Funny Cultural Moment

Yesterday Talia and I climbed a mountain in our city. A friend told us where to find a smaller, less traveled path in order to escape the Asian crowds and stair-climbing. The path hosted more people than expected, and it order to stay ahead of the traditional folk song singing crowd, we hiked at a rapid pace. It was typically hot and we did not start climbing until almost 11:30am, so needless to say, we were drenched in sweat. By accident, we ended up on a random path that brought us to the top by way of trash heap.

All of this made for hilarious cultural moment when the two of us popped out of the trash heap, onto the road, and into two very surprised Asian men on a moped tour of the mountain. They stopped immediately, stared, and pointed at us. We had just broken every cultural norm, two big ones in particular: women don't sweat and no one strays from the concrete staircase when climbing mountains. We blinked at each other for more than a few moments before trying to communicate, both sides holding back the mirth of being either on giving or receiving end of laughter. Eventually they drove on a little way and Talia and I tried to figure out our surroundings. We wanted to find a quiet tea house in which to take a break, but did not immediately see one. Eventually, we saw our moped friends sitting at a table at the bottom of a hill waving at us to come join them. We sat with them for a while as they sipped tea and we chugged our water, both parties chewing on some local snacks made of peanuts and sugar. We still wanted to find a tea house, so Talia and I decided to move on.

But of course, the meeting could not end without the typical request by the men to take pictures with us foreigners. We agreed and cell phone cameras were whipped out. I can't imagine what those pictures look like considering I noticed upon standing up that we left wet butt prints on our seats from the sweat. And I can't imagine what they told their friends about us as the proudly displayed their pictures. I head something to the effect of, "Foreign women are so strange. They like to walk through the woods to be eaten by mosquitoes and look at the trash. Didn't they know they could have walked up the stairs to see a beautiful view? They have blue eyes and yellow hair, just like the movies, but they sweat just like men! It would be better if they tried to look more beautiful."