Bike Ride from Hell!!

As you may or may not know our schools are supposed to provide us with a bike to get around town on. Let me say again, these bikes are for us to use around town, they are one-speed, Dorothy Gale of Oz bikes, not mountain bikes, there are no shocks, no changing gears, 1/2 inch tires, and they have baskets on the front, bikes. So our FAO has the brilliant idea of asking us to go for a bike ride in the country side. GREAT!!! So we go at 10am on our unexpected day off. It was very interesting, it was beautiful, but it was biking in the country on a city bike!!

We were in the farming area. Lots of field which were interesting to look at and to see the irrigation system. They farm in tiers with ditches cut through and around the fields.

This is black rice which is apparent popular here but I haven't had or seen any.

There are oxen/cows that do all the plowing. They are all over.

There is just field after field. All divided by different plants.

Can I eat that for dinner instead of rice or noodles please!!!!!!!

This was the hill from hell! It rivals St.Paul! These are the 3 students that came with us. The FAO's daughter, her friend and one of the 9th grade boys who never goes home because his parents work in Shanghai. Very sad story, but a super sweet kid.

But the view was awesome

Story time: We biked for 4 hours. It was exhausting. Up hill, down hill, up hill, down hill. I don't claim to have the patients of a saint but the two little girls had been screwing around the entire trip. So we were going up a hill and I was trying to keep my momentum up when my FAO's daughter decides to stop pedalling, right in front of me. I had two choices: Nail her and knock her on her ass or ditch and lay down my bike along with myself. Being the noble and self-sacrificing person I am, I laid down my bike which resulted in me crashing down. I scraped up my elbow and my knee. My elbow was bleeding and my knee instantly bruised. I wanted to punch her in the head. Now this was half way through the trip so I got to go 2 hours with my knee throbbing and my elbow bleeding.

Needless to say, I will not being going to the countryside anytime soon and my ass hurt so bad from sitting on that seat that I didn't get on my bike for a few days. ONLY IN CHINA!!