Living in a Fridge

My bones are beginning to shake. The cold chilling me to my depths. Relentless, pervasive, icy cold, i am getting to understand why animals go into hibernation.
It is literally as if i am living in a fridge. And this is only the first taste of winter. Soon it will be like living in a freezer. The night-time temperature at the moment goes down to about -7 celcius, daytime somewhere in single figures. Ive been told to expect days where the maximum is -10 celcius. Brrrrhhhh. The icicles forming in the streams are attractive, but its hard to appreciate when theres no apartment heating as a refuge from the bone-chilling cold. My hands and feet, fingers and toes feel it the most, despite having Scottish roots, as with my father, ive been cursed with poor circulation (maybe from living in the tropics as a toddler??), and extremities are usually numb and clumsy to use.
The weather's just not like this in Australia, (im a bronzed aussie!) and apart from few brief visits to the snow i've never spent much time in such an icy climate, so this a new experience for me. Fingers crossed find the will to survive and am not forced into hibernation or retreat down from the mountains and towards the equator.
And we have no heating in our apartment. We are still waiting to hear from management on that one, after we wrote a request to the director more than a month ago. OK. so since i wrote this draft we had had heating installed, what a relief! But still, whenever i go outside, the tendrils of icy air penetrate through my clothing and against my skin. 2 days ago i climbed a nearby mountain, from here at 1900m up to 3350m along a steep & narrow track, for some great mountains views. But along the way, when on the shady side of the mountain and facing the breeze i had the strange sensation of painfully burning numbness in my fingers as my nerves struggled against the elements. Sweating profusely and feeling numbed cold extremities at the same time is a strange sensation. I had hoped to one day climb Mt Everest, but this experience makes me suspect that id be almost guaranteed to lose some fingers and toes to frostbite in the experience.
All this makes me gain a deeper respect for the Tibetan people, as i wonder how they can possibly survive the cold winters, even at elevations much higher than this. Around here in many places the remains of bare terraced hillsides and tumbled earthen buildings indicate the historic location of Tibetan people's villages, all of them high up on the hillsides above the valley bottom, riverside location of towns and villages today. It seems the Tibetans had a preference for the higher places despite the cold, wind and inconvenience.
Nowadays these local guys are quite handy basketballers. A major way i get exercise is to bicycle down to the local courts and shoot hoops with these friendly enthusiastic young tibetans, who play ball in there spare time out from performing as singers and dancers in cultural shows. Except it can only be done in the midday hours when the sun is shining otherwise the cold wouldnt permit me to take off my gloves in order to shoot!
Other than that, my days are passing along steadily, keeping a bit to myself when english speaking colleagues are away, reading books and trying to improve my chinese. The marketing department has given me a few tasks of late- gathering research and report writing. The marketing department head is an interesting local tibetan guy who spent four years studying in Australia, and this experience shows through in his attitude to the job. Its interesting to hear of how his business innovation is obstructed by the conservative-socialist, power-games of park administration politics.
It was recently the 30th birthday of the national park (shortly followed by the 30th anniversary of China opening-up reform beginning) and the administration put on a big show with colourful dancing and singing, and the officials lining up to give communist-praising speeches. I passed on an offer to join the heavy drinking parties of the top park directors and politicians, including the Sichuan governor, feeling tired after a massive mountain climb. Fortunately i wasnt asked to sing an Australian song for the birthday show, though i had downloaded the lyrics just in case.
Instead a reporter from Sichuan Television asked me to give an interview to talk about my job at the park, so i was whisked off into the park for a in-situ filming, tried to use the chance to spread the conservation message while describing ecotourism to viewers....
Its nearing the festive season, my roomates have planned an Xmas gathering of various folks from Chengdu up here at the park- should be times of merriment, then im gonna head off travelling for 10 days or so with a chinese friend from Australia to some interesting places- Luoyang buddhist caves and maybe further south....
So Merry Xmas and Happy New Year to everyone
May you all enjoy the both physical and emotional warmth of festive season in Australia, and wish me luck to survive these icy times in outback western china
Cheers
callum