great wall revisited
for all the bad flak china has been receiving lately, e.g. poisoned century eggs and white rabbit sweets and the hotly debated wtf chopped cardboard meat, which i think is a strong contender for the 8th wonder of the world, i'd have to say that china remains as one of the most bizarre countries around, unless you like this sorta thing:
many cracked bowls later, my brother was able to do this too. proves that all you need is just a big tummy.
but fake food or not, i really did dig the great wall, clearly the highlight of my trip
the steps were massive in height and tiny in width, either the qin soldiers had bound feet so they could climb them more easily, or fell to their deaths trying to scale them in their clunky armor and boots. i'm leaning towards the latter.
the view from the top- you really don't want to fall down. chances are people would let you roll on past as they'd be too tired to help you themselves.
the great wall in all it's grandeur. truly awe-inspiring stuff, no?
here's what else is awe-inspiring, the only person to have ever scaled the entire wall spent a ballbreaking 8 months doing it and wore out 6 pairs of shoes. i'm getting angina just contemplating the sheerness of that remarkable feat.
this was pretty amazing too, that qin guy was a crazy bugger.
so i guess i actually do like china, quirky eccentricities and all. i loved sipping tea in a teahouse, riding the trishaw, having my feet massaged by chinese medical students (foot relexology is part of their curriculum) and eating candied strawberries from the roadside stalls. besides, anywhere which sells shoes for $4 a pop gets my vote. i'm a fan.
