Love Letters in the Sand

Let’s continue with my Sichuan trip.

After being delayed a day, we finally arrived in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan and one of my favorite cities in China, even though the food I too hot. We got a couple rooms in a low-cost hotel (right in the center of the photo)…

…and looked out across the alley to our neighboring apartment building.

Down below in the alley was a typical sales couple selling stuff for cheap prices. The husband walks around without a shirt (very common in China during the summer) while the wife eats and waits for customers.

Across the street from the hotel was a coffee shop.

In China, almost every coffee shop has a sign of some sort that is round with green on it. (Gee, I wonder why!) Also, coffee shops do not open early in the morning but rather at 9:30 or 10:00 a.m. They are not meant as a caffeine source but rather as a social gathering place. They can be crowded at lunch and through the afternoon. One teacher I know gave her students the assignment of writing an essay about why coffee houses now outnumber tea houses in Beijing.

For dinner we decided to take a taxi to the famous I-don’t-remember-the-name ancient village area. This is a major tourist attraction in Chengdu, as you can see.

This “village” is about a square mile in size, and every inch was as crowded as this one. Note the ubiquitous Starbucks (a real one this time), which itself is an attraction.

Across from Starbucks was a cheap noodle place,…

…so we got some noodles,…

…dumpling soup,…

…and beer,…

…and sat at the window seats watching the people go by.

After dinner, we braved the crowds again…

…and sauntered around, looking at the hundreds of fast food stands, all of which looked pretty much like this one…

…except for the stuff they were selling.

Each food stand would have a specialty. This one sold rice balls of different colors and, presumably, flavors.

Most dishes came with a pile of Sichuan peppers on top.

This place specialized in duck parts,…

…while this place had fish or chicken on a stick (very common in China),…

…with duck heads thrown in just for fun.

Not to be outdone, his two neighbors were selling rabbit heads…

…and pigs’ feet.

The gimmick at this place was one continuous noodle, which the guy would make in the metal pan in front of him,…

…then whip it across the room to the woman by the window.

There were a few real restaurants for those who wanted to spend more money.

They usually had a singer somewhere.

This is a fancy tea house.

Chinese girls love to pose for pictures.

We finally came to a place that wasn’t selling food. This Egyptian guy used colored sand to make decorative bottles.

He used a long-stemmed funnel to slowly add sand of different colors to the bottle until. Careful addition of the sand produced recognizable pictures in the bottle.

Thanks to the beer and old age, I suddenly needed a restroom (“toilet” in their vernacular).

I noticed a little sign above the urinal – first time seeing something like this.

Finally, tired of fighting the crowds, we took a little cart home.

That was Day 2.

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