Another overnight train had us arriving in Chengdu at about 6 in the morning to a city clouded in smoke from paddock fires.
Found a mint little restaurant and had dumplings and fried rice for brekkie before heading out to the People's park in the centre of town. Totally cool park, I wandered amongst the trees as elderly couples danced, people did Tai Chi and others were practicing martial arts. Then I came across a line of people with loud music blaring from the front of the line and a warble that would kill a cat. Making way through the crowd I discovered that I had happened upon a karaoke line, yes at 10 in the morning in the middle of a serene park, locals were singing karaoke...only in China.
I was under the assumption that Sichuan hotpot would cure my craving for spicy foods, but alas it was still not what I had been expecting. Nice but not mouth exploding.
The Tibeten quarter of Chengdu was a nice break from the more touristy shopping precincts although I was not impressed at being elbowed in the ribs by a kid as young as 5 who had been dressed up in monk robes and was asking all-comers for money. He literally tried to prevent me exiting a store, whoever is making this kid behave in such a way is screwed and worse still is how that kid will grow up.
Second day in Chengdu and it was pissing down with rain, but I hiked up to the Mao statue before heading to the Wanshu Temple for a vegetarian lunch. I've never seen so many "I can't believe its not meat" products. We totally gauged ourselves before heading to the Giant Panda Research Station.
Thankfully the research station was not as I had envisiged Chinese Zoos to be. The animals had huge enclosures with play equipment and loads of bamboo to munch on. The Pandas are so cool yet so lazy. They eat between 30 and 40kg of bamboo a day and must eat for 16hrs a day, the remaining time is spent sleeping, what a life eh! The video they showed us was rather interesting, someone termed it Panda porn and I would have to agree.
I finally found my spicy Sichuan! For tea I went to a street market and decifered a dish that was called Sichuan beef, oh yeah it was deliciously hot! Ran into the others later in the night and we all headed to an Irish Bar for a few pints of whatever it was Irish people drink. Huge expat bar, rather groovy. Actually all in all I could easily live in Chengdu, gorgeous, laid back city.
Final train journey ahead, overnighter to Kunming.
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