美洲行之二~~by 王兆復

12月18日，星期三，Portland，indian restaurent，washagol，dupont （遊記待續） 12月19日，星期四，上午8:20，抵達舊金山。virgin America airline，票價77元。 機場見到王家堂，四十七年沒見了。老樣子，一點沒變，鄉音依然，熱情如故。 午前，往訪伍鑑泉，舒靜之夫婦，剛由紐約，rochester，遷來，愛透了加州的陽光。 中午在狀元樓午餐，王做東，伍，染parkinson，八年了，控制，保養得法，尚能蹴杖而行。 12月20日，星期五 San Fransisco（遊記待續） 12月21日，星期六，早晨6:57，舊金山，SFO, 將乘United, # 1222，$125 8:30, 抵達洛杉磯，LAX, 机?見到 江文里，陳淑慧，大華吃早餐。巧遇葉定葳 中午 訪Irvine，王孝容，見到康學郁，飲食三和，老妹請了。 晚上，宿，老左府，餃子盛宴，鹵豬腳，牛筋，牛肉，雞肉，樣樣入味。滿園水果，採不勝採。Bob Liu健壯如昔 12月22日, 星期日，清晨， 健行天使森林，野牛谷，楊培正，楊臺美夫婦領軍，吳妘騏，劉佛申，江文里，左四臧，謝佩卿，楊茂生，廖月明，楊奉天，潘彼得，詹政雄，鄭麗惠，洪如林，王兆復和徐遠權等 共18人參加。兩英里的路，15條小溪穿路而過，來回30條，同舟共濟，疊石而過。眾多落水人士，其中以奉天在第29次過河時，入水之慘狀為最。臺美豐富，精美的食品，令人大飽口福。四臧家的蜜橘出盡了風頭，佩卿吃不過癮，后來爬完山後，還殺去左府，將男主人的樹存大量剪伐不說，還將昨晚俺忍嘴，不敢放肆，留給即將返家過節的女兒Jenny的美食和文里一起，一掃而空。交友不慎，其奈我何？詹氏夫婦來至新竹，次日即將賦歸，從事電子實業有年，為臺灣經濟的支柱。如林，雖不常出入山林，似乎也是健步如飛。遠權的歌喉初試，沒見大展，就淹沒於嘩啦啦的流水聲中了。和大自然的天籟過招，再好的歌喉也只得讓步。小飛俠名過其實，沒見他飛過任何一條溪流！妘騏，小小的個子，可是攝影的個中好手。沒見她寄給大伙的照片？張張傳神哩。佛申，乃吾故友，凱申之胞弟。奉天家的女婿。見之，思及英年早逝的凱申，往事不堪回首啊。茂生，南加汽車旅社的鼻祖，同業公會的創始者，手下九家產業，除么兒主事外，自個兒該出手時，依然毫不含糊。他陶侃我說，“老王啊。您此番南美壯遊，必然豔遇頻傳！”可不是嗎？剛剛才下到墨西哥城，還沒到中美，就已經招架不住了。張牙舞爪，故態復萌，是俺此刻心情的最佳寫照！來啊，茂生兄，我等您來共襄盛舉……………。 下午2:00, Lake Balboa Park, the City of Van Nuys，定葳和夫人，Laura，第一個到。湖不算太大，我們在湖邊的岬角覓得一亭，談將起來。我和他是高中同級不同班的校友。以往相互心儀，可沒太多過往的機會。這下逮住機會，一一交代N年來的點滴往事。他在成大念建築，和我另一友人，許文傑，乃班友也。沒過一會，文里有事先行，來了韓漪，童小南夫婦。葉的相機沒停的撲捉到不少特寫鏡頭，後來都寄給大家分享。王興國也來了。13年不見了，相貌依舊，只是鬢毛稀？膝蓋有點不靈，影響了昔日籃球場上的彈性威力。每天依然辛勤的在物理，電腦的本行裡創造佳績。 黃昏，晚餐 ，在Hokaido Seafood Buffet Restaurant，Encino 藍震坤和沈宗玲夫婦來了，見到興國，昔日在山林中的老友，居然，相對不相識了。後來，謝佩卿，左四臧，童小南，韓漪陸陸續續都來了。我們八個人湊成一桌，嘻嘻哈哈，其樂融融。鬧到別人都等著要打烊了，才臨別依依。 晚上，宿 韓漪，童小南府， 十二月23日，星期一，L.A.(遊記待續) 十二月24日，星期二，L.A.(遊記待續) 十二月 25日，星期三 L.A.（遊記待續） 12月26日，星期四，下午1:20 乘amerian airline, 飛mexico city，票價 $279元，在dallas轉機，飛機晚點半小時，到達墨西哥城上空後，由於地下沒空，無處著陸，在城的上空盤旋約二十餘分鐘，賞盡墨城美麗夜景。 墨西哥城的遊記，已以英文形式問世，?記述如下文： My trans America tour starts from Seatle on December 17th.. After a brief stop at San Fransisco and Los Angeles for about ten days, I headed for Mexico City on December26th …………….. The followings are my itinerary and travelogue combined in different forms at different times. I hope you like it. hello, my dear amigos, i'll write down my very wonderful experience in mexico city to share with you. Enjoy it ! I’m very slow in typing and also my English is not always correct. Please allow me to avoid all the capital letter typing to save my time. MEXICO CITY the transportation between the airport to mexico city hostel is easy and inexpensive. take metro, the subway, on line 5 cost you only 5 mexican pesos ( 1 u.s. dollar=12.5 peso), you can always use dollars and credit card almost everywhere in the city, of course, you pay extra service charge when you use the card.) . wherever you go on the metro, 5 pesos is the only fee you pay, after midnight, taxi is the only ground transportation you can use, price ranges from 165 to 205 peso, takes you to the door. It’s better to find an official window to pay to be safe, to get ticket to the driver to be very safe. jose, is the first nice mexican guy i met in this wonderful country and city. he is sitting on the floor by the wall, waiting for transiting to nyc, the big apple, to celebrate the new year’s eve. he helped me buy the phone card, call the hostel office, take me to the taxi office, buy the ticket for the taxi and finally whisper sayonara.. i wish the world is full of Jose, the wonderful Mexican. the city center didn't look that safe, full of police, and drunk people everywhere in the center of the town. . the english speaking cab driver had to zigzag many turns before he reached the hostel. it's two in the morning, when i finally lied down on the upper bunker bed of the room assigned by the hostel, it's comfortable and clean with a giant private storage place by the bedside, but you have to provide your own small lock. The bed costs me 12 dollars per night, I paid extra dollar for the exchange service. It’s the average international price for the room. After all the traveling effort, I definitely shall be the loudest snorer among all the amigos….....z z z z z z z z i woke up early and found the internet was not working, it means i can't book the hostel of my next stop on line, so i have to shortened my stay and decided to stay only for two days in the city, instead of three in my original booking. a great breakfast, on the house, much better treat than the regular continental offer ! i met my second nice mexican, david at the desk counter. He spent half an hour, standing side by sisde with me, telling me what mexico city is really like,, good and bad.. he's from Tijuana, a border city next to san diego of california, that city might not be very safe, but not when you have a trusted friend, like david.. i promise to visit him nest spring, when i reach los angeles right after my trans-america journey. i met liao ling by the not functioning computer room. a graduate student of mba in finance, she's from nan-chang, jiangxi province of china, schooling in sacremental campus of a collefge from philly penn., a lively girl, always jump up he staircase instead of walking. we had breakfast together. There i met a brave solo international traveler from soel, korea. kim was on her way to cuba, she told me the visa to cuba can be applied in the air as the plane is just about to land , no matter what kind of passport you have. i hope she can share her experience with us as she finish that part of her journey. ling went with me to a nearby supermarket and helped me buy all my needs for the next few days, mostly vegetables and a scissor and a small knife. she never would know that she was going to carry that heavy bag the next day when we and other four folks travelled the whole day for a wonderful trip to Teotihuacan. i bought a map form the counter for 45 pesos as my personal guide, handy but not quite worth the money. the streets were full of people, floating like streams everywhere. i decided to stay away from them by visiting the art museum, 37 peso is the fee to enter, free for seniors, but only for the natives, NOT FAIR. the special show is on the second floor, all religious stuff, not much fun, .but the first floor is more human, i spent a whole hour there. the rest of the afternoon i hiked three hours on the big boulevard, PASEO DE LA REFORMA, taking photos for all the statues and high rises, just before i reached the gigantic city forest, the night fell, then i took the nearest metro back to the hostel. i went to bed at eight and waked up at three in the morning. that’s my routine which gives me enough rest to recharge my battery for the full challenge of the next day. i met konrad at four in the morning, the same six footer like me, but only too much more handsome, a humorous, tired young fellow from germany. very sporty, he want to become a sport associated teacher as his profession..Later on on the breakfast table we met another seasoned young traveler, john paul from England. he enjoyed traveling in philipine, burma as well as the whole south america. he shared so much of his travelling experiences with us, and then came his taveling partner, sean, another english man. we had lots of fun chatting together on a big table there. . liao ling decided to go TEO…with me, then that tired handsome insisted of joining us. Unexpectedly, three other beautiful girls eating at the next table wanted to be the follower: maayan, from israel, with singing spring in her gmail address. She is fed on cucumbers and carrots .. i saw her check out yesterday and then check in again. may be because she saw an interesing chinese guy had just arrived. yohana rojas, always with bright beautiful smile, an english teacher and her lovely mother, claudiana ricaldi, also as a teacher but for primary school children.. they were from Lima, Peru. Claudiana is a very brave singer. later on in the bus, sitting next to me. when i asked her, 'cantar uno cancion'(sing a song for us, please), without any pause, she surprised us with a Peru folk song about the coastal, mountains and forest of Peru. she won all the big hands from the passengers on that bus……….. WAIT ! i'll hold on for now, because i'm heading for the beautiful beach in town within one hour for at least half a day. If i don't stop now, i probably will keep on writing for the rest of the day, then i won't have a chance to tell you the story about all girls I SHALL ENCOUNTER. ON THE BEACH............ let's go together.....ya？ ya ! ya ! every day and everywhere…….. i hope you enjoy my writing so far. adios amigos sincerely, your faithful friend, larry wang. From Oaxaca, Mexico. TEOTIHUACAN,, here we come ! six folks made an instant international team. Maayan led us to the closest metro station, quickly got on the train, then we didn’t realize we had to get off to transfer in only two stops. The train seems never give passengers enough time to think whether they want to get off or not We were divided into two groups instantly. Half on the platform and the rest were gone with the train conductor. Alas，the mother and the daughter were separated！ Fortunately, we have Ling and Maayan with her. Konrad, Larry and the worried daughter,Yohana went across to the opposite platform to wait for their return. Yes, we were all united again in just a few minutes. I have to say Mexico City has the most crowded and the fastest metro system I’ve ever experienced. For a short distance we had to make about four transfers before we finally reached our stop “Autobuses del Norte” on line 5, to catch the bus to our destination. TEO…84 pesoes is the round trip ticket to go. Claudiana, the mother, was much relaxed by now. she sang a folk song for us loudly like a happy bird, She drew a map of Peru to me and showed where coastal, mountain range and the forest area are. I understood only partially of whatever she said, but I knew for sure she would like to invite me to her house for dinner when I get to Lima, Peru, which happened to be on the route of my itinerary in circling all America. I’m so happy to have that another opportunity to be with them again. Forty five minutes passed so fast without knowing it. I rushed to go down the bus as the last passenger. Again, the bus ran away in a hurry. Oh, oh! I forgot my jean on the shelf. That’s the only long pants I have for my three month trip, I can’t live without it. There was happened to have a cab standing by. Yohana and I jumped into it and try to follow theat run away bus. LUCKILY, the bus terminal is about only five minutes away. I grabed my pants as my security blanket, and wear it, on the double. Now it’s worth 50 pesoes more, the taxi fee for the back and forth trip. The ticket for the TEO… is 57 peso per person. Again, if you were under 13, or over 60, it’s free, only if you are a Mexican. I wish I were. In China, there is no such discrimination against the nationality. Man are created equal…….。 TEO…looks like a pyramid, only with a flat top. There is supposed to have a temple on top of it, but ruined, scores of era ago. It is huge and beautiful. I felt being a humble subject under the power of the ancient king. This is the place for people to worship the God of sun. It is way worth the ticket value by just looking at it. There is a big square plaza in front of TEO…which gives enough room to show its will power. There is another Pyramid, about half size of the giant TEO… humbly stands on the left hand side, about six to seven hundred meters away. That’s for the God of the moon. We started climbing from the right hand side of the Teo... There is no figure shows the height of the towering TEO …, , but I have a habit of counting the number of the steps whenever I climb staircases. Normally I don’t stop on the way up, until I reach the top, there always a platform waited there. I made about four stops this time and the longest walk is 74 steps. So it is about 200 steps all together and the height of each step is averaging 25 cm per “stone”, about twice as our modern design. Yes, all the steps were made of volcano rocks. Now we can figure out that the whole statue is about 500 meters above the ground. When I reached the summit, looking down at the people struggling up the last and the steepest stairs, I felt they are using their last reserved energy. Indeed, it is not a very easy job for most of us. We found a spot to avoid the bright sunshine and the gusted wind. Now, it’s way passed the lunch hour now, but all our partners totally forgot to bring their lunchbox! Luckily, we have Ling carried the ten kilograms of Larry’s supply for the next few days. It’s a good chance to release her heavy burden out of her shoulders. We started sharing by sipping some juice made of small orangefirst, then six tomatoes, three carrots, two cucumbers, four small oranges, three loaf of bread and four cooked potatoes. As Larry was dividing the apricots to share, he cut his small finger with the sharp knife by accident, the blood bursted out like crazy. Maayan took some Band Aids out of Larry’s first aid kit and stopped the bleeding and used the juice from the small orange to clean the blood on his jacket effectively. Then came the camera time! Using the moon TEO… as the background, Konrad showed off all his athletic talent to satisfy all Yohana’s imagination. Ling was also so photogenic, a beauty with or without sunglasses. When it’s my turn to enjoy the show, I generated a brilliant idea…. I was in the National Museum of Art yesterday, watching all the nude figures of either sex, enjoying taking all photos in detail. I, myself, never short of experience of showing myself in the nature in the past. Many years ago, when I finished summiting the Long Paths, the highest point in Colorado, with John Chiang and his son Jerry, we were looking for a hot spring to recover from our fatigue. Luckily, we found one by the roadside, a small private pool. We didn’t know, not until we went in, it’s a place for the nude only. Nobody wear anything, but John. He shamefully put on a piece of towel to cover his importat part in that 41 degree C. hot spring. My second experience came from a deserted beach near Hong Kong, Kew Long harbor. After swimming about one hour, I noticed some uncertain objects in the water, scared and quickly escaped to an unknown beach nearby in the very early morning after camping overnight. I finished my morning routine by the water and I found that there was not a single soul on the beach. I decided not to put my swimming trunk back on and started jogging along the seashore. So relax, but not for too long, I peeked a steamboat rushed toward me from far away in full speed. Before I could figure out the shape of body on the boat deck, it stopped. I bet the crew on that coast guard patrol must saw me through their binoculars and found an innocent face with an honest smile. Not a smuggler, why bother ! Now, back to the Teo. I praise the Lord of the sun first, thanks Him to inspire me and give me the confidence of showing my perfect body in such a holy place. I naked my upper body first. Instantly, all the cameras , cell phones and iPads et cetera , cetera, cetera were turning toward the spot where I stood. Just before I untied the last string of my brief, I heard the whisper from Yohana，“Oh，no Larry”. I got to respect the feeling of the beautiful young girl. Her mother just invited me to their house and will cook for me next month in Lima, Peru. We had to descend now, because Konrad was feeling too tired to stand another hour for not sleeping for twenty four hours by now. On the way to moon TEO… I encountered a woman with her daughter， yelling very loudly toward their relatives, I guess. As they paused, I suggested, in order to do better, they have to inhale more and exhale started from their stomach instead of the mouth. Then the mother challenged me,” why don’t we do it together, I’ll count one, two three, we’ll start from the same point”. She must be very proud of her yodeling skill. At the end of the competition, I felt sorry to see her disappointed face. I should have told her that I’ve been doing this for over fifty years. …. Full of handicrafts salesperson in the square, Yohana bought some noise making tubes ready to be used for students back in school, Her mom, Claudiana, bought an Amarillo Mexican hat, so colorful and enjoyable, all she needed now is a rifle and a pony, ready to rub many banks and run after the trains. On the way back, I was sitting next to a Mexican college student, Salvador Elizalde，from UNM, the National University of Mexico, majoring in engineering system design. How nice of him telling me so much about his country, good or bad, in education, agriculture, history and the corruption of the government officials. He lived just a few blocks from our hostel and promised to take us to an authentic Mexican restaurant for dinner. Then we enjoy a “ mega” dinner after watching all the street shows along the way in the dark. He finally took me to the metro station to transfer to the major bus station at the stop of “san lazarol” for me to catch the ADO bus to my next destination, Oaxaca city, At the station, we saw a group of the so called socialist party members occupied the metro station broke the gate and let the passengers pass for free. Their issue is: the government should not raise the train fare from 3 pesos to five. 12月28日， 星期日，坐地鐵2號線，在zocalo上車，往taxquena方向，坐一站，在pina sususuarez換1號線，往pantitlan 方向，坐三站，在san lazaro下車, 即長途汽車站，在DOA窗口，買前往oaxaca（哇夏卡）城的車票，三更後，凌晨1點出發，將於清晨7點到，豪華客車，票價，墨幣512元，約美金50元，。墨西哥的哇嚇卡，乃文化，藝術之都，清涼小鎮。 Dec.29, 1:00a.m. bus from Mexico City to Oaxaca. Fare:512 pesos Dec. 30, Monday, went to the beach and back to Oaxaca, 170 pesos each way. Dec.31, Tuesday, visiting museum in the afternoon.feess;57 pesos 7:10 p.m. leaving Oaxaca to Tapachula, overnight 12 hours, fees:475 pesos then take a small bus, cross the border，passport tax : 28 dollars found the bus to Guatemala city，100Q. then 1Q by metro to the city center. January 1st Wednesday, arriving Guatemala City in the afternoon and met my savior, ronold Sandorol, he took me to hostel Pension Mesa in the evening. Paid 60 Quetzal per night ( 1 u.s. dollar=7.7 Quetzels) January 2nd, Thursday, Ronald took me to visited Taiwan Embassy and finished applying Chile visa in the their embassy nearby. we visited railroad museum and the biggest mall in Central America nearby. January 3rd, Friday, Apply Brazil visa pay 20 Q, pending next Monday. January 4th, Saturday, Recuperation and did hand laundry. And have a dinner in a Chinese Restaurantant. Met my first china doll,kiki, there. January 5th, Sunday, it is now, ………………….. to be continued. 哇哈卡的遊記 （待續） 12月31日，星期一，坐大巴 由哇哈卡南下墨西哥最南邊境，Tapachula，過境即瓜地馬拉。 然後，?繼續南下，薩爾瓦多（El Salvador），…….. 然後，秘魯（Peru)，和20日前 到達智利（Chile）首都，聖地亞哥。。 Jan. 10th （？） El Salvador Jan. 15th (?) Lima, Peru Jan. 19th, (?) Santiago, Chile