I've been blessed to get to see many different places in China (Beijing several times, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hong Kong, and a handful of cities in Inner Mongolia). I have plans in the works to visit Tianjin, Kunming, and other destinations. But my top 10 places I want to see next are as follows (and these are just a taste of the diversity that China has to offer):
1. Harbin Ice Festival
2. Xi'an
3. Urumqi, Xinjiang
4. Lhasa, Tibet
5. Chifeng, Inner Mongolia
6. Manzhouli
7. Macau
8. Yangtze River
9. Qingdao, Shandong
10. Chengdu, Sichuan I have technically already been there, but I want to go back in order to officially hold a panda. :-)
What about you? What would be your dream destinations in China?
(the glow of red lanterns in neighbors' windows...decorations for the new year!)
The Yuan Xiao Festival in China marks the end of the Chinese New Year celebration. People will display colorful lanterns and eat glutinous rice balls (also called 元宵 yuan xiao).
It seems I am always coming across a new festival previously unknown while living here in China. I didn't participate in the city-wide festivities for this particular festival, but I did go to a demonstration of yuan xiao and paper lantern making held at the local museum (and consequently appeared on tv and in several newspapers for being a whitey that showed up at the event).
People will also try to solve riddles written on lanterns...the kids really got into this at the museum and were given prizes (I was also given a prize, but not because I answered...just because I was there, ha).
During my recent travels in Thailand, The Green Hornet was released in Asia...so, of course, I went to see it the very first day that it came out (as a dedicated Jay Chou fan).
Let me just say, seeing a movie in Thailand is interesting anyway...you stand for five minutes at the beginning of the movie in honor of the king while they play the anthem and show video footage of him. But anyways....we really liked the movie (and in fact went to see it again the next evening and later bought a bootleg DVD of it...hey, I did my part in supporting it in the theatre).
So, my review is as follows:
While I am a big fan of Jay Chou, I honestly didn't know what to expect...I knew I would think his English was cute, but honestly didn't expect for it to be great, and didn't know if he would really be able to pull off the subtle humor that the dialogue required....but he definitely did.
I am also not a big Seth Rogen fan, but I found him pretty funny in this movie. The movie itself is an anomaly, and I think a very good one, in that its treatment of Kato as a character is really positive for Asians....without turning him into a flawless martial arts god, they made Kato the "cool guy" and true hero of the film, while still allowing him character flaws (though admittedly not to the extent that Seth Rogen's Britt Reid displays as he deals with some major insecurities of playing second fiddle to the "sidekick".
The dialogue and fight scenes were entertaining and actually really funny, and the chemistry between Jay Chou and Seth Rogen is great. Cameron Diaz also is limited in screentime, which is probably good as she wasn't exactly super-convincing as the brainy Lenore Case.
Apparently there are already talks of a sequel...which I fully support. It's about time Hollywood featured a cool Asian...not the stereotypical "funny guy with accent".
