Hash, K, and Osmanthus tea

The suns been out the last few days and its been really nice with highs in the upper 60's during the day. I wear shorts and t-shirts when Im out during the day but most locals wear pants and jackets. They think its cold I guess.

The lady finally moved out of the apt the school has for me to move into so me and Michelle went to check it out yesterday. Its a piece of shit! The wallpaper is falling off the walls and there is crayon everywhere from some little kid that lived there before. The place is pretty dusty and old inside, like it hasnt been cleaned in forever and hasnt been updated or taken care of since the 80's. The wallpaper is dark so the apt is dark and gloomy inside. There are a couple holes in different walls and the lady that moved out said there were a couple bats that got in and she didnt know if they left or what. The bathroom is OK, the toilet is probably the best part of the whole place. Its 3 bedrooms also, and one room was a kids room and has bunk beds in it. All the furniture is old, dirty, and in bad shape. It really is a piece of shit! I have to pay the electric bill and I dont want pay to heat the whole place, F that! I also dont want to walk into my place and see nasty wallpaper falling off the walls, crayon everywhere, and worry about bat shit. So I am going to find my own place I think, unless school has something else for me. Michelle says they will give me like 400RMB/month if I live somewhere else. People say you can find a decent one for like 800-1000RMB/month better than the one they have for me. I wouldnt mind making up the difference if it is nice and somewhat clean. I have to get either Gou or Wendy to help me find one, not sure when Ill look yet.

We went shopping, after the apt viewing, to buy some clothes and shoes at Nico Nico Do, a big dept store. We also walked down the main walking street looking for shoes and stuff to buy. We were out for like 3 or 4 hours and had been to like 10 different shoe stores looking at tons and tons of clothes and didnt buy one thing. All the Chinese clothing is corny and I cant find my size shoe in the style I want at all. All I was looking for was a clean white pair of kicks. Knock off Nike's for like 30bucks we found but no one had my size, 11. Thats beat! Most Chinese arent very stylish and mis- match their outfits regularly. Its pretty funny to see people wearing a brown shirt with black pants or a woman in a yellow skirt and bright red knee high boots with a green shirt or something.. Im dead serious too. I wanted to buy a shirt or anything soo bad but couldnt find one thing. They have nice dress shirts, but I brought tons of mine and havent worn two of them yet. I heard I have to go to a bigger, more up to date city to find cool shit or my size shoe. While out shopping I saw a girl walking down the sidewalk eating a tunafish sand which with chopsticks, lol.. That was a sight to see! I also had a small like 3 or 4 year old boy trying to sell roses to us grab my shirt and walk with me for like 5 minutes saying 'hello flower, 5 UN'(UN is RMB and 5 is like 75 cents). Thats also what vendors or people selling stuff say if they dont know any English. Like people selling panda stuffed animals say 'hello panda' and shit like that. He was soo cute though and I was chanting with him as we walked, but i had him change it to 'hello flower 10 UN'. He knew to stop and turn around when we got to a certain street and walk back to where he started from, and he did.

Then some Chinese guy came up and started talking English to us. He asked where we were from and what we were doing here and he told us he was going to NYC to teach Chinese and art at NYU. The is an artist in Guilin so he took us to his gallery and showed us his stuff. He paints on rice paper and some of it is pretty nice. I might go back and buy a piece one of these days. He then asked if we wanted to go have some of the best Osmanthus tea in Guilin and of course Im down with that! It was a little shop close by and in the back they made tea. We sat at a small table and a woman who worked there prepared the tea for us. Its a whole big process; she adds the tea into a small pot, which also has fresh ginseng in it, and then she adds the Osmanthus flowers. Next she pours some hot water into the pot and lets it sit for a min. Then she pours it into our tiny little tea cups, about half the size of a shot glass, and then pours it out. You dont drink the first pour. She then adds more water to the pot, lets it sit again and pours us our cups. We cheers and drink, and its delicious! Supposedly its really good for you and helps you loose weight and keep circulation healthy. You get a sweet feeling in the back of your throat when you drink it too and breath in too, really nice. I wound up buying 100grams for 100UN or about 15bucks. She wanted to charge 180 but we talked her down. Ive tried to make it at the apt but dont have to right equipment yet, I have to go buy the set and get some fresh flowers off the trees . Osmanthus trees are everywhere in the Guilin.

After we finished an said goodbye to our new friend we went to a small cafe/bar and met Michelles Chinese friend Jenny who works there. She is nice, is always smiling and giggling, and shes cute. She asked if we ever had this stuff that a man was making on the street by us, and we didnt, so she ran and bought some for us. It is some type of dried ginger and fresh sugar cane syrup that they dry out and cooked somehow. I dont know how to explain it but you suck on it until it all melts away in about 10mins. Its pretty good. Too sweet for me though. A little while later Gou called and said he was cooking dinner so we left Jenny and went home to eat.

After dinner I get a call from my friend who wants me to come over and talk with him. I go over and hes got some hash that he wants to give me, haha. Its not that good but better than nothing I suppose, especially after teaching little Chinese brats all day.. haha. Michelle out of the blue calls me and wants to go out to the clubs, so she comes over, but noone else wants to go, except yours truly. We jump in a taxi and head to Ragazza which is in the city center on the walking street. Its freaking packed when we walk in, the music is bumpin, and one of the girls escorts us to a central spot at the bar. They always put foreigners in the center so people think its a cool spot to be at. We order our drinks and Michelle finds some older Chinese dudes she knows from going out before and they invite us to their table. They are dressed pretty nice, are cool as shit, and of course start giving us beer. I ask Michelle what they do for a living and she says 'dont ask them' and noone knows or asks but they are in the clubs every night. She said they are rich as shit too. Gou knows them somehow and says he thinks they are mafia and drug lords in Guilin, they sure as hell dont look like drug lords I imagined though. They must be important because everyone that walks by knows them and gives them beers and cigarettes when they pass and shake their hands. They know all the cops too and noone messes with them in the clubs because a girl comes over with a bag and a staw and one of them takes a bump of what turns out to be K or ketamine while people who work at the club are watching. Crazy! Once again of course they offer it to me and feeling on the spot and wanting to be on these guys good side I hit some from the hot ass girl. These are definitely people you want on your side if something goes down or you get in trouble. I think they pay the hot girl to carry the stuff around selling and giving people they know some when told to. She was smoking hot. Its not as good as I though it would ,but it got me twisted. It was someones b-day in the club and at one point they shut the music off, turned off the lights, and started singing a Chinese remake of Happy Birthday in English. Then a couple waiters came out with big cheesecakes with huge fireworks on the tops shooting flames and sparks high as shit. I thought something would catch on fire but they knew what they were doing obviously. It was crazy looking, especially being all f-ed up. K isnt my style though. Since the guys we were with are important VIP's and basically run shit here, we got like half of one of the cakes, it was surprisingly really good! We stayed until Michelle got too drunk and couldnt be there anymore. I was kinda pissed because there were tons of hot girls and I wanted to stay with the mafia.. haha. They were really nice guys though and I dont know if they are mafia or what but they certainly had money and were well connected in the clubs. We took a taxi home around 2 or 3 and passed out.

Today I woke up around 11 and again its a beautiful day, so while Michelle was still sleeping I went to a local park and laid in the sun by the water for an hour or so listening to music. I had one Newport left from the carton I brought from the states and I used it to roll up a couple hash joints and took them to the park with me. It was really relaxing and I think I even got a little of my tan back. Today is what they call singles day here because its Nov 11 (11/11), all ones or singles and all the single people go out and party together. I want to go back out to the clubs but noone else does so far. I think there will be tons and tons of people out, all single. Maybe Ill go find my new mafia friends ;)

Peace from Middle Earth