Happy new year to everyone back home! Of course Chinese New year won't be celebrated until the end of the month, but that didn't stop any of the ex-pats from going out to their favorite dining and drinking establishments for some post-holiday festivities.
Monday night, Rachel texted me and asked if I would like to join her and Jess for a trip to the Tibetan district here in Chengdu. I hadn't actually gone out to explore Chengdu since the weather has gotten cold, and thought this would be a great opportunity to see something new. So we met up at the Sichuan Gymnasium stop of the metro line and caught a cab a few blocks West until we arrived in the Tibetan district.
Rachel describes this area of Chengdu as her favorite part of the city, it's the first place she visited, and it made her fall in love with the city. After we arrived I could definitely see why.
While most of Chengdu is a mixture of modern Chinese and Western influences, the colorful aesthetics of Tibet stand out strikingly from the modern, utilitarian design of the rest of the city. The people go about their daily business dressed head to toe in brightly colored and very traditional looking Tibetan garb, and robe-clad Monks from various monasteries beyond the city limits travel here to seek decorations for their temples. Every storefront is either a clothing store with traditional garments or an art store with some of the largest and most intricately detailed statues I've seen so far during my stay in China.
Monday night, Rachel texted me and asked if I would like to join her and Jess for a trip to the Tibetan district here in Chengdu. I hadn't actually gone out to explore Chengdu since the weather has gotten cold, and thought this would be a great opportunity to see something new. So we met up at the Sichuan Gymnasium stop of the metro line and caught a cab a few blocks West until we arrived in the Tibetan district.
Rachel describes this area of Chengdu as her favorite part of the city, it's the first place she visited, and it made her fall in love with the city. After we arrived I could definitely see why.
While most of Chengdu is a mixture of modern Chinese and Western influences, the colorful aesthetics of Tibet stand out strikingly from the modern, utilitarian design of the rest of the city. The people go about their daily business dressed head to toe in brightly colored and very traditional looking Tibetan garb, and robe-clad Monks from various monasteries beyond the city limits travel here to seek decorations for their temples. Every storefront is either a clothing store with traditional garments or an art store with some of the largest and most intricately detailed statues I've seen so far during my stay in China.
After wandering the streets for some time we came to a store that sold jade jewelery and traditionally prepared Tibetan tea. The tea is wrapped in straw bundles and allowed to cure for nearly a decade. The air in the shop was warm fragrant and the owners were friendly and inviting, allowing us to sit on large chairs fashioned from driftwood stumps while they served us samples of their wares. We stayed for awhile, chatting among ourselves and with the clerk who spoke a bit of English. Jess bought a block of the cured tea leaves and we left to continue exploring the area.
We departed the tea shop and continued exploring the various side streets taking in the colors and artwork before stopping again for a quick snack and some Tibetan yak-butter tea. We shared a kettle of it and it tastes exactly what you might expect butter tea to taste like. It's salty and milky and much improved by a small spoon of sugar.
Jess had to leave early to make it to an early New Years Eve gig, so Rachel and I caught a took took back to the closest metro stop, where we boarded a train back to her apartment. From there we walked to the Bookworm for dinner. We were lucky to be seated at the only non-reserved table, since the early New Years revelers were already out and about. It was truly a date between two introverts. We sat and chatted about books and literature while we waited for our food, ate, and spent the remaining hour mutually engrossed in out laptops while Rachel emailed her family back home and I caught up on the news. We both found it humorous at the end when we packed up to join Nick and Jess over at the Lazy Pug, a western-run bar just at the end of Tongzilin road.
We were forced to sit outside for a short time until a table cleared for us. And the plucky server brought out our first rounds for the evening. The Lazy Pug is famous for its two tiny mascots, the plethora of pug-related artwork, and "properly" mixed drinks. Unlike the other bars in town, they pull no punches when it comes to their cocktails. I had a fantastic Long Island iced tea, and we shared a bottle of champagne with Mike and his wife when they joined us prior to the countdown.
Jess had to leave early to make it to an early New Years Eve gig, so Rachel and I caught a took took back to the closest metro stop, where we boarded a train back to her apartment. From there we walked to the Bookworm for dinner. We were lucky to be seated at the only non-reserved table, since the early New Years revelers were already out and about. It was truly a date between two introverts. We sat and chatted about books and literature while we waited for our food, ate, and spent the remaining hour mutually engrossed in out laptops while Rachel emailed her family back home and I caught up on the news. We both found it humorous at the end when we packed up to join Nick and Jess over at the Lazy Pug, a western-run bar just at the end of Tongzilin road.
We were forced to sit outside for a short time until a table cleared for us. And the plucky server brought out our first rounds for the evening. The Lazy Pug is famous for its two tiny mascots, the plethora of pug-related artwork, and "properly" mixed drinks. Unlike the other bars in town, they pull no punches when it comes to their cocktails. I had a fantastic Long Island iced tea, and we shared a bottle of champagne with Mike and his wife when they joined us prior to the countdown.