Travels of Gabe: Qing Ming Trip Pt. II: Hot Spring and Emei-Shan

I would have mentioned the hot spring in my last post, but Blogger is a real pain-in-the-ass when it comes to working around attachments. Regardless,

After being driven to Emei-Shan, we got acclimated with the bottom of the mountain and hotel, visiting two temples (one of which had, rather 18 monk statues, five hundred) and an exhibit on the Emei-style kung-fu. It was developed by monks (I assume) using the movement of monkeys as inspiration... very fascinating. I didn't take any photos of the exhibit since I wanted to save my batteries for the top of Emei-Shan, but it was pretty damn cool (though small).

Something worth mentioning: when I first walked to the very foot of the mountain, I grew very uncomfortable. Directly in front of me was a pagoda with a bell, statues, etc. and to my right was a giant fountain - typical museum/tourist park stuff. But when I looked to my left, at a gate to a hotel, I suddenly felt this rush of deja-vous. I've never been there before, but everything felt too familiar. Like I was re-learning something I had forgotten. I walked around for a good twenty minutes before I felt like I wasn't dreaming anymore. We then visited two large temples/monasteries and got dinner.

It was in a two-minute span of time after dinner that I decided again not to eat meat anymore. Though I was fully aware that the restaurant we were eating at kept some of their dishes outside - alive, in cages, I wasn't fully aware of their contents. I love the taste of rabbit, and I've been inhaling it in excess. We even had rabbit for dinner - and then we walked outside, this time through a door closer to the cages. Inside one of the cages, next to the chickens and fish, two rabbits were huddled. They looked so dead inside... like dread had consumed them, and they had lost the will to fight their fate as unnecessary human feed. So dead, and so sad. I wanted to buy one, both, save them from imminent death - but I would have had nowhere to keep them and nowhere to set them free without dying/being caught again. Fifteen seconds after this thought, I saw a man beating the shit out of a fish - slamming it against the ground in a net. SLAP... SLAP. I feel sick now.

I was able to relax a little at the hotspring we went to... it was raining lightly (hotspring was outdoors), and after driving to the first spring, we discovered that the heater had just broken. So, we went to another more expensive one. I knew that it was more than possible Ken and I would be the only foreigners there - and to my knowledge, we were. Green paid our entrance fee, and gave me a waterproof-electric-key-bracelet and a clip to put on my shoes so I could check them in the locker room. After checking my boots and slipping into some rubber sandals, I went to my locker - which was very annoying to open, since my handle was broken - and inside was a towel and a robe. Got ready, threw on my makeshift bathing suit, and looked for Ken.

Most of the hour or so we were there, we got many curious stares and people often outright avoided us. It took me 20 minutes to work up the balls to sit in one of the smaller therapy pools (one of which was purple, one of which was green). Other than that - it was AWESOME. One of the coolest things I've ever done! Why don't we have hotsprings at home? They would be so much more popular than regular swimming pools.

The following morning, we woke up, got a free breakfast (egg sandwich yeah!) and ran to catch the bus to the top of Emei-Shan. Green told us that it would take two hours to get to the top of the mountain, but I believe it took longer. First was about an hour-long bus-ride on a long, inclined, winding mountain road - the curves were intense, the driver seemed pissed, and two people were throwing up, one of which was in my row of seats. I felt pretty sick myself, but mostly in a really tense not-want-to-die-today kind of way. But we made it alive, to another gate. Bought more tickets, walked about two miles to the lift, waited in line for 20-30 minutes, and finally arrived at the top of Emei-Shan.

It was foggy, and apparently had snowed the night before. Though it was very cold, and very difficult to see, I felt like I was in a real-life heaven.

Here's what the statue looks like without fog.

Six-tusked elephant representing Sakyamuni (the Buddha).

Me, dying, in my 20-yuan rental coat.

A woman was allegedly thrown off of this cliff, after which her lover followed her.

Multitude of locks left by lovers.

Locks left by lovers.

(Fuck Blogger's shitty formatting!!) After grabbing some over-priced food, we waited 45 minutes for the ski-lift thingy - which is actually when I started having fun! We shared tongue-twisters with each other, learned a lot of words, then RAN at the lift. The first time people sprinted to the lift to get a good spot/out of line
, I was pretty distressed - but I couldn't see the huge smiles on everyone's faces from my crappy place. With a roar, we all rushed forward, laughing as we managed to get three of the few seats on there. The view was excellent despite the fog, but I was saving my battery.

We caught another bus for an hour, where I worked on memorizing more vocabulary. We took a smaller ski lift pod, made (I believe) in Austria - they were very quick and compact, and we worked our way towards another monastery - it had one of the oldest temples on Emei Mountain. Of which dynasty, I don't remember, but I believe it was 1,300 or 2,000 years old. After that, we walked several more kilometers to see the monkeys.

I'm going to let my pictures speak for me from this point, but I'm sure you'll be able to figure out what's what. :)