This is My Life......

day5: 12 dec 2007

We check out of our hotel again.... and made our way to guilin. But first we stopped over at 伏波山, where we visited the 千人锅，the big bronze bell, stone carving of Buddha, and the scholar stone.

伏波山's entrance

For the 千人锅, it was believed that during war time , a person made such huge pot to feed the poor and the hungry. So to remember his good deed, this pot was kept... 小刚told us that by touching the pot one round, it will bring us good fortune... Since there were 27 of us, it simply made it impossible for to move round the pot together, but we made it... by squezzeeeee...

千人锅

桂林石刻

Then we entered 伏波山, it was freaking cold... All of us were shivering down to our bones as the wind blew into the cave from the 南湖. However, my relatives and I were determined to visit the scholar stone and the Buddha status. For the scholar stone, it was believed that if 2 person from the same family is able to stretch their hands into the small gap under the stone and touch each others hands, they will have a scholar in their family. Being kaisu Singaporeans, all of us rushed to that stone. When we were queuing for our turn, but ungraceful CHINESE cut our queue, i was so pissed off that i told them off... disgusting acts will not bring any scholar into their families. One lady simply stared back and me and I said: stare wat stare, digusting china ppl... dun noe how to queue... wat a disgust to your country.... hahaha... it was so shiok to see her turning red... haha...

Buddha's carvings

Inside the cave there were lots of Buddha carving which my uncle and aunties prayed too... I prayed too... hoping for the best for my family and myself.... When we were outside the cave, 小刚 reminded us that in China, we are no allowed to take photographs of and god and goddess status... oppssss.. me and my cousin had already took dozens of the unique status.. but then 小刚 said: 不智者无罪.

When we were leaving groups of beggars came to us for money. Some of them look really pitiful with no legs and there is one old man that had no eyes... 赤子之心... we gave them some money... but then 小刚 told us that some of the beggars are under some groups that purposely cut off their limbs to make us pity them.. But in the end, the money we gave them will only enter the pocket of those evil group leaders and not the poor beggars.

Our next destination was a factory selling silk products. They showed us how the obtain the silk from the cocoons and process them into pieces of blanket... Well, those silk blankets were freaking expensive.. cost RMB1400=S$280 each.. wow... Altogether, we bought 13 sets and my 2nd uncle bargained for more free gifts.. While we waited for my uncle to bargain, ppl start to notice my swelling eye.. then 小刚 told me that the traditional chinese believed that by using other ppl's needle to poke the swelling pus, it will heel faster.. but then he told me not to do it as the needle here isnt very clean... Well from his little acts, i realised that 小刚 is pretty observant, 细心 and very concern toward his group members. This truly, made him a 5-star tour guide...

The life cycle of silk worm

Our 5* tour guide, 小刚

The tub to process the cocoons.

We had 米粉宴 for lunch that day... a local delicacy for guilin.. Their bee hoon is quite similar to our thick bee hoon, but "Q"er.... They also served us fruit wine to warm up our body... as the weather was way too cold (only 8 degree during noon time).... we took a sip and the burning sensation was felt immediately.. then we realised that the wine had 30% alcohol.. my younger cousin mixed the wine with 7-up which made it taste a little better...

We then went to 象鼻山 and 爱情岛. There was a poem to describe the 象鼻山 which goes like this: 水底有明月，水上明月浮。水流月不去，月去水还流。 This describes how the hole in the mountain cast a shadow during the night which look like a crescent moon on the water surface. Over there, when we tried to take a group pic, some china ppl will secretly take our picture too.. then they will print it our and make us buy their pic.. it was pretty nice with the date and the poem printed on.. but it costs RMB25... i could do the same thing myself which will cost less than a dollar..... too bad my camera seemed to catch a cold in the chilling wind that it failed to take some pics for the whole day...

Next, we made our way to 爱情岛, which was a great dating spot for couples. There were a few cute scriptures over there which symbolises LOVE... We also saw a few signs that reflects the English standard of the Chinese.

Oppss.. am i disturbing???!!!

Their standard of English....

Following that we went to a well known tea- house, 茗坊国艺馆 or i should say a tea house that cheat off money from tourists like us. They prepared different types of tea(桂花王茶，普洱，田七茶，八桂珍) for us to try... the one i like most was the 桂花王茶, which has a unique smell and very smooth texture... Then they claimed to give us a discount for every 2 big bottle of tea leaves we buy, we can get a small bottle of tea leaves for free. But then after our bargain, we get a middle bottle of tea leaves for every 2 bottles we buy... Then when we made our payment and went down to their retail shop, there was a buy one get one free promotion... WTH... The tealeaves were not cheap... every 100gram cost RMB200... so angry with those cheater bugs.....

Look how happy she is... bcos she cheated our money..

After a walking so much for the past few days, we went for a foot and back message. Again, we had a pretty unhappy incident with the in-charge... they overcharged us and deemed for tips... The foot reflexlogist were did more talking then messaging.... no way we would give them any tips...

Lousy foot message.. talk tooo much..

After dinner, we stood outdoor to watch a water fall performance at one of the hotel.. The wind was blowing strong and my grandma was shivering pretty bad.. then the few of us decided to take off our jacket and wrap my grandma... Then the performance started, the magnificent view of water pouring down the hotel building seems to draw all the chill from me... We wondered how many gallons of water was wasted for every performance??? do they recycle the water???

Waterfall coming down the hotel building.

Along our way back to the hotel (City garden Hotel, our third hotel), we saw the night scenery of guilin. 小刚 told us that the large power consumption used to light up the place has caused many families to have no power supply during night time.. All this was because of Bill Calinton who visited guilin in 1999 and claimed that guilin is a heaven during the day, and the only regret is that there is nothing to see during the night.

Night scenery of guilin

Later that night, me and my aunties walked 15 minutes to the night market and had another shopping spee.... Despite the chilling wind, we had a fun time bargaining till 1 am.. i love shopping in China's night market.... everything is so cheap...

day 6: 13 dec 2007

People start to fall sick.. my grandma, my 2nd uncle and 3rd aunt.... my grandma and aunt were hospitalised for half a day... In order not to disrupt our tour, only Milly gugu accompanied my grandma to the hospital, while the rest of us went to the 榕湖，九曲桥，古南门(the most important gate to the city during ancient time)，a 1000 yrs old 大榕树.

古南门

Then we went to a chinese medical center, 宝树堂 that sold freaking expensive medicine. The old sensei claimed that we had some weakness in our body that requires 保健 products. I kinda suspicious about his words as he kept asking how are we related to one another. If father and son, he would say like the so inherited some medical conditions for the father.. as for me, he said that i was too 寒, should avoid eating cold stuff and tea... my uncle being very concern of our health conditions, wanted to buy all those stuff that sensei recommended. Then when the bill came, we had a shock... it summed up to S$20K!!!!!! My uncle credit did not have so much so he only bought the products for the more serious ones.... but it still cost him S$15k...

Unhonest sensei.

After that we went to another medical shop selling 西瓜霜 products and some chinese herbs. First The HK prof did a briefing about the different herbs they were selling. Being too tired and sick, most of us fell asleep during the "lecture", but i wasnt sleeping... hehehe.. then the Prof said: "i shouldnt speak anymore, since all of u are sleeping..." We were total embarrassed... haha... Then my uncle decided to buy only a few cheap stuff from that shop and leave.. but the generous act of the HK prof touched my uncle and he decided to buy more herbs from her. The HK prof seems to be more concern of the health conditions then the money she earned, unlike the previous sensei ( so $$$ eyed). In the end, the bill turned up to RMB3000....

After that we went to fetch our grandma from the hospital, Milly gugu told us that the hospital charged by the number of time, the nurses entered the patient room. According to her, the nurse only came in 10 times, but the bill stated 50. Each time, it's RMB20 and they did nothing.. only came in and ask how? Furthermore, the total amount of the bill did not tally with the sum stated. My uncle then went up to confront the doctor and they pissed off when they couldnt justify how the 50 visits came about... I can t believed that even the doctors are there to cheat our money.

Finally, we made our way to our 4th hotel, Merryland hotel(5** hotel). The journey took us 3 hours and all of us had a good nap on the bus. When we reached the hotel it was already 10pm. We were then served with yummy food and excellent service. We turned in to bed early as we need to recharge our body for the theme park the next morning.