China’s Last Burn on Lindzy and Nat

Nat and I can safely say that China has thrown way more punches at Nat than I.  Not only did she get her camera stolen, but she ripped off by a hairdresser, who refused to do her hair untill she bought overpriced hair serum.  Meanwhile, beside her and this dickhead of a hairdresser, I am sitting with my cute-as-a-button-i-want-to-put-you-in-my-pocket-and-take-you-home-hairdresser, who is working so carefully and pampering my head like it was the Queens hair or something.  Seriously, after he was done, angels sang and fairy’s floated around me while my hair floated around Clairol commercial material.  My smile was huge… untill I looked over at Nats sad face and puffy poodle hair.  There were a few other instances of rude people, stalkers and rip offs that I didn’t experience, making me think much more highly of China than Nat.

As we were walking around Nanning, our last city in China, we joked about how this is where Nat gets killed by a speeding car or something, with all the luck she has been having.  She was praying to make out of China alive. 

The morning we were walking to the bus station for the bus to Vietnam, I held up my fist in glory!  “We have won!  We are leaving China alive!”  Nat muttered something about not knowing what I had to complain about…. true…

Our bus arrived and we were home free… almost… as we walked to the bus, I missed a step, my ankle turned in and I came crashing down on my knee, my ankle bending awkwardly and making that snapping sound.  I didn’t cry!  I don’t cry!  I whine!  “Owowowowowowowowowowowowowowowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.”  I held my ankle tightly hoping that if i held it tight enough, the damage could be reversed. 

Not one Chinese person offered to help me, but all the foreigners were on me in an instant:

“Are you ok?”

“Let me get your bag-”

“Do you need aspirin-?”

I wobbled on the bus and kept the ankle elevated and took Bruces mysterious pills from Africa… Bruce and Kylie are a couple we met in Nanning that were on a similar route as we were. 

See ya China, and thanks for lessons on how to toughen up.   The Vietnam border awaits us.

Peace! (^-^)V

The Last Race in China: Guilin

So, since the beginning of this trip, I have been running for trains and buses.  No matter how hard I try, I am always left looking at a clock, gasping, coming to a screeching halt, switching directions, sprinting across subway stations, squeezing through doors, telling a cab driver to step on it, or, just making it to immigration.

I missed my bus out of Toyama, and my buddies Takahiro and Takafumi had to race the bus to the first rest stop, getting me on it safely, I had to run for my boat to China (and i mean ruuuuun), I was tense in the backseat of a taxi for my train to Xi’an, we read the ticket wrong for our tickets from Shanghai to Hong Kong (causing us a 1/2 hour mistake) and we got the wrong station to get a bus from Hong Kong to Guilin.

By the time we got to our time for Guilin on this trip, we thought we had everything down pat.  We arrived to Hong Kong with such grace!  We planned everything!  We got our tickets, our maps and our re-entry permits to go “back in to China” pretty much as soon as we got into Hong Kong (P.S. How annoying is it that HK and China are the same country, but you need a visa to get to China from HK??).  We had everything ready and planned to leave HK on a monday night.

Unfortunetly, the people at the bus station failed to tell us that there are two stations next to each other in the city where we had to catch the night bus to Guilin. 

Nat and I were plenty early for our night bus; we relaxed, ate some ‘cup-o-noodle’, made a toilet stop and 10 minutes before our bus, we decided to go find it… thats when the friendly bus station man informed us (through diagrams and flailing arms) that our bus left from the station two minutes down the street… and that we better hurry… no kidding… ready…set… sprint! again!

We arrived on time though… for a nightmare of a ride!!!  Have you seen the Chinese drive?!?

Alright guys, I defended you in Canada… shamed people for giving into the stereotype, but honestly, you guys are crazy drivers.  I understand!  It’s how it’s done in your country!  No problem!  Problem: Night bus, crazy driving, hills, curves and turns.  I have never hung on for dear life so much in my life.  It was fun…I guess… you know, like a fun rollercoster ride, that went on for 12 hours.. while you’re trying to sleep.. and is not fast enough for gravity to hold you down, so you have to rely on your own grip.

We arrived to Guilin exhausted.  We got there so early, that the lady we were staying with wasn’t ready for us.  We decided this time to rent out a ladies little apartment for $11 a night.  So good!  It was in a wicked neighborhood, no foreginers, tonnes of markets and tonnes of people on the streets, kids, adults eating and drinking and playing cards, they loved us.  Always shouting hello! and offering us delicious mandarins and grapes!  I love chinese fruit!

Since her place wasn’t ready, she dropped us off at her mos place.  It reminded me how much i love grandparents; which is what these people acted like for two hours, as in, they fed us more food than we could eat.  Luckily everythign was vegetarian…except for these meat balls that she kept putting on my plate.  Whenever she’d turn an eye, i’d put them back in the bowl.  BEing a Grandma, she would notice that i was out of balls of meat and put more on my plate…gawwwd.  In the end I won (aka, i didnt eat any mysterious meat balls).

Guilin is in the south of China, and absolutely beautiful.  We spent our time in parks, rivers, and mountains. 

My favourite part was our tour of some of the beautiful highlights of Guilin, Yangshuo and Xingping and the boat tour of Lijang.  Our hostess hooked us up with a cheap tour.  The unfortunate thing about these asian countries is that there is a price for locals, and a price for foreigners.  They love taking avantage of us “rich people”.  Listen, when I go back home, I am not rich.  In fact, I’m not rich now!  Does school dept mean anythign to these people…

Anyways, so our hostess hooked us up with a cheap tour, with allllll Chinese.  They loved us though and took real good care of us.  I’m sure each and every single one of them have a photo of Nat and me with either them or their child. 

My least favourite part was when Nat got her camera pickpocketed.  Burn.

Luckily she’s got insurance.

Guilin was a nice calm time for what had just passed and what was to come with crossing the border and doing it all in Vietnam.

Shanghai to Hong Kong: the road to Civilization

Music: waaaaaah, none!!!

After Xi’an (best known to Nat and I as the mistake), we arrived in class to Shanghai.  We had the most expensive and most comfortable 17 hour train ride.  This was not really our choice… if you read the previous post, you would know that a slack worker at a hostel caused us to miss out on the cheap train tickets (this girl does not need class! she needs cheap!! ) and run around all day looking for a way (anyway!!!) out of this city!

Though it was a little overbudget (really… it was only about $40 to $50 … not that big a deal…), we appreciated the smooth ride into the crazy and loud and smelly and hoooooooooot and humid Shanghai.

I love Shanghai.

We stayed with two girls, Katie and Sara, bright, loud and brilliant young girls from America, that lived in Toyama teaching English at one point.  They welcomed us with open arms (and lots of delicious home cooked food… and clean hot showers.. and tips on EVERYTHING in Shanghai) to their sweet pad in the center of the city. 

I can’t remember the last time I met two sincerely generous and helpful people.  Shanghai would have been nothin’ without ‘em. 

I didn’t wash my own hair once… puh-lease, $1.50 for a wash, cut, blowdry and massage… like I would waste my own energy on it.  We ate and drank at the best and delicious deals in town, thanks to Katies collection of business cards on where to be, all the time, anywhere. 

Within those business cards laid more business cards on where to get the best deals on hand made silk attire (Lindzy: + one yellow dress), eyeware (Lindzy: + one pair of Louis Vuitton frames and lenses), bags and purses (Lindzy: + 1 Chanel black handbag), and cashmere scarves (Lindzy: + one blue silky scarve)… this was all for less than $100..far less…. This is why I love Shanghai!

Ok, I went a little overboard, and spoiled myself, but how do you say no to these deals???  On top of the great shopping Shanghai is actually a hip and happenin city.  There are more foreigners than Golden Week in Kyoto (thats a lot), there are tonnes of places to go, there are tonnes of things to see and do, eat and drink, laugh and play, run and bike, and really do, anything. 

One of my favourite parts was checking out the circus one night and the amazing Chinese Acrobats.  Mind blowing!  I screamed!  I laughed!  I was almost peeing my pants!  (Too much?).  I t was amazing… At one point they had eight motorcycles in a small sphere, racing around!  This show SHOULD NOT BE MISSED.

I was sad to leave Shanghai, but fear of staying there for a year (Katie promised she could get me a job, no problem…yikes!  teeeemmmptiing), I had to get out, fast. 

Again, we went in class (man! tickets go fast here!) to Hong Kong! 

This is where Natalie and I get good at the travelling thing…seriously.  We got to Hong Kong, found our way to the cheap place to get our re-entry permits to China, got our tickets (cheap ones!) out and made our way to the place we were staying at.

This time, Nat and I couch surfed.  If you don’t know what couch surfing is, you should check it out.  It’s an online community that connects travellers who can help each other out, by offering a free place to stay (perhaps a couch…) or meet up for a coffee, to show the whats what in whichever town.

Our host was not as chic as Sara and Katie… He was an older man, probably a little lonely, who didn’t say much (hey, if I can’t make you talk, no one can), but put us up in his beautiful, sea front, mountain backdrop apartment, with our own bedroom and a housekeeper, who cooked us a mean seafood lasagna on the first night.

Hong Kong reminded me a lot of Vancouver.  Nat and I spent five days there checking out everything that could be checked out.  We toured the islands, saw the biggest buddha in Asia, went to the highest peak, ate delicious curry foods and walked a lot.  We probably would have only stayed for 3 or 4 days (the city is a little pricey…) but, we had to wait to get our re-entry permits… since someone didn’t tell us when we got our Chinese Visas, that if you go into Hong Kong,  and back, you need a double entry permit… they told us this, after we got our visas (and yes, we had given them our itineraries…grrrr).

I really enjoyed my time in Hong Kong… it was kind of a Western Tease …. everyone speaks English, no one is rude, and Starbucks are everywhere.  No one spits, no one tries to sell you crap, no babies are pooping in random places and everywhere has (angels!  clouds of heaven opening! harps playing!) clean! western! toilets! with! toilet! paper!

As a Chinese man from Hong Kong put it when we first arrived to HK:

“We’re more civilized here.”  He had offered to help a man with wheelchair, and the man thanked him, telling him that he was very kind.

This Hong Konger couldn’t have put it any better….

Xi’an: The Place we Should Have Skipped

Reasons:

1. The train was hell… hardseats for a 17 hour ride.  I slept on the seats, Nat slept under.  Way to take on for the team Nachan!
2. The hostel wasn’t the greatest.. mostly cause the people had half a brain and lied to us about train tickets.
3. Trains everywhere out of there were booked
4. When we finally got a train it was for that night, so we weren’t able to really do or see anything historic or monumental.  We did bike around the city wall, which I did really really enjoy, the city was cool, but really only took a day.  The next day we were out. 
5. We paid a lot, but got a really nice soft sleeper room, which we shared with a mother and her daughter ( a baby that did not randomely pee/poo anywhere she pleased, which we saw a lot in Xi’an.  You know how you see horses in a parade just let ‘er drop wherever, whenever?  Thats kind of like the tykes in China.  One girl had the class to step over a sewer… one boy whipped it out in a national park… hmmm.. SARS anyone? )
6. We got to see a true Chinese city, after the slightly faking it Beijing (they cleaned up nice for the Olympics), dirty, loud, smelly, rude, no english whatsoever.  No apologies for anything, no smiles.  I miss smiles.  And the spitting.. man do they spit.  Not just the little spitting or the ‘ oh I have extra saliva in my mouth let me just get rid of that in the bush nearby.’  No, no, this is straight up, from deep down, stomach gurgling, throat scratching hoarking.  Now i’m not so sensitive, and I could stomach it, but I mean, people, this is a nation wide problem!   Get that shit checked out!  You arn’t a country of spitters!  You’re a country with lung infections!  Again: SARS.

Things get classier from here.

Beijing: Baptism of Fire

Looking back I loved Beijing.  It’s big, it’s full of culture (a crazy culture), and there is so much to do!  When we first go there though, I was not in love.  I was close to tears. 

The taxi drivers are crazy and no one ( NO ONE) speaks English.  When we finally made it to Beijing from Tianjin (where the boat dropped us off), there was no one to help us.  The subway at that particular station was not finished (of course!  what is this? a bad part 3 of Speed??) and no one could tell us which buses to take where.  Even our ‘I’m a sad, lost, pathetic foreigner’ faces didn’t work. 

That is untill Angel number 2 appeared

(Angel number one was a Chinese/Japanese woman …who had also seen me naked on the boat… who could translate Chinese to Japanese for us.  saaafe)

Angel number 2 was an older man accompanied with his wife.  Together they took Nat and I in and escorted us safely to our hostel in the heart of Beijing, Sanlitun area.  They also paid for the taxi…Ping Pong!!

The tears were gone.  Beijing could be enjoyed. 

Enjoyed in a crazy way… i kind of missed the boat… a time when things were simple and all there was to do for two days was read and be lulled to sleep by the rocking of the boat and the humming of the engine.

The streets in China were one of my first shockers.  Absolute insanity.  I don’t see why they bother putting lines on the road, or stop lights, or pedestrian crosswalks…or sidewalks…

Also being in Chinese train stations, i missed the high efficiency and frequency of the trains in Japan.  Train stations in China are like airports.  With the amount of security in both the train stations and the subway stations, i wasn’t sure if i should feel safe or not.  I was also getting sick of taking off my bags and queuing up for the scanners.  After travelling a lot of China, I’m pretty sure all of this security was just for the olympics.

The first day we met these two awesome dudes that took us out for breakfast to a little family place on a little sidestreet they had previously discovered. 

We did the bank thing, we did the whole not signing our travellers cheques and having to leave them and sign them and find a new, not so close, bank.  (The travellers cheques are another funny story… yah we decided to get those two hours before our boat… they took an hour to get… we had to be on the boat an hour before leaving… we definitely ran through the streets of Kobe with 30 pound bags on our backs.)

We spent about four days in Beijing.  I loved it and hated it.  I was tired of holding my purse so tightly and I was tired of making stupid costly mistakes.  I was tired of running for trains with 30 pound bags.  I’m tired of taking wrong exits with no answers.  I wanted to stay longer to enjoy because I was finally getting the hang of it, but I also wanted to stay longer to kick its ass with my presence. 

We saw the lake, we saw the temples, we saw the Forbidden City, we saw the Hutong areas, we partied with randoms, we met some Paralympics and partied with them.  We saw the Summer Palace (soooo good!) and we climbed the Great Wall… According to Chairman Mao, that makes us real Woman.  Thanks buudddyy.  We got a sketchy cab driver after the Great Wall who made us get out of his cab in the middle of nowhere, for no reason we could understand.  Luckily we were able to flag down some random bus heading back into Beijing.  Little flirting with the bus drivers assistant and we were on at a gooood price. 

That was our Baptism of Fire.