Paul is my Hero

He works out of the London, Ontario Verizon office and I kid you not, he is the ONLY Verizon employee who actually wants to provide a solution. Since our first contact yesterday, I have spoken to him probably about 10 times (give or take) and I am happy to say that as a result of all our conversations, I now have internet. He wasn't kidding when he told me he was the "DSL Avenger".

Not that he will ever read this but I owe him a huge thank you. Thank you for calling and arguing with supervisors on my behalf. Thank you for calling me back when you said you would. Thank you for getting a technician to my house as promised and then following up to make sure the technician showed and that things were fixed. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I can now leave my house and have that celebratory rum and coke (or other alcoholic beverage of choice).

Exploring

One of the best parts of living in a new city is exploring. There's the necessary exploring like finding the local grocery store, bank, and Target. Then there's the fun exploring; finding your favorite quiet spot, the best running trail, the tastiest breakfast spot, and most interesting sight to take visitors to. I did the necessary exploring before my trip to China, now that I'm back home it's time for the fun exploring.

This past weekend I spent some time at the National Mall. I visited the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, the Natural History Museum and some of the monuments. On the one hand it was weird to be back amongst tourists again but on the other hand it was fabulous to experience what DC has to offer. Although there are some new exhibits, the majority of what I saw in the Air and Space Museum was the same as the last time I visited, in elementary school. What I found really interesting was the people watching. Here are a few things I overheard:

• Elementary school aged girl to her mother, "Did Teddy Roosevelt create the teddy bear?"


• Father to five year old son, "Charlie, what's your favorite missile?" Charlie's response, "Orange."


• 3 year old boy pushing buttons on exhibit to display different airplanes exlaims, "Airplanes! Airplanes!" Then turns to his left, faces his mother, and deadpans, "I pooped."

Next weekend I am going to go on a hike or run. Not sure where, but you can be sure that I'll let you know how it goes.

I Hate Verizon

Okay, so I am back from China, I am safely in Virginia, but unfortunately Verizon hates me. Well, at least the feeling is mutual.

Last week it took me three days of calling Verizon daily to get a technician to my house to repair my internet connection. When said technician showed up he spent all of thirty seconds in my house then went to the mysterious "Verizon box" on the street. After inspecting "the box" he called to tell me the news. Bad news, he couldn't fix my internet; Good news, a technician would be able to come out to "the box" and change "the card" and tomorrow I would have internet. Three days later, still no internet, and three days of calls into Verizon and I find out that "the card" was not the problem. The problem now exists in the mysterious "central office", but don't worry in just three or four days I should be all set. Yeah right.

I give them until the end of the week and then it's time to find alternate internet service providers. I might even be forced to get cable. Ugh.

Hong Kong Airport (Part 2)

So here I am, once again at the Hong Kong International Airport. Hard to believe it's the end of my trip, the end of a month in China.

 

Since my last post I have been to Lijiang, Tiger Leaping Gorge, back to Lijiang, Kunming, Beijing, Hong Kong and Macau. I have survived a 10 hour night bus, the heat and humidity of a thousand suns, met some amazing travellers, and eaten my way through some of the best Chinese cuisine. I have also experienced the worst toilet of my life and the longest game of hearts, all the while sharing so many laughs that my stomach still hurts when I think about it.

 

As this trip comes to a close I realize that it is not so much an end but rather an "until next time" because every time I feed my travel bug, it just gets hungrier and hungrier for more.

Chengdu to LiJiang

We are now in Lijiang getting ready to go hike the Tiger Leaping Gorge Trek. Unforunately our 20 hour bus ride yesterday turned into a 24 hour bus ride but fortunately we were riding on a sleeper bus. The first time I had ever heard of a bus like this, it has no seats just lots of bunk beds, three across and six deep complete with blankets and pillows. We boarded at 12:30, had a couple of pit stops including one for dinner where we ate at a road side cafe. And when I say road side cafe, I mean road side. A couple of tables with umbrellas and an open stove. We pointed at what we wanted, the lady cooked it for us and brought it to our table with a bowl of rice. It was delicious!!! Near the end of our meal the bus started loading and we thought we might get left behind so we started to rush to finish up and pay. As we were getting up the grandma and grandpa sitting next to us said in Chinese, "Don't get up, eat slowly, they'll wait". It was really sweet. In total I think we got about 9 hours of interrupted sleep on the bus, Irene and Shauna a little less because they were in the middle row and it's really challenging to sleep peacefully when the roads aren't paved and suddenly turn into one lane. But we are now happily here in a hostel with Mama. She provides free internet, hot showers, and a banquet style meal everynight. I must say it is nice to have someone look after us and I think we are all happy to have some other travellers to talk to. Now that we have had showers and cup of tea we are ready to go explore the old town. Then tomorrow we'll head out into nature for a two day 25 mile hike.

Buses in China

Chengdu and JiuZhaiGou are only about 400 km apart. Unfortunately, in China, that translates to a 13 hour bus ride. Now, the ride wouldn't have been so bad if:

 

(a) the lady sitting in front of us hadn't spit on the floor of the bus as soon as we boarded and if she had left her devil child at home

 

(b) we hadn't been sitting in the cramped seats at the back of the bus directly above the hot engine

 

(c) the bus driver had actually managed the pit stops a little better instead of stopping twice within an hour, then not at all for three hours, and then every hour thereafter and

 

(d) there were paved roads.

 

Despite all that we made it safely to JiuZhaiGou and had an amazing two days hiking in the gorgeous Chinese mountains. JiuZhaiGou is the "land of fairy tales", says the visitors map we received, full of lakes, waterfalls, meadows, and forests. The water in the lakes was so clear that you could see all the way to the bottom and so blue that it was as though it had been touched up with some food dye. It honestly was unlike anything I have ever seen before.

 

Unfortunately our hotel was a little bit like our bus experience, no hot water until after 8pm and then limited amounts of it, bugs in the rooms and dirty sheets, extra charges and very mean hotel staff. But we survived and are now thoroughly enjoying our hotel in Chengdu complete with buffet breakfast. Tomorrow we head off on a 20 hour bus ride to LiJiang and then we will spend two days hiking at the Tiger Leaping Gorge. We know we'll hate every moment of the bus ride but unfortunately it is the only option that will provide us enough time to see everything we want to see before leaving for Hong Kong on the 16th. But I honestly feel that the inconvenience in hotels and buses is more than made up by experiencing the beauty of China's nature.

Shanghai

So after three amazing days in Shanghai we have now moved on to Chengdu. I enjoyed the city of Shanghai a lot more than the city of Beijing, unfortunately the weather was not as nice. The temperature was about 100 degrees while we were there with a lot of humidity. So walking around and looking at all the sights was quite draining. We did get to see the Shanghai museum, Yu Gardens, Qi Bao (the venice of China), and the Jade Buddha Temple.

 

I think the coolest thing we did in Shanghai was going to Cloud 9, a bar on the 87th floor of the Jin Mao tower looking over the Bund in the center of Shanghai. It took us 4 elevators to get up to Cloud 9; the first was from the ground floor to the 54th floor, then the 54th floor to the 56th floor, then the 56th floor to the 85th floor and finally the 85th floor to the 87th floor. Despite the confusion in finding the elevators the view from the top was well worth the effort. We spent a couple of hours up there watching the sunset, seeing the lights turn on around the city and sipping cocktails. It was the best way to relax and enjoy some Shanghai air conditioning. Ironically we also ended up sitting across from a table of english speakers which included a guy we had had our eye on during our flight from Beijing. Some suggested it was fate, others merely a coincidence.

 

Tomorrow morning we are heading off to Jiu Zhai Gou to see the natural beauty China has to offer and get some hiking done. That means we have today to locate the famous silk market here in Chengdu. Luckily the weather here, although humid, is a lot cooler.

 

I apologize for not having any pictures to post with this, but unfortunately the right connections are unavailable at this internet cafe. Well I guess internet cafe is being generous, this is more of a gamers heaven. Imagine a large dark room with curtains over the windows, huge fans blowing air around the room, rows and rows of computers, high backed chairs, and lots of chinese boys/men gaming. It's quite incredible. I guess that mental picture is all I have to offer for now.