2012 Asian Adventure - Cruising the Three Gorges (Part Two)

Day Five

Hilltop temple in the morning mist along the Yangtze river.

On our last full day on the Yangtze Explorer we had a choice to make.  We could either go to the relocation village or we could go to the Ghost City.  The relocation village would take you to a village relocated after the water level rose to see how people were taken care of after the dam was built and "get a glimpse of real life in China".  The Ghost City is a temple that represents the Chinese afterlife.

Now, our tour group had been together for a whole four days and we were already getting along awesomely so it was no surprise when everyone said, almost in unison, "Ghost City!"  Our guide was a little flabbergasted I think.  Most of us tour goers are interested in the old China and all the history.  The guide was pushing the modern China.  China has a very different way of looking at its history.  History is to be forgotten and put away to allow for the new, be it a new dynasty or a new form of government, to be front and center, one example of how Confucianism affects Chinese thought.  Elders are to be respected but, as soon as they die, all pictures, painting, or other images of the Elder along with all of his/her possessions are to be disposed of.  That is how China treats its history ... they dispose of it.  I think, it has only changed recently once they realized travelers would pay to see it.

So, instead of seeing the modern China of the relocation village, we went to the Ghost City.  Our guide came with us ... a bit reluctantly I think.  While she said she was not religious she said the city made her nervous.  It may have been the depictions of ghosts and the tortures of Hell ... or it may have been the over 600 steps we would have to climb to get there.

A protector of the heavenly realm.

After climbing steps from the ship up to street level we took a tram to the entrance of the Ghost City.  From there we walked the shop-keeper gauntlet and then up even more steps up to the temples.  To make it feel bit more like Hell, a new escalator had been installed next to the steps we went up ... but they were not working yet.  At the top we passed temples and shrines of various protectors, warriors, and gods.

We reached a set of three bridges -  one of the tests needed to pass into heaven.  One gives you health.  One gives you wealth.  One gives you love.  If I remember right you had to cross the bridge in seven steps so The Wife and I held hands and walked across the love bridge.  Neither of us was thrown into the water so we passed the test.

Golden God.

After another temple we walked a path lined with representations of ghosts, each representing a sin or a virtue.  The statues looked very new but they are supposed to be old.  The temple were built almost 1,600 years ago and rebuilt a thousand years later so a lot of the complex is close to six hundred years old.  This temple complex, unlike many we saw, was not destroyed during the cultural revolution because the soldiers were afraid - They didn't want to end up in Hell.  Who would?

An inebriated ghost.

At the top is a temple to the head deity who determines if you go to Hell or Paradise.  In the temple there were statues depicting the tortures of hell.  Many of these were pretty gruesome.  I see why the superstitious soldiers left everything intact.

By the time we'd gone through the whole temple complex and had returned to the ship I'd pretty much sweated through every item of clothing I was wearing.  It didn't seem hot but the humidity ....

There were things scheduled that afternoon aboard ship.  I ended up skipping some of it.  After a shower and lunch I skipped the Captain's tour of the bridge and the Chinese painting and Calligraphy demonstrations.  Instead I went to the ship's spa and had a ninety minute Chinese Acupressure massage.  When I showed up at the spa I pointed at the acupressure treatment.  They looked at my choice and asked if I were sure I wanted that and tried to steer me more towards a Swedish style massage.  I insisted and take into a room by the tiny little lady who proceeded to kneed my muscles with the strength of an amazon.  I swear she could have snapped your neck like a twig ... with one tiny little hand.  I also discovered that a little pain, when applied appropriately really relaxes your muscles.  The ninety minutes went by like seconds and I left feeling incredible

My massage ended in time for me to join the mahjong class already in progress.  I watched over the Wife's shoulder and learned the basic rules.  After coming really close to winning her first game, the Wife turned her place over to me where I proceeded to lose the next three games ... coming close to winning only once.  (S_H from San Diego won all four games.)

We were all winding down from our three days on the ship and we were all ready to move on to the next stage of our China trip.  We were all getting a little tired of the hazy sunshine and the lack of wildlife - I saw a total of four birds over the three days.  Our guide and the ship's crew couldn't really give us an explanation for the lack of wildlife.  We all suspected a combination of habitat destruction by the dam and pollution.

Our last full day on the river ended with a Captain's dinner with a variety of Chinese food.  All the staff were in costume. We dressed up as best we could - I didn't really pack any really nice clothes but I did have a button down shirt and a nice, but casual, pair of pants.  The food, which up until then was excellent (we all ate way too much on that ship), was only mediocre.  Chinese cuisine is not on the top of my list but it was good enough.

I mentioned that I'd developed a disinterest in cruising.  I have to say my experience aboard the Yangtze Explorer has change my opinion a bit.  Small, intimate, informal cruises up interesting rivers now have an attraction.  I'm already thinking about taking cruises up the Nile and Amazon rivers someday.

Day Six

Our ship had docked in Chongqing the night before.  We had time to kill before our afternoon flight so we got on a bus and went to a shopping district in old Chongqing.  Our guide gave us some time and the Wife and I wandered around, priced a few things, explored the exotic shops (at least for us) and restaurants.  This street felt more authentic compared to what we'd seen in Shanghai.  We didn't buy anything.  We did look at the food ... but octopus tentacles on a stick didn't seem appealing.

Chongqing market street - the Panda is our guide ... follow the panda.

From there we went to the airport.  This is where the weirdness started.  Our next flight was taking us to Lhasa, Tibet and security was tight ... excessively so.  Our guide had told us she was worried about Tibet.  We were on a group visa which meant if one of us got sick and couldn't travel then all of us would not be able to go.  We could not be carrying an "excessive amount of literature" like magazines or books about Tibet.  We had to start being careful what we said and who we spoke to.  The guide also emphasized how lucky we were to have gotten our visa since Tibet had been shut down since some tourists unfurled a "Free Tibet" sign and several monks had self-immolated.

We got through security without any issues and we took the short flight to Lhasa.  From the plane you could see the hills become mountains and plains become valleys.  As we approached the Lhasa airport I looked out the window and saw anti-aircraft missile batteries ... we weren't in Kansas anymore.

Flying over the Himalayan foothills.

We were met at the airport by our Tibetan guide (Full blooded Tibetan - not a Chinese Tibetan), Max, who led us to the bus and talked about Tibet on the way to Lhasa (The airport is about an hour outside the city).  From the beginning you could see there was some tension between our two guides.  I perfect example of the Han Chinese - Tibetan relationship.

Lhasa is divided into old and new towns.  Old Lhasa is Tibetan.  New Lhasa is Han Chinese.  Lhasa is now half Chinese.  We passed through new Lhasa on the way to our hotel and passed several mining and drilling ministry buildings.  I now know why China wants total control of Tibet.

We checked into our hotel.  I crossed the street to a small store and bought some soda and water ... I even used one of the hand signals to indicate that I wanted six cans of Coke Zero.  The rest of the evening was resting, eating, and resting some more.  I felt very tired, had a mild headache, and I felt like I was floating - all altitude related I suspect.  Lhasa would be our highest spot during our Asia trip at 11,450 ft (3,490 m).  Our Tibetan adventure would start tomorrow.

Pictures from days five and six (06/27 - 06/28/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.

Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...

Good News To Follow The Other Good News

A quick note about my Mom's health situation.  She's been home for the last three weeks.  Every one of those days, two times each day, she had to go in to get antibiotic infusions.  After a CT scan earlier this week she has been taken off all her antibiotics.  Everything looks awesome, no sign of the infection, and things are healing up.  She is now only on anti-seizure meds which she will be on for a while ... more out of precaution than anything.

Thank you to everyone who had her in your thoughts and prayers.

2012 Asian Adventure - Cruising The Three Gorges (Part One)

Day Two

Day two was a transition day.  We had a mid day flight to Yichang.

In the morning the guide took some of our group to the temple we'd seen on our first day in Shanghai.  Since we'd already been there we had a lazy morning sleeping in and having another good breakfast in the hotel.  I had my first taste of Dragon Fruit here.  The dragon fruit has a white pulp with tiny edible black seeds.  The texture is similar to watermelon.  People describe the taste as a cross between a kiwi and a pear. I definitely tasted the pear.  The flavor is a little too mild for me - almost tasteless actually.

We went to the airport and, as we were checking in the counter agent asked me where I was going.  One of the perks of being on a tour is that transportation is handled for you.  When the agent asked where I was going I came up blank.  Didn't have the foggiest idea.  Fortunately the guide was nearby and I discovered we were flying to Yichang.  The two hour flight, flight number three of the trip, was uneventful.  We arrived in Yinchang, picked up our bags, and boarded a bus.

On the bus our guide taught us simple Chinese words.  Ni Hao ... Hello.  How to count from one to ten.  She also showed us common one hand gestures for counting to ten.  Not much of that stuck with me though I still have the handout she gave us somewhere.

The bus arrived to the edge of the Yangtze river where we boarded the Yangtze Explorer.  The four year old ship holds about 124 passengers but, since we were traveling in the off season there were only about forty or fifty people on board.  After working for the navy for twenty years and riding several navy ships over that time, I'd developed a strong disinterest in taking cruises.   I'd enjoyed our inside passage ferry cruise on the way to Alaska but I'd never really considered that a cruise.  When we boarded my feelings were assuaged a bit by the rather informality of the ship and the large size of our room.  All of the rooms had balconies, large beds, and a nice bathroom.   Okay, we noticed something: The bathrooms on the ship (and in most of our Chinese hotels) had a large window looking from the shower area into the living area.  They all had shades that could be pulled but it seemed strange and a little voyeuristic.  Weird.

The hazy Yangtze river near Yincheng.

We spent the late afternoon and evening exploring our new home for the next four days.  As we ran into crew members, they would introduce themselves (their adopted English name).  After one such encounter, as we were walking away, we could hear her repeating our names over and over as she memorized our names.  The ship was proud of its personal service.  A nice dinner (with some awesome desserts) and an introductory movie about the three gorges dam rounded off our day.  The ship didn't set sail until the next morning.

Day Three

The ship had activities scheduled throughout the day.  Day Three started early with Tai Chi classes at 7:00 AM.  We'd taken Tai Chi classes before.  The young crew member who taught the class was not as good as our teacher.  She went through things a little too quickly.  There was very little warm up (The class was only 30 minutes vs the hour we'd had).  I remembered some of my class moves but it was hard to follow our new teacher.  We ended up skipping the other two Tai Chi sessions.

As we ate our awesome breakfast (The food aboard was incredible) the ship set sail and began chugging up the river.  We soon entered Xiling Gorge, the first of the three gorges of the three gorges dam.  This gorge, being down river from the dam, was the least disturbed when the dam was built.

Sampans along the shores of the Yangtze river.

As we went through the gorge a crew member top side pointed out the various peaks, towns, and other features along the river (I thought she kept pointing out the 'pigs' but she was saying peaks - crazy Chinese accent).  The crew member, Jane, was very knowledgeable about the places along the gorge and its history.

After exiting the gorges we approached the dam.  We docked and we got on a bus that took us to a three gorges museum as well as a large memorial garden which offered a view of the dam.  The dam, one of the largest in the world, generates electricity for a large portion of China as well as prevents flooding along the Yangtze river, something that occurred quite often before the dam was built.  The dam submerged 13 cities, 140 towns, and over 1,600 villages along the river.  All of these people were relocated to higher ground.  While the numbers are impressive, the dam doesn't seem that big.  I think, since you really can't get that close to the dam, it is hard to grasp its true scale.

The Three Gorges Dam.

After our ground tour we got back on the boat, had lunch, and then waited our turn for the ship to go through the locks.  As we waited we attended one of the classes/demonstrations offered by the ship.  This one was about Chinese Reflexology (Chinese massage).

Approaching the dam locks along with a few of our lock mates.

After the demo I went topside to observe the transit through the locks.  This was the first time I've ridden a ship through locks.  It was pretty cool.  The locks were huge.  Along with our ship there were four barges in the lock.  You probably could have fit six full barges in the lock.  There are five locks, though, as the water level was a little low to accommodate the monsoon rains, only four were needed to raise the ships up to the level of the river upstream.  The fit was so tight that you could reach out and touch the slimy sides of the lock.

I left after we passed from the first lock into the second and went to a lecture and demonstration on Traditional Chinese Medicine.  The Wife volunteered for some acupuncture while another lady did cupping.  Our guide was a big proponent of cupping recommending it for everything from a cold, the flu, or just a long day at work.  After the demonstration I would begin seeing the large, perfectly round bruises on the shoulders of people who had been cupped.

After another good dinner we went to a "Cultural Cabaret".  The show, put on my the ship's crew, started out okay but, when the Spice Boys started performing, we'd had enough and we went to bed.

The Cultural Cabaret featuring the crew of the Yangtze Explorer ... a little too cheesy for me.

Day Four

Day four turned out to be one of the busier days of our cruise.  The ship had docked the night before at Badong.  (The view from our cabin that night.)  After breakfast we boarded a smaller ferry that took us up the Shennong Stream.  The "Stream", formerly a roaring rapids, was now a wide and very calm tributary of the Yangtze.

The ferry took us along the steep cliffs and mountain valleys of the Long Chang gorge.  On some cliffs we saw hanging coffins where coffins had been perched up on the cliff.  Many of these coffins were relocated (mostly to museums) when the water level was raised by the dam.

A Hanging Coffin seen in the lower end of the crack in the cliff.

The vistas, marred only by the ever present haze, were spectacular.  The views of cliffs, caverns, stands of bamboo, and more kept coming - the next view better than the one before.

A sampan passes our ferry along the Shennong Stream.

At the end of the stream, where it narrowed, we left the ferry and boarded a sampan.  We were given a demonstration of how sampans once were pulled along the stream by men on the shore.  (You can still see the paths the pullers would run along.) The sampan rowers were very competitive as we passed other boats full of sightseers.  Some of their local festivals feature sampan races and our rowers had won a few races.  We went up the narrowing stream for a while before turning around, returning to our ferry.

A sampan with tourists passes ours.

The ferry returned to the ship and we continued up the Yangtze passing through the other two gorges that make up the three gorges -  the Wu and Qutang gorges.  I was topside for both to listen to the crew commentary.  You wonder what was submerged below the waters when the dam was built.  The towns and cities you see along the shores now are all young ... less than ten years old ... even though they look like they've been there for many years.  Think what you will about the Chinese, they know how to build a city very quickly.

We docked at Baidi City where we took a bus to the City of the White Emperor.  The city, built by Gong Sunshu during the first century AD, changed hands many times over the centuries and is now said to have been built by Liu Bei, described by our tour guide as the ruler of the "good" side during the Three Kingdom wars.  The city and temple is perched on the top of a hill overlooking the intersection of the Yangtze and Mexihe rivers.

We crossed a foot bridge and then climbed some three hundred steps up to the top of the hill.  Many of the buildings here have been destroyed and rebuilt over it's 1,900 plus year history including during the cultural revolution - The Chinese have not been kind to their historical heritage.  I ended up not taking that many pictures up here.  Everything was beautiful but a lot of the interesting shots were in darker areas where my camera only captured out of focus shots.  The one place we did take pictures of is a view of the Yangtze that is famous as it's on some of their currency.  We fortunately got there and got our pictures taken before a large Chinese tour group showed up and crowded us out.

Famous view of the Yangtze displayed on their currency.

We returned to the ship tired and sweaty.  We skipped the ballroom dancing, variety/talent show, and the music of the Stardust Duo, instead opting for dinner, a shower and an early bedtime.   A very satisfying day of new experiences and sights.  One of the better days in China.

Pictures from days two though four (06/24 - 06/26/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.

Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...

Godspeed, Neil.

The first moon landing was on my sixth birthday.  I remember some of it ... I remember a televised puppet show explaining the moon landing to the children watching ... myself included.  On that day Neil Armstrong became the first human ever to walk on another heavenly body.  He is one of twelve who have done so ... in the last forty-three years.  Sad we could not continue what he started.

Neil Armstrong

"That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind"

R.I.P.

1930 - 2012

He strides amongst the stars.

2012 Asian Adventure - Shanghaied!

Getting There (Day Zero)

I think it's about time for me to tell you all about our summer vacation.  This year, as many of you already know, the Wife and I went to China, Nepal, Bhutan, and India.  It would be our most ambitious trip as a couple and it would also turn out to be an incredible experience.

Our flight left early Thursday morning taking us first to Chicago before boarding a flight to Shanghai.  The flight to Shanghai was 14.5 hours long, the longest flight I've ever taken to date.  To my surprise the 14.5 hours went by quickly, possibly because of the two Excedrin PM I took part way through the flight allowing me to sleep through a lot of it.  Possibly because of the book I took to occupy my time.  Possibly the individual video screens we each had with a large selection of movies, television shows, and music to occupy our time.

The two flights, the first two of the thirteen flights we would take on this trip, went incredibly smooth.  the only incident was when the Wife's pants got caught on an armrest while exiting the Chicago flight and tore a hole in the leg of her pants.  Not a major disaster but she'd bought the pants for this trip and it was the first ... and the last .... time that she wore them.

We arrived in Shanghai around two in the afternoon.  This was my first time across the international date line and I didn't really know when I was.  Turns out I was in tomorrow even though I was really sure I was in yesterday.  Very confusing.

In China we were going to be with a tour group.  After going through a rather painless customs process we met up with our guide, Malinda (She used an English name to make it easy on us), F_D and E_D (a couple from Virginia), and P_T and K_K (a Mother/Son duo from Utah).

A quick bus ride got us to the hotel.  Along the way Malinda pointed out buildings along the busy skyline of Shanghai.  It was raining, foggy ... or smoggy ... most of the way to the hotel.  It was monsoon season in this area of the world and I kind of expected the rest of the month would be like this - views through rain spotted bus windows.  Turns out I couldn't have been wronger ... but I'm getting ahead of myself.

A Shanghai view through a rain spotted bus window.

As we approached the hotel Malinda pointed out a Buddhist temple not far away and, since we had the rest of the afternoon and evening to our selves, suggested that we could visit it on our own if we wanted to.  After checking in and settling into our room, and seeing the drizzle had stopped, we took Malinda's advice and headed to the temple.

Jing An Si - The oldest religious site in Shanghai.

Shanghai is a modern city.  There is new construction everywhere.  The crane is said to be the national bird of China and the number of construction cranes sticking up amongst the tall buildings sure makes it obvious why.  The hotel was on a busy highway but getting to the temple was easy with the rather massive crosswalk system they have on many of the intersections.  Navigating the area was easy as most signs were in both Chinese and English.  The city was in constant motion, not much different from New York, but there was this sense of scope that felt bigger than any place I'd ever been before (Shanghai, with over 23 million people, has about four million more people than New York).

We reached the Jing An Si , the oldest temple in Shanghai, bought our tickets and explored the temple.  We were ready to take off our shoes but we noticed that no one else removed their shoes.  I think this is a result of China being a secular communist country - they have forgotten or actively disregard the old religious ways.  The temple was beautiful and I took lots of pictures.  The show piece of the temple was a fifteen ton silver Buddha near the top of the temple.

15 ton Silver Buddha statue at the Jing'an Si.

As we left we noticed we were among the last to leave - the temple had closed fifteen minutes earlier.  We walked back to the hotel buying water in a store along the way.  I noticed they had ice cream, Magnum brand, the same ice cream I ate in Spain - but the flavor was in Chinese.  Didn't know if I wanted to buy it just to find that I didn't like the flavor (I was torn ... what to do?!? HA!).

We ate dinner in the hotel.  They had a pretty good Chinese spread.  While they had western silverware I decided to see if I could handle chopsticks.  To my surprise they turned out rather easy to use.  The hardest thing to eat was rice.  For the rest of the trip, in most cases, I preferred using chopsticks to forks and spoons.

After dinner the wife went back to the room and I, following another suggestion from our guide, went up to the fortieth floor of our hotel to look at the city.  It was still a little drizzly and the cloud/fog/smog layer hung low over the skyline.  Shanghai's buildings are magnificent.  They are all different and at night each one competes to be to most spectacularly lit.  Even the elevated freeways are lit with blue light.  The lighting and the haze gave the cityscape a futuristic yet dystopian air that reminded me of Blade Runner.

Hazy Shanghai from the 40^th floor of our hotel.

The rest of day zero was spent watching television (CNN international, BBC, Al Jazeera, and a few channels in English with French or Spanish subtitles - an eclectic mix) and trying with mixed success to sleep.

Day One

Our first full day in China started with a good breakfast buffet and meeting the rest of out tour group.  Along with the four we'd already met we were joined by J_Q, S_H, S_U, and N_M from San Diego.  We would meet the three remaining tour group members, J_E, S_E, and E_M from Philidelphia, whose flight had been delayed, at our first tour stop of the day.

Our first stop was the Shanghai museum.  Readers of Homer's Travels may know that we are not museum people.  After a brief introduction, our guide gave us free time and we toured the museum, starting from the fourth floor and working our way down.  We went a lot faster than the others.  There were a lot of beautiful carvings, calligraphy, and jade.  I think that's my issue with museums: there is too much to take in all at once and I just go into overload.  We did manage to buy the first of many travel magnets here.

Shanghai Museum Art.

After the museum we went to the Yuyuan Garden.  The bus dropped us off and we followed our guide through streets lined in shops and vendors.  We reached the gardens and crossed the zig-zag bridge.  The bridge is a zig-zag because the Chinese believed that ghosts could not bend their joints easily which made it difficult for them to turn corners.  The zig-zag bridge helped keep out the ghosts.  Another feature of Chinese architecture are high door thresholds.  Ghosts could not bend their knees so they could not step over the high thresholds.  The higher the thresholds the high the status of the home owner.  The gardens were beautiful with intricately carved buildings, walls, and roofs.

Yuyuan Gardens.

Lunch took us to a restaurant on the Bund.  This restaurant was my  first experience with a table lazy susan.  The food was placed on the lazy susan and we each loaded our plates as we spun it around.  It took some practice - you have to time things right so that dishes didn't get away from you.

This is as good a time as any to talk about my food experience in China.  In China our guide ordered most of the food.  She admitted that it was Americanized Chinese food which mostly meant Chinese food with less spicy heat.  I always found that I liked something on the table.  There were a few things that were too spicy for my taste but in general I was fine.  What was missed by many at the table is the lack of salt - food was a bit bland when the spice was reduced - and a definite lack of sweet.  Most of their dessert were fruit plates.  We ate a lot of watermelon in China.  It was good watermelon but it wasn't chocolate.  Many of the hotels which catered to the international traveler offered sweeter western desserts so we weren't too deprived.  So my fears of having food issues in China, and the other three countries we would visit, turned out to be unfounded.  I've come a long way.

After lunch the rain picked up again and we walked to the edge of the river and looked at the Bund area across the river.  Despite it being a rather famous area in Shanghai, we really didn't spend much time there.  I think our guide considered it too touristy and expensive.

Our next stop was a silk factory where we learned how silk was made and where they tried to sell us expensive silk rugs and comforters.  That is the cost of these types of tours.  To reduce the prices tour companies make deals with factories - bring us your tours and we will buy you tickets for the more popular  attractions in the city.  It's a necessary evil ... and frankly seeing them spin thread from the silk cocoons was kind of cool.

The afternoon ended with a trip to a more common shopping area - a popular area for the non-foreigners - in old Shanghai.  The district had narrow, crowded ways that you could not drive down.  The wiring above your head insured employment for the electricians.  We walked around the area taking in the sights and smells (lots of restaurants) before we were given some free time to shop on our own.

Crowded Shopping district of old Shanghai.

Back to the hotel to freshen up and then we went back out to a dinner at a former slaughter house called the Bull Market.  J_Q and I successfully threw a dish off the lazy susan as we attempted to discover just how fast we could spin that thing.

We got back to the hotel pretty tired.  It was a full day.  Everything was so new - a new country, a new city, a new language, a new group of people to make friends with, and a whole slew of new experiences.  Shanghai was a perfect place to acclimatize ourselves to all the new stuff.  There wasn't anything important to miss in your traveler's stupor but enough to make things interesting at a pace that let you make the necessary adjustments.  Normally the tours start in Beijing.  Beijing would have been too much on the first day.  Shanghai was just right.

I slept pretty hard this night though for some reason I would not wake up rested.  That would take a few more days I'm afraid.

Pictures from days zero and one (06/22 - 06/23/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.

Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...

Ok, OK ... Here They Are Already!

I've been a little distracted lately and have been slow in processing my pictures from our latest adventure in Asia.  Based on the number of requests to see them, this delay appears to be irritating a lot of people.

I usually only post pictures with the written posts but the number of request has convinced me to handle it different this time.  I have gone through all of our China pictures (Nepal, Bhutan, and India have yet to be gone through) and have posted them to my Google Photos account.  Here is a small sample of the pictures I took.  I reserve the right to reuse them to illustrate any future posts.

Shanghai at night.  The lights and the fog/smog/haze reminds me of the movie Bladerunner.

Cruising up the Yangtze river on the Yangtze Explorer.

The Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet.

A Giant Panda at the "Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding".

Terracotta Army in Xi'an.

The famous picture of Chairman Mao on the south gate of the Forbidden City seen from Tiananmen Square.

The outside of the Forbidden City seen from across the moat.

Up the stairs on the Great Wall of China.

We nearly had this whole section to ourselves.

I've upload 295 pictures I took in China, a representative sample of the 2,102 pictures I took in China and Tibet.  You can see these in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.

I hope to start posting about the trip sometime  next week.

Some Good News To Follow The Bad

My Mom is in the hospital.  Her husband, E_R, took her to the hospital early Thursday morning when she was having difficulty speaking.  While checking her in she had a seizure.  If you're going to have a seizure then the hospital is the best place to have it.

She was immediately sent to get a CT scan and a mass was found in the left, frontal lobe of her brain.  Over the past four days there have been several theories: tumor, malignant tumor, or an infection.  They put her on anti-inflammatory steroids and anti-seizure medications.

We were woken up early Thursday morning.  When we got to the hospital Mom wasn't quite there.  She was confused and her speech was slurred.  She had trouble remembering things that happened five minutes before.

Over the next forty-eight hours the drugs did their job.  The improvement was tremendous.  Her slurred speech returned to normal.  She still doesn't remember much of last Thursday.  That may be a result of the seizure, the medication, or both.  By late Friday she was sounding like herself and her memory had returned to near normal.

We all spent the weekend, Mom and  E_R , the Wife and I, Mom's brother and sister, all of her friends, holding our collective breaths.  The biopsy/mass removal couldn't come soon enough.

This morning they finally went in and removed the mass.  Of the three possibilities discussed, the reality turned out to be the most benign and treatable: it was an infection.  They cleaned it out and removed the cyst wall.  She is on antibiotics.  Where did the infection come from?  That's one of life's little mysteries.

Every now and then life shakes you up and brings you back to reality.  This was one of those times.  Fortunately for Mom, it was gentle shake.

Canine Memories

Yesterday the Wife and I picked up my Mom and went to lunch (Joe's Cafe in Benson, really good, inexpensive, food). After our lunch we went to the Humane Society to look at dogs.

It has been two and a half year since we had to put down Homer. I thought I'd finally got over it. I still felt sad when I saw a lab but the feelings were less dark and they were short lived. Then I walked along the cages full of dogs, dogs of all sizes, and the dark cloud formed and memories of Homer came flooding back. I still miss Homer. I also had memories of Aldo.

I don't think I've ever talked bout Aldo. I don't think the Wife has either. A couple years before Homer, we got the urge to get a dog so we went to the local animal shelter and looked for a dog to adopt. There we met this dog, a cross between a dog and a sausage, who the Wife described as an old Italian gentleman. We thought it over and we eventually brought him home.  We named him Aldo.

Aldo was a sweet old dog. He wanted to be with you. He seemed happy. That night he slept on the floor beside our bed. The next morning when I took him out he started hacking up large gobs of phlegm. He'd actually had done this the day before but it didn't click that something was wrong until the morning. After contacting the Emergency Animal Hospital, he was diagnosed, over the phone, with Kennel Cough.  The hospital made it sound terrible - they said to bring him in but not to bring him into the building.  They made it sound like a very difficult thing to cure.  Turns out kennel cough is highly contagious but can be cured.  We were naive.  We didn't know.  We took Aldo back to the animal shelter.

Later that afternoon, after several miserable hours, we looked at each other and decided to go back to get Aldo and do what it took to get him better.  Having a pet was a big responsibility and we needed to do what we could for Aldo.   We drove to the animal shelter but it was too late.  The shelter's policy was to euthanize all sick animals.  Returning Aldo to the shelter had sealed his fate.  Aldo was gone.

Aldo had been home for less than twenty-four hours.  I don't think I've ever felt so guilty in my life.  We didn't talk about it.  I never forgot.

Homer came along a few years later.  My enthusiasm for a dog was not as strong as before.  I think a bit of it had died with Aldo.  But I sucked it up and my guilt melted away when I held that little puppy in my hands, the puppy who would grow up to be the Homer Dog.  I became very close to that dog.  Did I walk him enough?  Did I play with him enough?  Did I take him for granted?  When we had to put him down, a bit more of my enthusiasm passed as well and once again I felt guilty.

So here we are again looking for a dog.  The Wife is more enthusiastic than I am.  I don't think I will ever be as enthusiastic as she is ever again.  We looked at three dogs - a black lab mix (a little too rambunctious in need of a lot of attention) and two beagle mixes (one not house broken with daily accidents and the other partially housebroken but with occasional seizures).  All of them were sweet but none were a good match for us.

I know we will find the right dog.  I know my guilt, and heart, will melt once again.  I know memories of Aldo and Homer will fade, but they will never be forgotten.  Maybe this time I will assuage my guilt.

Diversions And Distractions

I mentioned in my last post that I would probably start posting about our vacation in a week or two but I overlooked some diversions and distractions that may sideline the trip posts for a while.

The first are the Olympics.  I am not a sports fan but every two years when the Olympics are on I find myself captivated by the competition.  The fact that I've spent some of yesterday and today watching Women's and Men's futball may be a good indication that I will be glued to the tube for the next two weeks.  It may also be in indication that I'm still a bit jet lagged.  One more incentive for me to watch is archery.  In Bhutan we took some time watching the country's national sport, archery, and I think I will have to watch that when it comes on.

The second distraction will be a new dog.  Starting next week we are going to start to look for a dog.  We'll be checking out the Humane Society and a few Rescue organizations in the area.  I'm sure this will generate a post or two over the next few weeks.

I'm not sure how much of a delay there will be.  I've started going through the pictures but I had a huge bout with jet lag yesterday.  Jet lag teamed up with allergies and a caffeine withdrawal to really throw me through a loop.  I was totally exhausted last night.  Hopefully I will be totally detoxed and in sync by the weekend ... in time to get engrossed in the Olympic Games ... so I can restart sifting through all the pictures.  Once that's done I will consider drafting some trip posts.

Until then GO TEAM USA!

Almost Home ...

My body got back from our trip yesterday noon, central standard time.  My mind is still somewhere a hemisphere away.  I don't expect it to get home until the jet lag abates sometime later this week ... I hope.

Our travels took us through China, Nepal, Bhutan, and India as I mentioned last post ... over a month ago ... and it turned out to be an incredible experience.  I had high expectations for the places we were going to see and low expectations about the weather.  To my surprise and, frankly, utter joy, everywhere either met or exceeded my expectations and the weather - it was the middle of monsoon season there - did not interfere with any of our activities ... not a one.

The first half of the trip, the China portion, was with a tour group.  Based on our two previous tours (Peru and Jordan) you either got a good group or you didn't.  It was a 50-50 chance.  Once again luck smiled on us and we ended up with an awesome group of people.

The other half of the trip were private tours - just me, the Wife, a guide, and a driver.  I'd had some apprehension going into this part of our tour.  I like the dynamics of a group.  It turned out that the private tours have their benefits.  We rearranged a few things in Nepal and India that we probably couldn't have done with a group.  So, which is better a group or private?  I think it's a wash ... but I think I prefer groups.

If you've read Homer's Travels for long then you know I can often find the negative in most positive situations.  There were few negatives in this trip.  Three of them stick out in my mind.  The lay over in Chengdu on the way to Kathmandu felt awkward.  Kathmandu, while full of interesting things, came up a little short.  By the time we'd reached India I was starting to run down and I think I didn't tackle the country with the enthusiasm I had in China.

The big surprise for me was how much I liked Bhutan.  I liked it so much I'm hesitant to talk about it as more tourism will eventually spoil the beauty of the place.

I will start posting the details of the trip in a week or so.  I want to go through the over 3,500 pictures I took before I start writing.  Yeah ... That may take me a while.  Patience is a virtue, you know.