Sightseeing with the younger generation - Ah Tao, his cousin Chu Chu, English teacher Toby and translator, Eric, who doubles as driver.
After chang fan - stuffed rice noodle for breakfast we drove along the river and through the countryside in fog or pollution, I still can't work out which, to Chao Zhou. This ancient Tae Choo (my family's region) walled city has an amazing bridge that has recently been overly renovated. The middle half of the bridge comprises about 20 horizontally aligned wooden boats that you walk over. These would rise and sink with the tide. We then walked up the gate tower museum, into Daoist and Confucian temples and then a 1000 year old aristocratic family home - whose hall of ancestors included Shennong - the Divine Farmer, author with the original compendium of Chinese Herbal medicine.
Ah Tao bought me a beautiful book on the city 27kg luggage increasing by the day! Eric the translator bought me a lovely hand made paintbrush from an 86 yr old man. So generous and thoughtful!
Too tired to walk back we took cycle rickshaws back to the car. Next stop Dr Lu, the herbal doctor of Eric the translator. After tea and corn baozi (dumplings) the Dr waxed lyrical with the air of medical authority which I'm already getting to know well. He took my pulse and wrote out a beautiful herbal prescription for my poor appetite and side headache I didn't know I had. Prescriptions in Chinese characters are practical works of art!
Unfortunately this left us insufficient time to visit the only Chinese Cultural Revolution museum based in Shantou which is a real shame.
Over lunch my 2nd cousin Ah Tao, an anti-Maoist, had quite a heated discussion with Eric the party faithful. The others were a little embarrassed and thought it was not good to discuss politics and the past. Funny how my friends and family happen to be anti-royalists in Bangkok and anti-Maoist in China.
Tonight I ate at least half a buffalo in a hotpot dinner! It was saved by the sate, chilli and fried garlic mix. The food until them had been a relatively tasteless and oily. I am definitely more Thai in terms of culture. Must be nurture over nature.
Then just round the corner from my hotel and restaurant a festival to another Shen or god was cracking off. Health and safety is definitely more relaxed or non-existent I'm this huge country. Firecrackers and fireworks were let off on every street corner of an area bamboo sticked off from traffic which didn't stop motos, bikes, pedestrian and even cars passing within 2 metres of explosions! We made it just in time for my favorite, the lion dance.
The evening was rounded (or spiralled) off with a social visit to Ah Tao's Chen Taiji master. Several demonstrations ensued, including my unimpressive LaoJia, punctuating a tea ceremony with a spark - the water was boiled on a clay charcoal buning clay stove.
On the drive back to the hotel we had to dodge the firecrackers! A bit scary!
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