Fae Chang Hao

This morning we rose early to catch a taxi to the airport and a plane to our next destination: Xining (pronounced "she ning") After a week of smog we saw blue sky and yellow sun again. It was beautiful. We arrived to 55 degree weather. What a welcome change. It did warm up as the day went on.

My friends met us at the airport. How wonderful to have friendly faces and knowledgeable guides! We went immediately to their BEAUTIFUL apartment. After our adequate lodgings in Beijing, we feel very VIP in their home. They had a homecooked meal for us and we've spent some great relaxing time just catching up.

Later we visited a cafe run by some friends of theirs that offers Tibetan hand-made crafts as well as some great lattes. The people that started the cafe have helped the Tibetans use resources they have in plenty (wool) to create unique merchandise that in turn earns them money and the ability to develop things they want like schools. I love this concept for community development that has the potential of being self-sustaining as they teach the people to create items that are marketable.

For dinner we met family friends and enjoyed mutton served at a night market. Everyone digs into a pot of mutton, peppers and potatoes. It's great to have some Chinese food that I really like after lots of experiments. I'm getting better with chopsticks I think. After dinner we walked down the market and saw many food items we could have prepared for us if we wanted: snails, crawdads, crabs, grubs, etc. We passed. I mean, we had just eaten, so we really couldn't eat anymore as good as the grubs--that were still wiggling--looked.

On the walk back, we saw this man who was making popped corn, barley and rice on the street. His popping contraption made such a loud noise when he put it to work.

Back at our hosts' home we were able to meet their language teacher. She was so sweet and it was great to get to practice my Chinese some more. I learned the phrase that I've listed as the title of this post. It means "fantastic." And that is how I feel about Xining so far. So much more relaxing and a beautiful place with hills and country surrounding the city. We will go explore outside of town tomorrow...