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Published: August 2nd 2009
Before we left Wuhan I (Sarah) had been feeling a little unwell but decided just to try and sleep it off on our overnight train to Nanjing.
We successfully made it onto the train but as the hours passed and my trips to the trains, shared steel 'squat', toilet became more frequent it became clear that I had travellers poo bum (amazing luck). As if that wasn't bad enough (having the a dose of the most uncontrollable runs in a shared squat toilet for a period of 12 hours on a hard sleeper train ), when morning arrived and it was time to step off the train my body, convententially, decided that it had enough and when I tried to put on my bags to get off the train, it decided to faint!!
I fell off the seat I had managed sit on and fell onto the aisle of the train with a large bang. Chris informed me that when I fell to the ground my eyes where wide open the whole time and totally unresponsive. When I awoke I was so confused. I could see Chris leaning over me and then as my vision panned out I
Silly swim hats
Amazing how crazy 48 hours in a hotel room will make you. realised that there 12 more faces in the form of panic crazed chinese train attendants screaming, shouting and pushing each other. I think its fair to say they do not cope well with a crisis!!
We managed to get off the train with the 'help' of a few attendants and I was instructed to sit on my bag while they all rushed off to get a doctor and a wheelchair. Now given that China is very paranoid about swine flu we decided not to hang around for fear of being put into quarintine - so a little confused and very weak we managed to hide from the panic crazed attendants in a stairway near the exit.
Chris, carrying all our bags and practically holding me up, managed to find and check us into a lovely 4 star hotel beside the train station. The room was lovely with a great view over the lake and city. I just couldn't wait to be well enough for us to get out and enjoy it all.
I got better after 48 hours. To test my renewed feeling of well being we decided to use the swimming pool in our hotel. In
China you have to wear a swimming cap, the only swimming caps that our hotel had available were crazy looking pink / polka dot ones. The perferct look for Chris I thought. Afer the receptionist searched through a total of 4-5 boxes she eventually found a groovy looking green one for Chris (much to my disappointment). (I was really hoping the girl couldn't find 'boy' colours so Chris would have to wear one a nice pink polka dot little number). We had a relaxing swim and were both glad that I was nearly fully recovered. We made it into downtown Nanjing that evening for a walk about.
Happy to be well again and pleased to be have been able to get out for a little sight seeing, we made our way down to reception to check out. On the glass elevator journey down to the check out desk Chris started to look a bit green and, just as the lift arrived at the ground floor, had to run to nearest bathroom. One of the hotel staff helped me gather up our bags and brought them to reception only to realise that he would have to take them back up
to the nineteenth floor. We checked back in for another 24 hours of travel sickness fun. In the lift on the way back to our room the friendly hotel employee was seemed puzzled, complemented and or impressed at our inability to check out of the hotel remarking "you must really like our hotel".
In short we saw virtually nothing of Nanjing, excpet the toilet in our room and about 7 movies.
Waiting for our train to Suzhou we did manage to head down to the lake and enjoy the views for a while. Nanjing looked like an amazing city and I am sorry we didn't get to explore it more. I think we will have to venture back one day.
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liliram
liliram
Just had to say something!
Your blog caught my attention. I have a similar blog....entitled "Misadventure in Nanjing" about my trip there in 2007. Like you, I was terribly in need of sleep (but my tummy's fine) and I fell , hit the pavement so hard it broke my eyeglasses, brought to a hospital to incise and pull out a small screw and a shard from my eyeglasses that got stuck near my right eyebrow. What a scare! I'm happy to say the chinese docs and nurses were very, very nice. I also only paid for the anesthesia, meds........the ultrasound, the incision (which they say is "operation") , use of emergency room and operating room, etc all went free. Anyways, nice blog. Keep them coming!