TengCheng

2/24/10
The night started with another overnight bus ride with more smells and annoying people. I thought I was lucky I had scored a bunk by myself for the 9-10 hour trip to TengCheng. Unfortunately this bunk wasn’t built for someone over 5’5” tall. It was a little bit wider than my last bunk so my shoulders weren’t digging into the metal but the only way I could lay down was to have my knees in the air. I decided the most “comfortable” way to lay was on my side. This sense of comfort wouldn’t last because with every corner and bump in the road I was tossed around in that bed and struggled for an hour of sleep. I woke up and we are pulling into a “rest stop.” Picture a series of run down brick buildings that have open fronts and are acting as make shift stores selling bottled water, tea, misc packaged animal parts, and instant noodles. As I walk to the bathroom I notice the ground is wet and there are big hoses running from behind the buildings to the buses and trucks that are at the rest stop, I reason that these must be the gas lines and about the same time I realize this, the truck I’m next to starts overflowing spraying me and the other people around me. I make it to the bathroom in hopes of being able to clean off and pay the standard 50 jiao (50 “cents”) to use the bathroom and I’m instantly reminded that one of the world smells in the world is human waste. Most of the public restrooms outside of the cities there isn’t running water so the human waste is collected until it is shoveled out to make room for more. Needless to say this creates an unsanitary environment with smells that make you want to throw up.

Back on the road we are moving and I’m continuing to get tossed around in my bunk. I manage to dose off for about an hour when I wake up and its 2AM and we are stopped, we are scheduled to get into Tengcheng at 5AM so I ask why aren’t we moving to find out that we are 3 hours ahead of schedule (now I know part of the reason I’ve been getting tossed around for hours). I get off the bus to grab my bag and find my foot in a pothole getting soaked in a variety of liquids. We managed to snag a cab to take us to a nearby hotel where I test the water in the shower before going to bed, the water is freezing cold (common in China), and I’m not happy.

I wake up a few hours later and decide to try to get clean; I jump in the shower hoping that I’ll manage at least a few minutes worth of warm water. I stick my hand under the water and its freezing cold I managed to wash one body part at a time to minimize how cold I am until it’s time to wash my head/hair. The water was so cold that as soon as I put my head under it I get the wind knocked out of me, what a great way to start the day.

Our plan was to spend two days in TengCheng and then take the overnight bus on Thursday to Kunming before returning to Beijing. In order to make sure we make it happen Ted and I decide to head to the bus station and book our tickets in advance to Kunming. There is a board behind the counter that shows buses leaving from Tengcheng to Kunming every hour and with 3 sleeps a day. The woman at the ticket counter informs us that the board is mainly aesthetic and they only run buses when they have them so “there will be another bus leaving for Kunming when we have a bus going, but go ask the office.” The guys in the office were slightly more helpful “we know we’ll have a bus going to Kunming later todaybut not sure when else we might have one, you can come back tomorrow after 7AM and if we have a bus we might send it.” GREAT! We’ve made our way to the middle of nowhere and we have no way to get out of here.
Realizing there’s nothing we can do about leaving for the time being we decided to set out for the volcanoes that sit about 20 KM north of the city. We pull into the national park and I see a long road that leads up to a mountain, running up the side of the mountain are 2 sets of stairs, as if my legs weren’t already exhausted from the past week of hiking it was time for more “UP.” We work out way up the volcano and step by pain full step until we’ve finally made it to the rim, I’m pretty excited having never seen a volcano before. There it was in all of its glory, essentially a mountain with a hole cut into the middle of it with patches of grass and bits of volcanic rock. It was as unexciting as a volcano could be. As we later found out the volcano has been extinct for 100’s of years but we are reassured it was once VERY active.
Black Fish River sat 15 KM away from the volcano and is where the aquifer’s come from under the volcanic rock to form the black river. We hire a local driver in the village to take us to the river and back to TengCheng after we see the sites. We decided to grab lunch in the village before heading off the river. There weren’t any actual restaurants just various tents on the street selling noodles, we sat down at the one that looked the least sketchy and quickly became the center of attention. Across the street an older woman sat in front of a cardboard box with two bowls on top of it making noodles, it was a quick reminder that while there is extreme wealth in some parts of China it is still a developing country. After a decent lunch we make our way down the road through fields of volcanic rock. Eventually we pull into a dirt parking lot and our driver begins to mumble some Chinese that none of us can understand until we hear her say “zaijian (goodbye).”
We head off towards the trail but before we do there are various “snack vendors” selling fresh fish (swimming in buckets next to their grills), and birds (picture a bird about the size of your hand from the head to feet and it is butter flied to toss on the grill, and yes the head and feet are still attached). We start making our way down a long flight of stairs to the muddy river below that sits next to a concrete irrigation cannel, what a view! We keep walking down the trial and decide that this place SUCKS! Just about a minute later Cooper decides to liven things up when we meet a lady on the trail selling the birds, he buys one (I named him Petey) and next thing you know our chef is cutting Petey with scissors and he’s spread eagle on the grill, about 10 minute later she hand Petey to Cooper and it was time for him to enjoy head and all.

We finally found where the water leaves the earth and its nothing spectacular the best part was the mini-village that was set up at the sit with people selling food (including Petey’s family) and various native crafts. For these people 5 foreighers was by far the most they had ever seen in person. We were again quickly surrounded with “HELL-OHHHS” echoing throughout the river. Cooper, Ted and Jon decided to try a black fish from one of the buckets and it quickly became a side show as they tried to catch one with their hands. Cooper managed to make this into a sit-com that lasted nearly 20 minutes as he tried over and over again to get the fish from the bucket as countless locals interrupted to show him how to pick one up.

We got back into TengCheng around 4 PM and decided to walk around the markets and the old village to see what the town had to offer. We quickly realized there was nothing to see and asked where we could find the best restaurant in town. We ordered up a couple of local dishes and some stuff that we’d recognize. None of it was good and I ended up being haunted by the grey pieces of skin that were left on the chicken.
After dinner we caught a bus for the jade market, or at least that was our goal. We got on the bus and Ted asked our driver to tell us when to get off the bus, he said he would and we settled into our seats. We rode the bus for about 15 minutes when we realized we were no longer in town. Ted goes and asks our driver where we are going and why we aren’t in town anymore. After some heated words we found ourselves standing on the street corner looking up at a billboard with a yak it wondering what just happened. We stand there for a few minutes trying to figure out what to do when Ted fins a place to buy a beer and ask for directions or a way back to town, the shop keepers advice “HA, hope a cab or bus come by heading towards town.” We walk back out onto the street and wait, about 10 minutes later a bus come by and we are on our way back to town.
1 AM: The chicken skin returns. I’ll spare the details but the toilet being less than 6 inches from the bathtub in our hotel room was a blessing given what I was up against.
6AM: Feeling beaten and destroyed I woke up at 6AM as I had promised the night before to head to the bus station to try to bus tickets out of this miserable town. Ted and I walk to the bus station, stopping along the way to use the bushes for my stomach problem. We make it to the station right as they opened. I can still feel the battle raging in my stomach and think to myself how am I going to ride on a bus to Kunming today. Once the doors open we’re first in line to learn that there would be no buses heading to Kunming today, but there is a bus heading back to Dali and its leaving at 11:40 AM, sounds good we’ll take it. We head back to the hotel where I get back in bed and try to sleep off the rest of my sickness.