Postcard: How Big Is Your Bladder?

He was from Amsterdam. Asked me point blank.

I learned quite a few things away from the warm assurance of my own bed. For many people, places and unexpected happenings that I will be grateful to for no reason other than they all (whether they realised it or not) made me a better and wiser person, more contented definitely.

Like the homeless smoker who stole hubby's backpack. Lock, stock, and barrel. You could think after that stupid 10-hour train ride that you would be fuming but heck, we threw our arms back like Moses bearing the Ten Commandments' tablets in joy for a family friend that had no need to take us in at that hour of the day but they did. We walked out from the showers to a cozy dinner setting of candle lights and Northern France yummies.

How about when they all want to just touch you, grab and shove you, beg and coerce? For the hardest part, I will always have India to thank for making me more gritty and more thankful. You really learned to see through the surface and understood life can get as good or bad as you want it to be. We've seen some situations that couldn't be worse yet also some spirits that shone like the strongest, humblest candles in a dark, devilish storm with no promise of a better day ahead.

And you find that you will encounter weird, and I mean seriously serial pigeon-hole professionals that seemed to be an expert or generalising sergeant on places and people that they had never been or seen.

"All Asians are out to con you", "They all want to show off their new wealth", "Ang Moh (Caucasians) just don't respect our culture at all"...

Oh yes, did I mention that we will all die on a plane crash?

Some of our best mates with the sharpest wit are Germans. Southern Indians are not "lazy". Not all Chinese "eat dogs". Some never want to leave their homes, while others were travelling into the unknown to run away so that they can find themselves again. We met a former youth Nazi who happened to be a lonely old man that loved skiing, that we ended up sharing dinner and some insightful conversations. I saw children of Mumbai that taught me of the future. I learned that love can really change a person.

Magic moments do happened. You always will have enough to survive. This too, will pass. What you have is now. Breathe. Laugh. It really doesn't matter because each side has what they think is right.

Is it worth stressing over yoghurt? Maybe yes sometimes, maybe sometimes you actually have to. Other times, you just have milk.

Many travelled for reasons that aren't mine but nonetheless true. Every time I meet new people I tell myself that no matter how bad or weird, good and fun, you can always take something away. You never really leave a place being the same.

So even if you have a tall, burly Amsterdam lad with a dead-pan attempt at humour, you stop thinking how much "friendlier" the Scots are (and they are one of the best people in and out of the UK that I have met) and just asked if that lone arrival wanted to join us in a group for dinner.

Even if the size of my bladder was no business of anyone's!

Postcard: I See Ya Baby!

You heard them told you about the 71m Le Shan Big Buddha. You read about the spicy, tears inducing Sichuan hot pot. You knew you were going to make heaps of friends from the hostel. You loved the tea houses. You wished you had paid more attention when mum taught you about mahjong.

There's a Hakka ancient town that wasn't so ancient so more beyond the stelae. Local tourists love their dressing-up as Marie Antoinette and Geisha. House of ghouls numbered to a good sprinkle after a bountiful harvest. I bought a little sparrow to let him loose in the people's park (poor little thing was supposed to be someone's "pet" for sale) and sipped some really unique local brew at the Cha Guan. Paid for a really expensive Guinness later that night.

The Old Quarters were really cool, just mind the traffic when you cross the roads! Remember, you're the foreigner when you're in a foreign land.

They stared. They kept quiet. Some shouted. Others smiled.

This is one prosperous city and should you want to learn Chinese in a city in China, hook up with fellow travellers, kick back and do nothing. Chengdu is your dude.

Heck, even if you just want to do a decent machine-ran laundry round, come here! You'll find yourself wandering into the lanes, over bridges, across touts, eyes and mouth all wide opened to take in the foreign and the familiar. Guaranteed.

There is a different spin to this town but look hard enough, there isn't that much to be different about. Everyone wants to chill, have a good time, do something useful, keep civil, be proud.

Some are out-of-towners just like you and me. Some just live above the streets in little beehives of human dwellings. Some just want to live.

Keep an open mind. You'll be ensured by Chengdu to have a good time. That too, guaranteed. 

Postcard: Finding Your Own Shangri-la

We just got back from spending two days up on the Shika Snow Mountain, a towering 4,450m that had hubby completely out snoring next to me. It was a quiet getting out of the town. We met up with our local guide, Dhamba, a Zhangsu who had the extreme profile of an Alpha male (he has two wives and he is only 22) that lived within a small community that burst with so much enthusiasm, "village rhythm a.k.a. come-and-have-a-cup-of-yak-butter-tea-first" and love. His loud, altitude-defying holler was very much comforting as he took us up the mountains over the past 48 hours, at times galloping fast up the dunes that we barely saw his shadow that marked the only indication that we were on the right path.

 

His 40-something aunt came along. They hardly even spoke much Mandarin but we communicated well, they were happy to feed us, had our pride rightly put in place as they kicked our asses (so much for our running training days!) and we delighted in just observing how close the villagers behaved and connected. Dhamba and his aunt never stopped talking into the wee hours of the dark night, yet as we laid down inside our sleeping bags, snugged like worms, we could hear nothing but a language that was foreign to the human ear, yet reassuringly true to the heart.

 
The hike? It was awesome. I couldn't write more about its perfectness except that (without sounding like I went off the senses) at one point, it got me feeling a little bit... erm, spiritual? It was one with God, whoever or whatever that may mean to you. That was probably how I could put it best. It was a long hike that each went into their own "zone" - I certainly did - and I saw goodness around me. I found, if I may so bravely speculate, my own version of Shangri-la.

My Shangri-la. An awareness that was always there that I had somehow lost along the way when I got too busy chasing deadlines and foolish musings.

The nature was stunning. The stillness spectacular. The honesty? That I found was something I took along with me as I came back down to the comfort of my warm bed. I can hardly fathom that just a few hours ago, I was up somewhere, and I think just as the student was ready, so did the teacher emerge. I am completely knackered. But there is a kind of wonderful sense of achievement that is just too difficult to colour or put into flesh.

My laundry hung around the room as I try valiantly to dry them up in time for our head-out to Sichuan, another night planned already for a youth hostel in Chengdu.

They say that "Shika" brings a meaning of a mountain plentiful with deers. We saw an empty casket of what was a yak's body, with only the skeletal remains left by a bear. I saw no deers but it was said that Sakyamuni began preaching Buddhism here, with two deers, enamoured with the compassion and gentleness of the Great One, listened attentively in knee-down position. This has been widely displayed in many golden carvings and statues in the many temples that we went to during our stay here. In Tibetan Buddhism, it is perhaps one of the biggest symbol of dharma adherence. 

Lots of fables and history surrounded this area. 











It's strategically located along the ancient Cha Ma (tea, horse) route and I can only imagine that this added to the luster and allure of this rugged landscape that many called home.

I leave this place with a kind of longing that is akin to perhaps, a question mark if I would return. Maybe I should stop the melancholy and retire to the realms of my dreams. Sleep I definitely need, and just that I may also be lucky to glimpse a sight of my own little fable land of purity and peace.

Postcard: Can We Rebuild The Destructed?

"Some Tibetans believe our present world of war, disease, corrupt inequality, and environmental desecration, is the self-destructive age of Kali,

to be followed by a new age of peace, ethnic harmony, environmental balance, and human dignity, yet to come.

This future is Shambhala, sometimes called Shangri-la."

I came across the concept of The Age of Kali from one of my many respected writers during our travels in India. In many ways, I have wondered if this golden place existed. In many times, I have daydreamed about it, as a Utopian getaway from my worldly worries.

Zhongdian is a pretty town, one that had been recently revived through new money flowing in faster than the great rivers. It's a created bliss that silently advertised touristy menu prices (again) but lots of charm in the people and way of adapting (instead of living) to a new regime. To an outsider like me, it was too easy to come in and enjoy the many options of hiking and biking around the immensely stunning countryside, dig into a few local cuisine concepts, muse at the 7:00 nightly sharp main square "dance" that I could only align with an autonomous Big Brother hand to ensure "communal integration". Heck, on our way back through the new city outside the walls, we saw that many still live in poverty, a lot more still get up at 4:00 pm to join a frenzy of a stupidly choreographed dance - if corporate team spirit dictated that monthly productivity can be improved by boosting team morale through physical conformation, then I only can conclude that what's real and what's not has a long way to go in here.

There is no firm sense of happiness in these "Tibetan" monasteries. We didn't see the level of freedom and spirit that lit up in the very eyes of the monks that we came upon. Dharamsala may be a small "fugitive" town but it rang out loud with the continuous struggle of one nation, one distinct culture, carving one line after another in making sure that nobody forgets.

Yes, there were humongous scale of building and new construction of parks and amenities. Yes, there were forms of resemblance of Tibetan culture (if you count in badly spelt tourist shops selling Tibetan souvenirs). No debates, no learning. Coerced living and pipe-feeding of cultural acceptance. Look at yourself in the mirror and not recognise your face anymore.

Is a new, gold-leafed temple dome ever going to erase the hurt of denying your own heritage?

Many countries and states may debate about each of their own version of Shangri-la. But my heart fears that what I see today, is truly a mirage of a heavenly place that only reveals the many skeletons inside a closet tightly locked away.

Once the dust has settled again.