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Published: February 7th 2006
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Hi,
Now I am sure that I am in nowhere: it does not exist in the drop down list above so I chose Guilin...
Anyhow, I am in Guiang, the capital of Guinzou province.
The last few days were full of Chinese people and very few western tourists.
After visiting Longshi, where the rice teraces are, I have decided to continue up north and to explore some more minority villages in my way to Kunming, instead of returning to Guilin. In the Lonley Planet, this way is described as the 'back door' to Guinzou province where not many tourists do it. And indeed, I met very few western tourists but those few were very interesting (following).
In the bus journey from Sanjiang to Kaili, I had the 'chance' to watch the bad manners of the Chinese people. The woman sitting next to me was spitting at the floor every 10 minutes or so. The bus was going up and down through the monutains and the road was very curving. So, the old woman sitting in the left-front was vomitting every 10 minutes or so and so did the young girl sitting in the right-front. When they wanted to vomit, they
opened the window and a very cold wind was blowing inside the bus. I did not mind them vomitting outside the bus but the wind - it was very cold! All this concert was very well scheduled. The vomitting women vomitted one after the other in a cycle and between them, the spitting woman was spitting.
It was a wonderful bus ride.
When I arrived to Kaili and saw a western tourist, I sort af attacked him, trying to get some information about the area. His name was Armand, from France. We then walked together to a tourist information. The minority villages around Kaili are famous with their frequent festivals. It appeard that the day after should be a festival in one of the nearby villages. I offered Armand to travel together to the village the day after but he refused. I was suprised becuase this is the reason for people to travel to this area. But afterwards, when we continued talking, Armand told me the main reason for his travelling in China. He is in a private mission of taking pictures of prostitutes in big cities. In small villages it is probably less common. OK, everyone and his own
purposes.
In my guest house, I met 3 other western people. The most interesting among them was Akram who was born and raised in Tul Karem (West Bank) and for 7 years now he is studying in Bejing. He could speak quite good Chinese. He was accompanied with his wife, Laura, from Itali. The third lady was Michele, from Canada, with whom I shared the room. Michele is studying Chinese in Shanhai so she could speak some Chinese as well.
Later on, we all went to dinner which Akram insisted to pay the bill. Who would imagine this, in Israel, I don't meet people from Tul Karem and out of no where I meet one of them and also, he paid my dinner. That is how cousins should behave.
On the day after, I went with Michele to explore one of the minority villages. It was not a very interesting village beside the fact that we had an 'authenthic' lunch at the house of one lady. I keep trying on mingeling with the local people.
Those last days were very good. The only bad day was today where I could not find neither bus nor train to Kunming. It is
the ending of the new year holiday so everybody is on the road. The only option left was a flight. Michele left at around 11.00 so I was on my own without Chinese speaker assistent. My first mission was to get some cash. I went to a bank and gave them my passport and 100$ TC bill of American Express which is quite common all over the world. About 5 clerks, one after the other and together were exmining those 2 documents carfully, turning them upside down and vice versa for about 10 minutes. They even made a phone call to check this issue. Eventually the verdict was no, they cannot cash it but they offered me to take a bus and go to another branch where the TC could be cashed there. Of course that ATM was out of the question as well. I was very frustrated and I was about to leave for this other branch when I suddendly remmebered that I had some US $ cash. This they would accept and I finally recieved my desired yuans. Next misson was to find a travel agency to buy flight ticket. I was walking in the street, trying to
find a picture of am airplane but I couldn't. After a while, I entered another bank branch where I showed the clerk in my phrase book the Chinese word for a travel agency for an airplane. In order to emphesize 'airplane', I showed the clerk by mt hand an airplane. She then took me to a travel agency where I found a ticket for this evening.
It was difficult to manage myself but eventually I have succeeded. It takes more time, more frustration but no other choice.
Bye, Sharon
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ממש מסקרן המפגשים האלו, עם המטיילים,, עם המקומיים. עדין לא הבנתי למה הקיאו הנשים, אולי אוכל מקולקל? והמפגש עם ארמנד, יהיה מעניין לראות את התמונות שצילם. בכלל עולם הטיילים, עולם מופלא. ושרון, מה מעניין אותך בפרט בכל המקומות האלו?