last Tuesday at 17:00 I went into the booking office again and they told me to sit down and wait. Without having to show my ticket, suddenly I had to go outside and follow this lady. Two girls and I were put into a taxi and we drove 5 minutes to the ferry terminal. We got off and had to wait again, for a long time this time, before boarding a bus. I noticed that the girls couldn’t speak Chinese either, and we started talking. They are from Korea and their names are Hi and Zu, and are both 27 years old and on a 4 week holidays through China. Like myself, they also had no idea what was going on, or what was going to happen. At 18:30, the bus left and after an hour or so we reached the immense building site of the 3 Gorges Dam. It was already dark and the dam was lit brightly. It is absolutely huge! Basically, it is nothing more than an enormous wall inside a lake.

We drove around the dam in silence, and then drove onward to our ship. We never stopped or took a good look at the dam, which was a pity. I had heard of other people visiting the dam, actually going inside and doing guided tours and stuff. We boarded our boat. The girls were in the same room as I, and there were three empty beds. Soon, three Chinese men in suits entered,

Our toilet on the cruise ship

turned on the TV on full volume and started talked really loud (as they do). The girls walked out and managed to change rooms, and now had a whole room to themselves. They asked me to join them. I thought for an instant, and then ran over to the reception desk to change rooms too. Our room is much nicer now, and we have a lot of space. There are six bed, but the shower is broken. There’s no shower head and we have to hold the hose in order to take a shower. I actually took a photo of the shower, because it was such a funny construction. There is a squat toilet, with the shower directly above it, so when taking a shower I had to be careful not to slip and disappear into the toilet! We were all very tired in the evening and went to bed at 23:00.

Cruise on the Yangtze River

The next morning we were awakened at 6:30 by a loud banging on the door from our ‘guide’, who can’t speak English. Hi opened the door and our guide spoke something in Chinese to us, and we figured we’d better get up and see what was going on. We quickly dressed and went outside. At 7:00 we were all herded into a smaller boat. It was cold and misty and we were half awake. None of us had any idea what was going on, or where we were going. It started to rain and it was getting quite miserable now. We hadn’t had breakfast. We arrived at a place where there were a hundred souvenir stalls. Here, they pushed us into even smaller rowing boats, with five men rowing in their underwear. After some time the water became very shallow and the men jumped out and ran ahead, pulling our boat by a rope. We returned and had to wait for the other people to do the trip. It was very cold and we bought some tea and something fried to eat (no clue what it was). Later, they brought us to some kind of performance hall, where dancers danced (poorly I should add) to music from a CD. It was the famous ‘boat thuggers’ song, that had been so popular all over China a few years ago. (So I was told) Those men, who should have been naked, were the boat thuggers who have done this since the beginning of time! Lies, all lies… Halfway during the performance, half of the audience got up and started running to our boat to get a seat. Chinese tourists are terrible. Now we were cold, wet and very hungry, and also very bored. Back at our cabin, we ate some spicy instant noodles and cookies. The girls had brought bags full of food with them, and I didn’t have anything. They shared everything with me though.

Boat thuggers dance show

On both sides of the ship were high cliffs, covered in lush forest. It looked very peaceful and it was a bit misty. When it was dark again, there was another knock on the door and our ‘guide’ said: “follow me”. We smiled and got ready. We took our things and went outside again. We had to pay Y10 for a ferry ticket to shore, but we refused. The Koreans are always good at budget backpacking, I later learned.

Meat for sale

Our ‘guide’ gave us the tickets for free. Our ship briefly stopped somewhere for fuel and water. Sellers came running to us with mandarins, souvenirs and an actual cart full of meat. Well, actually it was only pig’s feet and hens, fried entirely. It looked disgusting but one man bought one. Before going back We went to some sort of temple. From what I had read, this is where they had found coffins containing human bones of more than 4,000 years old. I made a photo of a glass box where two skeletons were lying. People had been throwing coins and paper money inside (for whatever reason) and one of the lamps had fallen over and was now locked in the skeleton’s chest. It looked so strange.

Ancient skelletons

Did people not care about ancient treasures like this? Someone once told me, that the Chinese have no respect for old things, and that’s why they feel completely fine about bull-dozing 500 year old neighborhoods and putting sky scrapers on the same spot. This is probably also why the museums are so boring here, people are just not interested.

On the way back, there were hundreds of souvenir and food stalls (I reckon a big boat full of tourists must pass here every hour or so). I bought some spicy potato chunks and three beers, and inside the boat we had a lovely supper of potato, rice and fish with sauce. The girls had brought a lot of food from Korea. They said they didn’t like Chinese food. They had even brought rice. They also had a big jar of that typical Korean Chili paste and a box full of little dried fish. The fish went on everything, and I loved it. I could see by how well the food was packed etc. that Korea must be quite modern and wealthy nation. After dinner the Korean girls taught me how to play a Korean card game, called Hwatu, or ‘Go-Stop’. It took me a long time to learn it, as I had to memorise many Korean characters and the rules were not very straightforward either. Even though Zu couldn’t speak a word of English (or she didn’t want to) and only Hi spoke with me, we were still having a lot of fun together. We played this card game all night and went to sleep at midnight.

My Korean travel companions

We were not awakened this morning. At the moment, we are juist cruising along the Yangtze River. Outside I can see more and more farms and houses on the hilly terrain. I expected to have seen some flooded houses and stuff, but only saw some trees under water. I guess that most things are already deep under water, as the water lever rises to 175m in 2009, which is about 10 meters more and the reservoir has been filling for 4 years already now. So far I like this boat trip. It is exactly as the Lonely Planet described it: “A change of pace and perspective”. It is also great to be out of the city for a while.

Friday 17 November

Chinese tourists

Yesterday afternoon we stopped at the ‘Ghost City’. We stayed there three hours. It was a large Buddhist complex with several shrines and temples. There were many skulls and devils and semi-scary stuff, and I think that local people believe that this place is (or was) haunted. The highlight of this town was the ‘Ghost Palace’, but it was almost too ridiculous to describe. The building looked like a castle on the outside, but on the inside there was some kind of a haunted house-thing, with Dracula puppets and scary sounds. Hi didn’t want to come because we had to climbs several steps to get up there, so Zu and I went in. Halfway through, there was a cash desk and we had to pay Y5 to continue. Zu and I were so angry that we didn’t pay and fought our way back to the crowds. Outside there were about a hundred souvenir and food stalls again, and they charged outrageous prices for everything. I bargained a lot in my best Chinese, and I bought some beer and had noodle soup. I nearly missed the boat, because I got lost between the 20 or so boats that were lying ashore. I couldn’t find out boat anymore, but eventually I found it and felt glad. I would have hated to end up staying here.

Back on board, I joined the girls in the restaurant and they bargained for a 2-person meal for Y50. The food wasn’t very good (not for this price anyway). I said I’d pay them Y10 for it, but I kind of forgot. The awful thing about Chinese tourism is, that they all have the money to spend, and are more than willing to spend it. They don’t care about paying Y50 for a bad meal, or Y40 for a little toy souvenir. Each day that restaurant was full of chain smoking, suit wearing Chinese (I call them businessmen because they all wear suits, but I guess the only people who can afford trips like this must be businessmen anyhow).

On Friday morning we had to get up at 5:30, and the boat would arrive in Chongqing at 6:00. The girls wanted to splurge on an expensive hotel, so we said goodbye and I was on my own again. It was still dark and cold and cloudy. A ‘black taxi’ driver tried to scam me for Y30 but I wisely refused and walked around the corner to where the ‘real’ meter taxis were. The fare was Y5. I needed to go to Minzu Lu, to a cheap hotel, because there are no youth hostels in this city. I asked some people on the street, and after a lot of talking they pointed across the street to my hotel (of which I will never be able to pronounce the name, I think it translates into ‘Peace Hotel‘ ~ all cheap hotels are called that anyways). Inside, a guard was asleep on a bench. I woke him up and he called the front-desk lady. I booked 2 nights in a dorm room for Y50 per night. I think I have a free breakfast tomorrow. The room has 6 beds (real ‘hard sleepers’: no mattress but a sort of wooden screen to sleep on) and so far (it is 20:30 now) the room is empty so I am lucky. The room has free shampoo, flip flops, toilet paper and tea, of which I took a whole stash. I slept for 3 hours this morning and took a shower and went outside.

Liberation monument

Minzu Lu is the main shopping street, with in the middle ‘Liberation Monument‘. I just walked around among the huge shopping malls and crowded streets. This is when I met Jimmy Yin, sales manager-to-be of Chongqing Yangtze Cruise Ship Co. Ltd.

“Jimmy makes it happen” reads his business card. He is a man of about 40, big belly. He offered to show me around. His English was quite good and he said that he had quit his job and will become a sales manager next spring, when the tourist high season starts again. He took me for lunch to a nice hot-pot restaurant. (Chongqing is famous for it’s super spicy hot pot. A hot pot is a bowl of spicy broth which is placed over a fire on the table. One can order whatever and chuck it in and cook one’s own meal like this). I treated Jimmy for lunch. I let him place the order, but when he said that he had ordered ‘guts’ I asked kindly to change that to ‘fish’ please. They brought a big pot of fiery red soup with red peppers and some more vegetables, and placed it into our table over a gas fire. They brought our dishes: eel, pork, fish, mushrooms and big radish. The food was great, and very spicy, even though we had requested ‘grade 1 out of 3′ of spiciness. Jimmy was slurping away his eels, occasionally spitting out some fish bones or clearing his throat and spitting something green out on the floor in front of him. After dinner I offered him a cigarette. He said he didn’t smoke but he’d accept my offer. He put half the cigarette in his mouth and dragged heavily. I wasn’t sure whether his behaviour was simply disgusting, or just cultural difference. I had seen people spit on the floor before. They do it everywhere. There are signs in Shanghai that say there is a penalty on spitting of Y500. Restaurant staff doesn’t seem to be bothered by it either. Everything that is not supposed to be eaten can be thrown on the floor, except bottles and plates etc. This means chopsticks, napkins, bones, food, tea, spit and toothpicks. The waitress will wipe the floor, and mop up the spit as if it is nothing. I even believe that it is awkward to leave a napkin on the plate. I always do it and the waitress always gives me a strange stare, and usually flings it off my plate onto the ground anyways.

Jimmy had shown me where to buy my train ticket to Chengdu, and where the Carrefour was. Then he said goodbye and walked off. I bought some coffee and searched forever for a pair of scissors. I went back to the hotel and made some coffee. I hadn’t had coffee in weeks. Later I went out again to look for a place to have dinner. Chongqing is quite expensive (even more than Wuhan), and it took me some time to find a restaurant. I tried ‘Almafa Pizza‘ but their cheapest pizza cost 50 Yuan. I passed a street with some hot pot restaurants (not much choice, it is hot pot or hot pot in this city). The first one cost Y50 because I was alone, in the second one they showed me a bowl full of duck bones, but the third one was bingo. They could not speak English, and there were five waitresses around me, all speaking Chinese to me. I let one of them order for me, and she pointed at a painting of a sheep on the wall, and showed me that it was Y28, and I said “hao!” (good!) A little while later, they brought me a big pot of soup (not spicy this time) and the meat. I found out that it was nearly all parts of mutton, expect any meat! I decided not to worry, and eat it anyways. I was too tired to look for something else, and besides… why SHOULDN’T I eat it? From what I could make out, I ate: intestines, stomach, I think bladder, some pieces of fat, and a large unidentifiable piece of bone. Actually, it was quite tasty and I really stuffed myself with the intestines. As I walked out, I wondered how long it would take before everything came out again. (so far so good….21:00)

I bought two cheap beers at a street food vendor for Y6 and walked back to Liberation Square, where a performance of music and dancing was going on. The music was so beautiful and unlike anything I had ever heard before, that I recorded it on my MP3 player.  It was very fast classical music. Another man, named Kenny Lu, talked to me. He said that the performance is to promote a clothing company from a neighboring province. He said that he was an artist and has exhibitions in Germany and next year in Amsterdam too. He showed me his ‘gallery’ and of course it was just like the ones in Shanghai and Beijing, but I liked the guy (he wasn’t too pushy) and I asked him a lot of questions about his art. He showed me an invoice of 50 paintings which he sold to an American woman for Y800. I asked for his business card. Imagine that I buy 50 of his paintings and sell them in Europe for 10x that price (like 25 Euros each). I would be rich!

As I walked back to the hotel, I hoped that my room was not full of Chinese businessmen. I had seen them on the cruise ship, and they are awful. First, they get drunk on baijiu (52% rice wine), during lunch or dinner, drinking it straight from the bottle. Then, they get sweaty and loud, and become a gang of rowdy, chain-smoking hooligans, and move onward to the karaoke bar, where they bark into a microphone to Chinese party songs, while the rest of the group dances around drunk. There is no stopping these animals. Drunk Chinese tourists behave 10x worse than in any other culture I know. Fortunately, most Chinese aren’t like this.

Chinese tourists

For some reason, I don’t like Chongqing. The county has 32 million inhabitants, and the city itself anything between 2 and 7 million. I read that this city has grown with a steady 300,000 people each year for the past seven years or so, and has nearly tripled in those years. The city itself is like Shanghai, but without it’s charm. This city is growing too fast I think. The traffic is chaotic and almost unbearable because of the noise, the stink and the impossibility to get from one place to another. Perhaps there are more quiet places to stay, but I am looking forward to going to Chengdu on Sunday.

Saturday 18 November

I did not have a good day today. Firstly, I woke up too late for the free breakfast. I just ate some cookies and had coffee. Then, I decided to go out and find that train ticket office that Jimmy had shown me yesterday. I couldn’t find the bloody thing. I spent two hours fighting through the crowds around the Liberation Monument. Finally, I decided to just go to the railway station by taxi, which is all the way on the other side of town. The taxi ride took quite a while. When we were nearing the station, I saw an awesome sight. They were building a truly huge suspension bridge over the river. We drove very close to it for a while. The main pillars were already in place, and were covered in scaffolding. They were now putting up the suspension cables. I fell silent to the view of this massive construction project in front of me. “The ‘sleeping giant’ as Napoleon called China, was slowly starting to wake up”, I thought.

At the railway station there was an enormous queue, and it took 30 minutes before it was my turn (there were over 20 ticket desks, and the queue was not a line, but a solid square of people, all waiting [read: pushing for] their turn). Fortunately, the woman behind the desk spoke some English, and I could buy my ticket to Chengdu (Y52) with relative ease. After I bought the ticket, I wanted to do something interesting to make up for the lost morning, and so I took another taxi to Ciqikuo, an ancient village on a hill overlooking Chongqing and the Jia Ling river.

Touristy beach

The driver was very happy, since it was going to be a long drive. He told me in Chinese that it would cost me 50 Yuan, but it was actually only 23. Ciqikuo is a beautiful (restored, but still nice) old village. One drawback was the huge crowd of Chinese tourists swarming around the village (I had forgotten that it was Saturday). Down by the river, I could see four or five cruise ships. On the main street, there was some kind of bakery that gave a show and crowds of tourists gathered to watch. Next door they were making candy and crowds stood around the shop in a big circle too. I was very hungry and tired by now, and sick of the crowds, so I ducked into an alley and came out at the back of the village. There were no tourists here, just old men playing Mah Jong and women doing laundry. It was quiet here. There were a lot of dogs and cats on the streets, and this looked much more authentic to me than the busy main street. This village was famous during the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368-1911) for it’s porcelain. It is now listed as an official cultural heritage site by the Chinese government since about 10 years, so that explains the crowds. I bought some BBQ meat, and was eating that, as I made my way through the crowds of tourists, when a camera crew suddenly blocked my way. Two girls tried to offer me some pastries with big smiles. I refused, and said that I was eating something else now. I felt a bit bad about doing that later, but I was so disgusted by this tourism-stuff that I had to get out of there.

I took a bus back, which took a lot of hassle. How could I explain in Chinese where I was going? I tried a couple of buses, and showed them on a map where I was going, but they didn’t want to help me. After three tries I was finally let inside. The bus ride would take 1.5 hours, and I had to switch buses somewhere halfway through. When I was nearly there, the bus broke down and all passengers had to step out. They couldn’t fix the problem and so another bus picked us up and I was finally dropped off somewhere downtown. I went into a restaurant and had noodle soup, which was my first real meal of the day. I then decided to treat myself to a Starbucks cappuccino (something I am normally dead against), and now I am sitting here on a comfortable sofa with soft jazz playing in the background. Oh, I could sleep here. What a day!

Police sign

]]> http://kikkers2.wordpress.com/2008/08/19/november-2/feed/ 0 kikkers Our toilet on the cruise ship Cruise on the Yangtze River 'Boat thuggers' Boat thuggers dance show Meat for sale Ancient skelletons My Korean travel companions Chinese tourists Liberation monument Chinese tourists Touristy beach Police sign http://kikkers2.wordpress.com/2008/08/16/november/ http://kikkers2.wordpress.com/2008/08/16/november/#comments Sat, 16 Aug 2008 17:34:06 +0000 kikkers http://kikkers2.wordpress.com/?p=15 ]]> Friday 3 November

I am now sitting in the train to Wuhan, and have some 13 hours left to go. I left Shanghai on Monday afternoon. I had to take the metro for about 7 stops. Shanghai North Railway Station is huge, and I got a little lost underground. Only after I started asking people and showing them my train ticket, could I find the actual entrance to the train station.

I had a ‘hard sleeper’ which means that there are three (hard) bunk beds in a compartment, but the corridor side is open. I heard that soft sleepers have softer beds and a compartment that is closed. I was the only laowai (non-Chinese) in there, and so I couldn’t really speak to anyone. One man in the corridor told met hat I would have a hard time traveling in China if I couldn’t speak Chinese. That wasn’t very nice of him, I thought. At ten PM all the lights went out and also the TV, which had been showing ‘House of the flying daggers‘ at full volume. Most people were already asleep at nine anyways. I had the top bed, and because I had some stuff there I couldn’t sleep well because there wasn’t enough space. At 6:00 AM everyone got up and at 9:00 we arrived in Xi ‘an.

I knew where I had to go, because I had taken some flyers of other hostels in China from the Mingtown Hiker hostel. A man approached me, and offered me to take me to that hostel anyways. He worked for them, and

Bell Tower

will get a commission if he brings people to the hostel. He paid the 1 Yuan for my bus fare and sent me on my way. “Just get out at the intersection with the big bell tower” he shouted, as my bus left. The hostel was beautifully situated next to the Bell Tower, which is a huge ancient building, and right on the main traffic roundabout of the city. The hostel is located next to the post office, and close to all major shops and restaurants. I checked in and ordered myself a full English breakfast. In my room were some people still asleep, so I didn’t want to wake them up and ate slowly. Shortly after, the two Germans from my room joined me for breakfast. They had brought their own coffee. Their names were Benny and Cathleen. We started talking. Benny was a big guy with a long beard, and Cathleen had red died hair and a piercing in her nose: “typical Germans”, I thought. They had taken the ‘Trans-Siberia Line‘ to Beijing and had lots of wonderful stories about Kazachstan and Siberia. I also met Jerome, the French guy who I’d met in Shanghai. He is here to study acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine in a Xi ‘an hospital and now lives in the hostel (in my room, actually). He told me, that when he comes to work in the morning, and he looks a bit tired, they give him a cup of ‘a certain tea’ and he immediately feels better. He is totally convinced that Chinese medicine is the way forward. Back in France he was a fire fighter, now he is learning to be a doctor in acupuncture.

Great mosque

The Germans went to the Muslim Quarter of Xi ‘An and I joined them. It was a bit strange to see Chinese Muslims at first; the only way of telling, is by their white hats. The streets were very lively and full of people and food stands. No tourists here! We fought our way through the crowded streets to the ‘Great Mosque‘. It was basically just a big temple with some Arab inscriptions, but it was beautiful anyways, and very old (7^th century). Just not what we’d expected. We ate some street snacks and went to a restaurant to have for lunch. On the way back we stopped at a local market, where the Germans had something to show me… There was a stand with a pile of about 10 to 15 dead and skinned dogs. Blood was dripping from their mouths. They looked frightful and disgusting. Still, it didn’t change my mind on wanting to try dog meat some time.

Dogs in local market

In the evening we hooked up with two more Germans: Michel and Matthias, and went to the bar street. Another girl: Carolin, joined us too. There is a small street with some bars, and there weren’t so many Westerners here as in Shanghai or Beijing. (Note that Xi ‘an still has a population of nearly 10 million). Nevertheless, the bar was comfortably crowded and music was playing. On our table was an old Tibetan bell, and when one of us rang it, one or two waiters came running to our table to take our order. We had (way too) many beers, and the bill at the end of the night was a shocking 450 Yuan. After this we went to a club for a Halloween party, but it sucked. It was a bit too fancy and there were hardly any people in there. We drunk Germanic Giants did not fit in there very well. We went outside again and drank a beer on the street. We went to bed at 4:00.

The next morning we met for breakfast at 10:00 AM, because we were going to the Terracotta Army, which is about an hour’s drive from Xi ‘an. Der Benny, nicknamed (“The Bavarian Beer God” after last night) and Cathleen left for Beijing and we all went to the station. They were a strange couple. I mean; they were not together, but they were very good friends. Cathleen had just broken up with her boyfriend, and Benny, well, I don’t know much about him except for that the two of them smoke more than 2 packs of cigarettes per day. Cathleen’s boyfriend and her were supposed to go to China together, and had saved for a long time for it, but in the end he didn’t want to come. Benny went with her instead.

Terracotta army

Michel and Matthias went with me to take bus 306 to the Terracotta Army. A Canadian named Dave joined us too, without saying much. When we arrived, we could not believe our eyes. They were building a huge commercial centre around the entire area! There were empty shop windows everywhere, and some building was still going on. I suppose these will all be souvenir shops at the time you are reading this. We laughed our asses off at some of the bill-boards they had put up around the place. They were written in very poor ‘Chinglish’. One of them said:

“Cooperating with commercial leaders, discovering the miracle and wealth wealth miracle. Welcome to Terra-Cotta Warriors International Plaza!”

Another one explained that:

“Puring Qin culture, generous history element, reappearence Reign of the emperor uniforming the six countries’s talent! At here, you will near distance feel Qin civilization thousands years ago. Qin element’s real showing, make you touch history’s vicissitudes, feeling civilization’s charm at brilliant Qin museum.”

The third one was a bit more descriptive:

“Terra Cotta International Plaza, according to configuration matches of cermocial items linked with new creative industries, become in public culture – tour pooling place, froming pure culture and visiting enpand to Assembly traveling service, showing, shoping, eating and so on this whole industries chain and connect communal morden practice traveling industries item.

No joke, this is what they really showed! Someone made the remark that some one must have obviously paid quite a bit of money to put these bill-boards up, but they never bothered to check them. The boards were huge; nearly 10 meters wide.

When we neared the entrance gate, we already got lost and reached the exit gates. One man pointed to the entrance gate and said: “There, police……very……goooood!” We didn’t know what the hell he was on about but we proceeded to the entrance, carefully. Once inside, our group immediately got split up. I was stuck with this Canadian, while the Germans were somewhere else. There are three excavation pits, named I, II and III. The first one only showed two chariots that had been dug up. The second one showed an ongoing excavation but the third one was the main one. It showed thousands of terracotta soldiers, pieced together from little pieces since they were discovered in the 1970′s. No two soldiers looked the same, and they are all about 1 meter high. The roof of the tomb had collapsed, some 1,000 years ago, and so all the soldiers had been shattered into little pieces. Still only about half of them were restored.

Terracotta Army

We spent about 30 minutes there, but to be honest, I wasn’t very impressed. Dave and I realised that we would never ever find the others in this huge complex. One could walk around for hours in here. We left and had lunch across the street. It was a lot cheaper than the food on the inside, we reasoned.

We had just missed the bus back, so we took a mini-bus. It was the same price anyways (7 Yuan). The ride was amazing. The driving leaned on the horn for the entire ride, to get people’s attention. He would drive up to every person he saw by the side of the road, and a woman who works on the bus asked them to get in. We took a big detour around Xi ‘An, and we saw a whole other part of the city. There were bad roads here and everything looked poor and dirty. I thought it was quite interesting, but very tiring too. Back in town we had dinner somewhere and just chilled for a while. In the evening we met up with the others again and went to the same bar street as last night. One place had beer for 10 Yuan (it was Y15 last night) and so we were in. At the end of the night they tried to charge us 15 Yuan anyways, but we managed to bargain a little.

City walls

On Thursday the Germans and I wanted to go to Hua Shan (2,100m), the sacred Taoist mountain 130 km from Xi ‘an, and we had agreed to get up early again. These guys must be the least punctual Germans I have ever seen! After meeting at 10:00, it took them 2.5 hours to take a shower and have breakfast! It was too late to go now, so we had to think of something else. The four of us (hungover) climbed the city walls of Xi ‘An and rented two tandems on top. We rode around the city walls (17.3 km) and we had to do it quickly too, because we had only 90 minutes to rent the bikes. It was a sunny day, and we had a lot of fun. It is the people who you’re with, not the actual activity that makes a good day, I discovered. After the ride we had lunch and went back to the hostel to exchange photos and email addresses. Carolin left for Wuhan and the other two for Beijing. Before they left, Jerome took us all into the Muslim quarter. “I’ll show you the best and cheapest restaurant you’ve ever seen!” he said. We didn’t have much time, and so we walked quickly. We went into one place that was packed with Chinese people. It is one of those places where everybody just throws their napkins and other garbage (spit) on the floor, and we were sitting up until our ankles into garbage. On the menu was: fried rice. It is all they did. We ordered five fried rice, and after seconds they brought us our meals. It cost 4 Yuan. It tasted delicious. I glanced into the kitchen. A boy of about 14 years old was frying rice in a big wok over an open fire. He was sweating, and it must have been very hard work. There was a whole team standing beside him, looking at him. When he couldn’t take it anymore, someone else took over. They fried rice non-stop, as if they stood behind an assembly line. We ate quickly and returned to the hostel. In the evening I didn’t do much. I stayed in the hostel and talked with some English guys.

This morning I got up at 10:00 and had some steamed buns (baozi) filled with mushroom (or ‘wushroom’ as the sign said) on the street for 1 Yuan each. I packed my stuff leisurely and just hung out. I left the hostel at 13:30, after saying goodbye to all the people I knew here, and took the bus to the station. In the waiting room, a Chinese girl wanted to practice her English with me. She helped me with reading the signs and stuff, and she was very nice. We talked for a bit, but as she only had a standing ticket, she could join me to my compartment. There are three guys in my compartment now, all wearing suits. They seem to speak reasonable English, but they look tired.

Monday 6 November

I am in Wuhan now, in Raihan’s room. I met Raihan in Shanghai. He was working there on his laptop, while I was waiting for my laundry and we started talking. He was there for some convention on ICT-business. He is from Pakistan, and he is doing his PhD in Computer science at Wuhan University of Technology. He told me that if I was ever to go to Wuhan, I could stay at his place for free. I thought “what the hell” and so two weeks later he welcomed me in his campus room at the univeristy.

My night on the train was another long one. The Chinese in my compartment couldn’t really speak any English, but we tried for a little while, but it was useless. I pointed at noodles, and they’d go “mien!” I pointed at chopsticks and they’d go “Kuaizi!” This game lost it’s fun very quickly. I really would like to learn Chinese now, as I can hardly speak with people here. In the middle of the night, the train came to a halt for about an hour, and later the same thing happened. In the morning, when we were getting ready for the train to arrive, they announced that we would be delayed. Finally, we arrived at 7:30, nearly two hours late.

I took a taxi to Wuhan University of Technology. There were other people in the cab, and the driver wouldn’t put the meter on. I paid 30 Yuan, which was quite a reasonable price, only a bit higher than a normal taxi I think. The taxi drive dropped me off at the wrong gate though, so the little map that Raihan had given me over the email was useless now. The campus is like a small village, and it is huge! In the days to come I would get lost in there countless times. Miraculously, I found my way without too much trouble and met him.

Computer market

After a short breakfast, we had to go into town. Raihan had promised his friends to buy computers for them, so we went to a big electronics market downtown. We took a city bus for 1 Yuan which took one hour to get there. Before I knew it, I found myself surrounded by a group of Pakistanis, all haggling and bargaining for electronics in this huge market (4 floors). Most of them had long beards and dressed in traditional Pakistani dress. In the end, they bought seven computers, screens, audio sets and webcams for under 3,000 RMB (300 Euros) each. We had to wait a long time for the computers to be assembled, so we hung around talking. Most of the people are PhD students, just like Raihan. They study in China because the level of education is better there.

Back home, we had dinner with some of the international students. Later on, there was a birthday party. We ate cake with chopsticks. It was pretty boring, until we started playing a drinking game, called Big Chicken. The rules are something like this: each person throws two dice, and if he or she rolls double three, then that person is the ‘big chicken’ and has to drink for every three that is thrown by anyone, until someone else takes over. For the rest, single three means 1 shot, 7 means previous person drinks, 10 means everyone drinks, any mistakes in calculations etc. also means drink. A pretty fast and ferocious game. The other international students I played with were: a Korean girl, a Vietnamese guy, a german guy, someone from Reunion, Syria, a Pakistani and some other people from Pakistan and Mauritania who were Muslim so they couldn’t play. The poor Korean girl, Kolly, was the ‘big chicken’ all the time and she was feeling a bit unwell after playing.

Wuhan East Lake

The next morning we got up early. My throat was sore, because Raihan, with the best intentions, had put the fan on last night. The thing had been blowing in my face all night. Anyways, we had an appointment at the ‘Wal-Mart Super Plaza’ nearby to play bowling with some friends. I borrowed a bicycle and we both rode there through the crazy traffic of Wuhan’s suburbs. It turned out that Raihan’s friends were still in bed, so the two of us played a few rounds of bowling and went back home. Later, we met the international students again and we all drove to East Lake, about 1 hour from campus. The lake was huge; one could easily spend an entire day there. We cycled around for a bit, and then bargained for a row boat to take us to an island. The island is connected by a bridge, but the entrance for that costs 40 Yuan, so we thought to be smart and get two boats for 100 Yuan (meaning about 15 Yuan each) to take us to the back of the island, passed the gates. The boat was very slow, and it took the poor guy one hour to row us where we wanted to go. Raihan and Saida (another Pakistani PhD student) and I had a dinner appointment later that afternoon, so we had to return, but all the others got off onto the island. We later heard that the others had some bad luck. They got lost in the forest on the island, then made to pay admission to the guards, and then were thrown out! I guess the guards must have seen them coming.

East Lake boat man

Meanwhile, the three of us were cycling as fast as we could through the crazy traffic during rush hour. It was very dangerous and tiring. When we finally got back home we took a taxi into town, because all the buses would be full now for sure, and would probably not even stop anyways (‘full’ in China really means ‘FULL’).

Wuhan is a megapolis, consisting of three cities: Hankou, Wuchang and Hanyang. It takes over a full hour to cross the city in a bus or taxi. When we arrived in the city centre, we went to a restaurant and met more Pakistanis. We took two tables; one for the men, one for the women. Most of the time they all spoke in their own language (Urdu) and I started to wonder why Raihan had invited me here. It was nice and interesting nevertheless. While I was eating, a Chinese guy who sat nearby offered me a cigarette and then walked outside. One of the Pakistanis was a virologist, and the other worked with nano-technology and we had some interesting discussions. After dinner we walked to the boulevard which is quite similar to the Bund in Shanghai. We overlooked the mighty Yangtze River, which I believe is 1,100 meters wide here. Lots of neon everywhere, and lots of noise too.

Old and new

There was a dark and dirty beach, and everywhere were young couples, standing in the mud, making out in the dark. In China it is still taboo to openly show feelings of intimacy in public, I noticed. A little further there was music: it was a mix of techno with Chinese singing, and people were doing a dance. Even further there was a group of four people, of which one was clapping a stick and the other was singing into a microphone of such a low quality, that the sound was distorted to the extend that it sounded like some new-age/punk music. It sounded horrible. It almost seemed as if all the people here were practicing for something, like a performance. I never learned what the hell they were all up to, but there must have been nearly a hundred people there doing their thing.

Today I am taking it easy. Raihan is at his lab, working on his thesis. I have been working on my blog and doing laundry. I tried putting some photos online on blogspot.com, but it seems that the site is censored here in China. Only sometimes can I access my account, and after a lot of hassle. I am going to have lunch with Raihan later today. He has been so nice to be: he pays for everything and is constantly asking if I am hungry or if I need anything. I have spent only 4 Yuan so far since last Friday, and I feel a bit guilty. It looks like I won’t be able to do a Chinese course here after all. I was hoping to do it somewhere, and what better place than a uni? Anyhow, I tried and asked around, but the semester is already too advanced for me to enroll now. I have bought a book though, to learn Putonghua (the People’s language). I think I will stay here for one more week, and then move on to Chongqing by boat.

Thursday 9 november

I stayed inside the campus on Monday. In the evening we had dinner at the restaurant again. I caught a cold on Sunday night, and I was sniffing an sneezing all the time.

Yellow Crane Tower

On Tuesday I took the bus to go to the ‘Yellow Crane Tower‘, downtown. The tower is 51 meters high, and beautiful. Entrance was 50 Yuan, which is a bit steep, but the park was worth it. I spent 2.5 hours there, walking around. I even saw some white people inside (Russians). The tower was actually a big pagoda, overlooking a park on top of a hill. It is amazing to see the contrast between this ancient pagoda (223 AD, according to Wikipedia) and all the high rise and industry, just a few hundred meters further. Big trains filled with coal drove right past the park. Ships with coal and oil could be seen in the distance, passing slowly. Air pollution was everywhere, and noise too. After visiting the tower I just walked around for a bit. There was a nice view over the long bridge over the Yangtse River. Back home we had dinner at the same place as usual and ate the same dishes as usual and after dinner we played badminton with some Chinese students, like every night. One girl, who is very good, is called Candy.

On Wednesday I went to the big shopping street downtown, who’s name I have forgotten, probably Beijing Lu or something, as all street names are similar in China, and for a little while, it felt as if i were back in Shanghai. As a white man, the street sellers all came running towards me, trying to sell me watches and shoes. I bought a nice pair of trousers inside a shop. Define ‘high-context culture‘: the lady in the shop measured my waist, and told me it was 25. She then pointed at a sign saying Y49. She then gave me a pair of trousers with a tag that showed size 32, price Y299. I fitted it and bought it for Y49… I’m glad I hadn’t looked at the tag before. I then walked to the river and sat down in the shade under a tree. It was sunny and 26 c degrees. Some beggars came to me, just as I was studying Chinese for ‘get away!’ and ‘leave me alone!’ How convenient. After an hour or so of studying I walked back and found an animal market right behind the bus station. I saw young cats, dogs, tortoises, fish, rats and mice. I even saw a box full of snakes. There were also flowers and pretty Bonsai trees for sale. I returned to campus in an overcrowded bus, feeling tired. We had dinner with the international students (again) in the same restaurant (again) and ordered the same food (again) and played cards and badminton after that (again). How dull and boring these students’ lives must be! No wonder they all want me to stay as long as possible. I feel trapped here.

Today I got up late and took bus 540 to where that electronics market is. I wanted to check out the real Wuhan University (Wuda) because it is said to be one of the most beautiful in China. It was built in 1912. I entered the area, but could all I could see was the International School of Software. Some curious people came over to help me and pointed me into a certain direction. After a long walk I found the real campus. The main building is huge. Although this campus was nice, the atmosphere was different here; not as relaxed as in the uni of technology (or let alone of Nankai university in Tianjin). I thought about doing a master’s degree in China. It would be cool. I had a delicious meal of dumpling soup in a dirty hole in the ground that was a restaurant. It took me a while to order. I was asking questions to this lady, and she was telling me things in Chinese with a big smile. All I could make out was ‘san kuai‘ = 3 Yuan, so I said ‘hao!‘ = OK! It was one of the most tasty meals I’d had so far. The dumplings were filled with herbs, and the soup contained some vegetables, spring unions and some remains of fish (could have been shrimp).

Wu Da

The bus ride back took me 50 minutes, and I stood for 45 of them. Back home, Raihan was just about to leave again. He had some big meeting for his PhD committee. When he comes back we’ll go to the shopping mall where i can book my boat journey to Chongqing (according to Raihan). I am now having some pijuo = beer while I wait for him.

Monday 13 November

I am in the train now, hard seat, on my way to Yi Chang. The travel agent last Thursday night couldn’t help us. The woman tried to charge me an outrageous price. When I pointed out the normal price in a brochure, she cried out: “But that is for Chinese only! Not for foreigners!” I was shocked and left. I decided to take my chances and arrange my trip in Yi Chang, which is 40 km from the 3 Gorges Dam.

On Saturday I got up late. Both Raihan and I didn’t feel very good. All I did that day, was walk outside the main gate and around a bit. I ended up at some backyard furniture market. In the evening we took a bus for 30 minutes just to have dinner somewhere. We went to a ‘Muslim restaurant’, which was just an outside barbecue stall. There were six of us, and we ordered 30 sticks of beef, half a chicken each and some vegetables. Ahmed, who is from Mauritania, told me that he’d love to offer me a beer, but he couldn’t because he was a Muslim. He couldn’t even touch the bottle! So if I would mind to buy a beer across the street and bring it over. He was really embarrassed but I didn’t mind. Later, back at the campus, we played cards again. ‘Shifu’, the caretaker (shifu means caretaker in Chinese) joined us. He was a funny old little man with a very thick winter coat which he always wore. He couldn’t speak English, and so we taught him to say “I pass” which sounded very funny. Raihan’s neighbor, who is from Syria, gave me some very bad Chinese wine and told me things about his country. He had brought all kinds of photos and brochures and stuff. He showed me ten photos of his brother, smoking a shisha (water pipe) at different locations. I made some excuse and went outside.

Busy city

On Sunday Raihan had a badminton match in the morning, and I had to pick up my train ticket at the office. After that, Sadia, Raihan and i went to Wuda again to visit some of his country mates. Once again I found myself surrounded by 10 or so Pakistanis. We had a marvellous lunch and after that I went outside, while the rest were discussing ‘democracy in India’ or at least that is what I could make up. Now I was really in Wuhan University, the last time I didn’t come here at all. It looks beautiful. It is just besides East Lake, and I walked around for about 1.5 hours and then took the bus back. I stopped at Walmart to buy a present for my friend. He has been so hospitable to me the last two weeks. At the campus, everyone was gone, so I had dinner by myself. I played ping pong with Raihan until midnight, while Sadia watched.

This morning I got up at six and quickly had breakfast and packed. We left the campus at 7:00 and I took the 542 bus to Hankou train station. Before I left, I saw another one of those street-cleaning cars whistling: ‘Merry Christmas‘. It took more than one hour to get there, but I was nice in time for my train of 8:48.

I felt pretty comfortable finding my way, even though there are no English signs anywhere. I have the feeling that now the real adventure is going to begin. Until now I have been in huge metropolises or very touristy places, but that is going to change as I head further inland. Yi Chang is tiny (only 3.8 million people) and so there won’t be so many facilities and especially not for tourists. Chongqing is even lesser known. It will not be easy finding accommodation etc. but that’s what it’s all about!

Along the way, in the train, I saw farmers working the land with oxes, demolition workers who tear down buildings by hand, using hammers and spades. Much garbage everywhere. No nature yet. I am starting to doubt whether China has any nature at all; everything is cultivated and polluted!

15:46

————

16:00 – Damn I’m slick! I walked out of the railway station, turned left 50 meters, and checked into the Railway Hotel (40 Yuan) for a dorm room on the 6^th floor. I then had some baozi and a warm beer and walked down to the misty banks of the Yangtze. In the restaurant where I ate, the lady pulled out a dusty and brownish piece of paper that read: “Welcome in English menu”. She obviously hadn’t seen many foreigners lately. The menu was full of spelling mistakes, such as ‘splcy green ptppers’ and so on. I went East to the bus & ferry terminal and fetched an English speaking female guard, who helped me book the tourist boat to Chongqing tomorrow. It costs 484 for a third class ticket. I will be in a 6 bed dorm room, but I don’t care. Boarding time is 17:00 tomorrow, so I even could have gone today. A regular ferry takes 40 hours but this one is nearly 100 hours. First, we’ll go to the 3 Gorges Dam by bus, and from there onwards by boat. 3 Trips are included, but only god knows what they are (the woman couldn’t explain it to me). I think one of them involves naked men…

Yangtze river in Yichang

I am now sitting by the river in a park. Behind me, old folk are singing and playing traditional music. I have 25 hours to waste now. Note that I haven’t seen a single foreigner since I left Wuhan this morning. It is misty here and a bit cooler than in Wuhan. The quality of the air is slightly better here. Yi Chang seems to be a thriving little town, judging by the expensive cars on the streets and the many high-end clothing shops on main street.

Tuesday 14 November

15:30 I am now sitting in the empty ‘snack bar’ next to the bus & ferry terminal with a bottle of Snow (beer). Behind me are six members of staff following every move I make, sometimes giggling.

Yi Chang has been good to me. Yesterday afternoon, as I walked back to the hotel to have a shower, a Chinese guy, who was handing out flyers, followed me and we started talking. Two girls joined us. I guess that they were about 16 years old, and the wanted to speak English with me. They told me to wait 10 minutes, and they ran back to their boss to get their wages.

I waited for them, and they soon returned. We went for dinner somewhere. The girls had bought me flowers, which I carried with me, a little embarrassed. These kids were really sweet. They were in high school, and earn 25 Yuan pocket money for a day’s worth of handing out flyers for a clothes shop. Nevertheless, they paid for my dinner, which was 12 Yuan and I felt a bit guilty. They insisted however. Later on, we stood outside on a square by a fountain, and there was a crowd around us. Some old people came and asked them where I was from and what I was doing here. Everybody was very interested in my presence. Some more people joined us, they were a bit older: Hu Feng, a girl that spoke quite good English, because she studies I

Bubble tea

nternational Business, and she translated everything for me. There was a Vietnamese student, called Nguk (pronounced: ‘Nu’). The young people left at about 20:30 and the rest of us went to the cinema. Nguk paid. We first tried some weird drink on the street of sugary syrup, orange lemonade with little rice balls in it (This drink is called ‘bubble tea‘ and is very popular among young people all over Asia, I learned later. There are Bubble Tea Bars, which are similar to the upmarket coffee shops in the West, like Starbucks). It wasn’t very nice, and I threw half of my cup away when no one was looking.

The movie we went to see was World Trade Centre, by Oliver Stone, dubbed in Chinese. I had no idea what movie we were going to see, until it started. I was hoping to watch some cool Chinese film, but WTC it was going to be. I couldn’t understand a word of what was being said. Feng sometimes translated small sentences, but the dialogue wasn’t very interesting anyways. The movie is about those fire fighters who get caught under the rubble of the collapsed WTC building on 9/11. I hated it how, in the end, the Americans were still portrayed as winners. Just because two half dead fire fighters were pulled from the rubble alive, it doesn’t make them winners. Anyways, after the movie we all went home and when I got to my hotel room there was no one there, so I had the entire dorm to myself. I went to bed at 23:00 and slept very well.

Yi Chang locals

In the morning I met Wong Lang, the Chinese schoolboy I had met yesterday. Since I was already leaving today, he had offered me to show me around in the morning. He even skipped school for it, I think. He had trouble to explain it to me in English (or perhaps he didn’t want me to know) but I think he also told me that he was fired at his job yesterday, for talking to me too long. He said that his boss had told him not to come back. He had brought a friend, who also wanted to practice his English. The three of us took a bus across the river, and again Wong paid for me. We were going to climb a mountain, on the other side of the river. There were mandarin trees everywhere, and we met some girl who was working there. She picked some mandarins for us, and then she showed us all the way up the mountain. If she was a friend of Wong, I never figured out. I think she wasn’t, and she was just being nice. The view over the Yangtze was very nice, although it was a bit cloudy and chilly up there. We ate some mandarins, which were delicious, from the girl. On top of the mountain, we met a group of business men, and once again they fetched some girl to do the translating. It seems that men are even more shy than women here, and they always push the girl forward to talk with the laowai. They all wanted me to come and visit their home towns, and they welcomed me to China and to Yi Chang. It was very ceremonial, and I have no idea what these guys in suits were doing all the way up this mountain. They were amazed to hear that I had survived in China for one month already, without being able to speak Chinese. Once again they grabbed the girl, who was called Lemon, and pushed her forward, and made her sing a song for me. It was beautiful, and a bit odd, to stand here on top of this mountain, with a girl singing a song for me, and a group of men in suits standing around us smiling and clapping along. After she was done they wanted me to sing a song too. They wanted to hear: ‘Everything I do, I do it for you‘ by Brian Adams, but I didn’t have the guts to do it.

They offered me some mantou (steamed white bread) with pickles. We all ate and we left again. We climbed a couple hundred steps up to the next peak, and we ended up at the bridge. A sign proclaimed that this was the biggest suspension bridge in the world (3 km) but I was sceptical. I find it hard to believe, to be honest. We walked back to the hotel and said goodbye. I was really touched by the people’s hospitality over here. The people I’ve met here were all so nice. I wish I could stay a couple more days.

A little while later, Ipicked up my bags and walked all the way back to that bridge, because that’s where the bus & ferry terminal is. It took me almost an hour. Boarding is at 17:00 and I think we leave at 18:00. I am a bit worried that I won’t see anything of the Dam now, in the dark. Anyways, it doesn’t really matter.

Bin

I left my parents’ house in Nijmegen, the Netherlands at 7:30 and my dad gave me a lift to the station. I quickly said goodbye and took the train to Schiphol Airport. There was some maintenance work on the tracks (there always is), so I had to go to Amsterdam Central first, and switch trains there. I still had plenty of time to catch my flight though. I first flew 12 hours to Singapore, where it was very hot and humid (around 28 degrees at 6 AM). I had drank some fine French wine and Heineken on the plane, since it was all free, in order to try to sleep. It didn’t work. I boarded the second flight to Shanghai at 8:00 local time, and slept for nearly the entire 5 hours.

I arrived in Shanghai and when I finally made my way through the immigration, I took the Maglev train to the metro station downtown. This train was amazing: it works on magnetic power and is elevated above the tracks. It accelerated to 430 km/hr and in 8 minutes I zoomed more thatn 30 KM into town. On the inside, the train was absolutely silent, and didn’t even move that much. What a brilliant invention!

Once at the Longyang Metro Station, I took a metro to Nanjing Dong Lu (East nanjing Rd), and walked to my hostel from there. Fortunately, the public transportation here is quite similar to that in Beijing, so I didn’t have too much trouble finding my way. It saved me a very expensive taxi ride.

I checked in at the hostel (Mingtown Hiker Hostel), and I was feeling very tired by now, as I was up for nearly 30 hours already. I went into the 4-bed dorm and slept for one hour until my room mate, Alex, walked in and we started talking. We both went downstairs and I met five other people. We had some beers and later walked to a restaurant Alex knew, and had a great dinner for 25 Yuan each. After dinner the others went to a club called ‘I love Shanghai‘ to play live poker, but I wisely didn’t. I just hung out in the lobby of the hostel with some Australians and Joanna, and English girl, and I went to bed at midnight.

Thursday 19 October

My first night was difficult. The room had no windows, and so it was impossible to see what time it was. I guess I was too tired to get some proper sleep, so I had many short periods of comatose-like sleep, after which I woke up again. When I got up the next day, it was 11:30. I saw Joanna in the lobby, and she gave me a map of Shanghai. I skipped breakfast, thinking that it is probably best to take it easy on the food the first couple of days.

The first thing I did, was to take a walk outside. I walked to the Bund, which was only 15 minutes away.

I could not even count the number of sky scrapers I saw there.

Bund Shanghai

I walked along the river front, and then went to the People’s Square to visit the Shanghai Museum. I ate some noodle soup with mushrooms first. The museum was kind of nice, as it featured some very old ceramics and paintings (some from as far back as the 11^th century BC) and some jade and other stone objects from 5,000 BC. What bothered me about this museum were the captions below each object. They would say something like: “broken green vase, Qing dynasty”. Well, I can see that it is a broken green vase, why is there not more information?

People's Square

I got a bit tired of it all and went outside. I sat down somewhere on the People’s Square and just relaxed for a bit. Two girls and a boy approached me, and started talking to me. They were very nice, and offered to go for a drink together. I had heard the stories, last night even, but I went with them anyways. It was a stupid thing to do. We walked for some time and went into a tea-shop, where we went into a private room. We tasted some teas and talked and laughed a lot. They said they were students from Inner-Mongolia, and were very interested in Holland. When the bill came, I was shocked. It was altogether 2100 yuan! The guy said that him and I should pay, according to Chinese custom. The girls had bought tea, and of course I refused to pay for that, and I only paid for the tasting. It was still Y700. I even went outside to the bank because I didn’t have enough money on me. The guy paid by giving his credit card to the lady, who returned minutes later (no receipt). I should have known better. At the time, I didn’t believe that it was a scam. I had seen the other guy pay, and I thought that these yuppie kids were just showing off to the foreigner, or something. When it was time to leave, they gave me some tea as a present. I kept this tea with me throughout my entire travels. Perhaps it has saved me from many more scams. I walked back to the hostel. I felt tired, dirty and hungry, and I even got lost in the hot and crowded streets! I finally made it and had learned my lesson. Never again would I trust anyone again.

Sunday 22 October

I am sitting in Yu Yuan Gardens at the moment, in the middle of a small bamboo forest. Last Friday Alex and I got up at noon and ate some noodle soup across the street for 5 Yuan. After that Frank (from Canada) and Sean (from Australia) joined us and we took a metro to the French Concession. Sean was quite a character. He was very short, and usually wore a suit. He was here ‘on business’ as he claimed, but what that business was, no one knew. He taught some English to local people and wanted to start his own business here or something. He always hung around the Internet computers or the pool table in the hostel, talking to everyone. He was a very energetic and rude little man, who could make anyone laugh. At the metro station, Sean told us that he was ‘kind of broke’ so he jumped the gates. We followed. At the French Concession we walked around for a bit. It is a very upmarket neighborhood with many expensive flats. We saw nothing but Mercedes’ and BMW’s driving around.

We hung around for a while at the ‘First National Congress of the Communist Party‘. A Chinese guy approached us and wanted to sell a laptop to us. Obviously he had just stolen it, and he was very nervous. The laptop was kind of old, but not in a bad condition. He asked 4,000 Yuan for it, but we bargained down to 2,000. For fun at first, but Alex became interested after a while. The bargaining was easy, because it was not like the guy had much to bargain with. He was so nervous that he ran away a couple of times, when a guard showed up. Alex, being from London, was as cool as ice. He bought it. We made sneaky photos of the exchange, for good fun. Sean asked the guy what he was going to do with the money, and he rubbed his nose. It told us plenty.

On our way back, Sean proceeded to make fun of literally everybody we met on the street. He tried to talk to all the girls, knocked on all the shop windows and went inside a couple of times. There were many street vendors who sell fake Rolexes and DVD’s and we had some fun with them. They would show a ‘brochure’ with all the fake things they sold. Sean would rip it from their hands, run across the street and try to sell stuff to other foreigners. The vendors didn’t know what to do. They just smiled and tried to walk after Sean. It was great fun. Especially since these vendor guys are a real pain in the ass when you are alone. They follow you forever with all kinds of stupid offers.

For supper we went to a Chinese chain-restaurant that sells Western food. We had a weird sizzly steak-kind of thing and returned to our hostel.

Oriental Pearl Tower

We wanted to go to the Oriental Pearl Tower in Pudong, the very tall radio tower, but we chilled out in the hostel first. It was such a nice hostel to relax in. There was a large bar that served all kinds of drinks and food, there was a pool table constantly occupied, and there was a big box of free DVD’s to watch. Most people just hung out in the hostel most nights, playing pool or joking around with the girls behind the bar.

When we finally were ready to go to the tower, it was already 21:30 and the tower was closed when we got there. We tried the Jinmao Tower instead, but we couldn’t get in either. On our way from the metro station to the hotel, we overlooked a pedestrian tunnel and decided to cross a deadly 10-lane speedway. Needless to say, it took a while. We went up to the 85^th floor of the hotel, the highest hotel in the world, and wanted to visit a club up there. Unfortunately, there was a 25 person queue and we were told to come back in 30 minutes. We went back down, only to find that the last metro had already left. We tried to find the pedestrian tunnel under the river, but it was closed too, so we had to take taxis back to the hostel.

Since tonight was Alex’ last night in Shanghai, we were all going out. However, he wanted to take a shower first so we waited. When he finally came downstairs, it was already midnight. We went to a jazz club called ‘the House of Jazz & Blues‘, where a live band was playing. The band members joined our table after their performance. They were from Australia. Later, we went looking for another place called ‘Babyface‘, but we couldn’t find it. It was always the same trouble in Shanghai; addresses don’t have any meaning, and no one knows where to find anything. We ended up walking up and down the bar street, which was nearly empty by now, drinking beer and talking to people on the street. All the bars were closed, but Sean just walked in, grabbed a chair from the corner and sat down watching TV with the staff. They didn’t know how to react. When looking for club ‘Babyface’ he kept shouting people in their faces Babyface? Babyface? Babyface? I wonder what they must have thought. We met two English blokes along the way, and they joined us to club ‘Windows‘. This is everybody’s favourite club, because the music is good and it stays open until six. Beer is 40 Yuan though. Those English guys were here on business. They were talking to me as if I was a retard. One of them said: “I go toilet now ok?” I don’t know why he did this. I guess he expected my English to be bad or something. It was annoying. We returned at 6:30 and had breakfast at MacDonald’s. I talked to Alex until 7:30 in our room. He had to catch a train to Hong Kong in two hours. I went to bed, wondering how the hell he could ever make that train. I was so exhausted.

I got up at 17:00 the next day and had a salad for breakfast. Sean got up at 17:30. We played some pool and went to the Hyatt hotel (Jin Mao Tower) again. This time we could get in. I went with two guys from Montreal, Frank and an African guy who’s name I forgot. The view was pretty good, but it was nothing special. It is possible to watch down inside from the 85th floor and see all 85 floors, since the hotel is hollow on the inside. This gives quite a hypnotic sight. The view on the outside was the same as the view on any tall building in any city. All big cities look alike, don’t they? We returned to the hostel and played pool again. It was only Frank, Sean and I now, because all the others had gone out. We played Sean’s music with the staff of the hotel until three AM. We played John Butler, the White Stripes and more. I liked the staff: most girls who work there live there too, and so they are always there. They try to learn English from us, and we just have fun in the bar mostly. The hostel is quite large, but it is always the same, small group that hangs around at the bar.

Tuesday 25 October

I am in Hangzou train station at the moment, waiting to board the train back to Shanghai. I feel exhausted. Last Sunday, I took a walk to Yu yuan Gardens. For breakfast, I’d had noodle soup it but didn’t come down right and I felt a bit sick. I sat down in the park, which is a nice place to relax, in a small bamboo forest. After that I tried to buy some flip flops at the bazaar over there, but I couldn’t find any. I felt really tired and decided to go back to the hostel and do laundry. On my way back I saw a house on fire near the Bund. There were four or five fire trucks which were blocking the road, and there was a lot of smoke.

Back at the hostel I tried to do laundry, but as there is only 1 washing machine, there was a queue. I went back to the room and slept for thirty minutes, and when I got back there was an even longer queue. I met a weird Australian whom I’ve met a couple of times before. He lives in Japan. He had bought some stuff for his ‘ex-wife’, he said. He looked like he was my age. He asked me many questions about the economic situation in China. Frank showed up and we went out to the ticket office to buy train tickets to Hangzou. After that I just hung out in the bar. I went to bed early (0:00) after talking to a Dutch man and a group of Belgians.

I had a terrible night, as the room was very hot and some bastard was snoring. Sean was pounding the bed side to get him to stop snoring, but without success. Frank and I met up for breakfast at 8:00 and I left my luggage and laundry at the reception desk. I’d be away for one night. We took a taxi to Shanghai South Station, because we didn’t want to walk all this way to the metro station. It was a long and nice drive, but cost 55 RMB. The station was huge and very modern. It looks and feels like an airport.

Shanghai South Railway Station

We had booked ‘hard seats’ but they were ok. The ride took only little over two hours anyways. We passed many cities and I saw construction work everywhere. We arrived at about 13:00 and took another taxi to a hostel. It was a nice place with a garden to sit in, but it was also very quiet and there was no pool table. We went tot he bank first, because we both had no cash on us. We then had some weird lunch: chicken curry with a lot of bones, soup with no taste and some spicy things. It had ‘steamed egg’ in it too, which comes in a cup. Very strange.

West Lake Hanghzou

After lunch we had a walk around the famous West Lake. It was beautiful and there weren’t many Westerners here. This is one of the most popular tourist destinations for Chinese people in the area. Frank and I had a look at the hostel again, but there was hardly anyone there. We did meet a German couple. The woman was really awful. They had been visiting all the major tourist attractions in China, and did nothing but complain: “The toilets were dirty everywhere, Western food was Scheisse, people were noisy, no one spoke English, and so on. Outside, we had encountered a truck with a big water tank on the back, showering the streets. As a precaution, the car had a siren. The noise it produced made both Frank and I burst into laughter. It was whistling: ‘happy birthday to you‘! We wanted to catch it on video, but were too afraid to come near this monstrous machine. It drove up and down the streets of Hangzou all the time. Later, Frank and I had a look at the bars again, after eating some dumplings at the hostel. On the street we met an American girl, Leslie, who is also staying at our hostel.

West Lake

She teaches English in a place called Jiaxing, not far from Shanghai. She has been in China for almost six months now, ans speaks a bit of Chinese, which helped us a lot to buy dinner and drinks later on. Basically, we walked around a lot, talking. Later, we went to a club. There were only Chinese people there, playing drinking games with dice. They stared at us a bit at first, but it was ok. We drank more beer at the hostel and talked about Chinese culture and it was very interesting. At 2 Am we had to get outside and it was quite chilly. I went to bed an hour later. At midnight, a group of Chinese tourists walked into our hostel. They had pretty much booked the entire place. 15 Minutes later, two poor Dutch girls tried to book a bed for the night, but the hostel was full. They argued and nearly cried, hehe. (I don’t like Ducth people very much; don’t ask me why)

I got up at around 12, took a cold shower and went outside to check things out. I met Leslie again, and there was an Iranian doctor who lives in Switzerland. We talked and talked and talked. I wanted to wait for Frank to get up so that we could go somewhere together, but when he didn’t show up, Leslie and I decided to get some breakfast somewhere. We walked over to a local and really dirty place. We ate fried eggplant, eggs & tomato and potatoes. It wasn’t very good. It cost only 6 Yuan. When we asked for some tea (cha) they told us ‘no tea today’. Anyways, it was interesting and I could have never gone here by myself, as I don’t speak any Chinese (yet). We then went for a long walk along the West Lake again. Like yesterday, in a park, there were crowds of people around some musicians. A percussionist, Chinese violin and a man or woman singing into a cheap microphone. It sounded horrible, but they seemed to dig it. We walked some more and met another American girl and the two started chatting about boyfriends and stuff and I lost interest.

Hangzhou

Leslie had some striking observations about Chinese culture: she showed me a photo of a skinny old nude man, taking a bath in a fountain. This is now quite rare, she said, thanks to the large multinationals and massive construction projects that make use of cheap labor. I guess it isn’t such a bad thing after all. Still, that photo of the skinny nude man was a very powerful symbol of poverty just below the surface of the culture here. – In one of her classes, she had tried to start a discussion by asking her students what he thought about a song they had just sang. On of them replied: “We want to know what you think first”. It seems that people here are not used to think for themselves. They need someone to tell them what to do. I guess a lot of this has to do with the massive population of the country too. – Young people in China love soft emotions, like their most popular movie is Titanic, favourite singer Celine Dion. Their names (translated) are: Apple, Lemon, ‘Beautiful snow’ or ‘Magnificent friend’. There are cigarettes called: “Double Happiness”. I took a photo today of a sign that read: “Melting snow on broken bridge →”. (We had no idea what it meant, or what it was pointing at.)

Melting snow on broken bridge

Later that afternoon I took the train back into Shanghai. I never saw Frank again. I liked Frank. He told me he worked night shifts in a factory that produces machinery in Montreal. He works there as a team-leader. I can just picture him, working long nights, just to earn money to travel. He said that his next stop will be Chengdu, Lhasa, then Kathmandu, then New Delhi. I wish him good luck.

Monday 30 October

16:25 I am at Shanghai Station again, in the train to Xi ‘an. We’ve just taken off. After returning from Hangzou I went to Mingtown Hiker Hostel again, and said hello to everyone. I don’t think that I went out that night but probably stayed up half the night playing pool in the bar. On Wednesday I went to Pudong but it wasn’t very nice. There are only big sky scrapers out there, and nothing to do on the ground. A man started talking to me. He said he was a teacher in Beijing, and if he could show me his art work. I knew what was going on, I had seen plenty of these guys in Beijing, but I went with him anyways. He gave me a paper with some calligraphy. He then wanted me to buy something, but of course I refused. He kept smiling, and so did I. I thanked him and went outside. I took the metro to the People’s Square and sat down. A girl approached me and we started talking. After a few minutes she skilfully mentioned a ‘tea-festival’ where she’d like to go, and asked me if I would come along with her. I said: “no, let’s go somewhere else!” She didn’t know what to say. She then told me that she was going to go for tea anyways, and left. I kept watching her as she sat down for a while a little further, and then walked up to to some other Westerners. I knew enough… This was also when I finally fully realised that this other time I had been scammed all the way. There was no doubt about it.

On Thursday morning I met Frank, my old class mate from my study exchange time in Finland inHelsinki Business Polytechnic, in the hostel. He had come on a school exchange, and will stay in Tianjin 2 weeks. He only had 2 days in Shanghai, and I met him early in the morning. It was good seeing him again after two years. We went for a walk on the Bund, went to Yu Yuan gardens, and walked around a lot. In the afternoon we met one of his teachers in town; what a coincidence. We had some tea together, and then went to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MoCa).

MoCA

It was a very funky and cool museum, and it shows that China is finally opening up for modern influences. For dinner we had some typical Chinese dishes; like eggplant, eggs & tomato and tofu. Frank ordered a bottle of ‘wine’ but the waiter brought hom a bottle of something that looked and tasted like soy sauce with alcohol (huangjiu; “jellow wine” I found out later). It was disgusting. I stuck to beer. At night we went out with some of the guys to club Windows, again.

The next day I took Frank to the Hyatt hotel again and we went in. I had already seen it, but it was still nice. When we returned that night, Frank realised that he had forgotten to book a ticket back to Beijing for tomorrow, and so he had to stay one more night in Shanghai.

Jinmao inside view

The next morning Sean took us to the fake market, which was not very far form the hostel. There was a lot of crap on sale inside, and Frank and I spent more time outside, observing the neighborhood. This was the old part of Shanghai, although it was rapidly disappearing. I hastily took some photos before everything would disappear. I had heard about it: people say that they can see sky scrapers being built one floor per day. One night, I walked past a sidewalk that was being built. It was 10:00 PM. The next morning at 8:00 AM, the work was all finished. People work day and night here. Most of the construction workers are poor migrants from other provinces who have come to the big city in search of work and money.

In the evening we went out for dinner with Sean and Daniel (who is from Sweden. He was in Shanghai to buy cheap shoes and send them home to his friends, who then sold them on). Our mission was to find a place called ‘Hello Pizza‘; according to the magazines this was the best pizza place in the whole of Shanghai, and cost only 10 Yuan per pizza. We took a metro and a taxi, but we soon realised that the address on the magazine we had was wrong. We spent about an hour searching already. We rang them and asked for a delivery outside. They didn’t understand. We rang them again, and gave the phone to a taxi driver and told them to give directions. This worked, and we finally arrived at the restaurant. It was 20:55 and they’d close in 5 minutes, but we were let in anyways. We ordered 4 pepperoni pizzas, but they wanted to make only two. They said that they had run out of pepperoni (can you believe that?) The guys ordered 2 pepperoni pizzas, and then 2 more but without the pepperoni. Frank didn’t like it all, but the rest of us had a lot of fun.

Later on Frank and I went to the French Concession to check out a club called Ark Livehouse. Apparently, Chinese live bands play here. Once there, there was only some cover band. The place outside was very lively and nice though, and we stayed. It was actually nice enough to buy a 68 Yuan beer (Paulaner). It was the place were rich Chinese and expats gather and drink and have fun. In one bar you could buy beer ‘by the hour’. They would put a keg on your table, and you could drink as much as you wanted before the hour was over. Afterwards, you could keep the keg and whatever was inside. If you’d finish before the hour, you got another keg. I didn’t dare ask for the price for this German wet dream.

Bund tv screen

On Saturday Frank left. We had spent some hours on the Bund again with Mike (from the US, works as a social worker with deranged kids). We had to laugh as a huge boat passed with a 6x3m big TV screen on it, showing commercials. It kept going back and forth along the Bund. It was Halloween night tonight, and I played pool with Daniel until 23:00 and then we went to club BonBon with some others. The cover charge for this club was 130 Yuan, but there was an open bar. The bar was well stocked too: they had Bacardi, good Whiskeys and Carlsberg. The club was very nice too; there were small lounge rooms scattered around the area, shielded off from the main dance floor. After a while, these rooms filled up with people who were passed out already. Behind a door was another dance room where a friend of one of our group’s friends was playing Drum ‘n Bass. It didn’t take long for us to get drunk. There was not a sober soul in that club. Daniel asked me if I wanted to come with him and some Chinese girls to their hotel room. I said: “sure!” We took a taxi and went into the hotel. We first bought 12 beers (50cl bottles) and some food (in a big box which he and I carried between us) and went upstairs to the twelfth floor.

One girl was a friend of Daniel, and had studied in Sweden. The other girl went straight to sleep and some guy tried to teach me Chinese and I tried to teach him Dutch, before he fell asleep too. The three of us who were still awake drank more beer and talked all night. We watched it get light. Daniel and I took a taxi back to our hostel at 8:30 and bought some friend rice cakes before going inside. At my room (I had changed into a bigger room with en suite bathroom, but I now had to share with 5 others instead of 3), my room mates had just gotten up, and were talking to me. They kept me awake. All I wanted to do now was sleep. I first puked out those rice cakes, because my stomach was too dry, then I went to sleep at 9:30.

I slept until 17:00, but got up at 19:00 to take a shower. The African girl who sleeps in the bed opposite of me was surprised to still see me in bed by 19:00; she thought I was ill. I was feeling so hungry. I went downstairs and ordered a sandwich. Later on I went to the noodle place with Sean and Daniel for cheap noodle soup. We always went to the same places; one for breakfast, and one fur lunch and/or dinner. They are the two most dirty places around, but serve the best food. Their menus are hilarious too: proper Chinglish. We played some pool, and at eleven we went to club ‘I Love Shanghai‘ to play poker. It is located directly under the Bund. In this club they have poker nights on Wednesdays and Sundays. The buy-in was 100 Yuan, and I passed 10 to Sean, because he was broke again. We sat in and I played live poker for the first time in my life. There were mostly expats there, but some Chinese too. It is actually illegal to gamble in China, and sometimes a policeman comes in and then we can still play, but not exchange our chips for money. It seems too easy. I spent the first half hour just folding, but when I finally played a hand I won. I wasn’t too obvious because we were playing with six or seven. My chips went up from 40 to 200. I was really excited and my hands were trembling. The next hand I played, I was heads-up against a very sexy Chinese chick. She was with some fat guy who had a Singaporean accent. I flopped the nut flush, but checked all the way as not to reveal anything. The girl could see that I was nervous, and she probably thought that i was a crap player. She went all-in on the river and I called. She had shit: only a low pair! Her boyfriend scolded her. “What was that!” he shouted. A little later I cashed out and walked away with 530 Yuan. Not bad for a first time… I walked down the dark and empty streets of Shanghai at 2 AM, feeling exhilarated.

Romantic Yellow Wine

On November 17, 2006 I boarded a single flight to Shanghai. I wasn’t really sure where I’d end up, but I knew it would be some place interesting. The following posts are from my diary, which I kept nearly every day. I ended up backpacking around South East Asia for six months, on a shoe string budget. I hope my story will interest some readers. Each post covers about two to three weeks.

China

I spent two months in China, traveling West and then South. I passed the cities of Shanghai, Hangzhou, Xi’An, Wuhan, Yi Chang, Chongqing, Chengdu and Kunming.

Vietnam

One month in Vietnam, traveling North to South, from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City by bus and motorcycle.

Cambodia

One month in Cambodia, making a circle around Tonle Sap lake.

Laos

Six weeks in Laos, traveling by bus and rented motorbike. I spent most time around Paxse, Savannakhet, Luang Prabang and Vientiane.

Thailand

Crossing the border by boat from Laos, I ended up in Chiang Khong. I moved on to Chiang Rai Chiang Mai, before booming South to Bangkok.

Return home

Some afterthoughts, written a week after I returned home. Had I found what I was looking for? Had I learned anything at all? Had my sojourn be a complete waste of time and money?