Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in geraldmaa's LiveJournal:

Monday, June 27th, 2005
10:01 pm	Taiwan Days (aka Shaved Ice everyday) So, sadly, this is going to be the last entry from east asia for, at the least, a long time. Give me a bit of time for a long sigh and a wipe at a tear. OK. We've been out of Kunming since the 15th. Our travels since have been low-key and relaxing--necessary due to the uber hectic final month and a half in China. First we took the cheap ticket to Shenzhen. There, we met up with one of my uncle's long time colleague who showed us around the suburb (Chang An). We were only there for about two days. Our host, Topson, was a blast and an excellent host. He took us shopping and showed us great places to eat--Korean Barbeque and seafood--Yum! Then we scurried over to Hong Kong via boat and flew to Taiwan. Our first week or so was in Taipei. We spent time hanging out with Grandma, uncle and aunt. We saw Taipei 101 which was, surprisingly to me, quite beautiful. Going around town we have been picking up cool Japanese and Taiwanese. I've gotta say we've thoroughly enjoyed the Muji store here. We also went to the Fine Arts Museum of Taipei and the National Palace Museum. From Thursday to Saturday we were in the southern city of Tainan. We stayed with some family friends. The one full day we were there we went to visit my grand uncle and then proceeded to the center of town and took a walking tour of the older sites. About mid-morning the sky opened up and poured for the entire day, so we spent the day seeing the sites, ducking into coffee shope and walking around the streets in the emergency-bought ponchos because I was ill-prepared. We saw the oldest Confucian temple in Taiwan and allegedly the first temple on the island. The food in Tainan was delicious because the seafood is so fresh, abundant and various. The Japanese meals we had there just amazing--everything from the sashimi to the eel to the sushi and tempura were so fresh and delicious. And for the final dinner our hosts took us to a suburb of the city to have snacks for dinner. Tainan claims to have the best snacks in all of Taiwan. We had shrimp rolls (shrimp, batter, chives and spices made into a cigar sized roll and deep fried) which were extremely good with a bowl of squid ball noodle soup. After that they took us to a store famous for its dou hua (a dessert of silken tofu with sweet red kidney beans in a brown sugar sauce). More yumminess. After Tainan we've been back for a couple of days. We just came back from dinner with my two uncles and a group of people one of the uncles knows. Yesterday we went out to a town called Ying Ge. My mother's cousin and her family took us out to see the town's old area. It's an area full of ceramics, art and tea. The city's known for its tea pots and has kept that part of the town preserved and is now full of stores. It only seems appropriate to end by saying that we've visited a Taiwanese bakery almost everyday and eaten Taiwanese shaved ice every day excluding one. Those two things possess such deliciousness I don't think I'm going to even start describing them. Just gotta come here or find them in your local chinatown and imagine it 20 x's better. Well, oddly, it's back to the states tomorrow. I'm going to be in Austin from the 28th until July 9th when I move to DC. So, all you folks in the USA drop me a line if you're going to be found in the same area at the same time. Give me an update about yourselves also. I'm looking forward to catching up with as many people as possible. And for the folks in China: it's hard enough to say in person how much I've enjoyed the company and friendships, so by computer it seems impossible. I thought I was going to enjoy my time in China before I left, but I never thought I'd enjoy it so much and make such good friends that it'd be so difficult to say goodbye. With much love to all, Gerald (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, June 12th, 2005
7:45 pm	on the road (again) hello all, writing to you from urumqi again. we arrived here this morning at 9 am after a 13 hour bus ride back through the gurbantanggut desert from altay. kanas lake was absolutely gorgeous - it it almost more beautiful than the alps. it is so pristine and there are only very few tourists (apparently there are more later in the summer but we went at just the right time when no one else was there). i really can't describe the scenery - you'll just have to see the pics. it's all beautiful rolling green mountains and valley grassland where kazakh yurts dot the landscape as well as their grazing cows, sheep, and beautiful horses. then the landscape becomes more forest - all 600 year old pine trees and birches. there are many wildflowers (don't worry con i took pictures). i have identified them (which means i could be wrong) as wild single-petal pink peonies, wild yellow siberian iris, as well as the ever-present tiny blue, white, and yellow alpine flowers. the lake itself is all glacier water and totally clear. it is on average 90 meters deep and in the deepest places 130 meters deep. the lake is home to the tuwa people who are a branch of mongolian people who came from siberia down to this lake 500 years ago. there are only about 2000 tuwa people left and they speak their own language that is a mix of mongolian and kazakh. they live in small wood huts near the lake (we stayed in one) in the winter when the snow reached 3 m deep outside and it takes 5-6 on horse sleigh to reach the nearest town. during the summer they live in yurts in order to graze their animals. in the houses of tuwa people hang a portrait of genghis khan because mongolians worship him as their leader. when we went to visit a tuwa house we got to hear a local musician who is half kazakh/half mongolian and he played the kazakh "dongbala" instrument, which is like a russian balalaika but with only two strings, and he also played a really weird and cool mongolian reed flute that is unique to the tuwa people. i took short videos of the performance with my digital camera so you can all hear what it sounds like. the lake is said to be home to monster (much like the loch ness monster) that will eat cows and horses if the tuwa let their animals graze too close to the lake. apparently there is some truth to the idea because the monster is or was a giant fish. a fish over 70 lbs was caught in the lake a couple years ago. the local people say that in the past they have caught fish so big that it was more than enough for the whole village to eat all winter. our timing at the lake was really good because they have 7 months of winter and the snow only ends in april. right now many of the kazakhs and mongolians are moving their yurts to their summer locations so we got to see camel caravans loaded with the entire home taking the yurt to a new location and we also got to see families building their yurts. we also got to go inside a yurt to take a look. the outside is made of hide blankets and the structure is made of wood - carpets and blankets line the walls on the inside. the yurts are cool but their food is not so cool - they drink milk tea, which admittedly is much less disgusting than tibetan yak butter tea, but still totally gross and they also drink milk moonshine (yuk!). in the middle of nowhere in the grasslands outside kanas lake are huge stone carvings that are carved in the likenesses of people. they were made by the ancient peoples to represent family members that had died and buried the likeness next to their grave. the carvings are really very impressive - you'll see in the pictures. it's like going to stonehenge or easter island except with not a single other tourist there. we just got to urumqi this morning and after finding a hotel we went out to the xinjiang regional museum to see all the artifacts and the mummies that have been dug up from archeaological sites all over xinjiang. there is a very famous mummy there called the loulan girl who is extremely well preserved. they're pretty creepy looking! the artifacts were really cool but the museum was so crappy it's really too bad. it was so hot inside we thought we were going to pass out. the mummy cases were literally taped shut - so much for climate control and preservation of the artifacts. it's really too bad that all of it's kept in such poor conditions. there are 11 mummies on display with the "loulan beauty" being the oldest at 3,800 years. all the mummies are either of european, mongolian, or mixed european/mongolian descent. there was also ancient pottery, fabric pieces, papers with writing on them, and even a ancient preserved moon cake! well that's all for now. sadly our adventure in xinjiang is at an end and we will leave tomorrow morning for kunming. love, anne (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, June 9th, 2005
6:18 pm	from the land of dersu uzala dear all, we made it to the town of altai mid-morning yesterday after driving through the gurbantanggut desert all night. the landscape of the desert is stark and impressive in its resistance to support any form of life. the trip was hot and every time you stepped off the bus, you got a lungful of dust and sand, which was pretty disgusting but sunrise over the desert made it worthwhile. because there's nothing to obstruct your view you get a full 180 degrees of sunrise. so we arrived in altai - which is a fairly unimpressive town in and of itself. it is not actually in the altay mountain range but rather at the foothills of it. the only impressive thing about the town is that the irtysh (or ertix) river runs through the middle of it. this river comes from the melted snow in the altay all the way from siberia. in fact, the altays are a siberian mountain range. the town is 50% kazakh with some mongolians, russians, and of course han chinese. apparently there are over 1 million kazakhs living in china. some of them have lived here for a very long time but a significant number also fled kazakhstan during the stalin era because they didn't want to give up their nomadic lifestyle. that is why only the kazakhs in china still use a turkic script to write kazakh where in kazakhstan proper they now use cyrillic script. we couldn't figure out at first why in such a small town their seemed to be more than a handful of high-roller, slick business men but then we figured out that this is the no. 1 location for gold mining in all of china. tomorrow we are moving on the kanas nature reserve and kanas lake. this is four hours north of where we are now except in the altay mountains. it is buerqin county and we have to bring our passports for security because this county is the chinese border with kazakhstan, russia, and mongolia. we didn't realize that this was the russian border until we looked at a map. this is the only place in west china where china and russia meet. the kanas nature reserve is siberian taiga forest and it is home to the snow leopard - steve, i am seriously in the land of dersu uzala. there are also mongolian gazelles, wild boar, lynx, brown bears, eagles, and antelope. hopefully we'll spot some of the wildlife. it is also home to a small branch of mongolian people called the tuwa. also, nomadic kazakhs living in yurts still live along the lake and we'll get to stay in a yurt tomorrow night. apparently it's still reaches 0 degrees celsius at night in this area so it's a good thing we brought our polar fleeces. there are hardly any tourists at all here and there are no other americans and/or europeans in this town. hopefully the nature reserve will be pristine and untouched because of the small number of tourists. by the way, the local food is about the same as in kashgar but they have also have a special pilaf rice with lamb chop on top. we are taking some dried noodles with us to the lake because a) the food is very expensive there and b) apparently milk tea (akin to yak butter tea) and innards are the staples of the kazakh and mongolian nomads. did you know that kazakhstan is the 9th largest country in the world, the largest of the former soviet republics, and it's four times the size of texas? i had no idea it was quite that big. today we spent our time arranging our trip to kanas lake (we have to hire a car to get there because there are no buses) and then went an hour outside of town to go see ancient rock carvings - there are about 2000-3000 years old. we went out and hiked around to look at them but only found two small examples. apparently most of the rocks have been carted off by the government to put in the lobbies of their buildings, by hotels for the same purpose, and by private citizens to display in their homes. the government has done nothing to protect the site and it's a real shame. but we did see a 2000 year old depiction of a lizard! well that's all to report for now. we are on such a tight schedule - we leave for kanas at 8 am tomorrow and stay there until saturday afternoon and then take the saturday night bus back to urumqi where we will arrive sunday mid-morning and then we fly back to kunming early monday morning. whew! we need at least another month just to explore xinjiang. it's so interesting out here. hope you are all well. - anne (Comment on this)
Monday, June 6th, 2005
12:39 pm	moving on from kashgar dear all, i write to you from the train station. we are moving on from exotic kashgar. we will take the 24 hour train back to urumqi and then will hop on another train to a place called bole in the scenic mountains on the kazakh border (in kashgar we are closer to pakistan tajikstan afghanistan and kyrgyztan). we had a great time in kashgar - the weather cooled off after the first blazing hot day because dust storms have rolled off the desert and now the sky is a dusty gray color 24 hours a day. it gives everything a very weird tinge because you can't ever tell what time of day it is plus the fact that the uyghurs follow their own local time whereas chinese people stick to running on beijing time. talk about confusing. here in kashgar we saw the largest mosque in china, which honestly wasn't so exciting on the inside except it was full of tall and shady poplar trees. we also went to the mausoleum of apak hoja, a famous uyghur king from the past whose daughter xiang fei was chosen as a concubine for the chinese emperor qianlong to make peace between the uyghurs and the chinese. some say that she served happily as the head concubine until her death and some say that she killed herself in protest. depends on who you ask out here. i also insisted on us visiting the old russian and british consulates. gerald thinks its a little nutty to go visit these old buildings with nothing in them but he indulges me anyways. the old russian consulate was established at the end of the nineteenth century and the british one was est. in 1908. we also got to visit a handicrafts market where you can watch the uyghur people making their traditional crafts - weavings, hats, knives, carpets, etc. even if you just walk through the old town you can watch all of the local products being hand made. the old town is also really cool because it has the uyghur style houses which are low and made of some sort of mud/dirt compound. we also continued to enjoy the food - the staples of the uyghur diet are 'pull noodles' which are thick and delicious noodles with tomato and beef on top as well as the flat bread and lamb kebabs. they also have delicious 'liang fen' which as not at all the same as the 'liang fen' in yunnan. it is a cool, clear, thick noodle with spicy sauce on top. they also make wonderfully tasty whole roasted chicken and a dish that is beef with a thick delicious sauce covering a big piece of nan bread on the bottom. we also discovered that the local rose tea, pomengranate juice, pistachios, and walnut filled pastries are super delicious. on sunday we went to the grand bazaar, which has been operating for perhaps thousands of years. did anybody know that marco polo himself went through kashgar? the market is absolutely massive with huge sections for head scarves, oriental rugs, shoes/clothing, hats of all kinds esp. the ones for muslim men, also the newsboy caps that are reminiscent of the ussr, and also russian fur hats. they also sell the handmade uyghur knives, handcrafted uyghur musical instruments, and many other things. all around the market food stalls are set up to sell local delicacies - how could i almost forget to mention the lamb pockets! little tiny piping hot lamb pockets oozing with fatty, tasty lamb oil. the vendors come from everywhere - many of the people here look almost eastern european. many have light brown, green, or blue eyes and a few people even have naturally blonde hair. many have light brown hair and also many women dye their hair red with henna. with some women you wouldn't be able to tell because their are varying degrees of veiling. almost all women wear a head scarf of some sort - the majority wear a gauzy see-through scarf, some wear solid scarfs, some wear not only the head scarf but also the part of the scarf the covers the lower half of their face. the most religious uyghur women wear a thick brown scarf draped all the way over their face so you can see nothing - there is not even a net for the eyes as with the veils of afghan women during the taliban. here, however, all such veiling is voluntary and based on personal religious convictions. many women also wear the shalwar kameez, the pakistani outfit that is a loose tunic with pants underneath. others wear sparkling, glittery shirt/dress combinations that must be uniquely central asian. most of the uyghur people here speak no chinese at all - it makes it a little difficult to get around. uyghur sounds very beautiful - it is a turkic language and the script looks very similar to arabic. well that's about all for now! more later from bole. hope you are all well. love, anne (Comment on this)
Friday, June 3rd, 2005
10:05 pm	Hello from Kashgar! That's right folks, we're in the western most part of China. And that's right it's 10:06 PM and the sun is in its 5 pm position...oh China, no time-zones for such a massive country. So after a hectic time moving we flew out to Urumqi on Thursday. I was busy tying things up for work and saying, sadly, my byes (I will miss my students and co-workers). About an hour after we landed we were on a day-long train trip through the terrain of Xingjian. The scenery was quite astounding and gorgeous--from the desolate rocky cliffs to the dessert to the oases. You know, Marco Polo visited Kashgar (Kashi in Chinese). This city is just as much, if not more, central Asian than Chinese. It's great! We haven't done that much since flying into Xingjian, so we'll have much more to update you on. There is a cantaloupe and some mount rainer cherries taunting me back at the hotel, so later for now... (Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 18th, 2005
10:25 pm	International Workers' Day Dear All, Sorry it's been so long since we've sent out photos. These photos are compiled from our recent travels over the May 1 holiday period. The first and last part of the trip I did with my two girlfriends (Christie and Kaytea). Unfortunately, Gerald had to work so he met us at Ruili. I went to Baoshan, Tengchong, and Ruili, which are all west of Kunming. I spent the most time in Tengchong, which is 40 km from the Burmese border. There we saw the old wooden architecture, enjoyed Tengchong's famous ersi noodles, ate Burmese food, visited the only in-city waterfall in China, and visited the World War II Memorial. The WWII memorial commemorates the lives of the many Chinese soldiers as well as 18 Allied soldiers that died in the battle to re-take the city of Tengchong (Tengchong was part of the famous Burma Road, which Allied soldiers used to transport supplies to the Chinese to support their fight against the Japanese). From Tengchong, we traveled on to Ruili, which is China's border crossing with Burma. The area between Tengchong and Ruili is beautiful country with lush green mountains on all sides. From the road you can see the mountains of Burma. We were lucky enough to be in Ruili during the Burma-China Friendship Celebration so we got to see parades and an ox-cart decoration contest. Ruili is a very interesting city where there are many Burmese, many Shan (Dai) people from both sides of the border, and many Kachin (Jingpo) people from both sides. We had a great time indulging in the delicious Burmese, Dai, and Thai food. We also wanted to let you know that you'll be getting more pictures in the near future. We are excited to have Gerald's family come for a visit at the end of this month. We'll be travelling with them to Zhongdian (Gyalthang) (a Tibetan town in far northwest Yunnan) and to Lijiang. Then we'll be going (just the two of us) to Xinjiang for two weeks and then onto Taiwan for two weeks. Then we're coming home! We'll be moving to Washington, D.C. in mid-July. Gerald is starting his MFA program at University of Maryland and I'll be working. We look forward to seeing you all again soon! Sincerely, Annie (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, April 21st, 2005
8:31 am	Kunming Days Well, to our now-monthly-updates. Again, it's a little hard to continue a 'traveler's' blog once routine and the quotidian have long established itself. Although things are still on autopilot, there is a holiday coming up. Anne and two of our friends are leaving for the Baoshan area in two days. I'm going to meet up with them once my vacation starts. Our trip is going to take place right on the China-Burma border. There are going to be volcanic hot springs, beautiful scenery, the Burma road and much more we expect on the trip. It is crazy that we're moving out so soon. Although we are both excited about being back in the US, the sadness with parting this fabulous city is hitting us hard now. (Sigh) So, since all the fun, extraordinary stuff is happening in the future: Recent pleasures: Apo. Our seventy-four year old neighbor is by far my favorite neighbor I've ever had. She's so motherly and kind to us. Although our communication is limited due to the fact she speaks heavy dialect, it's always warming to see her wave to us from her kitchen, run into her on our walks, etc. Before Sunset: dialogue is so important. Linklater captures the power, awkwardness, anxieties, and all that is in dialogue so well. Hedwig and the Angry Inch: rocking music, powerful story, great cinematography The Merchant of Venice: fantastic version of an excellent play. Pacino rocks it here. Days of Being Wild: another great movie with Wang Kar-wai's indelible stamp The Guns 'n' Roses ballad: 'nuff said Either/Or: a corny, melodramatic read but so, so fun (Comment on this)
Wednesday, March 30th, 2005
1:18 pm	My decision Dear all-- I have finally made my decision for the fall of 2005. We are going to DC. I'm going to attend the University of Maryland's MFA Program. I just had my brother mail off my official letter accepting their offer of admission and a TA-ship. We're both excited about the near future (even though it includes leaving Kunming and Yunnan). (Comment on this)
Friday, March 25th, 2005
9:10 am	still here south of the clouds So the weather's gotten into a funk as of late. It's been overcast (and therefore cold) and rainy for the past handful of days. Yesterday Anne and I gave guest lectures at the Nationality's University. It was coordinated by our good friend Mike, an alum, the guy whose hometown we visited during Lunar New Year. Despite the fact of faulty a/v equipment it was still fun. We were both very glad we did it. On another note, our friend Christie just moved into Kunming. It's great to have another excellent friend in town to hang out with. Aside from the routine that has regulized our lives here, there really is not so much to say. I did get the Wong Kar-wai box set of all his movies for about $7!!!! Woo-hoo Yes, movie shopping here still amazes me. I also got the Studio Ghibli set. Next year it looks like either DC or NY for us. I heard back from University of Maryland and they're offering me admission with a TA-ship. So, now I'm waiting to hear from NYU and see how their offer (if there is one) matches up to UMD's. Either way ends up in a program, situation and city I'm extremely happy with. Today Anne starts her calligraphy classes at the university and Monday we start the traditional Chinese painting classes together. I'm excited about this. Well, that's about all the extraordinary events I can think up of. But we're still enjoying it down here. Recent pleasures: * Rashomon by Kurosawa: great movie. Made me feel so bad about myself and people. * Moby Dick: An excellent, fun read. * Miyazaki movies: Spirited Away is one of my favorite movies. He does such a great job about portraying the real mind-set of real children (not like Disney), and therefore the heroines and heroes are that much more admirable and important. * Southwest Chinese Hot Pot--I could eat this every day of my life.... (Comment on this)
Wednesday, March 2nd, 2005
9:55 am	the next installation of our bi-monthly updates.... So my two weeks of double shifts (in order to make up for the classes lost during our psuedo-vacation) are now over. Our friend Don was here in Kunming for 2 weeks before he left for Laos and Thailand and India the day before. We had a lot of fun just hanging out reading, watching movies and talking. Again, the governing of routine has quickly established itself after the holidays. Back to meeting with the breakers tonight and partaking in a quiz bowl on a team consisting of my colleagues. Anne came back from Lijiang a few days ago and is recuperating from more than a month of intense field work and traveling: being itinerant and busy. An email to me with an address just might result in a little written something from this side of the ocean. I should be hearing back from my grad schools very soon. I have already received an informal and early reply from one of them as the one on the forefront. It's been howling here in Kunming: the winds have been intense and persistent. Currently, it's cold--well at about 50 F--but in our defense it's very easy to get accustomed (i.e. become a weather wimp) with the gorgeous weather here. Laters for now... Rec: *Charlie Chaplin: We've been watching his shorts (trousers and films) recently. They are both genius and hilarious. How could one make a slap-stick about World War I in 1919 with depth? Truly more of a master at "laughter in the dark" than any Da-daist or surrealist or practioner of what we understand as dark comedy. *Emily Dickinson: As always. Necessary if you want to authentically feel uncomfortable about yourself and your life. *Our friend Kaytea's focaccia bread. Sweet Oden's raven--it's delicious! (Comment on this)
Friday, February 18th, 2005
10:31 am	The end of Spring Festival So the trip over Spring Festival break was varied and quite fun. I left with two friends and stopped on over in Simao on our way to Jinghong. There really is nothing that special about Simao. It's just a regular mid-sized city that's pretty nice. We had fun just hanging out in the city and took a day trip way out of town to chill in some hot springs. After a few days we stopped over at a nature reserve just an hour outside of Jinghong. For a reserve with something like 15 million hectares there is about 4 km of roads we were allowed to walk along. It was beautiful nonetheless, but having the opportunity to explore beyond a concrete walkway and bridge would have been nice. The animals in the area were nice and beautiful, too bad they were all chained up and caged and treated with little to no respect. Then we made it to Jinghong to meet up with Anne and our other friend. We stayed for about three days and did what Jinghong begs you to do: just hang out and be lazy. Pool, food, more pool, reading.... From Jinghong we made it over to our Chinese friend's hometown, Shiting, for the week of Lunar New Year. Shiting's a tiny village of Yi minority people. They're all farmers. The village still has the characteristics of traditional rural communities of China: architecture, houses with mud walls, farming techniques, etc. So we did what people do over Spring Festival: eat, drink, play with fireworks, eat more and more and more... It was great. The scenery there's fantastic. Then we went to the old imperial city of Yunnan: Jianshui. It's still got old architecture throughout the city, the 2nd largest Confucian temple standing in China and a local culture a bit different from the rest of Yunnan because of the imperial influence. So we did our tourist thing of the recognized, preserved sites. We also met up with friends of a friend that was traveling with us. So this entry about our travels pretty much reads like a bullet-point list, but there was so much done that it seems the only way I can communicate it. So happy new years. A belated Chun Jie Kuai Le. (Comment on this)
Friday, January 28th, 2005
3:42 pm	Happy Spring Festival... So Spring Festival is here. After her week in Hong Kong and a one day stop over here in Kunming, she is back in Xishuangbanna doing her field work. She's uber-busy right now. When her torrent of work subsides, I'm sure she'll want to post about her time in HK and doing research. Yesterday was the first day of my only holiday this year. It's two weeks. My friends and I are going to go down and meet Annie in Banna and then slowly work our way up to Kunming. So we'll have more extraordinary things to post in the near future. Laters. Rec's: Snow by Orhaun Pamuk: It's a fabulous book. It's been a long time since I've read a book that's elucidated view points I just haven't ever been able to empathize. A political thriller; book about politics, religion and art; a great book about a place and culture many people don't think about trying to understand. Absolutely one of those books of the past five years. Anthony Hecht: Just brilliant. The New Danger by Mos Def: A present from Anne. I wanted it. Listened and wasn't sure about it and is growing on me... (Comment on this)
Saturday, January 1st, 2005
11:19 am	Happy New Year I'm in Kunming now after a week in Xishuangbanna--the tropical prefecture south of Kunming--with Anne and her family who came to visit during the winter break. We had loads of fun with the balmy temperature (upper 70s), the botanical gardens, scenic bus rides, jade buying and cards among many other things. We went to China's largest botanical garden in Menglun and enjoyed the wealth of beautiful flora in the prefecture. They are off in Lijiang now--in the foot of the Himalayas--and will be back Sunday night. (I had to come back because of work.) Before going to Xishuangbanna we enjoyed the beautiful tea culture in Kunming, the temples and other great aspects of Yunnan and China. Happy New Year's Recommendations: * U2 "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb": I love this album. Deserves all the hype it's getting. One of the few grandfathers of emo rock have come out with an absolutely gorgeous album. Lyrics, hooks, everything just clicks. It's been occupying my discman for weeks now. There's a reason everyone says it's a landmark album. * Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi: My intro to graphic books was a marvelous. Again, deserving of its hype. Graphic memoir about a woman's upbringing in Iran. (Comment on this)
Monday, December 13th, 2004
11:23 pm	We got so excited... reading all the holiday book lists, we decided to compile our own. TOP 10 BOOKS READ IN 2004 (alphabetical order) Anne: 1) Austen, Jane: Pride and Prejudice 2) Clinton, Hillary Rodham: Living History 3) Dostoevsky, Fyodor: The Idiot 4) Fadiman, Anne: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down 5) Fitzgerald, F. Scott: The Great Gatsby 6) Ghosh, Amitav: The Glass Palace 7) Murphy, Dervla: One Foot in Laos 8) Nabokov, Vladimir: Lolita 9) Nafisi, Azar: Reading Lolita in Tehran 10) Tanizaki, Junichiro: The Makioka Sisters Gerald: 1) Ali, Agha Shahid: The Country without a Post Office 2) Cole, Henri: Middle Earth 3) Dickinson, Emily: The Selected Letters of Emily Dickinson 4) Dostoevsky, Fyodor: The Idiot 5) Kundera, Milan: The Unbearable Lightness of Being 6) Marquez, Gabriel Garcia: Love in the Time of Cholera 7) Murphy, Dervla: One Foot in Laos 8) Nabokob, Vladimir: Lolita 9) Proust, Marcel: Swann's Way 10) Schnackenberg, Gjertrud: Supernatural Love (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, December 7th, 2004
10:12 pm	Hey there... So, it's time for the periodical update... Before Thanksgiving we went to an opening at a giant gallery under the Minority Museum where one of our friend's pieces was displayed. It was a huge exhibit of contemporary Chinese artists. It was a who's-who...anybody that's anybody was there. It was a lot of fun and quite unexpectedly impressive. Thanksgiving was a blast. Our friend, whose parents were visiting, had a pot-luck dinner with so much delicious food it was incredible. Among the tasties there: huge turkey with nuevo latino stuffing, Vietnamese salad, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, Chinese duck, apple crisp pie, strawberry short-cake, vegetarian stuffing, macaroni and cheese, sangria....the list goes on forever... Well, we hung out with our friend and her parents. We went to a gorgeous and huge fresh flower market and ate some great food. We visited Dian Chi Lake and hung out there also. And our great friend from our semester abroad two years ago came and visited for the weekend from Chongqing. We had fun hanging out, talking and catching up. One really cool thing was we saw the sea gulls at Green Lake park. They've been stopping at the park every December since 1978. We didn't see them here when we came here with SIT. It was fantastic. The park was absolutely festive. The weather has been fabulous for the past week...super sunny and temperature comfortable while the sun's out. In typical Kunming fashion, the weather changed greatly...last night alledgedly snowed for a bit. Well, that's it for now! Rec's: * Swann's Way by Marcel Proust. * The Tempest by William Shakespeare. * Anne's delicious brownies I'm munching on right now... (Comment on this)
Thursday, November 18th, 2004
9:50 am	Sorry about the tardy update.... but things have settled down into a routine more or less for us--Anne with her research and myself with my teaching job. My job is in a private after-school English school. I teach classes to middle and high school students and also have an additional class of nurses at a medical college. So I'm spending my time reading, writing and knitting. Our friend has taught us how to knit and currently I'm working on a light blue scarf that I'm completely excited about. We've also been having a blast spending our time reading the classics we should've already read by now (seeing as these are the only English books available in China--although for very cheap!). We love communicating with our friends and we love books, so if anybody would like to read along with us (sorry insisting on choosing the book, but it's out of necessity due to the lack of choice here) I'd love to start a book club. Well, our election party was a blast except for the final result. This past Sunday Yang Lan invited us over to his house again for delicious dumplings and great company. We met his son's family and hung out with Yang Lan's ten year old grand-daughter. About a week ago Hei Jin Long introduced us to two traditional Chinese medicine doctors who took us out for the night. I now meet weekly with a group of kids who are Kunming's top breaking crew, which is cool and frustrating (because I'm so rusty) at the same time. And we're excited about the prospect of our friend coming to visit us from Chongqing in December. The weather here has been fabulous up until the past two days. The past two days have been grey, miserable, cold and blah. But beforehand it's been sunny and very warm. There was--I imagine--a forty degree drop in the weather overnight. That's it for now...another update sooner to come... *Rec.s: the new Converge CD is awesome--super progressive but also cohesive songs *The Selected Stories of Lu Xun. I thoroughly enjoyed his writings. Superb talent at an interesting time in China's history. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, October 26th, 2004
6:36 pm	Another KM update... Starting out from where Anne left off: last Friday we went to our next door neighbor's (whom we know as Apo) 74th birthday party. His son wanted to do something for her birthday, so he had us over and another one of his friends--a graduate student/English teacher. It was fun. It was a long night of eating and conversation. Dinner consisted of: stir-fried tripe with chilis, bitter vegetables steamed in soy milk, free-range/organic whole chicken soup, stir-fried corn and soy beans, stir-fried spicy octupus, deep fried pork nuggets and cold pork slivers with cilantro and spicy pickled vegetables. Mr. Ta (the son) also went out of the way and bought a gigantic cake. Apo didn't like the frosting--in fact none of the Chinese (or the Americans for that matter) didn't care for the cake. But we had tamarind tea, fruit, medicinal bai jiu, Yunnan red wine and nuts. The conversation ranged from Apo and Mr. Ta's hometown to the American election to how expensive it is to buy food in Japan. Anne started going to aerobic classes at a gym my breakdancing friends introduced me to. The manager there, Hei Jin Long, is a very nice guy from Xinjiang. We've already gone out with him to eat twice and are planning to go karaoke with him. I've found and recently started a job here teaching English classes at a supplementary school. I've got one class of middle schoolers and should be getting more classes assigned to me very soon. That's about it. Kunming's been great, but it's still nerve-wracking to be away from the US with one week to go....all the stuff about DeLay, the despicable voter intimidation and fraud the Republicans are trying in key swing states (that away to stand up for democracy! especially after the disenfranchisement of African-Americans in Florida in 2000) and everything being read and said-- http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041108&s=facts Our election day party for Kerry supporters here in Kunming looks promising--everybody we've bumped into here are Kerry supporters--Chinese and foreigner...Gotta go teach, Peace Gerald (Comment on this)
Thursday, October 21st, 2004
4:43 pm	Kunming Fun Days Well, where to start? Again, I have to start by apologizing for the delay between posts. This time it so happens that our internet inexplicably stopped working for a few days. OK, so that doesn’t explain the whole delay but it’s a decent excuse, right? I finally met with my academic advisor again and we established a plan for getting my fieldwork done. He has arranged for me to go home with two graduate students during the school’s winter break (late January-February). They’ll take me to their respective hometowns (Lijiang and Xishuangbanna) where I’ll carry out my interviews. For now, I’m just working on revising my research design and hanging out. I’m not sure exactly what I’ll be doing between February – June but I guess I’ll have to cross that bridge when I come to it. We’ve been having some fun in Kunming this week. We kicked off the week by going to a hip hop dance competition that some of Gerald’s friends performed in, which was cool. We’ve also been enjoying the excellent weather (sunny and 85 degrees every day). We also met our neighbor and played a mean game of badminton with him. He and his mom live in the apartment next door to us and they’re very nice. He invited us over to try a fruit that we’d never heard of (we are certain there’s no English name for it). It’s a cross between a pomelo and a really dry Asian pear – it’s huge and weird, light yellow, and slightly bitter. We sat and chatted and shared family pictures and even experienced a very small earthquake in the middle of the conversation (Yunnan is extremely mountainous and earthquakes are common – there was 6.4 earthquakes west of Kunming on Tuesday). We’re looking forward to going to their apartment on Friday for dinner to celebrate his mom’s 75th birthday. Speaking of fun, the most fun I had this week was voting for John Kerry and sending in my completed ballot. Democrats, don’t forget to vote! I’m looking forward to the election party we’re organizing for local Kerry supporters to watch the election returns in our apartment on the morning of Nov. 3 (the night of Nov. 2 in the U.S.). Can’t wait to see the state of Iowa and every other sensible state turned a lovely shade of bright blue on the electoral map. Love, Anne (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, October 9th, 2004
6:23 am	as National Holiday comes to an end... Well, we're going to give livejournal a try. Hopefully this'll be better and we'll be able to post more regularly. It's the end of the National Holiday week. It's the second biggest holiday in China--the People's Republic of China's b-day--behind the new year. Over the entire year the people have been super festive in the temples, parks and city. Luckily Anne ran into a fellow Fulbrighter who was visitng Yunnan for the holiday week. He came from Beijing with his buddy Scott. We spent a couple of days with them. Went out to eat, play mah-jong, etc. One day we took them out to Qiong Zhu Si(Poor Bamboo Temple) and Xi Shan. We spent about an hour or so at my favorite temple around Kunming then went and hiked the day away at Xi Shan. It felt great to hike around in the outdoors. Xi Shan (Western Mountain) has some temples and other sites. It's super steep and far, but that results in a tremendous view of Kunming at the summit. The highlight of Xi Shan is Dragon Gate--an area where Taoists dug out tunnels and worshipping areas and other stairways way up on the top of Xi Shan. Our trip at Xi Shan ended with a gondola ride down from the top. We've been watching and enjoying the debates (televised live here). Finally people get to see the opponents on the same stage at the same time. I think it's telling to see the general response to the debates. We can't wait until the domestic debate in the next couple of days where the Dems will take the sweep as November approachs. After watching todays debate (at 9 AM China time) we went and had a fabulous massage--20 Kuai ($2.50) for an hour. They use tremendous elbow grease and tear you apart (in a good way). We came out dazed and hitting ourself for having waited until the 6th week to have our first massage. 'til later... (Comment on this)
Saturday, October 2nd, 2004
1:30 am	Happy Mid Autumn Festival! (Note: we've been having trouble posting w/ blogger from China, so we're going to try livejournal and hopefully things'll go more smoothly) First, sorry about the long delay between posts. I was on strike until I got assigned an advisor by my university. But I finally got an advisor (a young professor who teaches in the tourism and geography department) on Monday and now I can start my research after a full month of getting nowhere fast in Kunming. The first month has been full of challenges but who wants to hear about those? So I’ll update y’all on the fun stuff we’ve been up to. Last week Gerald and I had dinner with the family friend of his mom’s friend’s friend’s parents who live here in Kunming. We met them two years ago when we were studying abroad and they invited us over to their apartment for dinner. They’re an exceptionally nice couple and are very interesting people. He’s an ornithologist (professional bird lover) who helped compile a massive two volume guide to Yunnanese birds. Yunnan is quite the place for bird watchers – Xishuangbanna prefecture (in the south of Yunnan) covers only 2% of China’s land mass but is home to 25% of China’s plant and animal species. The semi-tropical climate makes the area home to some particular brilliant bird species that can only be seen in China and Laos. As some of you already know, yesterday was Mid Autumn Festival, which is the second largest Chinese holiday of the year. It’s a holiday where families get together to eat a special holiday dinner and many families head to the park to look at the full moon in a festive atmosphere. As always with festivals, kids get the best deal. They get to eat sweet mooncakes, stay up past their bedtime, and some lucky ones get little toy lanterns to carry around in the park. We joined in the fun by eating mooncakes and walking around in the park. We also had a special dinner at our favorite restaurant (a Korean-style grill) because we started dating two years ago on Mid Autumn Festival. That’s all the news for now. Hopefully things will start to pick up a little now that I have an academic advisor. We’re still spending a lot of time practicing badminton (watch out Mom and Dad!), going to the park to watch pekingeses play, watching majiang games in the park, playing majiang games with two ghost hands at home, watching the second season of Six Feet Under on dvd, and just hanging out. Hope you are all having a good fall. If you have extra time, we love to get e-mail! Love, Anne (Comment on this)