(PART 1) The worth of a passport

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Heya folks, bumming around Hong Kong after a diversion to Indonesia. Visa hassles still as hassly as ever. Visa was rejected due to a missing form, so got to send all the paperwork back to Xian and then they will post it back again after collecting the right forms. Red level thunderstorms here which is quite exotic, anyway got given the key to a flat of a nice English girl who's been teaching here but shes back to England soon and I expect I will be moving back to the infamous Chungking Mansions... Anyway last entry I had just arrived at the South gate of Taiyuan's university, waiting for my new friend Cassie to appear...



So after reaching the right university gate I took a chance to let the sweat dry and appreciate the chill in the air. Sat on my russack I knew she would spot me easily enough as everyone going in or out of the university fixed their eyes on me as they passed me by. Taiyuan, although the capital of this province, has very few vistors. Really it's just a big cold city with no tourist attractions and nothing to see. Naturally that makes me somewhat a spectacle.

After a short time she arrived and we bundled my load and ourselves into a taxi. She directed the driver and we were off. She told me she would take me to a hotel that alot of university students use when their dorms are periodically not avaliable. I suppose it's a chicken and egg situation. Which comes first the hostels or the backpackers. There's no hostels because no backpackers come here. Backpackers, even passing through on their way to or fro Beijing don't stay because theres no hostels, only hotels aiming at business clients.

So after paying the driver and extracting my luggage back to it's home on my back, we started down a road closed to vechicles. The snow was molded to black slush by a thousand Chinese feet. The narrow street was filled with small street restaurants and stalls seeing all daily commodities. None of the flashy or pointless souvenir stalls selling everything that every well-travelled tourist has seen a hundred times before. This packed street was filled with energy, bustling with young people going about their daily lives, only today stopping to stare at the white guy acting the mule, trudging past. Cassie, my self-appointed guide, couldn't help but smirk at being the center of attention for what presumably is one of the first times.

She told me this small network of winding streets was like a village in amoungst the city, a community set up around students and those to serve them, drawing in those who enjoy a more local way of life. I decided I liked this area immediately, I imagined this is how Hong Kong's side alleys would appear nestled slightly out of sight amoungst the suits and ties competing in the rat race of modern life.

We marched further, weaving between couples and crowds and bicycles ringing their bells as they drag carts filled with daily supplies. Further towards the heart, my eyes constantly darting attempting to absorb the action. The busy chatter, people shouting for waitresses, the ever growing piles of chopsticks and bottles overflowing the gutters, only to be gone by the suns rise. The neon signs hanging from wires above the streets in between peoples laundry and red lanterns.

If I was a local in Taiyuan, this would be my home. It's as if the narrowness of the buildings, the clutter of people and the cramped stalls all as compressed as they can be helps keep the energy from just leaking out into the polluted cloudy sky. Shame about the snow is all. I think soldiers marching over Paschendale had better survival rate then the soft flakes of snow, destined to become another black drop in a constant puddle. Good job I had my steel toe caps on. I recommend to any traveller, a pair of steel toe cap, fake leather workboots. Best manual labour, walking boots and wellingtons I've owned. And they're orange.

I hold open the dirty plastic door of the hotel, my fingers numbing to metal as Cassie, tilting her head and smiling sweetly walks, in before me. The door springs shut behind me and echo's around the empty hallway. Cassie, already ahead, was peering down the corridors trying to spot the owners. I throw my bag down with a grunt and decide there and then I have not packed my bag like a true traveller. It's heavy. Very heavy. But then I suppose I am only half traveller. My intentions to settle and live justify my extra weight, I tell myself, rubbing my sholders. Before I could put much more thought to the issue a teenage boy had appeared at one of the corridors. Stopping dead in his tracks to stare at me.

Cassie uttered some words and the boy darted off calling his mother. She then spun round and mused with a grin "they won't be expect someone like you". Although traditonally raised to be shy and withdrawn, even traditional young girls like this seem to come out their shells once they have relaxed and can see I'm not exactly traditional myself. As a middle-aged and very modestly presented lady hurried down the stairs, Cassie pulled a cheeky face before spinning back around to address the mother of the family business. They had a long conversation in which I sat next to my bag and tried to look as if I wasn't concentrating on deciphering what they were discussing. Although every time I glanced up at the lady her eyes were pinned to me. The unsettled look on her face told me she was at the least, reluctant to let me stay.

Before long though Cassie turned telling me to get my passport out. I handed it to the woman, who pulled it uneasily from my grasp whilst rummaging around for some paper on her counter. She continued talking in Chinese with Cassie, who by now was looking abit bored of her conversation. She filled in my details, settled a price with me, which I could at least do by myself and then led me back out of the front door to the neighbouring door. I hauled my things to the 4th floor and there she pointed to my room, handed me a key and skulked off still holding a wary look in her eye.

"What's crawled under her bonnet?" I ask, as I open the old door with some force and start eyeing up the room.

She looks blankly at me. "I don't understand"

"Sorry" I remember English is her second language. "Why was she so unhappy?". I dump my bag in a corner and check out the view from the window. Nothing much, just bricks from the next building along and the alley I walked up to get to the hotel.


"Well, she not seen a foreigner person" she sits at the bottom of the bed and turns on the dusty TV, flicking through one fuzzy channel to the next. I walk into the bathroom to see if there's hot water.

"That's not a problem is it?" I spot an old tank in corner. Looked to be the electic kind you plug in an hour before you use it and it heats the water up like a kettle.

"She think you Xinjiang person".

I stick my head back through the bathroom door to meet her gaze. She carries on flicking through the badly recieved channels without looking up. I know the Muslim minorities in Xinjiang have a reputation for being pickpockets in the rest of China but I wondered if that alone justified the owners dicontent.

She turns off the TV, suddenly looking animated again, "you ready?" she says meeting my eyes with a cute half smile. With that we returned to the drifting snow and hustling streets in search of some quick food. I wasn't satsified with her answer about the womans uneasiness, so as we slowly walked between stalls she explained further. It turns out Xinjiang pickpockets are ripe in Taiyuan and the police, in an effort to stamp it out have banned any Xinjiang people staying in the hotels. Apparently the police will randomly check hotels and if they find anyone they kick them out and fine the hotel owners cruel amounts. It suddenly became alot clearer.

So I have a passport, what does that mean to a local woman whos probally never left this province? Would be suprised if she's even seen a Chinese passport. She doesn't want to let Xinjiang people stay and to her thats how I look. Coming from such a politically correct country such as the UK it's strange finding rules and restrictions that are based just on race. The riots and protests such things would cause back home, but are just the way thing work elsewhere...

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Photos

The village within a city
This one of the wider streets near my hotel. KTV is karaoke