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Tag: Emei Shan

Emei Shan

by on Nov.16, 2009, under China

Buddhist Statue

Our journey from Chengdu to Emei Shan was 2.5 hours on a bus for 46rmb and a pretty exhausting one. The tickets were pretty cheap if you ask me, I’m glad the Lonely Planet book was there because it’s saves your life every day! You can get a bus at the Xinnanmen Bus Station, and buses leave every 20 minutes! Once we arrived at the bus station in Emei Shan, we picked up a small van for 10rmb a person (which in retrospect I think is a rip off) to go into town.

Modern Monk

Once there we attempted to find the Fuhu Monastery on our own but to no avail. Thankfully my Chinese skills came in handy, and we found Monks who embraced worldly possessions and modern technology by graciously using my phone to talk to my girlfriend. I found it extremely hard to understand him, as people from Sichuan Province tend to have a different dialect that is even listed as being in a separate family from Mandarin. We offered the men some chocolate gummies as thanks, and they again accepted without thinking about it. Talk about awesome monks!

Fat Buddha

Upon arriving at the monastery, we found out it was for women only, but they allow anyone to stay. We were first assaulted by the man at the ticket office, who insisted it was 120rmb per person to sleep there. After calling my girlfriend and attempting to negotiate with this idiot, we entered on our own and found a female monk who told us it was 50rmb a night, like the Lonely Planet book said. We got a room for the girls, and 2 rooms for us 3 guys. Our rooms were quite nice, as I was expecting no electricity or running water, but to my surprise we even had working air conditioning. I guess they are more modern than other places as they are only a 15 minute walk from the base of the mountain, and thus much more frequented by visitors and exposed to the outside world.

Nasty Breakfast

At 6:30 in the morning, we joined the monks for breakfast for 10rmb each. The breakfast was honestly the worst food I’ve ever eaten in my life. It was rice in water (a real Chinese dish which tastes really good when sugar is added.. there was no sugar here), steamed buns with nothing inside, and some spicy thing you put in the rice to make it remotely edible. After suffering through this terrible meal, we quickly thanked them and retreated back to our rooms to prepare for the hike.

Monastery

Emma decided to stay, so the four of us packed up and left to hike up the mountain. It began raining as soon as we got down the steps of the monastery, so we went back because as it was, we only had 2 hours to go up and 2 hours to get back before we had to leave for Leshan. In the end, we joined the monks for their morning service at 9am, and it lasted an hour. You normally donate a small amount to go inside. I gave them a 100rmb note, and they were very happy until they realized I wanted change. I only wanted to give them the 6rmb minimum as we’d already paid 50 each to sleep there the night before. They got me change and the world kept on going.After the morning service, we left for Leshan via the same van we used to get into town.


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August Trip Summary

by on Oct.03, 2009, under China

This summary will be broken down twice, once by location and another time by their totals.

Train to Guilin = 212rmb (paid for Lily) ($30.9)
Hostel in Guilin = 70rmb (paid for Lily) ($10.2)
Food in Guilin = 35.5rmb ($5.10)
Transportation in Guilin = 6rmb (buses/paid for Lily) ($0.80)
Activities in Guilin = 40rmb (die cai shan, paid for lily) ($5.80)
====================================
Total for Guilin = 363.5rmb ($52.80)

Bus to Yangshuo = 30rmb (paid for Lily) ($4.37)
Hostel in Yangshuo = 70rmb (paid for Lily) ($10.2)
Food in Yangshuo = 55rmb ($8.02)
Transportation in Yangshuo = 5rmb ($0.72)
Activities in Yangshuo = 0rmb
===================================
Total for Yangshuo = 160rmb ($23.31)

Train to Chengdu = 104rmb ($15.1)
Hostel in Chengdu = 60rmb (Melba paid for my first night) ($8.75)
Food in Chengdu = 62rmb ($9.05)
Activities in Chengdu = 100rmb ($14.59)
==================================
Total for Chengdu = 326rmb ($47.49)

Bus to Emei Shan from Chengdu = 46rmb ($6.71)
Monastery in Emei Shan = 50rmb ($7.29)
Food in Emei Shan = 50rmb ($7.29)
Donation to Monastery = 30rmb ($4.37)
================================
Total for Emei Shan = 176rmb ($25.66)

Private Car to Leshan from Emei Shan = 30rmb ($4.37)
Activities in Leshan = 90rmb ($13.13)
Bus back to Chengdu = 45rmb ($6.56)
=============================
Total for Leshan = 165rmb ($24.06)

Train to Xi’an = 209rmb ($30.51)
Hostel in Xi’an = 50rmb ($7.29)
Food in Xi’an = 101rmb ($14.74)
Activities in Xi’an = 155rmb ($22.62)
Transportation in Xi’an = 15rmb ($2.18)
=============================
Total for Xi’an = 530rmb ($77.34)

Train to Beijing = 311rmb ($45.40)
Hostel in Beijing = 140rmb ($20.43)
Food in Beijing = 242rmb ($35.32)
Activities in Beijing = 100rmb ($14.59)
Transport in Beijing = 139rmb ($20.29)
=============================
Total for Beijing = 932rmb ($136.03)

Train to Wuhan = 287 ($41.89)
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Total spent = 2939.5rmb ($428.58), My budget was 4500rmb ($656.93)

In the end, my friends paid for these things for me (thanks Alfred, Richard, and Melba!):

Hot Air Balloon = 480×2 (paid for Lily)
Black and White Panda = 1000
Red Panda (really a raccoon) = 100

——-

Look for my upcoming posts about Guilin, Yangshuo, Emei Shan, Leshan, Chengdu, Xi’an, and Beijing!


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Recap

by on Sep.05, 2009, under Daily Life


After such a hectic first half of August, I got to travel with Alfred, Richard, Melba, and Emma. They came over from the states to visit and travel China. I wrote in a previous post where we were going, but for those of you who don’t know or don’t remember, I’ll write it again. They arrived in Hong Kong and took a bus across the border into Shenzhen. They then flew to Guilin to meet me. Immediately upon meeting them, we took a bus to Yangshuo an hour away. In Yangshuo, we rode in a hot air balloon and rode bikes outside of town.

Next we struggled through a 25 hour train journey to Chengdu in which we had to sit the entire way. In Chengdu, we experienced a minority performance and were treated like royalty by the staff at the theater. We played with pandas and raccoons and ate spicy hot pot food. We hiked to the Fuhu Monastery and slept with the monks for a night and got to see their prayer service in the morning. We went to the world’s largest known Buddha at Leshan.

From Chengdu we went to Xi’an, a city filled with terrible pollution much worse than what I experience in Wuhan. It’s so bad that the 5 of us couldn’t breathe after riding rented bikes on top of the old fortress walls (Xi’an is 1 of two cities in China that has a wall still completely intact). In Xi’an, we also saw the Terracotta Warriors, which turned out to be quite boring for me. In Beijing, we went to the Forbidden City (another boring tourist trap) and took a bus three hours north of Beijing to hike up to a little-known and rarely-visited section of the Great Wall called Simatai.

After 16 grueling days of travel, I’m glad to be back in my new apartment. I went to my school and got my schedule and met my students and co-teachers. I’ll be teaching 2nd grade, which means my kids are 7 years old! My school is 3 metro stations south of my apartment, and the metro station is an 8 minute walk from my building. My other option is to ride the public bikes about 25 minutes, which I think is a much better option for my health! I’m excited to be teaching at a public school because it means I can be a real teacher and not just another white face being paid ridiculous amounts of money for no reason. Stay tuned to see what happens next!


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