Strange, I have never not been picked up by a taxi! I smile and wave one down, they stop and are almost always pretty happy to take a foreigner. My Chinese isn't excellent but I can usually make it known where I want to go and they are happy and usually try to make a little conversation in Chinese. I also tip them because I hear they sometimes don't pick up foreigners so this is a little bit of encouragement!
The rage! The sarcasm! The scathing attitude to all that is Kunming! Even the foreigners that come here are subjected to the rage!
Its just so entertaining! More, more, more! Though you may need some more material.
Subjects I believe not yet covered by BillDan:
People saying "Hello!" to you after you have passed them. If you acknowledge them, they giggle hysterically. People (especially old people) saying "Wai guo ren!" or "Lao wai!" or something similar when they see you. I consider the above two cute but I would love to hear your opinion on them BillDan.
Please, oh please, tell us about your cat and the "veterinarian" you went to. That will be awesome.
You have talked about the food in all of Kunming being terrible, but nothing about the service. I mean come on, any self respecting rage filled cynic MUST be able to create at least 1 tirade on the service!
Anyone think of anything else BillDan can rage at?
You mean Wal Marts? There are quite a few around in KM, 3 or 4 that I know of.
That was awesome!
Bill, I have switched to eating tuna sandwiches... 24 kuai for 2 cans of tuna in sunflower oil from Metro (4 meals for me)... very good Irish cheese - 28 kuai from metro (about 6 meals for me), tomatoes/lettuce/cucumber from any market, bread from Metro is passable and doesn't cost the earth. All up about 15 kuai a sandwich, very hao chi and very healthy! Man, are you stuck in your ways you HAVE to have ham! Bacon must be at least a worthy replacement? The fact you lasted so many years in Kunming is a testament to your fortitude!
Kunming isn't an international city by any standards, lets all admit that. Its got bits and pieces of internationality here and there, but most of us love it because its a bit "rural" in so many regards. Where else do parents hold their kids in a squat position for them to shit all over the footpath? You wouldn't find that behaviour in any city considered international, therefore you also should not expect to find ham!
As for the local cuisine, its quite good if you like spicy stuff, which is what I personally looove. Gutter oil is a little overblown and probably used by a minority of restaurants. The local food is loved by the locals. Kunming doesn't have a big enough international community or local interest in international foods to make it profitable for supermarkets to stock western perishables like ham or provide the expertise on how to store and serve it so you probably can't blame them. In the future, this will probably change, so lets enjoy rurality (?) while we can!
Bill, I think we should start a fund for you to buy you a return ticket for 2 weeks to mei guo! How about that everyone a "Bills Great American Fix" charity?
Wow, Bill is jaaaaaaded!
Bill, if you want some ham, I recommend going to Metro, buying some bacon frying it and using that instead. Or some of the local salami type stuff which is really tasty. Sometimes we have to deal with not having exactly what we want here, but substitutes aren't usually hard to find. That is what happens when you are in a foreign country. If I try to find Yunnan food in my country, its pretty difficult (and I have looked).
The stinky barbecued tofu here is excellent too mmmm.... actually I like the barbecue places where you can cook lots of different things yourself, tofu, vegetables etc. There are some pretty good hotpot places around too, I particularly enjoy some of the frog ones (weird, but really tasty!).
Check out the bugs that they eat here too, haven't tried them yet but apparently very hao chi!
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So fast, so convenient. One star off for opening before the train station stop is connected!
Wow, just wow. Possibly the best Chinese food I have had in Kunming. And in one of the nicest, traditional courtyard style restaurant I have been in. A woman dressed in traditional qi pao playing a gu zheng just adds to it.
We had okra, mushroom soup, dried beef and chou dofu. All top notch with the bill coming in at just over 250 kuai. But we could have fed 3 people for that so not too bad at about 80-90 kuai each. Not the cheapest but for the quality, it's damn good.
If you have people visiting and want to take them to a traditional Chinese style restaurant with Yunnan style food, or want a romantic night out with a gal, you can't go wrong here. Close to Green Lake (down a little alley) for a romantic walk... Just perfect.
Pretty good place for getting all your documents translated and/or notarised. Note that there are a number of notaries in the building which you can find by going up the stairs (the elevators are impossible). But you have to find the stairs to do so... go in the door, head over to the right, go up the big wide stairs which head up a floor, turn right then right again into the elevator area and right again into the stairwells. Whew!
One point off for the elevators never being available and having to hike 7-9 flights of stairs (not good if you have to go 3-4 times a day like I often did!)
This does not stop at the Jinanya hotel at Da Shang Hui as the flyers state (and is on the images tab here). They need to have another stop in the same area or else they are missing out on covering a big chunk of the city.
You can take another bus, the 919C, I believe, if you are nearby Da Shang Hui, which leaves from the bus station on HeHong Lu, nearby the Qianxing road intersection. This bus goes every hour and is white, found at the western end of the station. It is operated by a different company and takes about 1 hour 10 minutes to get to the airport due to a large number of stops especially near the airport.
Great bus though if you can catch it!
Friendly people, even got to the talk to the vice consulate, who told me she had done a stint in Malaysia's Siberian Consulate!
English is spoken by some of the Chinese girls working at the desk who are pleasant to deal with. I assume they do Visa's as well but I wasn't here for a visa, this time!
'No-car day' underlines Kunming's car conundrum
Posted byCall me an optimist but I think once the Subway is up and running there is going to be a substantial drop in car usage and ownership. Its fairly obvious that Kunming has had some major developments of new living/working areas on its outskirts over the past 10 years with nothing built to connect them together (except for the overcrowded bus systems). The result is people somewhat needing to own a car to enable the to get around efficiently. The subway (once full implementation happens) should go a long way to solving the problem provided the integrate effectively with the bus system... lets just hope its that simple (I did say I am an optimist!).
Around Town: Biking the trails of Changchong Mountain
Posted byHi Omgiri, I aren't in Kunming at the moment, returning in September. Will be keen for a ride up there with you if you are still around! Just have to figure out how to get my bike there from New Zealand...
I knew I wasn't dreaming! www.gokunming.com/[...]
A half decent mtb park would be a pretty cheap way and a good start to creating a world class training facility for MTB'ers. There are so many bikers around KM as well that I imagine the manpower for maintaining the trails wouldn't be hard to find.
Around Town: Biking the trails of Changchong Mountain
Posted byHey, where is this trail, it looks like fun! How do you get there? I have biked a lot around Changchong Shan and not seen this one...
Just a random idea... I remember reading a while ago the Kunming government talking about investing some ridiculous sum of money into making Kunming a high altitude international sports location. Was I just dreaming that??
If I aren't dreaming, it would seem like a good option for them would be to section off a piece of Changchong shan and earmark it for a MTB park. I am sure local clubs could provide the manpower and experience to develop the trails, it would just need government sponsorship of the land and tools, which could be dual use with forestry (which tends to be the norm where I am from and works pretty well - the trails get ripped up once every 20 years when the forest is harvested, a good opportunity to make improvements, while the trails provide forestry workers with foot access through the forest). As there are no shortage of both foreign and local riders, it would seem a feasible idea. If it was done to a high enough standard, it could also be advertised as a cheap high altitude training location internationally. Who's with me???
Getting away: Changchong Mountain
Posted byBugger, might have lost that big comment I wrote as I think I got logged out.
I tried the route but was turned around by fake policemen who stopped me from attempting the road I wanted I think due to a quarry doing some explosives work (I heard the booming!).
This map shows the route I took kind of (the blue markers) to the road, then a new route I just mapped out as well. Will be trying this one tomorrow probably... maps.google.com/[...]
Will let you know how it goes. My route from the other day somehow became corrupted on my phone so I can't upload it. I ended up cycling out to a town called Daoshao Cun and then cycled back.
Getting away: Changchong Mountain
Posted byMight head out there tomorrow if anyone else is keen? 8am start, will bike up past the new visitor centre then keep heading north along the tracks. Have checked it out on google earth and it looks quite rideable. Have mapped it out (not in detail!) here: maps.google.com/[...]
Anyone see anything wrong with my route (other than a couple of times not actually being on a road... will have to find my way I think!)?