Dalian: Week 4
Possibly the most uneventful part of my trip, because I spent most of this time in bed (or what sad excuse of a bed I was on) being sick.
When I first arrived I felt damn fine because I want to explore the city and do heaps of shopping. Chaoyang is a small, rural-esque city with country clothing and people so I wasn't able to buy anything there. As soon as I saw this fresh, hip, urban city with many many stores I was excited out of my shoes (literally, they were off on the bus).
I met up with my mother's aunt (great aunt?) and I was warned beforehand that her house will be an utter mess. It wasn't actually, apparently they cleaned up anticipating our arrival. I finally met my cousin again and she's tomboy as usual but the city life has made her more stylish and mature as a person. We went down to the fancy restaurant nearby to dine with da family, totally not anticipating the series of tragic events that followed suit.
It was a normal dinner except for the fact that after I finished eating I felt really stuffy, like I couldn't breathe. I didn't think much of it because often enough I find myself so bloated this kind of stuff happen. But the next moment I started feeling lightheaded and I felt like I wanna throw up. I created this whole emergency as I couldn't move a limb and I just kind of lied down on a bed made of chairs. When I could move I was dragged like a drunk person (attracting many suspicious glances on the street) home to the sad excuse of a bed that is whatever I had to sleep on. I felt better cuz I could lie down but the makeshift bed was hard and uncomfortable, plus my Ps just HAD to arrive on the same time so my entire body was acheing like mad. Apparently some of that food was bad because my stomach was rumbling like hell and I felt like I could poop my pants.
So yeah, think about all of these horrible, horrible, feelings, and combine them into one giant clusterfuck. Personally I've never been so sick in my life, as I had to stay in bed (proper bed, ended up stealing my mum's) for the next week, not counting the times I had to get up and throw up/chug Chinese medicine. Everytime I thought I've recovered I end up fainting in the weirdest of places (Chinese IKEA and Costco), just to name a few.
On my last day at Dalian I actually managed to recover and do stuff. I felt stuffy again during the last dinner (at the same restaurant sigh) so my cousin and her roommate took me out to some of the popular stores. It's super clean and proper and the stuff ain't too expensive either. Plus it's late at night on a weekday so noone's there and there weren't that much people. I bought a few things (all very small, ofc) and organised with mum when I'm going to Guangzhou to stay with Jess.
Overall, Dalian would have been a a great place if I wasn't on my deathbed throughout the majority of my stay. And also the taxi drivers there are so damn rude compared to good ol' Chaoyang with their crappy hotel system. You can pretty much NEVER catch a taxi and when you do if you're not going somewhere far away they won't even take you. Most of the taxis also take people even if they already have people on it (it's called a combined trip or something and you don't pay half but full price so those dirty bastards earn more money).
