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Published: October 23rd 2005
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What can one say about spending three days on a Chinese train? By the time we reached Beijing, Gerry and I had grown accustomed to the constant guttural hacking, noodle slurping, toilet stench and crying babies accompanying perhaps every train in this vast country. The train was hardly full, and yet it seemed like we were all crawling over each other every time we got out of our tine beds. Besides the obscene amounts of book reading we did, most of the trip included looking out of the window at the countryside whizzing by. The color scheme of China seems to be different than other countries. It included lots of grays, dark reds, greens yellows and black. About every 10 minutes we would pass another pollution belching factory. I have actually been pretty taken aback at the sheer amount of pollution here. China is certainly doing its part in contributing to global warming. And of the 3 days we were on the train, not one had blue skies or sun.
We were pretty excited to pull into the train station. What beautiful, beautiful toilets!!! Upon recommendation of nearly every traveler we came across, we checked into the Far East International Youth
Great Wall Greatness!
(just ignore the other tourist in the background) Hostel. A glorious place! It's full of interesting people to chat with, including the genius Chinese kids who hang around the entrance of the hostel to practice their English.
I accidentally ran into Mark, an amiable lawyer from LA I had met in Hanoi in the hostel cafe. I hung around him and his American dorm mates the first few days I was here and got my bearings. Bearings and shopping, that is! Yes!! Mark was going home in a few days so we had 2 days of hard core shopping with a trip to the Great Wall in between. What a great introduction to Beijing!
Mark and I signed up for a day long tour of the Wall. We hopped on a bus to Jinshanling in the morning and hiked 5 hours to Simitai. The Wall was more incredible than I expected. Looking in any direction during the walk was a perfectly beautiful scene - making it difficult to take a bad picture. It was hardly crowded and we took our time enjoying the magnificence of it all and trying not to break our necks on the un-restored portion of the hike.
Our journey ended in Simitai. There was
a mile long walk down to the parking lot. But we splurged and took a $4 zip-line ride down. According to a rusted sign at the entrance. The "Flying -Fox" passed Chinese safety tests. Heh... Definitely not reassuring. But were strapped on and took our chances, anyway. Gliding from the top of the wall, across the lake and to the bottom, I was 三smiling all the way. And even more so when I realized we were being hand cranked all the way down by a guy at the end. That's China for you....
On his last night in China, Mark took me out for some Peeking Duck. Very very nice. Actually that was my second best meal of the trip. The first being my evening out at Outback Steakhouse with a group of home-sick Americans. A meal that will live on for months. ;0
It's great being back in a big city. It's the most metropolitan city I have been in since Bangkok. I went into a REAL drugstore the other day and just lingered at the beauty products. I also had a Blizzard at DQ and guilt free meal at McDonalds. There....I came clean!
I've really been enjoying walking
Wait! That's not the colonel!!
Chinese version of KFC...yumm? up to Tiananmen Square from the hostel. It's a great 2 Km walk past hundreds of little shops selling fake branded clothes...and just about everything imaginable.
I went to see Mao a few days ago as well as the Natural History Museum that holds an incredibly grotesque collection of human bodies and body parts in formaldehyde on the 3rd floor. I had been cautiously looking at deformed babies in jars upstairs all by myself..when I realize I was not alone. Something was tugging at me to turn around....and I found myself greeted by three full human cadavers. The most unsettling, a very well preserved woman with her chest cut open and black bags over her hands, feet and head. On a scale of creepiness from 1 to 10, I rate that experience an 8.5. A definite "must see" when in Beijing!
These past few days I have been walking an insane amount! In fact, I have walked the tread completely off my tennis shoes. My biggest day yet was the Forbidden City. I am not sure I have ever walked so much in my entire life. But it was well worth it. Being the odd history/museum person that I am, I had
3rd Class Sardines
Life on a Chinese train a wonderful time using my little map and walking all over the Palace with my little audio guided headset. Bliss...
Gerry and I leave for Ulan Bator, Mongolia tomorrow morning on yet another overnight train.
Joy of joys! But this is it...my Trans Siberian excursion has finally begun!! And nothing but good stories have been passed around about Mongolia here at the hostel.
I am having trouble posting my photos here in Beijing. But until then, have a gander at the Chinese New Years celebration in Nagasaki last spring. I know...it's not really China..or related to anything I have written about...but you still might find them entertaining.
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Christy Busch
Hmmm...
I know..the picture link doesn't work. Chalk that one up to my persistant case of computer illiteracy. Will try again as soon as I can!