Crazy Monkeys

Our stay with the monks at the Buddhist monastery reminded me a bit of Thailand and the hilltribe stays: very rustic and showers with spiders and who knows what are common. Unfortunately we had a curfew and no alcohol was allowed (remember Leslie how that helped with those bathrooms>!?!!? haha)
I absolutely loved the hiking to the monastery which was located at the top of a mountain and we saw tons of monkeys there and on the way! They monkeys here have red faces and are about the size of a 4 year old who eats too many snacks since they are fed tons of garbage food by the tourists. They are actually a little threatning and you can't have water showing or drinks showing when you walk through monkey areas! Crazy! Our hike guide had an orange juice on the outside of his backpack and a monkey sneaked up and grabbed it. He chased after it for a little while while waving his walking stick and screaming a few choice words in Mandarin. He didn't catch the mono but it did unscrew the cap of the bottle and drink it in front of his face!!! Haha. It was funny. On the hike we enjoyed great views, rivers, many trees, cicadias, and ate a yummy dinner at this older couples house (very rustic...bathroom is bascially the side of the mountain and the bedroom may be the only enclosed room) and they were so cute and sweet! They named their restaurant the "Hard Wok" restaurant which gave all of us a chuckle and they also provided us with some yummy crepe-like banana chocolate pancakes for breakfast. Mmmmm.
We also visited a nunnery and met some of the cutest kids there. They were quite good at English and were taking a drawing class in the mountains with the beautiful scenery. Their drawings were amazing - I took pictures. Two little girls gave Deepa and me some dates and so we shared some Cheerios with them. It was so funny to watch them eat them - it's extrememly western and I think it was their first encounter with them.
On completely different note, it's been funny to be in China while it is so quickly developing. It means there are constant juxtopositions of old and new. For example, while hiking in the mountains we walked past a house with chickens running around outside, thatched-type roof, falling apart walls, and it had a HUGE satellite dish on it! Haha. It also means things like the roads will be amazing (the infastructure here is quite good), but little kids don't wear diapers - just assless pants - and they poo anywhere. Middle of a town square, sidewalk, etc. It's just fascinating.
Moving on: we cruised along the Yangtze River the past 3 days and really enjoyed that as well. In the year 2009 the dam that they are building will change the landscape of the 3 gorges area a ton - we feel very lucky to have seen them before they are resolved to nothingness. They are raising the river another 150 meters within the year, I believe. There are huge signs all over with 150M on them - everything below them will be gone. A lot of the farming people are going to be displaced and the dam is very controversial, but it will be a source of tons of energy and it will control flooding.
Crazy to hear about the weird bombing things in London and just got a warning about Al Quaeda in India. Keeping my fingers crossed....Thankfully there was a cease fire in Lebanon-Israel conflict, right? News here isn't so great.
Miss you - take care! We're off to a train for the next 15 hours and then onto some small towns...not sure when you will here from me. No worries, though, we're not where the typhoon is going on.