Chengdu

I'm actually in Chengdu now. Left Lhasa at 10:50 yesterday. Chengdu is a pretty nice city - much more easy-going and relaxed than most major Chinese cities. I don't have much to say about Chengdu... especially since it's more a "transit city" this time around (I leave for Malaysia tomorrow) AND I still have a bit of belated posts to complete for the Tibet section of this summer's blog. So, bear with me and thanks for bothering to come by and browse.

Nonetheless, here are some random notes from Chengdu:

1. The hotel I'm in is the same hotel we used last year EXCEPT that it has been upgraded to a 4-Star hotel! It's pretty impressive how they took only 5 months or so of gutting this entire 30-floor hotel to turn it into a completely different hotel!

2. We (Bill & Meg Gorvine and I) went to KFC for dinner last night (some of you know of my not-so-secret love-affair with fried chicken)followed by enjoying ice-cream at this real fancy Haagen-Dazs ice-cream place. Ice-cream selections were between RMB65-75 (about US$10).

3. We're meeting up with Jongbok - a UVA graduate student who is here in Chengdu, on his way to Lhasa. Ying told me about Jongbok being here right now and gave me his email. Again, (good) colliding-karma. Jongbok is going to find a good Korean restaurant for lunch. Delicious.

4. I know my checked baggage it already way over-weight.... but I think I'll go try to find a nice tea-set. Chengdu is FAMOUS for its tea-culture. When in Chengdu....

5. Finally (drum roll)... I took a couple of pictures of some sort of "hygiene-wash" sachets found in the bathroom (marked: "Non-complimentary, 10yuan"). To read the words on the sachet you might have to click the pics and open a separate and larger window.




I guess people here are very concerned about keeping their bodies free of "germs and pathogens." But this reminds me of what Ryan McL. said about how on any given day we should probably be more concerned about washing our hands rather than other more hidden body-parts since our hands are way more exposed to all kinds of germs, pathogens and yuck. I'd have to agree. But at the same time... different folks, different strokes. So, stay healthy and clean - however you do it!

Colliding Karma

Colliding in a good way, that is. I can't believe how many friends I have run into in Lhasa this time. Although I knew I would see a couple of them, I had no idea that it would be so many. On the morning after I arrived, my Dharma-friend Christine from California (we were expecting each other) turned up at Kyichu Hotel looking for me. Then we left for Drigung a couple of days later. Early morning after returning from Drigung, as I was stumbling downstairs to meet Christine before she left Lhasa, I ran into a Benji Bogin and Betsy Napper - colleagues in Buddhist Studies. It was my first meeting with Betsy who graduated from UVA Religious Studies years before I got there. Benji, I first met at an AAR a couple or 3 years back when he was then finishing up his PhD. The next day, while meandering around the Barkhor, shopping and people-watching while circumambulating the Jokhang, I ran in Jon Stoltz - a graduate-buddy. Jon got his doctoral degree in Philosophy last year (I think). Jon spotted me first and stood watching behind me until I turned around and see him with a bag of potato fries in his hand and a smirk on his face. "What are you doing here?" "Me?" The next day, we got done with visiting Drepung and Nechung Monasteries and went into Namaste Restaurant near the Barkhor for lunch. It was a crowded room and at the end of one room, in a booth was David Germano, one of my mentors at UVA.... Then just yesterday, I met Ying whom I had met in my last year at UVA when it was Ying's first year MA-program at UVA. We were all over at Drophenling - the fair-trade place near the Lhasa Grand Mosque. I knew Ying was in Lhasa working for THDL and had chatted with her on Gmail chat (http://www.thdl.org). AND (yes... one more), later that evening, when I turned up for dinner with David was Rich. Rich was an undergrad at UVA when I was a grad student there. I remembered him as someone very interested in Tibet and studied Tibetan language.

Sow how many is it now? We will see how many more people I will run into in Lhasa. BTW, it's not just me, one of the members of our group - Sarah - ran into someone she knew at Drophenling as well! So, if you want to run into friends whom you hardly get to see while in the US, hop on over to Lhasa!

But as Ryan M. just commented on Gmail chat, "I wonder for every person we run into halfway across the world, how many others do we pass by just 60 seconds earlier or later without our knowing." I wonder.