{"id":3637,"date":"2010-06-23T21:43:55","date_gmt":"2010-06-23T13:43:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chengduliving.com\/?p=3637"},"modified":"2011-02-10T21:52:53","modified_gmt":"2011-02-10T13:52:53","slug":"country-living-a-day-in-the-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chengduliving.com\/country-living-a-day-in-the-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Country Living: A Day in the Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

I live in a special neighborhood on the outskirts of town, roughly 30 minutes southeast of the city center. This area is called San Sheng Xiang (translated roughly as Three God’s Village<\/em>) and was transformed from sleepy little farming villages into flower manufacturing nodes dotted with small ponds, bed & breakfasts and rose fields. My friend Zhuang was the first “outsider” to move out here about three years ago. I was next followed quickly by several other musicians, painters, writers, sculptors, kung fu masters and hermits that helped to form a community living side by side — actually, entwined and enmeshed — with the locals, who have been living here for generations.<\/p>\n

Its a good place to live for many reasons, but today I’ll just share with you a typical day in the life:<\/p>\n

During the hot, early summer days, the first thing I do is get up early and pick plums from the trees in my backyard. After about 45 minutes of sweating, grunting and ducking, trying in vain to avoid thorns and spider webs, I manage to fill a colander.<\/p>\n

\"Fresh
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

As soon as I take this picture, I notice my faithful dog TofuPi watching me from beneath a table in the courtyard.<\/p>\n

\"Chinese<\/p>\n

A friend once told me I had to earn my breakfast, so after picking the plums I have the next best thing to Wheaties: two Hanuta, and a cigarette.<\/p>\n

\"Breakfast<\/p>\n

Then I have an idea. In Thailand, when the weather gets oppressively humid like it was the day I shot these photos, locals will take a bucket bath (which basically means dumping a bucket of cool water over your head). So I did that. Then I made the rounds, passing plums out to the little girls across the street and their parents next door.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Then, I went to visit local rocker family Proximity Butterfly at their home and shared my plums with them.<\/p>\n

\"Enjoying<\/p>\n

After we licked our fingers, we got into a serious game of Risk, which Joshua’s wife Heather won handily.<\/p>\n

On my way back I found out that friends from Dali have come to visit. I took Danny for a walk with his boy Hugo and my son Dorian while the ladies chatted away at the Orange Bar. Later we met and squeezed took turns squeezing children.<\/p>\n

\"Squeezing<\/p>\n

\"Visiting<\/p>\n

At Orange we had a fine dinner of tomato tofu soup, liquor infused chicken and the house special, Mad Pepper Fish.<\/p>\n

\"Dinner<\/p>\n

When we got home, the chickens were all ready for bed and the three of us in my family mimicked them, sleeping in a small warm pile underneath the mosquito net.<\/p>\n

\"Hens<\/p>\n

And that about wrapped up my day in San Sheng Xiang village.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s a hard life out in the countryside, but someone has to do it. For the next few weeks I’ll share with you the community living outside of Chengdu in Flower Town, a harmonious mixture of farmer, worker, artist and dreamer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[96,40],"tags":[213,96390,148],"yoast_head":"\nCountry Living: A Day in the Life - Chengdu Living<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chengduliving.com\/country-living-a-day-in-the-life\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Country Living: A Day in the Life - Chengdu Living\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It's a hard life out in the countryside, but someone has to do it. 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