Travel Journal on our Silk Road China Trip
August 16 Beijing 北京
Clark and I have been to the Great Wall in 1995, but this time we went to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. It hardly had any people. The view of the Great Wall stretched along the lush green mountaintops was breathtaking. We saw a wedding group taking wedding photos on the Wall. Good choice of a perfect spot!
August 17 Beijing/Urumqi北京/乌鲁木齐
We went to a local restaurant for lunch. It was a nice place for dumplings. We tasted ten different kinds of stuffing; most of them were vegetables with only one meat stuffing that the kids liked.
August 18 Urumqi乌鲁木齐
On the way to Heavenly Lake, we stopped at the roadside to look at a yurt (a tentlike dwelling of the Mongol and Turkic peoples of central Asia). Inside it was huge, large enough to comfortably sleep a dozen people. It was beautifully decorated with colorful carpets. The yurt was located on a scenic creek bank side. When winter comes, the nomad’s family just takes down the entire yurt, packs it and moves to warm grounds, next summer the family returns to the same spot and sets up the yurt again.
Sitting on top of a hill overlooking the Heavenly Lake, there was a Daoism Monastery we visited. It was so peaceful and beautiful there, truly heavenly.
August 19 Turpan 吐鲁番
Turpan was hot. We stayed at the Huozhou Hotel. Huozhou 火洲in Chinese means Fire State. Our room had a see-through glass wall bathroom, it was really cool. This was the first time we saw this kind of bathroom.
August 20 Turpan/Jiayuguan吐鲁番/嘉峪关
Our overnight train ticket had some issues. In fact we did not even have a train ticket. Our guide had to bribe several staff on the train with cigarettes and money so that we can get on the train with soft-sleep beds. Only a Chinese can handle this situation, westerners can’t even imagine what to do. Because of the ticket issue, a couple of us had to move from one compartment to another in the middle of the night; we did not sleep much.
August 21 Jiayuguan嘉峪关
Jiayuguan Pass was the first pass to Hexi corridor. People traveling westward must pass this fort in ancient times. Compared to Fort Snelling, Jiayuguan was huge. It housed one thousand soldiers and horses in ancient times.
August 22 Dunhuang 敦煌
We had our first camel ride at the Singing Sand Mountains and Crescent Moon Spring. It was fantastic! Most camels had two humps. We learned that the camels with standing humps were the healthy ones while those with hanging humps were not.
At Mogao Grottoes we saw a huge (over 30 foot tall) Buddha stone statue and a 26 foot lying Buddha statue. The Grottoes have over 700 caves, but at any given day only 30 caves are open for tourists.
August 23 Dunhuang敦煌
Dunhuang night market was a nice place to go. It had all kinds of spices, artworks and food. We particularly liked the local art and bought one wooden carving tiger for CNY800. The tiger looked so real, it was cool. Seeing the artist working on their projects in the market was definitely eye opening.
August 24 Dunhuang敦煌
We have been reading Chinese/English signs at places we went to. Here were the funniest ones we have seen. “Grapes and fruits taste the spot” in Chinese 葡萄水果品尝点，in proper English it should be something like this “This is the spot to taste grapes and fruits”. “Watch for ladders” in Chinese 小心台阶，there was no ladder rather there were some steps, in proper English it should be “Watch for your steps”. “Be careful of landslide” in Chinese 小心地滑，in proper English it should be “Floor slippery, be careful!” This sign on a bathroom door made us laugh for a long time.
August 25 Lanzhou 兰州
Two days in a row we traveled to different states; we were tired. Taking a speedboat ride on the Yellow River was an interesting experience on its own. The 45-minute one-way ride was scary considering the boat was tiny and completely enclosed with eight people trapped inside for a long time; not to mention on the way back the driver told us he saw a dead body floating on the water. However the serene Bingling Cave Temple hidden in the mountains along the Yellow River was worthwhile to see. Water buffaloes were happily resting in the valley where caves, mountains and river meet, it was picturesque! There was no other way to get to the Bingling Cave Temple, so we had to take the speedboat.
August 26 Xian 西安
After daily breakfast buffet and banquet style Chinese lunch, McDonald’s sounded so good to us. We often craved for ice cream on the trip and that was our supper.
August 27 Xian/Shanghai西安/上海
In Shanghai we departed with the rest of the group. Shanghai is my hometown.
August 28 to September 2 Shanghai上海
We still had a few days before we heading back to the States. One day we went to a nearby water town called Wuzhen. It rained and such moments appeared in many Chinese literatures “beautiful Jiangnan in the rain 雨中的江南是很美的”.
On the last day in Shanghai, a Typhoon hit the city and we got heavy rain for hours and hours. It reminded me how much I loved Typhoon weather when I was a child in the hot and humid over 100-degree days when the only cooling device we had was the fan in the house. It felt so nice and cool during Typhoon.
We had a great time in China and we have over 800 pictures! For a sneak peek of the photos we took on the trip, go to this link:
http://picasaweb.google.com/108878095563854310219/ChinaOldAndNew?feat=email#slideshow/5519900334163292242
Finding true meaning in classic Chinese literature
When I was young, I learned these classic Chinese literatures. One of them is the famous Dang dynasty poem from Wang Wei “A Song at Weicheng” and another one is one of the four Chinese classic novels “Journey to the West” from the 16th century. My trip to the Silk Road three weeks ago made all these literatures into reality.
王维Wang Wei wrote《送元二使安西（又名“渭城曲”）》A SONG AT WEICHENG
渭城朝雨浥轻尘，A morning-rain has settled the dust in Weicheng;
客舍青青柳色新。Willows are green again in the tavern dooryard….
劝君更尽一杯酒, Wait till we empty one more cup —
西出阳关无故人。West of Yang Gate there’ll be no old friends.
I was able to see the so called Yang Gate阳关 at Jiayuguan 嘉裕关and the nearby Jade Gate 玉门关. These gates together marked the boundaries between ancient China 中国 and the surrounding barbarians. West of the gates was desert while east of the gates was the civilized China in old days. Making the geographic connection allows me to fully understand the true meaning of “West of Yang Gate there’ll be no old friends”.
One of the most famous characters in Journey to the West 西游记was the Monkey King孙吾空. In one of the episode, the Monkey King had to pass the Flaming Mountain火焰山with his crew. The only way to pass the Mountain was to borrow a super fan from a powerful person. I thought the Flaming Mountain火焰山was existed only in literature when I was young. But there is the real Flaming Mountain in Xinjiang province that I saw this time. The red sandy mountain under the sun is breathtakingly beautiful. Not only did we find the real Flaming Mountain, we also went to Guazhou 瓜州. In Journey to the West, the Monkey King also went to Guazhou 瓜州. We tasted sweet melon at Guazhou, maybe that is why it is called Guazhou because melon in Chinese is Gua瓜.
By the way, if you don’t know what Four Chinese Classic Novels are, they are: Romance of the Three Kingdoms 三國演義, Water Margin 水滸傳, Journey to the West 西遊記 and Dream of the Red Chamber 紅樓夢. Happy learning because what you have learned could be true.
Red Cliff 赤壁
After watching the movie “Red Cliff”, I thought about the famous Battle of the Red Cliff in Chinese history immediately prior to the Three Kingdoms era around the winter of 208/9 AD. The movie is fascinating and entertaining. Several famous actors and actresses from Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan worked together to make this movie even more worthy of watching. Probably every Chinese child read Romance of the Three Kingdoms 三 國 演 義, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, can tell you the result of the battle where the movie “Red Cliff” came to an sudden end just before the battle. A small army of Zhou Yu and Zhu Ge Liang defeated a much larger army led by Cao Cao through courage and well-planned strategies. These strategies are enormously witty even today’s business world can use some.
Three well-known people throughout Chinese history were involved in the battle: Zhou Yu 周瑜, Zhu Ge Liang 诸葛亮, and Cao Cao 曹操. While you can find many records on who they were and how they contributed to the Chinese history, I though of Zhu Ge Liang as calm, full of wisdom, and a war and political strategist, Zhou Yu as an excellent army commander and a handsome man who died early, and Cao Cao as a proud man, with no fear, and knew how to use his power and army to his political advancement. Among the three, Zhu Ge Liang is my favorite. Many stories of him captivated my imagination throughout my childhood.
So where is the location of the Battle of the Red Cliff? While it is widely debated and remains uncertain, many believed the location is southeast of Wuhan and Yueyang in Hunan province on the south bank of the Yangtze River. I have not yet visited the place, but for sure someday I would like to see it where the word Red Cliff 赤 壁 is written on a rock standing on the river. You may watch the movie online at this link http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/svoS0m9mx4s/
Destination China
Celebrate the year of Tiger, beginning February 14
Walking along the Great Wall in Beijing; riding man-peddled wooden boat on the Grand Canal in a water village; and taking martial art training at the famous Shaolin Monastery Institute, China is a cultural and experiential destination for families and individuals.
YANGTZE RIVER CRUISE
The Yangtze River, along with the Yellow River, is the origin of Chinese civilization. From melting glacial waters in Tibet to the East China Sea at Shanghai, the world’s third longest river runs almost 4000 miles and divides the country into northern China and southern China. On the cruise, you will see the spectacular Three Gorges, many archaeological and cultural sites, and the largest hydroelectric power station in the world: the Three Gorges Dam.
GREAT WALL OF CHINA
Built in 210 BC by the first emperor Qin Shi Huang, the Great Wall stretches for more than 5500 miles. While walking on the Great Wall is very popular at Badaling, you can also take a day or two to trek the less popular but rather impressive Mutianyu, Jinshanling, and Simatai.
GOBI DESERT
The world’s fifth largest desert is along the Silk Road, a route through which China opened its door to the West in the Han Dynasty. Today’s Xinjiang province has several legendary sites such as Mogao Cave in Dunhuang, the Heavenly Lake in Urumqi and Flaming Mountain, a well-known 16th century Chinese classic and scenic Journey to the West spot in Turpan.
The 56 Chinese ethnic groups(中国56个民族)
Kudos to 14 professional Chinese photographers who traveled more than 10000 miles and took one year of time to take these beautiful high resolution pictures of each of the 56 Chinese ethnic groups. In the book they published “Harmonious China — China’s 56 ethnic groups silhouette” (<<和谐中华——中国56个民族剪影>>), each picture was documented with the photographer’s name, when and where the picture was taken with the exact longitude and latitude, and the names of the actors and actresses in the picture.
Among the 56 ethnic groups, Han(汉族) is the largest also called the majority while the rest is called the minorities. Han people accounts for 91.6% of the Chinese population. While the 55 minority ethnic groups distributed extensively throughout different regions of China, Yunnan Province has the greatest minority groups – 25 groups. Government policies allow ethnic groups to deal with their own affairs to ensure unity and equality, especially in five autonomous regions; Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Guangxi, Ningxia and Tibet. Each of the minority ethnic groups has a distinctive and different character, its own language and belief. Among the 55 minority ethnic groups, Guangxi province’s Zhuang Zu, Tibet’s Zang Zu, and Inner mongolia’s Mongol are the top three largest groups
Names of the 55 minority ethnic groups(少数民族) are: Achang, Bai, Blang, Bonan, Bouyei, Chaoxian, Dai, Daur, Deang, Dong, Dongxiang, Dulong, Ewenki, Gaoshan, Gelao, Gin, Hani, Hezhen, Hui, Jingpo, Jinuo, Kazak, Kirgiz, Lahu, Li, Lisu, Luoba, Man, Maonan, Miao, Monba, Mongol, Mulam, Naxi, Nu, Oroqen, Primi, Qiang, Russian, Salar, She, Shui, Tagik, Tatar, Tu, Tujia, Uygur, Uzbek, Wa, Xibe, Yao, Yi, Yugur, Zang, Zhuang.
See all 56 photos at http://hi.baidu.com/pdsdhh008/blog/item/adb6cc50c19e436885352491.html
Chinese tea (茶)
Chinese like to give tea as a gift to friend and family. If you are one of the lucky Americans who get this gift, what will you do? Tea lovers will drink it and enjoy it while others although appreciate the gift may re-gift it to give it away. Many people don’t know how to deal with loose tea leaf. I am not a serious tea drinker so I understand that. No matter which level you are at with tea drinking, it doesn’t hurt to have some tea knowledge.
Tea is native to China. Chinese has a long history and tradition of using tea for
medical and drinking purposes. There are four major tea categories: white, green, oolong and black. Among them, green tea is the most popular. Chinese flower tea (花茶), while popular, is not a true tea. In fact, flower tea is one of my favorite. It is so refreshing and fragrant.
Famous Chinese teas are: Jiansu province’s Bi Luo Chun (碧螺春), Zhejiang province’s Gunpowder (珠), Hangzhou’s Long Jing (龙井, Dragon Well), Anhui province’s Huang Shan Mao Feng (黄山毛峰), Hunan province’s Jun Shan Yin Zhen (君山銀針), Anhui province’s Keemun black teas (祁门), Anhui province’s Liu An Gua Pian (六安瓜片, Melon seed), Sichuan province’s Meng Ding Gan Lu (蒙頂), Hunan province’s Silver Needle, Fujian province’s Wu Yi Yan Cha (Rock Oolong), Henan province’s Xin Yang Mao Jian (信阳毛尖, Green tip), and Yunnan province’s Puer teas (普洱茶). Among them, some are yellow tea and some grow on the mountains.
Some people believe the first year tea is the best. I bought a 7-year old compacted Puer tea on a trip to southern China. I was told if I drink it after a meal, it has a diet effect because this tea absorbs fat.
Chinese tea culture also includes exquisite tea-set used to serve tea and nice tea houses for people to get together. Almost on any China trip, you have the opportunity to taste tea. What a great way to find out on your own what Chinese tea is like! For serious tea drinkers, there are also special tea trips to cater your love of Chinese tea. So cheers with Chinese tea, for good health or simply for pleasure.
China travel resources
Have you ever wondered which book to buy when you prepare for a trip to China?
The best tip I have ever seen so far is to buy the book “Point It”- a traveler’s language kit (ISBN: 978-3-9803130-2-5), a book with pictures only for you to point at. This book is very helpful when you travel to China or any other non-Latin countries.
I also recommend DK’s eyewitness travel guides “China”. You can find the book at any book store.
How about online resources? There are many. The one I like is this user-friendly tool www.tripadvisor.com where you can find hotel information, free travel guides, restaurants and things to do for a particular city.
Maps are always handy to have. If you are the person like me or most of us, you will be disappointed to know that recent China map or city map in English are hard to find, almost non-exist. China National Tourism Office publishes high quality maps and travel guides in English, but you can’t buy them in stores. You can either order them from info@cnto.org or you can buy them from me: map is $2 and travel guide is $8 each. It is too cheap not to have them. While those resources are very popular among my customers, my stock is running low.
As always, I tell my customers that the more they read and study on China, the more they will get out of their trips. It is true that learn a few Chinese words and sentences will take you a long way. I bought a few books “Chinese for Tourists with CD” while I was in China. Those turned out to be wonderful gifts to friends and customers.
Last but not the least, think about people resources. Do you have Chinese co-works or friends who you can ask for their opinion? I am happened to be Chinese, a travel agent and your friend, why not ask me?
Feed my starving children
My kids and I spent the last nice summer Saturday afternoon at Feed My Starving Children in Eagan. The non-profit organization bags nutritious meals to feed malnutrition children in eight countries like Philippines, Haiti, Indonesia and other. In two hours, a group of fifty people from our church bagged 73 boxes of food. With each box contains 216 meals, our work produced 15768 meals to feed 15768 people for one meal or 11 families of four for an entire year.
Two-hour flied by really quickly when we had a lot fun bagging food. Music was playing in the background and teams were working as fast as they can to see who bags the most. I was very impressed by the well structured assembly lines. Chicken flavored Vitamins and minerals powder, dehydrated vegetables, soy nugget, rice went in the bag in order, weighed at 380 to 400 oz each, sealed and labeled, then into the box.
1 bag = 6 meals; 1 box = 36 bags; thus 1 box = 216 meals.
Feed My Starving Children has five facilities in the Twin Cities area. It relies totally on volunteers to donate money and time. For 17 cent, you can buy a child in need a nutritious meal. My kids bought three M&M tubes for $1 each. Just $3, you can feed a child for 17 days. Next time when you are looking for something to do for the family, think about Feed My Starving Children because it is fun and the time is well spent for a good cause http://www.fmsc.org.
Why Las Vegas is a big attraction?
As the airplane left Las Vegas, I was overlooking the city in the middle of nowhere and could not help thinking why Las Vegas is such a big attraction to Chinese, Japanese, Indian, European and even American. Gamble, shopping, show and food are the top reasons why.
The human desire to win money and the addiction to keep winning more make this gamble city truly a sinful city. I heard people told me that Chinese officials visiting Las Vegas their tour packages include thousands of dollars of gambling money. The government pays for it, so why not? For me, every time I go to a casino, I set a limit for myself normally is less than $20. If I lose it, then I quit. If I win any money, I quit also. I am not a lucky person so I know better.
Adult show, theatre show, talent show, comedy show, celebrity show and concert are really fun to see in Las Vegas. No wonder if you have been to Las Vegas and you haven’t seen any of them, you miss a lot of the fun. Make sure you check out lasvegasshows.com before you go.
Food used to be my favorite thing. It was cheap. However it has changed over the years. This time, I stayed at Planet Hollywood. It claimed to have Las Vegas’ #1 buffet and the dinner costs $28.99. Who can eat that much of food? It is overrated and expensive. I do like the hotel though. It was a nice remake of Aladdin. My room was a suite themed with Tom Cruise’s movie “The Firm”. It has several pictures from the movie and even displays a jacket that Tom wore in the movie. Movie fans and Hollywood dreamers, even though it is not the real Hollywood in LA, you can definitely feel the atmosphere of Hollywood excitement.
The Miracle Mile Shops is the shopping complex connecting to Planet Hollywood. Here you can find high-end shops with name brand merchants. Why go all over the world to find what you want, you can shop everything at Miracle Mile Shops. I know Japanese and Chinese have deep pockets and they love name brands. Their society is so emphasizing on “face”, it is a status symbol to own name brand.
My client told me that Las Vegas used to be $100 vacation destination for Americans, but I told him that it is no long true. For a 3-night vacation to Las Vegas from Minneapolis, the best package will cost about $300 per person. Good luck to you and have fun in Las Vegas!
My favorite websites
I enjoy reading my classmate’s well-written blog with poems on weekend activities, good eats and nature surprises around us. http://binlipeng.blogspot.com/
I believe 5-minute laughter every day is good for us. For funny readings, go to: http://failblog.org/ and http://icanhascheezburger.com/ and political funnies http://punditkitchen.com/
Ever since I know this columnist, I like her writings that touch me one way or another. http://www.areavoices.com/onmymind
My sister recommended this blog to me. Written in Chinese, the author “Rabbit Editor” has unique view through her camera and her heart. http://ljj520.blogbus.com/
Need a place to share travel pictures, ideas and favorite foods and scenic places? Join this free online community specifically for oversea Chinese. http://www.loopow.com/
Social and professional networking is so big nowadays, it can be fun. Visit my LinkedIn profile http://www.linkedin.com/in/katieqiongdailey2008 or invite me (QiongDailey) to be your friend on Facebook. I have yet to learn Twitter. A popular Chinese social networking site I like is NetLog: http://zh.netlog.com/qiongdailey.
Last, my favorite picture site is Flickr. It has nice slide shows. I have posted my latest vacation photos here http://www.flickr.com/photos/25746090@N04/show/with/3775607045.
Enjoy and share your favorites.
