http://anniebower.theworldrace.org Annie Bower - The Travel Log Blog en-us Wed, 23 Jul 2008 21:27:28 GMT 30 http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=home-again-home-again-jiggity-jig http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=home-again-home-again-jiggity-jig It's midnight and I just ate lunch. Jet lag is keeping me awake, so I might as well blog.  After 36 hours of travel I arrived at the Pittsburgh Airport at about 5:30 am. As we landed I clapped to myself and said, "Thank you, thank you, thank you God for bringing me home safe."   I rushed through the airport with butterflies in my stomach to find my Mom, Dad, sister, and brother waiting for me with a big sign and American flags.  It was a sweet homecoming with hugs and tears all ar Wed, 21 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=whats-going-on-in-hong-kong http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=whats-going-on-in-hong-kong We have been in Hong Kong for the past 3 days after a 25 hour train ride from Beijing. I have been busy with debrief meetings, working on pictures and blogs. I posted Blogs from the 13th of October until today, so if you are interested you can check them out. If not, don't worry about it. I really don't like to leave projects unfinished and I did not want to leave any readers wondering about our experiences in China. I also wanted to complete my blogs for myself, so I could process and Tue, 13 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=the-secret-great-wall-if-china http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=the-secret-great-wall-if-china The main reason we traveled so far to Beijing was to see The Great Wall of China. We were given a choice to go to the touristy section of the wall which would involve less of a hike but tons of tourists or the "Secret Wall" where we would avoid the tourists and see better views. Thankfully the group chose the Secret Wall. Our bus drove out of the city and into the mountains we passed the wall that was stacked right on tippy top of the mountains. We saw hordes of tourists scaling the st Fri, 9 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-love-my-salt-girls http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-love-my-salt-girls This morning we woke up to such a beautiful blue sky with little smog, so Morgan, Candice, Emilie, and I decided to check out the Summer Palace. We took a city bus across the city of Beijing which took an hour and a half. Not only is the city large in population (17 million), but it is rather spread out. Once again with no guide to lead us around and tell us about the palace we learned very little about its history or function. But, it was really nice to take our time to walk around th Thu, 8 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=classic-beijing-tour http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=classic-beijing-tour I have never seen so much smog as we did when we rode through Beijing to our hostel.  The sun was out, but could barely be seen behind all of the polluted air.  We are staying in a hostel in the hutongs; which are also known as the urban villages.  The maze of hutong houses and alleys are slowly being demolished to build skyscrapers and big apartment buildings. After settling into the hostel Candice, Morgan, Emilie, and I decided to check out Tiananmen Sq Wed, 7 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=ready-to-go-home http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=ready-to-go-home Today I am completely ready to be done with The World Race. This feeling started this morning when I tried to turn my laundry in to be washed. I was told the hostel does not do laundry even though I have had it done before. I was annoyed, but went straight to the lady doing laundry. She was not easy to communicate with. After a frustrating conversation she took my clothing and I am hoping I get it back in time for our trip to Beijing. Then I went down for breakfast. I was charged 8 RMB Mon, 5 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-tough-job http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-tough-job This morning after I had some time to myself I walked out to shop at some of the street vendors. I stopped to buy at one of the booths and started bargaining with the lady. I started out really low and she started really low. I was willing to pay 15, but wanted to see if she would go for 10. She kept saying 15. I started to walk away and she asked me to come back, so I walked back and she said 25. Of course I refused and asked why she raised her price instead of lowering it. She woul Sat, 3 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=one-of-my-favorite-daysi-love-mopeds http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=one-of-my-favorite-daysi-love-mopeds This morning Andrew suggested that we rent mopeds to tour the surrounding areas. I have never driven a moped and would have preferred the exercise on a bike, but everyone wanted to ride mopeds and I thought it would be cool to try something new. With a deposit and a driver's license we were turned loose on the streets with 4 mopeds. Six of us rode with a buddy and Emilie started out by herself. It was a little nerve wracking to weave in and out of traffic and people, but eventually we Fri, 2 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-gorgeous-cold-wet-boat-ride http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-gorgeous-cold-wet-boat-ride Today is Clinton's birthday so we decided to take a boat ride to a mountain town down the river to a touristy town. It was raining as we took the taxi to the boat dock. Seven of us climbed into a little motor boat with a tarp for a roof. We puttered down the river as rain came in through the sides and through the tarp. I was cold and wet and wondering how long 4 hours of this would last. Slowly mountains popped up here and there along the river. We passed bamboo boats Thu, 1 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=go-big-or-go-home http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=go-big-or-go-home "Go Big or Go Home." This is one of Emilie's favorite sayings on The World Race, so we decided to make it the theme for her birthday today. She had about 10 different choices to make in which she could decide to go big or go home. The main choice was to go to the park and do some exercises with the old people or go for an adventure. Thankfully she chose the adventure which entailed a taxi ride to the base of a mountain. The weather was beautiful for our steep chair lift ride up Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=atl http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=atl Our group was sent here to ATL or Ask the Lord. Ideally we are to pray then wait until we feel the Lord is leading us to do something. We spent the morning taking some alone time then prayed for the other teams, China, and for our time in here. We then decided to take a city bus to see where the Lord would lead us. Some of the city buses are free, so we took the free bus and rod until we saw a store with a Biblical reference in its title. We got off to check out the store, and I hoped Mon, 29 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=new-location http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=new-location Our train ride ended at 4:00 am this morning then we boarded a bus for a 2 hour ride to our next destination. It was a little windy and squished. The man in front of James put his seat back so their heads were practically touching. Finally we arrived in the city and took a taxi to our hostel. Our current location is quite a contrast from our last city with huge leafy green trees lining the roads. We took a walk along the river where we passed a group of old ladies dancing to s Sun, 28 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=snapshots-of-china http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=snapshots-of-china We spent the last few days saying goodbye to students, eating in the cafeteria, and finishing with our classes. Some of the goodbyes were hard to say and brought tears from the students. This late in our year it is draining to say yet another goodbye. Team Salt split off from the rest of the group and we boarded a train for a 12 hour ride to our next destination. This ride was not quite as enjoyable as the last due to our loud, coughing, hacking, spitting, smoking neighbors. This train Sat, 27 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=traditional-chinese-medicine http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=traditional-chinese-medicine Today a tour was arranged for our group of a Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital. On the first floor of the drab building was the pharmacy. We were allowed to walk through the back room where dried herbs were contained in jars and open bags. I watched as the pharmacists took a scoop of this and a pinch of that to fill the prescriptions. Each patient received a packet with the different herbs and leaves and were instructed to boil the packet and drink the concoction. It was Thu, 25 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-never-want-to-be-famous http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-never-want-to-be-famous This morning we had another Chinese language class. We continued to work on learning the vowel and consonant sounds along with learning a few phrases in Mandarin. The class was almost painful as we mispronounced and stuttered over the unfamiliar language. But, our teacher continued to shower praise, "So good, you got it!", when we clearly did not get it. This afternoon an elementary school visit was planned by our cultural exchange program. Over 30 university students crammed into Tue, 23 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=fun-times-in-china1 http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=fun-times-in-china1 Our traditional Chinese music class afforded us the opportunity to hear 5 different instruments. Some of the music was pleasant, some was upbeat, and some was piercing. I am coming to believe more and more that culture influences our likes and dislikes including taste in music. Beijing 2008 Olympic Guitars Three girls had asked me to join them for dinner downtown after English Corner. Emilie and I climbed in the mini van to ride town with them for about 15 cents. F Mon, 22 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=language-barriers-do-not-make-for-easy-travel-days http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=language-barriers-do-not-make-for-easy-travel-days Because the park pass was good for 2 days and we had the afternoon free, 5 of us decided to revisit it today. We hoped to visit a new portion of the humongous park. It was not so easy to navigate without our student guides. After a series of unfortunate events (paying double to get to the park, going to the wrong entrance, taking a bus to a site requiring an additional entrance fee) we arrived with only an hour to spend in the park. It was just as beautiful today. We seemed to attract Sun, 21 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=what-a-beautiful-day http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=what-a-beautiful-day We had a free day, so a group of us went to a nearby park. The park is huge covering hundreds of miles. Five students served as our guides for the day. We started with a hike, climbing over 2 miles up a mountain of a mile high. The guides told us it would take 2 hours, but we climbed in less than 1. I was amazed to see both the very young and the very old making the strenuous trip. There was an option to take a chair up to the top. The chair was fixed to bamboo poles and carried by t Sat, 20 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=calligraphy-class http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=calligraphy-class Chinese Calligraphy was our lesson today. We each received a paint brush and paper. Our teacher has been working on her calligraphy since she was 7 years old. She demonstrated the proper technique in which each segment of the character was completed in one stroke of the brush. I loved watching her careful movements. The paintbrush seemed to dance across the paper. It came time for us to copy her movements and I'll admit, I cheated. One of the teachers walked by my desk and lau Fri, 19 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=english-corner-questions http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=english-corner-questions I have always wondered why my American education seemed to completely omit Asia from my History classes. Today we had a class on Chinese History. In 2 long hours we covered over 5000 years of China's recorded history. That was barely enough time for our lecturer (the president of the University) to list all of the emperors, dynasties, and kings. We did hear some interesting facts like the 1st writings came from copying the cracks formed in a tortoise shell after it was heated over a Thu, 18 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=all-things-chinese http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=all-things-chinese This morning we were on our way to a Tea House for our lesson on Tea Art. A man was squatted in front of a pile of bones. Our teacher for the day explained that they were goats legs; a Chinese delicacy. The man started burning the hair off the goat's legs; which sent off noxious fumes. At our Tea Art lesson we were served a dozen different teas (green, yellow, black, and flower). Many of the teas tasted the same to me, but some smelled like pretty flowers, and one had Wed, 17 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=guess-what-part-of-the-chicken-i-ate-today http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=guess-what-part-of-the-chicken-i-ate-today We were told to get to class early this morning, because it is very disrespectful to arrive after the teacher. We snapped a few"1st day of school" pictures then piled into our classroom. We were scheduled to start our the classroom portion of our Cultural Exchange through the Pinyin System. The Pinyin System is Chinese Phonetics. We spent the next two hours trying to match the teachers Chinese sounds by contorting our mouths, tongues, and teeth in ways they have never before moved. S Tue, 16 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-happy-birthday-for-me http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-happy-birthday-for-me I woke up this morning feeling well rested considering we had traveled as I slept. Train travel is definitely the way to go. I felt like I was riding on the polar express as we traveled through the night. After I woke up I went to the bathroom (which was a squatter toilet) and came back to find a group of World Racers wishing me Happy Birthday. Emilie and Candice came up with a camp theme for my birthday, so they put up camp decorations, had me fish from the top bunk for small g Mon, 15 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=travel-day http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=travel-day One bus and two trains took us to the Hong Kong/China border. We divided into small groups of 10 to cross the border, because we would run into more problems with crossing as a large group and it may give away the fact that we are a Christian group. When crossing the actual border we were told to say we were not with a group and were just crossing as tourists. Once across we waited 4 hours for our next train. As we waited in a room filled with hundreds of people we received much attentio Sun, 14 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=you-just-finished-the-world-race-now-what-are-you-going-to-do--im-going-to-disneyland-hong-kong http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=you-just-finished-the-world-race-now-what-are-you-going-to-do--im-going-to-disneyland-hong-kong Today was our final leg of The World Race. Honestly I was not too sad about the end of this particular feature of the year. The races are fun, but we have to rush through such amazing sites and experiences. This was one of my favorite races as we got to go all around Hong Kong by taxi, bus, subway, ferry, and tram. A prepaid card allowed us to use all forms of public transportation including the tram that took us straight up mountain. The view from the top of the mountain included th Sat, 13 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=its-official-no-internet-even-on-my-birthday http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=its-official-no-internet-even-on-my-birthday We have arrived in Hong Kong. It is beautiful with green mountains, extensive bridges, and towering sky scrapers. Today was our China debrief and tomorrow is the race. We found out a little bit about our time in China and what we will be doing there. I am so excited about our plans. I love learning about culture and hanging out with students and we will be doing a bit of both. We should also see some pretty cool sites and ride an overnight sleeper train. Unfortunately we will not be able Fri, 12 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-not-so-good-day-in-the-life-of-a-world-racer http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-not-so-good-day-in-the-life-of-a-world-racer We have talked many times as World Racers about how our blogs may be misleading.  Topics are usually exciting and positive in nature.  I have also been asked by a number of people to share not just the high points on the race, but the low points too.  Well some moments from today were almost comically low; at least they were in my opinion.  I was not going to post a blog at all today, but I wanted to step out of my box of blogs.  It all started when I woke up this mornin Thu, 11 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-may-not-be-able-to-blog-in-china-gaspwhat-will-i-do http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=i-may-not-be-able-to-blog-in-china-gaspwhat-will-i-do Tomorrow we head to China and there are a few things I need to tell you about our time there.  It is illegal to convert Chinese people.  We do have several Christian contacts in China that we will be working alongside.  In order to protect the security and anonymity of the contacts I will not be able to access The World Race site.  I may be able to send blogs to my parents to post, but they will need to be free of any Christian words or phrases. I will not be able to tell you Wed, 10 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-travel-day-in-the-life-of-a-world-racer http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-travel-day-in-the-life-of-a-world-racer A flight to Bangkok, Thailand from Siem Reap Cambodia lasts 35 minutes.  A bus ride from Siem Reap Cambodia to Bangkok, Thailand begins at 7:15 am and ends at 9:45 pm.  We moved such a small distance on the map, but the roads are so bad in areas that a small child could run faster than our bouncing bus.  Just another day on The World Race. I do have to say thank you to 10 of the World Racers that suffered through 6 hours on a non-air conditioned bus, while the rest of us crammed i Tue, 9 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-day-tour-of-angkor http://anniebower.theworldrace.org/?filename=a-day-tour-of-angkor All of the World Racers minus Team Zeo, Scott, Linnea, Rusty, and Josh have been in Siem Reap for the past two days.  This is our next to last debrief, so we have been encouraged to focus on the race rather than going home and to finish strong.  Today was an open day for us, so I got up at 4:45 to see the sunrise at famous Angkor Wat.  The temples of Angkor were built by Cambodian kings that were revered as gods.  The temples date from AD 802 to 1432.  Originally the tem Sun, 7 Oct 2007 00:00:00 GMT