Day 155: Episode 2

Time for another installment in the Spring Festival extravaganza!

DAY 4 - HOHHOT

We had decided to get up around 7 to have our first shower since Yinchuan (icky) and head out early to see everything we wanted to see.  I didn't even hear Nikki's alarm, which she had turned off.  So at 10:20 or so I dragged myself out of bed to discover we had no hot water.  So no shower.  Icky.

We got ready and went to get a cab to 昭君墓, the mausoleum of a once imperial concubine.  She wasn't actually a concubine, she was a candidate who was left waiting and never got picked.  So when a decision was made to send one of the candidates to the Huns as a peace-making marriage, the emperor sent her.  He had never seen her, and at the wedding he was less than pleased, as she was actually very beautiful, and he thought her ugly, as the painter intentionally painted her ugly in return for her not bribing him.  Still, the marriage worked and they all lived happily ever after.  Anyway, as I was saying, the taxi cost 60 kuai as it was at the other side of a toll gate.  We saw the tomb and stuff, and that was nice, then tried to find the bus stop back.  But an unlicensed cab appeared and offered to take us to our hotel for 50 kuai.  But we weren't going to a hotel, we were going to eat 稍麦, a local specialty (which are essentially dumplings (although I have to say, dumplings is a bad translation)).  They were nice, but not as amazing as the guidebook had made out. 

The restaurant was conveniently right next to the temples we wanted to visit - 席力图, 大召 and 五塔寺.  The first two were nice and all, but there's not much to say about Buddhist temples  Photos were forbidden inside the halls, so I have very few, and I think even if they were allowed, I would have felt rude taking them, as it was an active place of worship with people praying in almost every hall.
 

After the first two, we tried to find the last one, the 5 Pagoda Temple.  They made a good job of hiding it.  When we eventually found it, we went to the south end to find the entrance, as the entrance is always on the south.  We went to the ticket office, but there was nobody there.  The door into the temple was also locked.  So, disappointed, we wandered around the building trying to find a decent place to take photos over the wall.  I got some bad ones, then we walked to the main road that runs past the north of the temple to get a taxi, and found a ticket office with people in it and an open door!  We bought a ticket and went in, saw the five pagoda pagoda (originally there were five pagodas, each with 5 pagodas on top of them, but only one remains), and then tried to look in all the rooms.  But they were all padlocked shut.  So we tried to find the astronomical map which is entirely in Mongolian, and is the only one of its kind.  After much searching, particularly of the south wall where it was supposed to be, I wandered around the back of the pagoda (at the north end) out of curiosity, and found it, as well as two other things (although I have no idea what they were).  It was a bit of an anti-climax if I'm honest.

 

One weird thing about the temples - all the mopnks have mobile phones and we saw a group of youngish monks messing around with a ball in trainers.  I realise they are people too, but it did strike me as somewhat strange. 

 

We went back to the hostel and sat under the covers to thaw for a while, before going for dinner.  The guidebook recommended a place for good roast lamb (another local speciality), so we tried to walk there.  We had walked quite a distance before we realised we had been walking the wrong direction.  So we jumped in a taxi.  On arrival, we were seated in a yurt and then tried to order a thing of sheep ribs.  The conversation went like this:

 

Stupid Waitress: This is ship, this is beef (pointing at the menu)

Us:  The sheep.

SW: This is sheep, this is beef.

Us: The sheep.

SW: This is sheep, this is sheep, and this is beef (she had been pointing at more sheep and saying beef the whole time)

Us: The sheep.

SW: You want the sheep?

Us: Uhm...yes?

 

Then she tried to force booze on us, but as I would rather drink stale pee than 白酒 and our train the next morning left at 8am, there was not a chance.  But she kept pushing it.  Even when we told her several times that we don't drink, she still wasn't having any of it.  Eventually, she took the hint.  The milk tea was revolting, and the weird milk things Nikki got were 'unusual.'  The cabbage and sheep were really good though.  Like, really really good.  I don't know how they do it, but fat on meat here is really really nice, better than the meat sometimes.  As was proved when I rejected meaty bits for fatty bits.  How the times have changed.

 

When we got back, we showered and packed, and while Nikki was in the shower, we got a phone call that went a little like this:

 

Me: Hello?

Mysterious Woman: Hello

Me: Hello.

MW: I'm a masseuse, do you need a massage?

At this point, I was tempted to say no I didn't, but that my girlfriend had been complaining of a sore back, and I would ask her (for the record, Nikki is not my girlfriend, but I figured the prostitute on the end of the phone didn't need to know that.).  I decided not to though, and just told her no.  I had heard before about prostitutes calling round hotel rooms looking for clients, but this was my first one. 

 

DAY 5 - HOHHOT => DATONG

 

On the 8am train, Nikki and I were not seated together, which meant creating my own entertainment.  So I stared out of the window, ate some cookies, stared out of the window some more, tried unsuccessfully to sleep a little, and stared out the window some more.  Then loads of people suddenly got off, so I moved next to Nikki, where we were next to Chatty McChatterson, who kept trying his really bad English (which he had studied for 10 years).  He took a photo of us, then one of him with each of us.  He took my email and said he would send me the photos, but I'm not going to hold my breath for that, it's been 10 days now.  Nikki started feeling unwell, so when we got to the hotel (not the one I had found on the internet, whose prices were hugely greater than the ones online), we just lazed about for a while.  Which turned into all day.  End of Day 5. 

 

DAY 6 - DATONG => TAIYUAN

 

In the morning, Nikki was feeling much better, so we went to the Yungang Caves 云冈石窟.  We got a taxi to the bus station with a really friendly driver, and took the number 3 bus (for 1.5 kuai - really quite glad we didn't book the 100 kuai tour).  The caves were cool, lots of big impressive stone carvings, but there's not much to say about them really.  After a scout about there and an unsuccessful search for the Zhou Enlai memorial hall, we got the bus back to town.

 

We got a taxi to the Huayan Monastery 华严寺 with a really nice driver, who informed us there were two right next to each other, and gave us directions to the 9 Dragon Screen 九龙壁.  The first part of the monastery was a con, there was nothing there.  So we went to the second part, not hoping for much, and it was much much better.  And half the price. 

 

After exploring there for a bit, we did the 9 Dragon Screen and Drum Tower (which was disappointing, it was surrounded by a big fence). 

 

Frozen to the core, we headed back to the train station, several hours early.  We sat in an internet placey for 4 hours or so, then went to get some noodles for dinner.  Then came our first sleeper train.

 

When you get on, you go to your assigned bed and the staff swap your ticket for a small credit card sized thing saying which bed you're in.  Then when you get off, they give you your ticket back, because without a ticket you can't get out of the train station.  We were on the top bunks, which is about 18 inches below the ceiling, but surprisingly comfortable.  I lay reading my book for a while, when they suddenly (and without warning) turned out the lights, so I went to sleep.  And slept surprisingly well.

 

And that's all for this installment.  Tune in some time, next week, for more. 

Day 152: The Spring Festival Travels Begin

So, we're stuck in Taiyuan waiting for a train that leaves in 5 hours, so I thought I'd post the first part of my travels.  Photos will either be added to this post later, or added as one big post at the end, I'll let you know.

 

DAY 1 - URUMQI乌鲁木齐=>YINCHUAN银川 (also known as the day I wrote the least detail)

 

At 6:30am, my alarm went off.  So of course, I hit snooze, but then I remembered that Catherine was elaving around 7am for her flight to Shenzhen, and I wouldn't see her for over a month, and we had to leave around 8:30, so I figured I should just get up.  I finished packing and skipped breakfast (too early in the day for food) and we got a taxi to the airport, for a rather uneventful flight to Yinchuan.  After getting the shuttle bus to town, we walked for about three minutes before finding a 招待所 (A hostelly guesthousey type of thing.  Really cheap, not too bothered about the legal paperwork (the government like to track our movements by making us register our presence in every hotel, using our passport).).  We dumped the bags and headed to Tourist Site Number 1 - 承天寺 (Chengtian Temple).  Which was quite the waste of time and money.  One out of the three exhibits was open, and you couldn't climb the pagoda.  So we went to Tourist Site Number 2 - 海宝塔 (Haibao Pagoda), which was cheaper and more worth it, although the steps in the pagoda were horribly small, making the climb and the descent quite uncomfortable.  Tourist Site Number 3 was the 南关清真寺 (Nanguan Mosque), which was alright.  We weren't allowed in the prayer hall (fair enough really), so we saw a fairly rubbish museum which was essentially a lot of photos of famous people I'd never heard of visiting the mosque. 

 

We decided to go for food, so we searched out the 老毛手抓美食楼, a restaurant recommended in the guidebook.  We headed in the really vague direction the book gave us, and when we realised we weren't going to find it, we tried to ask a lady on the street.  But as soon as we approached her, she shook her head and ran off.  Even though Nikki spoke to her in Chinese.  A nice man then came over, and walked us to the place, which was quite far, and then walked past shortly after to check we got in okay.  We ordered an Yinchuan speciality, 手抓羊肉 (Hand grabbed mutton).  It came by the kilo, and as neither of us have any idea what a kilogram looks like, we ordered one kilo.  Turns out, that's quite a lot.  We also ordered 韭菜炒香干, which was Chinese Chives fried with some kind of tofu.  Quite nice really.  We did try to order a 羊肉小炒, although that never came (and having seen the quantity of food we had ordered already, that's probably a good thing).  The food was really, really good, although the tea was weird.  When we sat down, there were cups of what looked a lot like dates, sultanas etc. in old crusty sugar.  They added hot water, and it turned out there were tea leaves underneath, but it was so sickly sweet I couldn't drink it. 

 

After eating, we got a cab home to dump some things and go out for a walk.  But we ended up discussing our route for this trip again, and changing little bits, and adding Chongqing and Chengdu to the route, which means I might get to hold a baby panda for my 21st birthday :D:D:D

 

DAY 2 - YINCHUAN银川 => <strike>YANAN 延安</strike> BAOTOU 包头 (Also known as the day I wrote too much)

 

At 7:30, we woke up, showered in the most mafan (Chinese: 麻烦, meaning troublesome.  But who says that?) way known to man (it was a shower head directly over a western toilet.), and headed to 南门 (South Gate) from where we heard we could get a bus to the Western Xia Imperial Tombs (西夏王陵).  First, we bought our bus tickets to Yan'an, for the 5:30pm bus (the latest one we could get, and as it's a looooong way, we decided to do it overnight), and asked about buses to the tombs, but they said they didn't do buses there from the bus station itself.  So we wandered around 南门 (which looked a LOT like a mini Tian'anmen 天安门广场 square) looking for a bus.  Realising there wasn't one, we asked a bus driver who was playing with the side of his bus, and he said to go to 'xinye square.'  So we walked in the direction he pointed, and realising we couldn't find it, decided to ask someone.  He said there was no such square.  So we decided to get in a taxi, and ask the driver to take us to the stop where the bus to the tombs went from.  She suggested we take her taxi, for 100 kuai.  We realised it was more convenient (no waiting for buses, warmth, probably not hugely more expensive), so we did the 32km in her taxi.  The tombs really are in the middle of nowhere.  We bought our cheap tickets (yay for student cards) and started walking up the road.  It was so cold, so when the little bus thing pulled up by us, we were rather relieved.  Only thing is, it was colder in the bus, as the sides were open, and it was windy.  We finally arrived at a big building, outside which was a giant stone wall, carved with both Chinese and Xia characters.  We took some photos with the Xia characters and then went into what turned out to be a museum.  We ran around looking at a lot of old bowls and avoiding tour groups (more on how I hate them at a later date).  We wanted to see a tomb, so we went a little along from the museum to what looked like a tomb, judging by the models we'd just seen inside.  It turned out not to be.  But it had guard towers, which we climbed, from where we could see how to get to a tomb.  Once we were on the path up to the tomb, it became stupidly obvious how to get there.  We walked around the tomb a little, trying to take photos, but the weather and the weird light made that really difficult.  We found the entrance to the tomb itself, but you couldn't go in.  Just before, we'd been saying that if you could go in, would we?  I decided I would, scary though it would be, but then we couldn't, so no fear required.  We went back to the taxi, but only after taking photos with the Kalavinkas (if anyone has any idea what they are, please let me know). 

 

At this point, the taxi driver asked if we wanted to go to another place, the name of which I had never heard, and which was apparently a film studio.  So we went.  And it was exactly that.  There were two and a bit parts - Ming city, Qing city and a really little bit about the cultural revolution.  It was interesting enough, but I was cold and stopped caring after a while - not having seen any of the films didn't help matters much.  When we got back to the taxi, she asked us for an extra 100 kuai, because we're students.  On our return to the bus station, she explained it should have been 260, but because we were students, she would give us it for 200.  Her daughter was also a student, so she understood we weren't rich apparently.  We tried haggling, but she was having none of it. 

 

We had a while before our bus, so we went for food at a little place near the bus station.  It was alright, but the staf were rude.  As soon as we went in, the waitress came over, then without saying anything to us, turned to the other staff members and shouted: 他们听不懂 (they don't understand).  We proved her wrong.  After waiting for a while in the bus station, we went out to the stand for our bus, where were told to wait a minute, as it hadn't come in yet.  Around 5:15, we were told it wasn't coming at all, and we were to refund our tickets.  We took a taxi to the train station, and joined the slowest queue in the history of time.  Well, only after SEARCHING the timetable for Yan'an, and not being able to find it.  So we looked at the map to see if there was a line, but we couldn't even find Yinchuan.  Turns out, the map was not geographical.  How logical. 

 

There was a train to Baotou, stop number three on our route, at 6:43pm.  It was currently 6pm.  We could make it.  But the line was the slowest in the history of time, so by the time we got to the front, it was 6:40pm, and they stopped selling tickets 15 minutes before departure.  To say I was unimpressed does't even come close - people kept pushing in at the front, and the woman at the front was going really slowly.  So we got tickets for the next train to Baotou - 00:40.  With no seats.  Then, to kill six hours. 

 

We sat in the quieter of the two waiting rooms (unsure of which was ours) and starting wrinting our travel journals (which, to be honest), is the only way I could possibly remember all of this).  Trips to the shop, toilet and reading my book helped pass the time, but it was so COLD in the waiting room.  Nikki had seen a warmer room, which was 8 to get into, so we went in and got a free cup of tea.  We huddled by the heater and played cards for a bit, ate some noodles, tried (without much success) to sleep.  At around 10:30, they suddenly switched off all the lights without warning.  We were let into the soft seat waiting room though, which was nice.  We played some more cards, and I was too scared to sleep, because anyone that tried around me had "GET UP!" screamed in their ear. 

 

Eventually, we got on the train and made seats out of our bags at one end of the carriage.  Only problem was a) it was freezing with the door open; 2) no one shut the door and iii) it was seriously uncomfortable.  I tried sleeping a little, but really couldn't.  Nikki found two seats around 4am, but no sooner had I sat down when the guy who had been sitting there 20-30 minutes before came back and ordered me to get up.  The nice guy across the aisle let me sit in his seat for a while. 

 

At just after 7am, we got into Baotou.  Straight to the ticket office to book our tickets to Hohhot (book early or no seats/trains), where for some unknown reason we were pushed to the front of the queue by staff.  Not complaining, we got tickets and went to get a taxi to the bus station to get a bus to Genghis Khan's mausoleum (成吉思汗陵).  En route, the taxi driver informed us that there may not be any buses, on account of the snow.  When we got there, a load of people crowded round the taxi informing us that there were.  On getting out of the taxi however, it was a different story.  There were no buses, we had to get a taxi.  One guy offered to take us to Dongsheng, a nearby city, for 100 kuai each.  One way.  So that was 200 round trip, then we had to get from Dongsheng to the mausoleum and back.  Somebody else offered to take us to the mausoleum, wait for us, then take us back, for 1000 kuai.  Never going to happen.  He would go no lower than 800, and for 800 we had to take another passenger.  There were no buses and nothing to do in Baotou, so we didn't really have much choice. 

 

We got in the taxi, and a really obnoxious woman got in the taxi as well, and we got on our way.  Although I needed the toilet, and I discovered later that Nikki did too.  We figured it wouldn't be far, so it was okay.  We were getting there pretty rapidly when the police pulled the taxi over.  They looked at our passports, asked a load of questions, such as "Why are you in China?" "How long have you been here?" "What is the relationship between you and the girl?"  Fun fun fun.  Eventually, we were allowed to go on our way, and as we left, one of the policemen said: "欢迎再来" (Welcome to come again).  I wished I knew how to say "fat chance" in Chinese. 

 

Eventually, we dropped the obnoxious woman off and went on our way to the mausoleum.  After buying our tickets, we made a beeline for the restroom, before seeing the mausoleum properly.  We took a lot of photos, and say a museum which was built in the shape of the Mongolian word 'hehan' (emperor).  We tried to go to the old site of the mausoleum, but it turneds out to be a different site, and the mausoleum isn't even there, so we went back, as we had to be on a train at 7:55pm.  We got back around 4:30, around two hours earlier than I expected going by what the taxi driver had said before we got on in the morning.  We ate some not very good food, and then waited for much shorter than 6 hours in a considerably warmer waiting room. 

 

Eventually, we arrived and bought our tickets to Datong immediately, then went to find the Anda Guesthouse, which came highly recommended.  It's traditional Mongolian style, and in a convenient location, and reasonable priced.  But it doesn't exist.  Number 78 on that road does not exist.  We went to a hotel on Train Station Road instead, which was really quite alright, and not that much more expensive. 

 

And I'm leaving it here, because I am getting some serious cramp in my hand.  More later at the next stop where there is internet access and lots of time to kill.

As promised...

One map...



(I would also like to take this opportunity to point out that when the Chinese say their country looks like a rooster, they're really not kidding. It really does look like a rooster)

Day 144: The last part of Christmas/New Year

Apologies for the delay, thinks have been quite hectic here at Urumqi Towers, what with preparing to go away in 36 hours.

DAY 9: HANGZHOU

So, the day after we went to Tangkou, we decided to make the most of our day, which unfortunately fell flat on its face. We first went to book flights back to Urumqi, and the choices were either that day for 2100 or the next day (Hogmanay) for 1600. So we took the Hogmanay ones. After going to the bank to get cash to pay for them (well, Nikki getting cash to pay for both, see lost credit card), we paid for them, with Nikki convinced we were going to miss New Year. We were due back into Urumqi at 22:20, which gave us time to get a taxi home and quickly change, then get a taxi to the pub. These details are important, remember them.

So, after booking flights, I had to go to the bank to change my reserve Traveller's Cheques, as it was the only money I could get at that time. We waited a much shorter time than we had waited in Beijing, which was nice. But then the woman took what felt like hours to process it, and talking about how mafan much hassle it was. Charming.

Armed with my newly aquired 1000 kuai (600 of which went straight to Nikki for part of the flight, so I owed her 1000 exactly), we walked down to a main road to get a taxi to a shopping street Nikki wanted to visit. After an hour, we gave up and went back to the hostel, to see if we could find a bus route on the internet. But someone was using the only computer. So we decided to go and try another taxi. Waited a long time, decided to give up, but just then, a taxi pulled up next to us and some people got out. Two girls that were trying to steal our taxi before (had we had one) ran towards it, and we dithered at the door slightly, before jumping in and laughing at them. To be fair, we largely got the taxi so they couldn't. Anyway, we went to this shopping street, and it turned out to be around 50 feet from where we had been waiting previously, and it also turned out to be a total bust. We walked for a bit and saw some fountains, of which I took a lot of photos, although I have no idea why.

We were tired at this point, so decided to head home and sleep, and use the next morning before our flight back to explore around the West Lake, for which Hangzhou is famous (the West Lake appears on the one kuai note).

DAY 10: HANGZHOU -> URUMQI

The morning was not hugely interesting really, we walked around the lake a bit (to walk around the entire lake would take easily a couple of hours, which we didn't have as we had to be at the airport for 2pm). We had our last Starbucks for months, and toddled off to the shuttle bus. The taxi driver taking us to the shuttle bus offered to take us to the airport for 100 kuai, but the 10 in a taxi and 15 each for the bus seemed like a better deal, and we were really early anyway.

At the airport, our check-in desk hadn't opened yet, so we discovered the joy of those massage chairs. In the past, I always assumed they were a) rubbish 2) a waste of money and iii) completely pointless. They are possibly my favourite thing in the entire universe. So next Christmas, don't ask what I want, because it's the chair :D

After spending rather a lot of time on the chairs, we checked in and went through security where we didn't have to wait long at all before boarding. After boarding, we taxied a little, before waiting in the middle of the tarmac with the door open while some guy finished his phone call. We ended up leaving 20 minutes late. Making our arrival 2240. Not good.

But we got on our way, and the stop in Xi'An went smoothly. But then we were told we would be 20 minutes late into Urumqi, meaning 2300. Not good. We didn't want to miss New Year, so we decided to go out with our bags in our travelling clothes. Classy. The hour between 2300 and 2400 went as follows:

2300: Touchdown.
2303: Arrive at gate.
2303"30: disembark.
2304: Board bus to terminal.
2305: Impatiently clock watch.
2306: Impatiently clock watch.
2307: Impatiently clock watch.
2308: Arrive at terminal, run for the doors.
2310: Arrive at baggage claim, scope out the best point to stand, and use elbows to avoid other people stealing prime spot.
2312: Collect bags.
2313-2315: Argue with stupid man that the stickers on our bags might be the wrong way round, but we have the stickers on our boarding passes to match the stickers on the bags.
2318: Jump in a taxi. Tell him destination, and firmly to run meter. Cab driver (surprisingly) doesn't argue.
2320: Panic.
2325: Taxi driver asks which route to take. Tell him I don't care, just get us there fast.
2340: Think we're coming down a road that leads onto a road about 10 minutes from where we need to be. Consider offering to double the taxi fare if he gets us there within 5 minutes.
2341: Turn corner, realise we're much closer than expected, feel glad to have kept mouth shut.
2342: Taxi driver takes strange exit from roundabout, panic. Realise it's okay, this is just a slightly longer way but that avoids an annoying set of traffic lights.
2344: Tell taxi driver to stop, pay.
2345: Enter Fubar.
2346: Dump bags, go to bar.
2350: Sit down, breathe.
2400: Sing Auld Lang Syne
0200: Celebrate Uyghur New Year :D

I'm not going to blog about what happened between then and my impending travels, as it's really quite dull, but here's a summary if you're interested.

-Booked return flights to UK and flight to Inverness. I'll be back in Scotland on the 15th of August.
-Met a Latvian friend of Catherine's friend.
-Met a Uyghur girl, a friend of Catherine.
-Frantically prepare for impending trip.
-Get exam results, average of 93 (which Newcastle change to 79). Chuffed :)

Right, next post will be in a very long time, our route (for those who are interested) is as follows:

Yinchuan -> Yan'an -> Baotou -> Hohhot -> Datong -> Taiyuan -> Pingyao -> Shijiazhuang -> Beijing -> Tianjin -> Harbin -> Changchun -> Jilin -> Shenyang -> Xingcheng -> Dalian -> Yantai -> Jinan -> Qufu -> Zhengzhou -> Luoyang -> Xi'an -> Lanzhou -> Xining. I'll stick a map up with dots and lines on it later on tonight (hopefully).

Completely irrelevant

That has to be one of the funniest things of all time. I laughed 'til I cried. And stopped breathing. For quite a long time.

Day 135: More still about Christmas

DAY 8: SHANGHAI

Today, we decided that as we had seen so much good shopping, we were going to do it. So we did. We toddled off to Huaihai Lu (淮海路) and hit the shops. Hard. Well, I did. I spent far too much money in H&M (but then, it's Christmas, and I got money for Christmas, and I figure it's better to spend that money on stuff for me rather than bills and other such uninteresting things). So I went to H&M and bought a lot of things. It was good. Not much else to say about that really, although I'm trying to think of interesting things.

After shopping, we went to get our hair cut. We had been waiting since we got to China, as we were scared of what they might do to our hair. See, there are two types of hairdressers in Urumqi (three really, but I figure brothels shouldn't count in this): Han hairdressers, where they only know how to cut Han hair into Han styles; and Uyghur hairdressers, where they can cut caucasian hair, but only into Uyghur styles (which are basically a short back & sides with a side parting, ALL of them). So they did our hair, which was weird. When they washed mine, they didn't do it the way one would expect (you know, a sink and water and stuff). No, rather I sat there in my chair, and he started washing my hair right there. With a little squeezy bottle of water and a rather large amount of shampoo. Apparently, it's called 干洗 (Dry wash), and it was actually quite nice, as you get a full head massage while they're doing it. Western hairdressers should start it.

Here is the result (in the style of Hello Kitty):




After that, we met Vanessa (Nikki's Chinese friend) and we went for dinner, before heading back to base to go to bed, as it was quite late, and we were leaving for Hangzhou the next day.

DAY 9: SHANGHAI -> HANGZHOU

In the morning, we wanted to go for a massage and to the foreign language bookstore, so we toddled off to find them. We got to where a recommended massage place was, but couldn't find it (we figure it closed down, that happens a lot in China). So we decided to head to the foreign languages bookstore, buy a guideboko (and some other books) and find one from that. But by the time we had finished in both the bookstores, there was no time to go for a massage, as we had to get back in time to see Francesca before she went off to work and we left for Hangzhou. So we went to Mister Donut instead, which was AMAZING. They should have that in the west.

We went back to pick up our belongings, at which point I discovered my credit card had gone walkies. Alas. I had another card with me, and Nikki had access to money too, so it was okay. We went off to Hangzhou on the train, and after arriving at our hostel, we decided to take a little walk and find some food. After a while, we stumbled across 西湖天地, a little bitty on the edge of the lake with restaurants etc. We saw an Italian, so decided to try it. After looking at the menu (and its 150 kuai dishes), we decided not to eat there. But downstairs, they had a different, cheaper menu. And live music. So we ate, and cringed at the music. One girl tried to sing "La Camisa Negra," a Spanish song, but she clearly spoke absolutely no Spanish and had never actually heard the song. It was truely awful.

DAY 10: HANGZHOU -> TANGKOU

While in Hangzhou, we decided to make an excursion to Yellow Mountain (黄山). So we got up bright and early, and toddled off to the bus. After paying far too much for the bus (90+ kuai) and eating some "bread" that tasted like vomit (probably because it had 肉松 (A weird way of treating meat) in it), we got to see some lovely Zhejiang(浙江) and Anhui(安徽) scenery. We played the game where you hold your breath when you go through a tunnel, to see if you can make it. And then the bus arrived in 汤口 (Tangkou). Outside a hotel. Which is where the fun and games began.

A little man who was really quite obnoxious immediately approached us, asked if we were staying in this hotel, and when we said we weren't, offered to take us to the bus station from where we could get the bus to the Mountain. Now, I was confused, as I thought the bus we had just got off was supposed to take us to the mountain. So we followed him, and he kept telling us that if we went to his restaurant, we could look at a map, and his wife/mother/sister kept telling us we should be cold. I informed them I was in fact, not cold, as it was really quite warm there. But no, I was cold! I should buy a coat. This carried on for the 10-15 minute walk to near his restaurant (although it felt like an eternity, because the woman said literally nothing else except that I was cold).

At this point, we had figured out that it was too late to go up the mountain, and we hadn't taken things or money to stay overnight (and everywhere was a complete rip off), so we went to the bus station to see when we could go back to Hangzhou. The next bus was in two hours, so we bought tickets, and wandered around a little in Tangkou. Which was horrible. It is a run down little dump where everyone devotes ALL their energy to trying to sell tourists crap they don't want. If half the people selling maps went into something else, ANYTHING else, the town would already be a lot better. I haven't seen the film "The Hills Have Eyes," but apparently this village was like that.

So eventually we got back, after spending considerably longer than we would have liked in Hell Tangkou, and had a look at night time Hangzhou.

This concludes another installment of our trip (one more remains (hopefully))

Day 134: Yet more Christmas.

DAY 5: SUZHOU -> SHANGHAI

So, I got up early in Suzhou, and looked at the map, and worked out what the suggested route I had written down looked like. Nikki wasn't well though (just a cold, but she still felt rubbish), so we did the walk slowly (it wasn't that great, but we did see a lot of Suzhou), then we sat in Starbucks for a while to let Nikki rest (shh), then went to the train station to get the train to Shanghai.

One of our classmates who lives in Shanghai said we could stay with her, so we toddled off to her house on the subway, and when we got there some of their friends were over. They were having a Christmas Eve party before going out on the town. However, nobody made it out as people had to leave early as they were working on Tuesday etc., so by the end there were only a few of us left. Another classmate who was supposed to be going to Singapore on Christmas Eve had changed her flight to Christmas Day(!), but she couldn't come over so we didn't get to see her.

DAY 6: SHANGHAI

Christmas! We dragged ourselves out of bed around 11am, and lazed around a bit. It was nice to just sit and do nothing, and Francesca (our classmate) and Justin (her flatmate) opened their presents. Around 5pm, we finally made it out to go and get Christmas Dinner at O'Malley's, an Irish pub. But when we got there, we discovered it was reservations only and they stopped serving at 6pm. And it was 6:10pm when we got there. So we went around the corner to British Bulldog (on Urumqi Road!), where we were met by Nikki's tandem partner from Newcastle, Vanessa. After the starter (a salad with the smallest piece of salmon I've ever seen), we got the traditional dinner, turkey, potatoes, sprouts (which I still don't like), stuffing, gravy, cranberry etc.:



Then it was apple crumble pie for desert, which was really good. The meal came with a free glass of wine (but then, the whole meal was 228 kuai, so I expected something really). I phoned my mum (and spoke to everyone, including my grandparents), then we went off to a pub called Windows Scoreboard, where we had a few drinks and some games, which were highly amusing:



After sitting there for a while, we went off to a club called Babyface, and danced the night away until 4am. The taxi home cost 50 kuai (Urumqi taxi drivers make around 500 a month, so that is phenomenally expensive). All in all, a good Christmas.

DAY 7: SHANGHAI

Boxing day, we decided to see some of the touristy things in Shanghai (of which there aren't many). So we jumped on the metro to the old town, which I like to call Tourist Trap Town. People by the BILLION came up to us with little leaflets overing us "shoes, bag, watches" in a variety of brands: "Adidas, Nike, qreyhqoeiguioj" (I never did work out what the last one was). We found an old teahouse, which is quite famous. It's in the middle of a little pondy thing, and has a zig-zag path to it for protection. Evil spirits can't turn corners, you see.



We then paid 60 kuai for a cup of what was essentially wet grass. I have never seen so many tea leaves in one cup of tea in my life, it was horrible. Nikki removed around half from hers, and it was still too much, but now she had a pocketful of soggy leaves. After forcing a couple of cups down (they add hot water as many times as you want for free), we toddled off to see the French Concession, but not before taking some photos of the pretty lit up buildings:



The French concession was cool, all big buildings and lights and western things. We walked around there for a while, and headed to the bund. The bund is essentially the bit along the river, with lots of big old colonial buildings, which you will undoubtedly have seen in pictures of Shanghai (although probably not realised that's what it was).

The sightseeing tunnel under the river was...an experience. It's worth doing once, but for the love of God don't get a return. It's awful. It's tacky, cheesy and naff. All at once. At the other side, we climbed the Jinmao tower (once the tallest building in Shanghai, possibly China, I forget now):



The view from the top was quite good, but the windows were dirty, so I couldn't really get good photos. Here's two anyway:


(I just like this one because it mentions both Urumqi and London)


At the top of the Jinmao Tower, they have what is officially the tallest post office in the world, 88 floors up. As I couldn't resist, I bought some postcards and posted them from the tallest postbox in the world:



Back on the floor, my legs were too shaky to do much, so we searched for a restaurant. Not fun. We went to one recommended in the Lonely Planet, and it was closed. So we went to another recommended restaurant, also closed. So then a third, which was also closed. Eventually, we found a stupidly expensive restaurant which was still open, after which we returned home and flopped into bed.

Day 133: More tales of the Christmas Trip

Episode 2

DAY 2: NANJING (continued, 'cause I missed a bit by mistake)

So after Hunan Lu, we wanted to get a taxi home so we could sleeeeeep. So we waited at the crossroads. We waited at corner number one for a short while. As this wasn't working for us, we moved to corner number two. Then three. Then four. Then back to one, then three, then four, before finally getting a taxi. The whole process took around an hour.

DAY 3: NANJING

This day, we decided to be good tourists, so we got up at stupid o'clock in the morning, and spent 27 kuai on a taxi 7,000,000 miles across town to get on a bus which left from really near our hostel. The bus took us to 紫金山 (Purple Mountain), where we saw many sites. First, we went to see 宋美龄(Song Meiling)'s villa, which was done in both Chinese and Western style. It was a nice house, but not much to say about it really. But here's a photo of me in the doorway anyway:



After that, we got on another bus to 钟山风景名胜区 (Zhongshan Mountain National Park, another name for Purple Mountain) which had many sites. First of these was the Linggu Scenic Area (灵谷景区), named for the Linggu Pagoda (灵谷塔). Below are some photos, and I'll just summarise what we did. We saw the 灵谷寺 (Linggu Temple), a really important temple. Going in the door, you saw a courtyard where people were burning yellow paper in two drums at either side of a giant incense holder. There were loads of people praying, and it felt kind of wrong to be intruding, but people didn't seem to mind. Still, we didn't hang around long. The 灵谷塔 was terrifying, 9 floors (which doesn't sound much, but when you think about the high ceilings and the fact that there's basically nothing under you), but I climbed it anyway. But the weather wasn't great, so the photos aren't great.



After we finished there, we tried to get one on of those little tourist bus things made to look like trains to Sun Yat-Sen(孙中山)'s mausoleum (for the record, his name in Chinese is not Sun Yat-Sen, it's Sun ZhongShan). But we got on the wrong one, and went to the Ming Tombs instead. Which was okay, because we wanted to go there anyway. So we walked along the Sacred Path, which is in a curved line so as to avoid an old king's tomb (The emperor's advisors suggested destroying the tomb so that the Sacred Path could be in a straight line, but he didn't want to do that). We posed next to all of the animals as the animals, for example:



The animals they had were Elephants, Lions, Camels, Horses, Qilin (麒麟) (which is not a unicorn (which is the usual English translation), but rather a mixture of a lion, a tiger, an ox and a dragon, and it appears only in the reign of a benevolent and wise emperor, which is why only emperors have it in front of their tombs) and a Xiezhi (獬豸)(which is also a type of Chinese unicorn, which had a horn which it used to gore the guilty but it would never touch the innocent, so the Xiezhi appeared in courtrooms).

Then we saw the tomb itself, which wasn't particularly interesting, as it's just a big rectangular brick building in front of the hill, and his actual tomb is somewhere inside the hill. But out of respect, people don't look for it.

Then after a sit down (we were getting tired by this point) and some Starbucks chocolate covered coffee beans, we went to the mausoleum of 孙中山. They say communism never really reached Nanjing, and the way they are about the people from the Republic of China (1911-1949) makes that clear. His mausoleum is huge, they still have Song Meiling's house the way it was when she lived there etc., despite them being not too popular in China (as they were capitalists after all). The mausoleum is HUGE, and quite impressive, but 392 steps when you're already tired is not much fun. Still, we saw it, and it was good. We then got the bus back into town, and went to get some coffee. Not done being western, we went to Haagen-Dazs, which was half awesome, half not. I had Chocolate Cookie Dough ice cream, which was amazing, and a "Chocolate Stir," which was supposed to be rich hot chocolate served with a dark chocolate spoon. What I got was watery horribly hot chocolate with a sickly milk chocolate spoon. Unimpressed.

DAY 4: NANJING -> SUZHOU

Sunday, our last day in Nanjing, we got up kind of early, and checked out. We visited the Nanjing Massacre Museum, which was really quite grim. We went in, and a man came up to me, and gestured writing on his hand. I had no idea what he meant. He refused to speak though, as a lot of people did in South East China (they probably assume we're just like all the other white tourists who don't speak Chinese, which is fair enough, but still frustrating). Turned out, he wanted us to write our nationality and how many were in our party. Anyway, we then went on and saw the mass grave (which had around 10,000 bodies in it), then an exhibition which had loads of artefacts and stories from people who survived it, which were really horrible. The ways the Japanese killed people, the raping and burning...they were generally really horrible, and refused to admit it. They set up Comfort Centres, which were basically little buildings with Chinese women whom the Japanese could go and rape at will. The exhibition was slightly ruined by the schoolchildren running around screaming and laughing, and apparently finding the whole thing quite amusing. Although I do think they were two young to appreciate what it was all about.

After that, we got some street food (a big pancakey type thing with egg and mixed green bits with a spicey sauce, very nummy):



Then it was off to the train station to head to Suzhou. When we got to Suzhou, we went straight to the taxi rank where the guy immediately ran the meter (nice change) and took us to where we were going. Where they told us they weren't actually open for business, despite taking bookings online (I hadn't made one, I just looked and saw that they were). They sent us to another one, where they did have a room. But the walk was pretty:



We walked, got some street food (I got what in the UK would be called Chow Mein (炒面 - chao mian), and Nikki got some fried potato thing), and went to bed. And this concludes the second part of our trip to the South East.

Day 132: Christmas Trip!

This Christmas Trip will be broken into several parts, as there's a lot to say, and I can't be bothered writing it all out now.

So, without further ado...

DAY 1: URUMQI -> NANJING(ish)

At 4am Xinjiang time (GMT+6), my alarm went off, and I nearly cried. I hit snooze, then got up at 4:10am. I packed quickly (I'm getting really good at packing light, it was quite easy), then we toddled off to get a taxi to the airport. After checking in, we looked at the sign and discovered that our plane has a stop at Yinchuan. At this point, I didn't think it should count as going to Ningxia (The Autonomous Region of which Yinchuan is the capital). So we landed at Yinchuan, and we got off the plane to stretch our legs for a bit. After a wait of 45 minutes or so, I noticed a sign saying that due to weather conditions, our plane would be delayed, and more information would follow. The weather in Yinchuan was fine, so I assumed it was weather in Nanjing - great. A while later, another flight was also delayed, but this one was to Tianjin (next to Beijing) so I figured it was the weather in central China. Then an announcement came: "Passengers for the flight to Nanjing: Your new departure time is 11:30pm." An angry mob formed at the gate, and the woman repeatedly said it was nor her fault, it was the weather, and if they wanted to complain, they should go to the information desk. So the angry mob moved there. There was much shouting, then it was revealed that the problem was not the weather, it was a fault with the plane. More shouting.




After a while, we were given "refreshments" (a choice of Coke, Sprite, Fanta or Water), then bussed to a hotel in Yinchuan. This definitely counted as Ningxia now. We got to the hotel, and Nikki slept for a bit, as she was somewhat fatigued. I wandered around for a bit, read my entire book that was to keep me entertained for the entire trip, had dinner, wandered around some more. Then at 9:15, I was told we would be picked up at 9:30, and to get my bags and wait in the lobby. I went upstairs, to rouse Nikki from her slumber, and was informed she had (fairly minor) food poisoning (again). Excellent start to our trip.

We got to the airport, and at 11:35pm we took off, flying to Nanjing. But only after we were given 20 kuai for the inconvenience :D We landed around 2am, then got on a shuttle bus to the city centre(ish, we think), and got a taxi to a hotel. Hotels in China have an annoying habit of being empty, but telling us they have no rooms. I think it's because filling out the paper work and making the report to the police (they track your every move here) is too troublesome, so it's easier to turn people away. And also, our taxi driver was really quite stupid. The conversation went something like this:
Stupid Taxi Driver: Where to?
Me: Zhongshan Bei Lu.
STD: Where on Zhongshan Bei Lu?
Me: Number 550.
STD: Where on Zhongshan Bei Lu?
Me: Number 550.
STD: What place on Zhongshan Bei Lu?
Me: It's a hotel.
STD: Which hotel?
Me: Jinjiang something
STD: Call and find out.
Me: It's number 550, go there.
Waiting at a green traffic light for me to phone, until a car came)
STD: Is it Jinjiang Inn?
Me: Yes!
STD: Okay.
Two minutes later...
STD: Is it the Jinjiang Inn?
Me: Yes.
STD: Where on Zhongshan Bei Lu?
Me: Jinjiang Inn, number 550

So we walked down Zhongshan Bei Lu, and stumbled upon a little hotel, where they were willing to take us (although she was adamant we were allowed to get a Chinese ID card, despite not being citizens). The bed was essentially a board with sheets, but it was cheap, and it was 4am, so we didn't care.



DAY 2 - NANJING

At 11am, we got up, showered, dressed, booked another night in the hotel, then headed off for a day of exploration. I thought the Blossom Rain Platform (or something like that, not sure how to translate it into English) was near our hotel, but it turned out to just be a park. So we wandered through the park for a bit, then down a street where we felt famous. One boy saw us and did the stereotypical Chinese "oooooooo" when he saw us. One girl literally jumped when she saw us, and even a woman in her 30s tried her best English 'hello' on us. It was brilliant.

We then decided to jump on a bus, and went to the end of the line. We switched to another bus because a brown tourist sign was pointing in the direction that the bus was going, but it turned out to go nowhere near it. We realised we were going nowhere near anything, so we got off and went to a Wang Bar (from the chinese 网吧 (wang ba), which is basically a giant room with lots of computers, kind of like an internet cafe, but full of Chinese students playing games online), and researched places to go in Nanjing. Turns out, there's a LOT to do. So we headed back for the city centre to go to the Confucious Temple. The bus only went as far as a metro, so we hopped on that and got off a little along, where lots of taxi drivers wanted to take us to the airport. We realised we couldn't get to the Confucious Temple from where we were, so we got on the metro again to the very centre of the city. The metro was confusing: our tickets were small blue plastic tokens, and it took watching a couple of people go through to work out that it was a swipe thing.

Anyway, we got off the metro in the city centre, and then were too tired and it was so late that we didn't care, so we were very bad tourists.



It was brilliant. But then we became good tourists again! We had heard that Hunan Lu was good to see at night, as it used to have a night market (which was closed down), but it's meant to be nice at night, so we went.



This concludes the first two days of my time in the east of China.