We knew that finding our accommodations at Moganshan Loft required that we take a bus to De Qing and then catch a taxi to Moganshan. What we didn’t realize is that our taxi driver didn’t know how to get to Moganshan Loft (and neither did we) nor that his three-wheeler taxi didn’t have the power to climb the mountain.

So we were puzzled as to what to do when he dropped us off midway up the mountain. We were reluctant to pay him, as we had not reached our destination but were not sure how to proceed. Fortunately we were rescued by some Israeli travelers, one of whom spoke Chinese. They invited us to join them in their larger van and the one who spoke Chinese explained that their driver would pay our driver once we got to our destination. We accepted that and went on with them.

The Israelis were staying at a hotel inside Moganshan National Park. We soon found ourselves at the entrance to the park and had to pay the entrance fee. It was only later that we discovered that our hotel was not within the park at all, but farther down the mountain. So after the Israelis were dropped off and after several phone calls, we were delivered finally to our accommodations at Moganshan Loft.

But there was no front desk and no receptionist to be seen. Only an elderly man with a bandaged arm, dressed in boxer shorts. The man spoke rapidly and insisted that we pay him some money. I understood practically nothing of what he was saying and I was not at all sure why we should pay him; we had just arrived and I had already paid a 33% deposit for our room.

When we called the owner, with whom we had made our reservations, he informed us that he lived in Hangzhou and was presently on a business trip. He explained that the man in the boxer shorts was the manager of the property. Soon the manager gave us a key and showed us our room.

We hadn’t eaten all day, so we were getting hungry. He motioned with the universal fingers-together-and-hand-to-the-mouth gesture, indicating that we could get something to eat next door.

Next door we saw several laborers eating at a table next to a makeshift outdoor kitchen. We waited until the men finished eating and left the table.

With the universal eating gesture, the two women cooking asked if we wanted something to eat and we nodded enthusiastically. Then we were led into the food storage area where there were all kinds of vegetables and meats and spices. They seemed to be expecting us to point to the foods we wanted. We had no idea whether they were inviting us to purchase the food and cook it ourselves, or whether they would cook it for us and serve us a meal.

We pointed to some eggs and some tomatoes and some tofu.

They motioned for us to sit down. Soon they were placing in front of us a mouth watering tofu dish, an egg-tomato dish and a plate of rice.

We ate it all with gusto.

So it all worked out just fine; we had a place to stay and our bellies were full. The day just didn’t resemble the expectations we had about finding a hotel, checking in, and ordering a meal. And without being able to understand what people were saying, we had precious little information to use for making sense of the situation.

And you remember those Chinese lessons we took before the trip, to learn some Mandarin fundamentals? Well, it turns out, in this part of China, the dialect is very different from Mandarin; it sounds like a completely different language.

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T