Our feet hurt

Sorry again for not posting enough.

We've been keeping up a fast paced life here in Chengdu. Then earlier this week I caught a bug. I'm not really sick, I don't have many symptoms and they aren't bad, but it's been making me really tired throughout the day. Tanner has been fine! He hasn't gotten sick at all the whole time he has been here. My friend Katie's boyfriend also came for Christmas, right now he is very sick with a ton of symptoms and can't get out of bed. We feel very lucky.

I guess the biggest thing we have done since Christmas was our weekend trip to Leshan. I had a few days off of school for the new year, we planned a lot of traveling. That was when I started to get tired though, so we ended up just going to Leshan, but it was a great time.

We left on Saturday, it's a two hour bus ride south of Chengdu. It has the largest stone statue in the world, it's a large Buddha, named Big Buddha. It sits at the confluence of three rivers to keep away flooding. It's about 1,300 years old.

(Also, right now I am eating some Red Vines that Tanner got for Christmas that we just opened. They are amazing! Not stale at all, and so yummy!)

We took a pedicab (the real name for bicycle rickshaw) from the bus station to our hotel. It was in my guide book. It had a huge sign outside and inside that said "Recommended by Lonely Planet" which is not my guide book. I was worried about the cost but all we had to do was stand around looking upset and she gave us a good discount.

We walked around town a little. We ate dinner at a fancy restaruant, but it's off season and all the Chinese day trippers had left, so the place was empty. We had Xiba Tofu, which Leshan says it is famous for. It tasted fine, not particularly special.

We got up the next day and took the "ferry" to see the Big Buddha. I didn't realize that the ferry doesn't actually bother to cross the river anymore, it just floats by Big Buddha and hawks photos of you in front of it. Then it turns around and goes back to where it started from. But it was a good view.

Then we had a delicious lunch at a place full to capacity with locals. We ate at a little table on the sidewalk, on tiny step stools for chairs. A British woman stopped to talk to us. She was with a Chinese friend who gave Tanner his business card. He speaks English and runs a restaurant where he wants all the tourists to come and talk to him.

Then we took the longest rickshaw ride of my life. This guy took us all the way around to the back of the park, so we could buy tickets to the "Oriental Buddhist Theme Park." They had a temple and some recreations of other stone Buddhas. There was a cave with a thousand Buddhas, but actually much fewer, and most looked new. I was unimpressed. Then we hiked around the park. It was nice. The weather was okay, the elevation is so much lower there wasn't all the mist and clouds like the other places I've been hiking in Sichuan. Then we got to the Buddha. You climb basically directly down a cliff on some really tall but very narrow stairs. Then you look at Buddha and touch his feet. Then you hike directly up a cliff on some stairs back to the park. It was fun.

I found the Buddha very beautiful and inspiring. I am usually slightly disappointed at places full of Chinese tourists, they are just too loud. Tanner says he found the Buddha awe inspiring and impressive.

We ate a KFC one day. They had egg tarts.



We stayed in for New Year's Eve. There was really only one party, at a bar called the Hemp House. We were both tired and knew it wasn't really our scene. We saw some interesting Chinese musical performances on TV before the countdown. We bought some movies. We watched Singin' in the Rain. Tanner bought the Planet Earth mini series by the BBC. Watching that has been fabulous.

Then on New Year's Day we saw the pandas. It took us forever to get there. We got up early so we could see them right when they were getting fed. The cab got stuck in traffic. Then the bus pulled over and made us all get off. There was some kind of fun run or marathon so roads were closed all over the city.

We managed to get there on time. The pandas were cute. The cubs of various sizes were up and playing, that was best part. The museums weren't very good. I saw a ton of white people.

My sister Rhea loves Red Pandas. So I made sure to hang around the red pandas, taking photos and things. We got to hold one actually. For a donation they let you hold one for about a minute, Tanner got to feed it some apples slices even. It was very warm. The day we went was really very cold. The panda sitting on my lap was warm. Their fur was soft and bristly, like a short haired dog. The tail is so long and strong. Their little faces are really cute.

I had a good two hours looking at pandas. Then my toes were ice and we went home.

Tanner says most of the panda park was not very good. The museums and such. There was a video, documentary style, that had some good footage of pandas and we learned some things. He was very impressed by the pandas. He says it might have been magical even, to see something in real life that is so famous around the world.

One thing we learned was that panda mothers give birth very quickly. Sometimes in less then an hour. The babies literally shoot out of them. They slide right out and then on the ground. The new mothers don't know what to do or what it is! That is part of the reason it's hard to get pandas to raise their young. The new mothers will knock around the naked screaming cub, and sometimes kill it. Once they have tried once or twice then the maternal instinct kicks in and they are very good mothers. It was ridiculous to watch this footage of a panda's baby shooting out of it and off onto the floor.

We walked along the river and through a big park next to my campus. We ate some more street food.

We've been Christmas shopping for my mom and sister.

We toured the Tibetan District. It was interesting for me. Tibetan art is not Han Chinese, and is very beautiful. It has more color and is bolder then traditional Chinese art. It was a little hard to walk around, there were a lot of beggars, the most of any place I have been in Chengdu.
I got to shop for earrings for two hours, I was so happy. Tanner wants me to mention that it took us two and half hours to get there. We took a bus, okay. But then we walked past it by about half an hour, then we took a bus back to the right neighborhood. Then we walked a little longer to find it, and had to sit down and rest. I have gotten us lost a few times now...

I am very stressed out. I haven't been going to class much. I have a job hosting the Muslim Cultural Show thingy, and they haven't called me in over a week. I don't want to do this last minute and embarrass myself in front of a ballroom full of Chinese people. I have finals and a lot of work to do to get ready. I might actually really fail my Chinese class. Then after I do that I have to start my research work.

Tanner and I have been having a really good visit though. We haven't had a fight. I snapped a few times when we were traveling and I was getting sick, but that's all. I think we need to try a few more times, but we will end up good travel buddies.

We'll post photos now.