The Fatso's Big Fat Greek Wedding... Shoot.

Miss next-bed-neighbour whose new antics include waking me up in the middle of the night because she talks too loud with the other next-bed-neighbour, had her wedding shoot last Sunday.

Before the day, she had been constantly stalking the net for creative wedding photos. She compiled them all into a folder, a REALLY THICK folder, and started to prepare props. In the end though, the ideas that went through was robin-egg blue balloons and empty frames.

It was a day of corset-tightening (me!), helium balloons fetching (me again!), and basically any other sai kang that she can think of. In a span of a day, she zipped to 4 locations- studio, the warehouse, China Square and Sentosa.

The studio shoot took the longest. Forever, really. Then, the warehouse one which the bro-in-law started sweating like a pig in a furnace. I didn't go to China Square with them, prefering to relax in the comforts of the warehouse (and security guard #1 my mama was spying on us all the time via survellience camera linked to her laptop). Finally, as the day loses its last rays of light, we went to the sandy beach of Sentosa, balloons and bride in tow. I went home with the ballooons after that, while fatty bom bom went back to the studio for some more photo taking.

Wow. My sister's getting married. She told me, while I was half awake and complaining, that I'll miss being interupted by her in future. Well, yea. I'll miss her stupid jokes such as "Eh, your teammates call you Ah Mole ah? Then when you are angry, you'll be Emole!!", her bitchiness with regards to her best friend, and so many things.

If you think I'm lame, wait till you talk to her.

There's still a few months though, so in the meantime, I'll try to appreciate her antics in the midst of my sleep.





Warehouse shoot. Rosalinda, don't be jealous of her chest area.



Outside the warehouse, with oh-so-romantic pallets.



The brother-in-law is either deep in thought, or checking his car below to see whether he got tio any summons.



Teck Lim: "Next time we'll call our son Lim Kopi!"
Disa Tan: "Eh... maintain awkward smile first."



Teck: "Wah, her chin looks delicious eh. Like sharks' fin."
Disa: "Eh! You're supposed to look INTO MY EYES!"

The China Diaries Part 10- Heaven on Earth. 世外桃源

In the book Lost Horizon by James Hilton, a man gets kidnapped and lands on an unknown paradise called "Shangri-la".

We got ourselves to the place called "Shangri-la" in China from Tiger Leaping Gorge. This old town was originally called 中甸 but to increase tourism, the government renamed the place Shangri-la.

While there are disputes whether James Hilton's paradise referred to this piece of land in rural China, I can vouch with my own eyes that this land, at its very heart, is my sort of paradise.

This is the place where we cycled freely. We laughed and sang while we pedaled. We rode horses. For this one day, we were free from all troubles.

I loved it.




Before reaching, we saw plots of farmland along the road. They were really in pretty shades.



Our Youth Hostel, 老谢 Lao Xie's International Youth Hostel. Nothing but meadows surrounds the hostel.



Our ride.



We're off.



Singing, laughing.



Horse riding.



My horse, the furthest one, is also the naughtiest one.



The meadows and the animals in their own paradise.



While the rest rode in a single file, my horse had its own mindset.



I gave the horsewoman my polaroid and she was fascinated by it. This picture is of her and the horse, Tina.



Felicia makes sure she pens her thoughts before she forgets.



Cathy, in her own field of golden yellow flowers.



Driving into the rural town.



Checking out the shops. I bought most of my matchsticks here.



As day turned to night, we also started cycling back.



Playing pool by the outdoors.



Tired, but happy.



A good day begets a good night's sleep in a place surrounded by nothing but meadows.

Impromptus

I don't care already. I'm going to finish The China Diaries. I can't wait to show you guys wonderful pictures of the Shangri-la grassland. Just awesome. So, bear with my self-indulgent posts which are forever too long (or just skip over to the pictures. The pictures are fantastic).

Now I've gotten that out of my system. Stupid Felily and her emo-nemo posts which just makes me feel like going back. Joyce said that the 6 months didn't seem to happen at all. Which of course, isn't true, because I'm always trying to teleport myself back to 中山公园.

But I still love you Felily. And Joyce also.

And today, I woke up, feeling like I'm in Yangzhou all over again.

I stayed over at Ah Fang and Shi Hui's hall room last night, along with Wanmei, Jie Qi and Qinling. It was a moment of spontaneity. And as I already know, I either fall asleep fast or I don't fall asleep at all. I started drifting in and out of sleep when we went to sleep at 4am, but was mostly out- and I think everyone was fast asleep by 4.30am. For me though, it was the usual tossing and turning around. All I could think about was the similarities between this sleep and the one in Yangzhou, where I gave up trying to sleep and just laid there with my ipod in my ears.

When I was up at 8.30am, the golden period where all alarms went off and are put to snooze, I opened my eyes and just stared at the ceiling. I was thinking, this feels familiar. I would have woken Joyce up by now, and then would walk all the way to Felily's room to wake her up. And Joyce would still be on the bed, rolling in the sheets. If this was Shanghai.

Nonetheless, it was still a fun impromptu sleepover. We fashioned a slide out of the mattresses and slid down like little kids. Ahhh, such fun.

Once again, I feel super lucky to be going to school like a Year 1, even though I'm a Year 4. Then team has come up with a lot of activities during Recess Week and I'm just so eggcited. Seriously, it relieves a lot of stress and pressure from FYP. Plus, I just learnt some new moves during training yesterday. Oh yes. I really feel that there's so much to learn, and so little time. Often, I wonder why I never really played much with the ball when I was young. I'd always be home in a jiffy (ironically, I don't do my homework), never talking much to my so-called teammates. In JC I thought it got better. That's when I can say I played with a lot of passion. But it wasn't until I became a referee that I knew that there was so much more to the game. Damn.

But it's okay. I'm just glad I mustered the courage to go for Anti-You tryouts in year 1. It'll pay off, I told myself everytime I went for training. It'll pay off.

And yeap, it really did.

Obsession

Old man obsess over Streetfighter.

Young woman obsess over Hellolulu.

Young woman wins, because mother feeds young woman's obsession.

(must boast. Harharharhar.)

Then, other young women who just got out of the school circle obsess over uniformed jobs. 3 now. Army, army and police.

Young woman wonders what it's like to be in uniform. (No, not the darn SR one)

Young woman feels like sleeping.




Ah, this is going nowhere. I want to write The China Diaries again.

All that's left is to right.

I had the feeling that my fyp tutors hate me this morning.

It went away slightly after the meeting.

But they were right, in pointing out our fatal flaws. Now as I'm fleshing out my characters, I can see how the story would quite turn out.

I think I've been in Shanghai too long. I'm still in it. It's dangerous. While time moves forward, I forgot it's tugging me along. And so, I'm late. My fyp is late. Everything else seems to come late. Deadlines just fly by. There's hooks on 'em. Just trying to dodge 'em is torture.

Told you it's dangerous.

What I need is to focus. But then again, I've used that word one too many time that it has kinda lost its meaning. Maybe what I need is a safehouse. Somewhere to sit, and to write, and to write and to write.

So, social hermit it is. Unless it's Asshole Taiti, Saboteur or free movies *hint hint*, I'm going to crawl into that shell of mine.

And just write.

Okay, maybe I'll make exceptions for cycling. And of course, whistle-blowing.

Write Me a Parody

Hiatus

I'm stopping The China Diaries for a while. There are two more parts to go, and only two more, so to keep myself from finishing it, I won't be writing it for a while. Necessary, I think, because at least it'll force me to keep the memories in my brain a lil' longer.

So now, I'm going to talk about things that happened in Singapore. Boring, boring, boring. Coming back here, I feel like life, if it can be measured via the heart rate monitor, is a straight line. Yes. Dead. Somehow, I don't feel very excited about a lot of things now. I even told Leanne I'm inclined to be a social hermit soon.

There is one thing, however, that I am quite excited about. Which I try to make time for, at least once every week. There are times where I can't quite make it, but still, I'm happy. And I thank the people around me that makes it possible, even though sometimes I fall asleep at it. (Sorry Cathy). But things work in mysterious ways, and I'm glad to say I'm on the right track, although there is one tiny/herculean (depending on how one looks at it) hurdle to clear. There is one person who has been most hardworking in teaching, questioning, probing, pushing me every day and week, for whom I am glad is doing these. Thank you, Interested Person.

Yeap, she's definitely interested in more than my blog. My life too, in fact. But it's heading towards the right track.

Other than this, it's pretty much back to where I left off in January. School, basketball and refereeing. It has become quite a delicate task to juggle them nicely, and I can't quite say I've been doing a good job. Now I've thrown something else into the mix- a freelance writing job too. Making moolah has become one of my top priorities now, so I'd have enough to sustain my traveling addiction next year.

On a totally irrelevant topic, I love my mortal... and angel.

The China Diaries Part 9- Let the waters roar.

Tiger Leaping Gorge (虎跳峡) a valley so named because legend has it that it was so narrow that a tiger managed to leap from one end of the valley to the other. It is the deepest gorge in China and oh-so-full of rocks. As a result, the waters is a violent body, splashing and swishing in a deep brown colour as it flows down from one end to the other. Whirlpools are commonplace in this ravine that separates the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain from Haba Snow Mountain.

Oh no, people don't come here for calm and peace. People come here for the ultimate adventure, to see the fiercest waters at the foot of two large mountains around thrashing about endlessly.

At first, we'd decided to trek with our 55L backpacks from the Upper Leaping Gorge to the Middle Leaping Gorge, where our hostel is. But, after careful consideration (the gorge is a very dangerous place- it has claimed a lot of lives), we decided, instead, to take a 2 hour bus ride from Lijiang to our hostel in Tiger Leaping, put down our bags and then trek without any unnecessary baggage instead.

Did I mention our knack to make friends along the way? Although this bus driver is no Xiao Zhang- he's older and more mature- Felicia and Joyce managed to dig out a lot of information from him, including the fact that he's the boss of our hostel, and he had named it after his wife. The two girls continued to probe, asking questions like "How did you two meet?" and "So do you love your wife more, or does she love you more?" We also talked to a very hot American-born Chinese who is travelling alone.

By now, we were used to rocky roads and scary-looking mountains. Some caucasians in the bus were alarmed though, saying that the roads were too narrow and rocky to be safe. If the roads were narrow, wait till you see the footpaths.

After dropping our bags off at the hostel and a quick lunch, we went trekking. REALLY trekking. Unlike in Mount Huang, where climbing mountains equal climbing man-made step after step, there isn't any paved path here. Instead, there are dirt paths, dug many years ago by different families living in the area, so if you are using the road, you have to pay a passing fee. We were stopped by this very old lady at the beginning of the path. Of course, being budget tourists, we wanted to squirm our way through. But in the end, we relented and paid, since it was no fun being trapped on these narrow paths while trying to argue with her.

Down, down we went. The Middle Tiger Leaping comprises of a path from the driving roads that goes right to the river bank. Going downhill was no joke. If you're lucky, you'll be relieved by the sight of tree trunks and grass. If not, there's basically nothing by the side of the path, just the edge. So there I was, a scarady-cat, climbing down and seeing the ravaging waters below me from time to time, thinking all the time what will happen if I should slip. It takes just one step. One wrong step.

We managed to climb to the bottom in the end. There was this huge rock where everyone clambered on to take pictures of the whole place. We even spotted a woman in heels! Now how the hell she managed to reach the bottom was a mystery.

We climbed back up after a picnic at the bottom. The rest of the day was spent in the hostel, resting and admiring the mountains.



Nearly at the hostel. Us posing with Mike, the American-born Chinese we met on the bus.



We're really getting used to these rocky roads. Look, no barriers.



We reached Tina's, our youth hostel.



That's Tina, wife of the owner.



Other guests enjoying lunch with the mountains.



Starting the trek.



Going down.



Walking inside a cave. You can see the river at the bottom.



Literally at the edge.



The bottom of Tiger Leaping.



Joyce and a French guy whom she talked to during the trek. She can make friends ANYWHERE.



At the site where the tiger supposedly jumped to the other side of the gorge.



Old school bridge- and there are people guarding it, because you need to pay a passing fee.



张老师的妈妈. Mr Zhang is this guy who runs a hostel nearby. His family dug the road down to Middle Tiger Leaping, and today, his mother guards the path. When climbing up, I told her I saw a few people going down-- she was so alarmed cos she thought they didn't pay.



Along the way up, the sedan carriers also finished work, so they pick up their families.



Every time someone opens our hostel door, this is what we see. Mountain after mountain.

End of Part 9

The China Diaries Part 8- Mountains Bow Down and the Seas Will Roar

Legend has it that Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (玉龙雪山) and Haba Snow Mountain(哈巴雪山) were brothers before their incarnation. They would go to the river everyday to pan for gold. One day, an evil master came before them and wanted the gold for himself. So Jade Dragon and Haba fought him. Haba died first, but Jade Dragon persisted. It took 13 swords to destroy the evil master. Therefore, Jade Dragon Snow Mountain has 13 peaks, and now stands next to Haba Snow Mountain.

I don't know if it made much sense to you, but for me, I certainly had difficulty believing in it. Still, Jade Dragon Snow Mountain is still a very popular tourist attraction all year round, and its name came about because the shape of the mountain looks like a dragon.

One day after we came back to Lijiang from Lugu Lake, we got the hostel person to arrange a minivan (面包车) to drive us to Jade Dragon early in the morning. There was a rule that only 6000 people are allowed up the mountain everyday, and because it was summer, a lot of tour groups are clambering to go. Also, Joyce's research said that we could buy cable tickets in the Old Town of Lijiang, but we didn't find any ticket booths for that around, to our immense frustration.

At 6am, we were up. The driver came at 7am, and she was this kind middle aged lady. Upon seeing that we were going up the mountain with nothing buy cardigans and thin jackets, she drove us to a shop that rents those thick windbreakers and oxygen tanks. She told us the one time she went up, she could feel the air thinning and got a mild bout of altitude sickness. She was so worried for us she insisted we carry 6 oxygen tanks up. (These tanks were as small as air fresheners.) So, we carried 2 opened oxygen tanks and 4 sealed ones. The sealed ones could be returned later, if we didn't use them. Since these tanks were way expensive up in the mountain, we thought it was a good idea.

On our way in the vehicle, we had to pass through a station to buy entrance tickets and pay a preservation fee. The preservation fee was fixed by the government and was a must for every visitor. Our driver, though, having driven for quite some years, told us we can try to hide one or two persons among the stack of 6 windbreakers, so the station master cannot see, and would not charge for that person. Crazy idea it was, and an even crazier thing was that we did it.

Yours truly hid in the stack of windbreakers for 5 minutes. I felt the vehicle come to a stop. Soon, I heard the conversation between Felicia and the station master. "5 people." Felicia declared. In the darkness, I could feel Keon put his hand on the windbreakers nondiscretely. The station master counted aloud. But, seriously, the windbreakers were quite thick that it was horribly suffocating for a while. Then I heard the car door close and off we went. Keon hurriedly removes the windbreakers on top, and so I could breathe again. We saved RMB120 that day.

The time period between taking the cable car and reaching the place was a whopping 2 hours. At 1o plus am, we had only reached mid-mountain via the park's bus. A long line for the cable car was snaking, and the whole area was still cloudy, therefore there was no sign of the peaks.

But things have a way of unfolding when you're on holiday. We noticed a tall man in only a polo tee queing right in front of us. Everyon else was in winterwear, but there he was, in his white tee with thin black stripes. Afterward, a smokers' gang decided to light up, to my dislike because they were standing right in front of me. These balding 40 year old men who looked like they were having a mid life crisis started smoking together. So I took a piece of paper, and fanned. As wildly as possible, as sulkily as possible- I fanned. "IT STINKS" I kept repeating. I fanned so hard that Cathy and gang were quite afraid.

The only person in front who noticed my fanning, to my disappointment, was not part of the smokers' gang. It was the guy in the white polo tee, and he said with a smile,"Can you stop fanning? I'll be cold if you keep fanning."

And that was how we met Hui Qiang, this tall army guy who would later join us in Kunming. We had some conversations while queuing and he said he was traveling alone. All of us chatted about Singapore and China, and his resistance to the cold.

Come to think of it, while I was happy we made a new friend, it was funny how my tactic still didn't stop those fatty 40s from smoking. Hmm, maybe it wasn't elaborate enough.

We finally got on the cable at 11am. 6 of us squeezed in one cable car, and off it went, higher and higher. Steeper and steeper. Green grass gave way to rocky mountain surfaces. We could see the earth beneath us getting further and further away. My dad chose that time to call me. All I could remember was shouting into the earpiece, saying that I was on my way to a snow mountain, and it was going terribly high.

We passed mountain ridge after mountain ridge, then a huge white blanket of clouds covered the entire cable car. We could see nothing for a good 2 minutes. But when it cleared, my goodness, there was a working cable car station on the edge of the mountain, and right behind that station was a breathtaking series of greyish white jagged peaks. Jade Dragon Snow Mountain.

4000metres above sea level. That was how high we were. There was no snow, but it was still greyish white. There was a platform constructed by man, where people could walk around. There was staircases leading up to the peaks, and on these staircases were a colourful array of windbreakers and jackets. We slowly made our way up because we were afraid of altitude sickness. There were people around us who used their oxygen tanks happily, and people who looked sick. A lot of them were like us. They would walk a bit, then sit down to rest. The air was significantly thinner, plus there were so many people. I, for one, cannot phantom how I was feeling exhausted after a few steps. My heart was racing and I was really tired.

So Felicia, being the mother, gave me the oxygen tank. Nah, Deanna, use it, she said. Okay. So I did. I didn't feel anything though, although I could feel a gush of air when we squeezed the tank's nozzle. Slowly, I trudged up.

Staircases gave way to rocks. Soon, I felt like some mountaineer as I had to make my way up by stepping on the uneven rocks and all. Sir Edmund Hillary! But he probably suffered much more than me. And saw more too.

Finally we are on the uppermost part of the constructed platform. 4680m above sea level. The winds howled loudly as we posed for the camera. Felt like an expedition. I was at the top of the world.

Sadly, the day's weather didn't allow us to see the highest peak in the mountain. However, we were already lucky, because Samuel didn't see any peaks at all when he came. Out of nowhere, the clouds also parted and we could see to the bottom of the mountain. Magnificent.

After a long time up there, we headed down. Along the way we saw Regina and Ming Yuan, who were coming up with only their thin jackets. They said it wasn't very cold though, so they were quite fine. By that time, I was feeling out of sorts. Climbing felt exhaustive to me. Cathy and Keon felt a little dizzy, but the other three were still robust and full of life. Altitude sickness isn't fun at all.

While waiting for the cable car, I witnessed a worker stand on a makeshift "cable car". There was no interier, just a platform and a pole. He hopped on the platform, and down the "cable car" went, with the wind blowing in his face. I was in quite a bit of a shock. What is worst is that the cable car service stopped halfway, and it was only 10 minutes later that it resumed service. Can you imagine that man clinging onto the platform, with nothing else around him but that platform? Very scary!!

When we got down, the driver was already waiting for us. We had a quick tour of the surrounding areas (saw 牦牛!) before going back to deposit our rented stuff at the shop. By then, I was already feverish. The driver brought us to a famous and cheap place for dinner, then drove us back to the hostel. That night, I headed to bed earlier than the rest. After eating some fever pills, I went right to sleep.

When I closed my eyes though, I can see the snow mountain. Standing there, on its own, peaceful and white.




The guys trying to make condensation out of their breathes. Notice the white polo tee guy behind us?



Queuing to go up the cable car. It was a long queue. We spoke to Hui Qiang, the white polo tee guy.



Up, up and above!



We're there!



Look Ma, snow mountain! Cathy never told her mum she was going to go to a snow mountain. She herself thought she would be going to cities to play.



A trail of people heading up and down the mountain top via man-made stairs.



We meet Hui Qiang once again!



Using the oxygen tank.



We're really climbing a mountain here.



At the top!



Picnic-ing in the mountains.



We meet Regina and Mingyuan on the way down.



Down, down we go.



牦牛!



A cheap and filling dinner.



The old town where we rested, before going to Tiger Leaping Gorge the next day.

End of Part 8.