Day 2: Chengdu city

I was overjoyed when I landed in China. It seems at last I have made my
way to China, the homeland of my forefathers. Some friends that I met as
I made my way to Chengdu asked me if I was going to kiss the ground. I
pondered on the idea for a while and then decided it was a little out of
character for me to kiss the ground. Also remembering that I do not have
a hepatitis jab, kissing the ground might transmit some unwanted
diseases. I expected the place to be a bit wilder with cars not obeying
traffic rules and everybody trying to get a few more of my hard-earned
dollars, but I was pleasantly surprised that people it Chengdu were
generally honest and traffic abiding. I was expecting India but guess
nothing really beats India.

One of the first thing that I noticed very blatantly was that my Chinese
is not enough for me to communicate. Yes I could manage 'Where is the
toilet?' but how many times does one have to make their way to the
toilet. Anything more than that I found rather unmanageable. Luckily,
the friends I met will still be in Chengdu for 1 day before flying off
to Lhasa. I can still let them do all the haggling and taxi and the
ordering of food till they leave tomorrow.

Chengdu is a beautiful city - the most beautiful chinese city I have
seen. It has to be since it is the first Chinese city I have been to.
The food is on the spicy side and I got to visit a few cultural temples
and parks. The city is very old and historical but with my kindergarten
level of Chinese I did not get to understand too much about what is
going on. Tomorrow, I will try to make my way to Ermei Mountain on my
own and have not decided whether to walk up the mountain or to take the
bus. Judging from what the others say, I'd probably take the bus or the
cable car up.