Porridge, Pangang, and Partyin'

This last week was pretty action packed. On Thursday, the Peace Corps training officer and my site manager came down for a visit. We went out for the standard banquet with my school officials and then we went on a tour of the local steel factory, Pan Gang Steel. The steel company is the world's second largest producer of vanadium (added to steel to strengthen it I believe) and something like the worlds 4th largest producer of steel. It's a pretty big deal. The only reason that the town I live in exists, is basically because of the steel company. Panzhihua was a very small village until Mao Zi Dong himself picked the site to be the location of Pan Gang, because of its relative isolation. Oh, but I didn't get to go on the tour because I was wearing flip-flops. I understood at first, thinking they didn't want my open toes to get crushed by some misplaced steel. But, Hong Mei had high heels on, my program manager had fancy flip-flops on, and the site manager was wearing sandals. If a vat of boiling iron toppled over and we had to run for it, I sure wouldn't have been the last one out. At least I was allowed to wear the helmet and walk around the outside of the building.

For reasons unknown, the power is out for at least two days every month. You wake up to no power, but everyone seems to know that it will return sometime in the evening. So, on our no power day, Lindsey and I cooked the most 'Chinese' diner that exists, porridge and jiaozi. The jiaozi were the ones we had previously made with the twins on our lunch date, and the porridge was from the local store. Porridge, the standard breakfast for a large majority of Chinese is something most Westerners either hate or tolerate. Porridge, or wet rice as the literal translation goes is simply rice that has sat in water for a while. You can add a little pumpkin or some sugar to try and cut the blandness out, but it's nearly impossible. I for one love rice, but I can't stand 稀饭 （xifan) as it's called. Lindsey actually enjoys it now and makes it whenever her stomach is off.

Lastly, we took a trip to Xichang this weekend. Xichang is a city about 200 km north of Panzhihua. We took the trip just to relax and leave our cave for a couple of days. Lindsey and I bought some dishes with Chinese characters on them, I bought some hand-painted cups, and we also bought the traditional outfits of the local minority. We went to Xichang partly because I have this strange fascination with the minority who live in the region. The people were a slave holding society until the 1960's, they still have their own language, and they don't inter-marry with the Han Chinese. For the most part, they live in isolated villages high in the mountains, but Xichang is now considered their unofficial capital, so many of the locals come in to town for the markets.

Eating in the dark.

The top portion of this sign is in the Yi script. All of the signs throughout the city are in both the Yi script and Chinese. The Yi language is more closely related to Tibetan than Chinese. This sign says "The Xichang City Police Station"


Here's Lindsey buying a baby carrier from the locals. There was probably a group of 50 people standing around to see what the foreigner was doing.


My continuing obsession with the Yi hand painted lacquer-ware. I bought four of these cups to add to my collection, which includes a big fruit bowl and a vase. The clothes in the back are some more of the traditional clothes.