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Asia » China » Beijing » Great Wall of China
October 28th 2008
Published: December 23rd 2008
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Beijing

I left Kobe and Japan on the 16th October for the 3 day journey to Beijing. As usual there was a splattering of fellow travellers, 2 Irish girls, a Japanese girl and the by now obligatory Aussie. The journey was pleasant enough but there was very little to do except read which was grand. We arrived to a smog filled Beijing on the 19th and caught one of the spanking new express trains (travelling at 330km per hour) into the centre of the city to find our respective accomodation. After I sent my last e-mail detailing my exploits in Japan I got an e-mail back saying that a friend of mine was in Beijing on business and after a flurry of e-mails back and forth I duly met Martin and his business buddies for a feast of food and beer that all naturally went to the business buddies expense account - apparently it is rude to offer to pay you're share of the meal so naturally I did what was expected of me!! Cheers Martin or should I say Professor Tangney! Beijing as you'd except was more than a little mad but other than the smog wasn't a bad
First view of ChinaFirst view of ChinaFirst view of China

It would be another 2 days before we docked namely because the boat had to drop anchor for a whole day outside Beijing as we waited for our berth.
place to be. I visited the great wall at Jinshanling which is away from the main tourist blackspots and walked the 10km along the wall to a place called Simatai which was great. Other compulsory visits were of course made to the Forbidden city, Ti'ananmen square and the Summer Palace but the best craic was the day I hired a bike for a spin around the city streets - it was pure pandemonium especially at crossroads where you waited for a crowd of fellow cyclists to congregate beside you and move en masse to the other side. Traffic lights (and the police) were ignored by everyone. It was in Beijing that I first noticed that Chinese babies don't wear nappies but have instead a hole in their trousers etc that shows their bare behind for ease of use. They also seemed very docile as I never heard any one of them cry, mind you they're probably trying to get over the shock of why their arse is so cold!

Datong

After 8 days in Beijing I caught an overnight train to Datong in Shanxi province. My purpose here being to visit the magnificent Yungang caves (the Taliban blew up similiar caves in Afghanistan a few years ago)which were built around 400AD and the Hanging temple which is built into the side of a cliff. Datong itself was a bit of a dump but as usual when a few people greet you and are pleasant it makes you wish you had booked to stay a couple of days more.

Pingyao

Another overnight train and I was in the city of Pingyao which is renowned for practically all of its buidings being from the 17th and 18th centuries. It is also renowned as being one of the first banking centres in China which meant that many of the museums were either banks or armed escort ones - made me almost nostalgic for accountancy!!

Xi'an and Hua Shan

My next stop was to Xi'an and the Terracota Army. I shared a room with a Dub and the day after the tour to the Terracota museum we headed off to Hua Shan which is one of the 5 sacred Taoist mountains in China for a bit of a hike. We stayed in a (fairly crap) hostel on the mountain overnight and the following day headed back down to go our seperate ways. I was heading for Luoyang and had hoped that I could catch a train from the station near Hua Shan but it was about 30km away from the mountain and as there was a bus bound for Xi'an waiting at the foot of the mountain I thought it better safe than sorry to head back to this transport hub where I knew I could guarantee myself a train. Sure enough, after a rickety 2 hour bus journey we got back and I was on the train to Luoyang an hour later. Of course, you can't choose the people you're travelling with and I was sitting by the window opposite an 80 odd year old woman with no teeth and a man who appeared to be her 50 odd year old son. She had a bunch of bananas and proceeded to force 2 or 3 into her mouth to such an extent that they were dribbling down her jaw. The noise that she made was horrendous and even though I rapidly put on my IPod the sound of her eating was so ingrained in my mind that it was as though it was part of the songs themselves. Trying to look away from her to my left there was a man eating something else and than spitting the remnants into his hand. My last resort of closing my eyes and pretending to be asleep only made matters worse as my imagination ran riot. Finally she stopped only for her son to decide that he wanted one and although no worse than anyone else all I wanted was for him to stop. The person beside me got off at the next station and the old woman immediately got out and sat beside me so that her son could put his feet up on the seat. Almost immediately she draped herself across the small table and looking like a drunk asleep in a kebab shop on a Saturday night had me trapped against the window facing her son and the left over banana skins on the table. I thought it would never end but eventually she awoke and moved to where some other relatives were sitting. I immediately got up and put the banana skins into the bin. Relief at last, I sat back to enjoy the rest of the journey. Than we pulled into Hua Shan train station ............ .

Luoyang

I finally arrived at Luoyang where things improved for the better and within a couple of hours had my accomodation and my itinerary for the next couple of days sorted and was sitting down to a grand feed of stir fried beef. Unfortunately the enjoyment of the meal was frequently interrupted by other customers gubbing onto the tiled floor - pretty disgusting as I only expected that kind of thing out on the street. The following morning I headed to Shaolin Si Temple which is where Kung Fu originated and although nowadays it has turned into a sort of tourist trap there is still a lot of history there to make the trip worthwhile. The fact that there are dozens of Chinese youngsters learning Kung Fu here helps add to the atmosphere of the place.

Nanjing
I travelled from Luoyang overnight with the intention of staying in Nanjing (formerly Nanking) for the day and than catching another overnight train to Huang Shan. The weather in Nanjing was pretty awful so having decided that the best thing to do was to go and visit a couple of museums I choose the cheerily titled "Memorial to the Nanjing Massacre Museum" which commemorates one of the most infamous atrocities committed by the Japanese during WWII (the Chinese estimate that about 300,000 civilians were massacred while Japan says the figure is closer to 30,000). There is no doubt that a massacre did take place there but the museum was built on a site where many of the victimes were buried and the Chinese decided that the best way to illustrate the suffering was to dig into the soil and show skulls and bones piled on each other in a very over the top way complete with haunting type music for "dramatic effect". Upon leaving, the visitor was greeted with a statue for peace and some happy religious music to go with it. It was pretty tacky to say the least and given that its probably the only museum/site where I didn't have to pay an entrance fee (they charge an entrance fee for sacred mountains in China as well as for waterfalls etc). makes me think that the memory of these people has been completely politicised. The narrative in the museum also talked about how China defeated Japan in WWII making no mention of the Americans and the
Beijing - The Birds NestBeijing - The Birds NestBeijing - The Birds Nest

People in China tend to stare at foreigners as though we're from another planet. I was no exception and on a couple of occassions was asked to "pose" for photographs. These kids teachers asked me to do just that.
atomic bomb etc. - mind you, if the British and Americans can claim that they defeated Germany whilst ignoring Russia ..................... .

Huang Shan
Having got down from my high horse I boarded the train for Huang Shan (the yellow mountain) in Anhui province and arrived early the following morning. Huang Shan is one of the most famous mountains in China and appears on virtually every tourist guide etc. The weather was very misty but this only made the mountain more enthralling. I climbed all day dodging porters coming up and down as well as the by now familiar requests by Chinese to have their picture taken with a foreigner and stayed in accomodation on the mountain overnight. Had a very clear and crisp day the following morning which was great as I headed back down to the village and caught a bus the following morning to Hangzhou (near Shanghai) where I stayed for a couple of days before heading to Hong Kong.

Hong Kong
I headed down to Hong Kong to catch up with my old pal, Barry Halpenny from Ardee and his wife Collette. It was a very relaxing 10 days or so and staying in their flat was a great break from the usual 6 - 8 bed dormitories where I also made full use of their extensive book collection as well. Cheers Lads. Hong Kong itself is the city that we all imagine, full of skyscrapers, where everyone speaks English and buys Prada etc. It's practically a different country although it does retain much of the old Chinese charm especially in the form of the goldfish and bird markets etc.

Guilin and Yangshou
Competely refreshed and rejuvenated I headed back to mainland China on the 25th November to the town of Guilin in Guanxi province. From there I boarded a ferry for the exceptionally scenic river cruise on the Li river to the town of Yangshou. Full of Sampans, bamboo boats, water buffalo and Comorant fishermen the river was a hive of activity and definately one of the highlights of my time in China. I had planned to stay in Yangshou for a day or so but ended up staying a full week as the place was fantastic. A 14 mile hike through unique Chinese farmland, a 10 mile cycle to ethnic minority towns along the Li, Kayaking and a bit of rock climbing thrown in were the order of the day. My fellow travellers were a great bunch and there was always great craic to be had in the evenings.

Yangshou itself is a very nice town and is so popular as a tourist attraction that the place gets packed in the summer months. I was very glad to be here in November as it wasn't so busy and the weather was pretty ok as well. It is also popular with Chinese students of English and the expats who are here to teach it. There was more than one occassion where someone would ask a couple of us for some help with their English and an impromptu English lesson would ensue on a bench near the river. Passersby would than come over and before you knew it there would be 10 or 12 people standing or sitting around us. They had also all adopted very strange English names that they had derived from God knows where as they nowhere near resembled their Chinese name- males included the names Fly, Black and Ross and females had everything from LuLu, to Junior to Wendy. It wasn't all one way traffic though as we used the opportunity to try and learn some Chinese although I don't think we were very successful as Shane, from Dublin, experienced when he tried to tell one of the barmaids in Chinese that he was studying chinese. Her look of indignation only made sense when we discovered that he had actually said that she looked like a water buffalo!

Yangshou was also the place where I experienced my first "real" Chinese market as everything from the usual chickens and ducks to toads, rats and turtles were kept in pretty cruel conditions while waiting to be selected for the chop. The worst though was where I saw dogs and kittens in fairly cramped cages awaiting the same fate - I've eaten very little meat since.


Ping An, Chengyang and Xhioshaing
A few of us finally dragged ourselves away from Yangshou and we headed to the minority village of Ping An which is famous for its rice terraces that have been built into the hillsides over hundreds of years. The area is also home to the Yiao and Miao minority people who have a traditional dress all of their own and whose women never cut their hair once they are married. They even tie it up in a different way depending on the number of children that they have. Minorities in China are partially exempt from the one child policy and are actually allowed to have two. The other two villages that I visited, Chengyang and Xhioshaing were similiar to Ping An but had different minorities namely the Dong. Again they have their own traditional dancing and music which they demonstrate on a daily basis. The spectators are also "encoouraged" to take part as it's not all to dissimiliar from a ceili at home although I was very dissappointed when they wouldn't allow me to demonstrate the Siege of Ennis!

Dali
I next travelled to Dali in Northern Yunnan going via Kunming and Guiyang. Dali is a very pleasant place despite being well and truly on the tourist trail and is very popular with ex-pats who decide to base themselves in China. I had gotten used to people in almost every town in China coming up to me in the evenings and whispering "massage-e, massage-e, sex, sex", but in Dali it was slightly different in that middle aged women in traditional costumes would approach me whispering "Hashi, Hashi, smokey, smokey" and judging by the look of some of the expats they were availing of the offer on numerous occasions.

LiJiang and the Tiger Leaping Gorge
A 3 hour bus ride North brought me to the town of Lijiang with its matriarical Naxi minority. As Lijiang is also near the Tibetan border there is a large population of Tibetans in the town so as I hadn't planned on going to Tibet (at least this time!), Tibet decided to come to me. I ended up in a local Tibetan bar for the two nights I was there which was great as the staff dressed in traditional costumes etc performed traditional songs and dancing.

Lijiang was the jumping off point for an arduous but ultimately rewarding two day trip through Tiger Leaping Gorge which I completed with a couple of English guys. We stayed in a hostel on the gorge overnight where the food was just amazing and the view of the star saturated night sky magnificent. We spent another night in Lijiang before making our way to Dali to catch what we thought would be the overnight train back to Kunming. Despite independently checking the net and having all the time in the world it turned out that by the time we reached the station the last train had left and there was no option but to get the overnight bus which as well as having berths built for Chinese people only, managed to keep breaking down throughout the night. The two English guys came very close to missing their flight as a result. I had a full day in Kumning before catching another overnight bus to Hekou on the Vietnamese border - there were no trains due to the line being closed as a result of a landslide a few years ago - and crossed the border into Vietnam on the 21st December.








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Datong - The Yungang cavesDatong - The Yungang caves
Datong - The Yungang caves

All of the statues would have been painted in the same way as this one. A wooden strucure (most now eroded) would have been put in front of the statue to protect it from the elements.
Xi'an - Terracota ArmyXi'an - Terracota Army
Xi'an - Terracota Army

When you gotta go, you gotta go ..........
Xi'an - Terracota ArmyXi'an - Terracota Army
Xi'an - Terracota Army

How to look like a complete dick in 5 seconds or less!


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