China Day 9

Our time in the People’s Republic of China is quickly coming to an end and today is our last official day here. Our itinerary said we had a free morning before catching our flight to Hong Kong and since London and Emmy had requested to see pandas and we hadn’t seen any yet, this was our final chance! So we braved the streets of Guilin sans guide to get to the zoo. The zoo is located in a very large, very beautiful park called the Seven Star Park. We are now confirmed that we did the right thing by having private guides and private drivers this whole trip because without one, we were lost. A “goat rope” as Stevie called it. A confusing mess of communication and the feeling of getting ripped off with nothing we could do. But at last we made it to the pandas!

There are three pandas in the park, all females, two that live together in one pen and one in another. Apparently the two that live together were the ones used to promote the Beijing Olympics while the one in its own pen is considered something of a celebrity as she is considered a very beautiful panda (I guess she won the panda beauty contest!) She is often used in ads and in movies because of her beautiful face. When we saw her she was having breakfast so she had crumbs all over her face – not the most elegant of eaters. But they were a treat to see, especially in their native China. We also saw some adorable red pandas and some monkeys before we had to head back to the hotel to get ready for our ride. Unfortunately as we were leaving, we also saw that they had some white Bengal tigers that we missed.

The adorable red pandas

Native dress of one of the minority peoples.

Our guide picked us up early for the airport so that we could stop by a tea plantation on our way to the airport. Guilin has a tea research institute that grows its own organic tea so we were able to see the tea plants before having a tour of how tea is made and then a demonstration of a tea ceremony. It’s actually very interesting how you get the different kinds of tea – the white tea is the very young, baby tea leaves, the green tea is picked as a little larger leaf and always in clumps of 2 leaves together. The oolong leaves are a little bigger and then the black tea is even older and larger. And then there’s a difference in the amount of fermentation of the leaves.

Emmy with tea leaves and flower.

This is one of my favorite shots of the whole trip!  We look like we have halos!

They demonstrated the process of making the white tea by hand roasting the tea leaves for a few minutes and then kneading them and then baking them to dry them.

After the tea lesson we were treated to a Chinese tea ceremony which is very different from the Japanese one. Our guide reminded us that the Japanese tea ceremony came from China! It a very delicate, distinct way of making a tiny pot of tea with matching tiny tea cups. The tea ceremony is more for “tasting” rather than “drinking” so each cup is no more than a dribble drop.

You are supposed to tap the table 3 times to say thanks (no words) and then pick your cup up like this if you’re a woman…

Or like this if you’re a man…

Then you’re supposed to smell the cup by moving it from right to left, admire the color by lifting the cup down and up and then sip the whole thing in 3 sips (1 sip means you’re a water buffalo, 2 sips means you’re a donkey). More than 3 sips is ok if the tea is too hot for you. The process of brewing the tea was detailed too. Pouring boiling water in the pot first, then add the tea, then pour in water, then strain that tea out, then pour in water again, wait 1-2 minutes, pour the first batch of tea over the pot (which is made of clay) and when the pot dries out, the tea is ready. I hope I can recreate the process at home! We tried four types of tea: a white mountain tea (harvested high up in the mountains), an oolong with ginseng, authmenthus tea (which is flavored with the flowers from a tree they have around Guilin) and a tea that had been pressed into a hard brick form (it can last 20-30 years this way).

Osmanthus tea - those are tea leaves, not flowers.

A block of very expensive tea!

A sip of tea.

The kids' favorite part of the tea ceremony was when he demonstrated the "pee-pee pig".  It's a clay pig that he had soaking in a glass of cold water.  When you pour hot water over its head, it pees!  Yes, we walked away from the store with 3 of them (gifts from the shop for the kids since we bought so much tea!)

From the tea plantation we headed to the airport and flew to Hong Kong. My idea was to dash into the city, just to see it, but by this part in our trip we’re a little pooped and when my dad said it was a forty minute, high-speed train ride into the city, we opted for room service and a leisurely last meal with mom and dad.