Our week in Mayan

Note: this post is a few days late. I am leaving early due to family matters, so I will not be going to Kangding. Just another reason to return to China, I suppose!

 After 5 days of moving bricks, breaking up clay, securing rebar, bricklaying, and various other tasks, our time in Mayan Village has finally come to an end. To say we had a good time would be an understatement – although it was hot (95 degrees), humid, and hard work, I think it’s safe to say that we all learned quite a bit about life in rural China. The work ethic of the people we worked with put us all to shame. There were a couple of workers whom I remember with particular fondness: Li Shifu ("master" - a term of respect), one of the lead bricklayers. He didn’t say much, but patiently showed us how to spread the mortar so that the bricks would lay level. Wang Shifu (pictured below) was one of the most hardworking people on the site. He pushed countless wheelbarrows full of sand, mortar, and concrete back and forth for hours at a time. Not too shabby for someone who’s 66. I caught him on one of his rare smoke breaks; I asked him if he was from Mayan (yes) and if he was moving into one of the houses when they were completed (he was). I then asked him how to say “pipe” in Chinese, and he thought I was asking him if I could have a smoke on his pipe, which he happily offered. I smiled and politely refused. The Sichuan accent is pretty thick in these parts, so much so that it's almost a separate language from Mandarin. 

One of the most memorable experiences was a hike up the mountain behind the village. We stopped work early and headed up a steep and muddy path. As usual, it was sweltering, but the canopy of bamboo leaves provided relief from the hot sun. Chloe told us that the people who lived on the mountain took this path everyday to get into the village – about 3 km. We encountered a few other people on the trail, one of whom was carrying a birthday cake for his grandmother, who lived at the top of the mountain. Today was her 83^rd birthday. This grandmother was the same person we were intending to pay a call on; she, like many people living on the mountain, had opted to relocate to one the houses we were helping to build. Her old home had been destroyed in a landslide, and she was now living with her daughter at the top of the mountain. They were waiting for the houses to be completed.

After 40 minutes of steady climbing, we finally reached the top of the mountain and Grandmother’s house. She was delighted to have so many visitors (15 of us), and invited us to have a seat on her front porch. After chatting with her for a few minutes, she told us to have a look around at the neighboring houses, now abandoned; the former occupants had left to live down in the valley.

It was like walking into a ghost town. Chairs, washbasins, shoes, and various other items lay forgotten in the vacant courtyards. Small saplings had taken root in the tiled roofs, as nature slowly reclaimed what had always been hers. Chloe said that some of these homes were more than 100 years old. The path continued on – a remnant of the ancient Tea Horse Road, which stretched over 2,500 miles from Tibet to Nanjing. Standing on the path, I tried to imagine how many feet, how many hooves, had passed through here over that past 1000 years, laden with bricks of tea and bags of salt. It occurred to me that the people who once lived here must have left with heavy hearts as they said goodbye to their ancestral homes. I hoped that their new homes in the valley would be imbued with the same warmth and spirit that must have once filled these houses.

I come away from my time in Mayan and China with a better appreciation of how difficult life can be for people living in potentially hazardous areas. In rural, mountainous Sichuan, earthquakes and landslides are a constant danger. Habitat for Humanity China’s mission is to provide people living in these areas with a viable, safer housing alternative that allows people to stay in their home villages. With 150 houses under construction and accommodation for over 1000 people, the people of Mayan have embraced the opportunity to rebuild their village. As for our group, we bonded over long hours of passing bricks, strange cuisine (to us, at least), and the appreciation that we were contributing – albeit in a small way – to fulfilling a global vision of providing people with a “simple, decent place to live”. We were only in Mayan there for a week; but we left with a lifetime full of memories.

I hope to include another post or two about my post-build experiences within the next week. I do want to express my gratitude to everyone who has supported me on this trip - financially, morally, and spiritually. I had a lot of time while passing bricks back and forth to reflect on how fortunate I am to have such wonderful friends and family. You all are wonderful. Thank you.

 Our plans for the week

 Almost to Grandmother's house

 Grandmother and her family

 Abandoned house

 The ancient Tea Horse Road

 Sign for Mayan Village

 Me, Erin, and our fearless team leader, Val

 My amateurish attempt at bricklaying

 Our group and some Chinese high school students and their teachers

 Wang Shifu

Qionglai & Mayan Village

After 30+ hours of traveling, I arrived safely in Chengdu on Saturday. If you haven’t stayed awake for 48 hours before, it’s quite an experience. Somehow, though, I made it to a reasonable sleeping hour – and slept like a rock.

I met the other Global Village team members the next morning. After a quick breakfast, we loaded a minibus and headed to the Wolong Panda Research Center, where we spent the morning up close and personal with pandas - of both the black & white and red variety. The afternoon was spent traveling to Qionglai, our home base for the week.

Yesterday, we were up bright and early for the drive to Mayan, the village where we are building. After a white-knuckled 40-minutes of watching our driver weave in and out of lanes and narrowly passing trucks, scooters, and pedestrians, we were dropped off at the entrance to the village – an old concrete bridge spanning a beautiful stretch of river. We had definitely left the city for the countryside. No high-rise buildings, no traffic to speak of, no car horns. Just humble mud-brick homes nestled amid rows of corn and rice. 

The build site was on the other side of the village. I was stunned at the sheer size of it – the brick skeletons of at least two-dozen houses dotted the valley floor. I later learned that over 200 people would be living in them once they were completed. Workers were busy mixing mortar, laying brick, and pouring concrete foundations. Our crew leaders directed us up a small hill at the back of the project site. The team split into several groups; I joined the bricklaying team and set to work on building a water tank.  

Despite our best efforts, our section of the tank was rather unimpressive – quite crooked, in fact. The shifu – the boss – didn’t seem to mind; he went ahead and finished it later that afternoon.

Our lunch break was the highlight of the day. Not only because of the chance to rest and refuel, but to have a walk around the village and get a glimpse of the daily lives of the people who live here. Our first stop was a mahjong parlor, then Scotty, one of our Habitat China coordinator, took us across the courtyard to where they were making cooking oil. The place smelled like burnt popcorn. They were using rapeseed – slightly bigger than poppy seeds – to make the oil The rapeseed was heated in a furnace, then funneled into a press, out of which came a yellow, creamy liquid. This would later be filtered to produce the final product.

Our final stop in the village was the home of one of the homeowners. The woman on the left in the last photo is 85, if you can believe it. The other woman is her daughter. They were kind enough to invite us all in – and kept wanting to feed us. We politely said that we had already eaten. They used to live up on the mountain, until a landslide and destroyed their home. They now live in a small house in the village, waiting until their new home is finished. The landslide destroyed many homes – and is what prompted Habitat to work with the government to build safer homes in the valley.

After lunch it, we formed a line and started passing bricks from a never-ending pile (thanks to frequent deliveries by a huge front-loader) to be stacked around the foundation. The sun decided to finally show its face, making us drip with sweat as we passed and stacked 15 lb. bricks. After a couple of hours of doing that, it was time to leave and go back to Qionglai for dinner and a cold shower.

 

 

Apologies for some of the strange formatting - I'm discovering that Blogger can be a pain when inserting photos. Stay tuned for more updates!

Back to China

After a nearly 5-year hiatus, I'm happy to say that this blogger is back in action. Starting on Saturday, I'll be chronicling my sophomore trip to China - this time to Sichuan Province. For the first half of the trip, I'll be working with a team from Habitat for Humanity to help rebuild homes that were destroyed in the devastating 2008 earthquake. HFH is something very near and dear to my heart, so when the opportunity to volunteer with HFH China came along, I eagerly signed up. I'm really looking forward to working alongside families as we build, brick by brick, safe and sturdy homes.

After the build, I plan to head up into the mountains of Sichuan to Kangding, the gateway to Tibet. I'll spend a few days exploring the area, then it's back down to Chengdu, Sichuan's capital, for pandas, face-changing opera, giant Buddha statues, and lots and lots of kung pao chicken and dan dan noodles.*

Leshan Giant Buddha (source: yangtzeriver.org)

It is my hope that this blog helps spread the word about the good work Habitat is doing around the world. As much as I would like to update this blog everyday, we'll be in some places where internet access is spotty or non-existent, so posts may be intermittent. Stay tuned!

Finally, I'd like to say a great big 谢谢 (thank you) to everyone who generously donated to HFH China. Your support made this trip possible, and is helping hundreds of families in China have a "simple, decent place to live."


*According to Wikipedia, Sichuanese food is so tasty, UNESCO declared Chengdu to be a "City of Gastronomy" in 2011. Or to put it another way: Sichuanese food is "the Spice Girl among Chinese cuisines, bold and lipsticked, with a witty tongue and a thousand lively moods" (so says chef Fuchsia Dunlop, in an interview with NPR). 

Nevermind...

It would appear that my photos have returned... from wherever it is they went. As such, please disregard my previous post.

Where'd all the pics go???

As much as I would like to give a proper update to this blog, time does not permit me. That being said, I would like to comment on the recent disappearance of photos from my blog. Since I am by no means a computer geek, it's a mystery to me where they all went... perhaps to photo purgatory, or Harrisburg (I've spent a lot of time waiting for buses in Harrisburg - maybe that's what they're doing). Hopefully sometime soon I will have a spare minute to investigate and restore the pictures to their rightful places, but for now, this announcement of my bafflement will have to suffice.

Working in a Library

For the past six weeks, I've been working at Nimitz Library at the Naval Academy. I've been working at libraries since high school, and as most people can imagine, it's definitely not the most exciting job out there. There's nothing spectacular in shelving books or standing in front of a wall of books, painstakingly reading each call number to make sure they're all in order. The Library of Congress cataloging system is a mind-numbing series of letters and numbers, arranged in complex series and combinations that the average library-goer finds hopelessly indecipherable. For instance, does G124.R32 2003 come before or after GA121.S53? (for the answer to this question and more about the LOC catalog organization, please visit the LOC's Catalog and Aquisitions page).

And don't even get me started on periodical titles... if a journal has on its cover "U.S. Maritime Safety and Security Council Proceedings," (an actual journal title) one would logically presume it would be found under "U." Not so. It's actually filed with the "P's", with the title "Proceedings of the U.S. Maritime Safety and Security Council." I feel sorry for the poor soul who comes into the library expecting to read all about foreign trade vessels and the security of U.S. ports, and is left scratching his head in confusion in the "U" section, wondering where his journal has gone.

Despite my frustrations with the organization of library materials, I've really enjoyed my time at Nimitz. Not so much the work, but the people I worked with. The Circulation department has some really awesome employees. There were my two other fellow student co-workers, AnneMarie and Grace, my super-cool supervisor, Sam, Howard, who's been working at Nimitz for 30 years, Larry, a retired Navy corpsman, and Carmelo, a retired Gunnery Sergeant. All of them were a lot of fun to work with. What's more, Larry and Carmelo had some pretty awesome stories about their days in the Navy and the Marines.

I had shifting duty with Carmelo, moving journals around, so I got to hear a lot of his stories. Carmelo really is an amazing guy - he's a third-generation Marine (his grandfather was a Navajo codetalker in WWII), Force Recon, served three tours in Iraq, 2-time Purple Heart winner, and Navy Cross recipient. That's a track record that demands respect. Yet rather than being one of those Marines who can't seem to find the "OFF" switch and treat people like they're a bunch of new recruits, he's a really funny, down-to-earth guy. He called me "Pvt. Pyle" (I told him a few stories about my adventures in ROTC) and threatened to IPT me if I gave him any sass, which I always did. He even gave me homework one weekend: to watch "Full Metal Jacket."

It's amazing what I heard and learned from him during our shifts together, especially about leadership and accountability. Marines have this aura, this overpowering sense of honor that makes you want to be a better person... at least they have that effect on me. That doesn't mean that I want to go green - hell no. But I can definitely take a point or two from what I've learned from Carmelo (and others) and try to apply it to my own life.

Monkey Poo On My Shoe

Whew. I see it's been quite a while since I've written anything. It's been a busy month- end of classes, traveling around Tibet, saying goodbye to my host family, flying home, and most recently, getting over some serious jetlag. It feels really good to be back in the States and back to sit-down toilets, inwardly-opening soda cans, grass (the kind that you have a picnic on), cereal, waffles, steak, (relatively) clean air, and everything else that I've spent these past 4 months pining for.

My 2 week trip to Tibet and Nepal was incredible. Definitely one of the coolest things I've ever done. Tibet was unlike anything I'd ever experienced before. The people, the culture, the religion, the scenery... whether it was the bright smile of a Tibetan monk, the incredible architecture of the Potala Palace, or the long, bumpy road to Mt. Everest, I was in a constant state of awe and amazement.

We visited a lot of Buddhist monasteries - so many that I lost count. While it was really easy, in the words of Jon, to get "Buddha-ed out" after seeing so many, I could still feel a sense of sacredness within their dim, candle-lit interiors. Each time I crossed the threshold of a temple, I felt like I was entering a sanctuary, escaping from the chaos of the outside world. Pilgrims in ragged, dusty clothing filter in and out, prayer wheels and beads constantly in motion as they murmur the words Om Mani Padme Hum ("Hail the jewel in the lotus") before statues of the Buddha. The air is thick with smoke and the distinct, heady smell of yak butter candles. Murals of Buddhas and other deities gaze benevolently (and sometimes even angrily) at you as you make your way around the room. Countless gilded statues in glass cases and books of sacred texts line the walls. Monks sit in the corner, collecting donations and quietly recite scripture. Even for a person who isn't Buddhist, I could really feel a spiritual charge in the monasteries.

In terms of superlatives, the coolest place we visited had to be Everest base camp. It's a 4km walk from the end of the road to base camp, but at over 18,000 feet, it was slow going. The season was just about over, and only one expedition was left - they had started climbing only the day before. We were fortunate enough to have a relatively cloud-free view of the mountain, so I was able to get some decent shots with my camera. The wind was really strong, making me regret only bringing a lightweight nylon shirt. Still, it didn't detract from the awesome spectacle rising up before me. Sunset

The coolest thing we did was sitting on the roof of a bus for 40km on the road from the China-Nepal border down to Kathmandu. What a great way to travel. No seats - just hold onto the grill and pray the bus doesn't make any sharp turns. We passed other buses whose roofs were packed with Nepalis who liked to throw fruit at us (for eating). The road was barely wide enough to accomodate two cars, so it was always a hair-raising experience when the driver made a turn around a blind curve and there was a truck on the other side. There also was the occasional low-hanging branch that you had to look out for. This was one instance where I was glad I was short - they always cleared my head, but Jon, who was sitting behind me, would get a mouthful of leaves.

The grossest thing I experienced was in Kathmandu, at Swayambhunath, or more commonly, "The Monkey Temple." These monkeys are deceptively cute... they wait until you're not looking, then they grab your bag and run off with it, which happened to one of the group members. My experience, while much less distressing, definitely left me (specifically, my foot) smelling pretty bad. I was walking down a path, not paying attention to where I was stepping, and squish. "Uh, you just stepped in a giant pile of monkey crap," Jon dutifully informed me. I lifted up my left boot. Sure enough, there was a foul-smelling mess covering the sole. Despite stomping vigorously on grass, gravel, and every doormat in Kathmandu, it would not come off. It was like glue (must be all those fruits and nuts that monkeys eat). Even after 3 days, my boots still reeked. I'd be sitting at dinner with the group, and every once in a while, we'd all get a nice big whiff. I double-bagged my boots for the plane ride back to Beijing, and it took 20 minutes of hard-scrubbing to get the stuff off of just one boot. And they still stink.

Many other adventures - such as almost missing my flight back to China due to visa issues, altitude sickness, running out of money (Jon), trying to mail a yak skull from Lhasa, Tibet to Wayesboro, PA, and one particularly nasty bout of food poisoning - happened during those 2 weeks, but this post is long enough already. Pictures are forthcoming.

To end this post, I just want to say that the trip wouldn't have been nearly as much fun if Jon hadn't decided to come along. To quote a Dave Matthews song, "It's not where but who you're with that really matters." Jon made me laugh when I was stressed out, took care of me if I got sick (and vice versa), and always made sure that Joe the Penn State Lawn Gnome was prominently featured whenever we took a picture of a famous landmark. So thanks, Jon, for being such a great travel partner. You really made my trip.