Well, except for a cup of instant coffee last night after dinner, I haven't had coffee for about 4 or 5 days. I've been drinking tea. This morning it's hotel branded Wulong tea ...

Red Beach, Red Cranes ... Red Everywhere

Summer's over, by the way. If you happen to be writing about yesterday's typhoons and Asia, flooding in Southeast Asia, and Southern China ... it's not the worst weather of the Summer, because it's happenning in the Fall. It did rain in Northeast China yesterday, but today was sunny.

So we drove out to Red Beach. Red Beach is a misnomer actually, because technically. Red Beach is a swamp. It's part of the tidal waters around the mouth of the Liao or Liaohe River. I think the map calls it "Liaohe Kou." Not important really. It was a couple hours drive and we hired a guide for 300 Yuan, which might have included the entry fee.

The red color is caused by a swamp plant which one website refers to as a sea blight. I need a Botanist about now. as you can see it's red in the fall and there's alot of it.

It is ... I'm guessing ... part of the habitat of the "endangered, threatened and nearly extinct" Red Crane, which according to my friend, there are only a few left. The picture shows a couple of them, a breeding pair if I understood the conversation correctly. It is possible to feed this one a few fish from a bucket, but it appears his beak doesn't line up quite right.

I struggle a bit with the presence of oil pumpers and pipelines in the midst of a seemingly fragile environment. Is it bad or good?

“Museum for Chinese Volunteers Fighting with Korean Against the Imperialist Americans”

I am not making this up. "The Americans were defeated in Korea, using the superior technology of the Chinese." In Dandong, the location of the Chinese and Korean Friendship Bridge, there is a museum to honor the soldiers who bravely fought against the Americans. And I was there. At the museum. I am pretty sure the soldiers deserve it, and the Chinese people as well. It is a fitting monument to the soldiers and people of China. It's not really that kind to the Americans, however.

My father fought in Korea, in the navy. I never knew we sent troops to Taiwan. I guess we were always too busy talking about the great war to spend any time about Korea. I was pretty much ignorant of the whole affair. Until a couple of days ago. I understand Seoul changed hands 10 times during the Korean war. When we talk about the Korean war we talk about it in terms of "Police Action" or "Korean Conflict."

Not the Chinese. They talk about it being the time they helped their Korean friends push the imperialist Americans out of North Korea. Apparently they kicked our asses using soup cauldrons and kettle drums.

It was an interesting place that museum. The photos are some examples of the superior technology used by the Chinese during the Korean War. Perhaps I am being a bit unfair in my representation. There were solid examples of arms, artillery, and aircraft as well. I didn't see any compelling examples of superior technology, however.

When It Just Isn't Right

We arrived by train in Dandong late in the evening. It was already dark and we needed to find a place to stay that would accept Americans. My friend and I had outlined a basic plan which included a hotel with a river view, since the Yalu River was the main attraction.

Her father, however, was heavily engaged in a conversation with a stranger, her grating voice tearing into my ears and interfering with my idea of what was going to happen. I usually like to take a few moments to gather my perspective, get my bearings, allow my soul to catch up … etc. It absolutely wasn't going to happen. We quickly walked away from the train station following the grating voice into darkness. I mean literal darkness. Dimly lit streets, dark streets, a dark hotel. The hotel was pretty smelly, odorous. The rooms were a reasonable size for me, I just barely need a few square feet of anything flat.

The hallways had people sitting in chairs in them. The doors to people's rooms were open. It reminded me of sketchy resident hotels in America. Every one of my emergency warning indicators was blaring; No! I would be afraid to leave my room. I was already feeling trapped.

My friend asked me, "Is this going to be Ok?" I started into a series of "I'm not sure's" and bolted outside to find out if there was a store nearby. Since I had lost control of the situation I was unsure of the availability of bottled water and had a variety of other concerns. I couldn't get out of the place fast enough.
It quickly became clear that this was a no.

Now. I am not normally afraid. I've stayed in some really sketchy places in the world, including residence hotels, with some pretty sketchy folks. So why was this so wrong.

One, we were led there by a stranger. When travelling, we need strangers. Stranger give us guidance, local knowledge, kindnesses, sometimes friendship. They may offer us future opportunities, as the young man I met in Qianshan Park did, "When you return to China, would you like to visit my family in Jilin?" But they may also steal from us, mislead us, can harm us, may lead us into danger. One day while I was travelling in Cheoung Ju, South Korea, a man noticed that I had my passport in my front shirt pocket, and then invited my to accompany him for tea into a basement doorway with no signs. I graciously declined, claiming business responsibilities, and immediately walked away.

Two, egress from the hotel was unsafe. The doorway opened directly into the sidewalk without any opportunity to see what was outside, and it was dark. Big hotels tend to have big entryways and people around, and are well lit. It is easy to identify what's happening just outside the door from inside.

Three, services that I wanted seemed unavailable. Since I wasn't consulted at any time during the process of finding the room and seeing it, I was unable to find out if I could get what I needed from the hotel.

Four, I didn't feel safe in the common areas of the hotel. There's no way to state this strongly enough. The hotel with even the most minimal of services is part of your livelihood while travelling. Not being able to travel freely down to the front desk is a deal breaker.

Clearly, it takes more than a flat spot on the floor to make me happy. We went off to find a different hotel.

Bicycle Fisherman, Dandong, Liaoning, China

Unrelated Person Don't Enter

Ticket Office, Dandong, Liaoning, China.

Fisherman at the China and North Korea Friendship Bridge, Dandong, China

So now I am back in Anshan, China, drinking Longling Tea and reflecting on my recent trip to Dandong.

Yalu River Cruise

The port in China.  

China on the right, North Korea on the left.

Tiger Mountain Great Wall

The basic plan for today was to see the Yalu River and the Tiger Mountain Great Wall.

So we headed out to the river in Dandong, and while I wandered around shooting photos of the river and the Korean Peace Friendship Bridge or whatever exactly it is called, and looking across the river at what is North Korea, my friend Michelle's father was expertly arranging a Yalu River cruise for the three of us.
Since I am expressly forbidden by two governments, my own and the North Koreans, from entering the People's Democratic Republic of Korea (DPRK), I was skeptical. Since I realize the consequences include being rescued by Bill Clinton, I repeated interrogated my friends … "are you sure about this?" I was repeatedly reassured it was cool.

I put on the life jacket, got in the boat and hung on. The boat was a fairly powerful and well handling outboard and the pilot made sure we knew it. We ripped though the torrid waters of the Yalu river at high speed and drove immediate past a boat containing DPRK soldiers and directly to the shore of North Korea, actually speaking to people on the shore. At one point we were less than a few feet away from the shore of North Korea.

At one point, well most of the time actually, both shores of the river were North Korea. Clearly we were entirely within the country at this point. I shot photos of the Tiger Mountain great wall, from well within the boundary of North Korea.

The boundary between China and north Korea is clearly porous. At one point they asked if I would buy cigarettes for some soldiers on the other side. I didn't buy them but but my imagination tells me they would have approached the shore and tossed them to someone on land.

The idea of people or large amounts of substance crossing the border via the river seems quite tenable. I felt like a spy on a mission. I could imagine it. I could imagine my photo journalist friends trying to stretch the rules for a good photo, a temptation I ultimately resisted.

We approached a North Korean woman on the shore by boat. She was doing laundry in the Yalu river. With a 200mm lens this could have been a National Geographic cover. Seriously good stuff. A woman in the boat was taunting the woman into looking up with "Anno hisayo's." The woman on the beach was clearly disturbed by being taunted at by her Chinese counterparts. The dramatic difference in the quality of life that the two women had was glaring and profound.

I was embarrassed by it, and surprised. The classic shot turned into a screaming woman, and I missed the shot. The strange thing is … I can't possible imagine myself capitalizing on her simplistic life. Especially after witnessing her anger.

Just a note ... added as an after thought.  Did I truly have the Journalist"s will, I would have been driven to   share her tragedy with the people of the world.  I felt no such desire. 

Staff Revolt

I am drinking tea in my room. It's a sophisticated tes, some fancy oolong for kings. 6 yuan ($1) at the mini bar. Apparently I am spending too much on incidentals at the hotel and the staff is refusing me. Yesterday the room services person didn't want to restock the mini bar and told me that if I wanted bottled water, she would go buy it for me. I'm guessing it's somehow offensive to her for me to pay 12 yuan, for a 3 yuan bottle of water.

This morning I went down to the lounge to get some coffee and they just basically ignored me. I wonder if they find it surprising that I would dish out 48 yuan for a 12 yuan cup of coffee.

It's more likely that my American English speaking exotic presense may have overwhelmed them, so I suspect they were just unwilling to approach me. After a while I returned to my room for the tea.

8 dollars is too much for a cup of coffee. Last night I had some Steel Buddha tea, and this morning it's Anxi Tie Guanyin, which means, Iron Buddha tea. I think it's more interesting than coffee ... all those "endless aftertastes".

China, Day 2, "You Should Follow Me"

Anshan, Liaoning, China.

Today was a day like getting ready. I had a free breakfast at the hotel … meh. I went to Michelle's with gifts and to visit her family. It was warm and friendly and a nice reunion. We had a modest lunch which included some delicious locally grown Asian pears, and fresh corn, which roughly approximates what I might describe as "field" corn. Not much like the sweet corn one finds in the shelves in America. This was textured and chewy, with a rich grainy flavor.

It was nice to see everyone and despite being delayed for a couple of hours at the hairdresser, we had a great feast for dinner, thanks to Michelle's "Uncle." If you look closely at the picture you'll see it contains some interesting foods, for the head suckers out there, some head-on shrimp. Some native blue colored crab. An indescribably good salt water fish. Pumpkin, eggplant, and silkworm chrysalis. Plus a fungus native to only to this (Liaoning?) area of China. A couple of kinds of pork. It was decisively good.

Today we also went to a travel agent and booked a 5 day tour to Beijing. And made decisions regarding several days between our trip to Dandong and the Tiger Mountain Great Wall, and our trip to Beijing. Perhaps we will go to Juimenkou Great Wall and the city of Panjin, on the coast.

The tour to Beijing include the Great wall and bicycling in the Hutong, and several other days of stuff. It's all described clearly in Chinese on the tour description … of which I will get some English language version of tomorrow or in a few days. You will get intimate details later, dear readers.

Welcome to China (revised)

2011 September 24, Global Hotel, Anshan, China

I've arrived. My friend Michelle and her father, who I just call Bab, met me at the Airport. We ate at San Bao. We checked into the four star hotel, where I think my friend has arranged the maid's room for me at the deeply discounted price of 150 ¥ (Yuan), or about 20 dollars a night. That's roughly the same as 3 cups of coffee in the hotel bar. It's perfectly good, despite being far from the elevator, and having the noisiest fan ever in the bathroom, it is comfy and has a good view.

I immediately checked out the service and maintenance by plugging in my 125v rated adapter into the 220v wall socket, which caused a minor explosion and the lights to go out in my end of the hotel. Housekeepng and maintenance and a bit of trickery, and I am wired, wirelessly, here in China.

My trip started fairly ineffectively, with my sleeping through the alarm until my ride to the airport arrived. One of the nice side effects to good planning is that delays like oversleeping, are counteracted by proactive buffering of travel time to the airport, and reliable friends that show up a few minutes early.
Since I was still early for my flight, I was sitting there on the bench when Jeff Foott walked directly in front of me and sat down next to me. Jeff has been my friend since we went down the Colorado River together in 2003 with Jack Dykinga and an awesome group. I don't hear much from Jeff, but hear some of the various workshops and trips that he's doing. Jeff is a fairly notable biologist and wildlife videographer, and a great still photographer, having done some ground breaking work for the discovery Channel and National Geographic, among others.

We quickly caught up, and Jeff told me that he was on his way to Mongolia, a place he frequently has traveled recently. He has a new project with Dykinga and Justin Black which they are calling "Visionary Wild."

It was good to see him. I felt like a world traveler suddenly. Perhaps we can stay in better touch.
While standing in line for security a woman dropped her suitcase on me. Then turns out she was on my flight, and sitting across the aisle from me. She will show me around a bit in Beijing while I'm there. Says she can show me some local secrets … places a tour will never take me.

Welcome to China

2011 September 24, Global Hotel, Anshan, China
I've arrived. My friend and her father, who I just call Bab, met me at the Airport. We ate at San Bao. We checked into the four star hotel, where I think my friends has arranged for me the maid's room at the deeply discounted price of 150 ¥ (Yuan), or about 20 dollars a night. That's roughly the same as 3 cups of coffee in the hotel bar.  It's a great price for the room, even in China.
            
My trip started fairly ineffectively, with my sleeping through the alarm until my ride to the airport arrived. One of the nice side effects to good planning is that delays like oversleeping, are counteracted by proactive buffering of travel time to the airport, and reliable friends that show up a few minutes early.
Since I was still early for my flight, I was sitting there on the bench when Jeff Foott walked directly in front of me and sat down next to me. Jeff has been my friend since we went down the Colorado River together in 2003 with Jack Dykinga and an awesome group. I don't hear much from Jeff, but hear some of the various workshops and trip that he's doing. Jeff is a fairly notable biologist and wildlife videographer, and a great still photographer, having done some ground breaking work for the discovery Channel and National Geographic, among others.

We quickly caught up, and Jeff told me that he was on his way to Mongolia, a place he frequently has traveled recently. He has a new project with Dykinga and Justin Black which they are calling "Visionary Wild."

It was good to see him. I felt like a world traveler suddenly. Perhaps we can stay in better touch.
While standing in line for security a woman dropped her suitcase on me. Then turns out she was on my flight, and sitting across the aisle from me. She will show me around a bit in Beijing while I'm there. Says she can show me some local secrets … places a tour will never take me.

China

 I have all my stuff packed (your stuff too), I am ready to go.  See you on the other side.  Or sooner.  I'll try to post in the meantime. 

I'm Packing for China

Interesting point.  Things that are easy to buy ...  shirts, socks, shorts.  No problem.  Things that are hard to buy, be sure to pack.  Just imagine yourself trying to buy a laxative in a store without being able to speak the language.  Or imagine trying to figure out the difference between laundry soap and breakfast cereal in a store where you can't read any of the packaging. 

Camera:

3 lenses (10-22mm, 17-85mm, 70-200mm)
2 battery Chargers
Canon 20D body
about 10 gigabytes of Compact Flash Cards (Thank you Kristina)
card reader
3 batteries for Camera
Small ultralight backpack

Clothing:

2 shorts
1 pants
6 socks
5 Undies
3 xford Shirts
4 t-shirts with America on them!
Running Shoes
Flip-flops (yay!)
Raincoat
Umbrella

Hygiene:

Razor
Shave cream
Soap
Hand towl
Shampoo
Toothbrush and tooth paste, floss.
Toilet paper
Condoms
Wet wipes

Meds:

Ibuprofen
Immodium
Laxative
Bandaids
Antacid
Cipro
Vitamin C
Copy of insurance card
Vaccination Record

Logistics and Navigation:

Passport
Money in the right currency
Visa
Phone
Guide Books
Phrase Books
Light
Maps
Gps
Monocular
Extra Glasses + a copy of current perscription

Entertainment and Electronics:

Ipod
Cords, adapters and Card readers, chargers.
Computer

Gifts:

Booze for the men and food for the women is always a good approach.  Adhoc gifts to augment the pile and offer to new people isn't a bad idea either. 

Something to carry it all in. 

Trip day in just 36 hours away

I'll have a Gin and Tonic

Apparently, If I go to Yunnan province, I've entered the malaria enchanted region of the world.   I went out to the CDC website and read a -- well, way to many advices -- and found out that I need to go to the doctor.   I need to get some gin and tonic -- or perhaps a real anti malarial. 

And there's this:

Avoid Injuries
Car crashes are a leading cause of injury among travelers. Protect yourself from these injuries by:
•Not drinking and driving.
•Wearing your seat belt and using car seats or booster seats in the backseat for children.
•Following local traffic laws.
•Wearing helmets when you ride bikes, motorcycles, and motor bikes.
•Not getting on an overloaded bus or mini-bus.
•Hiring a local driver, when possible.
•Avoiding night driving.

OK -- so this is an advisement for China.  Did anyone even consider mentioning that you should "Stay the heck out of the street," if you want to stay alive? 

The link is here:  http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/destinations/china.htm#notices


New China Plan ...

.. there isn't one.  We are bantering, my travelling companion and I, around two basic ideas.  A grand daddy tour going from Shenyang to Myanmar Yunnan, including destinations like Xi'an and Chengdu, with a side trip to Beijing ... or a coastal adventure around Shanghai ... plus Beijing.

I am just a few days from leaving and ... again, I have no plan.  On the phone tonight we decided to not worry about it, and figure it out as we go.  This might be the first person I have met to plan as I do.  After all -- I have a Blackberry, with navigation and an international data plan.  

China

Interested readers,

I am going to China again.  The basic plan is to fly to Shenyang, ride to Anshan and see my friend.  Then travel to Shanghai, and Beijing.  18 days, all tallied.  This is cool.  Shanghai is cool travel destination.  So is Beijing. 

Hotels in Beijing

I am thinking that parking may be a problem ... there are definately a lot of hotels

Searchqu Toolbar Browser Helper Object Removal from Firefox

Ok -- we ll I am not going to go into what an insidious piece of shit this is, but I think I managed to remove a search engine BHO from my system.

1.  Check the Add-ons and toolbars sections of your browser and disable any addons that are searchqu or datamanager.   Do this for all browsers.  Set the default search engine for each browser to something you like.

2.  Go to Settings > Add Remove Software and find "Windows Searchqu ..." and remove it.

3.  Find the c:\progarm files\Windows Searchqu * folder and use a powerful tool to remove it.  McAfee provides a tool with their anti virus software.  Destroy the entire folder and all of it's contents.   Check repeatedly to make sure it's really gone.

3.  Search the registry for "searchqu" and delete the folders or keys.  Be careful to delete all the searchqu matching keys and not any neighboring important ones.  Be stubborn, because there are many keys. Make sure you get them all.

4.  Restart your machine.

Good luck.  Feel free to send me an email if you have questions.







 
 

8/15/2011 Takasaki, Japan

I'm standing facing the mirror in a somewhat less than private area where there is a sink next to the washing machine. I'm shaving. Frankly, I am trying to be extremely careful not to cut myself, but I am nervous because 郭洁 (Guo Sie) is watching very intently. Because she is an adult with some experience in the the world, one might guess that she has seen a man shave before – but it seems not. Perhaps she has never had an opportunity to study it in any detail. Perhaps, like other Asians -- her body virtually hairless, she has never bothered with a razor. I muse a bit in a very Murrayesque way that she is just wanting to see if I shave up or down. I am trying very hard not to cut myself as we discuss hair removal using out fingers, shaving cream and a razor.  

Without good use of a common language, the best way to describe what I am doing – shaving, in case you've forgotten – is to point and touch and scrape, and strangely she is surprisingly interested. I grow concerned when she starts pointing out the hairs I have missed. It's a surprisingly intimate moment. I secretly wish in some abhorent fantasy, that she is holding the razor.  

She's not however, so I continue not to cut myself because it's in the world traveler's guide that I hold in my head. This is the list I've compiled over the years, advise of veterans, doctors, things I read in guide books, tidbits from my personal experience. “Do not shave.” it says. “Do not enter a body of water, even if it's a bathtub.” What about a shower? “Never eat pizza in Korea. Don't drink the tap water.” What about ice cubes? “If it's not baked, bottled, or boiled … it goes on ... “Carry Cipro, get vaccinated before you go.” The list goes on. “Never go barefoot.” It's exhausting. “Never try to program the toilet ...”  

In my mind I know that the risk of a trip ending event increases if I break these rules. When I went to get vaccinated, Japanese encephalitis had been dropped from the list of vaccines and there were no advisories of any kind regarding health, health care, or behavior. They did mention however, that if you will have a new lover, an hepatitis B vaccination is recommended. It seems that Japan is somewhat safe to visit as long as you don't have sex with the natives, or get hit by a car because you forget that they drive on the left side of the street. It seems Japan has actually managed to escape from the third world.

When you leave the cities and travel with local residents things can get out of control. You find yourself being offered hot, fresh home grown corn on a farm in rural China that your generous host has just rinsed in well or rain water to cool it off. Suddenly, there's an awkward decision. Do I take the corn and run the risk of dysentery, any sort of odd unknown parasite, bacterias and viruses, or even typhoid, or do I decline and insult everyone, including my kind friends that brought me here. I enjoy the corn and take my chances. I have no idea that just being on a farm in rural China is going to result in a interesting shoe sanitation problem in Customs in San Francisco. But the corn was quite good.

So I have been here in Japan just a few days now and I think I have broken every rule. We went to an outdoor onsen, or hot spring. We hiked in the water at Lake Haruna. Gou Sie is apoplectic, because of my tendency to just walk out side barefoot, and then back into the house. Apparently there's a mysterious invisible barrier where outside shoes and inside feet must never cross. I drank the gifts of the God of Water the at the top of Haruna Shrine. I have been in several bath houses. I have eaten raw fish, there's been an earthquake, I mostly likely have been radiated, and I possibly was struck by lightning.

And now, I have cut myself. It might be a good thing that I brought the cipro.

The Other Side ...

I am back from Japan.  I spent 12 days in Japan.  I am suffering from jet-lag and strep throat.   I am recovering.  I have stories to tell about Japanese baths and rice growing in the front yard, and Kyoto and Tokyo ... subways trains and ... umbrellas and thunderstorms.   see ya soon.

Did I mention the toilets ... because they were generally good, and funny.