We're back safe and sound in the U.S. of A. and will hopefully have an address next week once we've househunted in the Bay Area. Contact information to come via email!
Thank you once again for reading our blog. It has meant a lot!
Best,
K and A
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Friday, July 4, 2008
Hong Kong
We had a great (and short) trip to Hong Kong en route from Kunming to L.A. Hong Kong is an amazing metropolis situated amongst undeveloped green hills, and a truly unique international city. It was interesting to notice all the differences from mainland China; in many ways, it felt most like San Francisco or New York City!
Bird Park: it is an extremely popular hobby among old men to walk their birds and air them (in cages) in parks. This park is dedicated to these bird men, complete with cage-hanging racks and maggot/cricket sellers.
Delicious breakfast dumplings in a '50s style Hong Kong diner.
Portuguese egg tarts: deliciously creamy and slightly sweet.
Yuanyang: a uniquely Hong Kong drink. Half coffee, half Hong Kong milk tea.
Strong, sweet, and refreshing on a humid day!
Porcelain figurines from the Cultural Revolution, including one of a "struggle session" (very disturbing).
Incense hanging from the ceiling of a 19th-century temple.
Reminders in Chinese and English that Hong Kong drivers use the British system of driving on the left.
Hong Kong is an Olympic co-host city.
The world's largest outdoor seated bronze Buddha (up 265 stairs). And it is impressive!
We took a cable car/gondola ride on the way back from the Buddha. Amazing views! Here you can see the airport and the South China Sea.
A sign on a street filled with ginseng sellers.
Hong Kong's swooping lines.
Dim sum! I'm holding a striped sesame jelly dessert.
More dim sum: red bean soup, vegetable rolls, mushrooms wrapped in tofu skin.
Skyline from the ferry ride, including the Hong Kong convention center (in front of which the official transfer from British to Chinese governments took place).
At the top of Victoria's Peak.
One of Hong Kong's historic double-decker cable cars (with a modern advertising twist).
The Star Ferry.
Katie and dim sum; below is one of the dim sum carts (this one featured desserts).
Bird Park: it is an extremely popular hobby among old men to walk their birds and air them (in cages) in parks. This park is dedicated to these bird men, complete with cage-hanging racks and maggot/cricket sellers.
Delicious breakfast dumplings in a '50s style Hong Kong diner.
Portuguese egg tarts: deliciously creamy and slightly sweet.Yuanyang: a uniquely Hong Kong drink. Half coffee, half Hong Kong milk tea.
Strong, sweet, and refreshing on a humid day!Porcelain figurines from the Cultural Revolution, including one of a "struggle session" (very disturbing).
Incense hanging from the ceiling of a 19th-century temple.
Reminders in Chinese and English that Hong Kong drivers use the British system of driving on the left.
Hong Kong is an Olympic co-host city.
The world's largest outdoor seated bronze Buddha (up 265 stairs). And it is impressive!
We took a cable car/gondola ride on the way back from the Buddha. Amazing views! Here you can see the airport and the South China Sea.
A sign on a street filled with ginseng sellers.
Hong Kong's swooping lines.
Dim sum! I'm holding a striped sesame jelly dessert.
More dim sum: red bean soup, vegetable rolls, mushrooms wrapped in tofu skin.
Skyline from the ferry ride, including the Hong Kong convention center (in front of which the official transfer from British to Chinese governments took place).
At the top of Victoria's Peak.
One of Hong Kong's historic double-decker cable cars (with a modern advertising twist).
The Star Ferry.
Katie and dim sum; below is one of the dim sum carts (this one featured desserts).
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Coming Home
Hello friends and avid blog readers!
As much as I know you have all relished in entries of K-and-A-in-China, the time has come to say goodbye.
We leave for Hong Kong on Sunday and then onto LA on Wednesday. From there we will hang out for about a week in Orange County, drive to the Bay Area and drop the car, and then jet-set from San Jose to Portland, Portland to Denver, and then finally to Seattle. We will be there a few weeks, and then we will drive to Walla Walla to collect the pets and our stuff, and make the U-Haul journey south to the Bay Area. Annelise will be starting her PhD in History at Stanford, and I am still searching for a job (although I have had some real interest recently, and have a phone interview scheduled for the day after we arrive!).
That's the plan, anyhow. Look for one last blog update from Honkers (as our Australian friends call Hong Kong), and an email update with new phone numbers and address.
If it appears that we will be passing through your area and by some egregious error we have failed to contact you, please drop us an email! We would love to see each and every one of you.
Thanks for reading and commenting! Best to everyone!
Katie and Annelise
As much as I know you have all relished in entries of K-and-A-in-China, the time has come to say goodbye.
We leave for Hong Kong on Sunday and then onto LA on Wednesday. From there we will hang out for about a week in Orange County, drive to the Bay Area and drop the car, and then jet-set from San Jose to Portland, Portland to Denver, and then finally to Seattle. We will be there a few weeks, and then we will drive to Walla Walla to collect the pets and our stuff, and make the U-Haul journey south to the Bay Area. Annelise will be starting her PhD in History at Stanford, and I am still searching for a job (although I have had some real interest recently, and have a phone interview scheduled for the day after we arrive!).
That's the plan, anyhow. Look for one last blog update from Honkers (as our Australian friends call Hong Kong), and an email update with new phone numbers and address.
If it appears that we will be passing through your area and by some egregious error we have failed to contact you, please drop us an email! We would love to see each and every one of you.
Thanks for reading and commenting! Best to everyone!
Katie and Annelise
Final Crazy Kunming Story
There have been many crazy stories from our time living and working in China and traveling around SE Asia. Some of them are truly bizarre, some of them just strange to us as foreigners, because we don't really know or understand what is going on around us. All that said, the other day as we were waiting for the bus, we witnessed one of the weirdest things I have ever seen (in China, at home and elsewhere). Not only was it bizarre, it demonstrates what happens when a country develops fast, gains wealth (and therefore cars) quickly, and has yet to establish fast food restaurants with drive-thru windows. I can only imagine what it might have been like if McDonald's had come slightly before Henry Ford. Giddy-up!
So here's the story: we are waiting in front of a bus stop. We notice a conspicuously parked car. In fact, the car is parked in the middle of the right-most lane of traffic (lane!). To make the situation all the funnier, there is a tiny child in the driver's seat and about 6 other passengers in the car. The car is turned off (thank goodness!) and the kid keeps turning the wheel and looking over his shoulder as if he is about to merge. Then he lays on the horn (not unlike, I must say, men many times his senior here). Finally, a man emerges from the KFC across the street, kicks the kid out of the driver's seat, takes a few bites of his chicken sandwich, starts up the car and drives off. So strange! Check out the video above.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
KTV and Mah Jongg
In our last few weeks we have been able to reach two more cultural goals: entertainment ancient (mah jongg) and ultra-modern (KTV, or Chinese karaoke). 
We played a few rounds of mah jongg in a teahouse by Green Lake with Scarlett, Aaron, and Sophie, instructed by the ever-patient Scarlett. Inspired, we now hope to purchase our own mah jongg set. We've heard that some people play mah jongg just for the wonderfully pleasing sound the shuffling tiles make; I can believe it!
As wildly popular as mah jongg is, KTV has its own faithful following. A key feature in KTV's fun is missing in American karaoke: private rooms. I don't know if you could do karaoke publicly in bars here if you wanted to (which I don't)! Entire buildings all over the city are dedicated to KTV. You rent rooms by the half-hour or hour, buy beverages and snacks in the convenience store inside the building (with airport prices and service workers that follow you around and carry your stuff). Other KTV places' prices include all-you-can-eat snack buffets. Once inside, you control which songs you choose via computer. It took us a good half-hour to figure it out (since the button labels were all in Chinese and the songs' organization system escaped us), and the workers kept interrupting to have us sign stuff, which was annoying, but we figured it all out eventually. Then Carol, Mike, Katie and I cut loose and rocked out!
We played a few rounds of mah jongg in a teahouse by Green Lake with Scarlett, Aaron, and Sophie, instructed by the ever-patient Scarlett. Inspired, we now hope to purchase our own mah jongg set. We've heard that some people play mah jongg just for the wonderfully pleasing sound the shuffling tiles make; I can believe it!
As wildly popular as mah jongg is, KTV has its own faithful following. A key feature in KTV's fun is missing in American karaoke: private rooms. I don't know if you could do karaoke publicly in bars here if you wanted to (which I don't)! Entire buildings all over the city are dedicated to KTV. You rent rooms by the half-hour or hour, buy beverages and snacks in the convenience store inside the building (with airport prices and service workers that follow you around and carry your stuff). Other KTV places' prices include all-you-can-eat snack buffets. Once inside, you control which songs you choose via computer. It took us a good half-hour to figure it out (since the button labels were all in Chinese and the songs' organization system escaped us), and the workers kept interrupting to have us sign stuff, which was annoying, but we figured it all out eventually. Then Carol, Mike, Katie and I cut loose and rocked out!
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Carol and Mike's Visit
We were so glad to be able to share our Kunming experiences with Carol and Mike; their visit was a wonderful way to wrap up our time here. One of our adventures together was fortune-telling in front of Yuantong Temple. Integral to this process was my tutee and friend Sophia, who tirelessly translated and bargained for us. There are several methods of fortune telling: pulling sticks with different meanings (very similar to tarot), Taoist readings from holy texts, palm readings, face readings, and a few others. Sometimes the fortune teller is blind (but can see the future), as was the person Carol and I went to. Katie pulled a stick (Queen of Heaven -- very auspicious) and had her face read by a couple of women, which produced a general good fortune. I pulled "Shang Shang," or "Highest" (one of the best sticks), which generated another general good fortune. Carol had her palm read (see picture below), which brought forth many more specific admonitions and predictions. The good news is that she'll live to be 88-99 years old! 
Sophia also helped Katie pull off an impressive birthday surprise: flower delivery! It was so much fun to get to celebrate my birthday with Carol and Mike in town, and to receive a truly surprising bouquet to boot! Katie also made brownies with lavender ganache and we later all went out to a fancy Yunnanese restaurant.
Carol and Mike joined a couple of Katie's classes to discuss social issues around the movie "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner." First, we had a delicious meal of Muslim pulled noodles in tomato sauce ("ban mian") in the Yangpu cafeteria.
In front of the building with Katie's classrooms.
On their last day in Kunming, we explored the Western Hills. Here we are with various treats on a stick.
Dragon Boat Festival
The fifth day of the fifth month (in the traditional lunar calendar) is the Dragon Boat Festival. This is an ancient holiday that is mostly marked by eating glutinous rice dumplings called Zong Zi and dragon boat racing (the latter does not happen in Kunming, and is mostly in Southeastern cities that have appropriately sized rivers). The Festival honors a famous poet from the Warring States period, during which his kingdom was conquered by another. In patriotic protest against corruption and defeat, he killed himself by throwing himself into the river. Supposedly mourning citizens threw glutinous rice dumplings into the river so that the fish wouldn't eat his body (or to feed his spirit, depending upon the version of the story). We were kindly invited to celebrate the festival with Zhou Baodi,
a professor who participated in the earliest exchange group with Whitman. She made the zong zi, which is a time-intensive process. You can see her with the plate of zong zi still wrapped in the special leaves while being steamed. As you can see in the unwrapped versions, the zong zi have peanuts and, in the middle, a sweet date paste. These were Shanghai style (Zhou Baodi's hometown); Kunming folks like plain rice zong zi. The third picture shows the plants that are hung by front doors to ward off evil spirits.
a professor who participated in the earliest exchange group with Whitman. She made the zong zi, which is a time-intensive process. You can see her with the plate of zong zi still wrapped in the special leaves while being steamed. As you can see in the unwrapped versions, the zong zi have peanuts and, in the middle, a sweet date paste. These were Shanghai style (Zhou Baodi's hometown); Kunming folks like plain rice zong zi. The third picture shows the plants that are hung by front doors to ward off evil spirits.
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