Tuesday April 5... in Liping
I got my dates wrong on my last post, so I've already covered Tuesday.
Wednesday April 6... in Liping
Another quiet day of adjusting to life in Liping. We were home most of the day, Jake went out to run some errands and Monica did laundry, laundry and more laundry. My days are filled with holding Lincoln, helping Creed with his schoolwork, playing Uno, chess and checkers with the kids. I've been going to bed pretty early (have I mentioned that I love my pink foam earplugs??), but I'm not feeling particularly rested. Go figure!
Thursday, April 7... in Liping
Jake and Monica went furniture shopping today so they can get Lincoln settled in to the extra room (that Jake uses as an office), but didn't find what they were looking for. They also went up to the language school at lunchtime to see the students that they worked with last year. Eunice, the girl I'm sharing the apartment sprained her ankle or broke some bones in her foot 3 weeks ago, and Monica took at look at that for her and helped her wrap it. They really enjoyed their time at the school, reconnecting with their friends they haven't seen in months.
The weather has been in the low 50's--chilly and damp. My apartment was 49 degrees this morning when I woke up, so I'm guessing that it was in the high 40's overnight. Seems like the temps are pretty close to MN temps this week; though I'm guessing that my house is a bit warmer than the apartment in the mornings. ;-)
I'm starting a list of things that I promise to NOT take for granted when I return... I've developed a new appreciation for the challenges Jake and Monica face living here--in many ways, it's like the years my parents spent living in rural Alaska--several hours to the nearest necessary supplies; reduce, reuse and recycle as a way of life (not a feel-good effort for the benefit of others); isolation from quality medical care; everything they do takes more thought and effort than we put forth in the states, where everything we need is at our fingertips.
Friday, April 8... in Liping
Jake and Monica are largely vegetarian. Now that I'm here, I can see how it would be MUCH easier to be a vegetarian here than in the states... to buy meat, you wander through the market, looking at the carcasses laying on dirty boards, with dirty cleavers laying beside them, waiting to hack off the part of the carcass you want for your dinner. No tidy little USDA approved packages of meat processed in clean USDA inspected facilities. The most interesting thing I've seen is the skinned head of a pig, hanging by the snout, ready to slip into a pot to make a soup. MMMMM.
Jake and the older kids took me up to a monument on top of the local mountain this afternoon. We wound our way up the hill, around a valley, climbing the whole way on slate steps. Cairns of stone mark the tombs of people buried on the hillsides, and all are decorated with foil streamers and colored foil bunting as well as paper 'monty' and burned incense sticks. When people die, it is believed that if their children and grandchildren leave gifts of food and money on their tombs, they will be blessed by those on 'the other side'. These tombs are covered in incense sticks, piles of disintegrating paper (purchased to represent money for the passed), food scraps and other gifts. There were small altars along the way, each was surrounded with dozens, if not hundreds, of burned up incense sticks. The moisture in the air holds the scent of the incense, so our whole walk was steeped in this sweet smell.
Almost at the top, we came into a spot that was a little wider than the rest of the trail with a pavilion and a spring coming out of the hill where people go to get their daily water (those who don't want to purchase water). It's a LONG way to go to get your daily water!! This little area held one of the altars, so we sat there for a few minutes soaking up the sights, smells and the sound of water pouring out of the mouth of the spring into a stone pool built to catch the water. It was surreal! I'll probably be transported to that place every time I smell burning incense!
During our 90 minute hike through serious forest, I only heard about 8 species of birds. I didn't SEE any, and the ones I heard were pretty isolated. Songbirds are commonly eaten around here, so they can be kind of hard to find! Without a bird book and a knowledgeable guide, I was left to guess at species, but I could tell that there was some kind of relatives of chickadees, nuthatches, thrushes and warblers, but that's as close as I could get to IDing what I was hearing. It's bizarre to hear so few birds in such a natural and remote area!
The valley is beautiful... it's terraced for growing rice, and watered by the spring at the top of the hill. Horses and a water buffalo graze in the paddies... I couldn't figure out where they lived, but they seemed content to slosh around in the unplowed paddies eating the plants growing up in them. The paddies will be plowed this spring, then flooded and replanted with this year's rice crop. Right now, they're standing fallow, filled in with grasses over the past 6 months. The hills look like a non-tropical rain forest. It's so moist here, and so cool, that things grow year round, though there are some trees showing new spring leaves budding, and flowers just preparing to bloom. I was most intrigued with the tiny wild irises growing on the hillside. Beautiful.
Tigers used to roam this area, but we're not sure what species. Locals have extirpated the tigers in response to people and livestock being killed over the years. The last tigers were in the forests here in the 1950's, so they've been gone for a long time!
About eating dog... Though there are restaurants here that serve dog year-round, the primary time of consumption of dog is around the winter solstice. People raise dogs specifically for this purpose (stop squirming... there's an explanation for this). I have come to understand that some foods are 'hot' and eaten during the winter, and other foods are 'cool' and eaten during the summer (like the difference between chili and potato salad). A lot of credence is given to balance here... think Ying and Yang... Dog is considered to be a hot food, and is used for the special occasion of the winter solstice celebration. The people here don't like to talk about eating dog... they know that other parts of the world consider it to be uncivilized and are understandably protective of the custom. I really don't have a problem with it. There is a sense of survival-level-existance here that we cannot duplicate in the states. I haven't been offered dog, and I'm not sure that I'll be in a place that serves it.
About squattie potties... Ok, I've been asked to describe this process. I'm SO glad that I've been an outdoors person for so long... all I've had to do is refine the process for indoor use. Squattie potties are porcelain toilet bowls sunk into the floor. The whole room drains into the pottie, so the shower and laundry can all be done in the same room. The shower hangs on the wall, and there is no door or curtain around the shower space. When you enter a home, you remove your outdoor shoes and put on house slippers (foam flipflops or wool clogs or other indoor slipper) for wearing inside the house. When you enter a bathroom, though, you switch into bathroom slippers that stay inside the bathroom and are not used in the rest of the house. Anytime we enter the bathroom or laundry room for any reason, we change slippers so we're not tracking bathroom germs into the house. Another thing I'll not take for granted... not changing shoes in the bathroom!
We're heading out to a party this evening... I"m sure I'll have more to say about that in my next post.
Thanks for reading,
Wish you were here!
No comments:
Post a Comment