Sep 2007

Yes, to any OPRC or runners that are reading this, its a PW (personal worst) for a 10K. And yes, it took almost 4 hours to do a 10K, but my excuse is, it was the Great Wall of China!

So yes, check! Another Wonder of the World seen. Done and done. The amazing Great Wall of China, also known as Wan Li Changcheng, or "Long Wall of Ten Thousand Li, li being a Chinese measure of distance roughly equal to 500m). It stretches for several thousand miles and for anyone that is interested, it was built after the unification of China under Qin Shi Huangdi (around 221BC) as means to separate it from rival territories and barbarians. After Qin Shi Huangdi, other emperors continued to maintain and expand it as more threats arose. So from the 5th century to the 14th-16th, it was considered a priority and was continuously being built and reconstructed. Its interesting because during this time the wall was hated - it wasted the country's wealth and worked thousands to death in building it. It is estimated that over a million workers constructed it during the Qin Shi Huang time, but by the time emperor Sui came, there wasn't enough men left and they recruited the widows of the lost men. That would suck, huh? I found this interesting poem that described it:

The wall is so tall because it is stuffed with the bones of soldiers
THe wall is so deep because it is watered with the soldiers' blood.

The irony of it all is that after all that, the wall never served its purpose. Many invasions continued to occur and cross this 'defense,' and was of little use against the sea power of Japan and later, Europe. But as these things go, it did serve some good, for a route of passage for troops and goods, and more importantly, I guess it restricted the movement of the nomadic people. Or something like that.

So story goes that after the Qing dynasty, the Machus left the wall to fall into desrepair because it wasn't serving its purpose as an obstacle to invasion. It started to crumble, and now in present day its been slowly restored and repaired for tourist means. And by tourists, there are of course, millions that have tramped on it. But helloo? You can't go to China without seeing the Great Wall! We decided to pick a route that was further away from the city than the popular sites like Badaling where everyone goes, and Jinshanling to Simatai is known to be less crowded. BUT, as it happened, we were very very lucky and picked the day before a Chinese holiday to go to the wall so it was pretty empty. We did the almost 4 hour 10K walk from Jinshanling to Simatai, and were to tired to walk another 2 miles to the carpark and did a fun paraglide down a hill, which I've never done before. The great wall is beautiful and... hard work! Lots of lunging and climbing and hiking through steep steps and steep inclines/declines. GREAT to get some exercise and a nice cardio workout! It was a beautiful day though, not to hot. Most people go there in the summer when it is extremely hot, and I couldn't even imagine that. It was fun, and like I said, really really nice that it wasn't too packed with people.

So yes, now I can say that I climbed the Great Wall of China! And here it is (I picked one without me because I was gross and sweaty):

Okay, nutshell, bambooshell, you know what I mean. I'm going to be lazy and sum up a few things I wrote before with some new things about my impressions of Bejing, but obviously some of this covers China in general...

-Squat toilets... something to get used to (strizan, you would DIE!). I've seen them before and I know its not that big of a deal, buuuut... its still not so pleasant.
-the spitting and burping. Also something to get used to (ugh! Its sooo gross though!).
-the history - amazing! I was bad and didn't brush up too much on my ancient Chinese history before I came, but I've been learning as I've been going. We already went to Tian'nan sqaure, the Forbidden City (amazingly big. There are many monuments for the 24 emperors that lived there over a span of 500 years and they have mini dragons and animals at the edges of the roof of each monument. The more animals to you have, the more 'higher-up' status you have. i.e. 9 vs. 3 (for the 'lower-class' concubines), the Temple of Heaven, the life of many emperors, the communist revolution, and .... how much the people still love and worship Mao. Oh, we went to see his mausolem, by the way. Cool to see him embalmed, I guess he is risen twice a day for public viewing, then he goes back below ground to his refridgerated room. I saw Lenin in Moscow, and they both look like wax figures. Still kinda cool. But yea, the many many temples we are seeing are super beautiful and colorful.

-Olympic Fever! They are definitely getting ready! 08/08/08 (the number 8 is a lucky Chinese #). I think its going to be REALLY cool, but yes, things are mega under construction here and most sites are still unfinished. I'm REALLY curious to how everything is going to pan out. They are not exactly customer friendly. Either they shove things in your face or they completely ignore you. More often than not, just ignore you. And its not exactly English-friendly either. We will see what happens. I have a sad feeling that things are just going to get more and more expensive (actually, I know they will. I bought a pin and keychain and it was TOTALLY overpriced. Its just the beginning I suppose!).
-Pollution - not as bad as I thought! We've had mostly sunny/overcast days. Today was the 1st day it rained... of course when we rented bikes for the day. Bangkok was 23094823904823904328904 worse and some other cities I've been to. I think the Olympic athletes will survive! I'd say if anything its hazy, but breathable.
-The Art of Bargaining - now this if fun, but emotionally draining. You really have to be in the mood. A few travelers that we met in Aust and NZ gave us some tips to just have fun with it, NOT to get angry, and this definitely has been true so far. You can pretty much guarantee that you will be given a price at least 50% higher than what its worth. Usually more. So you start the bidding. Kinda depending, but basically I've been started wayyy under and then trying to get a compromise maybe 60-70% of what they say. But then again yesterday I bought a Mao watch (he he, I had to!) for 20 yuan when he originally asked for 150 (which is like less than 3 dollars). It is actually fun, and its a lot of acting (gasping, looking shocked, shaking your head). You finally reach a final price where both of you are smiling. Then you walk away feeling good about yourself.... until the next block when you see the same exact thing you bought for 1/2 the price you bargained for. D'oh! Then you can just see the salesperson being like "haha! sucker!" But I try to think that I'm feeding their family, and its like $1 anyway. Which speaking of,
-Cost: SUPER CHEAP! Even though we are mega getting ripped off, its still dirt cheap (hostel room, $5/night, lunch: $2 for the 3 of us).
-Haggling: Annoying, but once again, I've seen worse (Eqypt). In super toursity areas, people just follow you around, but most of the time its like "lady! Looky looky! You want shoes? Good price special for you." Yea, whatever.
-Food: Pretty darn good! We've been doing some pointing and hand gestures, but so far we have been pretty lucky! And its been helping that we learned a trick to take a pepto tablet at the start of the day to coat our stomachs and (hopefully) try to prevent some future stomach probs. So far its worked! But yes, its very oil friendly... maybe thats why it is so good!
-The architecture: its kinda interesting. Still some very communist boring looking buildings, but then there are also some very modern looking structures. Especially for the Olympics they are builiding some crazy interesting modern structures/builings by some famous Swedish, Swiss, and English architects. Kinda Cool. Of course none of it is done yet.
-Bikes! Bikes! Bikes Everywhere! Its not as bad as Amsterdam, but there are a LOT of people on bikes and you have to tone your ears to the bell and to not be run over by one. Between bikes and cars, it seriously does take us 1/2 an hour to cross the massive 8-lane streets! BUT, Beijing is VERY VERY bike friendly - meaning that they have a separate mini aisle separated from the cars for bikes only. We actually rented bikes today and went around Beijing and its a pretty efficient way to get around... but also dangerous. I think I almost died like 10X.
-the bad english. Pretty much 80% of the time, things are spelled wrong, and said wrong. Basically, it just looks cool to write things in English, no matter if it makes sense or not. Its just funny. First your like, "uhh.. what?" Then you kind of have to take a sec to decipher it... then it still doesn't make sense. Menu's and signs are also pretty darn funny too. I'll try to post some up later.
-Noise and crowds: Definitely noisy, buuuut not as jam packed as I thought. When you got to Chinatown anywhere in the world, its usually packed with people. Here, well, its a little more spread out. Crowded, but nothing unbearable and different than any other big city. Definitely not as bad as I thought.
-And to refer to what I was writing about earlier, yes they still love Mao, and yes, there is a little part of me that thinks this blog is really being censored. We will see!

Oh, here is a Giant Panda. Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo cute!!!

Sniff sniff.... today is my last day in Australia. This leg is officially over. Its been quite a journey, but alas, a fun and exciting one. Its crazy to think that I have been here for just about 5 weeks... I feel as if I've done and seen soooooooooooooooo much. Well, I have I guess! Being the short amount of time in each place, just about 3 weeks in Australia and just about 2 weeks in New Zealand, we packed it in as much as we could. And I'm leaving with a thirst for more. Both Aus and NZ are absolutely amazing countries and next time I will try to see more than the 2% I just saw. Sydney is an amazing city and I would love to live here one day (except its SUPER expensive to live). We'll see!

To back track a little, after being in Sydney for a couple of days, we were already itching to go back to mountains and fresh air (hmm... especially that we are leaving for Beijing in 2 days, so we need to maximize our fresh air time!). So here we are in Katoomba, or the Blue Mountains, just a 2 hour train ride from the city central.
We are staying here the night to give us some time to do the hikes that we wanted and to not rush back home again. So we opted to do the 3 Sisters Walk, which is a 4-hour "moderate" hike and the most beautiful. Here is me, "I feel alive!!"

We had a good hike! It was beautiful and peaceful. But alas, lets just say after a little over 3 hours we were already headed back home on a paved road. I've caught a slight cold... okay, fine, I'm a little out of shape, so it was a little more strenuous than "moderate." The 3 Sisters view is famous for its Aboriginal spiritual significance, and yet, no where was it written what this was. Hmm.... a google search later I guess. But it really is amazing and awesome to see. Another part of our hike was to descend 900 VERY steep steps, and that eccentric loading left us quite shaky! So then we got lazy and took the Scenic Railway ("The Steepest Railway in the World") up the mountain versus climbing up 1200 steps. So yes, it was nice to be amongst nature again and smell (well, kinda. I'm a little congested) fresh air. The nicest part was it was a BEAUTIFUL sunny day, ahhh... gotta love the sunny skies! And of course the mountains are amazingly vast and gorgeous.

Since I'm leaving, here are a few final thoughts:

Highlights o Australia:
-THE OCEAN
-seeing the opera house en vivo
-the Sydney Aquarium
-scuba diving the Great Barrier Reef
-the Daintree rainforest and learning about unique flora and fauna
-seeing a dingo
-seeing whales and dolphines hanging out in the wild
-going to the pristine and beautiful Whitsunday islands
-Having a "no Worries" and "take it easy" attitude
-THE AMAZING people! Soooo nice and friendly!

• Here is a link to my picts (no need to sign up or anything. Just click on "view photos):"

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=15yjygum.7fuodyq2&x=0&y=55ojg5

Highlights o NZ:
-The amazing clouds. I know it sounds silly but they lay very low, and its no coincidence that New Zealand is also known as the "Land of the Long White Cloud." Its almost like the whip cream on an ice cream sundae with more cherries and sprinkles on top. But the cherries and sprinkles are snow-capped mountains and the sky.
-The pristine lakes and rivers. Yes, I said rivers. From those of you from Chicago, no, there are no dead bodies in the lakes or gross stuff like bandades and diapers, and yes you can see more than .002 inches in front of you!
-Learning about maori traditions
-Going BUNGYYYYY jumping! What a thrill and e-drenaline rush!
-Going skiing... in Sept... in NZ!!!!
-The diverse and ever-changing scenery. We were just in the South island and we saw everything from large mountains, lakes, the sea, glaciers, fiords, plainfields, to the ocean! Everything!
-Here is a link to my picts of NZ (same as before, just click on "view photos"):
http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=15yjygum.c2jmqbze&x=0&y=-vkb1xv

And finally, both countries:
1st, here's a not-so-exact map of where we were traveling:

Speaking of, its that time - off to China!

p.s. And as always, here is the links to my travel partners for other perspectives:
Lauren (who has been with me around Australia and New Zealand. She has good pictures!): http://lauren.travellerspoint.com
Char (who is meeting us in China): http://thelasthurrah.travellerspoint.com

Yes, that is an example of the many names that I can barely spell, nevertheless pronounce. Ah... those Maori, always keeping us on our toes. Legend has it that Tu-te-raki-raki whanoa (try saying that 3 times fast), was an atua (or godly figure) and was given the task of shaping the Fiordland coast. He sang the powerful karakia (chant) and began attacking the towering rock walls with his adze (toki) called Te Hamo. As he moved further north, he perfected his work, creating long winding inlets where the waters would provide refuge from the stormy seas outside. Milford Sound (aka Piopiotahi) is said to be his finest sculpture. This is one of the many many examples we here on a daily basis about Maori legends. Its really interesting, but hard to spell and remember all these things (hence, reference to brochures helps)!

And yes, they spell fiords like that, not fjords how we spell it.

Lauren and I took our car through the Roads to Milford from Te Anau and saw absolutely stunning landscape before we even got to the fiords. You're probably bored of hearing me talk about the gorgeous scenery all the time, but really, it never ceases to amaze me.

Appropriately called, Mirror Lakes! Isn't it gorgeous?!

So the fiordland was basically formed by a crack in the Australian and Pacific plates, and the Pacific plates is what is forming the Southern Alps. The reason I say "forming' in the present tense is because it is growing at a rate of 1 inch a year. Which at that rate will surpass the Himalayas (really!) but because of natural conditions like wind and rain, it kind of is hindering this process. At least this is something I think we heard. Anyway, millions of years ago ice formed glaciers and with time and warm climate, the glaciers kept on retreating and retreating till they advanced enough to form these sculpted rocks, or 'fiords.' So, I'm not a geologist so this was all news to me, but basically, fiord is an ice-carved valley and 'sound' (aka. 'Milford Sound') means something like a river valley flooded by the sea following a rise and/or fall of the land. The rocks were sooooooooo steep and Mitre Peak, the tallest fiord, is something like 1000+ meters!! And it is seriously straight-up vertical. We took a cruise ship up to the point where the sea merges with the Tasman Sea (we didn't get quite there, but close) and then back down again. Once again, its difficult to describe the beauty of it, it was absolutely majestic and amazing. Not just the fiords themselves, but also these cool waterfalls. They were many! Supposedly, depending on season, we could see everything from New Zealand fur seals (which we saw one), Fiordland Crested Penguins (one of the worlds rarest species, of course during the months between Oct and Dec), Blue penguins (the smallest penguins and only found in NZ and Australia), and bottlenose dolphins.

Here are some picts:

See the tiny boat? That'll give you an idea on how HUGE they are!

SUCH an amazing waterfall!!

After this adventure, we drove the 4 hours back to Queenstown and today we took our 8-hour bus back to Christchurch, where I am now. Sniff sniff... we are leaving NZ tomorrow to go back to Sydney. The 12 days (which I can hardly believe) was AWESOME! We not only saw amazing landscape (here I go again), but we met REALLY cool travellers. I don't even know whats best about traveling, seeing all these amazing things, or the people you meet. Hmm...

Well, next entry will be back in Sydney! We have about 4 full days to do laundry, re-pack, and most importanly, rest and revamp before China! Eek!

I went skiing! Its September and I went skiing!! I loooooove it! After our bungy adventure, we were pooped the whole day (seriously!), BUT I was NOT going to let that stop me from going skiing the next day! Queenstown has 4 ski mountains around it and Mt Cardrona was supposedly one of the better ones! Besides Whistler-Blackcomb, Canada like 15 years ago, I have only skiied Colorado and Utah. So I was curious and excited to ski in New Zealand. Unfortunately, everyone and their moms were saying that the snow conditions were bad, it was too "spring," its a tiny mountain, blah blah. So I had SUPER SUPER low expectations going (was it going to be like Wilmont, WI?), and of course, it was nothing like what I heard. The mountain was actually fairly big (4 lifts, 30ish runs?), plenty of terrain, and pretty good snow conditions. Yes, it was a little hard-packed in the morning and a little slushy in the pm, but I was actually impressed with the mountain. It was sooooooooooooo beautiful though with the sunny skies!! The mountains are awesome and pretty with Lake Wanaka in the background. Lauren doesn't ski, so I was on my own. Me and mountain, ahhhhh. But actually, it was pretty peaceful because I needed some me time to soak everything in and digest all that I've done these last few weeks. You know how when you are just going and going and don't stop to think? Hellooo? I'm in NEW ZEALAND?!?! Everything has happened soooo quickly and its crazy for me to think that I've been gone just about 3 weeks! I've seen and done soooo much in both Australia and NZ. Its hard for me to even think that I will be gone for another 3 months!

Anyhoo, so I had a wonderful, peaceful day on the mountain doing a sport I love. We chilled out that night because the last couple had been late nights!

Today we 'hired' a car, as they say here, to go to Te Anau and Milford Sound. For the 1st time in I don't even know how long, we could sleep in a little, and have a leisurely morning taking our time to drive up the BEAUTIFUL route to Te Anau, which in Maori means "caves with a current of swirling water." The actual town is pretty small but we took a catamaran through a tour group to go to Aurora Caves with the infamous Glowworms (which are only found in NZ and Australia), amongst the Fiordland National Park.

It was pretty cool! We crouched and ducked our way through the cave, which was mysterious and amazing. The 'swirling water' as they called it, eroded the limestone and sandstone creating these awesome rock formations, waterfalls, and tunnels through which water was literally forcibly gushing out. But of course the highlight was the glowworms. Their 'tails,' or butts seriously do glow, and interestingly, when they are hungry they glow because the glow attracts insects and then they feast on them. We took this little boat and had to sit quiet (because the glow worms are sensitive to noise and would 'turn off' their glow) and in the pitch dark because they are also sensitive to light. That was REALLY cool... but also a little eerie and spooky. We seriously saw what looked like a sky full of stars (okay, butts of glowworms) less than a foot away from us. It was AWESOME! Lauren and I were reminded of our youthful days putting those glow-in-the dark stickers on our walls (QG, you still have them!). It was almost entrancing looking at them, and definitely ahh-mazing. Its too bad we couldn't take pictures because, yes, they flash would disturb them.

Oh, here's the cute cabin we stayed in Makarora (AMAZING starry night) and then our fellow Stray bus passengers:

Soo.... NZ, if I hadn't said this sooo many times before, is jam packed with absolutely stunning and beautiful scenery. Everywhere you turn, there is something great to look at! Here are some example of the things you just "come across":

Here's a funny quote to finish off...
"I wish I was a glowworm,
a glow worm's never glum.
'cos how can you be grumpy,
when the sun shines out of your bum!"

Haha! Cute, huh?