There is so much to say yet so little time......
I am sitting in my hostel in Vietnam sipping on my $0.40 beer, with sweat dripping down my back and attempting to gather my thoughts.
In the past week I have climbed the Great Wall of China, saw the Forbidden City, bungee jumped from the Macau tower, explored China's Las Vegas equivalent and flew down to Vietnam. But that is just a snap shot of the last week of my life. I have only been out of Canada for maybe 10 days yet it feels like I have been gone for months already.
My life has exploded!
Everything I imagined is not what it is. Whatever my preconceived expectations were no longer exist. I have seen things that I never even thought imaginable and met people from all corners of the earth. The scariest thing of all is I can already hear my self uttering the words "I never want to come home." I fear this lifestyle can consume you and send you far away to never never land where you don't have to grow up.
I wish I could upload all my photos right now to give you an idea of the things I have seen and people that we have met but finding a fully functional computer is a great challenge. The keys on this keyboard are so worn off that no letters are visible and the mouse only works when it wants to.
Let me attempt to explain with words...
I flew from HK to Beijing to meet my travel partner Cindy Qu. We met in the Beijing airport and took a one hour bus ride to the heart of Beijing city to her parents home. That night we ate dumplings at her parents kitchen table while Cindy translated our conversation to her mother. My time in Beijing was remarkable. I was completely submerged in the culture and got to live like a local. We took the public bus everywhere. That may not mean much to most of you back home but the public transit in Beijing is beyond anything you can imagine. There are so many people that it is body to body with horns going off all around you and numerous people maneuverings through the sea of cars on their bikes. It is blistering hot (30C with 85% humidity) so Cindy and I are sweating buckets while sandwiched between the other 100 Chinese people on the bus. The public transit system costs $0.40 yuan! That is like a penny is Canada - poor conversion but you know what I mean, basically nothing. Even our train ticket to see the Great Wall of China wasn't even one Canadian dollar
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The Great Wall is something that everyone should see before they leave this earth. You can see it from space but it is much more awesome to walk on. The climb is way more challenging than I thought. In some points you have to use your hands and feet to get up and the way down is so steep that railings were put in to prevent tourists from falling. At the end of our three hour climb Cindy and I sat down over looking the feat we just accomplished and drank a cold beer. Definitely another check off the bucket list.
The next day in Beijing we exploded the Forbidden City and checked out the local night life. There is so much history in China that Canada is a mere infant in its shadow. It is an interesting experience being so submerged into a different culture where your the only white person around and no one speaks your language. Without a personal translator by my side I would have been in a major pickle. Numerous people asked to have photos with me simply because of the colour of my skin. Cindy actually has pictures of people taking pictures of me when I am not looking. Sometimes I think we forget how multicultural Canada really is.
After we saw the major sights in Beijing we flew down Macau for the sole purpose of jumping off a building that measures 734 feet high. It cost a ridiculous amount of money and was over in seven seconds but it was still worth every single penny. Standing with your toes over the metal edge, wind whipping through your hair, looking down at China's Las Vegas with some Kiwi screaming out 5-4-3-2-1 and convincing yourself, in that split second to jump, takes more strength than this Canadian girl knew she had. The symbolism of that jump represents this whole trip. I kept telling myself that I quit my job, sold all my stuff, gave away my kitties and booked a one way ticket to the other side of the earth so this is cheesecake right? Not so much but this life is meant to be lived not observed. We never know when we may have our last tomorrow so living each day to the max is essential. To convincing yourself to jump comes down to one thing - faith. Complete faith in yourself, in the universe, and in the guys who put on your harness. Faith that everything will work out okay and that your feet will touch solid ground again.....
As they lowered me down to ground zero I smiled harder than I have in years. Now nothing is impossible! Nothing is too scary, too high or too intimidating. Cindy and I high fived, grabbed our packs and headed to the airport for the next adventure.
