sofasurfers

Somewhat against the traffic, as more and more of China’s population
takes a one-way ticket into its cities and out of rural life, I headed
towards the village of Xing Ping in Guangxi province – yes! A village!
I’d found a couchsurfer in a village… Or had I? Correct: exactly as
feared when going to a place where there’s only one option, my one
option went and ran out on me. Just as I was on the bus there as well:
after I’d sent a couple of unrequited texts, I do indeed hear back
from my host that that he’s left town. Grrrowl. “Go to the youth
hostel and find Axiang – she will look after you”. Harrumph.
Actually, despite my grumpy cynicism setting in as I was led up the
(garden) path into the youth hostel, I was not expected to pay to
sleep in a dormitory with hairy and smelly travellers (and nor they
with me…). Axiang, the 21-year-old niece of my absent host’s wife,
took me off to her place where I even had my own bedroom.
Communication wasn’t easy (our Chinese whispers conversation led me to
expect to be staying with her parents and brother in a farm; I arrived
to find it was just me and her above a grain store), but she gave me
her house keys and her heart, and a window to life in her village.

And so I got to witness buffalo (oh maybe they are water buffalo, but
hey, the shepherd is herding in his pants – that’s got to be village).

I saw sausages made like they used to – out of real intestines (and
please note the orange trees in the background; also observed: banana
trees, chilli bushes and strawberries – and those are just the ones
that I understood).
 I saw Mao posters in pride of place by the TV (the real rural God) in
crumbly yellow brick houses with wide-open doors, holey ceilings and
woodsmoke fires… I saw a crowd which had gathered to spectate a
lorry unloading an oildrum (clearly a rare excitement). I saw abacuses
in shops, and small collections of orange pith (peel removed) drying
in the sun – some kind of cottage industry as they can sell on the
pith though I haven’t yet uncovered the point. I saw fresh dinner on
its way to the table – these little chucks were still alive.
 And what about the yuf, when they can’t get their hands on any spray
paint and a good wedge of urban wall? Bamboo etchings. Let’s hope it
says something fully filthy.
 I even went for a walk up those strange limestone camel humps where my
sole companion was this little calf (no people for two hours! Remember
this is China). I heard nothing but birds singing, cow bells dingling,
and sometimes just nothing at all. Total luxury.


And.. I saw this furry fellow in my bedroom – please do observe that
the water bottle you see for the purpose of perspective is a full
1.5litres, not an incy wincy 300ml one. In fact, so impossibly large
(and still) was my bedfellow that at first I thought it was a plastic
joke. But no – by the time I’d procured a giant jar large enough to
catch him in, he’d moved…into the shadows and into my nightmares.