好久不见！

Hao jiu bu jian! That means long time no see! Currently it is 11pm and I am exhausted. I stayed up until 6am this morning working on a Chinese project and studying for my Cultural Currencies midterm. Just came back from a whole day of classes (Thursdays = 10 hours worth of classes = HELL). Anyways, a lot has happened since my last update. We had our first study break and the first half was spent on a NYU sponsored trip to Guangxi where we went to Guilin and Yangshou. The second half was spent with some friends in Nanjing. I'll let the pictures do the talking...

The obligatory airplane food pictures. Planes in China are wildly efficient. The second everyone is on the plane, the doors are closed and the plane takes off. Turbulence? They just go faster. The minute you're in the air, food and drinks are served, trash is collected. oh wait. WEAH HEAH!

Pilot: Folks, we may be arriving a little sooner than scheduled.

plane speeds up

Flight Attendant: TURBULENCE! TURBULENCE TURBULENCE!!

plane goes even faster

Immodium and Banana Chips! We are definitely ready for a trip to rural China!

There were cute dogs like this everywhere! Super friendly too. They would just follow us and wag their tails. Too bad we couldn't touch them. Can you say Hepatitis A - Z, Rabies, and Meningitis (which by the way I am still not immune to)?

We hiked, ALOT. Oh and it was really foggy. This is a rice paddy. Just missing the cone shaped hats. 

Tiff fell on her butt / into a squatter. No worries, Steph to the rescue! 

AWwwwWWWwWWWwwWwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!

These women are some sort of ethnic minority. I forgot the exact name. But they never cut their hair. They just grow it out and turn it into a giant bun/hat. 

The minute they finished this woman whipped out her cell phone. Important business call? (oh and have I mentioned there isn't a corner of China where people can't get full signal? America, take note)

We are best friends.

Suspension bridges are scary. 

In downtown Guilin where they sell all types of lollipops. This one is kiwi

Nothing special, I know. I've just never had one. Wasn't as good as I thought it would be. Oh well. Good thing there are KFCs on every corner!

Guangxi is known for its mountains. And large random piles of bricks.

Don't be fooled by her Burberry boots, she only had a chopper carry her through half of the hike. 

Grueling workout...

I climbed all the way to the top! Pretty, no?

This is where all the pansies waited while the brave ones climbed to the tippy top.

An Escalade in rural China. I guess Chris Brown decided to flee the scene. 

We're suckers for tourist traps. 

This was our dessert. It is fried taro covered in hot melted sugar. You had to eat it quickly before it cooled off or else it would all fuze into one piece. Delicious!

Everything looked like a Chinese painting.

Tiff made a new friend.

Usually I'm not a big fan of nature but it really was beautiful.

I think this was somebody's farm. Oops.

This is where I skipped my first stone!

"Let's get down to business...!"

Look! Animatronics! 

Looks posed. BUTS ITS NOT. 

We walked through a little town. Apparently they like to make flowers out of citrus fruit peels and then dry them. 

The town was also known for fan making. We saw these drying on the streets everywhere.

This is also where we got totally and completely ripped off. Woman who sold us fans is probably laughing all the way to the bank right now.

At a "fishing show." Really it was just animal abuse. They had ducks tied to a boat and somebody would throw fish into the water and the ducks would catch them. That's when the fisherman would grab the string the duck is tied to and squeeze its neck until the fish came out. I couldn't watch. 

Passionfruit! It exists! And here I was thinking it was only a myth fabricated my Yoplait. 

We biked in the rain. Trust me, it was a lot more fun than it looks. 

I got really into it. Like my poncho?! Ralph Lauren Spring 2009. 

Carlos looking out of place. What's new?

We climbed all the way to the hole! It looks a lot more impressive from the ground (AKA MT. ITSNOTWORTHIT). Also, these old women climbed all the way to the top with us just to sell us water when we got tired. It was sad, the ancient women totally schooled us, and with coolers strapped to their backs too. 

We also went to a cave. This was the only picture that came out decently. 

The Guilin airport had ads of this guy EVERYWHERE! "Take these and you can look like your mom dropped you as a child too!" hmm....something isn't right. 

Billboards surrounding the airport.

Billboards inside the airport.

Even at the gates and on the back of our boarding passes. Relentless! I imagine this is how I would look after I took whatever drug he is pushing.

This is a nightclub in Nanjing. It was pretty cool on the inside. Lots of lights and lasers. 

We had our own table. 

They even gave us a goblet of fruit! It would have been better with fire. (get it? heh)

We went to Sun yat sen's mausoleum where we rented these nasty little two-wheelers. 

Some people rented bikes instead. Losers.

Cherry blossom!

All I do in this country is hike. 

Aren't we just too cute for words? LOLZROFLOMFG

Mutant teletuby. 

The Nanjing Massacre Museum. An event they rarely teach in the West. 300,000 Chinese were brutally murdered by the Japanese. Terrible. 

The museum was really well done albeit a tad biased. Following are little snippets of signs...

The Japanese not only violated all international treaties but also the moral codes of humanity. 

China has forgiven but will never forget. Although Japan is remorseful now, there are still evil forces within the country today...

Chinese fashion is a hoot. This girl had her hair cut short in the middle but long on the sides. 

Some lady workin it on her divamobile. 

And just a funny observation. I was coming back from class a few nights ago and to get to the bus I take to get back to my apartment I have to walk past a giant Mao statue right at the center of campus. While the statue was probably erected during the time when he was basically the head enchilada, now he's just another object for Chinese college students to skateboard and rollerblade on. Not just that, they had strobe lights going off on him and also had Chinese rap blasting. Gotta love modern China.