Fengyan to Longji
This is a translation of a German post. View original or Never translate German
... with Jan and Katha today
About 11:30 am
The alarm rings, Katha gets up, Jan and I still laying in the somewhat crammed second bed of the dorm — seven Lee Jong Suks are observing the scene from the postcards on the wall. What better way to wake up than to seven Lee Jong Suks..?
Once out of bed, we quickly walk on to the high school as to not miss lunch (rice with various sides). There we meet the rest of the German volunteers, enjoy the first meal of the day, and are approached by a few shy students asking for our WeChat names.
The female students are a lot more open than their male classmates, and much quicker to ask for WeChat contact info. WeChat, by the way, is something like the Chinese version of WhatsApp — everyone's using it, and if you aren't asked to exchange contact info on your first meeting, something has to be wrong.
Next, we travel to Fengyan, where Katha has spent her first few weeks in China (see Katha's Blog [in German]): First we board a bus, then a small three-wheeled vehicle, and finally one of the ubiquitous minivan "taxis", which gets us to the elementary school of Fengyan for the equivalent of 0.4€.
The drive itself is quite the experience — but Katha hasn't over-promised on Fengyan itself, either: We find an old Chinese village just like you'd imagine it.
Finally something that's actually old
And it's really beautiful, too — small buildings full of nooks and crannies with elaborate decorations on the roofs, overgrown paths and the mountains in the background. And despite the somewhat deserted appearance of the village on a first glance, we find grandparents with their grandchildren, old women washing clothes, small street vendors and the occasional tractor with khaki fruit.
Would someone wait for me?
... nope.
The village here is almost exclusively populated by elderly people and children — the adults that can work have left their home town to find a job in some factory and leave their children to the grandparents.
This, by the way, is very hard to prove. All I have been told is that it is likely the case.
Spotted on some door
Katha leads us to the Old House of Greenway in which she has lived for a bit — through the slit between the doors, we see a simple, traditional but beautiful house that I would have loved to see from the inside.
Another house — Beautiful, isn't it?
we follow a narrow path along the house and over long steps into the hinterland of Fengyan. Between the countless khaki trees being cultivated here, we have a great view of the surrounding mountains that we can't get enough of.
Hinterland with khaki fields
Here, we also find some time for (drum roll) our second V-Log — enjoy [in German, as usual].
After dinner, a high speed train (250 km/h, about twice Katha's walking speed) takes us back to our hostel in Guilin, where we'll start our tour of the rice terraces of Longji tomorrow.
The tour starts at 8:30 already, so we have to get up early for once. But the trouble is worth it — after about two and a half hours in the back of a minivan we arrive at the rice terraces and decide to replace the pricey cable-car ride with some free climbing of stairs. It's not like we can't walk.
The rice terraces of Longji are the #1 tourist attraction of Guilin. Well worth a visit despite the exorbitant entrance fees.
Rice terraces in Alpine landscape
After just about ten minutes on the steep stone stairs in the blazing sun, we begin to question this decision. Thanks to Katha's exhaustingly fast pace, we finally arrive at the summit after about 45 minutes of climbing through the beautiful landscape. It almost looks like in the Alps up here — just with some Chinese architecture and rice paddies.
Regarding my walking speed: I don't even walk that fast. Nils and Jan are just really slow... Do not believe anything she says!
Scenic spot on the summit
After lunch, we investigate our surroundings up here, find a small farm of sorts and two scenic spots, and recover from the ascent in the cool breeze. Where the golden Buddha whose signs we followed on the way up is supposed to be still remains a mystery.
Back in the valley
General Update
It has been almost 4 weeks now since we started on our journey, and Nils and I agree: It feels like we've been on the road for ages. No question that's because we have already seen incredibly much, collected so many experiences, met countless friendly people, got lost, and so on.
And all the while, we had lots of fun. Fun at discovering new things, writing this blog, and checking things off our bucket list.
When I remind myself that we have (just) completed a third of our journey this week, I don't know whether I'll be able to remember anything from back home once we come back — well, it's not quite that bay ;).
And of course there are things we miss, too. Most of all, I miss days where I don't have to walk and can just chill... but of course family and friends as well. Even things that I never thought I'd miss, like driving my car.
And bathrooms. Bathrooms with real showers. Learn to appreciate that, good showers are a luxury!
Our trip is made up of parts that could not be more different: Pure city trips, trains through unknown lands, and bus round-trips. So far, we have mostly experienced the first and are eager to find out what awaits us on the latter. Still, we can say that we will leave the most 'difficult' country on our way behind in a few days. Not that we don't like it here — but it's not just hard to inform ourselves here (censored / slow internet), but also to communicate in general. Anyway, we are excited as to what we will encounter in all the non-Asian countries that we have left and we will keep you updated throughout!
So far and somewhat surprisingly, we have managed to avoid any significant incidents on our travels — we neither got sick, nor were we robbed. We've always been understood well enough and didn't lose or break anything important so far — let's hope we can continue with that.
All the people we met so far were, without exception, incredibly friendly and helpful — be they other travellers, locals that we ask for directions, AirBnB hosts, hostel employees, students, or the people doing their very best at interpreting our attempts at ordering food.
We have gotten an awful lot of sightseeing tips, every now and then someone gifts us some food, and often people are just honestly curious as to who we are and what we do. Without these people, our journey would have been so much more difficult and boring. So, thank you. You're awesome.