handful of restaurants, shops, and a few museums for kids. If I were traveling by myself I would have spent 30 minutes there, said "Hm... pretty." and left. But it was an experience just for saying I went to a fake Austria, and managed to convince Ella's mother, at least for a few minutes, that we went to the real one. I'll let you judge for yourself.

We then set off far to the north of Huizhou to visit a hot spring up in the mountains. This was one of the most rural trips in China I had ever done, except perhaps out into Zhejiang to climb that waterfall a really long time ago. However, I am skeptical it was a real hot spring. I knew plenty of hot springs in Taiwan, and they all had murky water that smelled a little like rotten eggs because of the sulfur. Here, the water had no odor, and was pretty much clear. So, perhaps there is some hot spring water in there, but I have my doubts that it is pure. Its mostly a moot point, because I am a skeptic that sulfur water does anything for your health other than what all other water does. But this place is just a big hotel that has all these mini hot tubs scattered around a pool area, which you basically just hop between until you get bored. The temperature was hot but not sweltering, topping out a little below 45 (113F) degrees. That's enough that a few minutes is alright, but I wouldn't spend hours there. For comparison, the spring in Taipei I used to go to topped out at 50 degrees, but they had a lifeguard there and would tell you to get out after about 60 seconds. They had a swimming pool and water slides there, and it actually looked like a lot of fun - if it were not for the day being quite chilly. It was jacket weather, which was perfect for hopping between different hot tubs.

After a night at the hotel we had one more stop, Luofu Mountain. On the way we stopped at a restaurant which is advertised as a "farm to table" restaurant. In fact, that's pretty much all we ate at on this whole trip. I guess that type of place is appealing to Chinese tourists who live in the city, but I couldn't help but think that also must be a little bit bullshit. I mean, Gaungdong cannot possibly grow everything that you need to make some of these rather complicated dishes. So I'll say it was probably "main ingredient farm to table". Still, they were quite good. Luofu Mountain was also quite good, and remarkably well taken care of. It has the "AAAAA" designation, which is the highest you can get in China. For example, the Great Wall and the Terracotta Warriors are also 5 A. You can actually hike to the top of the 1300 meter tall peak, but it's pretty far from the base. If you do walk, it takes about 3-4 hours.

Or you can just ride the cable car to nearly the top. That sounds more appealing.

Unfortunately it's more like a ski lift than a cable car, with your feet dangling. Doesn't bother me, but as I learned everyone else in the group was quite afraid of heights. Poor Josh pretty much just gritted his teeth and had a death grip on the bar the whole way up. And it was not a short trip - maybe about 15 minutes or so. Some parts were quite high, but nowhere near compared to the one in Hong Kong or Taipei. Anyway, once we got to the top station it was another 15 minute hike to the actual summit. That's a nice way to enjoy a mountain - all of the view with only a token amount of work to make it seem like you earned it. But that was it for our little weekend getaway - back to dinner, and then a car back to Guangzhou. It was a nice little trip, and a little exhausting, but a great chance to get to know our coworkers. In fact, I'd call them friends instead of acquaintances now, and you can't get much better than that.