Vampire Worms- Yunnan Escapades

After knocking my head on the "too short for me" door, I crept into the little cabin only to be overwhelmed by a giant cloud of smoke emanating from the fire in the middle of the "too small for 11 people" room, where--you guessed it--11 people ended up being.

One of those crazy alcoholic guides motioned for me to come sit next to him on one of the makeshift beds, basically a couple of planks on a couple of logs. I just kept thinking, where am I going to sleep? I was also thinking, I hope I am not sharing a makeshift bed with a crazy alcoholic guide. Then I was thinking, fuck, I really need to sit down. So I sat next to Army Guy, and he gave me a smile, put his hand on my knee and offered me a hit off the bottle.

At that point, all time stopped for about five seconds as I thought about the repercussions of any action that might ensue. Its also important to understand that most Asian men are very touchy with members of the same sex, and I was just hoping that he was breaking my rule and not his own by putting his hand on my knee. There was a lot going on in the little cabin.

Oh well, if I am getting raped by a Tibetan mountain man, I might as well get loaded first. Besides, I didn't have the energy to stop anyone from violating me.

Swig, swig, swig. Ah. refreshing. Burning refreshment. Fuck that hurts so good.

Something was bugging me. I needed to do something, but couldn't quite remember what it was. I wiggled my toe. Ah--the soaking wet shoes that house my soaking wet socks, which are wrapped solidly around my feet.

Off with the bloody shoes. The socks came off like banana peels. My feet looked like giant prunes with raisins for toes. It never felt so good to pull off a pair of shoes.

I took another hit of the bottle and then took out my 5 kuai pen light. I shone it inside my right shoe. Lo and behold, a leech was inching its way around inside my shoe. I picked the nasty little bloodsucker out and tossed it into the fire.

Did he have a right to live? Was I far too brutal? Fuck No. I hate parasites. Let him burn. Nasty little fucker. I found two more in my other shoe. I sentenced them both to the same fate.

Evan found a couple in his shoe. It felt good to throw nasty, bloodsucking leeches into a fiery hell pit. Damn good.

An Honest To God Real Life Shithole - Yunnan Escapades

Imagine if you were in a giant frying pan. Except that the night before someone cooked 2 tons of bacon and now all the hot grease has congealed. Now imagine it isn't grease, but instead mud. Sprinkle potholes here and there full of water. Now two feet in any direction imagine a pile of:
a) horseshit
b) pig shit
c) goat shit
d) dog shit or
e) Human shit (later I left my own contribution)

Now imagine that the mud has over time developed into a concoction of all of the above not to forget copious amounts of animal urine. Now imagine it isn't a frying pan. It is a shithole. A shithole where two or three some alcoholic farmers live. Now all you have to do is walk to the cabin which resting on stilts.

However, being the unprepared fuck that you are, you forgot to bring shoes that are Shithole certified. So, in effect, every step you take is a potential chance at--you guessed it-- "eating shit."

Now, imagine you are me. There I was slipping and sliding on a slipper, crisco-like, shit-urine-mud confection. The goats were laughing at me as it took next to forever to get to the cabin. Then I had to get up to the cabin. That required me to walk a plank with a 40 degree gradient in my freshly shit-mud coated shoes. There was just no easy way to do it to walk that plank.

It was also raining. I just wanted to get inside and sit down.

The Down Hill Run- Yunnan Escapades

There aren't many activities quite as intense as running down a mountain trail. Rather, it is actually like small leaps to hopefully intact patches of stable mountain footing. Why were we running?

2 reasons:

1) Our guide told us that there would plenty of leeches waiting along the trail for us, and leeches suck blood from animals. Humans are animals. My general goal in life is to keep my blood inside my body.

2) Our guides have a recurrent problem of drinking too much whiskey. Therefore, they are alcoholics. Alcoholics have a hard time waking up when they are supposed to. When you don't wake up on time, you start later than expected. that means you arrive at your destination late. In the wilderness that means you have to race against darkness. I am no mountain man, that's for sure.

So we hauled ass down the mountain. We finally made it. Thank the Gods.

The Land of Milk and Honey - Yunnan Tibetan Escapades

Evan and I continued down the path. We kept thinking we were upon some kind of Oasis, or it was going to be just around the corner. It was definitely more than five minutes away.

But alas, we arrived. A small stream was pouring down the mountain, working its way past logs and over rocks, between crevices. I am always cautious about which water is drinkable. I always remember the movies where the thirsty travelers come upon a stream, and just as one is about to engorge himself with copious amounts of water in a frantic frenzy, the wisest of the group sees a dead animal and pulls the foolhardy back out of the water, just in time to save a life. So we decided to wait for the guides to catch up to us, just to make sure. Actually, the worst that would probably happen is that we'd get La Duzi (liquid shits).

Anyhow, Army Guy showed up and assured us that the water was safe. So I frantically filled my "Wahaha TM" bottle and perched it upside down on my lips. I drank and drank and drank. After about half the bottle disappeared, i started feeling sick. I wanted to continue, but i couldn't. It felt miraculous. Stupendous. Ingratiating. But it fucking hurt like a bitch. I kept waiting for projectile vomit to shoot out from my insides. But...nothing. Just glorious misery and miserable satisfaction. Kind of like having and orgasm while someone is punching your sack.

Evan came down and handed me a piece of bread. I wanted to eat but my stomach was saying "NO". I kept fighting the nausea. I put the bread in my mouth. I knew I needed it. A couple of chews. Then rest. Breathe. Chew. Rest. Breathe. I would have eaten it earlier, but I for sure would have choked. Death by sugary Chinese bread? Sorry, but I need a more dignified way out of this life if it is my destiny to die young.

I should die saving a child from a rogue bus, getting stabbed in a sword fight over the honor of some young maiden, or maybe having such incredible sex that my heart burst right out of my chest, blood squirting out my ears in ecstasy. But dying from lack of nutrition, because my dumb ass doesn't know how to prepare for a hike? Jesus, my Boy Scout Master would be disappointed.

No, not for me. I'll make this trip. I might throw up or shit my pants or something silly like that, but dying on a trail in China-nope.

Sucking on Leaves- Yunnan Tibetan Escapades part III

Dehydration, parched lips, dizzy after 20 steps up the trail. After 8 hours of stomping my way up muddy trails, slipping and sliding, I found myself on a a little path leading upwards through some sort of Sherwood Forest looking place. I was completely drained, no energy, and thinking only of how I could get some water in my belly.

The irony was that it was drizzling little bits all around me. I could feel water in the air, on my skin, on my face. I could see it in the air, in small puddles everywhere I looked. The 100 foot tall fir trees were occasionally letting giant drops plummet down on me randomly. Oh, what was that? A drop on my shoulder? I craned my neck to the Rain Gods of the sky and opened my mouth like a little bird. Nothing.

Luckily, I have watched movies, so I knew what do in this kind of situation. I grabbed the nearest branch, wrapped my dirty fingers around a giant chunk of leaves and sucked them dry. Maybe a teaspoonful at the very most. It was really only enough to wet my lips and coat my tongue. I staggered on, dreaming of flowing rivers of clean crystalline water that i could dive into, wrap myself in, indulge. Wild fantasies of underwater ecstasy. Splashing and playing and drinking. Fresh, cool, delicious.

But no. No water for Jason.

I just kept tromping mindlessly along, with no purpose. Every time I thought I would see the top of the mountain, it would just be followed by another set of peaks. No real end in sight. Only facades.

I kept thinking of the old Indian maxim: "If you get thirsty, find a small smooth stone and put in in your mouth." It makes you salivate and won't feel so thirsty. Mind control. But then every time I would look for a rock, I would see a giant pile of horse shit. Buzz kill. Zen me ban ah?

So I kept marching, slowly but surely. Then our long lost guides finally appeared out of a thicket, traipsing straight up the mountain, no path even. Fuckers!

"Do you have any water?"

The guide named Jason handed me a bottle. I opened it and sniffed. Oh, for fuck sake. Vile, nasty ass fucking corn whiskey. I don't want any fucking whiskey, you fuck. I need fucking water. Goddammit. God Dammit. Mei you, mei you.

Fuck, I ain't no mountain man. I can out swim you, and maybe even under normal circumstances, out drink you. But not today, not here. I just need to get to the top of this mountain for some kind of sanity. The realization hit me--no water. No motherfucking water. My swaggering mountain guides let me down.

"How far is the pass? "

"20 minutes, " he said. Fuck. in local time that means about another hour.

Actually, it was only about another half an hour. But I swear to God, it felt like another two hours before we arrived. We marched. Aimlessly. All I know is that I was just moving up towards the sky as best I could. Just one step, then another. Just stepping as many times as I could until I got dizzy. Then I would stop. Fuck being a soldier, but that was all I could do. I was marching uphill. No country, no cause, no patriotism. Just get up that fucking godforsaken hill. Supposedly there was water on the other side.

Forty minutes later, we we reached the pass. The top, the fucking top. What an immeasurable feeling of accomplishment. We just sat there and waited for the other three people. Jason again handed me the bottle of whiskey. Oh, what the fuck. I drank a swig. It was nasty. I thought I was going to puke. Then after about 4 seconds I felt better. A temporary solution. My body wanted to reject a few times, but it put my mind a bit at ease. It gave me a bit of relaxation.

After a few pictures of our first major feat, Evan and I decided to continue on. Mostly in search of water. Jason told us that down the path about 5 minutes we could find water. Music to my ears. However, 20 minutes down the path, we needed to look out for leaches. Fuck man. Little bloodsuckers that sneak in through the shoelace holes. Nevertheless, I'd give up anything, including some of my blood for some water.

Corn Whiskey- The New Human Fuel - Yunnan Escapades Part 2

Beginning of our Trek-

Lynne decided not go with us and headed back to Kunming. Its a good thing, you'll find out later why. She probably would never have spoken to me again.

Wow! What an amazing journey! Our guides are basically crazy Tibetan alcoholics. They stayed up super late drinking the night before we left, until about 4 am. For the most part, they weren't the best guides, but they sufficed. They carried our shit, which I probably wouldn't have been able to do, not being a mountain person by nature.

They spent most of the day either way behind us or way ahead of us, but either way, they were drinking quite heavily. In fact, the most boisterous one, Jason, gave his bottle of whiskey to Evan, just so that he could not drink any more. ha.

The guides at one point decided that we needed to get off the road and walk straight up a steep incline. Personally, I think it was a stupid idea. Why?

1) Wet grass and 2) it was a lot harder and didn't save and time at all. Ho-hum. Fuck. 3) It gave me soggy foot for the next 8 hours.

However, the scenery was good. Evan handed me a piece of fruit, which tasted like some sort of lemon wine vinegar concoction. I couldn't get that nasty taste out of my mouth for two hours. Thanks, Evan.

We stopped for lunch and ate slightly cream filled cookies and flat bread. Thanks to the two awesome Chinese women who were on the trip with us, we got to eat some starburst and cola candy - fizzling in your mouth goodness, and finally some almond chocolate mother fucking kisses.

Jesus Christ - oh shit that reminds me. I had this great idea for a Biscuit-cracker idea. Its Called Jesus Christ crackers, supplying alternative competition to Saltines and Ritz. Commercial is simple--we just show people taking a bite of a cracker and then they get all wide-eyed and emphatically state, "Jesus Christ, those are good." And then they just sell like hot cakes.

Summer 08 Yunnan Tibetan escapades Intro

Today, after a hard sleep, we got up and ate some hard boiled eggs and mianbao, which is basically a giant piece of steamed bread. After that we went to the local Church, whis a Catholic-a bit strange for a Tibetan Mountain village. The churche service was quite different from other church services I have experienced. There didn't seem to be any one person in charge.

Many kids or younger adults were taking turns reading from the Book at the front. maybe 3-5 minutes apiece. Then everyone would chant "Amen" or some other words I didn't understand. Then everyone would sing a kind of song that almost sounded like a chant. Actually, it was a chant. Then back to the reading. Another person would come to the front and read, follwed by more singing. Back and forth like this for over an hour. A few times all the women would sing/chant a few lines.

I didn't realize it until I was sitting there for a while, but i noticed the women sat on the left side and all the men on the right. Curiously, though, i noticed a few of the women sitting on the right side, but still near the center. However, no men sat on the left.

The atmosphere was very relaxed, but also seemed really ritualistic. Everything was done without thinking almost. Very repititious.

I wondered what they thinking. I wondered how their view of Jesus and Mary and God, and alll that bullshit was different than in the West. why did they come to church?

Seems like the church serves as a community unifying process more than anything else. The outside of the church looked every bit like a rundown third world church, except for the two dragons on either corner poking their heads out. Also, hanging inside were two chinese style lanterns.

I asked our host, A Luo (that is his mandarin name), about marriage processes in the village. BAsically, i asked him if its easy for men and women to meet in this village?" There is about 3000 in the village.

He said that now it is pretty easy, but before (some years ago) it was rather hard, and that the families would give introductions. You couldn't just meet anyone you wanted.

I also noticed that for some reason a local pastime is kicking the shit out of a dog whenever they get close to you. The dogs here are hard, man. They have been beaten and trashed most of their lives. They look pretty rough.

Test Run

Well, not really running, but let's just call it a lazy trot.

there you go
handsome little devil, hehehe

Lan Xiao