Fengjing Water Town: A Glimpse of Ancient China

Well, I got what I wanted this weekend:

Those of you that have been following this blog know that since I moved to Shanghai, I have grown a little concerned about the lack of Chinese and historical stuff I’ve found in the city. This weekend I got my first glimpse of Ancient China on a day trip to the old water town of Fengjing, a 45 minute bus ride from the urban metropolis of Shanghai. 

I’d been hearing about these old water towns in this part of China since I got here. Shanghai and the nearby cities of Suzhou and Hangzhou make up the “Golden Triangle” of historical cities in this region collectively referred to as “The Venice of the East”. Built around the Yangtze River Delta- the biggest river in China and third longest in the world- and with the East China Sea nearby, it is and always has been a veritable water-world around here. The villages were built hundreds of years ago around a canal system that has remained intact despite the passing of the centuries and the additions of modern infrastructure.

Water, water, everywhere

The star of this blog post will be the pictures that I took and not the words that I write. The town was beautiful beyond words. I got quite camera-happy there. It seemed like every photo I took could pass for a watercolor painting.

It was the perfect day and the perfect setting. I expected to be battling crowds as the water towns are a tourist destination and we were there on the weekend, but it turns out Fengjing is one of the lesser known water towns, and much to my surprise and delight we were the only (western) foreigners walking around that day. It didn’t feel like we were in a famous tourist spot at all. It rained lightly on and off, just enough to keep us cool and somehow, emphasizing the aquatic nature of this place and making it even more peaceful and serene. 

I was looking for something reminiscent of Ancient China, and I got it. People started living in this area around 2,000 years ago. In around 1275, it formally became a town. It has 52 bridges and the oldest one dates back to the Yuan Dynasty- nearly 700 years old.

More bridges than there are streets

A mural depicting life in Ancient Fengjing

The main square was a feast for the eyes, displaying the type of Chinese architecture I had been hoping to see, as well as statues, flowers, and red tags with wishes from past visitors tied to the trees, wishing prosperity and good luck to friends, relatives, and China. Red is quite obviously China’s favorite color, everything traditionally Chinese is adorned in red, a symbol not just of the patriotism (the country’s flag) but also good luck and prosperity

Ancient Chinese Architecture

Red tags tied to the trees carrying wishes for good luck and prosperity

Lunch was a cultural immersion all of it’s own, we decided to bravely sample the most typical dishes of the town, despite how far from our Western tastes and familiarity they diverted. I tried things I never expected to try in my life, including something called a “century egg”- an egg that is fermented in soy sauce for a period of several weeks to several months, eel, small fishes with the eggs still inside of them, pork thigh with gelatin in it…

Pork thigh and you can see everything: Including the skin and the gelatin

Our very Chinese spread, with a plate of eel from the local river in the foreground

Other local specialties that I did not try include roasted toads and the yolk of a goose egg with a strip of pork and a strip of pork fat, wrapped up and steamed for a few hours inside of a banana leaf:

Roasted Toads: A local specialty

The preserved yolks of goose eggs and strips of pork and pork fat, delicately prepared 

Owing to the predominantly aquatic nature of this town, people- not just tourist but the people who live and work in Fengjing- still get around by hand-controlled boat. After spending the morning walking around the narrow alleys, lanes, and bridges by foot, after lunch we hopped aboard one of the “Chinese gondolas” to see Fengshing from the water.

 The Chinese version of the Gondola

Chinese Ink Paintings, underneath the bridges

It was refreshing to find such a beautiful and well preserved piece of ancient Chinese history so close to one of the largest cities on the planet, a world away from the life I have been experiencing in Shanghai. I had a feeling that I wouldn’t have to go far to find it. Fengjing is just one of many such towns, and that is only in this one part of China. There is still an enormous country, almost as big as my own, with one of the oldest cultures known to us, to get to know.  I’ve only just begun to breach the surface of what there is to discover here, and considering I have (at least) 14 more months here, that is very exciting to think about. 

Dreams of Service

Note: This was a post that I started writing when I came home from my trip to Tanzania but never finished. I was inspired to do so when a recent trip out to the center of Shanghai got me thinking about the time I spent in Africa.

The last leg of this Tanzania trip finds us in the winding through the beautiful Usambara mountains of northern Tanzania, up to the tippy top and back down again. As we leave the main highway and begin our ascent, I am reminded of so many places that I have been before. I am naming this place “Tanzanian Tuscany”- only it’s not wine they are growing on these green terraces framed by red earth. Just about everything else though.

We are far off the main tourist track, and for that I am grateful. It would be a shame to come and go from Tanzania having only done Zanzibar, Safari, Kilimanjaro and the conventional tourism route. Since the friend I am visiting is teaching in Arusha at an International school, and my visit happened to coincide with their yearly field trip to this area, I was fortunate enough to get join them. Having no idea what to expect, I was literally just along for the ride. This no-expectation thing has been working out for me quite well here in Tanzania, as every good experience has been heightened by that element of surprise. This trip was no different.

Tanzanian Tuscany

 

While I think the school chooses this region for it’s rich biodiversity and opportunities for outdoor education, it was the service aspect of the trip that impacted all of us the most.

Class field trip to the Usambara Mountains

The first thing that really struck me about Africa- besides the treacherous condition of the roads- were the sheer numbers of children everywhere. They lined the roads skipping along on their way to and from school as we drove around, Zanzibar, Arusha… everywhere. So many children.

But back here in the mountains was a bit different. Here I see babies carrying other babies. They weren’t coming or going from school. Big groups of small children peeked out at us or came barreling down the hillsides to gawk at us, this odd-looking group of outsiders- a sight that many of them have never seen before. There aren’t many adults around, and one wonders who is taking care of them? It appears that primarily, they are taking care of each other.

Children gathered along the roads to watch us as we road by the village on our school field trip

The picturesque hostel that we camped at, Mambo Viewpoint, is part of an NGO that is working hard to make change in this area. One day as I sat writing about all of these questions dancing around in my mind, the secretary of the NGO, Hoza, approached me, as if he knew I needed answers, and started laying them out for me one at a time.

High up above the billowing clouds and looking down on the surrounding mountains: Sunrise at Mambo Viewpoint

 

Hoza was born and raised here. When he was young, they would get snow in these mountains, he tells me. Not anymore. Too much deforestation of the land has changed the climate. Now it is very hot and dry most of the year. Although I already had a hunch what the main issue was, he confirmed it for me: Overpopulation in this area is causing all kinds of problems.

 

He explains that in this Muslim village, polygamy is still being practiced, and it is common for a man to have two or more wives, and by each of those wives, “as many children as God will give him”. So each of these women can sometimes have up to ten children in one home. As part of their religion, they believe that they are to have as many offspring as God will give them. But Hoza says it is meant to be as many children as God will give them and that they can take care of, and as more and more children arrive, the mothers are finding they can’t take care of all of them. They can’t send them all to school. Furthermore, Tanzania is a socialist country, and also a “poor” country (because the money it produces does not come back to the country the way that it is supposed to, as evident in the pitiful road infrastructure). Therefore, there are only 2 primary schools in the village: one with 800 students, another with 1300 students. There is also a lack of teachers, so you will often find a 100:1 student- teacher ratio in the classrooms. What kind of an education do you think they are getting with those odds?

So the children in this village, if they are lucky enough to get to go to school at all, emerge from it without much more education than when they went in. This leaves them with little possibility to leave the village and forge a promising future for themselves outside these mountains. And so the vicious cycle continues. People suffer, the land suffers.

The children from the village were so excited and happy to see us. They live their lives unaware of what kinds of opportunities the world holds for them outside the village. A dutch owned NGO at Mambo Viewpoint is trying to change that.

So this hotel-turned-NGO has stepped in to make change. They are doing it in 5 ways: the most important being family planning, but also bringing in European doctors and mid-wives to train locals to better administer healthcare in the community. They are also working in entrepenuership: training local business men skills like bookkeeping and accounting.

The Mambo Viewpoint NGO is doing a lot of amazing things to help the population of this troubled area, but the most amazing and particularly unique thing is one that I got to participate in first-hand with our students: A circus that brings hope for a brighter future to the village children. I think we all could agree that it was the highlight of the field trip.

The story goes back to about 5 years ago, when a guest of the hotel- a Dutch man named Yanis- came traveling through these mountains as a tourist and noticed the same problems that I did. He decided to stay and do something about it. Recognizing that these children were left to a fate of staying in this town and into the same cycle of the generations before them,he came up with a bright and creative idea to help break that cycle.

An imaginative way of “breaking the cycle” for these village children

He organized a circus club for the children come to after school where they can learn circus tricks to performs. They learn their different tricks, including riding a unicycle, walking on stilts, juggling and acrobatics. As the older children become masters of their tricks, they are assigned to teach the new, younger children that come into the club. They practice for their circus performances that they put on regularly for the guests of the Mambo Viewpoint Hotel. We were one such lucky group of guests- only we went one step further and got to participate ourselves!

I try my hand at stilts

The village children teach our private-school students circus trips from the top of Mambo Viewpoint, with the beautiful Usambara Mountains as a backdrop

The students of the group that I was with are international, private school kids. Their experience growing up has been the other end of the spectrum from what the children we met in the villages have lived, one of great privilege and endless opportunity for growth. To have these village kids teaching us tricks was a humbling experience, to say the least, and one that moved every single one of us and will not be easily forgot. 

Another facet of this club that Yanis has planned for the village children that participate are excursions to bigger cities in Tanzania like Arusha, Tanzania, Zanzibar, and Moshi, so that they can see with their own eyes that there is life outside of the isolated villages that they come from and how it is different. This has inspired many of them to learn new skills and work towards a goal of one day being able to leave the village to study or to work- possibilities that they never knew existed to them before.

Despite the corruption, overpopulation, and all the visible problems in Africa that I witnessed when I was there, good things are happening, too. A lot of conscientious people from around the world are here trying to do something to help, like the team at Mambo Viewpoint: a dutch-owned NGO that started when some tourists with a social conscience decided to come back and do something to help rather than just pass through and carry on with their lives. The city of Arusha is filled with foreigners working for non-profit organizations that are trying to do the same thing, bring hope and help to a nation that is wrought with troubles. They have been an inspiration to me and have re-awakened my own dreams of service that have lived in me since I was a child. Mambo Viewpoint was born from a dream of service. I hope that one day, I can return to Africa to help, and not just to observe, and finally bring those dreams of service to life.

Read more about the story of Mambo Viewpoint as told by it’s Creators (Warning: May bring a tear to your eye)

Read More About What’s Happening at Mambo Viewpoint Here

Mambo Viewpoint Projects

The Ghosts of What Used to Be Here: Reflections After a Stroll Through the Center of Shanghai

So, as I began writing in my last post, today is Labor Day, a bank holiday in China, and the last day of my three day weekend. I decided to stay close to home in the quieter, residential part of the city where I am currently staying in a hotel right next to my school. Yesterday, I was feeling motivated to go out and do some sight seeing since I had three days off and nothing much else to do. I figured I should take at least one day to go see what Shanghai had to offer.

As I patiently attempted to load Google Maps (oh, how I miss the easiness of Googling things!) so I could browse around and figure out where I wanted to go, I noticed “Times Square Shanghai” on the map. I wondered to myself what the “Times Square Shanghai” might be like when every big and bright intersection I have seen here reminded me of that famous NYC landmark. What might set this one apart? Not much, I was to discover (except that it is home to the World’s Largest Starbucks that I mentioned in my first China post.) So far, it seems like everything in the center of Shanghai reminds me of Times Square in New York.

Times Square Shanghai by day and by night. Most intersections in the center of Shanghai look this way (minus the multi-level Starbucks)

What’s wrong with this picture? Why isn’t it reminding me more of China, or at least, the Orient? I started to get the creepy sensation that there used to be some pretty important historical Chinese stuff around here. Shanghai is the biggest city in China by a long shot, shouldn’t it have some representation of Chinese culture? What did they do with all of it? Where did it go? And without even knowing what was there before, I found myself feeling sad for the loss of it, and even in some way a bit guilty, because I knew deep down it was the influence of my own culture- the culture of consumerism that was born in the USA- that ultimately resulted in this.

The United States is a much newer country than China of course, so the culture of consumerism that defines places like NYC and LA is our culture in a way. But here, it isn’t, and something doesn’t feel right.

Last week, I walked past an enormous and important Chinese temple without even noticing it until a friend pointed out, because it was so overshadowed by flashing lights and fashion malls. At the street level, you only see high-end designer clothing and shoe shops. Unless you are high up in one of the surrounding malls or skyscrapers or it’s night time and the temple is lit up, you can’t even see it.

Jinang Temple by day and by night. At the street level, you would not know there is a major historical site around here, it is taken over by consumerism and towering skyscrapers.

I quickly realized that if shopping wasn’t something that I was interested in, there was little reason for me to be out in the center of Shanghai that day with the hoards of crowds that were eager to spend their holiday weekend purchasing. I walked into a couple of the malls just to see what they looked like on the inside (and to grab something familiar to eat at a salad bar: Read about the Stinky Tofu incident) and every time I was taken aback by the sheer spectacle of it all. The wealth, the luxury, and the enormity of each one of them, left me in shock.

You are about 1,000 times more likely to see something like this in the center of Shanghai than anything traditionally Chinese

Squeezing my way through the masses and pushing past crowds and every kind of storefront you can imagine, I began to regret my decision to put myself in this mess on what was supposed to be my relaxing holiday weekend. And I started to think about something else that was demanding my attention even more than those flashing, electric billboards: Overpopulation.

Everyone knows that China has an overpopulation problem. The two things are almost synonymous. China is the most populated country in the world. Despite having appointed a military strategist to tackle the problem a few decades ago (the infamous “One Child Policy” that caused far more harm and tragedy than it did good. Military strategists should probably stick to planning military strategies and not solving humanitarian crises), overpopulation is still a very real problem in China. And for the first time since I have been here, it felt very real to me.

I thought back to the last place that I traveled to where this was a strikingly obvious problem: Africa, and I felt inspired to finish a blog post that I started to write when I was there about that subject. I thought a lot about Africa that day and how I had a similar feeling in the face of such blatant and shocking overpopulation like I had never seen it before. But there is a big difference between overpopulation in Africa where people are struggling to get food and water and living somewhat primitively, and overpopulation in a place where people are living by first world standards like they are in major cities in China. Overpopulation of a culture that is this obsessed with consumerism takes a heavy, heavy toll on the planet.

Overpopulation in the first world: When everyone wants to consume.

Can the world sustain this much consumerism, if a country as populated as China becomes so strong economically that more and more of it’s people can afford the luxuries of a first world lifestyle? The activist and the environmentalist inside of me began to seriously worry. There’s nothing that I can do about it other than hope and pray that China does it’s part to off-set the damage. I know they are doing some things (I think they are cooperating much more with worldwide environmental initiatives than our current administration so, thank God for that!) When I planned that Earth day presentation for class last Saturday I learned a lot about China’s recycling system and some of the Green Initiatives the country is taking, which will be the subject of a future blog post as I learn more.

I was relieved to arrive back at my quieter corner of the city when I got home that day, but I was still taking in everything that I had just witnessed on my afternoon in the center and all the things that it made me think about: about China’s role in the world and ours, and Africa, and how we all affect each other: whether it’s consumerism or environmentalism. I am sure that Shanghai is the exception to the rule here and that as soon as I start to venture and explore outside this city, I will discover what real China is like. Big, cosmopolitan cities like Shanghai tend to be more of a representation of society than they are of the culture of the country they are located in, so it makes sense that my day out in Shanghai got me thinking about the world at large and how connected we all are.

Stinky Tofu Man: The Foreigner you DO NOT want to be

So this weekend on my little excursion into the city, I took advantage of being in an enormous mall with 3 floors of food courts to try some food that was more familiar to me than the Chinese street food I have been enjoying. Salad isn’t something you see often in Asia, so as soon as I spotted a salad bar the decision was made. It was one of those build-your-own-salad types of places where you tell the person behind the counter what you want them to put in your dish. As I stepped into line, I realized I had stumbled upon a  bit of a scene.

Build-your-own salad bar: A gift from the West.

A foreign man- I won’t say from where (though this time, it was not my country!)- was  losing his patience with the Chinese employee making his salad. “STINKY TOFU!” he yelled, wafting his hand in front of his nose as he pointed at the tofu behind the counter. “IS THE TOFU STINKY!?” The chinese man was staring at him blankly. “I’m sorry I don’t know,” he said. The frustrated customer began huffing and puffing throwing his hands up in the air and yelling louder: “IS THE TOFU STINKY?!”- as if  it was the volume of his voice that was not the issue and not the language.  He was obviously very worked up now to the point of anger, he might as well have been screaming “HOW CAN YOU NOT UNDERSTAND ME YOU STUPID IDIOT!!” Finally, the employee threw up his hands, saying what I assume was something to the effect of “I don’t need this crap” in Chinese and walked away from the bad customer, who continued to huff and puff about how stupid the guy had to be to not understand him when it was so obvious what he was trying to ask. I had to stop myself from tapping him on the shoulder and telling him what a “stinky tofu” he was acting like right then (haha).

“No, YOU’RE a stinky tofu” (hahaha)

What’s wrong with this picture? Here we are living abroad in China, and this man is getting mad at a local for not understanding when he tells him what he wants in English. I mean, in a way I can see where the guy’s frustration is coming from, like how can you not understand what I mean when I am wafting my hand in front of my nose (indicating a strong stench) and pointing at the tofu, but we don’t know that it translates to the same thing in Chinese. We don’t know that that type of tofu is called literally by the name of “Stinky” tofu in Chinese. It might have another name. Nevermind that this man, a guest in the Chinese man’s country, did not bother to go out and learn the Chinese words he needed to take care of his own dietary preferences when he goes out to eat. Nevermind that he didn’t learn what stinky tofu looks like, so he could figure it out on his own by looking at it. Nevermind the fact that if you are standing close enough to stinky tofu to see it, you would be able to smell it!

This is the type of awful foreigner or tourist that you never want to be. He just ruined that poor employee’s day and made a terrible impression of what westerners are like and how we behave. Demanding, rude, spoiled. Sadly, as I sat there eating eating I overheard more tense miscommunications between the Chinese staff and the foreign clientele. I imagine that they go through that type of thing all day long, as foreigners are the ones who are going to be coming to eat at a salad bar. I smiled at the man when I caught his eye as if to say “I’m sorry”. And I made a mental note to never, ever- no matter how frustrated I got with not being able to communicate or be understood- would I behave as pitifully and shamefully as that man did in the cafe.

A good rule of thumb is to behave as if you are a guest in the place where you are living. Respect the local culture and customs, no matter how strange they seem to you. Take the time to learn at the very least, manners in that country’s mother tongue. “Please”, “thank you”, and “excuse me” are the first words you should get in your vocabulary, along with words to communicate any special needs that you might have to make people aware of in your new home (dietary or otherwise). Frustrations will happen but it’s better for everyone involved if you approach those times with an attitude of humor or curiosity rather than irritation or anger. You don’t want to be a Stinky Tofu.

The spectacle of the Stinky Tofu man was a reminder to me that I need to dive into my Chinese studies full on, no matter how intimidating it might be. And oh, is it intimidating. I am used to speaking Spanish as my second language, and being bilingual in English and Spanish, I have been able to get by in lots of countries. Many of the European languages, for example, bear at least some similarity to either English or Spanish to where I can at least have a general understanding of what is going on if I put my mind to it. Chinese, not so. I have learned enough about Chinese in the short time I have been here to know it is going to be a very difficult language to learn, and I will be lucky if I even get to a conversational level by the time that I leave here.

Chinese is a tonal language, meaning that the same word can have many different meanings depending on the way that you pronounce it and the pitch of your voice when you say it.

 

All of the different final sounds and consonant sounds in Chinese. Pretty much none of them sound like they do in English. 

Then there are the characters. I thought the characters were like little pictures that had some semblance to the word which they were symbolizing. Not so. Take a look at the character for “peach” for example:

How is that a peach?

Maybe now you can see how diving into this language is so intimidating! I didn’t think one lesson a week would be enough to accomplish anything- surely I would forget by the time the next week came around- so I start next week, twice a week, two hours a session. It’s going to be tough but- it’s a lot better than being a Stinky Tofu man!

I’ll let you know how it goes!

 

 

The Importance of Saving Face

Today is a holiday in China- Labor Day holiday- and I have decided to spend it in the  quiet, residential corner of the city where I am staying at the moment in a hotel right next to the school where I work. These are precisely the moments when one could begin to feel lonely abroad: spending a long weekend by themselves in a new city they have been in for only a few weeks, when the only friends you have made (who are actually your coworkers) have gone away on holidays they planned out a while back before you arrived on the scene.

On the other hand, I can look at it as a very welcomed and well earned three days of rest. This three day weekend comes on the heels of a six day work week of an 8- 5 pm schedule. In China, you don’t get a break without having to make up for it in some way. This has to do with the concept of “face” and “keeping up appearances” which I will continue to discuss in upcoming posts. Since today, Tuesday May 1, is a holiday in China, the school wanted to give us Monday off so that we could have a long weekend. However, in order to give us this extra day off which wasn’t really a holiday, they have to make us- the students and the teachers- come in and work on a Saturday. So last week, I worked Monday- Saturday from 8- 5. You can imagine the state of the children, my co-workers, and myself by the time Saturday rolled around. Not good. Everybody was on edge. When I left school Saturday evening, I was quite happy to do absolutely nothing for three days in a row.

I see many such reworkings of the schedule to save “face” coming up on next year’s calendar and I’m not sure how I feel about them. I think I’d rather just work the Monday, have Tuesday off, then go back to work on Wednesday rather than have to come in on the weekend and suffer through a 6 day workweek and all of the stress that that entails. As my co-workers have informed me, we always plan a “fun” day for the Saturday, taking into account the state that everybody is in by the time the weekend rolls around, which means, we’re not even doing normal school work. This week, for example, we had an Earth Day celebration and cleaned up trash, planted flowers, and learned about recycling. It was a nice day for me because I am really into all that stuff and quite happy to teach about it but, at the same time, it’s kind of weird to be aware that us having to be there at all is just a facade.

This is the perfect place to transition into a discussion about “face”, because that is part of what it is- facade- although it’s much more complex than that. We are all familiar with the phrase “to save face” or “to lose face” which we use in our American jargon but the expression had to have originated here because it is so important to the Chinese. To understand them and their culture at all, you have to first understand face.

I am still learning about “face” but I suspect the idea goes all the way back to these guys (to be explored in future posts…)

Just living here for a short period of time I am already starting to get it by witnessing and experiencing it on a daily basis, like in the example I gave above. Then I’m reflecting back on experiences I had in the past with the Chinese through teaching online with VIPKID, and seeing that I actually knew more about this than I realized before I even got here. For example, sometimes I would be frustrated with VIPKID because my students would be placed at a level of learning that was obviously too high for them, and they struggled to understand and get through the lesson in a timely fashion. I would repeatedly suggest to the parents and to the VIPKID team that I thought the child should be placed in a lower level, but nothing would change, and eventually the VIPKID team would let me know that that was the level the parents wanted their child to be at, and if that is what the parents want and they are the ones who are paying, there is nothing that they can do about it.

But, why would a parent choose to keep their child in a level that is too high for them to learn anything, when they could put them in a lower level where they could actually answer the questions, feel confident about what they were doing, and have fun in class? The answer, I have discovered: Face.

The pressure of “face” starts when school does.

Intrigued by my personal observations of face, I wanted to know more, so I did a bit of research this weekend in my free time. I think, this is going to be an ongoing discussion in my blogs as I learn and experience more and more, but for now let’s say we can loosely describe face as one’s self image or reputation, although it extends beyond just the individual to families and the entire nation. The marks that my students get or the level that they are placed in is for the face of the parent as well as the child, you see? In fact, part of the reason why this aspect of Chinese culture is so immediately “in my face” (hahaha) upon landing here is because I work in Education.

“Men can’t live without face, trees can’t live without bark.” –Ancient Chinese Proverb

I can’t help but feel sorry for my little students who are being pushed to excel beyond what is feasible for them and what is fun for them to save face, and that they are conditioned to this from such a young age. A lot of times it feels like they are expected to perform and behave like little adults. If that is their culture than, who am I to cast judgement; every place has it’s idiosyncrasies. Actually, these ideas are not so far beyond what we know in our own culture, or we wouldn’t have the phrase “to save face” or “to lose face”.  China is not only place where this type of concept exists and holds high value. I haven’t been to Japan yet, but from what I have heard, society functions in a similar way there. Anyways, I think it is very interesting and something I look forward to learning more about and understand better while I am living here.

Ok, when I started writing this post, it was meant to be about something completely different, and I think I have gone off on a long enough tangent, so I am going to close this post here and go back to what I was orginally going to write (although face is a topic I was planning to bring up soon).  It’s good that I brought it up now since it is sure to appear in many posts as I share more about my experiences of China. Stay tuned!

 

Welcome to Shanghai

My first week in my new home is complete, and I am bursting impressions to share and praises to sing.

First can I say that, never in my life could I have imagined that this transition could go so smoothly. Except for the jetlag, I’ve hardly felt the shock of being in an entirely new country and culture. When I go out on the street, it isn’t until I realize there’s a communication barrier (because I only know two words in Chinese at the moment) that I remember that I’m in China. So much of the time, it doesn’t feel like I am! This could be any big American or European city. Big, wide, clean, elegant-looking streets, sidewalks, and bike lanes. Beautiful parks, flowers, and greenery abound. Every day I have to remind myself again that this is Asia!

Beautiful, tree lined streets like this are all over Shanghai

Perhaps because I have been traveling through Southeast Asia, which was my first experience or traveling sub-developed countries, I expected China to be more similar to those places. And I have been told that in rural China, it is. But Shanghai and other big, tier one cities in China , are much more similar to Europe or the States than the other places I have visited in Asia. In fact, in some ways they’re even more advanced than we are. I am still in awe of the virtually cashless society they have developed here, and how beautifully it is running  They have proven it is possible now to live in a world without cash, and they make it look very easy. In many places cash isn’t even accepted! I have not been able to participate in this yet because you need to have a Chinese bank account linked to your phone and I’m still getting that set up, but once you do, you can pay for literally anything with your phone. You can have literally anything you want delivered to your doorstep or office: food, coffee, cars, animals; What they have here makes Amazon seem like kid stuff. There isn’t much that you can’t do with the scan of a Q code in Shanghai.

There isn’t much you can’t do in China by scanning a Q code with WeChat

The advancements aren’t just happening in the realm of consumerism. I went to get a health examine the other day and it was not like any doctor exam I’d ever been to before in my life. It was like I imagine doctor’s visits will be in the future. Fast and efficient and using the most up-to-date technology. This goes for many other facets of society: transportation, infrastructure, etc, etc. Perhaps these advances came as the result of having to adapt to such an enormous population and the need accomodate and account for a society of over a billion people. I don’t know but, my head is still spinning. This is not how I was expecting China to be.

Sharing these fasinations with my new coworkers, who also came to Shanghai from the West to work, they nod their heads and say “Yea, you’ll see. It’s pretty hard to leave here.” I can see why already. One can live a very, very comfortable life here, the kind we are accustomed to in the West, but for much less money and without feeling like you are in another world. Especially on a teacher’s salary, which is one of the highest in the world for foreign language teachers. Apartments are new and modern, quirky, creative, clean and shiny… and affordable. The same goes with bars and restaurants- although you still have your hole in the wall homemade noodle, dumpling and steam bun joints up and down every street where you can eat your fill of delicious authentic chinese dishes for less than you would pay for a Starbucks coffee. Also, There’s a Starbucks coffee every few blocks as well so you can really get the best of both worlds.

The biggest Starbucks in the world is located in Shanghai. I like how the American flag stands on top in leiu of the Chinese one. Funny. No one in the world loves Starbucks more than the Chinese, so it is fitting that it would be here.

The best of both worlds. That’s what it is, that’s the magic of this city and part of what makes it, as my colleagues admit, hard to leave and so very, very enticing to me and over 300,000 other foreigners who have relocated here. The crazy juxtaposition of a society that has surpassed even the USA (from what I can see) in it’s enthusiasm for consumerism, economic growth and technological advancements, working alongside a culture rich with 1000’s of years of dynasty and tradition, and, let’s not forget, a Communist country living in a goverment state. Think about that. I mean, just try to imagine what that looks like, how does that even work? It is really and truly, mind blowing to think about and equally baffling to take in, and I find myself growing more and more in awe of Shanghai and China by the day. 

When I went into my phone to look for photos to accompany this post, I realized the only pictures I have taken so far are all of the food I’ve been eating! These are just a few of the beautiful, authentic and super cheap dishes I’ve sampled so far 

While most of the time you would hardly think about it or notice, especially with all the glowing neon lights of advertisements and enormous shopping malls gracing every intersection in the center, there are two things that continually remind me that we are living in a  “government state” here. One is good and one is bad. I mentioned how advanced society is here and how comfortable it is for living, but there is one comfort from home that is missing that could never go unnoticed: open and uncensored internet.

The hardest part about moving to China for a westerner will likely be having to say goodbye to fast and reliable internet. Not because the technology is not there, of course, but because the government makes it so. It doesn’t take long to figure out the Chinese hate Google, Facebook, and any of their affiliates, and they do not make it easy to use them here. Technically, it’s illegal. There are ways to get around it but in general, using the internet is a pain in the butt. The Chinese government purposely freeze it up, shut it off or slow it down… more or less to remind everyone that they are watching. You can download certain apps to surf anonymously but sometimes they even get into those. It’s kind of funny- if you go on to a Chinese website that has been goverment approved, it’s lightning fast. For us foreigners who don’t know Chinese, that doesn’t do us much good. So basically, say goodbye to reliable internet if you are coming to China and hello to WeChat and whatever other Chinese-made apps and internet services that are going to replace the beloved familiarties of home and become your new friends, whether you like it or not.

So that’s an annoying point but then, on the other hand, living in a government state means that one of the biggest cities in the entire world can also be one of the safest. Again, baffling to think about but, true. There is virtually no crime in Shanghai, and that is yet one more item on the long list of it’s many appeals, and another one of the reasons that makes it hard for people to leave.

It’s one of the most bike friendly cities I have ever been too, with beautiful bike lanes running along every road working cooperatively with the vehicles and pedestrians, and a brilliant bike sharing system to match. There is recycling. There is a club or group for anything you could ever want to try and you can find them on WeChat which makes it very easy to meet other like minded people in the city: Salsa dancing, martial arts, rock climbing, hip hop, you name it, you can try it here. There are so many new things I am excited to try my hand at in Shanghai! Starting with Chinese classes next week.

Safe, clean, affordable, advanced, and cosmopolitan. Old and new, open and closed; I’m fascinated by what I have found here in Shanghai so far, and look forward to calling this place my home and getting to know China more and more over the next 15 months.

 

A Fresh Start in China

So, I left off in the last post saying that I needed to take my life in a new direction. But how, and where to begin? I knew that it was going to begin with looking outside of myself. I had been doing all of this traveing basically for fun and my own personal exploration but- as I explained in the last post- that exploration did not prove very fruitful. I felt more lost than ever. So I knew that I wanted to take a break from thinking about me for a while and do something for others. Traveling through third world countries so much over the last few years had awakened me to how priveleged I was compared to the majority of the people on this planet. I wanted to do something to give back to those people. I applied to the Peace Corps, but I applied for a specific positon in Colombia, and I didn’t get it. At the time I got the news that I wasn’t accepted for Colombia, it was hurricane season in the Southeastern part of the United States, and every night there was a great call for help and manpower in Florida, Texas, and the Caribbean on the news. It was the same idea I had when applying to the Peace Corps- to help others- so in that same spirit I volunteered to go do disaster relief work in the Florida Keys following Hurricane Irma, followed by another month in Texas. All the time that I was volunteering, my debt continued to climb until it was clear that I could not afford to waste any more time figuring out what I wanted to do next: I HAD to go somewhere and start making money. Immediately.

Photos from my time volunteering in disaster relief at home

Since graduating college, the only positions that I have held in the professional world have been as an English Teacher. That is what my resume reflects: Teaching English. So I had to ask, where can I make the best money as an English teacher right now? Where is there the greatest need for us? I smiled to myself when, through researching these questions, I discovered the  place was actually somewhere I had experience teaching already, although I had never anticipated that I would actually live there. That place is China.

Now, when I say that China is not somewhere I ever saw myself going, I don’t mean it in a bad way. Just that it wasn’t one of those countries that was on my bucket list. I felt I had a connection to the Chinese culture through my experience teaching Chinese students online with VIPKID (my digital nomad gig) but I never saw myself actually going there to teach. But, why not? The students were by far the best I’d ever had. It’s a country that I have yet to explore. The economy is booming, and for us Americans, it’s a true land of opportunity right now. The demand for English teachers and native English speakers is very high, and the pay is good. I could live a much more comfortable life on a teacher’s salary over there than I could here at home, while still having the experience of living abroad, which I have grown accustomed to over the years. Even my dad, who is skeptical of every place that I tell him I am traveling to, was on board. I put my resume out to a recruiter for schools in China and my inbox was immediately flooded with employers asking for interviews. It felt like everything in my life was telling me that this was the right direction for me, inviting me to come this way. So, I’m going with it. I just signed a contract for a year and a half as an English teacher in a primary school in Shanghai, China. And now that it’s happening, I feel pretty excited.

Shanghai, here I come!

And relieved. To know that I am going to be staying in the same place for a year and a half- something I haven’t done since I was in COLLEGE (wow!) To know that I am going to have my own apartment, my own space to come home to every day, where I can hang my clothes up in a closet instead of pulling them out of a backpack and putting them back in every day. Where friends can come over and visit me instead of me always depending on them to put me up. To have money coming in, consistently, to pay for the things I need, instead of putting it all on the charge. To pay off that debt. To make new friends and not have to say goodbye to them tomorrow.

The travel love affair was nice, but it has certainly taken it’s toll on me in a way that has become painfully apparent to myself and the people in my life that love me. I wouldn’t take it back, but I’m ready to phase into a new, more stable lifestyle. A lifestyle where I can unpack my things and “settle down” a bit. I have to say, settling down never sounded so good.

Confessions of an Ex-Travel Junkie

I have a confession to make. This “forget about everything else that’s standing in your way and travel the world” thing- it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. It’s not all that I’ve cracked it up to be.

In the true spirit of the travel blogger, I have been pushing this idea for a long time that anybody can travel the world just like me. They can, and they should, because in fact, it’s not as difficult as you think and you only live once, so, quit making excuses and just, go!

You wouldn’t catch me dishing out advice like that to anyone these days. I’ve been silent on the blog for a while now as I’ve found myself in the thick of a serious change of heart and perspective in this regard, which has resulted in a change of direction in my life.

Traveling Carly is very, very tired

Of course, I know that I am not in any kind of position to complain about having been priveleged enough to sustain long term travel for all of these years. But I would like to share some or the hard realties of this lifestyle (the “confessions”) because I think it is often overly-glorified on social media and made to look like this is a glamorous and carefree life, the life of the #traveladdict, when it’s not. Like anything else in life, it has it’s ups and the downs that come along with them.

I laugh to myself when I come across images of exotic places on Instagram accompanied by the hashtag “travel addict” or “travel OD”. I’ve been there. If anyone can call themselves a travel addict, it’s this girl right here. The word “addiction” has negative connotations for a reason. It indicates the abuse or misuse of something that is supposed to be done in moderation or recreationally, and when taken to the extremes it can result in a loss of touch with reality. A travel addiction is no different.

#TravelAddict

I guess that I, like many other millennials and digital nomads of my time, have been trying to make travel work as a lifestyle because I am part of the first generation to have this possibility available to them: to work from a laptop and live wherever you want, at a time when travel is cheaper and the world more accessible than it has ever been. So why wouldn’t I? All these years and countries and flights later, I can give you more than a few reasons.

When I came home from my last backpacking trip through South America- just about a year ago now- I was unwell in many senses of the word. I was in debt. While I have boasted about having figured out how to make money as I traveled around the word by working from my laptop as a Digital Nomad, that’s not as easy to pull off as I made it sound, and I ended up having to exhaust all of my savings and put the rest on credit cards.

It’s probably easier to work full time if you are ok with staying in one location that is close to a reliable and strong internet connection to work from, but a lot of the most exciting places to travel to are not like that. No, that wasn’t what I had in mind. I wanted to move around and see entire continents while I worked from my laptop. That required me to plan my work around my travel when it should have been the other way around. This is one of many instances of my falling out of touch with reality because of an addiction to travel.

You give up a lot for the “freedom” that comes with never being tied down anywhere. I always feel weird complaining about this to my friends, like it’s not allowed. I know what they’ll think: How can you complain about getting to travel all the time? How dare you complain to those of us who bust our butts working a 9-5 every day while you are out discovering the world and seeking new thrills? Recently I opened up about it to a friend of mine who I was visiting in Spain, and my desire and struggle to phase into a more stable lifestyle after all these years of wandering the world. She listened silently while I worried what she was thinking. “You know, I just can’t imagine,” she said after some relflection. “When I go on vacation, at the end when it’s time to go home I feel so happy that I get to return home and sleep in my own bed and be in my own house. It must be so uncomfortable to just never get to do that.” I wanted to reach over and hug her. She gets it, I sighed with relief. 

Freedom comes at a cost

There is a certain stigma we attach to the idea of “settling down”. Like when you choose to settle down, that’s when life starts to get boring. Yet, there is something to be said for the stability that comes with settling down. Bloggers and #traveladdicts will boast about how in love they are with their routine of constant change, and I wonder how truthful they are really being- both to themselves and the audience that they are boasting to. Anyone who has gone on vacation knows how inherently unpredictable travel can be. Imagine living in that state constantly.

Of course, life can be unpredictable for all of us, but when you are moving about unknown territory, it’s a given. At the same time that you are beginning to learn the lay of the land, new obstacles are continually being thrown in your way. Just when you think you’re getting the hang of things, it’s time to move on again. Yes, has it’s thrills as well or we wouldn’t do it, but accumulatively, over the years it’s exhausting and unsettling. I wouldn’t call it “good for the soul” when taken to this extreme. I would never say that I “found myself” traveling, like so many set out to do. Far from it! There came a point when I was feeling beyond lost, so lost that I could not go on and had to stop and think about where I was really trying to go in my life. Everything that I had seen and done so far felt so ultimately, aimless.

I’m glad that I spent my 20’s traveling, I mean, how can I say that I regret seeing as much of the world as I have? But it has come at a cost. Not just financially. It’s been hard on my relationships, meaning, I haven’t been able to have them. Before I can start to develop something meaningful with someone it’s usually about time for one of us to leave. That’s been hard because as the years go by, I find myself longing for that companionship. But the kind of people you meet traveling usually aren’t looking for that. If they are not traveling with their partner already, they are usually pretty attached to their own freedom while they’re on the road.

It’s been hard on my family as they wonder how things are going to turn out for me. More than anything, it has been hard on me emotionally. An old confidant of mine once reminded me that “the outer world is always reflective of the inner.” I don’t know if any words had ever rang so true. My surroundings were unstable and constantly changing, and that’s how I felt inside. The excitement of never knowing what was next lost it’s luster and feelings of anxiety began creeping in. I knew I had to take my life in a new direction.

In the next post I will reveal the new direction that I have found and how I got there. But I do want emphasize one more time that while my “confessions” sound melancholic, that’s because the purpose of the post is to discuss the negative parts of the nomadic lifestyle that I have been living, because I don’t think that many people ever do. I wanted to honestly offer up another perspective: that it’s not as carefree and glamorous as it looks in the travel blogs and on Instagram. Of course there were plenty of beautiful, amazing, unforgettably positive experiences too, and I wouldn’t take any of it back, the good or the bad. Joni Mitchell sang it best, that “Life is for Learning”, and that’s just what I’ve been doing. 

 

 

 

 

SAFARI!

Recently, I have been trying to get back in touch with my creative dreams. The first step towards doing this is to think back on what you dreamt of doing as a child, the first things that you were excited and passionate about in your life. For me, it was saving the animals. As a kid I was obsessed with animals and I was particularly concerned about the endangered ones. I subscribed to wildlife magazines like Ranger Rick and collected wildlife fact files, learning everything I could and finding my own little ways to help, like making crafts and selling them to raise money for World Wildlife Fund and World Society for the Protection of Animals.

Then life happened, and in all the stress and chaos of growing up I forgot all about those dreams. Where did they go? So it is interesting to me at the same time I am reexamining those childhood passions of mine, I happen to find myself in a place that occupied so many of my childhood dreams: the Serengeti, and the array of beautiful animals that call it home. Could it be… synchronicity?

One of the hallmarks of African adventure is safari. Its the main reason why a lot of people come here at all. Safari means “journey” in Swahili but Ernest Hemingway- a big fan of this part of the world- brought the term into western jargon as we know it. Since it is such a huge tourist draw, that means huge dollar signs. You can shop around and try bargaining but you’ll be hard pressed to find a safari for less than 500 USD (3 day, 2 night safari). More than anything this is because of the high fees to enter the parks in the first place. It costs each individual 70 USD to enter the park, and you pay 70 USD to exit the park. So that’s 140 USD to go there at all. Our safari package included a trip to Ngorongoro Crater National Park and Serengeti. 140 times 2 is 280 USD for park fees. We paid 540 USD total for the 3 day, 2 night safari. So half of that was just park fees. The other 260 goes towards the fuel for the safari car, all of your meals, the guide and the cook, the camping equipment- everything else. When you look at it this way, it’s actually surprisingly cheap.

Hakuna Matata!

Regardless the experience is priceless and worth every penny. When the boss sold us this tour in his office in Arusha (the city where my friend is living), he delivered our itinerary to us as if it were a dramatic monologue, talking up all of the animals that we would see on our game drives and the beautiful places we would camp. Still, I had my doubts. I was sold the same kinds of big promises when booking budget tours in the past (ex the Amazon and Santa Cruz trips) that turned out to be a sales gimmick. So I prepared myself for some disappointment and that he probably was not being 100% honest in his over-the-top speech. I guess thats why its so easy for me to say this whole experience far exceeded my wildest expectations.

The only unpleasant part about it are the conditions of the roads, and this is a problem throughout Tanzania in general. Every road feels like you are off-roading here. Particularly going into Serengeti from Ngorongoro crater. We were bumping and shaking down a washboard gravel road for 4 or 5 hours. This is frustrating because of the high entry fees that each person pays to get into the park multiplied by the sheer amount of tourists that go through them each day. I cannot  fathom the amount of money that is generated by the Tanzanian government from them on a daily basis. But clearly, none of it goes back into the park, as evident by the treacherous, pitiful road conditions. Its widely accepted that it’s all going into somebody’s pocket, and that’s just the way it is here.

The Maasai people share this land with giraffes, zebras, wildebeest and the like. Can you imagine?

Now, I said I wasn’t going to get political in these posts, but I don’t want to be ignorant either and pretend like I dont notice obviously off things that are going on around me. The Maassai are an indigenous population that occupy Northern Tanzania and Southern Kenya. We have seen them everywhere that we have gone in Tanzania. They are one of the few nomadic, hunter-gatherer tribes that is left on the planet. Therefore, they migrate just like the animals in the parks do. Just like the animals, the Serengeti is part of that migratory pattern. In recent years the Tanzanian government has been trying to encourage them to abandon their nomadic ways by banning all tribes from access to the Serengeti. This has disrupted the migratory patterns of thousands of people and animals, and for what? Money. That is the sad reality of things here.

A Maassai village in Ngorongoro Crater

Ok, I’m done with the bad stuff now. I still stand by what I said before that Safari is a one-of-a-kind, out-of-this-world, amazing life experience. I have still enjoyed everything we have done here in Tanzania while being aware of these troubling things that are going on in the background at the same time. Truth be told once we started spotting animals, it’s so exciting you stop thinking about everything else. And that happened pretty much immediately as soon as we got into the park.

A Maasai shepherd boy says hello from the road

I could never have imagined that we would spot so many animals as consistently as we did the whole three days. I thought maybe we would be able to spot a few of the big ones. But this was like… BAM! Zebra. BAM! Elephant. BAM! Giraffe. Hyena. Warthog. Jackal. Wildcat. Animals I’d never even heard of before. The list goes on and on and the adrenaline was pumping hard. There is so much excitement in the air on safari- something you could never get at the zoo or looking at pictures in magazines or books. To actually have to grab your binoculars, pop the roof of the vehicle, and go out searching for animals in their natural habitat is an experience unparalleled, indeed.

I can’t believe that I actually saw lions and jaguars hunting in the wild, unphased by the safari cars standing by. The first afternoon, after we drove past a pool of enormous hippopotamus, we ran into a leopard on the hunt. We watched him stalk along the same side of the pond that we were on with his gaze fixed on some gazelle on the other side. Their gaze was fixed right back on him. It was so crazy. As we pulled away from that scene our guide spotted another leopard way up in a big tree eating part of a gazelle. It was crystal clear in the binoculars- not so easy with the naked eye, I don’t know how our guide did it- but there it was gnawing away in the branches.

On the hunt

The time flew by as we called out animal after animal and before we knew it, it was getting dark and time to go to our campsite. As we pulled in we saw a group of 5 African Elephants in the distance with some babies.

Camping on the Serengeti

When the company boss sold us this tour in Arusha, part of his grand monologue was that at night we would be camping in tents in the parks alongside the animals, and that there were no fences but there would be a security guard. We laughed at the time, thinking he was just exaggerating for dramatic effect. Then we noticed as we pulled into our camp on the Serengeti that there was no security guard (the cooks, however, stayed up all night keeping watch, I guess they were the security). After we had dinner and as we were getting ready to head to our tents to go to sleep, the guides warned us not to go out alone at night to go to the bathroom. Always stay in groups and to always have our flashlights on, they said, and if we follow those instructions, there won’t be any problems. Then just to drill it in, he shared a story about a girl who went out by herself in the dark at night to pee, accidentally found herself right next to a lion, and got eaten. Not the kind of bedtime story you want to hear. 

As we shuffled along arm in arm with our flashlights turned on to go to the bathroom then get into bed, we noticed green flashing pairs of eyes in the bushes. The guides warned us that there are hyenas around the camp, but they are only scavengers and they are only here for the leftover food, not to bother us. We speculated that those pairs of eyes we were seeing in the bushes were hyenas. That suspicion was confirmed when, as we zipped our tent shut, we shined our lights on one lying directly in front of our tent, less than 10 feet away from us.

So you’re the guy who’s been keeping us up night!

Like our guides said, the hyenas weren’t there to bother us, and we made it safely through the night and onto day 2 of Safari. We got up at 6 am to pouring rain- it has rained every day of this trip, but never for long enough to set us back on our adventure (except the day we went up Kilimanjaro). As if the roads aren’t bad enough dry, safari post-rainfall is extra slippery and…erm.. exciting! We ended up popping a tire that morning and later, our radiator died going uphill just before we got to our campsite on the second night. It’s not surprising that these cars breakdown from time to time- they get a lot of heavy wear and tear on a daily basis and, they’re old! For this reason the safari guides all double as car mechanics, and ours was able to fixit on his own without a problem. There is also a code between all guides to help each other out when they see someone in need, so when our radiator broke down any safari cars that passed by with empty seats in them gave us a ride to our campsite while our guide fixed the problem.

Just a busted radiator, no biggie

When life gives you car problems, make lemonade! Or something like that…

Coming out our campsite in the morning we came head on with a large group of baboons walking down the road in the opposite direction. After our morning game drive, we went back to the campsite for a fabulous brunch by our chef Manu. Another wonderful surprise was how amazing the food was! Each meal was more impressive than the last, and he cooked it all over a camping stove in a hut. We had curries and pastas and omelets, etc. We probably over-indulged considering we were sitting sedentary in a car for 8+ hours a day but, oh well, when in Tanzania…

As with every meal, after lunch we got some animal company. This time it was a troop of banded mongooses, who came barreling up the road and into the garbage pile as soon as we finished eating. It was such a hilarious sight to watch the little guys come bounding down the road and straight into our leftovers, as if it were timed, we were cracking up. Hornbills (Zazu!) swooped in and out trying to get their share as well.

After lunch we started driving back to Ngorongoro Crater. On the way we passed herds of wildebeest dotting the landscape as far as the eye can see- it seemed like there were millions of them. We got to see them in migration from the Serengeti to Ngorongoro Crater.

Zebras share the same migratory patterns and eat the same food as the wildebeests

I could see why they would want to live here. We joked about how if we were animals, Ngorongoro Crater is definitely where we would want to live. Lush and green with pretty lagoons and lakes, the crater is a gigantic caldera from a volcano that erupted here millions of years ago. It’s formed a perfect little animal sanctuary for these guys to live and play, and a great place for spotting more wildlife!

We got to the campsite after our radiator breakdown just as dusk was setting in, and once again there were elephants passing by about 300 meters away from us. That night, as we were falling asleep, I listened to them trumpeting back and forth with howls of spotted hyenas (who make a very strange, creepy sound themselves- youtube it).

One of the most idyllic campsites I’ve ever set foot on in Ngorongoro Crater

The next morning we woke up at 5:30 a.m. to catch a very sweet sunrise over the crater.

Sunrise over the crater

Then, we descended the 650 meters into the crater- a bit nerve wracking considering the car problems we had been having, but, once again our fears were quelled when we got into the crater and, once again, started spotting wildlife left and right.

Just before the 650 m. descent into Ngorongoro Crater

 

Our guide got a call from another guide on the other side of the crater that they had spotted a Black Rhino with a baby- the rarest of the rare when it comes to wildlife spotting in these parts. There are only about 32 left in the whole park, and they are heavily protected and kept in a special area far from the roads. They only let a few out “for the tourists”, and sped over there fast enough just to catch a glimpse of them before they slipped too far for the eye to see. So I guess we were pretty lucky to get even that.

The next most amazing thing that happened to us was spotting three sleeping lionesses right next to the road. Even though they were sitting right there on the side of the road, we nearly missed them and drove right past because they blend in so well with the grass. As soon as he noticed, our guide halted the vehicle to a stop and turned it off. As we watched the sleeping lions, wondering if they were going to do anything (we saw a lot of lions the previous day but they were pretty much always sleeping), one lifted her head up, looked over at us, then slowly got up and started to walk towards the car. Of course we all started freaking out, but our guide explained she was just coming over to lay in the shadow. Indeed, she plopped down in the shadow of the car and went right back to sleep! Shortly after, the second and third ones joined her. She was so close I could get a sleeping lion selfie so naturally, that had to be done…

We made a bathroom stop at a lagoon that was full of hippos, more and more just kept popping up out of the water. We hung out at the lagoon for nearly an hour, listening to the hippos grunting to each other. Apparently, they hurt more humans each year than any other animal in the park. They have jaws that could snap a man in half, and you don’t want to sneak up on one of these guys. While they might not look it, they are aggressive and they can run fast. We played in the trees as we admired them from a distance and watched beautiful birds darting around us.

You don’t want to mess with these bad boys

The skull of an african water buffalo. So heavy!

Nearby we saw some enormous African Buffalo bathing in a pit of mud, and Pumba and his friends warthog friends were hanging out nearby.

Enjoying a bath

We left the crater very satisfied with all we had seen and done. After enjoying one last lunch at our beautiful campsite, we loaded up the cars to make the four hour journey back to Arusha. We all felt like we could have stayed on safari for a few more days, it was so much fun. The good news is Tanzania has about 60 more national parks to explore, showcasing all kinds of different wildlife. I will definitely be back one day to do some more safari-ing around here!

It means no worries! I highly recommend watching the Lion King before and after safari, or even right now, for that matter.

Africa: The New Frontier

Like so many of the places I have visited the last couple years, when I started planning my first big trip to Africa, it raised some doubts and concerns from my family, and myself of course.  Even though I was visiting a dear friend that has been living here for the last three years, and I have a lot more experience now traveling through sub developed countries than I did a few years ago, you still never know exactly what you will find when you get there. While I know it is usually not as intense or scary when you visit a place first hand as it tends to be portrayed on the news, you still can’t help but carry those ideas in your mind and wonder if they will end up affecting you.

Such is the case with Africa. I think there are two ways we tend to view Africa as outsiders.  Either as that far-off, exotic continent that conjures up wild, romantic notions of “Born Free”, ¨The Lion King¨, and other beloved tales of adventure. Or we hear Africa and we think of a dangerous place wrought with political unrest, civil wars, poverty, famine, and lacking any kind of infrastructure. Delving into these juxtapositions as I travel here has provoked millions of questions inside of me. No place I have ever been to has piqued my interest and curiosity about how our world works quite like Africa has.

All of my questions stem primarily from this one: How did such an enormous, outstandingly beautiful continent so rich in natural resources and treasures- the cradle of mankind- fall so far behind in the world?

Perhaps this map provides some clues: It is scaled to show the accurate representation of the size of the continents in the world. Africa is actually much bigger than it appears on the maps and globes we grew up with, which were laid out by European colonists.

While I am learning a lot as I talk to more people, ask more questions, and do my own research about what happened here over the centuries, I have to remind myself that my intention is to write a blog post about my trip and not a study guide about the history and politics of Africa. Today I will focus on the fun part of this trip, because it is really, really fun.

Why don´t I start with all of the surprises. The awesome thing about going to a place not sure what to expect is the all the potential there is to be pleasantly and wonderfully surprised. In the first place, it is so fertile and green here. We were all expecting some drought-ridden savannah like we see in the movies, but drought is not a problem (where we are anyways). Apparently it is unusual for it to be raining this time of year, the rains usually stop in December.

The land around Kilimanjaro is primarily sunflower fields which they use to make sunflower oil. 

Some warm hot springs near Kilimanjaro that we visited. We had the pools all to ourselves as monkeys leapt above our heads. 

The scenery is incredibly lush and ideal for growing crops. Which leads me to our next surprise… how awesome the food is here! I did not expect anything from African food at all but the food we have been eating here is some of the best I have tried anywhere. Literally every meal has been a culinary delight. So many fusions flavors blending Indian, Asian and traditional African, and such a wide variety of vegetables. Everything is prepared so nicely and no one has gotten sick.

Lamb spare ribs and grilled octopus with salad and fries. Pork is not so big here since it is a primarily muslim country. I ate octopus every day we were in Zanzibar. 

Zanzibar: I knew nothing of Zanzibar before coming here, but if you find yourself in this part of the world, Zanzibar is a must. A very large island just off the northern coast of Tanzania and a 20 minute flight from the capital, Zanzibar has a very different vibe from the mainland (as islands tend to have). With picture perfect white sand beaches, nearby coral reefs to explore with more species of colorful fish than I have seen anywhere, and a plethora of exquisite seafood dishes to be tried, it is a veritable paradise.

Fishing is, of course, the main industry here, along with tourism now. Stone Town or Zanzibar City is the main hub for boats and is interesting to check out for the history of the place, shopping, and eating. The best beaches, however, are found on other parts of the island.

Stone Town 

The most famous beaches are located on the east side of the island. Our first stop after Stone Town was Kiwenwga, a beach that has been taken over by an Italian expat community. The locals could all speak Italian, presumably to have better employment opportunities. They can make awesome pizza and sell things like nutella and olives. We even went out to some Italian-owned nightclubs. For this reason, it wouldn’t be the first beach I would recommend. There was a very obvious divide between the Italians and other wealthy tourists and local people- obvious as in there was literally a wall separating the two. So that was a bit sad. The beach was beautiful, nonetheless.

Our beach house a Kiwengwa

Nungwi is the beach you have to go to. Located on the northernmost tip of the island, it is the only beach in Zanzibar that you can swim in all day long. The other beaches are in low tide half of the day, exposing sea urchins and rocks on the floor that make beach exploring difficult. Nungwi is stunningly beautiful and super chill, with fantastic eateries that stretch out into the water and sugar white sand. It is a favorite spot for kite surfers, and also the place were they make the dhow fishing boats. You can watch them build the boats on the beach! You can also go out in one for quite cheap on an all day snorkel trip. We paid 20 dollars each for a day trip to the coral reef, including lunch on board of grilled fish and all of our snorkeling equiptment. Did I mention the grilled octopus galore? We loved Nungwi.

Kilimanjaro: The two main reasons why people come to Tanzania are for Kilimanjaro and safari. Even the two most popular tanzanian beers are named after these things, respectively. Hemingway frequented this place which fueled the fire for some of the stories of his later years. We were surprised to learn that it is not as easy to spot the snows of Kilimanjaro as he made it out to be. Besides being the tallest mountain in Africa, it is famous for being snow capped year round despite its position practically on top of the equator. Sadly, the only way to guarantee you will see those snows is to hike to the top of it, which takes a lot of preparation and about a weeks worth of trekking. The locals call her a ¨shy girl¨ because she tends to hide behind the clouds, only rearing her snowy head on rare, clear occasions. We still have not seen her yet, because we didn’t have the time or frankly, the desire, to go all the way to the top. Even from 2800 meters high at the first hut, we still couldn’t see her. It was raining far too heavily. We all felt glad we were not hiking all the way to the top in such conditions.

We arrived at the first hut, Mandara, freezing cold and soaking wet. We struggled to warm up as we ate lunch and waited for the rain to slow down. It never did and we hiked back down in heavy rains, drenched and freezing. 

On the way back to Moshi after our treacherous hike, our guide suggested we stop in Marangu village at the base of the mountain to try a local specialty: banana beer. That ended up being the highlight of the day. To begin with, this was the bar that we stopped at off the main road and hidden behind sunflowers and banana trees:

Yep, the lady in the blue is the bartender, that is her bar and her homemade banana beer, which is nothing like you expect beer to be. This was a ḧomebrew in the most primitive sense, made the way they must have made beer way back in the day. It was creamy and even chewy, due to the millet and banana that it was made of. I know it sounds crazy but, we actually enjoyed it! It was served in little buckets, we shared a bucket of it around the back of the bar where the locals were hanging out. Even better than drinking the beer itself was getting to be in this very local bar/urban garden. Despite not being able to speak the same language, everyone in the bar talked to us and we actually made some new friends that day.

I will admit at first, we were skeptical.

The locals were happy to have us join them

The traditional dress here, and I am talking about the women especially, is just beautiful. So many colors and patterns, the things that they can do with one piece of material just boggle my mind. It can be a hair wrap, a skirt, a dress, a shirt, you name it. The clothing and jewelry of the local women are truly a sight to behold, not to mention their ability to carry pretty much anything on their heads. I have seen ladies carrying piles of firewood, huge baskets of fruit, sacks of grains, jugs of water, you name it. If it isn’t alive and moving around they can probably carry it on their head.

Women and children work hard here- from what I’ve seen, they are working much harder than the men, who often work more sedentary jobs that supposedly bring home the money. Children are shepherds. I have seen so many little kids off on their own moving huge groups of goats and cows, without an adult in sight. I often see women tending to the fields in addition to all this heavy head-lifting. Men are supposed to be the ones bringing home the money but I question whether that is really the case. There are certainly clearly defined roles in society for men, women and children, and they do not overlap.

Well, the next segment of my journey will be covering SAFARI, but it will take a whole separate post for that. Stay tuned!