Little Guilin Again


Little Guilin
A year and a half after our first expedition, and a day after our last attempt, we went out to Little Guilin again. This time, we left in the morning, rather than waiting until a rainstorm blew in, and we carefully researched the bus routes so we wouldn’t do anything damnfool stupid.

Of course, we relied on Google Maps, which told us we needed to take a bus to get to the bus stop, and we didn’t drink any coffee before trying to transport two small children on two buses for half an hour, and we had La Serpiente complaining alternately that she wanted to run and that she was too tired to walk, so we may have been redefining the concept of ‘damnfool stupid’ but it’s not like it’s easy to be a trendsetter.

Still, we got to Bukit Gambok without great struggle, and I justified hefting my huge camera and two lenses and a tripod I don’t think I’ve used since I bought it in Kota Kinabalu in 2011 by taking five or six photos of the hillside above the lake (which, if you’ve not been to Guilin, bears a stunning resemblence to Guilin) and then we walked to the train station, where the kids were rewarded for their good behaviour by being bought a loaf of green bread. (No caterpillars on sale today, sadly – not sure if that’s because of New Year or not)

Honestly, it probably isn’t worth the yomp out there if you have two small children. If you’re not encumbered by such, it’s probably easier – I kept seeing things from our first walk there from Bukit Batok, and having flashbacks to the psychic horror of that day. But never mind.

We went home, we put the kids to bed, my wife passed out cold and I spent three quarters of an hour editting photos (from today and from our holiday in Canada in December) so I could at least prove I’d done some things with my life.

And it didn’t rain at all, which was annoying as we’d carried two umbrellas with us the whole way there and the whole way back. Still, these are small complaints.

Tomorrow, I go back to work; on Thursday, La Serpiente goes back to school. I hope it’s not too abrupt an adjustment for either of us.

Now, to read a few pages of Trigger Mortis, and then to bed. On what I’ve read so far, not sure if it’s a faithful rendition of Fleming or a pisstake (between the Sapphic switcheroo, Bond drinking half a bottle of whiskey and then drinking three coffees and driving 75 miles the next morning, and lines like ‘just one more example of the utter cold-bloodedness and contempt that seemed to be built into the Slavic race’ it’s hard to tell…)


2 responses to “Little Guilin Again”

    • I couldn’t deny Destroyer the same character-forming experiences that her sister has been exposed to…

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