After my meal I headed over and found a seat in the theatre to wait for the show to start. While waiting there were people walking around offering ear cleaning and massages. I said no to both. Considering our ears clean themselves naturally, there was no way I was going to say yes to someone sticking shared utensils into my ears. Just because something has been a cultural tradition, doesn’t mean that I need to partake in it. The theatre filled up quite a bit, especially just before the show started when a tour group came in.
The show had a range of different performers showcasing their skills and talents. There were dancers, puppeteers, and of course the impressive face changers. It was nice to take in some entertainment and see some local classical theatre stylings. The tea pourers were super impressive, and if you ever go to a show make sure that you get the tea add on package so you can experience the tea pourers up close. I didn’t get the tea, and I would next time for sure.
I think one of my favourite acts was the drum and vase foot roller. She was incredible, so impressive watching someone tumble and catch objects with their feet.
Not really understanding Chinese didn’t negatively impact the experience at all. The good thing with a lot of these performances was that there were no words, and the main one that did have words. A comical clowning act, I could still kind of piece together enough of it through the dramatisation of the actors. I really enjoyed the show and was so glad that I decided to check it out.
I then just went for a bit of a walk around to just explore and see the city. it had been described to me that Chengdu was a very relaxed city, where stopping for tea, or seeing tea houses with locals sitting around catching up and playing mahjong was common. It kind of was. There were lots of signs and things about saying how relaxed Chengdu was, and there were certainly lots of tea houses where you could just stop and watch the world go by for a bit. The city does have a chill vibe to it.
I headed over to Tianfu square to check it out. Tianfu means abundance and Chengdu is often referred to as the land of abundance. In the middle of a big round about is the square and shopping plaza. I had decided that I wanted to repinkify my hair and so I was on the hunt for some gloves. Do you think I could find any? Nope. I went into the sorts of beauty supply stores I would think would have some of the things I wanted but no luck. I did stop in at a Uniqlo though and got myself another tshirt and singlet the same as I had bought in Guangzhou as I was actually wearing them constantly that having some new ones would be good. Especially finding tshirts that I am comfortable to wear, because I know that in South Korea I will want to keep my shoulders covered a bit more. It’s actually quite tricky for me to buy singlet tops here in most of the shops because they really like to put boob padding into them.
Anyway, after no luck finding the things I needed I decided to head back to my apartment and try at some of the shops around where I was staying. This is where I had the luck. I found a packet of plastic gloves, plastic bowls, and disposable chopsticks. These were all the tools I needed to dye my hair and they cost me about $4 at the larger convenience store.
For the rest of the evening I pretty much just did some work, dyed my hair, and packed up my things as I was off to catch a high speed train to Xi’an the next morning.
