Day 4

Big Clear Lake. The lake is big. Entrance fee = RMB 15. Coincidentally, there was an Old Folks Celebration going on and we seized the opportunity to be entertained by the folk dances, Taichi and songs. The weather was good, cooling but not so cold. The locals enjoyed playing cards and chinese chess in the public. I enjoyed strolling down the park. Can't find such place back in M'sia. So sad.

For 2 consequtive days, I patronized KFC in Jinan coz I found the other local eateries dirty and unappetizing. KFC is localized. They have chicken dipped in Beijing sauce, hot honey-lemonade juice and almond-flavoured ice-cream.

After lunch we took a 1.5-hour bus to TaiAn, the town of TaiShan. Bus fare = RMB 15. TaiAn is a "student" town with "modern" technology. There are lots of boarding schools around and thus there are many teenagers around. I was surprised to find how creative and innovative the entrepreneurs are. The shops have funny and gimmicky names. (Of course, you need to understand Chinese in order to appreciate their creativities) There's a barber shop named "理还乱" - a phrase following the phrase of "剪不断" - "剪" implies that you need to cut ur hair!

We stayed in a newly renovated hostel-like hotel. We were lucky as there's only 1 room with 3 beds. The IKEA-like room only costs RMB 100 per nite. The owner of the hotel must be a young and IT-savvied entrepreneur. The room design, the furniture and the "price tags" are really IKEA-styled. There's a book menu, Windows XP-styled with Yahoo Messenger's emoticons, listing down all the price of items available in the room, explicitly declaring the price you've to pay if those items were lost (you purposely steal it or you wanna take it as a souvenir or 1001 of reasons... who cares?) or damaged. Packets of condoms and panties are readily available on the table, together with packets of instant noodles and drinks. Just like items on the supermarket shelves, they have price tags on them. Wah-lau-eh, it really opens my eyes!

We had a steamboat dinner. Everyone has his/her own personal pot. Very hygienic! Food is very cheap too! I'm an 80% vegetarian. I cannot tahan the cheap vege on the menu. The waiter has to stop me from ordering as the vege comes in big portion and nobody has ordered so much before. The waiter said politely, "小姐，这也太多了吧？"! Aiyoh, only RMB 1 for a big plate of green-leaf vege. How to resist the temptation?