Yangshuo, that weird and wonderful backpackers' enclave, was beginning to hang heavy on us after a few days, so we got out. Far to the north of Yangshuo, over 4 hours by bus, are 66 square kilometres of amazing rice terraces in an area populated by the Zhuang and Yao minority groups, who have unique clothes and customs and language.
We were picked up at 7.30am by the tour guide (it was going to take a full day rather than four hours to get there on our own steam so we capitulated and booked a tour). The bus was almost full of westerners - Australians, English and Dutch it seemed - and we were on our way fairly quickly. North past Guilin and into the mountains we went, leaving the weird karst hills of the lowlands behind.
The trip there was slow and arduous as we were driving up into very high mountains and the road was less than ideal in places. For the first three hours or so we were on decent highway but we were still going really slowly due to the steep gradient. Then we turned at a hairpin bend, and the guide told us it would take one and a half hours to travel the final 17km as the road was so tough. She wasn't wrong.
We followed a river valley, the road clinging to the valley walls sometimes hundreds of feet above the almost-dry river bed. Narrow wooden houses on spindly stilts lined the roads on the valley side, shored up sometimes by a few huge struts. On the other side of the road - unhelpfully - huge amounts of timber was piled up, reducing the width of the road in places by a third. But it was still a half-decent road with a tarmac coating.
Then at a river crossing, the tarmac road continued left across the bridge and our bus continued straight along onto what I had thought was a building site. This was the state of the road for the rest of the journey - dirt track would be a generous term. In England we would not attempt this road without a state-of-the-art 4x4 genuine off-road vehicle.
The timber was still piled up and this time there was nothing between us and the river valley but fresh air. No barrier, no struts, no bollards, nothing. Landslides, we had read, were frequent in these parts, and the roadway was cluttered with enormous boulders, some of which had clearly only recently smashed down from above. Above us workers continued to cut timber in the heavy forest. At one point Orlando flinched visibly - later he told me that some workers above us had lost control of an enormous bamboo trunk and it was coming towards us end-first. They rescued it at the very last moment before it snooker-cued us off the road and into the valley below.
The steep hills were beginning to show signs of terracing, although much of the land was covered with dense forest. Around the towns small amounts of land were terraced and as we continued, greater and greater areas in the hills had been cut into to make arable land.
Over an hour along this dirt-track, and many numb rear-ends later, we arrived at a ticket office and a car park in the middle of nowhere. A gaggle of local Yao women were waiting for us to sell their handicrafts. These women looked very different from the Han people who make up more than 92% of the Chinese population. Over 2 million Yao people of various sub-groups live in the southern and south-western provinces of China.
The women were mostly dressed in their traditional clothes of highly-coloured embroidered blue and bright pink and yellow and black fabric: plain (some western) tops were worn under collarless hip-length jackets which wrapped over in front like a kimono, belted at the waist with a long embroidered fabric belt which wrapped twice around the waist before tying at the back. Skirts were knee-length and again embroidered, many narrowly pleated, and most wore a knee-length black apron in the front. Jewellery was ornate silver-plate including heavy hoops in the ears which had elongated many of the women's earlobes (apparently long hair and long lobes equal a long life). Some women wore cloth wrapping around their calves like knee-length socks, black with a white tie at the top. All wore standard army-issue green plimsolls on the feet. But most striking was their heads.
The Yao women are famous for their incredibly long hair, which they wear wrapped in ponytails around their head and covered with a kerchief-like black cap. Most women's hair will get close to reaching the ground when unwrapped. Along with their own hair, young women will also have one or two long tails of hair which belonged to their mother, grandmother or great-grandmother. They add this to their own hair to make the ponytail mane even longer. They wrap it a couple of times around their hair like a crown and tie it in a loop at the front.
We were attacked by these friendly but enthusiastic women even before we had disembarked. They chose their prey as we got off, attaching themselves to us - literally - by linking hands and arms with us and starting the most aggressive sales pitch we have encountered so far in China. However, they were really good-natured (many cheeky!) women who were clearly having a laugh as well as trying to do business. They hawked their jewellery, embroidered bags and aprons and blankets, and the inevitable postcards, as we walked along a stony path towards the village that was to be our overnight stay.
Nestled in the middle of surgically-cut terraced hills was the small picturesque village of Dazai, and its beautiful wooden stilt houses. A wooden school for the children was in the middle with a basketball court in the centre. One or two houses also had small shops. We walked across the central open space and started to climb steep stone steps into the dense houses above.
All the time, these wiry women, young and old, tried to get us to allow them to carry our backpacks for us, in the sturdy wicker baskets they carried on their backs. We kept going doggedly, almost missing the beautiful houses and increasingly amazing views around us as we tried not to lose our step.
Twenty or so perspiring minutes later we were at the uppermost reaches of the village, and stopped finally at the Countryside Cafe, the very highest building in this part of the village. We stopped to admire the spectacular view laid out beneath us and the chiselled terraces stretching as far as the eye could see. These terraces are called the Dragon's Backbone terraces, and it is said that the small hills look like snails and the larger ones like waterfalls. It is autumn here (despite the high temperatures) so no rice was growing and most of the terraces were dry, but the sheer scale of the area is enough to make you stare.
We had lunch surrounded by the seller women and then headed off into the hills guided by a handful of the local women to find one of the best viewpoints. We climbed and climbed up these steep stone steps, thankful that we had left our baggage in our room for the night back at the cafe. In the autumn sunshine we sweated and panted our way up and up, past another village where older women were sitting on their balconies in these big wooden houses weaving fabric on foot-powered old looms.
Up and up still, and the views got more and more panoramic and amazing. Everywhere we looked, hill after hill into the distance, was carved out into razor-sharp terraces. Not an inch of land was wasted. We stopped at a make-shift halting point at which - surprise surprise - women were waiting to sell us their wares along with cold drinks. My camera was hardly switched off at all as I clicked away at every new view.
On and on for about an hour, and we finally came to "viewpoint number 3" where still more women, handicrafts and cold drinks awaited. Some of the women offered to take down their famous long hair for a photo, for 5 or 10 yuan, but I declined - it seemed nothing short of prostitution to me (the picture above I took from Google till I can upload more of my own).
We sat and found our breath and marvelled at the panoramic views all around us before setting off on a different, mercifully downhill, path back to Dazai with yet more lovely views.
Those of us who were staying the night parted company from the others on the valley floor as we returned to the village, and returned to the cafe where were sat sipping Sunkist Orange (all those delicious e-numbers!) and eating supper in the yard overlooking the village and valley below, while the sun slowly set and the lights winked on in each homestead in the hills around us.
We slept soundly in our wooden room on stilts (despite no insulation or floor covering so every whisper and footfall was transmitted throughout the house) and woke again to breakfast outdoors before a gentle wander along another pathway and across a small "wind and rain bridge" (think Bridges of Madison County) to the next village of Tiantou.
It was so peaceful strolling by ourselves along these stone pathways through terraces that were cut into the hills more than 700 years ago. We were hundreds of miles - and years - away from the circus of Yangshuo, and it was one of the highlights of the trip for me. As we walked, local people went about their business, tending the fields or carrying goods up and down from the villages in woven baskets carried on bamboo yokes across their shoulders.
In Tiantou itself one or two small guesthouses had covered sedan chairs outside, the kind which two people would carry up and down the pathways with lazy westerners or prosperous Chinese businessmen in, which they must use in the high season to entice the more weary travellers beyond our village of Dazai and up to their businesses.
A wonderful couple of days, and certainly a trip highlight as I said. Back to the "big smoke" of Guilin and on to Shanghai in a day or so for us, on the final few days of this odyssey.
Showing posts with label china ramblings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label china ramblings. Show all posts
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Monday, November 07, 2005
The China Logs: Yangshuo 2
Yangshuo is not the type of place that grows on you. With two people who don't drink beer at any price (and it is cheaper than tea or water here) we are finding the time a bit heavy on our hands some days, but we are trying to chill out on the balcony and appreciate the inactivity and continuity for a change.
We spent two lovely days out on rented mountain bikes in the countryside around Yangshuo, which is spectacularly lovely especially in the sunshine and unusually high temperatures we've been having. It is easy enough to find your way around with a local map, and even if you get lost you soon find a familiar landmark again.
The local people seem to be used to Westerners who have read Lonely Planet out with the cameras and the bikes trying to find abit of genuine China behind the movie set that is West Street.Water stalls are propped up at every dirt track corner and the prices are not exorbitant. I have been tempted on a number of occasions now to buy one of those pointy woven hats people use when working in the fields but that, I suppose, would be the ultimate in kitsch.
Orlando took the opportunity to have a Chinese lesson yesterday which he really enjoyed, and has made him even more confident. The test will come, I know, once we have left this enclave and can't rely on English menus for everything.
Meanwhile I decided to have a couple of calligraphy classes, and spent a really enjoyable few hours sitting like a schoolgirl at a table in Lisa's cafe being taught gently but firmly by Li Shao Ren, a retired gentleman with a greying buzz-cut and a winning smile who taught locally for 32 years. He has little English but enough to correct my faltering hand: "Strong good. No strong, no good. This (pointing to a feeble attempt at a "han" or "la" stroke) NO good. Again!".
I sat with my tongue sticking out, concentrating on copying my characters onto the squared tracing paper with some sort of confidence. People stood looking over my shoulder at my faltering strokes and laughed with the teacher (in good humour I think) at my enthusiasm and complete lack of ability. I felt as hopeless and as hopeful as a three-year-old.
It is amazing how your mind clears of everything but the paper and the ink and the brush and your posture and trying to get some sort of character into your brushstrokes. I did succeed a number of times in doing something half-decent, and was rewarded with a huge grin, a thumbs-up, a little "correct" mark and an enthusiastic "VERY GOOD!" from Li Shao Ren. So there is hope for me yet!
I also took the opportunity to get some acupuncture for my backwhich was preceded by a strong back massage (I had the bruises from that for two days). Not sure if it did any good but it was worth a try. I went back today for a reflexology session as there is nothing so good as somebody massaging your feet for an hour. I sat first with my trouser bottoms rolled up on a tiny chair with my feet in a big bamboo bucket half-full of warm water in which some herbs had been mixed (or, as we like to call it here, TEA). No matter what one is doing, one always feels slightly ridiculous inr olled-up trousers. It was a lovely hour spent being pummelled and my feet look great although nobody will ever know with these boots on.
Tomorrow we are off to the mountains again, to stay in a farmer's house and see some wonderful rice terraces. This is the last weekof our stay in China, so we will be squeezing every last drop from the time left before we depart for Aus in a week.
We spent two lovely days out on rented mountain bikes in the countryside around Yangshuo, which is spectacularly lovely especially in the sunshine and unusually high temperatures we've been having. It is easy enough to find your way around with a local map, and even if you get lost you soon find a familiar landmark again.
The local people seem to be used to Westerners who have read Lonely Planet out with the cameras and the bikes trying to find abit of genuine China behind the movie set that is West Street.Water stalls are propped up at every dirt track corner and the prices are not exorbitant. I have been tempted on a number of occasions now to buy one of those pointy woven hats people use when working in the fields but that, I suppose, would be the ultimate in kitsch.
Orlando took the opportunity to have a Chinese lesson yesterday which he really enjoyed, and has made him even more confident. The test will come, I know, once we have left this enclave and can't rely on English menus for everything.
Meanwhile I decided to have a couple of calligraphy classes, and spent a really enjoyable few hours sitting like a schoolgirl at a table in Lisa's cafe being taught gently but firmly by Li Shao Ren, a retired gentleman with a greying buzz-cut and a winning smile who taught locally for 32 years. He has little English but enough to correct my faltering hand: "Strong good. No strong, no good. This (pointing to a feeble attempt at a "han" or "la" stroke) NO good. Again!".
I sat with my tongue sticking out, concentrating on copying my characters onto the squared tracing paper with some sort of confidence. People stood looking over my shoulder at my faltering strokes and laughed with the teacher (in good humour I think) at my enthusiasm and complete lack of ability. I felt as hopeless and as hopeful as a three-year-old.
It is amazing how your mind clears of everything but the paper and the ink and the brush and your posture and trying to get some sort of character into your brushstrokes. I did succeed a number of times in doing something half-decent, and was rewarded with a huge grin, a thumbs-up, a little "correct" mark and an enthusiastic "VERY GOOD!" from Li Shao Ren. So there is hope for me yet!
I also took the opportunity to get some acupuncture for my backwhich was preceded by a strong back massage (I had the bruises from that for two days). Not sure if it did any good but it was worth a try. I went back today for a reflexology session as there is nothing so good as somebody massaging your feet for an hour. I sat first with my trouser bottoms rolled up on a tiny chair with my feet in a big bamboo bucket half-full of warm water in which some herbs had been mixed (or, as we like to call it here, TEA). No matter what one is doing, one always feels slightly ridiculous inr olled-up trousers. It was a lovely hour spent being pummelled and my feet look great although nobody will ever know with these boots on.
Tomorrow we are off to the mountains again, to stay in a farmer's house and see some wonderful rice terraces. This is the last weekof our stay in China, so we will be squeezing every last drop from the time left before we depart for Aus in a week.
Friday, November 04, 2005
The China Logs: Yangshuo 1
Whilst Yangshuo is certainly a backpackers' haunt, it seems to have become more (or less?) than that too over the years.
There appears to be four different types of visitor to Yangshuo:
There appears to be four different types of visitor to Yangshuo:
- Independent travellers like me and Orlando, looking for a bit of R&R and a few days off the road - the original backpackers;
- Young tour groups passing through with their "fun" tour guides - often their first stop in China outside Hong Kong - lots of drinking and activities like rock-climbing, cycling etc.;
- Well-heeled over-50s tour groups in expensive rambling gear roughing it in "the real China" for a few nights, and enjoying the shopping;
- Legions of Chinese tourists who come for the justifiably famous spectacular scenery, and spend their evenings on Xi Jie (West Street or Foreigners Street) watching the westerners watching them.
In a way the town has become a caricature of a genuine backpackers' haunt, which are usually devoid of tourists and tour groups, and very inward-looking. Orlando may be right - this is a bit of a theme park, but it is not "Disney China": this is Disney Lonely Planet Town.
For myself, I can happily disregard what I don't need here and focus on the nice things like places to sit and watch the world go by with a coffee; shopping for cheap trinkets; maybe a cocktail or two; and yes, banana pancakes for breakfast.
Places like this can be a bit of a double-edged sword too. Many of the West
erners here have come up from the warm south and have outfits to suit. I am experiencing a bit of wardrobe envy - or, in these particular circumstances, backpack envy would be the correct term. Here I am with two nice serviceable and warm pairs of trousers; ditto sweaters; ditto footwear (one pair of lightweight waterproof hiking boots and an ancient pair of Dunlop trainers to hang out in). Two thermal vests, a rain jacket and a handful of plain tee-shirts complete my choices. Apart from by bindis and three (ONLY THREE!) pairs of earrings, I have no other adornment.
Then I walk down West Street and see spangly flip flops and knee length floaty dresses on women who have clearly deep-conditioned and coloured their hair far more recently than I. I see younger women doing cool artlessly-tied things with pretty scarves on their heads. I see casual but elegant black ankle-length trousers worn with colourful wrap-around tops.
Now, none of the above would have served me at all in freezing Datong or rainy Xi'an. My fleecy black tea-cosy hat may have made me look like a madwoman but by God I was glad of its thermal rain-proof properties up north. My cheap black corduroy trousers kept me nice and warm especially with an alluring old pair of opaque black tights underneath (thermal vest tucked in of course). I packed well. I hope these women checked the forecast for Beijing before they zipped up their backpacks.
But oh, how I long for something pretty to wear. A skirt, for god's sake. A pair of flip-flops or sandals to wear instead of clumpy boots. More jewellery. A nice colourful lungi or wrap. Nail polish on my toes. I can get fisherman's trousers here (naturally: this is a backpackers' place!). but they are only for the slim-thighed. People with normal (read: generous) proportions such as myself look fine standing up in these wrap-around trousers, but when we sit down they split each side to the hip, giving all and sundry an eyeful of beautifully dimpled pale-blue cellulite on each leg. Perhaps not then.
The evening sellers are setting up opposite our little hotel. I have been watching them avidly like it was Eastenders every night. I sit, literally, on the edge of my seat watching young women unfurl the long coloured scarves of the woman directly opposite our balcony. I agonise over which colour they should choose and silently urge them on to give the lady some early-evening business.
Tonight I may be her first customer. I have my eye on a lovely blue scarf that I saw yesterday. I won't wrap it casually around my head or use it as a sarong. Indeed I may not wear it at all. I may just sit here and dream of my lovely white linen trousers and dark red-and-gold jewelled kaftan and spangly sandals waiting for me in Melbourne, stroke my new purchase lovingly, and chant gently to myself: "ten more days... ten more days..."
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
The China Logs: Guilin to Yangshuo
We have finally arrived in Yangshuo, a famous backpackers' haunt in the south of China in Guanxi province. This will be our final stop on our odyssey before heading back to Shanghai and onwards to Aus.
Yangshuo is quite westernised in parts, and is actually advertised on Chinese TV as a place where westerners and Chinese people hang out in western-style cafes. The main drag is actually called West Street (although that is originally because it is on the west shoreof the river that runs through the town).
The landscape around this area is really unusual; karst hills rise out of the land like alien sculptures. We started out in this area in the small but pretty city of Guilin, which has a real holiday feel to it. At last the weather was a bit finer and I was able to discard the thermal vests I have been wearing constantly!
We spent a few days in Guilin seeing the local sights (many of which are these hills) - ElephantTrunk Hill looks like an elephant dipping its trunk into the river, and Camel Hill looks like, well, a camel. It sounds less attractive than it is in reality I promise you!
In the evenings the river tributaries and city lakes are all lit up, and we spent a pleasant few hours strolling along the banks and across the bridges (allvery Venice-like in places) watching Chinese Opera being performed on a lake island or enjoying the floodlit dancing waters of the lakefountains set to music. On another lake there are twin pagodas, one silver and one gold, sitting on stone lotus flowers beside each other. They are floodlit at night and look beautiful.
We decided on a river boat trip to Yangshuo, as this is the way to travel around here, and anyway it was one of the few modes of travel we hadn't experienced in China. We chose the Chinese tour(Y190 each - about 15 pounds) instead of the English tour (Y500!) as the only difference was that the tour guide spoke English, and all we wanted to do was see the scenery in any case.
As the river level is really low after a dry summer, we were ferried by bus toanother embarkation point downstream where dozens of big flat-bottomed river cruisers were lined up to receive the tourists. Along the river bank local people stood selling fruit and trinkets until the boats departed.
It took about half an hour to get out of the little wharf village (and this is low season!) but when we got underway the scenery was really breathtaking. We slowly wended our way along between the karst hills in the sunshine, surrounded by well-heeled young students from the Beijing no. 55 High School all dressed up in head-to-toe designer gear (not fakes) and dripping in electronics like iPods and digital cameras.
I took dozens of photos of the hills and the people working the river, either selling fruit or gifts from the bamboo rafts they punted alongside the tourist boats on, or fishing or doing their laundry.
We were served lunch - a fairly basic meal of rice, stewed bamboo shoots and some pretty salty tofu, which one could augment by ordering other more expensive dishes, mostly river fish of one type or another.
After about three hours we arrived in the sleepy village of Xingping, where we disembarked amongst an army of sellers and taxi drivers. We managed to find the local bus (Y5.5 toYangshuo for one hour through the countryside) and sat wedged into our narrow seats, backpacks and all, for the ride. The female bus conductor crammed as many people as possible in this bus (up to her legal limit - we were stopped at one point by the police doing as afety check) and she even had little footstools for people to sit on in the standing room. I sat with a local woman beside me on a low stool, a small child harnessed to her back, whilst a long-legged young man sat with his legs folded up under his chin in front of her.
We drove through beautiful countryside, small haystacks punctuating the low fields as small home-made beehives clustered in otheryards. The hillsides around us jutted up into the (at last!) flawlessly blue sky and my all-black travelling outfit seemed far too hot for once.
In time we arrived in Yangshuo and were assaultedfrom all sides by women with pictures of their hotel rooms - one lady had pics of a little place called Fawlty Towers which actually looked lovely and had been recommended to us by an Israeli couple we had chatted to before. We headed for our hotel, the Morning Sun Hotel, which was located off the main drag and would hopefully be a bit quieter than the rest of the town. It is a lovely place, with a little courtyard in the middle, shiny marble in the halls and dark wood polished floors in the rooms.
Our room actually has a balcony overlooking a pedestrianised street below, where the daytime sellers (key-cutting, clocks, beltsetc.) make way for the more touristy sellers at night time (bags, scarves, jewellery). It is a bit of luxury for a change (although in low season right now the prices are great) as we intend to stay here almost a week.
I think Orlando might be a bit unimpressed as this is most certainly not the "real China". Instead, the main Street, Xi Jie(West Street) is lined on both sides with cafes selling Western food (real coffee! French toast! Banana pancakes! Hamburgers!Pizza!) as well as Chinese food (although they are really surprised when you order Chinese). Shops sell every type of trinket and item of clothing. Huge fans are a fashion here (the type which look like a handheld fan but are actually about 6 feet across for hanging on the wall).
There are rock-climbing cafes (Karst Cafe and Spiderman’s!) for the more adventurous, and bike hire everywhere forless than a pound a day. Other places I have been promised offer acupuncture and massage (I fancy a bit of foot massage I think) as well as calligraphy classes or Chinese lessons. I think I will like it here although I suspect Orlando will have to take off on a mountain bike once or twice to get out of here. Never mind. I can shop!!!
Yangshuo is quite westernised in parts, and is actually advertised on Chinese TV as a place where westerners and Chinese people hang out in western-style cafes. The main drag is actually called West Street (although that is originally because it is on the west shoreof the river that runs through the town).
The landscape around this area is really unusual; karst hills rise out of the land like alien sculptures. We started out in this area in the small but pretty city of Guilin, which has a real holiday feel to it. At last the weather was a bit finer and I was able to discard the thermal vests I have been wearing constantly!
We spent a few days in Guilin seeing the local sights (many of which are these hills) - ElephantTrunk Hill looks like an elephant dipping its trunk into the river, and Camel Hill looks like, well, a camel. It sounds less attractive than it is in reality I promise you!
In the evenings the river tributaries and city lakes are all lit up, and we spent a pleasant few hours strolling along the banks and across the bridges (allvery Venice-like in places) watching Chinese Opera being performed on a lake island or enjoying the floodlit dancing waters of the lakefountains set to music. On another lake there are twin pagodas, one silver and one gold, sitting on stone lotus flowers beside each other. They are floodlit at night and look beautiful.
We decided on a river boat trip to Yangshuo, as this is the way to travel around here, and anyway it was one of the few modes of travel we hadn't experienced in China. We chose the Chinese tour(Y190 each - about 15 pounds) instead of the English tour (Y500!) as the only difference was that the tour guide spoke English, and all we wanted to do was see the scenery in any case.
As the river level is really low after a dry summer, we were ferried by bus toanother embarkation point downstream where dozens of big flat-bottomed river cruisers were lined up to receive the tourists. Along the river bank local people stood selling fruit and trinkets until the boats departed.
It took about half an hour to get out of the little wharf village (and this is low season!) but when we got underway the scenery was really breathtaking. We slowly wended our way along between the karst hills in the sunshine, surrounded by well-heeled young students from the Beijing no. 55 High School all dressed up in head-to-toe designer gear (not fakes) and dripping in electronics like iPods and digital cameras.
I took dozens of photos of the hills and the people working the river, either selling fruit or gifts from the bamboo rafts they punted alongside the tourist boats on, or fishing or doing their laundry.
We were served lunch - a fairly basic meal of rice, stewed bamboo shoots and some pretty salty tofu, which one could augment by ordering other more expensive dishes, mostly river fish of one type or another.
After about three hours we arrived in the sleepy village of Xingping, where we disembarked amongst an army of sellers and taxi drivers. We managed to find the local bus (Y5.5 toYangshuo for one hour through the countryside) and sat wedged into our narrow seats, backpacks and all, for the ride. The female bus conductor crammed as many people as possible in this bus (up to her legal limit - we were stopped at one point by the police doing as afety check) and she even had little footstools for people to sit on in the standing room. I sat with a local woman beside me on a low stool, a small child harnessed to her back, whilst a long-legged young man sat with his legs folded up under his chin in front of her.
We drove through beautiful countryside, small haystacks punctuating the low fields as small home-made beehives clustered in otheryards. The hillsides around us jutted up into the (at last!) flawlessly blue sky and my all-black travelling outfit seemed far too hot for once.
In time we arrived in Yangshuo and were assaultedfrom all sides by women with pictures of their hotel rooms - one lady had pics of a little place called Fawlty Towers which actually looked lovely and had been recommended to us by an Israeli couple we had chatted to before. We headed for our hotel, the Morning Sun Hotel, which was located off the main drag and would hopefully be a bit quieter than the rest of the town. It is a lovely place, with a little courtyard in the middle, shiny marble in the halls and dark wood polished floors in the rooms.
Our room actually has a balcony overlooking a pedestrianised street below, where the daytime sellers (key-cutting, clocks, beltsetc.) make way for the more touristy sellers at night time (bags, scarves, jewellery). It is a bit of luxury for a change (although in low season right now the prices are great) as we intend to stay here almost a week.
I think Orlando might be a bit unimpressed as this is most certainly not the "real China". Instead, the main Street, Xi Jie(West Street) is lined on both sides with cafes selling Western food (real coffee! French toast! Banana pancakes! Hamburgers!Pizza!) as well as Chinese food (although they are really surprised when you order Chinese). Shops sell every type of trinket and item of clothing. Huge fans are a fashion here (the type which look like a handheld fan but are actually about 6 feet across for hanging on the wall).
There are rock-climbing cafes (Karst Cafe and Spiderman’s!) for the more adventurous, and bike hire everywhere forless than a pound a day. Other places I have been promised offer acupuncture and massage (I fancy a bit of foot massage I think) as well as calligraphy classes or Chinese lessons. I think I will like it here although I suspect Orlando will have to take off on a mountain bike once or twice to get out of here. Never mind. I can shop!!!
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
The China Logs: Longmen Caves
I was woken by a gentle "Happy Birthday To You" being sung in my ear by Orlando. We were in a lovely little friendly hotel in a town called Luoyang, (well it has a population of more than 6 million but that feels small by Chinese standards), about 6 hours by fast train east of Xi'an.
After doing some chores like sussing out bus routes for the next day, and booking our train back to Xi'an for later in the week (Orlando really is coming along fabulously with his Chinese!) we hopped on the number 81 bus to the Longmen Caves, which we had been promised were similar to the Yungang caves we had seen earlier in our trip. One hour and Y1 each later we arrived at what was obviously a big tourist place - all car parking and auspicious-looking signage.
The Longmen Caves are a recognised UNESCO World Heritage Site. We ran the gauntlet of a long parade of tourist shops selling the usual stuff, and I stopped to use the loo. For the first time, I was confronted by a real Chinese public toilet: three toilets opposite three, but each separated from the next only by a low tiled wall about a metre high. Each cubicle was open at the front - no doors! Unperturbed (and in desperate need in any case) I got organised to do my business: there was nobody else there so it wasn't too bad.
As soon as I squatted (oh, yes, most toilets here are the ones in the floor over which you squat) another woman came in, but happily chose the stall alongside me. No problem still - there was a modicum of privacy afforded both of us by the dividing wall once we were both in position, so to speak. Then a third lady arrived, and chose the stall opposite me. She was a large enough lady, one of the sellers it seemed from the capacious apron she wore over her tracksuit bottoms. She squatted - or, rather, half-genuflected as best her bulk could allow - and I averted my eyes before the uncompromising view before me became too much.
In time I escaped my baptism of fire, none the worse for wear and with another Chinese first under my belt!
The Longmen Caves were a spectacle. The day was warm with hazy sun trying to break through the ubiquitous Chinese smog, and we spent almost five hours wandering slowly along the river bank from cave to niche. There are over 100,000 carvings here, of various Buddhas and their companions, but tragically Western explorers desecrated most statues in past years by removing them completely or simply by removing the Buddha's head, apparently by a swift upward machete blow.
Some key pieces are in the Metropolitan Museum or Art in New York, and others in the British Museum. Even all those years ago, I cannot imagine anyone coming across this place and not realising its religious, spiritual, and cultural significance. How arrogant we Westerners have been. Of course, the Cultural Revolution also took its toll: Chairman Mao's attack on the "four olds" (old customs, old culture, old thinking, old habits) from 1966 - 1970 resulted in much of China's heritage being destroyed, and the Longmen Caves suffered in this period too.
The caves got bigger and the statues more impressive, but nothing could have prepared us for the sight of the main cave (or niche) - the Fengxiang Si or Ancestor Worshipping Temple. Here, dozens of steep steps above the valley floor, stood a beautiful 17 metre high statue (thankfully almost intact) of the Buddha Losana surrounded by 2 disciples, 2 Bodhisattvas, 2 kings, and 2 protector warriors. The Buddha's face, allegedly modelled on the face of a Tang Dynasty Empress, was serene and benevolent; despite the crowds of tourists I could sense the peace surrounding this place.
We continued on, across the river to yet more carvings and caves, some being worked on by archaeologists and preservation experts. Our last stop was a beautiful temple high on the east river bank, where I threw money (a coin and a note) into a pond promising good health for floating money and longevity for sinking money.
As we enjoyed some birthday ice cream sitting on the temple wall, the sun sank slowly behind the caves on the west bank, and the incense hung in the still air while the monks chanted their meditations. What a lovely way to spend my birthday.
After doing some chores like sussing out bus routes for the next day, and booking our train back to Xi'an for later in the week (Orlando really is coming along fabulously with his Chinese!) we hopped on the number 81 bus to the Longmen Caves, which we had been promised were similar to the Yungang caves we had seen earlier in our trip. One hour and Y1 each later we arrived at what was obviously a big tourist place - all car parking and auspicious-looking signage.
The Longmen Caves are a recognised UNESCO World Heritage Site. We ran the gauntlet of a long parade of tourist shops selling the usual stuff, and I stopped to use the loo. For the first time, I was confronted by a real Chinese public toilet: three toilets opposite three, but each separated from the next only by a low tiled wall about a metre high. Each cubicle was open at the front - no doors! Unperturbed (and in desperate need in any case) I got organised to do my business: there was nobody else there so it wasn't too bad.
As soon as I squatted (oh, yes, most toilets here are the ones in the floor over which you squat) another woman came in, but happily chose the stall alongside me. No problem still - there was a modicum of privacy afforded both of us by the dividing wall once we were both in position, so to speak. Then a third lady arrived, and chose the stall opposite me. She was a large enough lady, one of the sellers it seemed from the capacious apron she wore over her tracksuit bottoms. She squatted - or, rather, half-genuflected as best her bulk could allow - and I averted my eyes before the uncompromising view before me became too much.
In time I escaped my baptism of fire, none the worse for wear and with another Chinese first under my belt!
The Longmen Caves were a spectacle. The day was warm with hazy sun trying to break through the ubiquitous Chinese smog, and we spent almost five hours wandering slowly along the river bank from cave to niche. There are over 100,000 carvings here, of various Buddhas and their companions, but tragically Western explorers desecrated most statues in past years by removing them completely or simply by removing the Buddha's head, apparently by a swift upward machete blow.
Some key pieces are in the Metropolitan Museum or Art in New York, and others in the British Museum. Even all those years ago, I cannot imagine anyone coming across this place and not realising its religious, spiritual, and cultural significance. How arrogant we Westerners have been. Of course, the Cultural Revolution also took its toll: Chairman Mao's attack on the "four olds" (old customs, old culture, old thinking, old habits) from 1966 - 1970 resulted in much of China's heritage being destroyed, and the Longmen Caves suffered in this period too.
The caves got bigger and the statues more impressive, but nothing could have prepared us for the sight of the main cave (or niche) - the Fengxiang Si or Ancestor Worshipping Temple. Here, dozens of steep steps above the valley floor, stood a beautiful 17 metre high statue (thankfully almost intact) of the Buddha Losana surrounded by 2 disciples, 2 Bodhisattvas, 2 kings, and 2 protector warriors. The Buddha's face, allegedly modelled on the face of a Tang Dynasty Empress, was serene and benevolent; despite the crowds of tourists I could sense the peace surrounding this place.
We continued on, across the river to yet more carvings and caves, some being worked on by archaeologists and preservation experts. Our last stop was a beautiful temple high on the east river bank, where I threw money (a coin and a note) into a pond promising good health for floating money and longevity for sinking money.
As we enjoyed some birthday ice cream sitting on the temple wall, the sun sank slowly behind the caves on the west bank, and the incense hung in the still air while the monks chanted their meditations. What a lovely way to spend my birthday.
Saturday, October 22, 2005
The China Logs: Things I Have Noticed About China Part 1
Chinese Hygiene
Chinese people are beautifully turned out, and very well presented, the vast majority of them. The hotels foyers are lovely. The malls are highly polished. There is precious little litter on the streets, and armies of street cleaners are in evidence everywhere you look. So how come they still hawk and spit wherever they please? Even indoors on carpets and where people are sitting or eating? In addition, how come you can walk through the poshest of hotels or restaurants, to find the stench of the toilet meeting you way before you see the sign? Why does the stench not get any better even when there is an attendance there whose job it is to clean the place? WHY???
Being Sick In China
The Chinese (Mandarin) for Aspirin is ASR-PEELING. I love it! How come despite a blocked nose impervious to all known medication, once you approach above Chinese toilet to use the facilities, one's nose miraculously unblocks perfectly for the precise time it takes you to use the facilities, so one can appreciate the atrocious smell better, and then blocks right back up once you have walked out?
Chinese Hairdressers
We noticed this more in Beijing, and Datong, but not so much further south. Nice hairdressers all set up to do business in the day, with women getting blow dries and people with curlers in and all that... then the sun goes down and the lights are dimmed. Sometimes even the light bulb is changed to a red or pink one. The hairdressers' clothing gets slinkier and sexier, and there seems to be very little hairdressing going on at all. Indeed, most of the clients are now men. Hmmm.
Chinese Pregnant Women
Pregnancy is a big thing over here, given that you are only supposed to have one child (unless you are a farmer and your first born is a daughter - you can try for a son then). Pregnant women's clothing is all cutesy and cuddly, dominated by the dungaree look (criminal in most other countries) and almost everything is appliquéd with teddy bear, balloons, storks, you get the picture. Fashion Police - quick!!
The One Child Policy
There are huge billboards everywhere advertising (or encouraging) China's one-child policy. Most of the pictures I have seen show a young good-looking couple with their beautiful daughter playing in a park or by a river. I guess this is to also encourage people not to discard their child if it is female, which happens with alarming regularity over here (death by neglect or the orphanage being the two main routes).
Chinese Traffic
Traffic lights are everywhere. Most of them have little green and red men for pedestrians too. Generally the little green man flashes like he is walking. In Xi'an some of them are animated so that he sprints alarmingly when time is running out, encouraging you to do the same. Traffic lights are purely decorative anyway. A red light for traffic doesn't apply if you are (a) a bicycle, (b) a motorbike or other motorised two-wheeler, (c) a truck or bus, (d) turning right (they drive on the right here), (e) turning left. I may have missed a few out. Generally, traffic lights are a suggestion only, and should not be taken too seriously. Orlando has taken (quite chivalrously I would say) to always standing on whichever side of me faces the oncoming traffic, so as to defend me against the onslaught.
Chinese people are beautifully turned out, and very well presented, the vast majority of them. The hotels foyers are lovely. The malls are highly polished. There is precious little litter on the streets, and armies of street cleaners are in evidence everywhere you look. So how come they still hawk and spit wherever they please? Even indoors on carpets and where people are sitting or eating? In addition, how come you can walk through the poshest of hotels or restaurants, to find the stench of the toilet meeting you way before you see the sign? Why does the stench not get any better even when there is an attendance there whose job it is to clean the place? WHY???
Being Sick In China
The Chinese (Mandarin) for Aspirin is ASR-PEELING. I love it! How come despite a blocked nose impervious to all known medication, once you approach above Chinese toilet to use the facilities, one's nose miraculously unblocks perfectly for the precise time it takes you to use the facilities, so one can appreciate the atrocious smell better, and then blocks right back up once you have walked out?
Chinese Hairdressers
We noticed this more in Beijing, and Datong, but not so much further south. Nice hairdressers all set up to do business in the day, with women getting blow dries and people with curlers in and all that... then the sun goes down and the lights are dimmed. Sometimes even the light bulb is changed to a red or pink one. The hairdressers' clothing gets slinkier and sexier, and there seems to be very little hairdressing going on at all. Indeed, most of the clients are now men. Hmmm.
Chinese Pregnant Women
Pregnancy is a big thing over here, given that you are only supposed to have one child (unless you are a farmer and your first born is a daughter - you can try for a son then). Pregnant women's clothing is all cutesy and cuddly, dominated by the dungaree look (criminal in most other countries) and almost everything is appliquéd with teddy bear, balloons, storks, you get the picture. Fashion Police - quick!!
The One Child Policy
There are huge billboards everywhere advertising (or encouraging) China's one-child policy. Most of the pictures I have seen show a young good-looking couple with their beautiful daughter playing in a park or by a river. I guess this is to also encourage people not to discard their child if it is female, which happens with alarming regularity over here (death by neglect or the orphanage being the two main routes).
Chinese Traffic
Traffic lights are everywhere. Most of them have little green and red men for pedestrians too. Generally the little green man flashes like he is walking. In Xi'an some of them are animated so that he sprints alarmingly when time is running out, encouraging you to do the same. Traffic lights are purely decorative anyway. A red light for traffic doesn't apply if you are (a) a bicycle, (b) a motorbike or other motorised two-wheeler, (c) a truck or bus, (d) turning right (they drive on the right here), (e) turning left. I may have missed a few out. Generally, traffic lights are a suggestion only, and should not be taken too seriously. Orlando has taken (quite chivalrously I would say) to always standing on whichever side of me faces the oncoming traffic, so as to defend me against the onslaught.
The China Logs: Xi'an
Xi'an was wet and miserable when we got here, but has cheered up since then. Nothing much to report except for the Terracotta Warriors which were predictably a highlight. It is one thing to read about them, and understand how many of them there are (4,000) and how old they are (more than 2,000 years) and that they all have different faces, and that some of the technology used to manufacture them and the other things buried with them have amazed 20th century scientists. But it is another thing entirely to find yourself in an aircraft-hangar-sized complex in the middle of the Chinese countryside and actually behold them with your own eyes.
They reckon it will take another 10 years to fully excavate and research the site, but what they have discovered already is amazing to see. The sellers in the market outside the gates are also amazing in their tenacity.
Upon leaving, we were met by an impenetrable line of them holding up small replica warriors, bits of jade, the usual Chinese tourist stuff, and yelling prices at us. The prices fell rapidly too - within less than one minute I had bargained with one woman for a box with four warriors and a horse in it (they are about 4 inches high, don't panic!) from her initial "One dollar! One dollar!" (Y8, or the price of our dinner some nights) to Y3 (25p). I reckon I could have got her down to Y2 but that would have been churlish.
They reckon it will take another 10 years to fully excavate and research the site, but what they have discovered already is amazing to see. The sellers in the market outside the gates are also amazing in their tenacity.
Upon leaving, we were met by an impenetrable line of them holding up small replica warriors, bits of jade, the usual Chinese tourist stuff, and yelling prices at us. The prices fell rapidly too - within less than one minute I had bargained with one woman for a box with four warriors and a horse in it (they are about 4 inches high, don't panic!) from her initial "One dollar! One dollar!" (Y8, or the price of our dinner some nights) to Y3 (25p). I reckon I could have got her down to Y2 but that would have been churlish.
The China Logs: Chinglish 2
More Chinglish For You Fans Out There
- Sign outside bar in Xi'an: "Sunny Half Past And Friend Changing Club" (any ideas, anyone? We have a few...)
- At Terracotta Warriors complex: "Fire Exting Atcher Box" (you can guess this one)
- Enormous billboard in Xi'an advertising something I didn't understand: "You can't along with eagle to fly, when you are as high as turkey together." (this is my favourite so far)
Thursday, October 20, 2005
The China Logs: Chengde
Well it's been all up and down since the Great Wall, and we have clocked up quite a few miles too.
I am writing from sunny Xi'an (not! It's been raining for 24 hours now) which is about 1,200km south-west of Beijing. I thought it might be a bit warmer here, and it's certainly not cold, but this incessant pouring rain is getting to me, especially since both of us have come down with inevitable colds.
One of the highlights of the trip so far was last Sunday, when we took a four-hour train journey north of Beijing to spend the night in the mountain resort of Chengde. We travelled in a hard-seat carriage, which certainly doesn't mean sitting on wooden benches - it is a reasonably comfortable carriage with about 150 people to the carriage, sitting 3 opposite 3 or 2 opposite 2 on nicely upholstered seats. Being a Sunday, most of the passengers seemed to be in high spirits, and it was a really enjoyable journey.
The train left promptly at 7.16am and after an hour or so we slowly left the built-up area of Beijing, and the high-rises melted away. The countryside began to take over as we climbed into the craggy mountains. The land looks fairly infertile but it can't be - every spare inch of ground has been cultivated in some way, right up to the train tracks. Mostly the corn crop was dominating, although the harvest was over and all that was left were stalks ready to be cut down to make fuel or to be burnt on the narrow terraces for the next crop. The harvested corn was everywhere, like I saw before, stacked on windowsills and roofs to dry. A good deal of cabbage was being grown on the cleared land, and in the foothills I saw orange, lemon and peach groves covering every possible corner.
The people working the land seemed to have a hard enough life. We are talking 19th century farming methods for the most part: I saw one small tractor in the whole journey. Mostly, the land was being cleared by hand with scythes, or weeded manually with long-handled hoes. Other harvested crops (wheat? rye?) were being threshed by hand by the women, or laid out on the roadways to get the traffic to do the heavy work first. I even saw a traditional stone mill for grinding flour - it looked fairly newly-hewn and was clearly in current use. Nonetheless, there are electricity lines going into most of the dwellings so it's a bit of a mismatch of technology I guess.
The sun shone as the train flew along through this scenery. I caught a rare glimpse of myself like a satellite camera zooming in on my position on the globe - I am so privileged to be able to travel so far in the world and to see these things for myself. There is a one in four billion chance that I was born to be who I am rather than the daughter of one of these subsistence farmers.
My thoughts wandered to my Dad, from whom I inherited my much of my adventurous and inquisitive traits. He was a great armchair traveller and I am sure would have been able to tell me a thing or two about my destinations and what I had seen, as well as being fascinated by the insights I gave him. I thought of all the things I had already seen in our travels that I would never be able to share with him, and how much I missed him still. Sitting there on the train as China passed my window and the sun shone on my face, I wept for all the new conversations I would never have with my wonderful dad.
In time we reached Chengde, and after a hairy hour or so looking for a bed for the night, we got our bearings and jumped on a local bus to take us to the biggest local attraction, a Buddhist monastery with an interesting statue (the book said). After 20 or so minutes crawling through the busy shopping streets of this little city (population approximately 1.4 million!) the shops thinned out into stalls and barrows selling fruit and other local produce. On the outskirts in the hills we could see the pagoda roofs of other local temples (there are eight in the general area) as well as some weird rock formations, one which looked like a club standing vertically (called Club Rock) and another which really looked like a toad (called, predicably, Toad Rock!).
We couldn't have missed our destination though. The bus driver gave us the nod as we reached what looked like a fairly big monastery complex surrounded by touristy stalls selling the usual tat (red Chinese hanging good-luck things, postcards, bits of jade on a string, chopsticks, Fifty Cent tee-shirts???? yes really). We bought our tickets and a young monk let us in through the space-age-looking entrance gates into the ancient-looking complex. We found ourselves in a courtyard surrounded by smaller buildings in the Chinese style, as well as one pagoda housing three large steles (tall stones with calligraphy on). Just behind this building was another larger temple in which we found three buddhas, one representing the past, one the present and one the future. The middle one (the present) was a bit bigger than the other two, and they were all really nice, but nothing hugely exciting.
I looked around a bit more trying to be impressed and then came back out. Hmmm. Wonder which one was the interesting statue?
At the back of this courtyard were huge steep steps up to another gathering of buildings so we climbed up. A much larger courtyard was surrounded by buildings which looked a bit more Tibetan/Buddhist to me. A big trough held central position in which many big incense torches were burning. Young monks sat and chatted in small groups, hugging their maroon robes around them and kicking at the stones with their trainers. They looked like any other group of youngsters except for the shaved heads and monks' habits. Closer to the main temple, a huge building at the back, was a group of much older men playing traditional Chinese instruments and chanting. Being late in the afternoon, there were few others around and I could really appreciate the tranquillity of the place.
We walked into the big temple, which was really high like a pagoda. On the right and left were huge painted statues of mythical warriors which are the protectors of the temple. I was fascinated by these and inspected them closely as they resembled a lot of what I had seen in India. Orlando's bemused face directed my attention to the centre of the temple.
There, behind the monk's prayer benches, above head height, I saw a pair of giant wooden bare feet peeking out from the carved wooden folds of a gown. I stopped in my tracks as I beheld what must have been the bottom quarter of an enormous statue. Even without being able to see the whole of the statue I was frozen to the spot by its presence. Awed, I edged forward and gazed ever upwards until I could see the whole 22m (about 70 feet) of this heart-stopping sight: the Buddhist Goddess of Infinite Mercies, Guanyin, with over 40 arms, carved entirely out of four types of wood, stood in majesty gazing at me from above.
(Strictly speaking, Guanyin is not a goddess (as Buddhists don't worship gods) but a Boddhisattva, which is a person who has reached nirvana but chooses to stay on earth as a guide for others.)
Her head was crowned with an ornate headdress, an enormous necklace of wooden beads hung around her neck and her arms were adorned with what looked like jewelled armbands (but everything was polished red-hued wood). Each of her hands had an eye in the palm; each hand held an implement or object: an urn, a flower, a bow (for throwing arrows), a sword, a goblet.
I was entranced: more, I was overawed, and fought the urge to fall to my knees in front of her. There is only one time in my life that the sight of something has reduced me to tears, and that was the very first time I laid eyes on the Taj Mahal; but my reaction to this magnificent sight was much more profound that a reaction to an object of beauty. I am not sure if thoughts of my father were still fresh in my mind, or if the goddess herself sensed my emotions and understood. I truly felt as if I was in the presence of a divine being. I had no words for Orlando (then or since); I simply stood and wept silently for the second time that day.
I am writing from sunny Xi'an (not! It's been raining for 24 hours now) which is about 1,200km south-west of Beijing. I thought it might be a bit warmer here, and it's certainly not cold, but this incessant pouring rain is getting to me, especially since both of us have come down with inevitable colds.
One of the highlights of the trip so far was last Sunday, when we took a four-hour train journey north of Beijing to spend the night in the mountain resort of Chengde. We travelled in a hard-seat carriage, which certainly doesn't mean sitting on wooden benches - it is a reasonably comfortable carriage with about 150 people to the carriage, sitting 3 opposite 3 or 2 opposite 2 on nicely upholstered seats. Being a Sunday, most of the passengers seemed to be in high spirits, and it was a really enjoyable journey.
The train left promptly at 7.16am and after an hour or so we slowly left the built-up area of Beijing, and the high-rises melted away. The countryside began to take over as we climbed into the craggy mountains. The land looks fairly infertile but it can't be - every spare inch of ground has been cultivated in some way, right up to the train tracks. Mostly the corn crop was dominating, although the harvest was over and all that was left were stalks ready to be cut down to make fuel or to be burnt on the narrow terraces for the next crop. The harvested corn was everywhere, like I saw before, stacked on windowsills and roofs to dry. A good deal of cabbage was being grown on the cleared land, and in the foothills I saw orange, lemon and peach groves covering every possible corner.
The people working the land seemed to have a hard enough life. We are talking 19th century farming methods for the most part: I saw one small tractor in the whole journey. Mostly, the land was being cleared by hand with scythes, or weeded manually with long-handled hoes. Other harvested crops (wheat? rye?) were being threshed by hand by the women, or laid out on the roadways to get the traffic to do the heavy work first. I even saw a traditional stone mill for grinding flour - it looked fairly newly-hewn and was clearly in current use. Nonetheless, there are electricity lines going into most of the dwellings so it's a bit of a mismatch of technology I guess.
The sun shone as the train flew along through this scenery. I caught a rare glimpse of myself like a satellite camera zooming in on my position on the globe - I am so privileged to be able to travel so far in the world and to see these things for myself. There is a one in four billion chance that I was born to be who I am rather than the daughter of one of these subsistence farmers.
My thoughts wandered to my Dad, from whom I inherited my much of my adventurous and inquisitive traits. He was a great armchair traveller and I am sure would have been able to tell me a thing or two about my destinations and what I had seen, as well as being fascinated by the insights I gave him. I thought of all the things I had already seen in our travels that I would never be able to share with him, and how much I missed him still. Sitting there on the train as China passed my window and the sun shone on my face, I wept for all the new conversations I would never have with my wonderful dad.
In time we reached Chengde, and after a hairy hour or so looking for a bed for the night, we got our bearings and jumped on a local bus to take us to the biggest local attraction, a Buddhist monastery with an interesting statue (the book said). After 20 or so minutes crawling through the busy shopping streets of this little city (population approximately 1.4 million!) the shops thinned out into stalls and barrows selling fruit and other local produce. On the outskirts in the hills we could see the pagoda roofs of other local temples (there are eight in the general area) as well as some weird rock formations, one which looked like a club standing vertically (called Club Rock) and another which really looked like a toad (called, predicably, Toad Rock!).
We couldn't have missed our destination though. The bus driver gave us the nod as we reached what looked like a fairly big monastery complex surrounded by touristy stalls selling the usual tat (red Chinese hanging good-luck things, postcards, bits of jade on a string, chopsticks, Fifty Cent tee-shirts???? yes really). We bought our tickets and a young monk let us in through the space-age-looking entrance gates into the ancient-looking complex. We found ourselves in a courtyard surrounded by smaller buildings in the Chinese style, as well as one pagoda housing three large steles (tall stones with calligraphy on). Just behind this building was another larger temple in which we found three buddhas, one representing the past, one the present and one the future. The middle one (the present) was a bit bigger than the other two, and they were all really nice, but nothing hugely exciting.
I looked around a bit more trying to be impressed and then came back out. Hmmm. Wonder which one was the interesting statue?
At the back of this courtyard were huge steep steps up to another gathering of buildings so we climbed up. A much larger courtyard was surrounded by buildings which looked a bit more Tibetan/Buddhist to me. A big trough held central position in which many big incense torches were burning. Young monks sat and chatted in small groups, hugging their maroon robes around them and kicking at the stones with their trainers. They looked like any other group of youngsters except for the shaved heads and monks' habits. Closer to the main temple, a huge building at the back, was a group of much older men playing traditional Chinese instruments and chanting. Being late in the afternoon, there were few others around and I could really appreciate the tranquillity of the place.
We walked into the big temple, which was really high like a pagoda. On the right and left were huge painted statues of mythical warriors which are the protectors of the temple. I was fascinated by these and inspected them closely as they resembled a lot of what I had seen in India. Orlando's bemused face directed my attention to the centre of the temple.
There, behind the monk's prayer benches, above head height, I saw a pair of giant wooden bare feet peeking out from the carved wooden folds of a gown. I stopped in my tracks as I beheld what must have been the bottom quarter of an enormous statue. Even without being able to see the whole of the statue I was frozen to the spot by its presence. Awed, I edged forward and gazed ever upwards until I could see the whole 22m (about 70 feet) of this heart-stopping sight: the Buddhist Goddess of Infinite Mercies, Guanyin, with over 40 arms, carved entirely out of four types of wood, stood in majesty gazing at me from above.
(Strictly speaking, Guanyin is not a goddess (as Buddhists don't worship gods) but a Boddhisattva, which is a person who has reached nirvana but chooses to stay on earth as a guide for others.)
Her head was crowned with an ornate headdress, an enormous necklace of wooden beads hung around her neck and her arms were adorned with what looked like jewelled armbands (but everything was polished red-hued wood). Each of her hands had an eye in the palm; each hand held an implement or object: an urn, a flower, a bow (for throwing arrows), a sword, a goblet.
I was entranced: more, I was overawed, and fought the urge to fall to my knees in front of her. There is only one time in my life that the sight of something has reduced me to tears, and that was the very first time I laid eyes on the Taj Mahal; but my reaction to this magnificent sight was much more profound that a reaction to an object of beauty. I am not sure if thoughts of my father were still fresh in my mind, or if the goddess herself sensed my emotions and understood. I truly felt as if I was in the presence of a divine being. I had no words for Orlando (then or since); I simply stood and wept silently for the second time that day.
Saturday, October 15, 2005
The China Logs: The Great Wall
We hiked the Great Wall a few days ago. The plan was to be dropped off about 11okm north-east of Beijing at the Jinshanling entranceto the Wall, and hike the 10km or so to the Simatai Great Wall portion. Sounds interesting: the Lonely Planet said it was not for the faint-hearted, but would take about 4 hours. I can do that, I said. Let's book it.
We were picked up with a few others from our hostel at 7am and went off in a small minibus. A few more pick-ups later we were on our way. It took about 2 hours to get out of the built-up area of Beijing itself (bear in mind that the metropolitan area of Beijing is about the size of Belgium!) and soon we saw familiar-looking mountains ahead. Just before noon we passed through the gates of the Jinshanling entrance and parked up. It was fairly chilly so I was glad of my rain jacket and sweater.
The entrance place was well organised with a ticket office (Y30 each to get in - about 2.50 sterling) and plenty of stalls selling drinks, food and "I climbed the Great Wall" sweatshirts. We walked along the nicely-landscaped pathway towards the wall (the signs and litter bins brought to mind a nice country park) and finally saw the way up to the Wall itself - a fairly steep set of stone steps.
My heart sank. I hadn't even seen the bloody wall and I was already out of breath and getting too hot. I lagged behind badly from the start. Orlando encouraged me to keep up and said I was not to be "the limping gazelle". That didn't help- all my life I have been the limping bloody gazelle, struggling up a hill whilst some bloke or group yomped happily ahead. Why do I continuously do this to myself???
We reached the wall in about 5 minutes, and I must say it was quite a thrill to set foot on this amazing structure. The wall stretched for miles as far as the eye could see in both directions, with a tower breaking the snakelike route every 100m or so. We stood and gazed and took photos and took in the moment. Then the hard work began. The wall looks like it undulates gently over the hills from tower to tower. It does nothing of the sort. It climbs steadily and relentlessly up and down some of the steepest inclines I have ever seen. The steps are uneneven and range from 4 inches high to about a foot high. It is hard going and unforgiving. I hated it from about 3 minutes in.
My daypack got heavier and heavier, and I ran through its contents in my head to see what could be jettisoned (where? There were no bins and I was hardly going to litter a World Heritage site). Water? First aid kit? Dried fruit for energy? Our last remaining Sainsburys Diet Red Bull-type drink? Lonely Bloody Planet?
Orlando didn't even seem to notice the inclines. I knew those muscular thighs of his were useful for something: now I knew.He gently and patiently waited for me every 10 paces (I do not exaggerate). Vendors swarmed around us trying to sell us books and tee-shirts. They were 10 years older than me, and wearing kung fu slippers, not my Ultra-Lite-Weight mountain hiking boots. They hadn't even broken a sweat, and now and again stretched out their hand to help the poor heaving Western woman up a tricky bit of wall.
Simatai was not to be seen on the horizon. We were still only on a fairly easy stretch. In the distance (about 10 towers ahead) I could see a particularly steep part of the wall going up a hill that looked almost vertical. I was panting like a marathon runner (although I guess they train well and don't have that problem) and my legs were literally shaking with the effort of every step. We had been walking only 45 minutes. We were less than a quarter of the way, and the bus was leaving the other end in three hours and 15 minutes.
The sellers were looking at me with pity, and they stopped Orlando and spoke to him (as the man of the couple, almost all communication is done through him, which is good as street touts ignore me in favour of him, but occasionally hurts my feminine pride). He told me they had said I wasn't going to make it. Apparently we were on a easy section of the wall, and if I was struggling now, I was not going to make it across the next part. There was an easy way to Simatai, they said, off the wall and through a valley alongside. One of them would take me if I bought a book from them. My pride was not too strong to consider this get-out-of-jail card carefully before dismissing it. I really did think I was struggling. But could I face the ignominy of accepting defeat? Also I would be ruining Orlando's experience too.
In the end, Orlando said he would continue on alone and meet me at the other end if I wanted to bail out. I conceded, and we (cheekily) bargained the woman down from Y100 to Y80 to guide me off the wall to the other end. We parted, and I followed the woman off the wall at a nearby tower onto a mountain path heading downhill away from the wall but vaguely going in the same direction. We walked quickly down the hill, the guide walking ahead of me. At first I politely declined her offers of assistance but a one tricky bit I finally accepted her hand and she steadied my progress down the steep and crumbling hill.
Once the pathway evened out I spoke to her. Her name was Li Qui Shu (first two words with a downward tone and the last with an upward tone, like a question or an Australian sentence). She ws 41 years old and a Mongolian farmer. Her husband still lives and works their farm in Mongolia with their oldest 2 children, a 17-year-old girl and a 12-year-old boy. She lives near Beijing with her youngest son who is three, and she sells books and tourist gifts on the wall to make money to keep her children in school. She is 41 years old.
Li Qui Shu led me along a gentle pathway (at a fairly quick pace) which wandered through trees and small crop fields. Whilst walking she helped me with my Chinese pronunciation, gently correcting my numbers and other routine words. The pathway brought us along a small number of houses and smallholdings where corn was growing and people working the fields. She taught me the word for pig (ro), sheep (yang) and chicken (jee). Coming towards us along the path was an ancient-looking person bent almost double with a load of straw on their back and a conical woven hat on their head. All I could see was the crown of the hat and the straw as the person proceeded towards us. As they passed I saw the smiling face of an old woman taking me in - she grinned more broadly and returned my hello.
After an hour's gentle but brisk walk we turned a corner and there was the wall again. Li Qui Shu pointed out Simatai to me - only two towers away. We did our business (I bought her book) and I thanked her again for her help. She led me along the final approach to the wall and we got back up through another tower. I sat on the edge of the wall and laughed in jubilation - I could see people coming towards me along a fairly dodgy section of wall and thanked my lucky stars I had found an escape route. Li Qui Shu insisted upon waiting with me until my "husband" (Eye-run in Mandarin) caught up with us.
Not 45 minutes later I saw his distinctive figure come into view and a few minutes later we were reunited. He has a few beads of sweat on his forehead but was not even out of breath. What a man. We walked the last stretch of wall before having to come off and down some steep metal stairs to cross a ravine via a cable bridge, as this part of the wall had collapsed. The cable bridge was hairy to say the least - we were miles above a river and the footbridge swung (to my mind) wildly as we crossed. Orlando hummed the Indiana Jones theme tune whilst I tried not to see through the considerable cracks in the planks down to the water far below, and chanted madly to myself that it was all going to be OK.
Half an hour later we were sitting under a tree talking to other travellers, gazing at the wall from a distance. What a day. I was so glad I had come, and even happier that I had escaped the full experience. From Simatai westwards the wall snaked out of view, climbing even steeper inclines that Orlando had walked and I had escaped. I have no comprehension of how the people managed to built this amazing structure, given that I couldn't even walk along it.
On the way home in the bus, we dozed (although it's not like I had exerted myself for too long!). We were booked on an overnight sleeper train to Datong that night, which is where I am writing to you now. Datong doesn't look too big, but apparently 3 million people live here (WHERE? It's really not that big looking). Max temperature yesterday was 9 degrees, and minimum last night was -3 degrees. We are wearing almost all the clothes we possess.
We got back to our hotel room last night and it was freezing. We complained that the room was cold and were given two more duvets: there is no central heating (or to them it not cold enough to switch on - temperatures here in winter get to -30 degrees so they probably think this is nice autumn weather). We have now checked out of out hotel and we have 7 hours to wait until our overnight sleeper gets us out of here back to Beijing and beyond. Hope we can keep warm until then!!!
We were picked up with a few others from our hostel at 7am and went off in a small minibus. A few more pick-ups later we were on our way. It took about 2 hours to get out of the built-up area of Beijing itself (bear in mind that the metropolitan area of Beijing is about the size of Belgium!) and soon we saw familiar-looking mountains ahead. Just before noon we passed through the gates of the Jinshanling entrance and parked up. It was fairly chilly so I was glad of my rain jacket and sweater.
The entrance place was well organised with a ticket office (Y30 each to get in - about 2.50 sterling) and plenty of stalls selling drinks, food and "I climbed the Great Wall" sweatshirts. We walked along the nicely-landscaped pathway towards the wall (the signs and litter bins brought to mind a nice country park) and finally saw the way up to the Wall itself - a fairly steep set of stone steps.
My heart sank. I hadn't even seen the bloody wall and I was already out of breath and getting too hot. I lagged behind badly from the start. Orlando encouraged me to keep up and said I was not to be "the limping gazelle". That didn't help- all my life I have been the limping bloody gazelle, struggling up a hill whilst some bloke or group yomped happily ahead. Why do I continuously do this to myself???
We reached the wall in about 5 minutes, and I must say it was quite a thrill to set foot on this amazing structure. The wall stretched for miles as far as the eye could see in both directions, with a tower breaking the snakelike route every 100m or so. We stood and gazed and took photos and took in the moment. Then the hard work began. The wall looks like it undulates gently over the hills from tower to tower. It does nothing of the sort. It climbs steadily and relentlessly up and down some of the steepest inclines I have ever seen. The steps are uneneven and range from 4 inches high to about a foot high. It is hard going and unforgiving. I hated it from about 3 minutes in.
My daypack got heavier and heavier, and I ran through its contents in my head to see what could be jettisoned (where? There were no bins and I was hardly going to litter a World Heritage site). Water? First aid kit? Dried fruit for energy? Our last remaining Sainsburys Diet Red Bull-type drink? Lonely Bloody Planet?
Orlando didn't even seem to notice the inclines. I knew those muscular thighs of his were useful for something: now I knew.He gently and patiently waited for me every 10 paces (I do not exaggerate). Vendors swarmed around us trying to sell us books and tee-shirts. They were 10 years older than me, and wearing kung fu slippers, not my Ultra-Lite-Weight mountain hiking boots. They hadn't even broken a sweat, and now and again stretched out their hand to help the poor heaving Western woman up a tricky bit of wall.
Simatai was not to be seen on the horizon. We were still only on a fairly easy stretch. In the distance (about 10 towers ahead) I could see a particularly steep part of the wall going up a hill that looked almost vertical. I was panting like a marathon runner (although I guess they train well and don't have that problem) and my legs were literally shaking with the effort of every step. We had been walking only 45 minutes. We were less than a quarter of the way, and the bus was leaving the other end in three hours and 15 minutes.
The sellers were looking at me with pity, and they stopped Orlando and spoke to him (as the man of the couple, almost all communication is done through him, which is good as street touts ignore me in favour of him, but occasionally hurts my feminine pride). He told me they had said I wasn't going to make it. Apparently we were on a easy section of the wall, and if I was struggling now, I was not going to make it across the next part. There was an easy way to Simatai, they said, off the wall and through a valley alongside. One of them would take me if I bought a book from them. My pride was not too strong to consider this get-out-of-jail card carefully before dismissing it. I really did think I was struggling. But could I face the ignominy of accepting defeat? Also I would be ruining Orlando's experience too.
In the end, Orlando said he would continue on alone and meet me at the other end if I wanted to bail out. I conceded, and we (cheekily) bargained the woman down from Y100 to Y80 to guide me off the wall to the other end. We parted, and I followed the woman off the wall at a nearby tower onto a mountain path heading downhill away from the wall but vaguely going in the same direction. We walked quickly down the hill, the guide walking ahead of me. At first I politely declined her offers of assistance but a one tricky bit I finally accepted her hand and she steadied my progress down the steep and crumbling hill.
Once the pathway evened out I spoke to her. Her name was Li Qui Shu (first two words with a downward tone and the last with an upward tone, like a question or an Australian sentence). She ws 41 years old and a Mongolian farmer. Her husband still lives and works their farm in Mongolia with their oldest 2 children, a 17-year-old girl and a 12-year-old boy. She lives near Beijing with her youngest son who is three, and she sells books and tourist gifts on the wall to make money to keep her children in school. She is 41 years old.
Li Qui Shu led me along a gentle pathway (at a fairly quick pace) which wandered through trees and small crop fields. Whilst walking she helped me with my Chinese pronunciation, gently correcting my numbers and other routine words. The pathway brought us along a small number of houses and smallholdings where corn was growing and people working the fields. She taught me the word for pig (ro), sheep (yang) and chicken (jee). Coming towards us along the path was an ancient-looking person bent almost double with a load of straw on their back and a conical woven hat on their head. All I could see was the crown of the hat and the straw as the person proceeded towards us. As they passed I saw the smiling face of an old woman taking me in - she grinned more broadly and returned my hello.
After an hour's gentle but brisk walk we turned a corner and there was the wall again. Li Qui Shu pointed out Simatai to me - only two towers away. We did our business (I bought her book) and I thanked her again for her help. She led me along the final approach to the wall and we got back up through another tower. I sat on the edge of the wall and laughed in jubilation - I could see people coming towards me along a fairly dodgy section of wall and thanked my lucky stars I had found an escape route. Li Qui Shu insisted upon waiting with me until my "husband" (Eye-run in Mandarin) caught up with us.
Not 45 minutes later I saw his distinctive figure come into view and a few minutes later we were reunited. He has a few beads of sweat on his forehead but was not even out of breath. What a man. We walked the last stretch of wall before having to come off and down some steep metal stairs to cross a ravine via a cable bridge, as this part of the wall had collapsed. The cable bridge was hairy to say the least - we were miles above a river and the footbridge swung (to my mind) wildly as we crossed. Orlando hummed the Indiana Jones theme tune whilst I tried not to see through the considerable cracks in the planks down to the water far below, and chanted madly to myself that it was all going to be OK.
Half an hour later we were sitting under a tree talking to other travellers, gazing at the wall from a distance. What a day. I was so glad I had come, and even happier that I had escaped the full experience. From Simatai westwards the wall snaked out of view, climbing even steeper inclines that Orlando had walked and I had escaped. I have no comprehension of how the people managed to built this amazing structure, given that I couldn't even walk along it.
On the way home in the bus, we dozed (although it's not like I had exerted myself for too long!). We were booked on an overnight sleeper train to Datong that night, which is where I am writing to you now. Datong doesn't look too big, but apparently 3 million people live here (WHERE? It's really not that big looking). Max temperature yesterday was 9 degrees, and minimum last night was -3 degrees. We are wearing almost all the clothes we possess.
We got back to our hotel room last night and it was freezing. We complained that the room was cold and were given two more duvets: there is no central heating (or to them it not cold enough to switch on - temperatures here in winter get to -30 degrees so they probably think this is nice autumn weather). We have now checked out of out hotel and we have 7 hours to wait until our overnight sleeper gets us out of here back to Beijing and beyond. Hope we can keep warm until then!!!
The China Logs: Chinglish
A week into our odyssey and I am settling in at last. The past week has been a whirlwind of activity and confusion and excitement and frustration and highs and lows and triumphs and cock-ups. I got to enjoy Shanghai before we left on Monday afternoon - I think my initial shake-up was simply culture shock to be honest. We had a good few days there sightseeing and getting used to the Chinese way of things.
"Chinglish" is the term for the Chinese way of translating things into English with interesting results. Sometimes you can understand the jist; sometimes it is completely unreachable.
"Chinglish" is the term for the Chinese way of translating things into English with interesting results. Sometimes you can understand the jist; sometimes it is completely unreachable.
- Take-away Breakfast translates to Breakfast Outside Send.
- Sign at Datong city taxi stand: "The Taxi Stands".
- Proclamation outside Beijing central China Post depot: "Post is Profession. Post Bureau is Home. Mail is Life. On-time Delivery is Gold."
- Flyer inside a Beijing restaurant menu: "Print the degree throw around flat cake. (A form plays now)." Answers on a postcard please...
- Notice on restaurant in Shanghai market: "Carry Forward Diet Civilization!". (I think I get what they want to say)
- Lots of words seem to have their "l"s and "r"s mixed up: my favourite was on a cocktail list in our Shanghai hotel where a Glasshopper cocktail was on the list (I really really hope it was genuine and not ironic!) (they also had Chivas Legal listed so I guess they were genuine)
Interesting Things About China Part 1
- People wear brushed cotton pyjamas as outer wear in the streets.I mean nice fluffy ones with balloons or teddies or nice paisley patterns on them. One gentleman taking the air in a park on Sunday morning had teamed his blue pyjama top with some nice casual trousers for a new look.
- Anything that can be eaten can be put on a skewer and cooked over charcoal: we have seen frog's legs, octopus, lamb, chicken, a whole small bird on a stick (I bet it was NOT chicken), and I swear what Orlando was attempting to buy on a street corner last night was dog.
- Police cars drive around with their blues and reds flashing (no sirens) at all times, just so you know they are really cool and important. Police on bicycles have no sirens or lights, but cycle through crowds at speed enthusiastically shouting "LAOW LAOW LAOW"(roughly translates as "excuse me excuse me excuse me!") and that seems to work fine. Somebody might pass this on to the bicycle ambulance team as a cost-saving proposal.
Sunday, October 09, 2005
The China Logs: Shanghai
Yes, friends, the Captain's Log is back (for those of you who remember my original postings online way back in the late 90s). Orlando and I planned to update the websites as we went along in China, but unfortunately we didn't plan for the vagaries of Chinese internet access. We can't access our website write pages!!! Actually, we can't even access the BBC news website so in that context I guess we were hoping for too much. So I will email you all on a regular basis instead, and copy everything later on to the website for posterity. (Nic or Paul please copy to the usual PTS distribution list - thanks)
So, China.
I am getting used to it.
I am not sure if I was just very tired and emotional by the time we got here or whether our marathon 6-hour walking odyssey yesterday did me in completely, but I am struggling at the moment. We arrived here in uneventful style on a perfectly comfortable flight (those of you with China Eastern flights booked, bring plenty of entertainment as all the TV is in Chinese!). It gets dark here at about 5pm so we saw little of the taxi journey to the city.
Our hotel is absolutely lovely - the Pujiang Hotel (or Astor House as it used to be known) is an old colonial Victorian style edifice, all dark wood and marble and vaulted ceilings and old-world east-meets-west charm. Our room is enormous, with a huge desk upon which Orlando writes daily (I prefer the sitting area for my musings), a minibar (Chinese red wine is quite nice, I found on the plane!), a vast TV with cable (ie lots of Chinese stations and CNN) and a huge bathroom which is bigger than some hotel rooms I have stayed in. We love it!
We are about 5 minutes walk to the Bund which is the heart of the city - a river-side walkway along the river Huangpu (a tributary of the Yangtze) which is lined on both sides by amazing buildings: on the old Shanghai side there are venerable old hotels and banking buildings dating back to the 1800s and the height of Shanghai's heyday; on the new Pudong side there is an amazing array of 21st century skyscrapers that outdo anything the west can offer, dominated by the Oriental Pearl Tower, a 430m TV tower which looks for all the world like an inverted hypodermic needle pointing skywards. The Bund is where the whole of Shanghai congregates in the evenings to take in the view and promenade amongst the hawkers selling tacky souvenirs, photo opportunities and a chance to fly a kite shaped like a shark.
The rest of Shanghai is a little weird for me; I guess I was expecting something a little more Oriental and Communist and Chinese and, well, different. But a huge proportion of the city is given over to the worship of consumerism like any big Western city. Elaborate shopping malls jostle for space with smaller stores, all selling Salvatore Ferragamo, Gucci, Prada, Tag Heuer, Levi's - and I mean the genuine article, not rip-offs, all at Western prices. The main shopping areas look like any city centre shopping streets to me, with pedestrian walkways, shopper mini-trains for the weary, nice seating areas, McDonalds, KFC and - yes - even Starbucks Coffee. It's just the fact that most of the signs are in Chinese and most people speak little or no English that gives it away. I am struggling with the language - we both are, but Orlando is making a valiant effort and it is paying off.
I had a bit of a panic attack last night when it was way past time for dinner, and we couldn't find a restaurant with an English menu. We hesitantly approached one place and were finally sent upstairs to the (much more expensive) first floor to read the English menu: my face and my spirits fell when I read lists of such appetising dishes as boiled chicken claws (the one thing I dreaded but it was the nicest thing on the list!), chicken gizzards, stinky tofu in beer, sliced eye fish in sauce... I am quoting directly from the menu. Would we ever find edible food in the city?? I had been haunted since the night before by the memory of lumps of beef fat glistening amongst my noodles at dinner, and had resolved to eat only vegetarian food from now on, but even the veg dishes had sounded worrying.
Thankfully Orlando was still feeling buoyant and he managed to allay my fears until we happened upon a clean, bright, 24-hour fast food place with - wait for it - PICTURES of food in the window (to think I used to deride this practice in Spain). I ran in and found to my delight that they had a list of English words to go with the photos. In bad Chinese and hand gestures we ordered a dish of beef with rice and tea eggs (eggs boiled in tea and star anise - quite tasty it seems) for Orlando, and a simple plate of beef and fried noodles for me. The food came and it looked exactly like it did in the photos!!! I fell on it and devoured my noodles in minutes. Delicious. I was so relieved.
We had a long day yesterday so we are taking it easy today - nothing like lounging on your sofa in your colonial hotel room eating chocolate raisins (Orlando) and drinking coffee (me) and reading magazines and Lonely Planet whilst Shanghai life buzzes outside your window. But not all day - shortly we will take a stroll (not too far today!) and sample a few bars and coffee (sorry, tea) houses before starting today's search for edible dinner. I promise: no visits to Starbucks!!!
Tomorrow we fly off to Beijing where a new city awaits. More then.
So, China.
I am getting used to it.
I am not sure if I was just very tired and emotional by the time we got here or whether our marathon 6-hour walking odyssey yesterday did me in completely, but I am struggling at the moment. We arrived here in uneventful style on a perfectly comfortable flight (those of you with China Eastern flights booked, bring plenty of entertainment as all the TV is in Chinese!). It gets dark here at about 5pm so we saw little of the taxi journey to the city.
Our hotel is absolutely lovely - the Pujiang Hotel (or Astor House as it used to be known) is an old colonial Victorian style edifice, all dark wood and marble and vaulted ceilings and old-world east-meets-west charm. Our room is enormous, with a huge desk upon which Orlando writes daily (I prefer the sitting area for my musings), a minibar (Chinese red wine is quite nice, I found on the plane!), a vast TV with cable (ie lots of Chinese stations and CNN) and a huge bathroom which is bigger than some hotel rooms I have stayed in. We love it!
We are about 5 minutes walk to the Bund which is the heart of the city - a river-side walkway along the river Huangpu (a tributary of the Yangtze) which is lined on both sides by amazing buildings: on the old Shanghai side there are venerable old hotels and banking buildings dating back to the 1800s and the height of Shanghai's heyday; on the new Pudong side there is an amazing array of 21st century skyscrapers that outdo anything the west can offer, dominated by the Oriental Pearl Tower, a 430m TV tower which looks for all the world like an inverted hypodermic needle pointing skywards. The Bund is where the whole of Shanghai congregates in the evenings to take in the view and promenade amongst the hawkers selling tacky souvenirs, photo opportunities and a chance to fly a kite shaped like a shark.
The rest of Shanghai is a little weird for me; I guess I was expecting something a little more Oriental and Communist and Chinese and, well, different. But a huge proportion of the city is given over to the worship of consumerism like any big Western city. Elaborate shopping malls jostle for space with smaller stores, all selling Salvatore Ferragamo, Gucci, Prada, Tag Heuer, Levi's - and I mean the genuine article, not rip-offs, all at Western prices. The main shopping areas look like any city centre shopping streets to me, with pedestrian walkways, shopper mini-trains for the weary, nice seating areas, McDonalds, KFC and - yes - even Starbucks Coffee. It's just the fact that most of the signs are in Chinese and most people speak little or no English that gives it away. I am struggling with the language - we both are, but Orlando is making a valiant effort and it is paying off.
I had a bit of a panic attack last night when it was way past time for dinner, and we couldn't find a restaurant with an English menu. We hesitantly approached one place and were finally sent upstairs to the (much more expensive) first floor to read the English menu: my face and my spirits fell when I read lists of such appetising dishes as boiled chicken claws (the one thing I dreaded but it was the nicest thing on the list!), chicken gizzards, stinky tofu in beer, sliced eye fish in sauce... I am quoting directly from the menu. Would we ever find edible food in the city?? I had been haunted since the night before by the memory of lumps of beef fat glistening amongst my noodles at dinner, and had resolved to eat only vegetarian food from now on, but even the veg dishes had sounded worrying.
Thankfully Orlando was still feeling buoyant and he managed to allay my fears until we happened upon a clean, bright, 24-hour fast food place with - wait for it - PICTURES of food in the window (to think I used to deride this practice in Spain). I ran in and found to my delight that they had a list of English words to go with the photos. In bad Chinese and hand gestures we ordered a dish of beef with rice and tea eggs (eggs boiled in tea and star anise - quite tasty it seems) for Orlando, and a simple plate of beef and fried noodles for me. The food came and it looked exactly like it did in the photos!!! I fell on it and devoured my noodles in minutes. Delicious. I was so relieved.
We had a long day yesterday so we are taking it easy today - nothing like lounging on your sofa in your colonial hotel room eating chocolate raisins (Orlando) and drinking coffee (me) and reading magazines and Lonely Planet whilst Shanghai life buzzes outside your window. But not all day - shortly we will take a stroll (not too far today!) and sample a few bars and coffee (sorry, tea) houses before starting today's search for edible dinner. I promise: no visits to Starbucks!!!
Tomorrow we fly off to Beijing where a new city awaits. More then.
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