Friday, 27th January 2006

For breakfast we decided on the little cafe/bar across the street from our Hotel. Who knows, maybe the breakfast would be better, plus one of the girls had such a beautiful face. Hey, she got my return! The breakfast was beautiful! The previous evening one of the shoe shine guys had stopped to watch us play cards. He was so interested and had such an awesome happy smile. This morning he was doing his rounds of the city and found us on the cafe's porch and stopped to see if our shoes were ok. My sandals were in fine shape, a little thin in areas but I guess my toe nails could have been a bit cleaner, maybe that's why he kept pointing to my feet.

In the end Judy gave in and had hers polished and glued to perfection.

The day was spent walking around Mengla's outta areas. We began with the 200 and something stairs that took us to the inner mountain top. Here there were many new houses that were trying to overtake the older areas that had been here since who knows when. In the end I'm sure they will win, money usually does. After walking a maze of streets we finally found one that took us down the other side of the mountain. Here we walked a very dirty street towards a horrid factory. Here I found one of the greatest toilets I've used so far in China. You wouldn't take you mother within 100 meters of it!

A brave little girl began walking beside us and she had such a happy smile. She skipped and smiled as we walked. We reached the factory headed back the way we had come. Other kids joined our little friend for a photo session and she happily headed in the other direction.

Whilst walking we stopped to watch some worker women carrying sand and stones into a building site and then up ramps to the top. Unbelievable! They would use a bamboo shovel type thingsmabob and fill baskets. They would then put the basket on their back and head on up the ramp. I bet I couldn't even lift one let alone get one onto my back!

We then headed across the river out into the little villages where we replied to a million 'hellos'. This is my favourite part of travel, the little villages and its people. This is why I love Tianyang so much. I love the houses and the little lane ways. Here I spent 20 or so minutes playing badminton with a boy around the age of 9 or so. If we had more room I'm sure he would have kicked my butt but luckily for me the shuttle kept going over the fence. After our happy good byes we continued our walk and finally made our way to our little 'Snow Cafe' for a couple of beers and about 4 hours of cards before heading to BBQ Street for some meat sticks, potatoes and a few more beers.