The only Laowai in the village

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Since leaving Xian we have not seen any other foreigners so we think we can lay just claim to the title of ‘the only Laowai in the village’

Oct 30
Hanzhong
We had a day off to explore this medium sized city. We put ourselves at the mercy of the local hairdressers who spoke no English. The usual sign language and pointing at the occasional useful word in our phrase book served its’ purpose. They wanted to give me a perm but I wasn’t ready for something quite so radical - I ended up with short hair and a fringe instead! Still it was a much needed change in appearance. Nigel’s camera bag needed repairs to the zips and the local tailor (in her position on the pavement on the street corner) was up for the challenge. A crowd began to gather as the repairs took place, by the time they were complete there must have been about a hundred people gathered - really we are not that entertaining! We gave the tailor a big wave as we cycled past the next day with the newly repaired bag mounted on the handlebars and her big smile seemed to indicate job satisfaction.

Oct 31

We stayed in our cheapest hotel yet, 20 Rmb 1quid 30p. A birthday party was going on downstairs and a few drunken members of the crew were keen for us to join them. A few shots of the vile tasting rice vodka with a drunken policeman and his friend were enough for us and we made a strategic retreat to our room.

Nov 1
What an amazing day we had today. We awoke to a scene of small school children doing callisthenics in the school playground. The sun was out and the smoky polluted haze had lifted, and everywhere were picture perfect scenes in the mountain hill villages. The bright yellow of the corn bushels drying added cheery colour to the mud brick homes. Labour intensive farm work was going on in the terraced plots and rice paddies, but not so intensively that the people didn’t stop to greet the laowai (foreigners). As always, the Chinese were upbeat and friendly. It is entertaining to see that here the roads are not at all sacred; they are in fact the ideal place to lay out your crop for drying. Corn, persimmons, chilli, berries, mushrooms, and seeds all spread or finely raked at the side of the road.

Nov 2

Today we crossed the border between Shaanxi and Sichuan province. It seemed like arriving in a different country - the first indicator was that our G108 road had been hijacked and turned into a car only road, right in the middle of the mountains with no other roads available. We ignored the no bikes sign (well that is what you do in China, rules are only suggestions) and luckily the cops ignored it too, only stopping to take souvenir photos of us with their cameras and waving cheerily. Having our photo taken in China has become a regular occurrence; the Chinese seem to regard us with the same curiosity that we regard them. The road seemed strangely lifeless in it’s new form with metal barriers preventing exit or entry except at designated points, and like a European road, used only for driving, and not for drying out crops, driving livestock, meandering at will, or cycling. We were amused to see that a few of the barriers had had their screws strategically removed to allow local entry and exit and also to note animal droppings inside the tunnels (you can take the China out of the road but you just can’t take the China out of the people!)
Eventually we escaped this road and re-entered an old and un-maintained section of the G108. School kids marching in a kind of human train shouted out a chorus of hellos. Just before Guanyuan a thousand Buddha’s stared down through the ages from a cliff wall at us.
A young boy attempted to practice his English on us as we cycled into the city. This is another common occurrence - a school kid will cycle alongside us for a while practising a few choice phrases. Unfortunately this one crashed his bike as his school books fell off his rear carrier. Luckily he was unhurt and so was Nigel (as the boy had rear-ended his bike) but his pride was definitely wounded. Nigel cheered him up by presenting him with a bungee cord and securely strapping on the wayward books.

Nov 3
We were horrendously lost trying to leave the city; it took 26km before we had located the G108. For any other cyclist attempting this route, just follow the signs for the airport, it is on the G108, the road which goes left at the start of the expressway.
After locating the road we seemed to spend all day cycling through suburbia, and the scourge of China that is white ceramic tiling on all the buildings. Calls of ‘Laowai’ followed us all day.

Nov 4
The scenery changed again today and we found ourselves cycling through an ancient forest of Cyprus along a ridge. Arriving in the small city of Jian Ge we were impressed by the bustling Sunday market and the character of the hutongs and decided to end the day there. As we explored the local market, we were greeted by some school girls ‘Welcome you come to my school’ Being a Sunday we couldn’t imagine much would be going on at the school and we continued to browse the markets. One girl popped up every now and then, presenting us with small gifts, sugared fruit on sticks, and lucky charms. Each time she pressed us further to come to her school. Eventually we agreed, imagining it would be just the boarders at the school, and that they would crowd around and we would have to set a limit to it. Arriving at the large school we were first given a short tour by the proud girls. Just as we were about to excuse ourselves, they called their English teacher who appeared almost at once.
He explained to us that we were in a poor province, the pupils never get the chance to interact with foreigners, and would we mind introducing ourselves to the class? How could we refuse? We were split up and taken to separate classrooms. As I walked in the door of the candlelit room (there was a power cut) 80 pupils raised their heads from their books and leaned forward with eagerness written all over their faces. I was introduced as an ‘English teacher’ and received a big round of enthusiastic applause. And so began an hour of me speaking and explaining about my trip and fielding such questions as ‘why don’t you fly?’ ‘what do you think of Chinese culture?’ and ‘what do you think of the way china is developing?’ and other such challenging questions.
Nigel spoke to 3 classes, I spoke only to 2. It was a great experience though I think the pupils would have got more out of it if I had been more prepared and had some props!
The English teachers of the school then took us out to dinner, an amazing vegetarian banquet, and insisted on meeting the cost of our hotel (totally unnecessary as I’m sure we got as much out of the experience as the pupils did). The pupils work 7 days a week and from 6am - 9:30pm though there must be some personal discretion as we met the students in the town. Apparently the long hours are necessary to bring the students up to the level of the bigger city schools, the schools they attend at a young age leave them unequipped to compete with the city kids academically.

Nov 5

Another day amongst the Cyprus trees - the road was blissfully quiet today, but I ate some dodgy tofu and came down with a violent stomach bug.

Nov 6
A day in bed for me, for Nig a quiet day exploring the small town of Zitong.

Nov 7
Back on the road. The hills have subsided but we kept the day short as my energy was low. A dreary polluted haze settled around us.

Nov 8
So close and yet so far from Chengdu! We were only 100km from Chengdu, and the ride had deteriorated into some kind of living hell. The G108 was no longer surfaced and everywhere we looked everything lay under a thick layer of dirt. Plants and homes drooped under the dirt, we could barely see ahead of us and as we were bouncing and shaking over pot holes heavily laden trucks were belching and carrying out overtaking manoeuvres which coated us in fresh layers of dirt. As one went to overtake I thought Nig had called out ‘Stop’ (really he had called out ‘Go!’) Anyway I stopped, he rear ended me and I ended up in a pile of dirt at the side of the road, thoroughly demoralised from a combination of being unwell and the hellish conditions. As I threw a little tantrum and prepared to divorce my bicycle, the usual curious onlookers observed the strange behaviour of the Laowai (foreigner). Squatted at the side of the road patiently, they had far worse problems to deal with - the giant load on their truck had become unstable and the boxes were sliding off. It was going to be a major job to re-load it. But at that time I was only feeling sorry for myself. We made the decision to back track to Mingyuan and take a bus. As we headed back, we had a flat tyre, and when we stopped to repair it I stood in dog shit and a million biting flies swarmed upon us. It was not our day but by now we were able to see the humour in it!
But things looked up when we reached Mingyuan and shortly we were on a bus to Chengdu. The bus took the road we would have been on for the first 50km and we were able to see that we had not missed much, the scenery would be beautiful were it not for the pollution. Still, a tinge of regret for not having completing the planned journey.

Trip notes

Oct 30 Day 197
Rest day Hanzhong
Hotel 120
Haircuts 35
Restaurant and food and drink 110
Bag repair 30

Total = 265 Y
Euro = 28


Oct 31 day 198
Hanzhong to Xinpu 63km
Hotel 20
Food and drink 37

Total = 57
Euro = 5.32

Nov 1day 199
Xinpu to Ningqiang 56km
Hotel 80
Food and drink 94
Internet 5

Total = 179
Euro = 17

Nov 2nd day 200
Ningqiang to Guan Yuan 82KM
Hotel 100
Internet 4
Groceries 14
Restaurants 50

Total = 168
Euro = 16

Nov 3rd Day 201 Guan Yuan to Km 1928 of G108
64 Km (it took us 26 km of being lost before we located our road at the edge of town)
Hotel 20
Rest 50
Groceries 17

Total = 87
Euro = 8

Nov 4 Day 202 Km 1928 of G108 to Jiange (45km) We stopped early to explore this lively town with it’s Sunday market and were invited to ‘introduce ourselves’ to a class at school.
Hotel 60 (cost of this met by the school) School also paid the deposit for our room 40 Y (refused to let us pay it back to them) and bought us dinner in a restaurant.
Repair to cycling shoes 10
Other food and drink 10.

Total = + 20 Y
Euro = +2

Nov 5 Day 203 Jiange to Zitong 78km
Hotel 100
Restaurant 40 (overcharged and served re-heated tofu which gave Sonya violent stomach bug)
Groceries 70

Total = 210
Euro = 20

Nov 6 Day 204
Rest day Zitong
Sonya ill so stayed in same hotel - it was fully booked so we had to move to the ‘executive suite’ 200Y.
Groceries 35

Total = 235
Euro = 22

Nov 7 Day 205
Zitong to Yuxian 45km
Hotel 40 Y
Food and drink 40Y

Total = 80Y
Euro = 7.5

Nov 8 Day 206 Yuxian to Mianyang + 15km (45km)(we backtracked at about 15km out of Mianyang due to the road conditions)
1 flat tyre - Nigel front
Bus to Chengdu 84Y
Restaurants 30Y
Hotel 60Y
Atlas 11 Y

Total = 185Y
Euro = 17

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Photos

Nigel gets his camera bag fixed..
much to the interest of the local population

Recycling in action
just outside Guanyuan, beyond the gate lies the hill of buddhas

the girl who bribed us to come to her high school...
she enticed us with toffee fruit

The Class at Jian Ge High School
I have never been so popular!

the vegetarian banquet with the English teachers
and there were yet more dishes to come

Water buffalo
the man behind is kind of surfing on a wooden thing!

Comments

[Cody]

Hey there, great blog! Impressive journey so far. Good luck! www.mytb.org/stephanieandcodyinchina (we've just started our trip into china and we hope to pass through Chengdu)