I Grew My Boobs in China (11 page)

“I saw someone out there selling tissues. I’ll go grab some,” Bree offered. And that was all it took to start her newest pack-rat addiction.

“Mom, I’m not doing it,” I tried.

“You have to. Now stop fussing and go before the bus leaves,” and that was that. Under duress, I did what would have been unthinkable even two days ago.

Back on the bus, the driver took off at the same pace he’d been maintaining all night. I swung a hand up to make a grab for the belt, but I missed and had to grab onto the side rails of my bed with clenched, bloodless knuckles to keep myself grounded. I waited a moment between bumps. Sensing a smooth patch, I reached again and felt the tightly woven strap of a belt. Securing my weight with this one, I bravely took my other hand and snatched at the remaining strap. In one clean, quick motion, I slammed my fists together and heard the click. I couldn’t help but squeal with delight. It was actually just a bit thrilling!
Mom is so lucky. If it weren’t for me, she’d have fallen out that window five times over by now, open or not!
Safely secured, I checked on Bree, who was being tossed about crazily and laughing out loud. We braced ourselves against the next huge bash before resuming our chatter about the American guy. We’d been watching him bounce wildly around in his bed.

“How can he possibly sleep?” I whispered to Bree, who was trying desperately not to howl. “I swear he’s going to fall out!”

We kept a keen eye on Mr. Kent as we rode the road’s tidal waves. In one particularly massive collision, he was abruptly ejected from his bed, just as we’d predicted! His long, blond hair seemed to linger in slow motion in mid-air before he landed with a loud thud. We face-planted our heads into our pillows to stifle snorts of laughter. Stumbling sleepily from the floor, he clambered back into his top bunk, this time finding his belt and securing himself in for the rest of the night.

Chapter 11

A Moment in Time

The mattress beneath me rumbled from the engine as the tires grabbed the dewy pavement. My eyes slowly blinked open. It had to have been about four-thirty in the morning. The sun had not quite risen, but it was gently making itself known. The view was hazy so I drowsily clenched my hands into fists and rubbed my eyes, wrists twisting back and forth. Reopening them, nothing had changed. I was unable to tell if I was awake or still dreaming as my previous world collided with what I saw through the eerie morning fog.

Images dripping with mystery and wonder flew by. The earth swelled up into monstrous snails that had lain petrified for so long that vegetation had found refuge on their backs. Mist swirled around the base of the lush mounds of earth, wandering magically and timelessly above the fields of rice and around the ankles of water buffalo hauling wooden ploughs. Small silhouettes of men with loose shirts and conical straw hats trailed behind their gentle beasts of burden.

The night had whisked me into another dimension completely. There was no trace of the city’s technology or machinery here. The land lay undiscovered, as if it were reserved for dinosaurs to nest and graze amidst its beauty. I felt I could dream endlessly in this modern-day time capsule where birds were taking flight, suspended between earth and sky with outstretched wings.
This is going to be my very own Never Ending Story,
I thought
, but if it looks anything like this, I may never want to leave.

As the sun came up, the silhouettes in the smoky charcoal painting were transformed into a vivid masterpiece etched in brilliant shades of green. Foot trails skipped deviously through the fields. The keepers of this land tromped barefoot through the sticky mud, pant legs rolled up to their knees as the fields of rice began to glow from the reflection in the water pools.

The beauty of the scene before me caught me completely off guard, and goose bumps worked their way up and down my arms. Till now, I had assumed that my angst about this trip would manifest itself in the form of something terrible or shocking, like the sky falling down on me. Instead, in my half-asleep state, something within me awakened, and I felt the most calming form of peace imaginable. For just an instant, I let go and peered curiously through that doorway of exciting possibilities, but it was one I was not yet ready to step through. I lost it just as quickly as it had appeared, but a tiny seed of joyful anticipation was planted before I fell back to sleep.

Chapter 12

Reality Check

“Well, so long! And have a good trip,” Kent said as he walked away with what looked like a hint of a limp. As he was swallowed up by the throngs in the Yangshuo market, I knew we wouldn’t be seeing him again. We headed off in our own direction to find a place to stay. Just as we’d hoped, one of few locals trying to get commissions found us. He wore thin-brimmed, wire glasses and as a bonus, he spoke English. I was surprised to find someone who did, and he seemed just as surprised to find us.

“Yes, yes. Come. Good place for you,” and he waved us on. Ammon, shrugging his fully-loaded shoulders, decided to follow him and check the place out.

Yangshuo was supposed to be a quieter, less populated town, but it appeared to be just as fast-paced as anywhere else we’d seen. The streets were buzzing but in a different way. Briefcases and shiny shoes had apparently been traded in for rakes and sandals. Double-decker buses became wagons loaded with bundles of hay that towered threateningly over bustling pedestrians. Flashing city lights were transformed into shirts and underwear billowing from balconies and windows. Though a little more tanned and weathered than city folk, little about the inhabitants’ physical attributes had changed. The men were uniformly clean shaven with short, well-groomed hair and soft features, and the women all looked like our friend Sandra.

The gawking continued, but it was here that a new, less-biased awareness finally sank in: it was not me the inhabitants were staring at, but Ammon! I was not alone in having to crane my neck to look up at him. He was a full foot taller than everyone else! Our five-foot-three height had miraculously become average sized, and we were like three little ducklings trailing in a row behind our brown-haired leader. He stood out like a flamingo in a flock of geese, a feature that often came in handy when we were chasing him in a crowd.

I would react the same way if I saw a purple-headed space giant walking down my street,
I realized.
If I saw a long, stringy hair dangling from someone’s mole, I’d be tempted to stare, too
. In fact, I had sent out some pretty inquisitive looks myself in the last few days! And it was not just his relative size that drew attention. Ammon’s short brown ringlets and five hooped earrings looked like something from the age of pirates.
They must think he’s a woman. No wonder they’re confused and curious.
Here, women wore only simple earrings and men would never be seen with such feminine accessories. Long hair on a male was completely unthinkable.

Leaping over a puddle, I was cautious to gauge the hectic speed of approaching motorbikes and bicycles that could potentially swipe me off my feet.

“Was that a chicken?!” I bellowed, staring at another bicycle passing by, this one with four hens strapped upside down by their feet to the handle bars. Another went by shortly with a load of fresh eggs stacked high in wooden crates teetering on the back fender. Clothes danced above us on lines strung from the windows as we made our way down the small, dirt streets of the residential areas, causing Bree to wonder aloud at the apparent lack of dryers.

“They probably don’t have washers either,” Mom piped in, looking up.

“I’m sure they don’t. It’s called haaand waassshhhing,” Ammon said, arrogantly sounding it out for us.

Waddling up alongside Ammon, I expressed my disbelief, “Noooo, they don’t! You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“You would have said the same about the way they work their fields. People just don’t have all the modern appliances you’re used to. It’s not necessary.”

“Hand washing, huh? Is this the slum area?” I asked, cautiously surveying the rickety buildings.

“No! It is not the
slums.
You’re going to be doing it too, ya know,” he warned in what I took to be an ominous fashion. I hadn’t thought that far ahead and suddenly regretted the clumsy smudge of chocolate I’d gotten on my pink shirt. I began helplessly searching my memory for any Laundromats I might’ve seen along the way, but I couldn’t recall a single one. Only a few weeks earlier, my head would’ve exploded at even the prospect of using coins in a machine to do my laundry. Never once in my cushy life had hand washing crossed my mind.

The majority of the buildings were concrete blocks with white tiled fronts and grey tile roofing. Wet, brick-strewn alleyways led us to our hotel at last. Shiny, golden gates encased the doorway where two large, captivating lions stood guard in typical Chinese style. Their round heads featured snarling red smiles.

“If you need anything, you ask for me. My name is Larry,” our escort said before letting us go.

Sneaking up behind Ammon at the small reception desk, I asked the question that was always foremost in my mind when it came to our accommodations, “Do they have Internet?” A man came out from behind the desk to show us that the Internet was at the bottom of the stairs. My heart leapt with joy at the news that guests were allowed one free hour a day per person. This was one bit of happiness I felt I could freely show. This would be the first time, aside from the quick note on our family blog at the airport, that we’d get to read and send emails, and I had so much to share. It had been one very long week, and I’d often wished that Terri and the others could have been there. My mind couldn’t stop spinning words around, trying to pick the ones that would best describe our experiences thus far.
Not that I wouldn’t have traded them in a heartbeat to be back in my room at home with my friends, but brilliant, stunning, and gorgeous were the words that came immediately to mind.

We were shown to our room on the fifth floor. I sure would’ve appreciated an elevator, and felt just a tiny bit irritated at how effortlessly the little reception man climbed all those stairs. My preoccupation with the prospect of Internet access dulled the pain surging through my body a bit. My jellied legs were wobbling under the heavy, book-weighted backpack; they felt as if they’d been carrying two libraries. But our room was big enough to give me some hope that maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t be sleeping partly on my backpack for the whole year! In comparison to Hong Kong, I was totally impressed.

Ammon saw the surprise on my face and had a good laugh at my expense, “Hey I didn’t say anything. I just let you draw your own conclusions.”

“Oh you did not! You purposely let me believe the rooms were going to get smaller! I don’t know how I could’ve fallen for that.”

Our room had three beds with a bathroom and was less than half the price of Hong Kong’s closet, but of course, it was I who would be sleeping on the floor. Now I knew for sure they were out to get me as, once again, the dubious benefits of being the youngest were hammered home.
Why should I be the one to go bedless?
Surely my whining had caused them enough pain to have earned some comfort for a change!

Had I bothered to voice that argument, Mom would surely have responded, “And that’s exactly why YOU got the floor!”

Suddenly, I noticed Bree’s absence. “Where the devil?” and then it hit me. Mom was already busy claiming first shower, and that was fine by me; all I wanted was the Internet! I was halfway down the staircase before she’d even opened the bathroom door and caught sight of Bree’s long ponytail around a corner of the open stairwell. She was already two flights closer to the computer, but I was gaining on her!

“You can NOT do this to me,” I commanded, flying in right behind her on the main floor.

“Hey, first one gets dibs. I won it fair and square.”

“You are such a loser!”

“Oh poooor baaby,” she rubbed it in gleefully.

“Please Breeeeeee?” I begged, using my helpless baby sister voice and bouncing anxiously.

“Oh, okaaayyy,” she laughed and scooted over to make room for me on the rudimentary, wooden chair. “You write down what you want to say before you do it while I’m checking and then while I’m planning how to respond, you can type what you wrote.”

Our hour was nearly over and one side of my boney butt was asleep when Bree complained that she couldn’t get on to the blog.

“What do you mean, you can’t get on the blog?”

“Well, I mean, I did. I wrote my thing and posted it, but I can’t open the site up to read it or see anyone’s comments.”

“Wow. That’s weird.”

We turned simultaneously towards Ammon, who had just found us. “It must be censored. Somebody said something about that before. But that’s a huge bummer.”

“Why would they do that?” I asked.

“I guess they don’t want the influence of the outside world. I didn’t realize the blog would be blocked, but it makes sense. They don’t know what we’re saying, so they don’t want their people to read it.” We couldn’t think of much to say to that which would change anything, so we moved on. Noticing that Ammon had his daypack slung over his shoulder, Bree asked where he was
going.

“
We
are going out. I know it’s sort of cheating, but I just booked two days of activities with the hotel. So get off the computer, we’re going. One of you run up and get your mother.”

With my Internet fix only partially satisfied, Ammon was back on his feet and ready to
start
the day when I was ready to end it. It wasn’t even noon and I’d already exhausted myself visually and physically. Of course, no one cared what I thought about anything, so it wasn’t long before we set off on our next expedition.