Wednesday 24th -almost driving off the mountain

I woke up well aware of the fact that yesterday had only been a soft start, and today the ‘adventure’ was really about to begin. At 8 am a car of four, including me, Panda, our project guide Lotta (a lovely Danish woman who reminded me of the female version of a happy Santa Claus), and the driver Vance (One of the DI:s. From Shanghai actually) departed Yuxi and headed towards the mountains and the project areas. I knew we had a 4-5 hours drive in front of us, and after 15 minutes I already needed to go to the toilet… Damn. My bladder has never been made for road trips.

Both Elisabeth and Lotta had asked me before if I was OK with mountain driving and I had said yes without really thinking. However, I have been going in the mountains of both France and Indonesia before without any issues, so I didn’t think this trip would result in any complications. Therefore, I politely declined their idea that I’d eat some ginger before we went, as it apparently helps if you can’t tackle the heights.

We had been driving for about 2 hours when it started raining quite heavily. Just as we were going down one major hill and about to hit the curve, I looked out the front window and suddenly saw the road disappear in front of me. The feeling that followed is had to describe. I heard Vance go ‘shiiiiit’ as he lost control of the car and headed off the edge of the road. The car’s left wheels hit the ground and almost flipped, and I literally flew to the left side and landed on Panda (of course there were no seat belts in the back seat where we were sitting). But… we were lucky. The edge wasn’t so steep and the car stopped, and for a moment it felt like everything stopped. We then came back to reality, and I crawled off poor Panda that I had almost crushed. Everyone was OK but Vance looked like he’d seen a ghost, and the rest of us were a bit shaky. As we climbed out of the car and saw the result, I realised that it was going to be a long day. There was no way we could get the car back on the road by ourselves.

Vance called emergency… and then we just had to wait. And wait. And wait. And… Almost getting run over. We were standing on a curve, remember? A lot of cars came with way too much speed (like us!) and almost skidded off the road and straight into us; an unhappy bunch in umbrellas and raincoats.

After about 1.5 hours the rescue team came and did what they had to in order to get us back on the road. Luckily the car was ok and soon we were on our way again. In a much slower pace this time though….

We drove and drove and left the good roads for a less good and more bumpy ride… A few times I even hit my head on the car ceiling. But as long as we stayed ON the road I was OK. It didn’t make me happy, thought, when Vance and Lotta realised that we’d taken the WRONG bumpy road and had to turn around and bump back, just to enter another (almost worse!) road. That only cost us another extra hour and a half of bumping up and down in that car.

We arrived in the village Yani about 3.5 hours too late, and food was almost more needed than a toilet at that time. The village itself wasn’t small, and not really considered poor either, but when I saw what they called their toilet (a, literally speaking, dug hole in the ground), I felt like I was faaaar away from civilization.

After some (great) food we headed to the Yani middle school to speak to some teachers and kids. Lotta warned me that when foreigners come they always have to perform something, as the kids then can ask questions and practice their English. ‘Mhm…’ I replied, while I felt drops of sweat break out on my forehead. Perform?! In front of kids? My travel insurance doesn’t cover this sort of things?!

‘How about you sing “Små grodorna? [a Swedish midsummer song that goes: ‘the little frogs the little frogs, are great to hang around!’ And then u r also supposed to jump around so that u look like one. Note that grown up Swedes would never take on the challenge unless they’ve consumed a lot of alcohol prior to the event]”’ suggested Lotta, and when I looked at her I saw she was serious.

‘You know,’ I said, and attempted a forced smile, ‘I really am a terrible singer! Maybe I’ll just speak to those kiddies instead!?’

‘As you wish,’ Lotta said. ‘But they can be quite hard work to get to talk.’

1.5 hours later I desperately wished I would have jumped around like a little frog. At least then the kids might have laughed at me?! Instead, I now stood, in front of their black table, and drew bad versions of horses, pigs and rabbits so that the kids could guess (in English) what I attempted to ask them (‘what is your favorite pet?!’) The kids were between 12-14 and still, they were soooo shy and afraid to speak! When I directed the question to someone straight, they were so nervous they stuttered for about 15 minutes before something came out of their mouth. Basically, it was dead quiet! Now I realised why it was good for them to practice to use their English, but then again -why ME?! Besides… the rabbit I drew looked more like a cat than a rabbit and Vance and Panda were waving for me to get down from there. Why did life get so hard all of a sudden?

Overall, Yani middle school was a pretty nice place. The kids came from all the villages around, and most of them lived on campus. The school has been suffering from children running away to return to their homes though, as a lot of children from the minority groups and poor mountain areas feel left out when they come to a place like Yani (where Mandarin Chinese is spoken in the classes). We discussed this problem as we drove on to Daxi and Ben Pi where we going to have dinner with the area leader of the village. Due to our little accident we were pretty late and it was already getting dark when we arrived at Ben Pi. I had an interesting chat with the area leader and I was also showed around the village and allowed to take a look at the towns non-working biogas system. The village had actually had biogas since 1993, but no one had shown the ppl how it works, and therefore no one is using it!

The area leader cooked us up a feast, which consisted of huge rice bowls, beans, a modest amount of veggies and LOADS of meat. Unfortunately, I am a no-meat-eater but it all looked great. What caught my attention in Ben Pi, though, was the children. I am normally not much of a child person and I don’t really know how to behave around kids. But those children… I don’t know how, but I think it was through my fancy camera that we made friends. They just couldn’t believe I had a screen that showed the pictures and they all turned into little posers as they thought it was hilarious. And I gladly snapped away. It’s always rewarding to photograph children.

It was getting late when we went to some families that had received micro credits in order to help them with their farming. What really struck me was how positive all the village people were! There they were, living in moist and dirty little shelter-houses, and still, no one would stop smiling. There was an amazing atmosphere amongst everyone, and that was really wonderful to see, especially considering their poor living conditions. It definitely challenges your own views and ideas about your own life.

When we started driving towards the Government where we were going to stay it was completely dark, except for a few lights that came from the houses. I was terrified, like, really, and it took Lotta and Vance some serious convincing talk to get me into the car that was gonna transport us, on those bumpy and small roads. For the last time I insisted that I’d rather walk but then the car started and off we went.

It sure was muddy and bumpy and I was astonished as I watched Panda fall asleep?! I, on the other side, was sitting up straight, clinging on to the door handle as if it was my last grip of life. But really, those mountains are 3000 m high and it was really really steep (and dark!) this time! But everything went well.

The Government almost gave the impression of being more poor than the village, and there were bugs and shit everywhere. Toilets, sinks or any sort of taps…. forget about it. There was a few light bulbs glowing, but that’s about it. We were given a room with 3 beds and I decided it was definitely time to bring out the mosquito net…. So, all wrapped up in a mosquito secured, bug sprayed sleeping bag I entered sleepy land. It actually surprised me how easy it was to fall asleep.