Wasps
wars
Our
first night with Daniel’s family we are greeted by his dad, proudly holding a
plastic bag. I peer inside to see it’s a wasp nest! I immediately yelp and jump
back, or course. He in turn laughed and handed the bag to his grandchildren,
age 5 and 7. They fearlessly squat down in the kitchen picking the eggs and
wasps out of the nest. I can see some of them still flapping their wings and I
couldn’t bear to watch the rest! Apparently fried wasps are a delicacy in Guilin
and you can sell the wasps for 100 kuai per kg ($15). It is actually delicious!
I got pictures! The kids loved it too, like the dad had to keep moving the bowl
out of the way.
I
asked Daniel how his dad caught them without getting stung and his answer was, “he
has the raincoat.” It took me a minute to realize what he meant. I knew his dad
has bees too, so he must have meant the bee keeper suit, same thing right? I
wouldn’t be surprised if he wore and actual rain coat though, they seem to not
need a lot of the equipment I would think was standard.
Later
that week I got to see first-hand how you hunt for wasps. I almost died of
boredom. We where suposta be on a nature walk exploring the forest, but I ended
up watching for hops. Btw hops is also a local delicacy I got to try, not as
impressive but still not bad. And another clarification ‘hops’ is the chinglish
for grasshoppers, which Daniel fails to see any difference in the terms. So
back to the wasp hunting, you catch a grasshopper and put it on a stick to feed
it to the wasp. The goal is that the wasp will carry the grasshopper back to
the nest. And here is the fun part, we run after the wasp that instantly
disappears into the sky.
So
Daniel gets the idea that he should tie a feather on top the wasp so we can see
it easier. Here is the example of lack of equipment. Daniel decides he will
take a plastic grocery bag, no gloves, no raincoat, just a bag! I told him it
was an awful idea but I was out voted. His plan is that he will catch the wasp
and put the feather around its head and I can pull the tie, hell no! So the
neighbors come out to help as well as his niece and nephew. So I see Daniel
run off on his own and I assume he got stung or something. Me and his nephew go
after him to see if I can help. When I get close I realize he is still holding
the stupid wasp with the feather on it! It seems like his wings are damaged because
it won’t fly away when he lets go. So he picks it up and throws it in the air
again. And of course it LANDS ON ME! I freaked out! And start jumping around
and it falls down my shirt! I’m screaming and shaking it out of my shirt scared
to death I’m gonna get stung and die! And then it falls down and lands on my
jeans! Instead of helping me Daniel LAUGHS AT ME! He tells me after the fact
that he already took out the stinger, but I still don’t care. And I look up the
road and his neighbors are laughing too. I was so embarrassed first off that I was
screaming like a fool and then probably flashed the whole neighborhood.
I
stormed off and marched right back to his house and I couldn’t fight back the
tears when the little girl held my hand to walk back with me. I don’t think I will
ever get used to the Chinese laughter. They laugh in any uncomfortable
situation. I hate being laughed at when I don’t understand what’s going on. Now I
love to make people laugh, when I am in on the joke. But it is very different
to be laughed at. All week I could only pick up on a word here or there and it
was all new customs and I didn’t know how to act. Every time I did anything his
family would laugh; anytime I use my Chinese, eat with chopsticks, make a face
when I eat something new. I know they are just not used to foreigners. But I still
don’t like it.
When
Daniel finally came back the kids had told the whole story to his parents so he was getting yelled
at from all 5 of us! It made me happy.
Mama
sucked my faced
The
most blogable moment was when Daniel left me alone to go hunting with his dad.
I was stupid and somehow forgot to pack any allergy or headache medicine. So I was
dying! I had been fighting a bad headache all morning and by the afternoon it
was unbearable. I cuddle up in bed to try to sleep it off, but the kids keep
coming in and jumping on the bed or trying to get me to play with them and then
the mama would come and shooed them out. One time she came in and saw
tears in my eyes because the pain was so bad.
So
she comes back in with this plastic machine and asks me to sit up and a bunch
of Chinese I didn’t understand. She points it at the center my forehead and I figure
it’s some thermometer or something. It had a plastic cup connected to the top
and you pull the trigger and it sucks the skin into the cup and then detaches
stuck on your face. It pulled so tight that I immediately scrunch my face up
and tears just pour out, then she laughs!
It’s
the same as fire cupping, like in the new karate kid! Its suposta be Chinese medicine,
I’ve had it done on my back before. And they say it is good for you if you
are sick, it will suck out the illness or something. Well I don’t like it. And she
came back to do a second one too! I didn’t have the language to tell her NO,
and I was just overcome with pain. The little boy was the one that finally pushed
the release button to take them off. The worst part is that it leaves a dark burse!
SO I have a knot in the middle of my forehead. Mama says it should only last 2
days but 4 days later I still look like a freak.
It
reminds me of the grey’s anatomy episode where Christina is getting married to
Burke and she tells Meredith, “Mama took my eyebrows!” I wanted to text the
world, “Mama fire cupped my face!” When Daniel came back he burst out laughing
as soon as he looked at me, then silenced quickly as soon as he looked me in
the eye, “well did it help?” That’s the worst part, it kinda did! But I don’t think
the headache went away, I think I just had a more focused pain.
However,
the next day was the weekly market where the whole village goes to
exchange their crops and stuff. So me and Daniel go together and I meet
all his classmates, neighbors, and family members for the first time with a
huge knot on my forehead. He promised me that it was normal in China and
everyone would know it was from fire cupping. But his other little niece poked
me and asked “what happened” as soon as she saw me… fml
Money
hungry buses
The
travel part of vacation is always a hassle, but it is a particular annoyance in
China. The crowds are just redonk! My first trip to Guilin, this time 2 years
ago I took the sleeper bus. The best invention ever! Its bunk-beds on a bus! You
crawl into bed in Shenzhen and wake up in Guilin 8 hours later. However for Chinese
New Year the sleeper buses sold out so we had to take the train back. It was
awful bench seats and just tons of people AND 14 hours to get there and UGH!
So this year I made sure we got the tickets
earlier so we would have beds. Daniel went to Guilin early and I rode with my 2
American friends: Heidi and Sarah. So the 3 foreigners travel to this middle of
nowhere bus station outside of Shenzhen city center. Like the only white people
for miles, crazy sticking out in the massive crowds. We finally get a taxi and
he is taking all back roads and we didn’t know where we were or if we were
gonna get there on time. So Heidi being the boldest of the group, asks the driver
to hurry up. He laughs and looks back at the road. Then Heidi asks again, “why
this way not the main road?” and he answers, “there is traffic.” Then he sighs
heavy and turns on the main road, 3 minutes later we are completely stopped in
bumper to bumper traffic. Like people are getting out of their cars and
walking! So the taxi driver turns to Heidi and says, “Traffic!” I couldn’t help
but laugh out loud. He totally showed us, don’t tell me how to do my job! This
is what he does with his life! Finally he asked us what time our tickets where
for and told us, we better get out and walk after he got us as close as he
could. Lol
Then
we walk into the bus station and it’s a mad house people everywhere and the
three of us each hold each other’s backpacks and squeeze through the crowds. After wandering
around a bit we literally ran into a security guard. I handed him my ticket and
gave him my puppy dog eyes. He instantly started leading us pushing people out
of the way until we cleared the whole waiting room in 3 seconds flat. Then
there were so many buses and people everywhere. He turned to say something to
us in Chinese and I just smiled until he gave up and continued to guide us. He
had to ask at least 6 people before we got to the right bus. Turns out this is
NOT a sleeper bus but a regular seat bus! They gave us some crap about how the
sleeper buses couldn’t get there in time because there was too much traffic! We
were super mad because the regular seats are not nearly as comfortable and the regular
seats are less expensive. I called Daniel to see if he would yell at somebody
for me, but he said it would do no good.
THEN
on the way home me and Daniel were riding together and they gave us a regular bus!
When I pushed Daniel to yell at the driver and he tells us that sleeper buses
are against the law now. If that’s true then why did Heidi and Sarah ride home
on a sleeper bus 2 days earlier? And there were literally sleeper buses right
beside us. So I get mad that the man is obviously lying to our face! But that
was better than his first response when we told them we had tickets for a sleeper
bus. He told us, “It’s ok you can sleep here.” NO! No I can’t, actually! There lies the problem. And there is nothing we can do about it. Daniel asked me if I wanted
him to pitch a fit and get our money back for the ticket but then we would have
no way to make it home. It’s such a trap. Then we get on the bus after I pitch
a fit and the stupid bus stops every hour. We had been on the bus 3 hours and I
notice we are only 30 minutes down the road. It turns out that we are taking
all these country roads and stopping to load food and stuff from the countryside
to bring into the city to sell. So they have some greedy money making scheme
going on. I think they over sold the tickets for the sleeper bus so they just switched
it to regular seats so they could fit everyone and made us all cram our stuff
into the overhead bins so they could have more space under the bus for all
their business items. I’m on to you, buddy! A lot of good it will do me though.
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