Journal Transcript 4: 5/6
Note: Now my journal is kind of starting to get sloppy; it's becoming more a collection of notes rather than a narrative, so bear with me here.
Hangzhou Train Station:
Welp, here I am 3 hours early again. This time I'm cutting it a little fine, by having a late dinner at a fast food joint whose logo looks suspiciously like the KFC Colonel, except with a neatly combed part, a complete lack of facial hair, and an epicanthic fold.
The food, by comparison, looks stellar -- roast chicken, noodle soups, cold meat platters, what looks like spaghetti, and a tantalizing array of cold and hot starters and sides. Hoping for as close a comparison as possible, I've ordered some roast chicken. We'll see how it goes.
Last night was a blast; once Yuuko and Keiko overcome their massive, near-crippling shyness, they're a lot of fun. Also, all respect to Marjolijn and her dietary choices, but Louwailou was SO much better with meat options on the table.
We grabbed a taxi back to the hostel afterwards, but jumped out early when we spotted a laser/water show; it went on for about fifteen minutes -- easily besting the Bellagio's in variety and composition -- after which we had a nice leisurely walk along the lake back to the hostel and our waiting mystery fruit.
The mystery fruit party was, in a word, phenomenal. The wax apples were universally adored, and that warty green thing was astonishingly good. The dragon fruit was... well, it was anticlimactic. A bit like a bland kiwi was how Yuuko put it, and I can see no way to improve on her choice of words.
Then there were those tiny cherry-like things, the plum/apricots, and the camouflaged honeydew; I'd gladly tuck into any of them again, and I know I'll think wistfully of them when I'm back in the States.
Stuffed and sticky with an array of juices -- all of them fruit, mind you -- we sat around and talked about various food obsessions, each revelation made all the more mouth-watering by the effort needed to communicate it to each other.
After drooling together over ume shiso maki -- the shiso pork roll of yakitori fame -- we decided to head off to bed, where I had a call with the girls. Jabbering away in my bottom bunk while Yuuko & Keiko were showering, I didn't notice the naked Frenchman in the bunk above me until I jumped up to go wash up.
(This chicken, incidentally, is superb -- but only in comparison to KFC's)
Pierre, as it turns out, is on a whirlwind 20-day tour of China, and I was able to point him to a few resources about Huang Shan, which I hope will prove useful to him.
I was also able to point him to Keiko, who speaks French, much to her dismay.
Anyway.
This train ride is another incremental increase in difficulty; I've opted for a hard sleeper this time, and I have to make one or two connections before I get to Wudang Shan ( note: ended up being about four, a story for another time ). Not having a reservation anywhere is also a slight worry, but I should probably be okay. After all, aside from having a hard sleeper, this is nearly the exact same situation I was in heading to Huang Shan, and that ended up all right. I certainly can't expect the same caliber of experience on this leg -- though I will probably harbor some hopes nevertheless -- but my fear of undiluted misery awaiting me has sensibly diminished.
Having had the good fortune to spend more time with Marjolijn in Hangzhou, I'll happily admit that my initial imprsesion of her as a cynic was way off base. I'm not just saying that because she said she'd be checking my page, either (You Lun, ni hao...).
Despite being several years younger (I assume) and possessing an entirely different procreative toolset, Marjolijn is I think very similar in many ways to the person I hope to resemble, eventually.
Let me be clear by saying I'm not talking about hormone treatments and lots of plastic surgery; I simply mean that she's very grounded, yet doesn't seem to have lost any of her mobility. She's calm, capable, apparently fearless, and still has a sense of humor, and I do look forward to meeting up with her if she ever makes it down to California.
My last act in Hangzhou, apart from this stint in the train station and watching a few episodes of the Chinese equivalent of "Blind Date" -- they mix it with some Elimidate and Queer Eye -- was to sit on a bench by Xi Hu and watch the sun go down over the mountains. It was a nice little moment of quiet reflection, and I felt it a fitting way to bid farewell to Hangzhou.
Yet another place I never expected to visit -- in fact, I decided to visit only one or two nights before I got there -- yet one to which I find myself saying 'till next time, rather than goodbye.