Day 20: Theme Park, Scream Park

Today the local students Shen Ping and Yang Tao brought us to 中山公园(ZhongShan Park), named after the father of the Nationalist movement in China, Dr. Sun Yat-Sen (孙中山). To reach there, we had to take bus 549, but because it was the holiday week, it was ultra crowded. And today, I followed ShenPing and YangTao and boarded through the back-door of the bus. REALLY REALLY SQUEEZY!!! There was barely any 'personal space' and at one point, I had to balance myself on the edge of a step because more and more people were forcing their way up the bus! Even worse, when the bus crossed the river, a lotof people wanted to get off, at the same time, a lot of people wanted to get on, so there was a lot of movement through the back-door. Getting caught in this torrent is really terrible, and even worse, makes you extremely exposed to pickpockets!

their version of an ez-link card, but it can be used multiple times for multiple persons for multiple modes of transport, and should be slightly cheaper than paying cash

Anyway when we reached the Park, we were all bewildered by the Sunday crowd and looking very lost because we couldn't see any rides typical of an Amusement Park anywhere. So we walked inwards and then we saw the rides, and started to buy tickets for the rides we wanted to ride, since the rides operate on a pay-per-ride basis.

The first ride we took was the Slingshot, but it is slightly different from similar rides in other theme parks and amusement parks where the ride up is slow. This Slingshot, really shoots up and then drops you down. One more thing to note, is that in the picture, I'm still wearing my spectacles. Bad move, you say. You're right, because just when I tried to throw it into a basket with my belongings, the ride started and shot up! So on the way up, I was screaming for my spectacles that I had dropped in shock!!! Thankfully, my spectacles just got slightly greased by the machinery.

This is the next ride, and it works like a pendulum, going back and forth while the ring rotates clockwise then anti-clockwise. This ride seemed extremely popular, so we all gave it a try, and joined the queue, which really went round the entire ride and we had to contend with people trying to cut our queue too.
Another very popular ride, the Roller Coaster, which we had to queue for a really long time and endure people trying to cut queue. But although the wait was long, the short short ride was really exhilarating and quite worth it. But the best is yet to come.

The 4 of us took on this challenging ride, which spun the 5 spokes clockwise and anti-clockwise while each spoke rotates forward and backward. WOW. REALLY REALLY AWESOME. Halfway through the ride, I reached my threshold, and was being squashed into the safety harness by the centrifugal and G-forces. When I came down, I finally felt giddy. But awesome. Pure awesome.

After the excitement, we went to 武汉广场 (Wuhan Plaza) for lunch at a Singaporean Foodcourt!!

easily recognizable from a mile away - our dear Merlion

After 20 days, to see our own unique type of food is really comforting, and we went all out to eat a slice of home away from home. I had laksa, roti prata, and teh tarik. Unfortunately, the security guards reminded us that photography was not allowed... So I only managed to sneak 1 shot.

looks somewhat original, but they use thin ramen for the noodles and they substituted the taupok and fishcake with local versions, though the gravy really tasted like Singaporean Laksa!!

Anyway if any Singaporean who longs for a taste of home some 3000+km away, this place is a good place to go to because the food is about 60-70% original. And my best recommendation is the dessert and drinks stall, where I bought the Teh Tarik, AND WAS ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS AND TASTED TOTALLY LIKE SINGAPORE!
On the way to the bus-stop back, we saw this man reproducing the Mona Lisa with chalk on the pavement. He didn't even have to refer to a picture or anything, but he could confidently color in and draw in the details on the Mona Lisa. Total respect.

Reflection:

Similar to yesterday's post, today I finally really saw the children of Wuhan, all of whom had been hiding away at home or in school until this holiday season. Partially due to ignorance, we always think that the Chinese people are so much different than us, but in reality, I think that we are more alike than we dare admit. The simplest observation was seeing youths hand out together and getting on rides together, cutting queue together and horsing around with each other. On that same note, we also tend to stereotype 'Made In China' products, which is also why some of us were really concerned over the safety records of the rides, but there really was no cause for concern (apart from some minor incidents such as my spectacles and other people's shoes falling off the ride mid-operation) because the rides were very secure, although some of the belts and buckles ought to be checked because they couldn't serve their purpose of providing a secondary security measure.

On a more personal note, (which I think I might have mentioned before) I never gave money to beggars or buskers in the past because the thought of begging syndicates and stuff always loomed in my head. But seeing this old man made me think that what if these people really are unable to hold down a job, and if that is the case, here he is using his talent to produce such a beautiful piece of work using chalk and the pavement, and if that isn't deserving of some money then what is? So I gave some money and walked away with a new perspective in mind:

No matter who they are or what they do, we must always appreciate their talent and effort.

As Mr Loh commented on Han Hui's blog in one of the posts, at least they are using their talents to beg or busk for money, rather than relying on sympathy.