Hey Hey and a Big G'Day toya,
 
It's been a weekend full of a bit of this and a bit of that and not much in between.
 
Friday night I was supposed to head to the Teachers College to watch a Halloween performance and I was getting quite excited about it too as I was hoping to finally meet the other four foreign teachers that are supposed to live here. I've been here for over two months now and with the amount of walking I do each day and weekend you would think that I would have run into at least one of them, especially in a tiny mountain city such as this.
 
I mean, we have only one main road.
It is a rather long one main road but there is only one of them.
Along that rather long one main road there is only a small section of 'shopping'.
And that small section of shopping along the rather long one main road is right where I live.
 
In the end I missed the performance as I was talking to Luo Wei on the phone and as her mother has been staying with her along with her long working hours we really haven't had a good chat all week, just a quick 'good night pumpkin cakes' kind of thing. After we hung up I realised that the Shangzhou Halloween Extravaganza was over by a few hours so I ended up down at the night food market drawing pictures of Ghouls and Goblins with my noodles.
 
Saturday, we might as well skip Saturday (and I wasn't even sick).
Saturday was spent curled up on the couch from mid day until three Sunday morning watching dvds.
 
Dekker the Trukker, War Inc, Fire Birds, Mummy III, Postal, Married Life, Sarah London Phantom Hour, Otis and Flood. I did start Then She Found Me but I couldn't quite grasp Helen Hunt. Where is the rest of her, she looks so frail and thin. So much so that I could watch the movie as it made me sad each time I saw her face. I then started Kabluey and didn't make it past the first ten minutes.
 
The two picks of the night were War Inc and of course Mummy 3.
Married Life was cool and Postal was awesome.
 
As most probably know it is not often I actually sit to watch a movie but a few weeks ago I found the dvd store and purchased around eighty to one hundred movies for about fifteen Aussie dollars. So far all of them have worked and have been great quality. The only problem is there are about ten movies on each disk so once you put A or ONE movie on, when it finishes you sit back and wonder what the next movie will be.
 
After about ten for fifteen minutes you think, Hey I've watched this much might as well continue!
Next thing you know it is dark and you are in the kitchen making instant noodles for dinner!
Next thing you know you are on the couch eating your instant noodles re-glued to the telly.
Next thing you know you are thinking, Man I'm in China eating instant freakin noodles
Next thing you know it is three in the morning and you've just watched eight movies.
 
This morning when I woke up I thought to myself, it's Sunday and Sunday is an adventure day. It's a day to go hunting down a Mummy or two but as I'm no where near Egypt or even the Great Wall for that matter I decided to simply walk along the river and say Hellow to all the pretty Chinese Mummies playing with their 'child' instead. As I was walking I thought to myself, how cool is life when you can actually say that you live an hour away from the 'real' Terracotta Warriors and the emperor who created them.
 
If I really wanted I could jump on a bus and be at a part of the Shaanxi Great Wall in under ten hours!
I think that's a bit of a trip as well.
 
I was actually going to go back to the dam and take the ferry across to the little island I skipped last weekend but some how I found myself on the other side of the river walking through some fields to get to a little village I had spotted a few weeks ago. Ferries, islands, fields, villages, whatever they are all the same! Hahahaha! As I was walking through the fields I came across a little boy with a hand hoe helping his mother and grandmother...I could say plough but it was more like he was trying to sever their hands from their wrists.
 
It was like watching an 80's horror Flick!
 
Thankfully the legendary Rick Baker was out to lunch and mother Wang over powered Evil Hoe Hacking Boy before he could begin his evil killing spree that would have resulted in the bloody death of us all!
 
Who is Rick Baker?
You are joking? You kid me not?
You know 'An American Warewolf in London', Men In Black', Batman and stuff!
For those who are interested scroll down when you have finished as I've added a bit on him at the end.
 
Ok, back to the Evil Hoe Hacking Boy and his family.
I was thinking that maybe I could turn this into a motion picture and call in 'Snakes On A PLAIN'.

We could have little Evil Hoe Hacking Boy, who of course would have to look somewhat like Samuel L Jackson, (maybe we could call him Samuel L Wang - you know, little chinese boy with a beard and all) running around the corn field with his evil hoe in hand yelling out 'I'm sick of deese Mutha F*ckin Snakes on this Mutha F*ckin corn plain. Mrs Wang could pop up every now and then holding her blood spurting handless arm yelling out 'I not sink I know what you say little Evil Hoe Hacking Wang'. Evil Hoe Hacking Boy would then stop and with blood red eyes say; 'I not sink you hear me Mutha F*ckin Wang. I said I'm sick of deese Mutha F*cking Snakes on deese Mutha F*ckin Corn Plain'.

Argh, but I live in fear. Yes I do, not of Rick Baker or even Stephen King not wanting in on the deal but I live in fear of the Mutha F*cking Corn Plain gaming rights. I doubt X-Box would a part of the Muth F*cking Corn Plain game so I would have to sell it to Atari for the Atari 2600 or even to Commodore for their Commodore 64. So I live in fear if explaining to my nieces and nephews or my younger readers of what the hell a cartridge is or even worse, what the hell a Mutha F*ckin tape drive is for the Commodore 64.

Seriously, could you imagine trying to explain that I grew up with a tape drive!
Heaven forbid, I take away all gaming rights to the Mutha F*cking Corn Plain game now!

So with my tail between my Mutha F*cking Corn legs I left them and not long after I noticed what I thought was a temple on the side of the mountain in front of me. Put a temple or a mountain before me and I'm there. Or better yet combine them and I'm sold within seconds. All thoughts of dams, islands and ferries were forgotten and I became like the cop in Terminator II.

Head straight, fast walking and almost running towards my destination.
On the way stopping to show a man on his funny litte Chinese tractor my camera screen and saying;
Have you seen this Mutha F*cking Evil Hoe Hacking Corn Boy....oops, I mean; Have you seen this Temple
 
From there I went through a few villages, a couple of brick factories, many back yards (or backyard type things as they are here in China) and then finally I found myself placing my foot on the first step up. The temple itself is only tiny but it's also a very friendly place to visit. They saw me coming and had a glass of water waiting for me. A little puppy and kitten kept me company during my visit and awhile after I continued my journey to the top of what is known as 'Double Breasted Hill' (Or so I have been told).
 
I'm still unsure of what the temple is called as no one seems to know it exists.
But I do like the thought of mounting a 'Double Breasted' hill' though!
 
The views from the top of the hill were totally amazing and the three 'city photos' at the top of the photos below all text will show you my city if Shangzhou in all its tiny glory. In the left shot, if you follow the river around you can just see the Dam Wall and the Dragon Back Mountains from my last blog. Over those mountains is Xian City. The middle photo (the one with my shadow) is most of the city. If you look back past the buildings you can just see a pathway (to the left) that leads up to Pagoda Hill. Love that walk!  Further back are the mountains I was walking on in my entry 'It's so strange to feel strange'. My school is kind of near the big building at the very left of the photo. In the 'Right Photo' or photo three, if you follow the river out of town and a little after where the road and river turn right is where the Twin Pagodas can be found from my birthday walk.
 
The shot without the river in it is on the other side of 'Double Breasted' mountain.
 
The rest of the day was spent walking around the villages below the temple and I then followed the river down to the Twin Pagodas and then back into town where I found an excellent eatery that serves some of the most delicious Won Tons I've ever eaten. I finally finished writing this Monday night and for most of it I was on MSN chatting to two of my good friends. The first one was of course English Daniel who was teaching in Fujian with me for nearly a year. He's back in England finishing off his degree and says a big hello to everyone.
 
The second was my Polish friend Rafal whom I met here in China nine years ago. 
 
I was on a train heading to Kunming in Yunnan Province and I heard what I knew wasn't Chinese. That was a great present after looking out of the window to find ice and snow everywhere. I left Yangshuo and headed to Kunming as it was supposed to be much warmer there. In the end I didn't find warmth in the weather in Kunming as I was nearing knee deep in snow but I did find a life long friend. We then traveled down to the Xishuangbanna Region where I spent the first of my five Chinese New Years so. Raf and his then girlfriend Meggie were in China for a year as students studying Chinese. We all got sloshed at a local Dia Peoples wedding and rode bikes to and fro and had a blast.
 
Nine years on we still chat on Skype and MSN.
He was married not so long ago and only two weeks ago became a father.
Here's a bloody HUUUUUUUUUUUUGE congrats to Rafal, Katarzyna and baby Karolina.
 
Oh and a big Happy Birthday for today to Happy Naomi from Japan. She is the beauty holding the little Koala in my Asia 2000 Blog and she should be signing onto MSN very soon, or as soon as baby Naomi falls to sleep. .
 
Beers N Mutha F*cking Snakes on a Noodle Plain toya.....shane
PS: As usual all photos can be found below.
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The soundtrack to this entry was Mr Awesome himself Prince.
The album was...well you know the one with the symbol on the front.
 
Along with Gatecrasher's 'Slinky Planet Moscow'.
I just got back from having dumplings at the night market and a walk around town.
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RICK BAKER
 
Richard A. "Rick" Baker (born December 8, 1950) is an Academy Award-winning special makeup effects artist known for his realistic creature effects.
 
Baker was born in Binghamton, New York, the son of Doris (née Hamlin) and Ralph B. Baker, a professional artist. As a teen, Baker began creating artificial body parts in his own kitchen. Baker's first professional job was as an assistant to Dick Smith on the film The Exorcist. He received the inaugural Academy Award for Makeup for his work on An American Werewolf in London. Subsequently, Baker has been nominated nine more times with five additional Oscars, both records in his field. Baker claims that his work on Harry and the Hendersons is one of his proudest achievements.
 
Baker had a cameo as the pilot and gunner (with Peter Jackson) who shot down Kong in the 2005 remake of King Kong, and a cameo as a drug dealer with a business card in the John Landis film Into the Night. Baker was awarded a Doctorate of Humane Letters from the Academy of Art University San Francisco in 2008.
 
Filmography- MATE, CHECK THIS OUT!
 
The Wolfman, Enchanted, Norbit, Click, X-Men: The Last Stand, Cursed, King Kong, The Ring Two, Hellboy, The Haunted Mansion, Men in Black II, The Ring, Planet of the Apes, Dr. Seuss' How the Grinchs Stole Christmas, Nutty Professor II: The Klumps, Life, Wild Wild West, Mighty Joe Young, Modern Vampires, Psycho, A Thousand Acres, Batman & Robin, Men in Black, The Devil's Advocate, John Carpenter's Escape From L.A, The Frighteners, The Nutty Professor, Batman Forever, Baby's Day Out, Ed Wood, Wolf, Rex, Lorenzo's Oil, The Rocketeer, Gremlins 2: The New Batch, Coming to America, Gorillas in the Mist, Missing Link, Moonwalker, Harry and the Hendersons, It's Alive III: Island of the Alive, Max mon amour, Ratboy, Cocoon, Into the Night, My Science Project, Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, Starman, Making Michael Jackson's Thriller, Videodrome, An American Werewolf in London, The Funhouse, The Howling, Tanya's Island, It's Alive 2, Star Wars, The Incredible Melting Man, King Kong, The Zebra Force, The Thing With Two Heads.