People’s Republic of
After a delayed start sitting on the aeroplane on
the Heathrow runway, once we touched down in
Our tour of Beijing sights continued with a visit
to the Great Wall at Badaling. I thought the Wall was amazing, working its way,
seemingly unhurriedly, along the tops of the ridge of hills, following every
dip and rise. Beautiful panoramic views were offered over the receding hills.
We toured and then lunched at an
enamelware factory making exquisite enamel vases, pots, saucers, keyrings,
bracelets among random dust collectors.
We then carried on to the Ming
Tombs. Supper was followed by an amazing Chinese acrobat show. The people
hardly seemed human. Their joints certainly aren’t! Finally sleep…
Although we checked out of our hotel, we still
had several more sites to see. After a drive through the ‘Silicon Valley’
district of Beijing, we arrived at Nathan and Lisa’s flat. They were Henry’s
friends described as ‘middle class Beijing residents’. This was an outing
instead of going to a farm as the risk from bird flu was deemed to high. In
fact their flat seemed pretty normal but nice, the only difference being their
countertops – several inches lower than Western kitchens!
We only had the afternoon left in
A quick supper and then off to catch the
overnight train to Xi’an. Experiences of other trains and others’ stories had
me expecting a drafty, rickety old train with broken windows and a rock hard
‘bed’. Instead it was one that even came with personal TVs and headsets! Even
the toilets worked for several hours… I think the gentle trundling of the train
rocked me to sleep and the opposite from what I expected, I probably had my
best sleep of the trip on there!
When
I awoke we were just pulling into
We then drove by coach out of
The warriors themselves were pretty amazing. And
so far they’ve only recovered about 1/3 of the warriors – that they know about. Definitely a work in progress! It’s mind
boggling to imagine how so many life size figures could have been made 2000
years ago – and then for some vandals to have broken them up just a few years
after the finishing touches were made.
During the evening we had a chance
to wander through the night stalls in the Muslim quarter and then watched the
‘Tang Dynasty’, a Chinese opera, right from our supper seats.
In the morning we rushed to leave
early, only to discover at the airport that our flight was delayed due to
‘atmospheric conditions’. Not surprising, remembering the apparent view from
the city gate. Anyway eventually we arrived in
In
the morning we met our ‘intellect’ who, through Emily, our English speaking
guide, explained the design and functions of the dam. Of course we got to spend
time at the dam too looking at it from several spots and angles.
Later in the morning we visited an orange grove
farmer. I had visions of huge citrus orchards with orderly rows upon rows of
trees… in fact the ‘grove’ consisted of trees dotted around, straddling the
hill side as we walked up to the farmer’s home. I think I quite liked it the
way it was though.
The family were very hospitable,
giving us their oranges to sample and showing us their kitchen – the centre
piece a big stainless steal rice cooker – and their living room – sparse save
for posters of Mao and a brand spanking new TV.
Then we had a chance to wander through the
village. Walking along the path we could hear children’s laughter and Mr Hall
scouted out a primary school. So many happy smiling faces! I think we disturbed
their lunch but their teacher didn’t mind and they certainly didn’t either!
They were certainly a highlight of my day, maybe the whole trip too. I think we
made their day too! Their teacher explained to us why they were so interested
to see us and why they thought we were so funny – we were probably the first
non Asian people they had ever seen! Of course I couldn’t understand what they
were saying, but probably ‘oooohhh weird… blonde hair…cool dude!’
Our visit had to be curtailed with the reminder
that we still had to drive all the way back to
An even earlier wake up
call this morning, in order to catch a flight to
At least that gave us
plenty of time in the afternoon for sightseeing around
We drove down to the other side of the island to
I found it hard to get my mind round the size of
them – just a single block could fit the population of two Malverns or more
than the whole of
Evening was falling just as we passed a Buddhist
temple. We watched the sunset and stroked the Buddha’s tummies. Unfortunately
the Money Buddha was a bit too popular and I couldn’t even find the end of the
line! Anyway I walked across the little red bridge a couple of times which
apparently extends your life by a few days with every crossing!
The evening was spent at the Mong Kok night markets.
Scarves, belts, handbags, watches, shirts, so many name brands – so many fakes!
But fun all the same.
The following day we were taken out to lunch by
the Yums, a very generous family with sons who are/went to Malvern. To truly
spoil us they then took us out in their luxury motor yacht around the coast to
The next day we had to say good bye to
Our final dinner included the
This spectacular whirlwind tour of just a few of
…You know you’re in
… you find that you are the tourist attraction
… you find food in the red light district
…prices drop faster than shooting stars and yet
someone else will always have found the same for less
…everyone supports the government
…you can keep fit just by not spitting
at
least according to signs on the Great Wall
…camel humps, deer lips and scorpions are
delicacies
Luckily we were never treated to such dishes!
… the children are always, always smiling
… and the only rubbish to be found is on an
English group’s tour bus