Benjamin Satterfield
Being one of the of the first people on Blogabond I feel attached to this project.
Hanging out with it's creator, Jason Kester, gives me an advantage to making impressions on getting the site to...

Shanghai, Day 15
Shanghai, China
Our last day in China.
Free time in the morning went quick. Some of us walked along the Bund, others went to visit the Jade Buddha temple and the tea shop there. There wasn't much time since we had to leave at noon. If you weren't tired when you woke up, you were now.
As we were checking out we said good bye to the memebers who are traveling longer. We said good bye to Robert who was also staying a few days longer.
And finally we had to say goodbye to our national guide Sunny. He was our hero and our support, we were sad to say goodbye.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 29, 2005 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Fall 2005

Start Here
Beijing, China
4 days in Beijing, hit all the major sites.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 31, 2006 from Beijing, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Summer 2007

My First Taste Of China '97
Hong Kong (historical), Hong Kong
Fresh off a flight from LAX (before that I was in JFK), I was beyond jet lagged. We hit the ground running though and I met up with the other students 10 in the group
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on April 8, 2006 from Hong Kong (historical), Hong Kong
from the travel blog: Living in China 1997

Neo-Tokyo Is About to Explode
Tokyo, Japan
Got into Narita Airport from my flight over from Hong Kong. Just getting over some annoying respirtory infection that I picked up before visiting Xi'An and Beijing.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on December 20, 1998 from Tokyo, Japan
from the travel blog: Japan Tour 1997

Meet up at JFK
New York, United States
We all met up here first before going to our stop-over destination... Amsterdam. Oh yes...
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on April 8, 2006 from New York, United States
from the travel blog: Yemen 1997

Meetup in JFK first
New York, United States
We met up here before heading over to our stop over in London. Who knew we would hit a flock of geese and be stuck in a London pub for 48 hours... Oh yeah and Air India decided they would strike as well. great.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on April 8, 2006 from New York, United States
from the travel blog: Tamil Nadu, India, 1996

Meet Up With Ryu
London, United Kingdom
Ryu was a new resident in the UK. So since he had an apartment there, we decided to make his home (his flat) the base of operations.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on April 8, 2006 from London, United Kingdom
from the travel blog: Scotland Tour 2001

Shanghai in 30 minutes
Shanghai, China
We got here Shanghai Pudong airport. But can we make the connecting flight to Beijing?
We have a long day of instant sight-seeing ahead of us.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 17, 2005 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Spring 2005

Xmas in Tokyo
Tokyo, Japan
It's strange; Christmas here in Japan is like New Years in the states... and New Year's here is like Christmas in the states!
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on December 25, 1997 from Tokyo, Japan
from the travel blog: Japan Tour 1997

Beijing Fling
Beijing, China
Forbidden City, Tian An Men Square and Summer Palace; or go to Great Wall in our first jet-lagged day! We cut out the forbidden city, it was just too much. Hop on the flight for Chengdu.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 18, 2005 from Beijing, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Spring 2005

Nanjing, Day 12
Nanjing, China
In the morning we were able to visit an acupuncture clinic. The clinic was much smaller than the hospital but they were especially welcoming and friendly. There was much more room to observe as a group as well. We were able to see patients being treated with acupunture, e-stim, cupping and tui-na massage.
In the hallway I talked with a local farmer who travels to the clinic weekly. He said that he used to go to the hospital that we visited yesterday but hates it there. He said that they just gave him the same patent pills over and over to treat his back pain. The results weren't that great. He said, "That place isn't a hospital, it's a shopping mall! they don't treat you as a patient, your just a number in line there." He enjoyed going to the clinic and said his treatments were getting results now. We later said thanks to the doctors there and stopped for a quick group picture before heading out.
After lunch a few of us went with Robert to hike Zi Jing Mtn. with our local guide Sean. We climbed most of the mountain and got to see several medicinal plants in the wild before the rain started to come down. We then hustled back down to ahve the bus pick us up.
Dinner was at the same restaurant as yesterday, only we had a special meal cooked with medicinal herbs. While there were some novelty dishs such as Bitter Mellon (pretty spicy and darn bitter) and Pig Lung Soup (actually really tasty), the meal was really good. We had fun guessing some of the herbal ingredients before Yulien was kind enought to translate to menu to tell us what was really in the meal.
After dinner Sean arranged Tui Na massages for those interested. The clinic we went to had mostly blind therapists giving 1 hour massages. They were great and we all appeared an hour later glassy eyed and sleepy. We thought how in the States the session would have cost $80 versus the $8 that we spent.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 26, 2005 from Nanjing, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Fall 2005

Nanjing, Day 11
Nanjing, China
Today was a well-needed slow day.
The morning's plan to visit a large TCM Hospital was rejected due to some miscommunication. The hospital was obviously going through some serious changes and reconstruction. With that came a rather exclusive attitude, especially to foreigners. They were only going to let us stay for about a half hour instead of three. That wasn't the plan and it wasn't good enough. So we canceled and left. However, a few hours later, we scheduled another visit with a different TCM clinic for the next day. We were relieved to find a quick substitute, since many members were excited about seeing medicine practiced in China. It all worked out for the best, since several people were feeling tired and probably needed a slow day to recover.
After a drive in golf carts around the park, the remainder of the group opted out of visiting the nearby temple in exchange for going back to the hotel early or visiting "electronic alley," a place for pirated software and knock off electronics and cheap MP3 players. It was packed and definitely catering more to the local crowd's needs.
After dinner the group Split up to go back to the hotel, out shopping, visit the local Pizza Hut (which is more like a fancy, expensive restaurant in China, not fast food; even though it still is) or out to a nearby nightclub.
For those who went to the nightclub, it was another night of dancing. The dance floor however, was tiny and packed with locals, who were very interested in our presence. After a few beers, many of them were coming over to practice their English on us. It's hard to be hidden in place like that when you're white and 6'3."
After the dancing and bizarre variety show interludes with dancers, crappy live bands and a drag queen, we took taxis back to the hotel in the rain. It was a great night together.
http://www.belila.com/Chinatour/
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 24, 2005 from Nanjing, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Fall 2005

Chengdu Immersion
Chengdu, China
AM Herb Market.
PM Tong Ren Tang pharmacy Herb dinner in Qin Shan Fang Restaurant.
We're gonna stay at the 3 star Nine Dragon hotel for 4 nites.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 20, 2005 from Chengdu, China
from the travel blog: China Tour Spring 2005

Arrive in Beijing, Day 1
Beijing, China
Check into hotel in Beijing, meet up with the guides and deal with the jet lag.
Tian An Men Square
Forbidden City
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on June 27, 2005 from Beijing, China
from the travel blog: Bhutan or Bust

Medical Day
Chengdu, China
Full day at Chengdu's Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) college and hospital. In the evening we had the hot pot dinner.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 21, 2005 from Chengdu, China

Nanjing, Day 10
Nanjing, China
We arrived in our new hotel, which was a huge 4 star hotel holding a computer conference. Although the hotel was packed for the weekend, we could tell that we were going to be spoiled here.
After check-in, we went to the Nanjing Botanical gardens nearby. This is where Robert worked a lived fro a few years. We got to meet some of his old friends and teachers and pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. We spent a few hours there going over the many different medicinal herbs, many of which Robert originally planted there in 1997. It was a lovely garden that had a new teahouse built to relax in. After sipping tea for a bit and playing with some of the local kids (balloons are a huge hit with the kids here) we went back to the hotel.
Dinner was in the city downtown, which is a decent drive from the hotel. After the meal we had free time to walk along a promenade. It was Friday night, so all the shops were open late. Here you can find anything... pirated movies or CD's (good quality ones too for $1US), pet stores, silk stores, gift shops, handcrafts, fast food, etc. It was great to hang out with the locals and haggle at the shops. It was barely enough time to even scratch the surface.
After that, it was back to the hotel, where we had to go exploring. The hotel is huge and the nicest one by far on the trip. Some of us wandered around and came across a disco... this disco is like 2 stories underground in what could be the dampest, moldiest part of the city. It looked like nobody even knew it existed! In fact, for a little while, we doubted if it even did. Going down the hallway, everyone was laughing at how surreal the wallpaper and giant mirrors were. The name David Lynch was mentioned a lot when trying to describe it to the others who didn't check it out. Anyway, it was rewarding, we found Coronas and a lit-up disco floor with a video projector behind it. We had the whole place to ourselves, so the Michael Jackson music video marathon began. Who knew we had so many good dancers on the trip?
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 23, 2005 from Nanjing, China

Chuzhou; Long Ya Mtn. Day 9
Chuzhou, China
Robert at the 'check out line'
Today we waited out the rain by having a short lecture/ class with Robert on botanical nomenclature. After finding a store that sold boots, we were ready to hike up Longya Mountain. The rain subsided a bit, and the mountain was filled with misty clean air. Robert did his best to dig up roots and hunt for plants in his poncho. There were a good amount of common medicinal herbs growing on the mountain there. That pretty much took all day, with the evening open for free time, writing postcards and early rest.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 22, 2005 from Chuzhou, China

Natural Chengdu
Chengdu, China
AM: Herb Museum, DuFu poetry garden.
PM: Xin Hua book store.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 22, 2005 from Chengdu, China

Beijing, Day 2
Great Wall
Summer Palace
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on June 28, 2005 from Beijing, China
from the travel blog: Bhutan or Bust

Panda Reserve
AM: Visit Panda Breeding Center, way cooler than any zoo. If you love cute fury critters, don't miss the panda reserve, especially the baby nursing area. Go rain or shine, it's not to be missed! Also check out the red Pandas (the lesser panda), they are sometimes overlooked, but you can pay to hold and pet them!
PM: Drive to Emei Shan (Emei Mountain) area and see local Herb Farms. 3 star Emei Shan hotel. Also, take a dip in the lovely and huge hot springs around the corner! They even had herbal baths to take a dip in. You can even buy a pair of retro swimming trunks for a few bucks, sweet.

Chuzhou; Long Ya Mtn. Day 8
Chuzhou, China
This day was pretty much a driving day. The bus drove down a mixture of never ending roads that were almost entirely used by us. You'd think that the lack of traffic would get us to Chuzhou faster, but it didn't. It was a 6 hour bus drive through a rainy country side in China. Good thing we bought that 2 hour VCD of Shaolin monks fighting to watch on the TV...
It was fun to see how the local vehicles cope with the rainy roads as well.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 21, 2005 from Chuzhou, China

Bozhou, Day 7
Bozhou, China
The morning started out with the Bozhou herb market, one of the largest in China. The warehouse was like an herbal COSTCO, with thousands of items for sale at wholesale prices. There was everything from scorpions to deer antlers. The locals seemed intrigued by our small troop going through the building. Not only is it strange for non-local Chinese to visit there, its simply unimaginable that people from the US would travel around the world to go there. I guess it would be like living in Lafayette, United States and seeing a bus load of Japanese tourists pile out at your COSTCO to check it out from around hte world. It was fun to wander around the many isles and explore the herbs that are not sold in the US like centipedes.
Afterwards, our guides took us to their local herb store for a quick tour before heading out to their pill factory after lunch.
The pill factory welcomed us with 2 large banners hanging on their buildings. There was even a local TV station there to record the event for local broadcasting. We were all excited by the amount of attention we got; we were treated like diplomats from the US goverment.
Inside the plant we saw the process of taking the local farmed herbs and preparing them into powders and pills for resale.
of course, most things are clinically tested and visitors and workers have to wear the lovely sterile looking uniforms. Our guides were as pleasant as ever and they invited us to dinner later at finest retaurant in town. The woner adn director of the factory said that the city's economic leader would be present at dinner and wanted to welcome the American guests in person.
Before heading back to the hotel, the plant owner gave us a quick history of the onve famous city of Bozhou. not only is this area the bitrth place of Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu (Taoist founders), as well as kung fu... But it is also the birthplace of Hua Tou, the famous Chinese Dr. who formalised Traditional Chinese Medicine. We went to visit a small shrine to him in town on the way back. Hua Tou also created a set of animal exercises that sorta resemble Tai Qi practice. Here's a pic of the owner really getting into doing one of the animal forms. It was pretty fun.
The official dinner started off with a rather formal introduction, some of us felt a little underdressed, but they didn't mind. The welcomedus to their town and country and hoped that we would return again soon and bring more attention to the importance of Bozhou in the herb growing market.
The dinner adn hotel was amazing. It was the best nite yet. After about 100 shots and various toasts to almost everyone... we were ready to call it a nite and asked robert if we could sleep in the next day.
there was one last photo op before we left. We felt like we were part of the UN.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 20, 2005 from Bozhou, China

Emei Shan (Emei Mountain)
Emeishan, China
Hiking day on a holy bddhist mountain. didn't see any famous monkeys though. Full day Emei Shan, return to Chengdu. Last chance to visit the hot springs for the group. leave 3 star Nine Dragon hotel. nice place!
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 24, 2005 from Emeishan, China

Travel Day to Lijiang
Lijiang, China
AM: fly Chengdu/Kunming (stop over)
PM: fly Kunming (stop over) to Lijiang, rest of time free 3 star Cai Xin hotel for 3 nites. it's darn cold and the hotel's heating system went out on the first night! Luckily they brought each of our rooms space heaters.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 25, 2005 from Lijiang, China

Bozhou, Day 6
Bozhou, China
faOur train trip to Bozhou ended and our 3 hour bumpy bus drive began. the raods are crowded and severly undermaintainded out here. This is rural China, farms are everywhere. Yet even here there are significant signs of progress and new building, including new cell phone towers in the middle of fields. We checked into our hotel, which, despite its huge number of vacancies and rural location, had the best accomodations so far. Including a great internet connection in every room! we spent the morning recovering from our travels.
We spent the afternnon traveling visiting nearby farms. The local farmers were great company. The village there was small and quite poor. They invited us to look around at the herbs they were growing and showed us how they process some of the herbs locally. This place offered great insight into the chinese herbal medicine; it's where it all starts. The hospitality we recieved from the farmers was wonderful and everyone welcomed our alien presence and constant picture taking. They were digging up samples and telling us the differences in age and quality with some herbs.
The family of farmers there introduced us to th eldest of the group. The man beig 90 and his wife 92! Both still looking healthy and both still working in the fields there. Everyone was sad to say goodbye to our newfound friends.
After, we traveled to the display gardens just down the road. We were told that although these lands were once owned by the government, they were now sold and privatised and the herbs grown there are still subsisidized. Mr. Gou, the owner and self-taught herbalist was there to show us around and invited us to be his guest for our stay in Bozhou. The garden was quite big and had a lot to offer. We were able to see a good amount of commonly used herbs growing there. the owner and the directors were very friendly and we left there just before the rain fell.
The owner and directors came back with us to the hotel and asked to guide us through the herb market and pill making factory the next day.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 19, 2005 from Bozhou, China

Luoyang, Day 5
Luoyang, China
The Longmen caves are huge sculpted grottos along the river in Luoyang. The city itself was an ancient capitol of China and the birth place of Mahayana Buddhism. Traveleres and traders brought the influence form India and settled in the political and economic capitol. Most of the ancient city is gone, as well as its prestige. Luoyang is now an industrial park, resurrected by the communist party.
The grottos are massive and took years to make.
We spent much of the afternoon in the "old city" which is really just a budget redux of the old city walls. Inside the city there wasn't much and we spent most of our time looking for either bathrooms or internet cafes. The old city seemed to be designed to attract tourists and promote shopping with in the walls. Although we were there for a limited time, the only shops we saw were countless barber shops and spring shops (for like car shocks?). Talk about lack of diversity; perhaps these meet the large local needs? The streets inside are small, and the traffic is completely unregulated, so you had to spen most time looking over your shoulders. Still, the people were friendly, and rather curious to why we were even there.
After dinner, our amazing guide, Daisy, took us to the river bank to do a ritual for the mid-autum festival (moon cake festival). We prepared a small floating lantern with flowers and after a prayer we floated it down the river. Amazingly, it traveled a long ways and we could see it thru the darkness even as we were driving away.
On the bus ride to the train station, Daisy yet again impressed us with an on-bus performance with a chinese instrument that sounds like a clarinet and is fashioned form a gourd. We then got dropped off at the trainstation, which was pretty much empty but had a lot of people in the square hanging out together. There were about 100 people dancing (I guess becasue of the festival) and playing sports. There was one girl there, she had to be maybe 4 or 5 years old practicing kungfu that pretty much put the monks performance to shame. After a wait at the station and hanging out with some locals, we got on our sleeper train and met some other traveling foreigners. A Dutch group was on board, and by the smell of it, they had been traveling for quite some time...
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 18, 2005 from Luoyang, China

Lijiang's Ancient Culture
Lijiang, China
Full day Black Dragon Pool park and Dongba Institute; Museum of Naxi Culture. Nice day outdoors in the high altitude sun. You can see Jade Dragon Snow Mountain all day with it's snowy peaks.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on March 26, 2005 from Lijiang, China

Luoyang, Day 4
Luoyang, China
We arrived in Luoyang by train in the early morning. After checking-in to the hotel in town, we got ready for a short drive out to the Shaolin temple. After a local lunch we visited the temple at the base of a mountain whose peak looks as though Buddha is lsleeping on his back (it kinda looks like that). The shaolin temple was one of the most anticipated sites to visit for the trip. The following events occurred:
DUDE, WHERE'S MY CAMERA?!
The Shaolin temple is pretty much on its own park. There are countless children and youth training away and maintaining their own grounds. The main focal attractions at the site are the theatre, where you can see them perform and train (its a choreographed show really) and the pagoda forest, a collection of small pagodas dedicated to the past shaolin masters. The performance was impressive but has an edge of feeling over rehearsed. After the show, which was really too short, you can buy shirts and other momentos outside. This is where we encountered the master of the five-fingered discount. I was talking with the shop keepers and students interested in buying some stuff from the store and I put my video camera down for a second. A minute later, it magically disappeared, in th emidst of only about 5 people. My camera DV got yanked! And not only that, the DVD's that Robert and I bought where bogus. They weren't the performance that we saw, it was a lame instructional video... it was a shaolin hustle. A lesson in impermanence.
Other than the slight damper of the theft, the religious ceremony at the temple and the pagoda forest were quite interesting and impressive. Although, on the way out of the pagoda forest, I did see a monk kick a blind beggar in the back to get him out. Not very compassionate... then again, there is a serious contradiction with having monks be powerful warriors. There's somehting not right about Peace, Compassion, and Butt-kicking. Still, it was cool to see all these things; monks doing head stands, breakig stuff, etc. I mean, we've seen so much stuff in film and TV, it was nice to go to the source of it all.
As we drove away that evening there was a huge reddish moon rising above the mountains. It was the start of the mid-autumn festival (moon cake festival). Later, we finished the day off with hour long foot massages. It was great and I almost forgot that I got ripped off earlier.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 17, 2005 from Luoyang, China

Beijing, Day 3
The day started out with an intense ambition. We had three main attractions to visit: The Great Wall, The Summer Palace and Tian An Men Square, in that order.
The Great Wall featured, of course, lots of steps. Most at a severe incline. It's probably one of the most international tourist sites in the world. I heard at least 10 different languages spoken on the hike up. Where most people climb the great wall and some even skate it, for Robert it was just another obstacle to jump over in order to find plants. And find them he did. He came back with plastic bags of not t-shirts but of plants to show us on the bus. Mao said your not a hero until you climb the great wall... I wonder what he thought about teachers who jump it. There was a nice hook on the ride to the wall, yet again by our tour guide. We took a short detour to see a jade factory, which of course had a massive jade store attached. We all protested before going in, but yet again, most people ended up buying something (perhaps there's subliminal messaging in these places). The hook worked.
The next stop was the Summer Palace which is a good drive back from the wall. The palace is one of the largest parks in all of China and was the vacation spot for the later dynasties. The gardens and lake were a welcome haven for us, although we had to rush through it in order to fit all of the days activities. Where there is Yin there is Yang... to contrast the peace of the garden, just outside was an alley back to the bus, which we've nicknamed "swindler alley." Not only was the long alley loaded with poor merchants hounding us to buy their t-shirt knock-offs and cheap crafts, they were ready to scam the tourists. After some tour members put up a good job haggeling down the price of some goods, they found their change back to be counterfeit bills... So it is possible to get Shanghaied in Beijing.
After dinner we got to walk a few minutes around Tian An Men Square, which was lit up at night and preparing for the upcoming Mid-Autum Festival (moon cake festival).
After the square we drove to the massive Beijing train station to get aboard our sleeper train to Luoyang. Upon entering there was a huge crowd outside waiting to get in and watching someone get detained by the police. After a bout of abuse, about 5 red guards handcuffed the guy and took him away. Then we had to deal with the bottlenecking and the thousands of people laying around or rushing to get on their train. While we were all excited to hop into our soft sleeper cabin on the train, we quickly realized that after a day of hiking around without a shower, the tight quarters weren't as pleasant as we thought, especially after we took our shoes off...
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 16, 2005 from Beijing, China

Beijing, Day 2
After a change in plans, we visited IMPLAD an institute on the outskirts of Beijing where there are research facilities on herbal medicine and extensive gardens and green houses. We spent most of our time outside in the damp, over-cast garden with Robert reviewing about 25 common medicinal plants growing there.
After lunch we somehow got caught up in some kind of tourist trap that makes and sells pearls. After several awkward demonstrations of pearl creams and oyster shucking, we had enough, although there were a few enstarred shopers... We then straveled to Bai Wang Mountain on the edge Beijing.
While in pursuit of the ellusive Chai Hu herb, we came across countless plants and massive flourescent spiders. The Chai Hu was found, but half of our tour got lost along the way. After a few hours of hiking the rain finally broke and it drizzled the whole way back down the mountain. The group was divided, but we all made it back to the bus alright. Robert came back covered in plant matter and grit but with bags of samples, including the Chai Hu...we've never seen him happier.
After spending a ridiculus amount of time in the Beijing rush-hour traffic, we decided to skip out on dinner in an attempt to make it to the Peking Opera performance. We just made it... oh, by the way, the performer in the picture below is a man.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 15, 2005 from Beijing, China

After a long overnite flight we arrived in Beijing just before morning rush hour. The weather has been reported as "the best in over a month," with nice sun and cool breezes. The pollution and smog are at a minimum and the group is happy to be here for the next few days. We'll be even happier to sneak in a nap here and there.
After a big breakfast we walked through most of the Forbidden City, which is about 2 blocks from our hotel. Despite the massive reconstruction efforts there, the tour went well and it wasn't over crowded. After a few hours there we returned to the hotel. Unfortunately the acupuncture and herb museum was closed for some last minute rennovations. On the way back Robert found a bunch of common medicinal herbs simply growing around the streets and informed us what they are and used for.
After a short break, we went to see a Chinese Acrobat troop perform and had a late dinner before calling it a day. We're all tired but content and happy to be touring together.
Later, some brave travelers ventured down the street from the hotel to the night market, where u can pick up tasty treats like starfish, centipedes, scorpions on a stick...
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 14, 2005 from Beijing, China

Hangzhou/ Shanghai, Day 14
Hangzhou, China
It was a tight day, there was a lot to squeeze in.
We started by hiking up Phoenix Mtn. and see herbs there. This was the last hike, so naturally we had to get separated as a group in order to keep with the tradition. It was a nice day out and the trail was lined with new slate tiles all the way. Robert grabbed a couple of samples to show us on the trail and later on the bus.
During lunch we all decided that while Hangzhou is a niced city, we were ready to move on to Shanghai earlier and wanted to all have a formal, final dinner together.
So we revised the schedule a bit.
Next we visited the West lake tea farm. Along the drive you could see all the tea growing on the hill side. Here we met some of the local farmers who pick the green tea leaves and pan-dry it for 8 hours each day by hand. It's an arduous task and explained why the tea is expensive to produce. Then we met "Dr. Tea" who then explained all the benefits of green tea as well as the various grades there of. He was a total salesman with animated demonstrations. The teas though, tasted nice. Of course, we had to buy some, since it is hard to find good quality tea in the US.
We then had to hurry to catch our boat ride on west lake. The day started off beautifully and continued that way while we were out on the water, the weather was perfect. The ride offered nice views of the surrounded hills which were dotted with pagodas and temples. In the distance you could see the modern city, a drastic contemporary contrast to the ancient buildings. It was a perfect snapshot of modern China.
After the lake, we had about an hour to squeeze in any last minute shopping at the promenade in town. there were lots of paintings, textiles, handcrafts and snacks to be had. So much to buy, so little time.
Then it was our last 3 hour bus ride to our final destination: Shanghai.
The city was all lit up. Shanghai is a city with the height of NYC, the width of LA and the electric light overload of LV. Our hotel was located right on the end of the "Bund," an area along the river where on one bank there are all old European colonial buildings and the other all skyscrapers made during the last 10 years. It was a great drive and a perfect introduction to the chaotic city.
We quickly checked into our hotel, which was all Art Deco and made in the 30's. Then it was nice final dinner together. We were all able to fit at one large table this time. After many toasts and thanks to one another we called it a night. it was great to wrap up the trip together this way. So much had happened in the past weeks, you could barely remember all the events. At this point, the traveling had taken a toll and most of us were exhausted. We had to prepare for the next day, check out and leave Shanghai at noon. A few brave souls walked around the Bund and checked out Shanghai's night life.
written by  Benjamin Satterfield on September 28, 2005 from Hangzhou, China

Nanjing/ Hangzhou, Day 13
We checked out in the morning and drove over to Nanjing Pharmaceutical University where we met Dr. Chen and the director there. They took us on a brief tour of the school and a small herb museum while we waited for the herb garden to be unlocked. No pictures allowed.
While waiting a few of us wondered around campus. We saw a few thousand students dressed in military outfits yelling chants and marching around the grounds with rifles. It was strange to see such a presence at a medical school, we wondered if it had anything to do with the upcoming holiday: National Day. Sean told us that it was just a way of breaking in the new freshmen, in an attempt to convince them that school is serious and not a place to party. He thought it was a funny sight too... because the students have little to do with the military at all. Still, it was a frightening to see.
Meanwhile DJ and Patricia were on a mission to buy one of the student jumpsuits that say "Nanjing Pharmaceutical University" on it. The campus store wouldn't sell it to them and thought that something was up, because no foreigners would want such a thing. In the end they were able to trade some stuff from the US with some students there and got the jackets. We were finally able to get into the garden and Robert took us on a tour reviewing the herbs that were growing there.
We only spent a few hours there and most of it was spent wondering around the campus, which is a very different experience then that of any school in the US. Students are 4-8 in single room. Everything is cold concrete communist-style. For fun, there's ping-pong and badminton (only after marching). we then said goodbye to Dr. Chen and our local guide Sean and were off for lunch.
After that we were off for another 3-4 hour bus ride to Hangzhou. This time it was a scenic, sunny drive. We saw lots of farms and then suburban developments; building was everywhere. Along the way was an awesome new rest-stop. We were able to stock up in water and some comforts of home (well, they had Lay's chips.. even if they were cucumber flavor or Italian meat-sauce flavored). We got a kick outta that place. Then it was back on the bus.
We arrived in Hangzhou in the evening. Before checking in at the hotel, we met our local guide Jerry and went to visit a silk factory. It was pretty cool to see how all these tiny filaments are spun into thread and then spooled into what looks like cob webs. It's quite strong when massed together. The guide showed us the way to determine whether silk is pure or not: you burn it.... Umm, OK. If it's white smoke, it's real, black it's not. Good luck trying that one at Macy's. Naturally, there was a silk store next to the factory which had anything silk you could want. Some people bought some bedding, but most of us just wanted to checkin and pass out.

Robert at the 'check out line'

Golf Cart through park

Black Dragon Pool