Subversive activities

Sidewalks here are a perfectly acceptable place to drive and park. Additionally, pedestrians do not have the right of way, especially on the sidewalks. They have the right to keep their wits about them lest they be run over and tossed like a ragdoll into a shoe store blasting techno music out into the streets while a couple of teenage chinese girls stand on the speakers clapping out of time and another shouts at indifferent passerbys through a megaphone. I'm not making any of that
up.

Foshan feels bigger than Shunde. At first I thought fewer people were staring at me, but maybe I'm just getting used to it now. I took a long walk tonight down the main drag of Zumiao Lu and there are lights, a neon-coated Pizza Hut, a whole bunch of giant shopping malls, and a zillion other shoe and clothing stores lining the
streets. It is about 9pm on a Wednesday night and everything is still hoping. Each store you walk by has different techno going, so it is kind of like changing radio channels but everything is the same. As far as I can tell the only difference is the speed and the pitch of the singers voice. As close to chipmunk-pitch as possible is ideal, and I am not exaggerating.

I feared the worst for dining tonight having not identified any positive vegetarian restaurants here, but a girl at the hotel recommended a place to me right across the street called the Happy Cafe which worked out great. I could see everything as it is cafeteria style so I didn't have to negotiate a Chinese menu, I could just ask
what's vegetarian and they had many an option for me. The food was really good, I'll be going back possibly for every meal while I'm here. It was also only about $2USD, and rather than most meals I've had here the place was kind of shiny and young instead of feeling more or less like any average Chinese restaurant. I think it was my favorite meal since Hong Kong.

There's some crazy looking nightclub/restaurant/bar next to the hotel and I think I'm going to check it out for a drink. I'll be heading to Guangzhou on Friday morning and staying until sometime the following week. In an effort to both speed up getting to more scenic territory and avoid a 14 hour busride, I checked out regional flights to Guilin in Guangxi province and I'm pretty sure I can do it for like $50US, so if I can figure out the Chinese website's online reservation system or
otherwise get someone at the hotel to help me, I'm going to get on that.

I had to send this update to myself in Gmail and upload it from the hotel because apparently there are more website restrictions at internet cafes than there are at business centers at western-friendly hotels. We can't have anyone visiting any subversive websites and updating their blogs now can we? After the cafe I decided to try out a local bar so I went to one down the street and it was pretty dead but there were 3 Chinese guys playing live music, probably some of the worst I've ever heard, but I must say it was really funny. The bar was pretty dead but one guy who worked there was really excited to meet an American and wanted to chat a lot, and wasn't afraid to try out his English which wasn't horrible. He even bought me a beer. I might hang out with him later tonight, maybe he can show me something interesting in Foshan I wouldn't find otherwise before I leave.

I'm off to check out this giant temple called Zumiao, for which this street is named. Tonight is my last night in Foshan and then I'll be off to Guangzhou tomorrow morning. I'm looking forward to that, should be a really interesting city. Maybe tonight if I can I'll upload the pictures from mainland so far.