Foodie Friday & things to do in Kunming...

The exams are over for me, so I'm more or less back to regular postings again. :)  The paper yesterday was difficult, but I'm going to just leave it to God now since its already over!  We had dinner with my parents today to celebrate that my exam is over (at least til next year), as well as hubby moving up to become a registrar at work.  So we headed to one of our favourite malls, Parkway Parade, and had dinner at Espirito Santo.  This place started off as a butchery and then expanded  to include a restaurant section, and we love the Brazilian food there!  Dishes to try would include their crab soup, their steak (get the filet mignon, which hubby raves about!), as well as their oxtail stew... Another nice thing we like about the place is that they serve complimentary bread with a pesto dip, and that is really really yummy!

Oh, and back to rambling about our Yunnan trip! :)  After our stay in Cang Yuan, we headed back to Kunming for a day of exploration.  On the morning we were supposed to leave, the team paid a short visit back to the hospital and the patients actually sang a song to us... These patients actually had to take a 20 hour bus ride to Cang Yuan, and I think they probably would never had gotten their operations if the team didn't come down, so its nice to know that all their hard work made a difference in these people's lives!

After that, it was the windy 4 hour drive again to Lin Cang airport.  But since it was in the morning, it wasn't so bad as everyone was busy looking out of the windows and snapping photos.  It was misty, and there were dewdrops strung like beads on all the spiderwebs, so all the trees look liked they were decorated with lace... (but the ambulance was moving too fast for me to capture any photos of that!)

We had a toilet stop along the way, but for that stop, most of the girls spent their time behind the camera rather than in the toilet since there were a couple of cute puppies wandering about! (I got distracted by a pair of brothers that were hanging around the area too...)

We stopped at a restaurant for lunch, and the place had both a picturesque view, as well as yummy food!

It was a full day of traveling, since by the time we reached the Spring City Resort where we were supposed to be staying in Kunming (our stay was sponsored by the resort itself), it was already dinner time.  The resort is situated by a lake, and the scenery there is gorgeous!  The resort is very popular among golfers... I mean, imagine tee-ing off while looking upon the distant lake... and wandering around in the course on a warm sunny day!

The next day was spent exploring a few areas in Kunming.   

We went to one of the local markets and wandered down the little alleys, where people sold all manner of things, from brooms....

to weevil wine (I'm serious, its not for the want of alliteration, but they actually rear weevils using corn husks and steep them in alcohol!)...

We stopped to eat some yummy pancakes...

saw old ladies in their ethnic wear going about their shopping...

observed men smoking the large traditional pipe... (That was in a shop selling all sorts of paper accessories for funerals by the way!)

basked in the autumnal sunshine...

and even caught a glimpse of a bride on her way to her wedding!

We then stopped by Naigu Stone Forest, which was literally as the name suggested, a forest of stones!

We then headed for lunch, followed by a stop to a tea house to buy tea (pu-er).  As we were wandering around the area, we met another baby around baby J's age... but baby J wasn't exactly very friendly then, but we had a nice chat with the boy's mother.

Then we stopped by Walmart (yes, China has Walmart!), and found this little shop selling Crocs.  Wait... those were not Crocs, but the Hong Kong version of Crocs (which were as well made as Crocs themselves, but cost a fraction of the price!), called Coqui.  Coqui basically refers to some little frogs found in Puerto Rico (don't ask me why the Hong Kong-ers chose that animal, of all things), so instead of the crocodile, they have the froggy symbol on their shoes.  

Finally, we headed down to "The Wicker Basket" to meet our host (who had arranged for all the details for the entire trip) for dinner.  The place is a cafe cum bakery run by the deaf and the disabled, and the baked goods are very yummy!  So if you ever go down to Kunming, be sure to stop by and stock up on snacks (their cinnamon buns are fantastic, and according to some other team members, the carrot cake and cookies are good too!), and have a meal at the cafe.  The cafe has a sister shop just next door called "Hearts and Hands" which sells handicrafts made by the deaf and disabled.  We're talking about really nice quality handicrafts, spanning from quilts, nursing covers, and bags, to handmade toys, dolls in their Yunnan ethnic wear and even papercut greeting cards.  You can be sure I went nuts shopping there!

And that ended our day of exploration of Kunming and marked the end of our trip (as we flew back the next day)... it was a pity we didn't get to explore their famous "flower market", but we did have lots of fun that day!