Kunming

After the crazy schedule from Beijing, I was ready for some rest, but not too much! Jenny, David, and I left for Kunming in the Yunnan province. I've dreamed of going to Yunnan ever since I saw a Yunnan dance performance at UNC my freshman year. I was so excited to see the ethnic minorities and traditional dress of Yunnan.

Kunming was definitely a bustling city, something I didn't expect. We settled down in our hotel and planned out our weekend. My Lonely Planet guide came in handy the entire trip. The first order of business was to grab some lunch, so we tried to find Mama Fu's nearby, but accidentally went into the wrong one! Nevertheless I got a huge bowl of noodles for less than $1! That's definitely good enough for me. Next, we went to the Chuang Ku, or Loft, art section of the city. Our hotel was centrally located, so we walked there, and it took much longer than I thought it would. But once we got there it was so charming, and there were some cool cafes and art galleries. The art we saw seemed so European, so it was reminiscent of my trek across Italy. Seeing something different like this was so refreshing after all of the traditional Chinese art and buildings. There was even one gallery that was born from an artist from China and one from Sweden.

Afterwards we walked to the East and Western pagodas. They were pretty close to each other, and nice to see, but we couldn't go inside because they aren't really restored. There was some kind of food festival going on in the area too! Tons of dried fruit, nuts, snacks, etc...even ostrich eggs?

It was starting to get dark, so we headed back to the hotel and tried to find a teahouse to sit in and relax since our feet were hurting. At least mine and Jenny's feet hurt, David's a trooper. Couldn't find anything, so we referred to the handy dandy Lonely Planet guide and went to a cafe. We relaxed for awhile and drank some tea, and waited for our appetites to kick in. Jenny and I shared some traditional "Across the Bridge" noodles, which turned out to be more food than we could handle. Oops...

Okay, so I've decided I've gone into too much detail, so I'll try to go for more highlights now.

The next day we went to the Stone Forest and Da Shui Pu Bu, a waterfall. We hired a driver, who turned out to be not so nice at the beginning. We planned on running to Wal-Mart or Carrefour to buy lunch supplies, but he refused because of traffic, so instead he took us to a nice local place at the Stone Forest. We tried some of the local mushrooms, since they are more expensive everywhere else in the world. Some of the best dishes I've had since I got to China! I even asked the waitress to write down the names for me. The Stone Forest seemed pretty artificial, until we found a path that led down and then up to the top of the rock formations! There was no one else up there, so we took our time and sometimes I thought I'd fall. There were no railings, but you could tell which rocks were used as handholds since they were smoother than the rest of the formations. Before we got to the Stone Forest our driver took us to the Waterfall, and I'm pretty sure he got lost for a bit...but once we got there it was just good to get out of the car. We took a cable car down so we could explore the area around the waterfall too. Jenny and I were posing for a picture in front of the waterfall when donkey almost ran us over? Next thing you know its owner comes down running after it, haha, that was pretty fun. Then on the walk back to the car a herd of goats came by...and there were cows by the waterfall. It was an animal filled day for us.

The other highlight was going to the Western Hills. We managed to take public transportation all the way there! We made our own lunches and enjoyed them before the real climb started. We followed the road for awhile, it was strange since there wasn't really a walking path. But eventually we found one and of course it was filled with locals trying to sell us little toys and trinkets. We trekked all over the mountain and found some more paths leading to another side...Jenny and I didn't make it all the way, but we waited so David could get to a higher point. Obviously, David was more gung ho about going the extra mile during the trip. Then we took a long cable car halfway down and walked the rest of the way. The walk was much further than I remembered...

That night we found the real Mama Fu's and I had a hamburger for the first time in MONTHS...maybe a year or something! Crazy! It was so delicious and juicy, I scarfed the whole thing down. The best part was that everything seemed home cooked. The patty was handmade and the bread was fresh..mmm...now I'm hungry and it's almost lunchtime!

Coming up next....the study trip to Shanghai and Tokyo!