back to civilization, back to reality

I'm back from desert land. Mongolia was an experience. Not my favorite trip but something different. It was like a culture and history lesson with a twist. Firstly, Inner Mongolia is still rather fresh in the tourism industry. Many of their sights housing historical information were newly constructed (eg. 2005) unlike the synagogues in Turkey or the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, which have been there from the start and not specially constructed for tourists. I believe that they do have their rich and deep history but much of them were not recorded or preserved well. It might also be due to the fact that they were nomads, thus not leaving much presence behind. Secondly, famous Chinese novels like 射雕英雄传 (Legend of the Condor Heroes) and 天龙八部 (Demi Gods and Semi Devils) introduce famous heroes and places like Genghis Khan and 西夏国, but mixed them up with fictitious characters, leaving me somewhat confused due to my lack of factual Chinese history. But overall, the trip was better than expected even though the weather did catch me a little of guard. It's freaking summer, with temperatures averaging 35 degrees Celsius and we had to cover ourselves with layers of sunblock (SPF130) and long sleeved clothes. I still managed to get burnt...

The vast grassland with views only limited by the polluted air. Of coz the highlight was to stay in a traditional yurt which means a wooden plank as bed, dripping cold bath water, non-existence sewage system and tons of insects. Luckily it was only for 1 night.... I bearly slept and was companied by the sky of crowded stars.

There was nothing much anyone can do on the grasslands except for horse riding. We were assigned our horses and 2 horsemen led a pack of us, galloping through the plains the whole afternoon. I never expected horse riding to be that physically demanding. It was fun though. We had to literally lit our asses from the saddle to damp the jerking.

The desert was hot hot hot. It was all brown and blue. The sand is super fine and soft. We played desert golf, rode on the sand mobile, drove a sand OHV, conquered the sand slides, did a flying fox across China's famous Yellow River and melted under the sun. Summer is a tough season to travel...

I jump, and jump, and jump some more

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Did I mention that 1 of the greatest motivations of this trip is shopping at Shanghai (I <3 H&M!!!!), besides the fact that this is probably the last trip I'm leeching off my parents since I'm employed now. I should be happy if they don't ask me to pay for their future trips. When they were discussing our next year's holiday destination, it struck me that I'll probably not be part of it coz I won't have sufficient LEAVE to juz take off. Oh well, that sux and that's life.....