I peel myself out of bed at about 10, this was after I got back to sleep at 7 when an army of Chinese came into my room and started talking very loudly. No consideration. I get in to the common room and I meet Jan, we head across the road for some breakfast. I got bowser, that is not how it's spelt, but how it sounds. It is like a dumpling with bread and some meat inside, it's a bit dry but otherwise quite tasty! 4yuan for 4, can't be bad to that! Back to the hostel and we are deciding what to do. We get chatting to a couple of Chinese girls and after a bit of table tennis we decide to rent bikes and cycle round the city. I'm a bit scared of taking a bike, but in a group of 4 hopefully I'll be ok. Unfortunately there are not enough bikes and so we end up walking, with the girls being our guides, Yu Yu and Fei Fei. We go to Kuan Zhai Xiang Zi, which is an old street in Chengdu, it is tourist city. So so busy. There is little of the original buildings left, they have all been ripped down and new tourist friendly ones built. In front of them is a canvas showing what the original building looked like. It's nice just wandering through the streets imaging how it used to be. Chinese everywhere taking many photos in front of particularly relevant buildings. There are a couple of streets and we wander through them all soaking up the atmosphere. There is even the famous ear cleaners! That's right, you can pay 30yuan for some boy to clean your ears. We saw so man practically asleep while this bloke was cleaning his ears, the guy doing the cleaning looked more like a dentist, with many instruments and a spot light shining in to the mans ear. My ears get itchy just at the thought of it, I'll pass.
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After this we go for lunch where the girls order us up the usual hot and spicy noodle soup dish. It's a good job I like spicy food because that is all there appears to be here, or at least it is the favourite. We then head to Qing Yang Gong (Green Ram Temple) which is a Taoist temple. Fei Fei speaks quite good English, Yu Yu can speak English but chooses not to, though she understands what Jan and I are saying. Communication with her is through an iPhone app. Fei Fei buys candles and lights them at the various points throughout the temple. You walk through a series of buildings, with different statues inside, lighting candles at the front and back of each building. Fei Fei give Jan and me some candles and incense and we light them and then bow 3 times before placing them in the right area. Normally I don't get involved in such things as I have no idea what I am doing, but as I got direction I decide, why not. I'm not sure what the difference between Taoism and Buddhism is, I think they are similar. There are places where you can pay 100yuan to have a candle lit for a year, to brin you good luck, most of these are lit, and other areas where you can have holy men read your palms and pray for your good health.
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Home time, Jan needs to sort accommodation for the next few
nights. After failing at getting a taxi it is a 10min walk to a subway and then back to the hostel. when we get back there is a dumpling party happening. Let's get involved. It's harder than it looks. Get the pastry, add some veg mixture, then fold and pinch intricately to form the classic dumpling shape. Of course mine look more like classic sausage shapes! Even after lessons from Yu Yu and Fei Fei, though by the end I think I am getting the hang of it. Off to the oven they go, and they come back out 10mins later and it's time to get stuck in. You get a bowl filled with a super spicy sauce mixture and you roll your dumpling around in it before eating. I eat some of my beautiful creations, which causes no end of amusement for the girls, and indeed everyone else at the table. That was dinner sorted, and all for free, a good laugh.
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As has become the norm, we all sit up and play pool until the wee hours. Yu Yu and Jan leave tomorrow. Fei Fei and I are going to go to the pandas. We have decided to go on our own because it is much cheaper that way. We will meet at 9 tomorrow morning, it is after 3, I'm going to be fresh!