traditions&signatures

Liu Family Explorations 3

Day 8. traditions&signatures

Hello and welcome to the third episode of Liu Family Explorations. Thank you to all who are commenting and following faithfully with this sometimes-dull blog, even though i don't have lovely pictures as I would like!

Okay, now enough with the formalities. ON WITH IT!

So today, my family went to TongLi. Before that though, we all decided on a list of traditions, because our group is the best and totally the coolest like that.

FAMILY TRADITIONS

To always get a popsicle at the beginning

To always cough like Maya does when we pass a nearby smoker

(Maya is our secondhand smoke alarm. =P)

To always say 'SAN GE~!' when we feel like it.

(inside joke.)

To always save lunch for near last.

To always pose in pictures =)

Anyway, the list will add on and grow over time, i'm pretty sure. Interesting huh? Okay. So like i said, we went to TongLi today, and since we did that we needed to ride a bus to this other bigger bus boarding building place, where we got ahold of a tourist bus that would take us farther away than a normal bus would. This particular bus brought us to somewhere near TongLi, and it was somewhat creepy because there was this STAREY (yes, starey) guy sitting a few rows and he couldn't stop staring. Not that a lot of people don't, but THIS guy was like, O________O

Yup. We were so relieved when he got off before we did, and then after that we munched on our signature stuff. Basically, the things that we always brought and pretty much always ate/drank.

'Signature' Stuff!

Clare: Juice of some sort, mostly OJ

Maya: Sprite

Sean: Coca Cola

Clayton: Hi-Chew (fruit chews)

Alex: Mango Mousse Pocky!!

That should be enough lists to last us awhile.

So after THAT we jumped off the bus at the next stop, which was near a normal bus stop that would take us to TongLi. We just sat down while Clare and Amy went to go look at the big board with all the buses on it. Then we heard this really loud karaoke coming from somewhere, and all of us looked around, wondering where it came from.

IT WAS COMING FROM DOWN THE ROAD. A little boy pulling a man on a simple wagon-like thing with a boombox, and the man was singing with a microphone. Instantly i got up and pretended like I was going to help Clare and Amy look for the right bus, and i heard the karaoke music gradually crawling closer, and Maya, Sean, and Clayton followed me, and most of us hid behind the big board.
Right now the music was REALLY loud, and we hoped that maybe we could disappear behind the board, so that man didn't need to bother us. But we were spotted, and the music got so loud i could feel it breathing down my back. The little boy then appeared behind us, and started tugging on Amy, I think, holding out his little metal bowl and whimpering something that wrenched my heart.

Ugh! I hate how little kids can do that!

OW I CLAMPED MY FINGER!

OWWWWWWWWW!!!

*screams inwardly*

But anyway, what really made me sad was his sunburnt head. The little kid that was probably six or so probably had nothing to look forward in life and had to tug his dad (presumably) who pretended to be lame (it was like mistaking a horse as a mouse) everyday. We gave him a few little coins and Clayton gave him a fruit chew, and the little boy was on his way again, pulling his dad down the empty road.

*sigh*

It sounds like a sad story except the fact that it's actually real.

But putting all that sad stuff aside...*throws lists of sad stories into a fire*

We walked down the pretty-much empty streets of TongLi towards the old town, seeing lots of convenience stores and elderly people. (Maya coughed a lot. =P) Finally we got tickets, entered the Old Town, and looked around a bit.

Well it was like yesterday, a place with stores scattered everywhere selling the same thing over and over again. (Sean complained afterward about why we girls had to stop at every single shop, even though they all just had the same things.) We bargained some again, and this time we found some skinny white angel hair powdery things, like chinese cotton candy. There were peanuts in the middle, so i didn't take any. (Contrary to popular belief, i am not allergic to peanuts any more. I just don't understand how people can like them. Yuck!) it was fun to watch the lady make. She had this taffy stuff, and she stretched it and stretched it and stretched it, from this fat taffy size to spaghetti noodles to thinner than hair! IT WAS AMAZING.

We were also supposed to eat pig thighs/muscles? (Kinda tasted like rock-hard pork.) and this little cake thing, biscuit thing...(meh.) and SMELLY TOFU! (ehhh. was okay...)

But I'll get to that later.

We bargained some more, found an AH-DORABLE KITTEN that Sean had a fun time playing with, and then we went into this little museum place where it was basically empty and quiet and looked like all the other old chinese buildings we were in. We interviewed people too, but they were hard to keep on-task. We left as fast as we could.

Finally we had lunch in a tall tea house, where we ordered food that wasNOTvery good at all. My curry was too salty and the tofu wasn't as smelly as it was supposed to be. I didn't like the tofu much but i figured if i went to a better place and had it there, I would probably love it. Who doesn't like deep-fried tofu?

In the end we got more popsicles and hopped on our tour bus, and then a normal bus, and ran into two other groups (Pam's and Woody's) and had a lovely walk back with all of them. =)

The end!

~~~Reporter Poh