China Trip - Day 5

Day 5 (~18 February 2010~)

On early morning, we start our journey by finding a place for our breakfast. On 8.25am we packed our luggage and went to a Taiwanese style restaurant called "Yong Jie Tou Jing Fang", a restaurant which mainly sell soya bean drink. When we reach there, the stall was out of electricity, a total black out and just depend on the sunlight at outside to shine in. For breakfast, i ordered a Udon noodles fried with black pepper and a soya bean soup. Well, this is the first time I drank such a delicious saya drink, the taste is a bit salty, just like soup, and also some "ikan bilis" taste (don't know whether they insert ikan bilis or not). I don't like soya taste, but this really change my mind, truly a great soya. Perhaps is because the taste like soup, so I kinda like it. Besides that, we also ordered "You Tiao" (a.k.a Yao Chao Guai) which is also famous in Fu Zhou. The You Tiao is really crispy, you must try it when you reach to Fu Zhou.

Picture 5.1 - Me, prepared for breakfast.

Picture 5.2 - Inside "Yong Jie Tou Jiang Fang", showing total black out.

Picture 5.3 - My Udon Noodle fried with black pepper and a bowl of soya soup.

At 10.00am we start moving to "Xi Chang Shi" (sorry, I don't know how to write Chinese). Well Xi Chang Shi is a large place for people to pray to the gods (Taoism probably). Below are some photos that I had taken. I'm sorry that many things that I couldn't explain deeply about this place, as I was at that time just walking around and enjoy the scenery. I was hopped that someone would explain to me the history about this place.

Picture 5.4 - The front gate of Xi Chang Shi

Picture 5.5 - The front door of Xi Chang Shi.

Picture 5.6 - Inside the entrance. (Look at above, ancient Chinese crafting)

Picture 5.7 - The lake that I saw in Xi Chang Shi, with a Guan Yin.

Picture 5.8 - The bridge that pass though the lake.

Picture 5.9 - two large buildings and a pagoda that I found in the area.

Picture 5.10 - A entrance to a temple, with a dragon crafting on middle to staircase.

Picture 5.11 - A lady trying to place a coin inside the dragon's mouth

(believe that it will grant our wishes)

Picture 5.12 - Another entrance to the temple after the first entrance.

Picture 5.13 - After the second entrance, came the Hall of Heavenly Guardians.

Picture 5.14 - Behind the Hall of Heavenly Guardians, there is a temple, where many people went for worship.

Picture 5.15 - After visit the temple, I head towards the pagoda.

Picture 5.16 - Finally reached the pagoda, but it was restricted to go in.

Picture 5.17 - After visit the pagoda, we plan to visit this large building.

Picture 5.18 - The front of the big building (another temple as I believed), lazy to go in, so just snap the front view of this building.

Picture 5.19 - A very big tree located in front of that big building. I took this photo before I start going back to the bus.

Picture 5.20 - "Goodbye Xi Chang Shi. I'm heading to another interesting place."

After two hours of visit in Xi Chang Shi, we started our journey to a popular lake called "Xi Hu" (西湖).

Xi Hu is a very large lake in the middle of the city. The unique about this lake are there're many beautiful scenery that we can enjoy on the walkway which surrounds the lake. Besides that, there's a fun park located inside the area too. Also you can have some water cycling around the lake. On that day, we was lucky to view the flowers exhibitions around the lake, it was magnificent. I nearly catch a cold while I was in Xi Hu, that day the temperature is still consider low, but the wind around lake are strong, when the cold winds swings around me, it chills me from the top to bottom. Here are some photos showing the specialities on Xi Hu.

Picture 5.21 - De' Xi Hu.

Picture 5.22 - The water cycling activities on Xi Hu.

Picture 5.23 - One of the walkway around the Xi Hu.

Picture 5.24 - One of the entrance to Xi Hu (Total of 4 entrance if I'm not mistaken).

Picture 5.25 - One of the beautiful scenery.

Picture 5.26 - A walkway suitable for jogging in the morning.

Picture 5.27 - An interesting classical walkway.

Picture 5.28 - A scenery with trees and flowers.

Picture 5.29 - Beautiful trees around the lake.

Picture 5.30 - One of the display for the flower exhibitions.

Picture 5.31 - Another walkway with Chinese lantern hanging around the side roads.

Picture 5.32 - Can you see where is the wind blows? (Ans: towards left, "Cold~")

Picture 5.33 - Another flower display for the flower exhibitions.

Picture 5.34 - The Lovers' Bridge??

Picture 5.35 - No, I know is other name, and I don't know how to read it.

Picture 5.36 - A bonsai exhibition.

At 2.00pm we start moving from Xi Hu, and went for our lunch, at the same restaurant that we had our lunch yesterday. At 3.25pm, we planned to start moving to "Xia Men" (下门), but during that evening, heavy traffic jam occurred during our journey, we didn't manage to reach Xia Men in time, so we changed our plan and straight away head to "Zhang Zhou". After 7 hours of journey, finally we reached to a hotel in Zhang Zhou. During that time, it was raining. The surroundings are freezing cold, it shivers me down. After we took our luggage to our selected room. Me and my friends, with my boss went to a restaurant for supper.

Once again, it's alcoholic drink time, Ah Chong again, brought two bottles of white wine. Luckily I didn't forced to drink that nasty drink, but I had to drink beer. That night, we ordered "Zhe Chuan" (四川) famous dishes for our supper, it was so delicious until my mouth can't stop chewing on all those foods. Also, one more thing, that night also is the night that I first time ate "Ma Po" Taufu, thouse taufu really delicious (this was the first time I said taufu is delicious for these 20 years ++).

Picture 5.37 - The hotel that we choose to say a night.

Picture 5.38 - Yummy Zhe Chuan dishes, all hot and spicy!

Picture 5.39 - The restaurant that we had our supper.

During that night, I really had my wonderful time with my boss, he really talks many about his experience in China, and many of them are very funny. Besides that, my friend, Ah Chong was drunk, along with someone (which I can't tell who it was). When they are drunk, they done something silly, if you were there, you will shock about it. At 2.20am, after everyone was tired, we head back to our hotel to have some rest (The restaurant is just few steps away from the hotel).

China Trip - Day 4

DAY 4

After a nice sleep in the "Tao Yuan" hotel, me and my friends wake up and plans to eat the wanton noodle in "Mei Zhi Jie" again. But this time, we found out that there're many people, including my boss and his family were there. They came because yesterday we were in the bus yesterday, talking about the wanton noodle that we ate yesterday.

Today's wanton noodle isn't much delicious compare to the wanton noodle that I ate yesterday, because we ate at another stall, which I called the stall number 3. Yesterday we ate at stall number 2. We didn't try for the stall number 1, because we can't figure what they're selling. After we finished our breakfast, I walked around the hotel, this time I walked even further, I walked to the back streets of the hotel, I found a restaurant which selling porridge. I told my friend, Chong, if yesterday I went to the back streets, we may ate our breakfast at the porridge restaurant.

On 8.40am, we start our journey to Fu Zhou. On the journey, we stop by to my boss friend, which we met yesterday in the village. He's Uncle Tan, he's a Mandarin Orange distributor to our country, Malaysia. We went to his storage house (we're still in Yong Chun), and at the same time, there's fireworks at the opposite village from where we're standing on that moment. The fireworks aren't obvious, because it's daytime.

Picture 4.1 - The front view of the storage house.

Picture 4.2 - Me and Uncle Tan's daughter, Xia Lan

Picture 4.3 - A bunch of Mandarin Orange

On 9.40am we continued our journey, on 1.20pm we finally reach to Fu Zhou. We stop by to a restaurant for lunch. I don't know what's the name of the restaurant, but picture 4.4 will show the front view of the restaurant. The food of this restaurant is delicious, I can say that on this four days of travelling, this is the restaurant where we had our most delicious food. There're two dishes that I loved it very much, first is the cabbage fried with dried chilli which totally suit my taste, and second is the boiled chicken soup in clay pot. Besides that, we also had a bowl of soup which filled with many types of mushrooms, and it tastes almost like Campbell Soup.

Picture 4.4 - Front view of the restaurant.

On 2.35pm, we finished our lunch start heading to Gu Shan. It tooks about 50 minutes to reach there. Gu Shan is a hill which had the height of 1.8km from the sea level. At the top of the hill, we can view the scenery of the Fu Zhou. Because it's so high, we plan to use cable car to reach to the top. Because we had a compact schedule, we just reach to the top and walk around. Before we start going back, we went to a stall to fill our stomach. I ordered a bowl of noodles with peanuts gravy and a bowl of Fu Zhou fish balls, these dishes are the local favourite.

Picture 4.5 - Me in front of the Gu Shan entrance.

Picture 4.6 - Entrance of the cable car to the top of Gu Shan.

Picture 4.7 - The walkway around the Gu Shan.

Picture 4.8 - The back view of my seat while we're going up.

Picture 4.9 - (Wow) A long way to go.

Picture 4.10 - The end of the cable car, total got 24 columns.

Picture 4.11 - The view of Fu Zhou 1.

Picture 4.12 - The view of Fu Zhou 2.

Picture 4.13 - This is where I took picture 4.11 and 4.12.

Picture 4.14 - Me in Gu Shan.

Picture 4.15 - The noodles with peanuts gravy.

On 5.30pm, we start heading to a hotel called Fu Zhou Hotel for rest. So once we reach to hotel, we took our bath, hanging around, snap some photos and chat with our boss. On 8.00pm we start heading to "Jian Ping Gong Yuan". Before we reach to "Jian Ping Gong Yuan", we went to a place where we can see many decorations (I couldn't recall that is the name of the place, but I knew there's Mao Zhe Tong's statue opposite the place). As we walked to the destination, I found out that there's some speciality on Fu Zhou, there're many pedestrian cross on the road, especially on the cross roads, and their traffic light are quite special, three colours (red, yellow and green) shown in a same box.

Picture 4.16 - The Fu Zhou Hotel.

Picture 4.17 - A special pedestrian cross with special traffic light.

Picture 4.18 - A statue in front of the building.

Picture 4.19 - Statue of Mao Zhe Tong.

Picture 4.20 - The "Jian Ping Gong Yuan"

After we walked around "Jian Ping Gong Yuan", we plan to take our dinner at a restaurant called "Lao Fu Zhou" which located on other place. While we're waiting for a taxi, there's a fireworks activity occur in front of us, I also managed to record a video how and what did we saw on that moment.

Video 4.1 - What had we enjoyed while we waiting for a taxi.

Picture 4.21 - Restaurant Lao Fu Zhou.

On restaurant Lao Fu Zhou, we ordered many things, like Fu Zhou fishballs, Mala Toufu, noodle soup and fried noodle. The food looks pretty, but many of us said the food is in "ok" condition, means that those food aren't delicious enough to entertain us. So, at 11.00pm, me, my boss, ZY, Ah Chong and Johnson (one of my boss stuff, but different company) went for supper (BBQ) and have some beer (Sorry, no photos taken). The best part that I felt during the supper is, my boss really looks like our friend rather than our boss, he actually loves to talk many about his experience to us and loves to joke around (really not like what I saw during work). During our supper, we ordered many beers, we drank many but no one was drunk, even me. During the supper, I found out that our beer in Malaysia, the taste are much stronger compare to the beer which we took on China. China beer feels like water plus a little bit of malt taste. I don't know why, I never drank so many beer in my whole life without getting drunk.

On 12.20am, we start heading back to hotel and have some sleep.

China Trip - Day 3

DAY 3

After a good night sleep in the hotel, I woke up 7.00am in the morning, but still my co-workers and my friend still haven't wake up. So I decided to go outside of the hotel and walk around the place.

Picture 3.1 - The front view of the hotel.

Picture 3.2 - Front view of "Mei Shi Jie"

Picture 3.3 - The food stalls at the side of the Mei Shi Jie

Mei Shi Jie is a streets which we can find lots of foods. Because we went to China in the Chinese New Year festive seasons, there're not much stall open for business. As I walk though the street, there's only 2 stalls are open, all of them are selling noodles.

As I walk to another streets, I found out that there're many motorcycle-taxi around that area. Feeling kinda weird, this was the first time I saw motorcycle can be used as a taxi. As I was showing my curiosity eyes on them, they came approach me, and ask me whether I need their service or not, it was quite scary as many of them (2 to 3 persons) can approach at the same time. I just quick walk back to the hotel with my hands shaking (showing that I don't want their service).

On 8.30am, me, zy and Ah Chong went down and walk around the streets again. This time I take them to the Mei Shi Jie for breakfast, we went to a stall which cooks wanton noodle. The price are cheap, RMB 3, 4 or 5 (Convert to Malaysia currency which is about RM 1.50, 2.00 and 2.50). Besides wanton noodle, we also ordered a bowl of dumpling soup.

Picture 3.4 - The stall which we went for wanton noodle.

Picture 3.5 - The wanton noodle.

To me in China, the noodles are really delicious and special, compare to the noodles in Malaysia. In China, the wanton noodles are totally different, they're mainly in soup base and they doesn't have noodles with black caramel sauce. Besides that their noodle are fully man made, not like ours in Malaysia are machine made.

On 8.50am, we start moving from the hotel to my boss's ancestors village, which also located at Yong Chun. It almost take about an hour to reach to the village. The village is located at the hill, when we reach there, it's very cold (Higher elevation tend to have colder temperature, for example, KL and Genting Highlands). When I step down from the vehicle, I can feel like I'm a total different place, a very peaceful place that I never been before, a place with no traffic jams, non-polluted air and no congested areas.

Picture 3.6 - A simple view of the village.

Video 3.1 - A view around the village.

After we took some pictures around the village, my boss invite us to a small house, where all the ancestors plate are placed. Inside the house, they start their ritual, I don't know what kind of ritual, but I think it's a ritual that used to pray to their ancestors. Beside the on-going ritual, many people are also taking breakfast at the same time. At that moment, my stomach is still full, but the dishes looks delicious, so without hesitation, I eat them all.

Picture 3.7 - The food in front of me.

My stomach was totally full, I can't eat any more, so I have some rest. But once I stand up and start going from that house, some aunty told me, there will having lunch soon, which in an hour. At that time, I really wish that I didn't take so much of food. As soon I walked out from the house, me and my friend ZY walked around the village and snap some photos again.

Picture 3.8 - Me in the village.

Picture 3.9 - A Mandarin Orange Tree.

Picture 3.10 - A view which taken from higher spot, which shows the building around the village.

After an hour, I backed to the house for lunch (another meal again = =, haih....). I seated on the chair and waited for the food to come. After the first dish, Chong came with two cups of white wine, and asked me and ZY to drink. At the moment my stomach really not that feeling well, overload and started got some feeling like want to vomit. There're total 18 dishes as been told by the folks around the village, and all the villagers are going to have lunch together. In those 18 dishes, one of them are O-mee-sua. Finally my favourite food arrive, but sadly my stomach are full. Since I can't take any food any more, I went out and walk around the village again, but this time, I walked further from my boss, because I was scared to let him called back and go drink that white wine.

Picture 3.11 - The Delicious O-mee-sua (But it has dried up).

Picture 3.12 - The cook which cooks our lunch.

Picture 3.13 - This is how they prepare the dishes in front of the house.

Picture 3.14 - The only "red leaf" tree that I found in the village.

Picture 3.15 - One of the view around the village.

Picture 3.16 - The paddy field in the village.

Picture 3.17 - Me in the village.

Picture 3.18 - A side view of the paddy field.

From 1.40pm till 4.00pm I at outside walking around the village, sat on roadside with my cold hands in my pocket, enjoy the view with some fresh air, finally I step back into the house for some rest. I found a place where I can finally to have some nap, then after an hour, suddenly someone pull me and wake me up, is was my boss, in his drunk form. He pulled me to sit beside him, and asked me to drink with him, luckily I was lucky to ran away when my boss was talking with the villagers.

At 6.00pm, we start to have our dinner, even I'm still full. After dinner, we had our very own fireworks session. The fireworks are really wonderful, they just release it in front of the house, just a few meters away from me, on that time, I video some of the fireworks activity, right below the fireworks. On 7.45pm, we start heading back to our hotel and have some rest.

Video 3.2 - One of the fireworks that I enjoyed during that night.