March | 2016 | DC's Asian Adventures

Sichuan Day 3, Part 4

To finish off this day, we arrived back in Chengdu from the day tour in the evening – hungry. Our hotel was in an interesting neighborhood: though not necessarily seedy it was certainly working class.

We started down one of the little side streets and immediately came across a common site: some guys playing Chinese chess in the street on a warm summer evening.

1916 Guys playing Chinese chess

Then we saw some fruit carts and knew we were getting closer.

1917 Fruit cart 1

1918 Fruit cart 2

Nearby was a group of young people eating at a little outdoor café, sitting on the customary plastic stools.

1920 Outdoor eating

We were tempted to go inside but in the end we wanted to eat outside, and there was only that one table.

Across the street we saw a man and a woman running a grilling operation where you choose what you want to eat, then they grill it for you and put it in a Styrofoam box. Ah, yes, our kind of haute cuisine!

1921 Stick cart

Here’s what I got:

1922 Paul's food

I don’t remember what the big stuff was (fish? tofu?) but evidently I liked it.

1923 Paul eating

I guess the beer helped my enjoyment of the food.

Next to us was a group of young people having dinner and drinking a lot of beer.

1924 Neighboring table

At first I thought how nice it was that these kids were out eating together, but then I saw them take tissues from the box on the table, wipe their mouths, then casually toss them onto the sidewalk next to them.

1925 Trash

I have a theory about littering in Third World countries. A large percentage of the people are still not sophisticated enough to realize that littering hurts their country, and until there is a national educational priority to change this, it won’t happen. Fortunately, the various levels of government hire armies of street sweepers, so you rarely see much litter linger in public places for long periods of time.

On the way back we saw a bridge spanning the river. The Chinese have a penchant for gaudy lighting on their bridges. Nothing subtle here.

1926 Bridge

Then, almost home, we rounded a corner and saw a bunch of people sitting on stools, all facing the same direction, and we wondered what’s up.

1927 Crowd 1

So we went behind them and saw what they were looking at.

1928 Crowd 2

X23 told me this is common in her village, also: many people don’t have TVs, so they gather at someone’s house or shop and watch together. It’s reminiscent of the days when my parents huddled around the radio and when my siblings and I fought over which of the 3 available TV channels we would watch. (Of course, whoever won had to actually get up off the sofa and change the channel because there were no remotes in those days.)

Most of you know my feelings about personal communication devices and social media. The latter is a misnomer in that, despite the ability to maintain tenuous connections with large numbers of people, this newly acquired ability to isolate ourselves with our lives self-contained in digital devices has resulted in the weakening of the deep community spirit that used to bind us together. “The road to Hell is paved with good intentions”

保罗

I’m currently in Shanghai and I have some interesting things to show you, but it seems illogical to do so without first completing the Sichuan trip. (Sorry I’ve been so lazy.)

Sichuan Day 3, Part 3

After Qing Cheng Mountain, we were taken to an “ancient village.” I put it in quotes because, though I suppose it may have been an ancient village long ago (hmmmmm), it now seems to be little more than a tourist trap. To control the number of people inside the village to a mere few billion, they held up the buses of tourists outside the city, letting only one bus in when another departed. Here’s the only entrance.

1884 Entrance to ancient

Off to my right, across the river, I saw an old man fishing. It’s not often you see people alone in China.

1885 Man fishing

Clearly, some parts of the city were indeed old,…

1886 Old wall

…while other parts were newer, such as this bridge.

1887 Bridge

Parts of this “ancient village” resembled an amusement park, such as this walk-on-swinging-log attraction.

1888 Walking on log

1889 Paul walking on log

One distinguishing characteristic of this village was that there were statues EVERYWHERE, though none of them were old.

1890 Statue 1

1891 Statue 2

1892 Statue 3

There was a shallow area in the river where the tourists played.

1893 Water 1

I don’t know whether it was intentional or not, but the little café also had water you could walk through.

1894 Water 2

More statues.

1895 Statue 4

1896 Statue 5

More amusement stuff.

1897 Bowling

1898 Drum

All along the way, you’re assaulted by the horrible, tinny sounds of the tour guides squawk boxes that are ubiquitous throughout China.

1904 Bad sound 1

Of course, to get out of the “ancient village” you had to pass through the shopping area,…

1899 Shopping area

…which wasn’t so bad because after the street of useless trinkets, you entered the narrower street of yummy food.

1900 Food area

1901 food area narrows

The only negative things about this part of the village were the crowds were thicker and you were bombarded by more squawk boxes – this one from a girl in a cowboy hat. I called her “Tex” but she had no idea what I was referring to.

1905 Bad sound 2