Modeling and Duck Hunt - Nech does Guilin

Our final day in Yangshua, a small town near Guilin, we stopped at a village populated by an aboriginal minority group still living a primitive lifestyle. As I was testing out their old-school mill, two giggling Chinese girls about my age came over, clearly intending to take a picture with it. But when I tried to get out of the way, they started giggling even more, saying, "No no no." Confused, I ventured my best Mandarin guess at "what do you want?" - "ni yall shamah." Now they were doubled over laughing. I looked over to Christine for confirmation; "you said it right," she told me later, "I just don't think they were expecting it." After a minute or two of this, I figured out that they did want a picture holding the mill wheel; they just wanted me to be in it too. "Cute," I thought. We take the pic and I start walking away to join my friends when a middle-age Chinese guy tapped my shoulder and motioned back to the mill. As my buddies applauded my new celebrity status, I posed with the guy, his friend, and a six-year-old boy who didn't quite know what to make of me.

Later that day, Greg, Maarten (whose dirty blond hair also attracted Chinese tourists), Rachel, and I made a gang sign to flash at the other vanilla faces we passed by. Christine and Lance, as helpful as they were with their fluent Mandarin, were not invited to participate.

Guilin is a city in southeast China known for its uniquely vertical mountains and ancient caves. There we ski-lifted up to the top of a famous mount to get a panoramic view of its unique nearly vertical hills and rode down using toboggans on a metal track. After the first of what would eventually be 4 stalagmite/stalactite caves, we had some exciting street food at the market, tasted the local tea, and prepared for an early start to Yangshua.

There we crashed an ancient Buddhist temple, a 1600 year old Banyan tree, and dragon caves before taking a cruise on scenic Li River (background to the 20 Yuan bill). After witnessing a dog being chopped up in the local market, we headed over to the water theater for a traditional show produced by the same dude who did the Olympic opening ceremony this year and acted out by local farmers. The next day we biked, first to the minority village and then down a very rocky path through a rural village down to the water/mud caves, where we got very very dirty and floated like in the Dead Sea.

Lunch that day proved to be an adventure in itself. Having already caught our own fish from the tank for Friday’s lunch, Greg and I asked if we could watch them pick the duck for our main dish. So the two of us and Maarten followed an old lady a shed where she opened a door to a corridor 15 feet long and 3 feet wide. At the other end were 5 ducks cowering in a corner. She gestures for us to go in, but stays outside. Apparently we had asked to catch the duck ourselves. Greg goes to the ducks, I move to the middle, and Maarten hangs to the door. Greg lunges. Ducks go crazy. Greg freaks out. Lunges again. Ducks waddle/flap past Greg towards me. Maarten escapes outside and shuts the door. I bend down and quack at the ducks to force them back into the corner. Same thing happens again. I’m laughing so much my face hurts. Ducks finally calm down, frozen with fright. Greg calms down too and finally gets one by the neck. We retreat before the other ones attack.

An hour later we were picking Donald's bones from our teeth.

I'm going to Thailand for 10 days (woohoo!) and won't be able to post about that till the Wednesday after (October 15). In the meantime, check back next week for the story that Tal Raviv gave a "Wow x 30" in "How I became a badass - Nech does Shenzhen."