Portrait of an LBX

By Evan

I just wanted to write a quick post to let everybody know what’s going on with us. The more substantive posts about our LBX activities will be coming soon. Thankfully, the weather cooperated with us on our last three cycling days (all over 100 km — real killers), and we pulled into Shenzhen right on schedule. Thanks to Andy’s friend Marissa and her roommates Arte and Alex, we had a comfortable place to rest in the old deep ditch (深圳). Yesterday morning bright and early we passed into the bright light of Hong Kong with a day to spare on my residence permit, on a dedicated mission to crank out some long term visas.

We had heard that six month visas were possible, and accordingly we cut a B line to the visa agency of Linda Hui. Mrs. Hui told us that US nationals could indeed process 6 month visas, and French nationals 3 month visas, but with one prickly little caveat: we have to leave the country every 3o days (每三十天都必須出境), no exceptions at all. In a panic, we ran to several other visa agencies, called everybody we knew, and generally freaked out. In the end, the owner of our hotel processed a 3 month, no required exit visa for Alexis for 400 HKD (~$51 USD). Being a US citizen, I was forced to accept a very bitter solution: 6 month tourist visa, 30 day stays, 1700 HKD ($220). This, of course, means that I will have to take a bus from wherever we are to Shenzhen every god$@*& #*~’ing 30 days to walk across the border, buy a sugar free Oolong tea in a 7-11, and walk back across into Shenzhen. The words “arbitrary” and “wasteful” were flashing before my eyes as I accepted the stupidest of solutions before dowsing my anger with expensive beers (what was I just saying about “arbitrary” and “wasteful”?) with Andy and our old pal Drayton. (more…)

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Jour 144 (12/02/10)

Luxi(芦溪)

Province du Fujian(福建省)

Etant donné la journée crevante d’hier, nous faisons aujourd’hui la grasse matinée. Lorsque nous sortons, les filles du patron de l’hôtel insistent pour nous accompagner, de peur que l’on ne trouve rien: ni où manger, ni quoi voir. Nous réussissons, non sans mal, à nous en débarrasser, pour aller prendre quelques baozi sur une étal du marché encore très animé, puis partons vers le tulou le plus proche.

Marché de Luxi (1)

Marché de Luxi (2)

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By Evan

Time to make up a little lost time. After our time in Anxi, we spent some really glorious days meandering around Xiamen, which I swear is China’s most charming city — that I’ve visited — bar none. If we were urbanists and not LBXists, as it were, I’d spend an entire post writing about how we got lost in the old city’s dense, pulsing alleyways the way men lose their souls in a beautiful woman’s long hair. Alas, our quest is for LBXes, and after only three days Alexis returned from his visa run to Hong Kong, obliging us to part from that beautiful city. [Andy's pics of Xiamen here]

On our first day out of Xiamen, torrential rain stopped us short in Zhangzhou (漳州), a rat hole of a city, where successive sicknesses encumbered us for two days. At least it was in Zhangzhou that I got to see my Saints roll to a Super Bowl victory via a friend’s NFL.com subscription (thanks to Weiwei and Travis!). Three days later than expected, we rolled out of town toward the northwest and the land of the tulou (土樓), or as they ought to be called in English, round earthen castles.

Inside the tulou of Xiazhai. Photo by Andy

That day out of Zhangzhou, I lost three tubes to lesions in the same spot on my back wheel (one before even riding on the $@*# thing) before realizing that my rear Schwalbe Marathon XR, “the ultimate expedition tire,” had been ruptured severely. I threw it away and put on my spare, but seriously, I want my $55 back. Needless to say, that cost us loads of time, and we got only as far as the small town of Xiazhai (霞寨鎮), where the following day I was sick to the stomach… again. As I lay in bed listening to the same five Spring Festival songs on endless repeat at max volume (there will be brutal violence next time I hear the gongxi gongxi gongxi ni [恭喜恭喜恭喜你!] song), Alexis wandered out and found a surprise: a tulou right in Xiazhai, way ahead of schedule. (more…)

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Jour 141 (09/02/10)

Zhangzhou(漳州)-Xiazhai(霞寨)

Province du Fujian(福建省)

- 65km -

Cette fois-ci, c’est bon! Nous nous levons à 7h, le ciel est clément et aucun de nous n’est malade. Nous quittons la charmante Mademoiselle Cai (蔡小姐) qui travaille à l’hôtel, allons prendre un café au Mc Do, et reprenons enfin la route.

"Payer ses impôts conformément à la loi est un honneur"

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By Evan

Yesterday as we made a rough 90 km cold, rainy push from the charming — if dilapidated — old town of Chayang (茶陽鎮) south through some amply steep mountains, the last we ought to see for probably a month, something I’ve read recently popped into my head. For background, I believe I mentioned in a post some months ago the importance of geography to politics and culture after we had crossed the desolate wasteland of the North China Plain (華北平原，古稱中原). The great flatland surrounding the Yellow River, the “cradle of Chinese civilization (中華文化的搖籃),” has apparently always been extremely susceptible to sweeping political or cultural changes since the entire area is flat enough to allow for rapid horseback transit within its boundaries. As such, the language, ethnic makeup, and culture of the areas within the plain are largely identical. While that makes trade and communication vastly more expedient, it also allows for easy conquest by armies of whatever marauding warlord happens to be strong at the time and subsequent assimilation into whatever said warlord’s imperial imagination can conjure.

I can’t speak to what China looked like a hundred years ago, but I do know that the North Plain now has been the victim of several quite overwhelming imperial edicts (詔) over the previous decades, the Great Leap Forward and Scientific Development to name the two that come most to mind most quickly. Since there’s literally nowhere to hide from such movements on an open plain close to imperial power (China’s capitals have by and large been in the plain for the last two thousand plus years), the whole place is, as we found it, a dusty, polluted Mad Max-like dystopia (with Chinese characteristics, of course). It was thus with great relief that we arrived at the northern boundary of South China’s sprawling mountain ranges (take a look at this map) after our stay in Shanghai, even if it meant slower progress. (more…)

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Jour 138 (06/02/10)

Xiamen(厦门)-Zhangzhou(漳州)

Province du Fujian(福建省)

- 65km -

Après un petit dèj de baozi et un petit café, nous sommes enfin prêts à partir. Dans une ruelle, un vieux lbx me demande ma nationalité:

• “你是哪国人？” (« Tu es de quel pays? »)
• “法国人！” (« Je suis français! »)
• (entendant cela, un autre lbx, lève le pouce) “法国好！法国戴高乐将军很棒！” (« La France, c’est bien! Le Général de Gaulle était génial! »)
• (flatté) “对，很棒！谢谢！” (« Oui, il était génial! Merci! »)
• “他们也是？” (« Eux aussi sont français? »)
• (je réponds d’un ton ironique, que le lbx ne perçoit pas) “不，他们是美国的！美国人不好！” (« Non, ils sont américains! Les Américains sont pas bien! »)
• “美国人也有好的！” (« Des Américains, y’en a aussi des bien! »)
• (encore plus ironique) “可是他们卖武器给台湾！” (« Mais ils vendent des armes à Taïwan! »)
• “哦！这个不好！不好！” (« Ahh! Ça, c’est pas bien! C’est pas bien! »)

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A girl flashes us the ubiquitous peace sign as we walk back to our hotel after checking out Luxi Town's tulou.

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A man carries his granddaughter piggyback through the courtyard of Luxi Town's Zhibi Tulou (植碧楼).

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By Evan

Ok, this will be a short one, just to let you know that we haven’t died in a horrible rice wine / fireworks accident over CNY.

As I write now, we’ve crossed the border of Guangdong from Fujian, which is arguably the most colorful province we’ve visited so far (in really tight competition with Zhejiang). We’re currently sitting deep in Hakka (客家) territory in an old town called Chayang (茶阳镇), with an old section that seems to have once been very beautiful but is just rotting to pieces before everybody’s uncaring eyes. Other than that, these Hakkas have a unique (that I know of) tradition of hanging red lanterns (红灯笼) over their doors with the family’s last name printed on them. Very cool, but I digress. (more…)

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Jour 132 (31/01/10)

Anxi(安溪)-Xiamen(厦门)

Province du Fujian(福建省)

- 90km -

Le but aujourd’hui est de pédaler jusqu’à Xiamen (厦门), appelée aussi Amoy. Nous faisons alors tout pour y arriver le plus vite possible. Lever tôt, petit-déjeuner tôt, et nous repartons sur la départementale.

Vieilles maisons sur le bord de la route (1)

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