Kevin's Fresh Chicken
10/21/2002
Right now I'm lost somewhere in China.
I'm in a 3 street town that is little more than a truck stop along the 700 km
dirt road we have been travelling for 4 days now. I havn't seen white people for
over a week and by the way kids run in fear from us and old people stop in their
tracks with their jaws on the ground I figure they havn't seen white people
around here for a long time. We are basically following the Burmese boarder from
Jinghong to Ruili through a mountainous region in the heart of opium country.
The Chinese police check my passport and search my bag whenever thay get a
chance. And when I go to bus stations and communicate where I want to go the
first response is always 'no busses go that way, why not go here instead?' It
takes them a little time to dust off some books to discover some bus that passes
through town at an obscure time of day that will take us a little bit further.
Today we only made it 90km but it was the most beautiful and tretcherous road I
have ever been on. The road went up and up and up then went through a pass and
hugged the top side of a mountain with jungle cliffs going up one side and down
the other. The road was greesy mud and the bus kept sliding out. We spent half
the time in the clouds and every now and then hill tribe people hopped on and
off the bus, sometimes wearing traditional dress and sometimes wearing cammo.
The people are always shocked to see us but they react in 2 ways. They are
either proud to serve us or help us or else they don't like the looks of us and
want us gone stat. It's prety much 50-50 the way it will go but we've had two
multi-course dinners bought for us along the way. Last night they even ordered a
live chicken to the restaurant so we could have the freshest chicken possible.
And we got it in soup form with head feet organs and all. Men also want to find
out how much booze we can handle but being bigger than them with a well
conditioned liver means they are usually under the table before I even consider
myself drunk. But that doesn't help much because it just means I start getting
twice as much booze.
Also, nobody speaks a word of english suprise, suprise. Every now and then
someone can say one-two-three but that's prety much it. They more or less expect
us to speak Chinese and they are dumbfounded when we cant. They usually speak
louder or say things in a different way. Or, better yet, they write it down for
us to read in Chinese characters.
I have an expression I can make with my face that looks so insane that it scares
even me. I like to hang that face out the bus window for the country folk to get
a quick look at. Their return expressions are usually like they have seen the
devil. I'm trying to get a picture of their faces. Just a little fun to help the
hours go by.
Like your web site. Oooh ahhh. Good stories. I was gonna tell you about Vang
Vien but figured you'd figure it out quick enough. Sorry if that guesthouse had
soiled mattresses cuz I didn't actually stay there :) Plan on it when I go back
though. Welcome to the Vietnamese tourist track. The loop through the north
(consult Wild Land Guesthouse travel folks if you need some advice) and the road
through the central highlands, niether of which I did, is your only saviour.
Plus the food and people and women are amazing everywhere.
Talk to you later,
Kevin (one of the Canadians)