World Trip Update #4 – China

Mon, 20 Mar 2006

Nihau from China again,

Since last email, we did the Terracotta Warriors which was great, and then caught a 17 hour train to Chengdu. Again we had the dreaded top bunks, but  this time I knew not to put my feet in the arch position, and so didn’t get  attacked by any crazies. We only spent the day in Chengdu, and went to the Panda Research Centre. Both Phil & I got to hold and feed a Red Panda, which was very cute. I also got to hold a 6 month old baby Panda, which was extremely adorable. He was gnawing on my finger the whole time and was so soft and like a big teddy bear. Only one of us did it, as it cost us more for me to do it than 2 weeks accommodation for both of us cost!!!!!!!!!!!

Caught another overnight train for 12 hours to a place we had no idea what it was called, but was the closest train station to Lijiang where we were heading next. Then had to get 2 buses to Lijiang which took another 11 hours (taking in a 2 hour wait between). The bus ride was the worst hell yet. It was just a dodgy minibus with about 30 people in it, mostly smelly men, and although there are no smoking signs all over, everyone smoked the whole way, and I couldn’t breathe. We were the last on the bus too, so had to sit apart and neither of us near a window to try to breathe out of, so just had to suffer. I tried many times in vain to tell them to stop or smoke out the window, but it was no good. After we made a toilet stop at the filthiest pit yet, I was just about ready to throw China in, and get the hell out of here. When we got to Lijiang though, I changed my mind, as it has an Old Town which is really beautiful – cobbled streets, lots of hanging willows, colourful flowers, stone bridges, and really old style Chinese architecture, all in front of a snowy mountain backdrop.

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Update from China #1

Sat, 11 Mar 2006

Nihau,

Well, since my last email we have since got into China, and have realised just how easy Japan was, even though at the time we thought it was pretty difficult. No-one in China speaks English and it is almost impossible to get anyone to help you at all. Most people are just rude and pushy. The only really good things about China is how exceptionally cheap it is. We had dinner tonight for the equivalent of about AU$1 total for the 2 of us.

We didn’t know what it was, but felt ready to break out from our supermarket bought cheap food staples we’ve been having a lot of and just eat with the locals. We found this little place in a back street where a lot of locals were eating (and of course no-one spoke English), and decided to just go in and point at other people’s meals and see what we got. As it worked out, it wasn’t too bad, so let’s hope we don’t end up sick from it.

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