Mountaineering through Inner Mongolia

Honestly, if given the choice, above almost anything else I would really like to climb mountains. Not just any mountains, but the biggest baddest mountains out there. Serious mountaineering is the coolest thing ever. I watch countless documentaries about them just to pretend for 5 minutes I am one of them. I know it's a random, dangerous and expensive hobby...so I'd just like to try it for half a day then give it back to the people who aren't posers like me. Like the pinch hitter on the Everest summit team. Okay.. not not my best metaphor.

Just a few minutes outside of Yinchuan lie the Helan Mountains. They run between Ningxia (my province) and Inner Mongolia. I've been a few times, to a place called suyukou. I live in the desert of china and somehow there's a national forest towards at the top of the mountains? The first time I forgot my camera. Smooth move. The second time I brought Austin back! 

AustIn and I both agreed that this was our favorite day of his trip. 

After being up pretty high, we wandered down the mountain, out of the forest, and down a road where we stumbled on a quiet little Buddhist temple and part of the Great Wall. It was amazing.  Sometimes between the snot rockets, rice comas, and the horrifying toilets I kind of forget how awesome China is. Things like this are necessary reminders because they help me keep in mind how much I like China, and why I'm here.

Another part of the Helan mountains has really crazy old rock art carvings. I went back in May to see some of the 6,000 pictures found carved into the side of the mountain. Some of them date back 10,000 years. Imagine Mongolian Mountain Men carving pictures into rocks on the side of a mountain 30 feet in the air. Although I personally like the scenery better, the rock art is what makes these mountains somewhat famous in China. It's nice to spend some time in the mountains because I've not had much time around mountains before. Which makes me interest in mountain climbing all that more bizarre. Although, most of all I just want to jump the border to Inner Mongolia before I leave.

This is the most famous rock art picture of them all. It's the sun god and it kind of definitely looks like an alien. The weather was not great, and lots of the carvings were really high up so I had to mega zoom so I didn't get the best photos...

Branching out and blending: Austin in China

Austin came to visit me! After nearly 10 months in Asia, somebody finally made the trek to this side of the world.  It was a pretty stellar 3 weeks. We spent some time in Yinchaun, went to the mountains and he watched Netflix while I babysat..err taught English. Having him here was just as awesome as it sounds. 

We also took an overnight train to Xi’an, famous for the Terracotta Army. The Terracotta Warriors were built in about 200 BC by a 13 year old emperor who was so terrified of death, he needed a fake army with over 8,000 soldiers and hundreds of horses and chariots to be buried with him (no seriously). 

The army was pretty cool…but not nearly cool enough for people to call it the 8^th wonder of the world (that should be Angkor Wat in Cambodia). Most of our time was spent buying souvenirs for Austin, and hunting down the nearest sandwich for me.  Yinchuan has two restaurants with western food: KFC and Pizza Hut. So, naturally when presented with a weekend outside of this city, I established a Chinese food ban from our diets. Austin didn’t fight me for a second.

The coolest part might have been successfully blending in as real Terracotta Warriors. 

Culinary highlights of Xi’an included me inhaling a subway foot long sandwich in about 2 ½ minutes…my first sandwich in almost 4 months... and spending probably ¼ of my paycheck on Starbucks.

... and eating french fries and an oreo  Mcflurry from McDonalds.

I promise we got a little bit of Eastern culture into our days, I just ensured they were adequately alternated with Starbucks and sandwich breaks.

 

Moving from Cambodia to China: 10 differences

I realize this is a little late...um I moved here months ago...but thank goodness for my borderline obsessive nature to write everything down. Moving from Cambodia to China resulted in some culture shock. Spending half a year in a 3rd world country will make moving anywhere much different. I realized many different things upon my arrival in China than I ever would have if I'd come straight from America. Here are 10 things (in no order) that I noticed immediately after arriving in China.

1) PEOPLE FOLLOW TRAFFIC LAWS? Well kind of. By this I mean they usually drive on the right side of the road. Traffic in Cambodia was like nothing I've ever seen. I honestly can't believe I biked my butt around in the middle it for months and made it out with all my limbs intact. If you've seen traffic in China, you might think I'm nuts for using the adjective "organized"....but the fact that a red light receives a usually stop response, rather than a plow-straight-through-but-honk-your-horn-to-make-it-legitimate response is just mind blowing.

2) So. Many. Old. People. China's population is about 15% elderly, while Cambodia's elderly population is under 4%. Old people in China are so active, they are always out walking in the parks, playing mahjong or exercising. In Cambodia it was very rare to see an elderly person. That is partly due to poor healthcare and also a very obvious result of the Khmer Rouge where about 2 million people died. My very first day in China I realized that I could count on one hand the number of elderly people I had seen in the previous 6 months.

3) Sidewalks. What are these? We can (usually) walk here without being run over?

4) Oh my gosh I can understand what people are saying. My Khmer is...nonexistent.

5) Oh lawwwwwd it's cold. When I left Cambodia it was in the high 90s daily with painful humidity, where AC was a HUGE luxury.When I arrived in China it dropped to the 20s at night. The heat was shut off by the government a week later.

6) A car? When was the last time I rode in a car? Oh. My sister's VW bug on the way to LAX in September.

7) WHOOP I blend in. Kind of. Sometimes.

8) Walking. Why aren't people yelling at me while I walk? What if I want a ride? A tuk tuk? A moto? Oh right, no one walks anywhere in Cambodia.

9) Wow there are literally no Westerners here. Where are the white people? Cambodia was crawling with tourists and NGOs working to save everything. After a few months here I can count on my two hands the number of foreigners I've seen here who aren't my coworkers.

10) PEOPLE ARE HUGE. No they're not. Chinese people are tiny. In comparison to Cambodians, Chinese people are monsters. Me in comparison to both..I'm Shrek.

The Resurrection: The time I beat a teen with a pineapple.

I haven't blogged in a while, partly because I became lazy, and partly because I felt that I didn't have many exciting things to share. Buuuut with some encouragement from friends back home (Kiersten Brown) I have decided to resurrect my blog.

I've since moved to Yinchuan, Ningxia. This is my first blog post from China, and it marks 8 months living in Asia! On my 7 month anniversary, I celebrated by beating a teen (maybe a preteen) with a pineapple.

Here is a picture of the entrance to my apartment building. This photo is taken with the flash of my camera, but my apartment complex has no outside lights. I do realize that I am a bit of a pansy but I'm always a little bit nervous walking through dark places at night alone in a foreign country...call me crazy.

One night I was walking home after dinner with friends, holding a pineapple in a plastic bag that was given to me for free by a creepy middle aged Chinese man who runs the fruit stand by my apartment (that's a different story). There were kids playing some kind of game, one of them was holding something that looked like a plastic sword. I heard the boys say "It's the foreigner!" so they stopped playing. Thanks boys for the flattering introduction and wildly obvious statement regarding my nationality.

Anyways, the boys stopped playing and I walked on by towards my apartment building. Suddenly, the boy with the sword came straight towards me and grabbed me by the forearm. Cue fight or flight instincts. And terror. Without even thinking, I swung the pineapple like a sledgehammer. I'm talking full force swing, over my head, with all of my 5 foot 8 strength, into the upper back/neck of this kid...with my pineapple. Not really the ideal equipment to be armed with in a fight. I was horrified and frightened, so my first instinct was to beat the person who grabbed me by any means possible. This particular day, those means were in the form of the free tropical fruit I had in my hand.

 Well, the good news is that there was no fight. Because immediately after bludgeoning this Chinese teen with my pineapple, I see that he's blindfolded. Ummm what? It turns out, he was playing a game with his friends and thought I was one of them...cause he couldn't see me...cause he was blindfolded. Whoops.

I didn't apologize, and I'm not sorry at all. The only thing I am sorry about it losing that pineapple. I was going to eat that...

Don't be a hero

One time, on my way to play with an elephant I had an allergic reaction to a deer in the form of hives on my face and neck. One time, Cambodians rubbed Tiger Balm all over my hives to heal me. Actually...four times.

I've allllllways wanted to play with elephants. It's actually kind of amazing that I spent almost 6 months in southeast Asia without seeing any elephants. My roommate, Melissa, and I have been talking about elephants since we arrived in Cambodia in September. FINE-NUH-LY we made the trip by jeep to a wildlife rescue center about 90 minutes outside of the city to see ourselves some wildlife. 

Our trip started with some really big deer. Everyone was petting the deer. However, because I'm from central Austin where deer are so plentiful it's more exciting to see a squirrel, I wasn't going to touch this mammoth of a creature. When people stopped loving on it, the monster started bowing its head and touching it's antlers to a girl with a camera that could cover my rent for the next 12 months. So naturally, I started petting it to calm it down to help her out. DON'T BE A HERO CHRISTINA. Approximately 47 seconds later I started breaking out in hives all over my face, neck, and chest. No one had benadryl, but oh good we had liquid Tiger Balm.



The first time they applied Tiger Balm, it burned, but it was preferable to the burning hives. The second time, it hurt more, but was tolerable. The third time, my eyes began to water. The fourth time tiger balm was rubbed on my face, I couldn't hold back tears. It felt like someone lit my face on fire. In the middle of the Sahara desert. While pouring shampoo in my eyes. And drinking clorox.

The remedy for that? Rub the coldest thing I could get my hands on all over my face. A can of beer from a local vendor. After about an hour of pain, the hives went down, and I continued on my tour as if nothing happened. I did, however, lose almost all my dignity as I sat on a wooden table, teary eyed, rubbing a can of beer on my face.  Now, I really wish I had a picture of that.

Once fully recovered, I hung out with tigers, lions, leopards, sun bears, snakes, monkeys (not too exciting...you see them in the city), and Lucy the elephant.

I didn't quite keep my composure while interacting with Lucy the elephant...which has subsequently provided some pretty funny photos.

Lessons learned: Don't touch deer. Don't be a vet. Don't be a hero. 

Ridin' Dirty

Navigating the roads in Cambodia is all about finding a delicate balance between cautious-this-is-my-first-day-of-driving-school defensive driving, and I-was-Evel-Knievel-in-a-former-life-everybody-move-over aggression. If you aren't careful, you'll get run over. Literally. If you aren't aggressive, you won't get anywhere. Literally.

Things I've seen while biking in the past week:
-Cows getting in the way of traffic

-Two men transporting a fridge on a moto

-A 10 passenger van full of pineapples. Completely full. Literally, I couldn't see in any of the windows. Or the driver of the van, for that matter.

-A monkey running across telephone wire above me. Like a squirrel. 

-4 adults crammed onto one motorbike

-A 10 or 11 year old child operating a moto. 

-A mother nursing her newborn on the back of the fathers motorbike 

-People getting bag snatched 

Things I haven't seen while biking in the past week:

-Traffic signals. They took out signals on one of the busiest roads in the city.

-People obeying the few traffic signals that do exist. 

-Helmets being used 

-The moto that nicked my arm with their side mirror while zooming past. 

-Turn signals being used

-The multiple cars/motos/buses that have almost hit me 

-Any indication that the concept "yield" exists

Here are some photos of what the traffic and crazy vehicles that occupy the road here.

Just a casual commute to work with 98 other people on a truck with standing room only. If you look closely at the moto closest to the camera, there is a family of 4 piled on. The youngest is half standing/half squatting in front of the father who is driving...without a helmet. This is the Cambodian car seat. 

Chillin' on some plant life. 

A moto with 50 kites attached. 

A bike with 50 balloons attached. I've actually been bopped in the head multiple times by balloons attached to bikes. 

A bike with a small convenient store attached. 

Casual traffic in front of the royal palace. Blocks away from my apartment. 

Today, while driving in the right lane of a 3 lane road, luckily, I saw the car attempting to turn right from the left lane. This was annoying. Unfortunately, because I was paying attention to the car attempting to turn right from the left lane 5 feet before his turn came, I neglected the car driving the WRONG way down the road straight at me in my right lane. This was more annoying. I successfully avoided both cars. Narrowly. Somehow, I'm still alive. 

Christina's Cambodian Christmas Card

This is an email I sent to over 100 people around Christmas time. I think it only made it to a handful of people. Not sure if I should blame the Cambodian internet or the fact that I use AOL....

December 24, 2012

Hello from Cambodia!

This is my version of a Christmas card. Instead of distributing a picture of me in a Christmas sweater (because who wears sweaters in Cambodia?), you are receiving a reflection on my 15 weeks so far living in Southeast Asia.  This country is different than anything I’ve ever experienced (duh, Christina). Cambodian people are spectacular, the weather is almost unbearable, and the experience is something I never could have prepared myself for.  The email and evaluations you are about to read are far from many you will hear from backpackers who pass through or preteens here on week long youth group trips. I've far from experienced all of Cambodia, but here is a taste of my life and evaluations for the past 3 ½ months in a third world country. I've kept a blog (http://cambodianchris.blogspot.com) if you want to see some pictures and other stories I've posted while I've been here. 

 Cambodia is a rapidly developing country. Developing…but far from developed.  It is not for the faint of heart. This is not a ploy for you to pity me or scare you from venturing over here, but an honest assessment: it’s a real challenge here. The people I've encountered here are…interesting. I have had an unimaginably difficult time negotiating where I stand in the expat community here. There are 5,000 expats living in Phnom Penh. Many of these are who we refer to as “sexpats”, people who have come to Cambodia to engage in, and from what it looks like, sustain the booming sex industry.  It’s easy to identify a sexpat. They are middle aged to…well…old men, who walk with a leering, undeserved, confidence with a beautiful Cambodian woman on their arm.  This shatters my heart into a million pieces while simultaneously triggering my gag reflex. I’ve been on a constant search for other teachers like me: half Chinese volleyball playing girls with a deep love for ice cream and multicolored windbreakers. However, my search has surrendered no results. I’ve widened my search to young adults who are attempting to navigate their way through the transition to adult life, while barely remaining financially stable from our meager Cambodian income.  Unfortunately, this search has turned out to be only slightly better than the previous one. PEOPLE LIKE ME ARE HARD TO FIND!

 

It’s never really been hard for me to make friends in the US. Between captaining volleyball teams and 4 years in my sorority, Zeta Tau Alpha, finding friends has been quite easy.  I am constantly surrounded by amazing people when I’m home. That is no coincidence (I have excellent taste). I LOVE being in groups and socializing. I CRAVE constant human interaction and ALWAYS want company.  Knowing this about myself, 4 years ago I added to my bucket list (a list of things to do before I die...yes I have one…yes I’m serious…yes I love lists) “move to a place where I don’t know anyone”.  Holy Cow 18 year old Christina what were you thinking?! 22 year old Christina took it further and changed it to “move to a country where I don’t know anyone”. Okay seriously…who does this?! I guess I wanted a challenge. Wellp. I found one.

 Finding a niche here has been HARD. Finding friends has been HARD. Navigating my way through typical young adult tribulations here has been HARD.  People say they change over here. People say that with any extended trip abroad. Everyone says “I’m sure you’ve changed” blah blah blah. Have I? Maybe. I’m not sure. I do know that I have definitely grown up.  I’m maturing and attempting to pilot my way into adult life, much the same as my counterparts/best friends in the US. At the same time, so so so different.  Not harder, or easier…but different.

Ready for good things? I feel like I’ve finally got the hang of life over here.  I’ll never fully get how this country ticks, how everyone can possibly be so relaxed, how the traffic somehow continues to flow, or how I possibly safely transport myself via bike in this traffic. Somehow, not every day feels like a near death adventure anymore. Finally it just feels like life.

 My students are INCREDIBLE. My little kindergarteners are hilarious. They bounce back and forth speaking Khmer, Chinese and English.  The best thing they say is “5…6…7...A...9…10…elephant...” ummm now that I told y’all that I realize maybe we should practice counting more. Sometimes I feel like my kindergarten job is glorified babysitting, but my amazing TA makes everything much better. She is 29 and married with a child, and she’s one of my best friends over here.  She feels like my big sister, Dre, and has helped me understand this country more than I ever could have on my own. My college students are AWESOME (I just taught them that word last week). Honestly, I feel like teaching my college course makes teaching here worth it. I've formed relationships with my students, they have dreams and goals for the future, and I am helping them get there by teaching them English.  I’m fairly certain they think I’m a true basket case, and I’m also pretty sure they think I’m 18 years old. On the first day of class I fell out of my chair, and the second week I wrote on our dry erase board with permanent marker. Classic.

An amazing thing that I've observed about Cambodian people, is the balance they've found between maintaining a good work ethic, and the ability to relax 24/7. I've seen some of the hardest working people in this country, and I've also seen some of the chillest people in this country. It’s always impressive, and sometimes aggravating.  

It feels like Cambodia realizes the work that is left after their recent dark days of genocide, but that hasn't produced a rushed or panicked feeling like many would assume. Rather, it seems that they accept where they are, and they have a reasonable timeline and goals for their crusade to progress.  That being said, the government is extremely corrupt and paying off cops is as nonchalant as paying for a loaf of bread (I did it yesterday).  People have got plenty of horrible things to say about the Cambodian government, and believe me I could give you a laundry list. However, I think people sometimes forget how recently it was that this country had a massive genocide under Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. If we’re comparing how this country is being run now to how it was before, I think we don’t even need to have this discussion.  Cambodia’s progress is undeniable and encouraging for me to see. The food isn't especially great, the weather is especially sucky, the infrastructure is almost nonexistent, but it’s the Cambodian people who make this country worth a second glance. People here are very unapologetic about Cambodia. This is helpful when I get frustrated with minor things here. It is what it is. RELAX CHRISTINA.  

 

I've spent many days feeling lonely as I negotiate the difference between being alone and loneliness.  Luckily, this has also given me time to observe and think (and write this staggeringly long email).  I’m happy over here, but I’m also ready to begin my second adventure.  In 2 months I’m moving to China and I couldn't be more thrilled! I’m moving to Yinchuan, which is in the far north of China, close-ish to Mongolia. I've signed a six month contract which begins March 1. After that? Who knows. I don’t even know what country I’ll be in. I’m determined to make my way to Tibet, Nepal, and India…eventually.  I have no idea where my final destination is, but I am so pleased with the direction my life is going.  Until then, I’ll do my best to maintain this nomadic lifestyle. 

I hope everyone is having a fabulous holiday! I wish I could be with my family and best friends delivering my signature Christmas cookies.  Instead, I’m eating rice and breaking a sweat on Christmas Eve as I type this email. If you've somehow read this entire email you deserve a cookie (hey can you mail me one of those as well?!).  Read my blog! http://cambodianchris.blogspot.com if you don’t read it, I understand…just don’t tell me you’re not reading it.  I’d love to hear from y’all and I apologize for not keeping in better contact with many of you. I’d like to hear what is going on in your life after making you read so many of my words about me. 

Merry Christmas! LYMI, peace n’ blessingz, SB < 3, ZLAM, and any other slang/acronym/youtube quote you can think of to say I love and miss y’all. Love you mama and daddy!

Christina