Tim_Day 241 - 251 (China)

Day 241
It was a long plane flights from Prague. We didn’t really get much sleep except in the beginning. Luckily they played a few English movies that weren’t to bad (Mr. Mom, etc).
As we were descending into Beijing I was happy to be out of Europe and back in a more “toothy” country. Not only will China be nice to our wallets it will be much more adventure and exposure to a totally new culture. Europe was fun but in allot of ways was like America just a little different.

The sun was just coming up when we landed. The sky went from black to blue then to green and orange. It was really beautiful. The city was massive from what I could see and seemed like a tangle of industries and homes, and shopping centers all fighting for room. I could tell pretty easily that it wasn’t the same as Europe. The heat and smell was just different when we got off the plane. Even the old smelly man next to me on the bus to the terminal smelled different. Different in a bad way unfortunately for me.

We got our bags from the rack with a sigh of relief they made it and headed outside. The first thing we saw was a huge Starbucks sign. It felt like we were back home. Damn Starbucks are everywhere.

We walked the cat walk just outside the gate looking for our names on a sign in a sea of people. But all we got was funny stares and no name. So we bought a phone card and called the hostel. They said there guy was running late and would be there to pick us up in 20 minutes. We then did like typical Americans and got a coffee at Starbucks and sat waiting for our guy to pick us up.

Our guy came after 45 minutes and we headed into Beijing. The first impression riding down the street was WOW there are allot of everything. There are millions of buildings, bikes, cranes, construction, vendors, markets, etc. You name it and it was there times five thousand. Really interesting.

We got to our hostel and were pretty beat. We checked into our little 6-person dorm and our roommates were sleeping. So we decided to join them and ended sleeping till the middle of the afternoon. It was nice to sleep since I really didn’t get much sleep the night before on the plane.

After waking up we went to a local small restaurant to have some food. We ordered some small lamb kabobs and some fried rice. It was really good and I tried to savor the desire to eat Chinese food. Since I know in a few weeks that same meal will be dreaded. It was also nice to see the bill at the end which included two drinks and was only US two dollars. Now that’s my kind of price.

We had heard that there was a good place to get a massage just around the corner. In fact there were about 20 places right around the corner but the guy in our room recommended this one place. Ana and I both wanted a massage and my back was actually killing me from the night on the plane and the last few weeks. A massage sounded great.

We found a place that I think was the one they recommended. We ordered the full body massage for 1 hour for $8 US dollars. They took us to the back and laid us down in the small room. Two guys came in and started massaging us. The guy massaging me wasn’t bad. I had wanted a girl but the nice thing about a guy is they have stronger hands. Man how gay does that sounds.

Anyway they continued over the next hour to massage both of us. The massage was really nice and some of the techniques were different than from than what I had experienced in massages in the States. Not that I had many but they never massages my scalp. It seemed like they were pushing pressure points. Whatever it was it was nice and really relaxed me.

When we were done they tried to up sell us on another massage with oil, or the cups on our back. They didn’t know any English so it was hard to understand them. In the end I decided to do the flaming cups on my back. In the States I had allot of back problems when I was younger. I went to a Chinese Acupuncture/Chiropractic guy and with the flaming cups, a back adjustment and ultra sound he had cured me in only a couple visits. I was game for the cups again and maybe they would help with some of the off and on chronic back pain I had been having in the past few years.

They came in with a whole tub of glasses. I should have known from that point but oh well what you can do. The guy I went to before only had small cups and only put them in the places where I had pain. This guy though used cups about 3 times the size and put them all over my back. He started by lighting a small swap with alcohol on it. They he would wipe it in the cup creating a small fire inside then place it on my back. When he did that the fire would burn out all the oxygen and create suction. That suction after about 15 minutes created huge “hickies” on my back. It was a little painful but not that bad. It was nice to get them off in the end.

When the cups were removed your back looks really bad but it doesn’t hurt. Just like a “hickey’s” don’t hurt neither did these. But Ana was pretty grossed out by the look of my back and it was pretty funny. My entire back was pock a dotted with bruises. It’s only my first night in China and I look like a Circus monkey. They probably were laughing and it’s some kind of joke they play on Western people.

When we got back to the room we took some photos and it looked pretty bad. After the photos we decided to go have a beer and talk about how we were going to do the next part of our trip. We found a small local bar with a roof top patio and we headed up there. The beers were only 60 cents for a huge draft beer. Nice. Cheap beer is always a good thing. Makes any town seem nicer no matter how bad it looks.

We talked for a while till the place started filling up with crazy Chinese locals playing cards and dice and drinking. We also in the process met 3 Swedish girls and a Dutch guy. They were pretty cool and by the end of the night we had put down quiet a few beers and were playing Texas Hold’em using broken incense for money. Around 3:30 or 4:00 we decided to call it a night and head back to the hostel. Man I’m starting to feel like a drunk with all the drinking we’ve been doing. Oh well I’ll only be able to party like this for another few months and it’s back to the old grindstone. NOOOOOO.

I crashed pretty hard in the bed. And fell asleep with no problem. The room had AC which was really nice.








Day 242
Of course for some dumb reason my butt woke up at 5:30 am in the morning and I couldn’t get back to sleep. I was pretty pissed about that. It was the middle of the morning according to my body clock but that didn’t matter. Instead of sleeping in till 2:00pm the next day I was up at 5:30. WHY?

Rather than just sit in bed all morning I decided to get up and shower. After that we had our wonderful breakfast and headed to the PSB to try and extend our visas. No such luck though on getting an extension when we got there. They said they would be able to extend our month visa but if we did it that day they could only give us one more extra day. Brilliant. Damn Communist need to keep such tight control of everything. Man that drives me nuts. Oh well I’m in there country and need to live with it if I want to travel here.

After the failed attempt at the PSB we headed down to try and find the Lama Temple. The streets were really tough to understand but I was able to get us there not by the street signs but by intuition. In the end though we did find the temple. I knew we had the right area when we started seeing the tour busses and the guides holding there little flags with hoards of people behind them trying to keep up.

We bought a ticket and entered the temple complex. I had noticed about 100 different incense vendors just outside the gate and wondered if the Chinese people must really enjoy incense. But the first thing we saw was a crowd of about 50 people all trying to light a handful of incense in a large fire. Once they were light they would bow and pray to this part of the temple. It had some sacred meaning I had no idea what was. Was an interesting sight because this temple wasn’t just for viewing but actually was more of a living church that people really were using to pray. Later I found out that this church was the largest Tibetan Temple for Buddhism outside of Tibet. That and it was really beautiful for tourist drew a big crowd.

After checking out the crazy Chinese lighting incense and praying we headed into the first set of gates. The place was really crowded but at the same time very beautiful. I’m sure if the crowds were about 5% of what they were it would be a very peaceful and religious place.

The architecture was the similar to what you imagine in your head of a Chinese temple. Red walls with intricate decorations and cures then the sloping roof with gray tiles and color. It was really beautiful and the same look and feel was echoed throughout the entire temple ground, which I would imagine were about half a mile squared.

We fought our way through the temple for about an hour until we got to the final large building. When we looked inside there was a massive standing Buddha. It was huge and I was wondering how they got it inside the building because it looked like the only way they got it there was in pieces and I couldn’t see the assembly marks on it. In the end I found out that the Buddha was a huge single piece of carved wood. It was so large that it was in the Guinness books of world records. It was made of a tree I had never heard of and was at least the size of a Sequoia. Man it was massive. They had to have built the building around the statue. Really cool to see and an unexpected jewel like that.

After the Buddha we were pretty tired and headed for the gate weaving our way through the heaps of people. Outside the temple we decided to walk back home. That simple inch or so on the map was a pretty good walk and we were tired when we finally reached the hostel. We decided to crash again for a little bit in the middle of the day since we were running really low on gas. We did so and sleep about 3 hours. I felt more human after that little nap.

We got up in time to eat again at the local little restaurant. This time though we ordered something special and it wasn’t so special. It was really bad and to top it off I got a peak into the kitchen when the guy opened the door and I wasn’t to excited to see the inside. It was extremely dirty and black and about the size of a small closet. There were about 3 people crammed in there trying to move and cook. Nice.

Later we found out that our roommate that told us about the place was having stomach problems and a tough time eating anything the last couple days. I told him thanks for the recommendation. He didn’t think it was the place but I’m pretty sure it was. We decided not to eat there anymore. Our stomachs will be forced to eat in placing like that enough on this trip. We don’t have to give it more.

After our fine fresh and clean dinner we headed with one of the staff of the hostel to a local place that gives acrobatic performances. To our surprise the show was actually really entertaining. All the performers were really young and I don’t think any of them were over 15 years old. They did all kinds of crazy feats that only a rubber person could do. Was really amazing and the one thing that blew me away was that I only saw one mistake the entire 1.5 hour show. Wow.

The one thing that made me a little sad was to see such young children in those positions. I can only imagine they have to train extremely hard to do what they do. I can’t imagine a kid willingly practicing and training that hard to get to the level they were at such a young age. They must live, breath, and eat acrobatics. I can only hope they find some joy what they do. I didn’t see allot of life and joy on their faces just dead cold concentration most of the time.

Outside of that the show was fantastic and we really enjoyed it. After the show we headed back to the hostel and crashed.








Day 243
Again for some reason I watched the sun rise in the morning again. Not sure what the heck is wrong with me but that’s what I did. I was tired but couldn’t sleep. So we got up and ate then headed to the Forbidden City. I was pretty interested in seeing the city that you would be killed if you stepped in only a few hundred years ago. I love to be in places that in time someone like me could have never been. It was really an amazing feeling.

The Forbidden City was the seat of power for over 500 years and 2 dynasties. Pretty amazing. I guess the emperors hardly came outside of the complex and pretty much lived their entire lives within the walls of the city. That kind of life would be pretty hard for me to imagine. I guess if you’re born into it then it would be all you know.

We taxied to the front gates and got the tickets to get in. We wandered around the site for the next few hours. The architecture was pretty much the same throughout. The scale of the city was amazing. I think it takes up 70 square kilometers. The walls and buildings were incredibly large and there were massive open courtyards.

The one thing that was nice to see in the Forbidden City was a Starbucks. Sure enough inside the walls there it was. Nice. It was pretty hidden but it was there. We ended up stopping at a local small place for a cup of coffee and a short break. We both couldn’t support a Starbucks there. I’m glad we felt the same. I support them everywhere else just not there. It didn’t seem right.

We continued to the end of the city with all of it starting to look the same and become actually a little boring. We were starting to get a little “Templed Out”. That happens when they all look the same and you don’t have a good grasp of the history of the sites. Hard to connect and feel anything. Maybe a tour guide would have helped peak our interest. But in the end we spent about 2 hours and had enough of the temple.

We excited the back and we were dropped of right into the Tiananmen Square. That was cool to see and it was funny to see a massive portrait of Mao at the entrance. We bought some tickets and went up to the gate tower. It was a nice view of the city. The one thing that was really funny was that there was a large police or army presence. Not sure which one but they were there all over the place with their pressed uniforms and polished guns. Also there were cameras everywhere including the lamp poles and sides of buildings. I’m sure they want to keep a close eye on that square.

We walked on the square where tanks rolled in and killed thousands of protestors. According to what I read no one was actually killed on the square but all were killed on the streets surrounding the square. Being there and feeling so watched and managed really gave me a deeper understanding and experience of Communism. Its control of the people and you feel it in the air. The government is the boss and don’t mess with them.

While we were in the square Ana got asked to take a picture with two Chinese girls. It was pretty funny and we had heard about this happening to other people. Pretty funny but for some reason they like to take pictures with Western people. They really like the blond girls and it’s even worse for them. Ana loved it though and she felt like a movie star.

After the square we tried to walk to a famous local place for getting Peking duck. But because the streets were so badly marked and the map sucked we ended up getting a little lost and I wasn’t in the mood to hunt down the place. So rather than a Chinese wonderful lunch we had KFC. Our stomach preferred the KFC and it was a nice was to settle our stomachs. Ana has also been dealing a little with her stomach so she wanted some Western food as well. That always seems to happen when we enter a new area. Hopefully though like all the other countries we start feeling better in a few weeks. I think you just have to get used to the local bacteria.

After the wonderful meal we taxied back to the hostel and again. I tried really hard to stay awake and was able to till about 8:30. I was beat and finally surrendered to the overwhelming pull to go to sleep.







Day 244
I woke up again at about 5:00 in the morning. Not sure why the hell that is but it sure is. Whatever. At 6:30 we all pilled in the small bus to head out on our 3-hour video game ride to the wall. When I say video game I mean it felt like you were in a video game. From diving through traffic to blind corner passing cars you name it the driver did it. Welcome reminders were back to the Asian world of driving. The funny thing is that way of driving doesn't seem to be illegal since we passed allot of police cars while doing some amazing stunt. I must say the driver is pretty good or just lucky. I imagine he's good and that makes me feel better.

Anyway we arrived to the drop point of the wall. After a brief poorly English spoken explanation we were sent on our way to walk the 10k section of the wall. Everyone pretty much didn't understand what the guy said we were supposed to do and when we were supposed to meet. We asked questions to them but somehow ended up feeling more lost after asking questions. Man I don't miss that and I really miss Europe and the intelligence level in those moments. Luckily we followed the "guide" and cut off the main road to the wall early. The large part of the group ended up walking straight and doing about another extra 2k walk. Pretty funny.

We headed straight up the hill and the first sight of the wall was impressive. In my mind I checked off another of the "things I need to do before I die" list. It was great to see. The hills were extremely hilly and the wall cut through it like a snake all the way to the far mountains where you could barely see it. Really an impressive feat.

As we made our way to the top I started to realize the nice ladies walking with us who didn't really speak any English were actually vendors in disguise. They were asking questions and saying simple things like "its cold" and "beautiful wall". They were cute and if they wanted to follow us up the steep hill to the wall it was fine with me. They were kind of old so I can't imagine them lasting too long.

Sure enough as we got close to the wall they were starting to sell us postcards and t-shirts. What was kind of cute was starting to get annoying and it was hard to enjoy the wall with someone stopping every time you do and constantly trying to say something in their broken English.

By the time we got to the wall it was even more beautiful. The wall was built out of bricks, which surprised me. I'm not sure what I thought it would be but bricks seemed very advanced. They had to build them out of mud, fire them, and then transport them here. There were billions of them used to build the wall. I guess I was thinking it was stone or something that actually would be much more work.

Once we got on top we headed down the wall to check it out. I was hoping the vendors (Older Chinese ladies) would eventually tire and die out but that wasn’t the case. In fact they were like little Carl Lewis. They shadowed us for at least an hour before my temper got the best of me and I was saying rude things to Ana like “There’s no way in hell I’m giving these ladies any money!”. I’m pretty sure they understood a fair amount of English and I think they got the point eventually. It was so frustrating and it’s hard to be cruel to such nice people but in the end they were really disrupting my experience of the wall and that was making me mad. I just wanted to watch and enjoy it not have someone all over me moving everywhere I did and literally about 5 feet from me at every moment. It was very frustrating but in the end we did loose them and only the ones that were sitting down bothered us on our way past them. That was much nicer.

We were told the hike was easy and we had 5 hours to do the 10k walk. That didn’t sound too bad until we started walking. The part of the wall we were walking was amazingly steep both up and down. The stairs also were really tall and the more we walked the less managed the wall was until eventually it was very much in ruins. It was really beautiful to see the wall that way and the nice thing was that there were hardly any people with us. At time we had the wall to ourselves and that was really a beautiful experience.

We walked and enjoyed the wall for the next couple hours. Most of the tail was really badly managed and bushes were growing all over the wall. The trail was a little treacherous and we had to take it slow and easy. The weather keep changing in the valleys from really cold and windy to the uphill summits of sun and sweating.

About 3 hours into the walk we started moving with a little more speed. I wanted to just enjoy the wall but I wasn’t sure how far we had to go and our great guide gave us really bad directions. In fact none of the people we knew even knew the restaurant we were supposed to meet up at. He said the name in Chinese and we all just looked at him dumbfounded. Then when we asked him again where the restaurant was where we were meeting and the name we still looked at him dumbfounded. I thought I was the only dumb one but it turned out no one understood him. That’s the way things work in these countries I guess.

As we walked I could see the wall stretching forever into the distance and I was thinking we had to do one more very large mountain before we had to meet up with the group. Luckily toward the end we saw a bridge the guide mentioned and we thought we were getting close. We ended up being right on time and finding the bus after a little hunting.

The wall in the end was a great experience. It is such a simple idea. Let’s build wall around the country to protect it. They had no concept of airplanes or bombs. For them they could defend the country with a really large wall. In the end though the wall didn’t really work. I could see that just in walking on it. It wasn’t very tall off the ground only about 10-20 ft max. Which in my opinion seems pretty easy to penetrate. I also think moving troops along the wall would be very hard since the stairs were steep and massive. Carrying weapons and food must have been a nightmare. Also I think if the enemy found a weak point of the wall (which I saw many) and they waited for the cover of fog or night I think they could pretty easily penetrate the wall. One other thing was it would take about 6 million China men to man the wall. I’m sure they have allot but that was kind of crazy. Either way it was an impressive feat and I hope all the men who lost their lives building it did not do so in vein.

After the wall we were all pretty tired. The video game drive back home seemed much quicker since both Ana and me took a nap in the middle. After we got back to the hostel we were pretty worn out. We hung out in the room and then ate dinner at a very good little Chinese place down the road. Ana practiced eating with chopsticks, which she isn’t too good at. I helped her learn the shovel technique where basically you hold the chopsticks about .5 inches apart and shovel the food into your mouth. It’s the best way to get food from the plate to your stomach with chopsticks when your have no skill. We had a large beer each with the dinner and I managed to give the waitress a huge tip by mistake. The meal was 27 Yean and I gave her a 50Y thinking I gave her only 30Y. When she came back I said keep the change. But the change wasn’t 3Y it was 23Y. She smiled and said “Sank You”. I felt really bad and stupid so I didn’t ask for the change back. Oh well I made her night. Ana also took the plastic chopsticks as a souvenir and to practice eating with.

After dinner I head the bed and fell asleep like a log. Man I was dead tired. I ended up falling asleep at around 8:30pm.







Day 245
Of course since I got to sleep so early I woke up in the middle of the night and watched the sun come up. Great. Another jacked up night of sleep. When the sun was just high enough to see I got up and took a shower then went outside for a walk down our street. Our hostel is on a pretty cool old alley that is in the middle of being upgraded. There is a ton of construction going on in time for the Olympics. It’s amazing to wake up on Sunday morning and see people working and all over the place. It seems like the Chinese never sleep or stop moving. Man there is just a million of them all over the place.

I went looking for a coffee but to my surprise nothing was open. I think it was 5:30 or so it made sense. In the end I just sat outside on a small bench and read and watched the city wake up. An old man came up and smiled and tried talking to me in Chinese. They are so nice and friendly. It’s really funny because I just feel like all they want to do is talk and know more about my Western background and me. I guess I’m just very interesting to them. Nice to feel like were in a country that doesn’t mind us being here and allot of times actually feels like they want us here. That is a welcome relief I must say from Europe where many parts give you the impression they don’t want you there and you’re a pain in the ass to them.

Ana woke up a little later and we had out Oh so yummy free breakfast. I had the “Chinese” breakfast that was dumplings, some rice and a weird flavored sprout thing that went in the rice portage. The dumplings were eatable but the rice I couldn’t choke down.

We were pretty tired after breakfast and decided to just go back to bed and take a nap. The little nap turned into a 12:00 nap. We got up in the middle of the day and we both felt more energetic. Was a nice nap.

We took care of some scheduling details (train, hotel, etc) for the next city then headed with 3 other guys from the hostel to a local flea market. The ride over was interesting since our cab was trying to follow the other cab with the 3 other guys. Basically he had to drive like a mad man to keep up and I must say he did a great job.

The market was full of people and products. The bulk of the market was painting, sculptures, furniture, antiques, and jewelry. The sculptures were amazing and if I was leaving this town I would have bought a truck load. But unfortunately we not and I had to leave them on the counters. Also there were some really amazing paintings. The quality was superb and I almost bought some but in the end didn’t. I kind of wished I did. But oh well it’s too late now.

After about 2 hours we had enough and headed back to the hostel. In the evening we went and had Peking duck at a local restaurant with 3 other guys we had met. I wasn’t sure what to think of the duck in the beginning but you have to try it if you come to Beijing. In the end the duck was superb. It came sliced with half the head on one side of the plate and the other half on the other side. Luckily that was the only part outside of the meat. How you eat the duck is you take a small thin tortilla type thing and wrap the duck up like a burrito adding a little cranberry sauce, onions, and cucumber. It was really nice and Ana even liked it. She always seems to shy away from new food but this was something she liked.

After the dinner we headed to a local bar and got a drink. We were all pretty tired so we headed back to the hostel to crash. Once we got to the hostel our roommate Martin wanted to drink a couple beers and play Texas Hold’em. How could I say no? I was really beat but what was one beer and a couple games. Of course I had 4 large beers and a few games of Texas Hold’em. We would have played more but this crazy Chinese guy came over and wanted to play with us. He was really nice but very annoying. He could speak much English and he was really drunk. Eventually his willingness to try and speak English and his cartoon character won us over. We started trying to understand what his job was and after half an hour I think we understood he was a manager of some company. He said “I tell people what to do”. That’s about the most we really understood and it was extremely funny trying to communicate. We also played a card game where you have to tell a story with the cards and it was hilarious. In the end we just laughed all night and he was really funny. Crazy Chinese.

We headed out around 2:00am and crashed. I was really tired and partially drunk.








Day 246
We woke up around 10:30 Yeah! Finally I slept in. I felt pretty rested. Ana and I decided to get a bike and ride around to a local site then to a local 7-11 that we spotted in a taxi the previous day.

I was a little scared to have Ana on the crazy streets of Beijing with her minimal biking experience. But in the end she did very well. We first went to the drum tower, which was the center of the old Mongolian empire. Biking was easy and Ana did great in all the crazy zigzagging car, people, and bike traffic. Organized chaos is how I would describe the streets. The strong survive.

The drum tower was interesting. It was like a bell tower in America but they just use a drum instead of a bell. There were about 18 large drums ranging in width from 4-6 feet wide. We also were lucky enough to see them beat them in a replica reenactment of how they did it in the old days. The boom was big. I’ve never seen a drum that big and it was nice to see it and experience it.

The tower had a great view of the city, which was a sea of large building and people. Really amazing. 30 million people are a bunch of people. The city is just HUGE and really amazing.

After the tower we headed to the 7-11 where I cried when I walked in and saw no Slurpee machine. Man what kind of 7-11 is that! I told the owner he was crazy and he needed to shut the place down immediately. It was sacrilegious to not have a Slurpee machine. How could he do that? But he just said “Zing Bing Kling Ding Ming” which I think was something about my mom. I walked out because I wasn’t sure if that little guy knew Kung Fu or not. He could be a 95 pound – 80 year old killing machine. You never know in China. Better safe than sorry.

I got on my bike and road out into the distant sunset with Ana on my tail. We got as far as a local Mc Donald’s and gave into the urge and grabbed lunch there. Our stomachs were a little off so the local food was a good thing once again. Helped calm the beast.

We headed back to the hostel and spent about an hour catching up on emails. After that we got back on our bikes and went for another ride down around the local lake. The roads at that time of the day were much more interesting. There was at least 4 times the crowds on the street and it was pretty much chaos. After about an hour of riding and seeing the local lake and bars we decided to call it a day and just head back. So many people on the roads made cycling very intense and I was getting stressed out. I just wanted to walk and chill rather than be afraid for my life all the time.

So we walked to the local Mc Donald’s and once again got ice cream. We’ve been eating there way too much and I’ll be happy when there are no more around to temp me.


We spent the rest of the night relaxing and catching up on some emails and my blog. It was nice. We fell asleep to the sweet cold air spewing from the air conditioner sometime around midnight.








Day 247
Day seven in China consisted of us sleeping in for most of the morning. Finally I was able to sleep good all night long and that was wonderful. We lazed about and didn't really get out of bed till about 11:00.

We packed and put our bags in storage then went for lunch at the local restaurant called "Drum Fusion". Ana is getting pretty tired of the Chinese food and complaining. But I say it's Chinese or Mc D's, or KFC - Not the best of options. Poor things it's really early in our Chinese trip to be tired of the food. For me so far it hasn't been bad I just really hate eating Chinese food for breakfast. Dumplings and weird rice things are not my idea of a solid way to start the day.

After lunch we tried to head to the local mall to buy me some new pants. See I ripped the crotch out of my other ones when we hiked the Great Wall of China. I had a small hole that I repaired. When I that it caused the material to be stretched even tighter. So on one of the big tall steps on the wall I heard a Riiiiiip. Then pretty much for the next few hours I keep hearing smaller versions of that sound till the rip pretty much went down my leg. In the end it was about 5 inches long and that was enough to let the cold mountain air hit my delicate family jewels. It was time for a new pair of pants and we were headed to the mall to find some.

While in route to the mall I realized the directions the dumb girl at the reception put on the paper were wrong. It was too late so I just sat back and let the guy drive us to who knows where. We ended up at a mall that was super fancy. Not what I was looking for and I was pretty mad about that. But what can you do. We walked the mall for a couple minutes, had another Mc D's ice-cream and called it a day. We taxied back to finish out the day and get ready for our night train to Punyang.

Later that evening sometime around 6:00 we took a taxi for our overnight adventure on the trains. I wasn't sure what to expect. We had "Hard Sleepers" Whatever that meant and we would be in a triple bunked in one compartment.

Luckily we were headed to the same place another Australian couple was headed. We were able to share the cost of the taxi to the station and that was nice since it was about 45 minutes out of town. When we got to the station I was amazed. I had never seen such a massive train station. It was HUGE. The building was seemed to be bigger than any other building I've seen. Usually in America we build massive buildings upward and tall. This building wasn't so tall as it was wide and just massive in proportion. WOW that was just a train station. Of course they move some serious people through that station and once we entered it was a "Chinese mad house". That is much larger in scale and worse than an "American mad house".

We entered the building and got in line for our train. I must say it's not as bad as I thought to navigate this country. Luckily allot of the major places have numbers next to the symbol equivalent. That is really nice and makes things much easier. Also lucky for us the only other language they use on signs, maps, etc is English.

Once we were in line it wasn't really a line. See you stand there but if there is more than a millimeter of room between you and all 4 sides of you a little Chinese guy or girl will try to fit in. Damn that part of the culture drives me nuts. Oh well. I just need to close that massive gap and then they won't mess with me.

After about an hour the gates opened up and we were all corralled through them like a bunch of cows. It was nutty and Ana was getting claustrophobic. We finally made our way to our train and go inside. It was a Chinese mad house as well on the inside. There were people all over each other with bags and babies everywhere. To top the overcrowded train it was hot inside. Man wonderful. I ran to get our bags to the only luggage rack left. One guy got in front of me and put his small bags up there where I was going to put them. So I did like all other Chinese and took my heavy bag and smashed my bag on top of his. Ana had to sit on the little seats in the middle of traffic coming down the isle but I needed to just get in my tiny bed and chill for a bit to cool off. I was sweating and the crowds were bugging me.

Luckily the mattress was like the ones you find at the Hilton hotels. The only thing was it was only about half an inch high. I immediately understood the term "hard sleeper" and realized why they were about half the price of the "soft sleepers". But it was surprisingly not too bad. In fact I expected my arms to fall asleep and things like that but I really didn't have that many problems. I have a bad back so usually I'm much better on a stiff bed than a soft bowed bed.

Around 10:00 the lights went off in the train and everyone settled down for the night. I was really surprised to see everyone settle down and try to go to sleep. WOW in most countries there are enough people up and laughing and drinking or doing whatever to keep you up all night. But here the lights were off. You didn't have a personal light and that was it - time for bed. Pretty cool. I laid back and tried to fall asleep for hours upon hours. Finally at some point I would imagine around 3:00am I fell asleep.









Day 248
I woke up about 13 minutes after I fell asleep. My twisted and contorted body didn't really like the small 2 foot wide bed I was sleeping on. So I pretty much fought with my bed till that large ball of fire arose in the sky the next morning. I fought hard using moves like quick turning, fast footwork, flipping, twisting, and punching the pillow with my face. But by the end of the night I had been defeated and in the early morning hours I felt tired and my stomach feel off.

We got up and tried to figure out when to get off sometime around 5:30am. I finally tracked down a lady who said 7:00 is when we get off. I noticed that she was waking everyone up who needed to get off the train. She had to get the ticket they were holding off of them before they left the train. It was really nice and I hope they do that on the next train. I think part of my worry during the night was not hearing the alarm and missing our stop.

Sure enough at around 7:00 we rolled into a town that had to be Pingyao. We grabbed our bags and went out front to be mobbed by the taxi drivers. It wasn't too bad and we only got about 3 guys taunting us to take a ride with them. I must say they are by far very polite people and I've really enjoyed not having to fight with them too much.

We worked a guy down on the price and finally got him to 75 cents to take us to our hotel. It was early in the morning and the place looked pretty dead. The city of Pingyao was a very old and well preserved Ming Dynasty city. The entire city was surrounded by a wall about 20ft high and really well built of grey blocks. I was impressed at how well it was built as we approached it from the bottom. I could actually see how they could defend some pretty large enemies using this wall. Unlike the Great Wall of China it was much taller and wider and seemed well built and thought out. I'm sure it was built later and maybe they learned from the Great Wall what not to do.

We entered the city through one of the four main entrances to the city. The large open doors were impressively thick. Once inside it was a really amazing city. It was like a time locked city. I think how this city stayed so well preserved was that it was a huge banking city during the Ming Dynasty. So there was allot of money and the city was full of rich people with extravagant houses. Then within a short period of time the city and the banking systems collapsed leaving the city abandoned and useless. So no one really lived there of messed with the city for a long time till recently. Allot of the buildings are deemed cultural relics and that should hopeful preserve it in the future.

As we went down the main drag you could see the Ming style everywhere. The building were all touching each other and they were dark grey in color with typical Chinese style roofs made of once again dark grey bricks. The windows were very large and they all had a thin wood square patterns running through them. Each house had the same walls and roof but the windows are where the style seems to come it. Each had its own version of what seemed like the same thing. Very beautiful windows.

Also as you looked down the street you could see hundreds of red lanterns on the outsides of the buildings. I'm not sure the significance but they were beautiful and gave color and life to the rest of the otherwise grey street. Looking at the street I could totally see ninja's walking down the streets on a raining night with lightning lighting up their figures. It would make a very cool movie setting. They said several famous movies were filmed none of which I knew.

We arrived at our hotel only to our room wasn't ready and the hotel owner was trying to push us into another more expensive room. Damn you got to love the Chinese. I knew we were going to get into it at some point and here we were. We were no longer in civilized Beijing and it was fight for your life street verbal brawling again. She told us the room was way more than we reserved it for. We had to say "No were not paying that, you said it was this" and then she does the "Oh but we don't have room" shit. Then magically when we start to leave there is a room but it isn't clean. So we said ok and decided to leave our backpacks and go look for another place.

As soon as we left that place our taxi driver was trying to get us into his taxi to take us to his local hotel where he would get a great commission for bringing us there. So we said no thanks and ignored him following us down the street. We tried one place then on the second one we got to he beat us in and told the people he had brought us there. Nice scam.

We checked out the place and was able to get a Ming style room for the same price as the other one. We happily went back and got our bags. The lady wasn't happy and I said oh well tough luck for her. Next time she should try not being a punk. It felt nice to leave her with an empty room. Ana and I were getting better at following our instincts and just leaving if we feel the situation isn't right.

We unpacked in our room and settled down. It was a cute little room with a bed that was massive. The reason it was so massive is because it was a large piece of plywood with a .5 inch mat on it. I'm starting to think these Chinese beds are going to be all like that. Oh well surprisingly I'm not minding it too much. I actually enjoyed having such a large bed.

After getting settled in we headed out to get some food. We were pretty beat but I wanted to figure out the train tickets and eat before we took a nap or anything like that. We needed to be out of that little town in a maximum of two days or I would go crazy. It was amazingly beautiful but after two days I could tell there would be nothing more to do but the same. I much prefer to keep moving and seeing new things.

We found a nice little place to eat that had a Western style breakfast. We saw a large tour group leaving and knew it must be a little expensive but a good place. We sat down and ordered some omelets which were pretty good I must say. Ana is getting really tired of the food and complaining allot. I must say it's nice to not be the one hurting over the food. So far the food is ok and I'm surviving. Ana unfortunately is starting to hurt and that's not a good things. Good luck my love. Good luck.

After our Western breakfast Ana was feeling better. I was as well. We headed to the train station to try and secure a next day train ticket to Xian. When we got there we got a dumb lady who told us "No train ticket. Gone 5 days". Which meant they had sold out 5 days ago. Great. I was hoping our hotel had a connection or there was an underground way of buying tickets we just didn't know about.

We headed back to the hotel and tried to explain what we wanted to the girl who spoke a little English. But in the end she was so dumb it took about 20 minutes to get her to I think understand what we were asking her to do. We left the money and hoped the tickets would be bought. She said come back tomorrow and she will have the tickets. No way would I be back in about 5 hours to ask if she had them.

Having that done we decided to head up to bed and take a short nap. We were beat from the tough train ride in the night. Our nap lasted about 2 hours and after that we were feeling much better. We put on our chucks and headed out to cruise the town.

Once we got outside the city looked much different than it did early in the morning. They city had woken up and there were people everywhere. Vendors poured into the street and the people and bike traffic weaved constantly back and forth throughout the city. The weather was still pretty grey and sad. We decided to get lost walking in the city.

We eventually made our way throughout the city over the course of the next few hours. Many of the shops were selling antiques that were amazing. Man if I had a car I would have bought the city. They had old swords, bows, sculptures, pipes, etc. You name it they had it and all at a price you can't pass. But in the end I didn't want to carry any of it and we decided unless it was the most amazing piece in the world we wouldn't buy it.

We ate lunch at an ok place and pretty much spent the day enjoying the city. It wasn't very large so it quickly started feeling like we were tracking over the same grounds.

Towards the evening I went back to the hotel to ask if we had gotten our train tickets. I was starting to get worried we were going to be trapped in this damn little town for days. It was beautiful but one day was enough. Sure enough my nightmare was true. The girl with an IQ or 1 told us "No tickets". I said "Ok can we get it the next day" she said "Yes Yes, No tickets". In the end it took another 20 minutes to get the idea across we wanted to try to go the next day. I even had Ana get a calendar and we pointed and said train on this day. She only looked at me dumb and blank and said ok. Then she preceded to hand me the money back. Man it was SOOOOOOOO frustrating. I decided to let her keep the money and try to get a ticket I think on the day we wanted and then I would go and try to figure it out myself at the train station.

I left Ana behind and was getting really frustrated. I can get pretty bull headed when I want something and feel like I'm surrounded by idiots and people who don't understand what I'm trying to say. So I left Ana back to rest and I headed out down the streets like a bad ass American with an attitude.

Luckily I ran into a girl we met on the train and she said she was staying at a HI hostel in town. Those are pretty good hostels and usually deal with allot of people like me in the same situation. Sure enough I went there and they were able to help me out. They spoke great English and were really intelligent and helpful. The other girl said there were no buses to Xian and at this hotel I not only found two but was able to book one for the next day at 12:00. Thank god for them. I was about to go Loco on some people back at my hotel.

I ran back to my hotel and canceled the tickets and asked for my money back. There was a guy who spoke English and Chinese and he translated what I was saying to the smarter women who looked like the owner of the hotel. She said she had made many calls and tried very hard to get us tickets. I said ok and.... The guy translating keep laughing and telling me she said "I made 4 calls and now I have to make one more to cancel the tickets". I said ok and... I knew she was trying to get a tip or something but screw that. You weren't helpful you actually just drove me nuts. There always trying to skim off the top and that I can tell is going to drive me nuts. Oh well I'll just play dumb travel and ignore what she's trying to do. It worked and after saying the same thing for about 10 minutes she gave up.

The lights on our block had been out and night was starting to fall upon us. We headed to our Ming room to find our flashlight before the light completely went out. While we were searching a girl brought up a candle for us to see. It was really nice and set the mood nicely in the room. It was great and I really though it was beautiful and must have been what it was like hundreds of years ago. Completely black with only candle light in the night. COOL.

After it was completely dark we headed out on the town to check out the light lanterns and take some photos. It was a really beautiful city at night. Very surreal. We walked for a while and took a bunch of night photos. I bought a little cake type thing that was really good from a vendor. I thought Ana would like it but no way. It tasted very soft and dough like which I really enjoy.

For the last stop of the night we headed to a corner bar that was playing some really good Western music. I think the DJ must have been English because the music was really eclectic. He played all things from Hip Pop, Country, Tecno, Electronica, etc. Very cool mix and American music was sweat candy in my ears. It was so chill just to sit and enjoy it. It's like having water after you've been craving it for a long time. It tastes so good. The music was the same way. We hadn't heard it in so long it was just like magic to the soul. It sounded even better the more empty beer bottles the waitress removed from the table. In fact what started out as a simple beer turned into a dancing night with Ana on the floor with some other drunken Dutch people. Pretty fun. We had a great time and it was nice to chill after what was a very stressful day for me.

We headed back to the room and crashed for the night on our board with a little padding.







Day 249
We woke up a little tired sometime around 9:00. We headed to the same place we ate breakfast the day before and ate there. Was pretty good and the best part was it wasn't Chinese flavored breakfast. Have I said I hate Chinese breakfast? Man.

We packed up after breakfast and headed out. We went to another hotel where we met up with the same Australian couple we traveled from Beijing to Pungyao with. Funny that we were on the same course.

We jumped in a little oversized electric golf cart and were carried to the bus station. Once we got near the bus station we were put on another old cart that barely fit Ana and I and our bags. We then headed out of town bouncing around like bobble head Americans. During the drive over our driver and the other driver got in a little race. It was pretty funny since neither of the little carts ran well and the motors would bog and smoke when they tried to take off. It was really funny and we were all laughing and joking (including the drivers).

As we were playing and racing we weren't really sure where we were headed? At one point we got pretty far from town and were coming up on what looked like a check point. That's when we stopped and sat there on the side of the road. We proceeded to try to communicate with them and they found us pretty funny. We sat for about an hour and then finally the police came. The guys were a little uneasy and I never know if what we are doing is legal or not. Who knows?

Either way we ended up flagging down a bus and we were thrown on. The bus turned out to be not too bad. I had leg room which was a HUGE plus. We sat back and hoped we were on the right bus headed in the right direction. Time will tell, and if we start seeing signs for Beijing only 100k ahead we know were headed the wrong way.

Over the next 6 hours we drove and stopped about 3 times. The country was very similar and the sky was very grey and gloomy. It was a little depressing and also pretty hard to see much of the country. On one of our stops we grabbed some noodles (much like the American Cup of Noodles) and tried it. Man it was spicy. But I ate it and hoped my stomach didn't get mad at me for doing so.

We arrived in Xian sometime around 7:00 in the night. We grabbed our bags and headed out into the night and the crazy city. Oh the joy of getting into a new city and not knowing where you are or how to talk with anyone. Gotta love it.

We eventually found our place only about 1 block away from the station which was really nice. A guy followed us and tried to get a commission. But when we said we had a reservation he was out of luck and got pretty mad. Oh well.

We checked into our rooms and walked with our bags up to the fifth floor - Nice. The rooms though were really nice and I was impressed. The beds were the standard dorm bunk beds with a 1 inch thick mattress. Man that was pretty plush.

After settling in we went down to the lower restaurant to eat. We ended up ordering some Chinese food that was really good and decently priced. Ana was happy with it and that was a good thing.

After mowing we headed downtown to see if the HI hostel might have a cheaper tour of the Terracotta Warriors. The one offered by our hotel was really pricy and I hate doing the follow the guide with the flag tours.

As it ended up we walked for about an hour to reach the center of town. Man this city was massive! It has a wall surrounding it as well and I thought it couldn't be that big of a wall. My mistake. We ended up going down large dark sidewalks and side streets which seemed pretty safe but who knows. Finally though we made it to the downtown. Man was the downtown impressive. It was MASSIVE and there were people EVERYWHERE. It was a weeknight and it seemed like Vegas. There were massive building high blinking neon lights. The main mall downtown I think is the biggest building I've ever seen in my life. I couldn't believe the scale of it. Damn they build things HUGE in this country.

We weaved our way through the crowds for about a half an hour looking for the hostel before we decided to give up and just get an ice-cream at Mc D's. I know what your saying "Another ice-cream" but I don't care. There my little treats away from home and I love them. Thanks Ronald for making me so happy.

Anyway we decided walking back was out of the question and decided to take a taxi. The ride was much easier and we headed to our beds to crash. We wanted to get up early the next day to figure out all the detail of our Tibet trip. Man I HATE details.







Day 250
Waking up early was pretty tough that morning. But we managed to get out of bed around 7:30am. We headed straight for the travel help desk downstairs. It was really busy the nigh before and we wanted to catch them when it was free. We spent most of the morning and into lunch running around and figuring out what were going to do over the next few weeks. We decided to buy the tickets and permits to Tibet here and we were able to do that. Of course we had to get money out of the back and walk about 2 miles to an agent that let us charge our tickets to our MasterCard. Oh the fun.

Meanwhile the whole time I was getting stressed Ana sat talking to her mom on the phone and typing emails to her friends. In the end I got pretty mad and just started doing things alone like I do. She got pretty mad and we got into a little argument over it. No big deal but it is some of the stuff you got to deal with on the road. I'm sure though all these things in the end are only making us stronger.

Drama aside we got most of the main details squared away and were headed to see the local museum. We grabbed a taxi and got there pretty quickly. The museum had a bunch of Ming and Qing Dynasty pots and small sculpted figures. It was not that impressive to me and we pretty much flew through the 6,000+ collection to get to the end. The other thing that was extremely annoying was the amount of tourist and tour groups in the museum. Man it was a joke. There were tons of people and flags everywhere. And of course if you’re looking at something the tour guide will walk and stand right next to you and start talking about the piece you’re looking at. And of course the 50 or so Asian people will all crowd around you and push you to take a look at the piece. It was a joke. I shouldered a few of those punks on the way out of the crowd. Funny thing is they don’t even care. They just take the hit and try to get by you to get to the glass to take a photo. Good times.

After the museum we went to see the large Pagoda in that area. It was pretty cool and was surrounded by a very tranquil and Zen park. It was really nice and for a second it felt like you were in some other country. The crowds and chaos was slowed and people seemed to be on their best behavior. Was nice and it was cool to see a real live pagoda. It was really cool and I can see why they have so much fame. The one we were looking at was also very large. It was about 7 stories high and really massive. It reminded me of the pagoda fireworks we used to get on July 4th. The little fireworks would spin and spark and at the end would pop up to make a lighted pagoda. Those were good memories and I only remembered when I was staring up at the large structure. Was a cool experience and a fond memory.

After the pagoda we headed to the local Pizza Hut to grab some dinner. I wanted to eat some solid food before we headed to Tibet. I’m pretty sure the altitude in Tibet is going to make us not want to eat. I can’t wait for my stomach to ach and growl like a mad dog.


At Pizza Hut we had some wicked good wedge potatoes. They didn’t even taste Chinese. That was amazing. We also had a pretty good pizza as well. Man we were pretty happy. We topped off the dinner with of course an ice-cream cone from Mc Donald’s. Man it felt like we were home.

We walked around a little bit and then headed back to the hostel. We were both pretty tired and crashed early.











Day 251
Ana got up early and went to figure the tickets to Mongolia and take a shower. I rolled out of bed sometime around 9:00 and we continued the day from there.

We first went to get Ana some breakfast. She’s got to have here morning food or she gets cranky. So we went to the hotel restaurant and got some pretty good eggs and bacon. Was nice and didn’t taste too Chinese. That was a big plus.

After the breakfast we headed out to catch the local bus number 603 to the Terracotta Warriors. I was pretty excited to see them even though it was a major tourist draw card.

I was a little worried about getting the local bus. I though man there going to pack us in every inch of that bus. But to my surprise they actually only let the amount of people that fit in the seats onto the bus. I was thinking something must be wrong. There must be a bomb or something on the truck. Either that or were going to pay 10 times the price for this bus. But sure enough for only 1 US dollar we rode the bus for 1.5 hours to the museum. I was impressed. I must say overall I’m really impressed at the transport systems so far. I guess I was expecting the worst and since it’s better than that I think it’s great.

We got dropped off about 6 miles from the actual museum. But after a small hike we made it to the entrance and entered the complex. All the warriors dug up so far were inside huge buildings. They started excavation then after they defined the areas where the sculptures were located they built 3 massive buildings the size of football stadium over the pits. Man these Chinese are crazy. I can’t imagine the cost but I guess labor is pretty cheap here. I don’t think they could do something like that in the states. Just the buildings were impressive.

We visited the first pit and it was pretty impressive. Allot of the figures were not that well put together and were pretty broken. All the figures were put in underground tunnels. Eventually over time the ceilings collapsed and crushed the terracotta sculptures. The archeologist had to piece all the fragments together and in this particular pit they hadn’t done allot. But none the less it was cool to see.

As we entered the second pit the scale of the pit was AMAZING. I keep saying this but I think the building was in the top 10 largest buildings I’ve ever seen. Damn Chinese can build. There wasn’t allot of figures that had been uncovered but you could see all the roofs of the building that they were going to dig up once they got the man power to do so. Very cool.

We headed to the third pit and as soon as we entered you could see the figures. There thousands of them lined up in rows. Really cool and this was obviously the showpiece pit. This was also the place they take all the photos from. It was amazing to sit there and enjoy the figures. That was until a damn Asian tour guide came up with her flag and stood right next to us. URRRG! Sure enough about 50, three feet tall Asians are surrounding us and pushing us back and forth. They were a couple of them trying to get in front of me and the railing. Man I almost threw a couple of them in the pit.

It’s so hard to be patient in the madness of this country. It is so different from what we know. It feels so much like people don’t respect you and are totally being rude. But in their culture it’s all game and it doesn’t mean anything. They just pile on top of each other like rats and there just used to it. We’ll see how things go from here. ‘m hoping I can get more used to it and not get so mad. I think even an American priest would be cussing at these Chinese in a couple days. Maybe not. Maybe I’m just short on patience and I for sure hate crowds.

We left the point we were looking at the figures from and moved 15 feet to the left where no one was standing. But about 10 seconds later another group was headed our way and we decided just to keep moving. The place was massive but there had to be 2,000 people in the building. We walked around the entire building seeing all the different Terracotta Warriors. They had different ones. Some were archers, generals, sergeants, etc. They even had horses pulling cars. It was really cool and all this was at human or animal scale. The craftsmanship was really great. Amazing all this was built for one guy to go into the afterlife with an army at his command.

The crowds were killing me and Ana and we decided we had seen enough and needed to get out of there. We headed out and on the way out decided to buy a small 12 inch Terracotta Warrior to take home. Thought it would be cool in the house. We bargained pretty hard and were working pretty good on teaming up on the vendors. We were able to get the statue for 5 US dollars which I thought was ok. It was pretty heavy so the cost wasn’t the piece it was sending it back home.

Before we headed out we hit the bathroom. While we were there I saw another guy with the same box and what looked like the same Terracotta Warrior statue in his hands. I asked him how much he paid cause I got mine for 40 Yeon ($5 US). He looked at me funny and said 40 US dollars. No I said 40 Yeon. He had a funny look on his face. I was just curious if I had been had at the place. He said no and that he had paid 400 Yeon ($50 US) for his statue. I think he was pretty upset and I thought man he must have gotten taken pretty bad. He left pretty unhappy and I think I spoiled his day. But in the end I think I got a pretty good price? Either way it wasn’t that much.

We got the bus back to town and wrapped up our little statue to send in the mail. We took a cab downtown and where we could send the box. After a little hassle it was off and only cost us $20 US to send. That wasn’t bad since it ended up weighing 8 pounds. I was happy we bought it. We’ve passed up allot of cool things because we didn’t want to send them home. I’m trying to make more of an effort to just buy the things we like and send them home. Later I know I will love them.

After mailing our sculpture we hit the local KFC for dinner. Men were getting bad with the fast food. I must say though Ana is the major driving force for us not eating more Chinese food. She complains all the time. So we ate KFC and as soon as we finished she started complaining her stomach was upset. I told her we should have eaten more Chinese. She almost vomited thinking of more Chinese food.

After our great meal we headed back to the hostel. We got a punk ass cab guy that I think took us down the most trafficked road in town. So we jumped out and paid him for only the time he had drove us. He was pretty mad but screw that punk. We walked on foot from there to the hostel.

While we were walking back we heard a guy on a bike coming from behind us “hacked and spit a massive luggie”. People in China do that all the time so we didn’t think too much of it. But when the guy spit I heard Ana go “Euuuuuuughhh that’s nasty”. I turned around to find that the guy had spit right on Ana’s lower leg. Man that was nasty but also pretty funny. She wasn’t to happy and I think the old guy on the bike hit her leg on accident. There wasn’t anything to do but wipe it off and get moving again. Ana was so mad. She grabbed a napkin out of her bag and wiped it off. Then she threw the napkin on the floor and said “I don’t care if I’m polluting!” It was pretty funny and she walked pretty fast toward the” hostel. I keep making joking sounds and she didn’t think it was very funny.

When we made it back to the hotel I decided to grab another small bowl of fried rice at the restaurant below. It was really good rice and I wanted to eat a large meal before we headed to Tibet the next morning.

We ate pretty fast and headed upstairs to pack, shower, and hit the hay. We had to get up at 5:30 to catch our flight to Tibet the next morning.