Well, now that I am finally in Jinyun I wish I wouldn't have been so apprehensive about coming. What a wonderful time I am having! Seriously, I needed this trip more than I even knew I did. So far I have only gotten agitated (err, pissed off) twice. Both times in the morning. Morning one: I am awoken at 6:52 am by the hideously loud sound of robotic like voices that are projecting from a loudspeaker, from a truck that is parked right outside my window. Make that 8 trucks, actually. I guess it was some advertisement. This is how they roll in China. 6:52 am? No problem. Parked in a heavily residential neighborhood on a national holiday? No problem. Pretty sure that 'f*ck' was the first word to escape my mouth yesterday. But seriously, once you wake up and come to and realize what it is that you're getting pissed off about, its pretty hard not to laugh at the whole situation. Which is exactly what I did. This morning was a similar situation, but much, much, louder. 6:56 am, I am in a blissful slumber when all of a sudden I hear what sound like a million gunshots going off at once. My ass must have jumped 2 feet out of the bed before my feet hit the floor, and I seriously debated 'hitting the deck.' Wait, I'm not in America, China doesn't have drive-bys, do they? So this morning marked day 2 of me waking up in a slightly pissy mood. It wasn't just a few fireworks that I heard, it was more like 50-60 of them. It lasted a while. And they were loud. Very loud. And it didn't just stop at the 50 or so deafening fireworks right outside my window. No, there was some kind of grand effing firework finale after the initial one. Good times. My initial reaction this morning to the 7 am party taking place below my window was, "Ok, cool. Its Chinese National week and I'll give them a break." However, when the mom of the family that I'm staying with informed me that it had nothing to do with the holiday and was solely for 'celebrating' a new advertisement for a car, I started seeing red (sorry China, no pun). Looking forward, kind of, to seeing what kind of random surprise the morning greets me with tomorrow. If it trumps this morning there will be no pissy moods, only abundant laughter, I'm sure of it.
Yesterday, for Chinese National day, the family I'm with took me to a lunch/dinner (they pretty much eat all day) at some friends of theirs. They also proceeded to get me obliterated drunk, much to their amusement, off of Chinese whiskey...Chinese moonshine. Literally. They make it themselves, fermented with fruit, its strong and its absolutely delicious. Lets just say I was passed out napping on a bed next to some random girl by 4pm. I had a blast! I was essentially giving one giant English lesson, while attempting to take notes in my 'chinese language journal,' as they taught me different phrases in Mandarin. I probably said 'cheers!' and 'gan bei!' at least 50 times during the course of the early afternoon party we had. As I have said before, laughter and effortless smiles mitigated any language barriers that might have existed. And once again, I felt alive! So grateful to be in China and experiencing everything that I am. The mother of the family I'm with, Jane, said I am a very strong drinker and she was so glad I could try to keep up with the men. Not sure if I should take that as a compliment, but I know that's how she meant it. I minded my manners and apparently knew just when to stop drinking. The stuff is wicked dangerous. You feel and taste nothing, and then all of a sudden you wake up in a bed with a random Chinese girl. Classic. Today was an even better day though! I fell in love...with this town. I have dubbed it the 'Colorado of China' and I am seriously thinking about relocating. Its gorgeous here. Nature at its finest. The air, the mountains, the river, the laid back way of living. This gypsy might be spinnin' her traveling wheels once more. The beauty of this life I'm living. When the wind does blow, I am free to go with it.
Holy shit, Alfred is back, and in full effect. This will make for a grand day of blogging tomorrow. Sh*t.
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