i've been super mega hyper ultra wopper busy, and as such, dropped off the map a bit. and i even actually got worried messages from couple of people - aww, shucks guys! i've not had enough time to get up to no good here, so all worries are unfounded for now.
where to begin? izz and i went to yulin lychee and dog meat festival to lead the revolution and save some dogs from dire dissection and a destiny for the dinner dish. alas:
1 - we were way, way too late
2 - it took us 6 hours to get there thanks to some spectacular misadventure
3 - we were actually supposed to be meeting up in Guangzhou (about 381km off target).
i of course found this hilarious... i'm sure izz was doing everything in her power not to hit me for spending the whole weekend laughing.
i could recount the entire heroic journey in full here, but i think it's much more fun to just drop in some trivia of the adventure so far.
did you know? #1
(south) chinese people are addicted to their phones. i mean, i know basically everyone is a little bit dependent on checking their screens, but these guys are always plugged in. driving a motorbike? you can use a phone too! changing your babies nappy? selfie time! traffic collision? paparazzi time! my personal favourite is when you see a whole family squashed onto a motorbike, and the husband who's driving, the mama who's holding the kids, and both their kids are all on their phones each - 10/10
******* it's photo time! ********
did you know? episode 2
(south) chinese people don't use earphones. ever. everything is always on loudspeaker, always at maximum volume - nowhere is sacred; nowhere is silent. old men are the worst for this - day 1 seeing citizens of 80+ using smartphones was cute as a novelty on day 1, but they are usually watching really bad action movies or chinese soap operas (=shouting and screaming matches that don't end). this is tolerable if you're in a good mood, but when we were on the train back from guilin some degenerate decided to watch an action movie - with explosions and everything - at full volume at 3am when most people were trying to sleep. i hope his next birthday is a monday.
so much more has happened, but it'll have to wait until next time.
this week i'm flying to hanoi, viet nam. i'm super ultra stoked for all the real viet food i'm gonna eat, but izz insists that we can't just spend five days eating and we'll actually have to sightsee. ohhhh, how she underestimates me..........
jk - can't wait for the cultural overload. there's so much of asia to see and so little time to see it!
thanks for everyone who's sending me messages; sorry to everyone i haven't replied to yet.
stay shiny!
j xo
P.S. china is gonna be shutting down vpn's forever, which means i won't be able to communicate apart from whatsapp or email. i won't even be able to blog here. yay. i'm sure i'll find a way around it, but if i do actually disappear, it's just the great firewall of china
