Day 16: Bai Sha/Shu He/Lijiang/Xishuangbanna (parting ways....)
In the words of an angry chinese blogger.... "you've seen one 5,000-year-old pagoda, you've seen 'em all." I kind of felt that way today a little. Except we weren't looking at pagodas, we were looking at old towns. We've seen so many on this trip, that I just wasn't as impressed with the one we saw today. Apparently Lijiang's old town is just a commercialized form of the real old town called Shu He. We got to see it for free today (because we went in a "back way" thanks to our hostel owner person) and I'm kind of glad, because I don't think I would've wanted to pay money to see the same thing I've already seen so many times. It was neat, it was just....the same as all the others. Just a bit smaller. Maybe more authentic. Not quite as pretty as Lijiang's old town, though. We got to see a small performance going on because today is the last day of the Chinese New Year (called Lantern Festival, I think). We just walked around the town. More of the same shops selling more of the same stuff. Then we moved on to this other little place called Bai Sha. This is more popular because in one of the houses there are these ancient "Dongba" (a religion in these parts) paintings. It was pretty cool to see. The religion itself borrows from the other major religions such as Buddhism, Daoism, and Hinduism (??). In the afternoon the other girls went walking around and I just rested for a bit. It was kind of sad, because it was our last day together as a whole group. Two of the girls were going back to Shanghai to rest up for a bit before their semester began (and get ready for it, of course). For dinner we had this dish called "Tang Yuan" which are these round things made of rice paste and filled with something, usually sweet. Apparently you're supposed to eat them on the last day of Chinese New Year to have good luck or something. So we ate them. And they were good. :) (I usually get them at the store, though, so it wasn't anything new) Then three of us had to leave for the airport to catch our plane to Xishuangbanna, in southern Yunnan, for the last leg of our journey. (I love riding planes!) :) When we arrived in Jinghong (capital of the "county" I guess you could call it), it seemed so different. It was dark, for one, but it was also warm. This place is famous for its minority groups, and a lot of them are the same ones found in Thailand, Burma, Vietnam, and Laos. It's kind of like being in Thailand except we're still in China and most people also speak Chinese. It felt like we were really going to the edge of the earth or something. Well, we were going to practically the edge of China. A lot of people come here from Burma or Laos. Anyway, we got checked into our hostel and walked around for a bit before heading to bed. We found a neat park that you have to pay to get into, but since it was so late we just went in for free. :) We have been greeted all night by what sounds like a few bombs going off. But really that's just the locals celebrating Lantern Festival. Lots of fireworks, lots of noise. I guess you gotta give them some props since they invented the stuff. I didn't realize until much later what was going on, so at first I just thought most people were partying a little too hearty. Chinese plus fireworks is actually quite normal. We'll see what the plans are for the rest of the time tomorrow....
(Also last night one of our little adventures in Lijiang involved going into a singles bar. Yep, I can now say I've stepped into a singles' bar and walked around. It was a lot of Chinese people. At each table they have these phones that you can use to call people at the other tables. I wouldn't have wanted to stay anyway, but the fact that everyone would've been speaking Chinese was an extra incentive to not stay. We all just went in for fun and to see what was inside anyway.)
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