Starting this email on my Iphone while sitting in yet another traffic jam, and with a GI system on the fritz and temporarily tamped down with a steady regimen of Cipro and Immodium on the way to Dali- the next overtouristy "traditional" old Chinese town on the trail south. At least we are in a scenic rice paddy, though too bad its raining again. So- I'm well aware that there are stereotypes out their about driving, and well aware that I keep harping on the traffic in this country and don't want to play into it, but I do just want to comment a bit more on the insanity of road travel in a country where everyone has just learned to drive in the past five years. Its insane. We left our great hostel, Panba in Lijiang, probably the best hostel I've ever stayed in, although Christmas themed for some inexplicable reason- Merry Christmas written everywhere and a stocking hanging on our door. Our taxi to the bus station took us down a terrifying but not atypical three lane road- sort of a lane for one direction, sort of a lane for the other but most cars seemed to prefer swerving in and out of said middle lane. Furthermore, without exaggeration I can say that every single trip we've taken of more than two hours has involved waiting around at an accident scene watching people who've crashed their cars / buses/ trucks /tractors into each other argue for hours about who is at fault, with no sign of police or any kind of officials doing anything beyond putting on their sirens so that they can get past the scene of the accident. And half of the trips have spotted a car, truck or bus thats gone over the side and into a ditch. Uh-oh, This accident appears to be an overturned bus, which is sort of changing my appetite for taking an overnight bus from Dali to Kunming... Good thing we are moving becuse the movie on the bus has ended and it is now on to showing Karaoke videos. No, I'm not kidding. That god the passengers arent singing along- not too many of them anyway...

Okay, now in Dali, AKA Xiaguan. These towns are starting to blend together like the Unesco-fied colonial cities of Latin America. Beautiful to be sure, but we are ready to do something else pretty soon. And the rain isn't helping, and apparently Lijiang had a few deaths from flooding yesterday. Dali however has a bit more of a run down feel than some of the other towns we've been to- seedy almost, dirty, a bit rough around the edges, and more more for Western backpackers than Chinese tourists. Is that why I like it more, or is it the seediness- not sure.

No other particularly enlightening observations at this point. Some wacky things- I went to buy potato chips and all they had were chicken, beef, pork and corn (!) flavored chips. I opted for corn, which were very strange, though not as strange as the corn flavored candy. There is also some weird brand of car here that makes the collectivo style minibuses that have as their logo the starfleet insignia, which is kind of awesome. Bus station sold lighters that had Bin Laden on one side and George W Bush on the other. Food continues to be good if Szechuan, some fun deep fried ribs and Kung Pao chicken, and the other odd things about restaurants are that there are no napkins, place settings come to the table shrinkn wrapped and you have to unwrap them, and they sell the local rotgut alcohol in single serving shot glasses that are sealed. And if you ever do go to China, I know I mentioned it before, but the Pleco app for Iphones is super fun way to pass the time. Draw Chinese characters as best you can on your screen, and they translate automatically. (Watch video here). The other news is that our two year old Lonely Planet is also hopelessly out of date- there are now trains everywhere, and tons of stuff exists that didnt when the last edition of Southwest China came out.