The Panama Incident!

Yet again I have left it a long time with no post. This can be attributed to me having just sat my HSK Level 4 (a government recognised Chinese exam) Sunday just gone, and so I’ve had my nose in a book for the past few weeks, having also had my mid-terms as well. As you can expect a lot has happened since my last post, so allow me to fill you in.

 Small/unimportant things first; my football team has changed its name, moved down 2 divisions and is now doing average to poor, an improvement on our abysmal performance of last season. My mid-terms and HSK are out of the way, as I have already stated, and with them has gone the majority of my motivation to go to class unfortunately. Beijing has decided that it is now summer, and so most days it is sunny and around 30 degrees C, we do however still get the occasional day of heavy/ torrential rain though. My time remaining here has just passed under 1 and a half months, which seems ridiculous to me and obviously means I have been here almost 9 months now. Two of my best friends (I haven’t forgotten you Ben) arrive in just under 3 weeks, whereupon their journey into the insanity of Asia will start.

 The main thing to update on is my continued travels. Having been given time off for Spring Break (yet another Spring themed holiday), we decided to take the opportunity and hit two birds with one stone：said birds being Nanjing and Hangzhou. The decision was made due to us only having been given 2 days extra, thereby giving us a 5 day weekend, and both cities being with 6 hours of Beijing. We also have classmates in both cities so we thought it a good chance to catch-up etc. We headed to Nanjing first, opting for the cheaper long train though and again found ourselves with no seats (it was too cheap to argue with). The journey only being 10 hours helped, as did our party taking up a considerable part of the carriage, allowing us to simply lay on the floor for the greater part.  We did however make the error of not booking a hotel for both nights we stayed there, an error we later repeated in Hangzhou, but more on this later. 

We arrived mid-morning and were surprised to find that the weather was already rather hot, this being before the rise in temperature in Beijing and so all of us were  unprepared for such warm weather. We made our way to our hotel, freshened up, then headed out to do some sight seeing, deciding to head to the Nanjing Massacre Museum. Not the most alluring of names, the museum itself was actually really interesting, informing me not only about the massacre (which I was unaware of) but also when it occurred and the reasons for it, so it basically fulfilled all its roles as a museum. That night we headed into the city for some food, then to a rather strange little bar, before heading outside for a cab only to find it had decided to start a torrential rain shower in our absence. 

 The second day was much in the vain of the first, with more sight-seeing, including a huge park with a lake, and other things that I don’t remember. That night we met up with our Italian classmate Luigi, who took us to an all-you-can-eat all-you-can-drink Japanese restaurant. The food was amazing, as was the sake and rum, and as you can imagine things got a little out of hand, what with us then heading to a club with what seemed like unlimited free whiskey (it later turned out that one of Luigi’s friends was buying, and not in the least bit concerned with strangers consuming the majority of it). We then returned to our hotel. I’ll take this as a chance to explain our hotel arrangement; as it was a holiday, many Chinese people also had the time off work and so chose to travel. What with us being the un-organised group we are, we didn’t book a hostel/ hotel soon enough and so had to make do with the only available hotel online. Unfortunately they only had space for our first night, so our second day was half spent looking for a hotel with spare rooms. Luckily we (I) was able to find an Ibis hotel and we got ourselves some rooms on the cheap. The only flaw being that we were a party of 9, and had to squeeze into 3 double rooms, meaning a person on each floor, but much cheaper per room, although what we did was technically illegal. We then did it in the next hotel in Hangzhou, another Ibis, which claimed to be in the city, but was actually in the adjoining town area, a whole 30 minutes from the city outskirts.

 Anyway with Nanjing well and truly visited, we set our course for Hangzhou, a couple of hours south. When we arrived the weather wasn’t at its peak, with cloudy skys and rain on both days, which was unfortunate as Hangzhou is supposed to be beautiful. The main attraction of Hangzhou is the West Lake, which we headed to both days we were there. It is indeed very beautiful, but with such poor visibility it was very difficult to get the best impression. We managed to meet up with Ryan in Hangzhou - a classmate from Manchester studying alone in Hangzhou - and he seemed in good spirits, but we didn’t get that much time with him due to our travel deadlines. The best part of Hangzhou for me was probably the speciality food we had; which included Beggar Chicken - a whole chicken cooked in tinfoil, but tender enough to eat off the carcass with chopsticks - and this amazing pork belly which is some of the best I’ve ever had. 

 After 2 days in Hangzhou we were on our way back, with a brief transfer by way of Shanghai. While our experiences of the cities were brief, I feel we were able to get a good feel of both of them, and they are both places I would return to, especially Hangzhou if only to see the West Lake in good weather. 

 Not much more to say on past events really though. I’m working on another ‘Strange Experiences In China’ post, and in the coming weeks there should be at least a couple of updates, as there is a lot going on including Brett and Tom coming, our final travelling for this year, and a couple of big weekends planned as well, but this is bye for now.

Peace x

They Don’t Know Anything Really, They Don’t Even Know How To Sit Down Properly

1) The title of this blog refers to the the Chinese preference of squatting over sitting down, as the picture above displays. I’m pretty sure the craze of ‘Owling’ must have started in China.

2) Number 1 probably stems from Chinese toilets. A Chinese toilet is essentially a hole in the ground you squat over, as they don’t seem to want to be comfortable when relieving themselves. While this does build-up good leg and core strength, it’s pretty vile and leads to horrific smells around any public bathroom in China.

3) The schools give children energy saving light-bulbs to help spread the message to protect the environment and ‘go green’. These children are 8 years old.

4) Chinese children are allowed to choose any English word they want as their name, shown by the names of my students, which include; Hamburger, Cherry, Blue, Obama, Clinton and Handsome.

5) When Chinese kids buys books from their school, they are rewarded with presents, ranging from comic books to grabber-arms.

6) Beer is, in some places, cheaper to buy than bottled water.

7) Peasant women who are always either pregnant, or carrying babies, will sell you a fake student card, marriage license or any other document you need.

8) If you want a screen protector for your iPhone/iPad/touch-screen phone, find the nearest bridge or underpass, there you will find people who’s speciality is putting screen protectors on phones, as justified by the signs they carry.

9) Crossing the road in China can be as dangerous as running across with your eyes closed, due to the fact that cars are always allowed to turn right, even when the light is red, and cars don’t often stop even for a red light.

10）Ticket sellers are very un-helpful, choosing to drip-feed you the information you need as and when you ask for it, instead of telling you all the necessary information straight away.

11) The Chinese prefer to drink boiling and hot water, because they believe cold water shrinks and destroys your stomach. 

12) Chinese people have very few manners; they push and shove their way past with out apologising, don’t offer their seats to the old and infirm, are impolite to women, stare blatantly at any foreigners and in Mitchell’s case, drop the shoulder whenever they are passing in order to inflict some extra pain.

13) From my experience, even when Chinese people are trying to be polite - which is about as infrequent as seeing a Chinese child that isn’t spoilt -they still come across as rude and angry, which is essentially their default setting.

14) It is almost impossible to buy a real DVD in China, as they much prefer pirate copies that are a fraction of the price. The extent to which they prefer pirated copies is that I’ve yet to see a real DVD, but there are about 3 pirate DVD stores near my University, as well as street vendors selling knock-offs.

15) Chinese people love bikes. They don’t love lights and bells though, so you will only know if a cyclist is going to hit you once they have done it.

16) Corn (as is sweetcorn) is a popular flavour in China, for products such as tea, juice and sweets.

17) Chinese drivers love to use their horns, but don’t know when to use them. It often seems that they sound their horn simply because they like the sound of it, or are really happy they have horns, either way they sound retarded and are extremely annoying.

18) Chinese people smell, probably due to the lack of deodorant on sale in China. Either that or it’s the peasants.

19) With reference to No. 13 - Due to the One Child Policy most Chinese children are extremely spoilt and thus vile little creatures. This is known as ‘Little Emperor Syndrome’ in China.

20) It would appear that most Chinese people now have iPads, and will whip them out for a casual picture at most tourist attractions.

Peace x

Sssh, I’m China Tell You Something

Hello there again.

China

So to get back into China we got a direct train from Ha Noi to Nanning. It was a lot more hassle-free than we thought it would be, only requiring us to exit our train twice; once at the actual border crossing so they could check everyone had the correct visas, and then once more when we were in China, for no other reason than to make everyone get off and then get back on, with all their luggage. Well, it wouldn’t be China without a little needless hassle and pointless procedures. The journey itself was fairly uneventful, we all got beds this time, which was nice considering it was about a 14 hour train, and we only encountered two minor problems; one at the start when a very rude Chinese lady accused us of being in her beds, but it turned out the silly wench just couldn’t read properly and felt no need to apologise for her unnecessary hostility, and then once again when we were getting our passports back, when the attendant didn’t believe it was Mitchell in his photo as he has a different hairstyle now - they can be a little simple over here. 

 After the journey we had 1 night in Nanning, waiting there simply to get over to our desired destination of Yang Shuo. We did nothing in Nanning but sitting in the hostel watching films and going to get some food, mainly because there wasn’t anything interesting to do, unless your interests lye in buying the skeletal remains of tiger legs, or horns from unspecified animals. 

 From Nanning we headed over to Gui Lin, then on to Yang Shuo. We chose Yang Shuo mainly due to Jo having been there previously, and not ceasing to talk about it the whole time we have been over here. To her credit it is a really nice town/city, with really beautiful scenery, quite a lot to do and really good food. The food especially was amazing, with highlights being the beer fish (fish cooked in beer obviously) and the custard buns that I could probably eat all day if I were allowed and had the funds. We ended up doing quite a lot down in Yang Shuo as well; we hired mopeds one day and went round the surrounding area, exploring around the mountains and villages, and stumbling upon a camel for some unknown reason, we also went to the mud baths and hot springs located in the caves around the area. Now the mud bath wasn’t exactly what we expected, Jo had told us there was a slide, what she hadn’t mentioned was that the mud was cold, slimy and stunk and the ‘slide’ barely two feet tall. Walking through a huge pool of cold mud is a very strange feeling, going down a slide into said pool is stranger still. The hot springs afterwards however, more than made up for it though. After rinsing off all the mud (the stuff gets EVERYWHERE), we spent about half an hour just relaxing in the pools, which were pleasantly warm, especially so when compared with the temperature of both the mud and the cave itself, where they are located. The only other activity of note we did in Yang Shuo was play beer-pong, mainly due to the most popular bar in the town having a table. This is were we met the majority of the other traveller in Yang Shuo, all 10 or so of them (February is off-season due to the cold weather all over China) and spent the majority of our evenings, drinking and being continuously beaten by a couple of Chinese girls at beer-pong. We actually ran into about 6 people from our University in Beijing in Yang Shuo, amazing considering the size of this country, and the relatively few people we know still remaining in China. 1 or 2 would have been coincidence, but 6 different people, not all travelling together was just freaky!

 After Yang Shuo, where we spent about 4/5 days, we hopped on a 24 hour train back up to Beijing, marking the end of our travels for the next couple of months. However, what our University had failed to mention was that we had an additional 2 weeks on top of our holiday time before our classes started, which resulted in us bumming around Beijing, doing nothing but wasting time that could have been spent in less polluted and sunnier climates for the said 2 weeks. 

 That about brings this blog upto the present day. The only things I’ve been doing since being back in Beijing are going to class - we’ve all been moved up two class levels so I’m now in the 3rd highest level of classes - and teaching at the Primary school I work at - yes, they have actually allowed me to teach English to kids over here. I’ll probably do another update pretty soon, got a good idea for the next one, but that’s all for now.

Peace

29 Hours? You’ve Got To Be GuangZhou-kin’!

Firstly, we survived the 29 hour train journey, and it wasn’t as bad as we imagined. We only had to stand for about 3 hours, after that people started to filter of the train, so we got seats, then for the last 11 ours we actually had a bed each, as the majority of the people got of at the penultimate stop. I wouldn’t want to do it again in a hurry, but it has certainly made the subsequent train journeys we have had fly bye. 

 Guangzhou was a really nice city, so clean compared to Beijing. We didn’t really get up to much, just wandered around town, cleared out the lungs and got stared at by the majority of Guangzhou’s population. On the second day me, Mitch and James headed of to the zoo, while the girls hit up a market. The zoo was alright, although the Chinese apparently consider farm animals exotic enough to put in a zoo, so we saw pigs and sheep as well as tigers, bears and giraffes. The strangest part of our stay was actually our roommate. We got a dorm, and in the separate room there was an older gentleman. We thought he was quite odd, as apparently he couldn’t close of room door, but we vastly underestimated him. Turns out he was an inventor, who had just invented a new kind of roller-skate, and was trying to get a patent before his visa ran out. Honestly even I couldn’t come up with a stranger story than that. 

 One other experience we had was midnight roller-skating outdoors, a very popular activity in South China apparently. It was pretty fun, and it’s one thing that the Chinese do well, so well in fact that most choose to go backwards. We also learned Jo is afraid of roller-skating, don’t really understand why but she gave up after about 2 minutes and instead chose to just sit there with the skates on and watch a group of young Chinese boys showing of their insane skating skills. I guess girls really do like guys with ‘skills’. 

 We’re in Hong Kong now, staying with Jasmin, who is acting as our tour guide as well. First impressions are good, it’s a lot more Western than anywhere else we’ve been, and there are a lot more foreigners here. Probably the best thing is that you can get the things we miss here, such as normal bread and Western brands of products that we miss. We are here until Wednesday I think, then we head of to Vietnam, followed by Laos, Thailand then back into China. That’s all for now though.

Peace x

(Thanks Adam for the title)

Frostbite? Are You ‘Haerbin’ A Laugh?

So we went to Haerbin this week, a city in the very North of China, famous at this time of year for it’s Ice Festival. As you can imagine, it’s a pretty cold place, what you probably can’t imagine are a temperature of -11 C in the day, and -25 C at night, biting winds and whole parks made entirely out of ice, just like the one above. Temperatures so cold, you can feel your nostrils freeze as you breathe in, and where your toes start to freeze even through 3 pair of thermal socks. I know I’ve already said that Datong was the coldest place I’ve ever been, but its like the Bahamas compared to Haerbin. Basically it wasn’t t-shirt weather. 

 We went there for a couple days, but didn’t get up to too much, apart from being cold. We visited the biggest of the five Ice Parks, and it was pretty damn spectacular. There were all there huge structure made completely out of ice, as well as ice and snow sculptures, let’s just day the Chinese are pretty handy with the solidified forms of the old H2O. Overall I was pretty impressed by the ice park, and certainly glad we chose to visit the coldest part of China, when its at it’s coldest. I can’t help think we missed out on some of the finer things to do in Haerbin, such as Siberian tiger sanctuary, were for the low price £200 you can buy a live cow that is then fed to the lions - alive - right in front of your eyes. We did however get to drive dune buggies on a frozen lake, then go to a night club with a whole 4 other people in it. 

 This was a pretty short post I know, but all the interesting stuff will be happening in the next month as we are embarking on our tour of Southern Asia for our Chinese New Year holiday. The journey start tomorrow night/ early Tuesday morning at 2am, when we get on a 29 hour train journey to Guangzhou in Southern China. I should mention at this point that we have standing tickets for this journey, as no seats or beds were available due to the stupidly large number of Chinese trying to get home to celebrate Chinese New Year with their families, and so are inconveniencing us by taking all the available seats, so inconsiderate. It sounds insane but it has to be done so we can get down South, and it was only £22 so you can really complain for that I don’t think. Anyway, if we survive this train journey, we then head to Hong Kong, then onto a week in Vietnam, followed by Laos, possibly Thailand and finally back into China to spend a couple of days down South. 

 See you all in a couple of days (I hope)

Peace x

PS, We did the smart thing and ate ice cream in Haerbin. Thought it might help warm us up buy making us feel warmer outside than in. It didn’t work…..

We Are So ShangHai Right Now.

So we had yet another Chinese holiday two weeks ago, know as Tomb Sweeping Festival in the West. I guess its kind of like the Chinese ‘Day of the Dead’, and basically it’s when the Chinese go to their ancestor’s tomb, clean them and make offerings as well. What it meant for us was 3 days off from Monday to Wednesday. Obviously this made it seem like we would have a 5 day weekend, but unfortunately we had make up classes to do on the Saturday and Sunday, because Chinese Universities are retarded and unfair. 

 Anyway me and Mitch decided we’d use this as an opportunity to go to Shanghai, as it’s only a 6 hour train journey away, and so seemed the perfect place for a couple of days away. We set off on Sunday and arrived Sunday night. The express train to Shanghai is considered one of the best in China, and almost as good as the Japanese bullet trains, and I say I agree, although I have never been on a bullet train. It’s pretty lush, really comfortable and smooth, and you get a decent amount of leg room. But enough of my love of trains. We spent the first day looking around the area and the park around us. It turns out I managed to book a hostel on the outskirts of town, so it didn’t seem like there was much to do at first, but we ended heading over to this aquarium nearby, which turned out to be a damn good choice. The aquarium itself was pretty modern, and had a bad-ass shark tunnel in it. That was worth the price on its own, but the ticket also included a performance by Beluga whales and Sea Lions, that was probably the best part, as the Sea Lions were absolutely banter, and the whales were more the size of dolphins so were able to do a decent amount of tricks, so it was more impressive than it sounds. I took a couple videos so I’ll try and upload at least one to give an impression of what it was like. We also did some go-karting there as well, as there was a track right near the aquarium and we had some time to kill before the show. Now this was go-karting China-style, so as well as a lack of a health and safety briefing and protective clothing, they also had go-karts with dual controls, which we couldn’t quite get our heads around. Now these were pretty high-powered go-karts, so me and Mitch were whipping them around corners and drifting all over the place. I was having a pretty good race myself until I tried to turn right and suddenly drove straight into the barricade. When I looked down it turned out I’d sheared my steering shaft perfectly in half, and so there was no way I could continue. When I tried to complain and get another go however, I basically got shouted and and passed from person to person, then called stupid because I couldn’t remember my car number, so I decided the best option was to just walk away before I smacked the rude pit manager.

 That night we met up with Mitchell’s friend Ben, who’s over here working for Tesco. We met him over near the Bund, the long river that goes through the middle of the city. To get there we got on a motorbike taxi, which was extremely fun, but took about half an hour longer than it should because our driver didn’t know where we were going, despite insisting he did every single time we stopped for directions, at one point claiming they had actually moved the road somewhere else. Anyway, when we arrived Ben took us to this nice little bar/pub in a very swish area, where we enjoyed the good version of Tsingtao beer, that they apparently reserve only for small bottles at high prices (it has a red label in case you were wondering how to tell the difference). We chilled there for half an hour or so, and then I assumed myself and Mitch would go and meet up with the other Renmin students who’d come to Shanghai separately. Ben however had a different idea, deciding he was going to show us the real Shanghai night-life, so our next stop was the highest bar in Shanghai, and possibly the world, the 92nd floor of the ‘Bottle Opener’ so named due to it resembling a very large bottle opener. The view from this bar was amazing, being able to see over everything in Shanghai was amazing and the view at night was breathtaking. After there we headed to another bar on the river-front, where we met a very annoying american lady who refused to leave us alone. After politely excusing ourselves we then went on to another 2/3 bars, and ended up in a nightclub, where we eventually lost Ben, but found our Irish friends from last semester who have now moved to Shanghai for University. We decided to bail about half an hour after Ben went missing, and made the long trip back to our hostel. Turns out Ben had gotten bored and wandered odd, Mitch informed me this is a common occurrence.

 On our second day we checked out of our hostel and went over to Ben’s apartment as he had offered to put us up for the other night we were there. Now Ben has a pretty sweet set-up in Shanghai; he has a massive 3-bedroom apartment that is free, a driver (more on this later), flight allowances, a salary and a living allowance on top of all of that. As I kept telling him, he is pretty much living the dream over here. After arriving at Ben’s, me and Mitch headed out to do a little culture, so we went to the Natural History Museum (underwhelming) and then the People’s Square (pretty, but not much to do). We then headed back to Ben’s, chilled for a bit, then went out for a more relaxed night in Shanghai; we did a couple of bars, a jazz club and then the same nightclub, but finished earlier than the night before. 

 On our last day we decided to go and check out a nearby water-town, described as a ‘ miniature Chinese Venice’, so you can imagine we were keeping our expectations low for this one. Ben loaned us his driver, as he had no need for him as it was a holiday for him as well, so we got a free ride to this town, which was almost 2 hours outside of Shanghai. We were lucky with the weather that day as well, as it turned out to be really sunny and warm, and so walking around the town was rather pleasant. Now the description of a ‘miniature Chinese Venice’ was a little off, as only part of the town contained any water, but it was a pretty town none the less. We decided to do the boat tour for the authentic experience, and were fortunate enough to find 3 Chinese girls who wanted to share a boat with us, so we got it cheap as well. There wasn’t much to the town however, so although it was a nice day trip, there really isn’t much to else to say about it. 

 That was pretty much all we did though. After that we headed back, chilled a little then borrowed the driver again to get to the train station, then enjoyed a cheeky 12 hour train ride back to Beijing. It was a good trip overall, and Shanghai is, in my opinion, a nicer city than Beijing, albeit a less interesting one for visiting.

 The next update may be a while, as my mid-term exam period is rapidly approaching, but after that I’m going travelling again, although my destination is as of now TBC, so it’ll probably be in a week or so. See you all soon. Peace x

Remember, We Don’t Question It Anymore

China is a very strange place, here are a few reasons why;

1) Babies don’t wear nappies, they simply wear crotch-less trousers and go to the toilet in bins, bushes and sometimes even their parent’s hands.

2) Health and Safety really isn’t a thing over here, a few examples we seen of this include; various different men welding directly into their faces ‘sans’ welding mask, men cutting down trees using bread knives and repair men being able to fix/break any problem in our dorm rooms with only a screwdriver, hammer and a pair of pliers.

3) You don’t wear seatbelts in taxis, neither are you able to, the reason being that in China it is safer not to wear one, as if you are in a crash, you need to be able to escape quickly, before another car hits you.

4) Queueing is simultaneously both present and lacking in China - big queues are formed due to the severe lack of efficient systems and services, and yet many Chinese choose to ignore queues and jump straight to the front, with not a word of complaint from anyone in the queue.

5) The subway is always busy in Beijing, be it 6 am when the workers are moving their peasant bags around the city for no reason, rush hour when it is not unusual to wait for more than 4 different trains before being able to get on one, or late at night, when I assume people are riding it simply so foreigners aren’t able to have a seat.

6) Spitting is not only not frowned upon, but practically encouraged, with bins provided in most places for saliva collection, including in classrooms and swimming pools. If a bin isn’t provided, feel free to spit on the floor, regardless of whether you are in a restaurant, on a train or on the bus.

7) It is impossible to buy fresh milk in China, do not believe otherwise.

8) There is a similar problem with bacon, although average-to-good substitutes do exist.

9) Street food is always cheaper, and often better than food in restaurants, offering a better range and friendlier service.

10) You can buy an iPhone practically anywhere. 

11) Once you own an iPhone, you can buy a cover for said phone anywhere. Seriously.

12) Dentistry is non-existent. Either that or they use faeces as toothpaste.

13) The Chinese love everything sweet, and yet are unskilled at making good cakes and desserts.

14) Taxi drivers do not know where places are in Beijing and I don’t just mean specific addresses, more often than not they are clueless as to where major tourist attractions and hotspots are. Basically this would be the equivalent of getting in a taxi in London, saying Kings Cross, and then having the taxi driver stare at you blankly.

15) The Chinese like Western food, but seem unable to grasp how to eat it properly, i.e. they more often than not try to use chopsticks on things such as pizza, sandwiches and burgers.

16) It is possible to buy a fake anything in China, even eggs!

17) They haven’t entirely grasped exercise either, often playing sports or running in jeans or a full suit.

18) Drinking Baijiu - a 56% spirit - is an acceptable activity for anyone, any-time, anywhere.

19) They don’t get bread - more often than not it’s sweet, even when used for sandwiches.

20) Koreans are the most stylish race on the planet. (Not strictly relevant, but a valid point nonetheless)

That’s it for my ramblings on China for now, but I’ll probably do another one of these soon, as I probably have enough material to warrant a blog dedicated to this topic (though doubtless they already exist).

Peace

[Insert Vietnam-Related Pun Here]

Well, it’s been a long time since my last post, think it’s over a month now. Ofcourse loads of stuff has happened in that time, what with travelling and all that, so I’m gunna try and sum it all up so this post doesn’t drag on too long (I know I say this every time).

HONG KONG 

Hong Kong was awesome. It was surreal being in a city so Western and similar to England, and yet it be full of Chinese people. We were there for about 5 days in all, including Chinese New Year, and we had a really good time. Luckily for us our friend Jasmin - who is from Hong Kong - was kind enough to let us stay in her house with her, which saved us a lot of money. Speaking of money, that is the other big thing to note about Hong Kong, it is expensive. Prices are similar if not more so London, which, being from the North of England, is something I personally am not used to. Everything from the food to the subway was expensive, myself and Mitchell managing to spend over a tenner on the subway in one day. But dollar aside, it was an awesome experience, especially over Chinese New Year, when we got to watch the firework show Hong Kong spends so much money on each year, followed by the parade featuring acts from all over the world.

Singapore

Due to our drastic lack of thorough planning our travels, we were left without a way out of Hong Kong, assuming we would be able to easily get train tickets straight to Vietnam, as it would be an unpopular route for Chinese people wanting to return home for Spring Festival. Oh how wrong we were. We ended up having to buy plane tickets to Southern Vietnam, as there were no train tickets available, not even standing. Being students we opted for the cheapest flight we could, which included a stop over in Singapore. We only had 8 hours there, so my impression probably isn’t the best one to go off, especially considering we didn’t leave the airport, but if Singapore is anything like it’s airport, which has its own Botanical Gardens, then it’s a pretty awesome place.

Vietnam

Vietnam was where we spent the most part of our holiday, clocking in at just under 2 weeks in all. We started our tour in Ho Chi Minh in the South, which is a pretty cool place on the whole, although the only real things of note we did were; visit the War Museum and learn about how awful the Americans were, go see a Water Puppet Show, apparently a big part of Vietnamese culture and one of the strangest things I’ve seen in Asia so far (and no, it doesn’t hold a candle to Punch & Judy), and finally visit Ho Chi Minh’s Water Park, which actually turned out to be pretty freaking awesome, and was made more surreal by the fact we made up about half the number of non-Vietnamese in the park, so the staring actually rivalled that of China.

 After 3 days in Ho Chi Minh we decided to hit the coast line and soak up the sun, so we head to a seaside resort called Mui Ne. This was a bad idea. If you go to Vietnam avoid this place, it has nothing to offer apart from a really good burger restaurant. I am being serious, that is the best thing about the place, there is nothing to do, and hardly anyone there. We decided to spend only 3 days there in the end and set off to another seaside town called Nah Trang, but not before I managed to pulled my neck muscles and put myself in agony for a couple of days ofcourse. 

 When we rocked up at Nah Trang it was a relief to run into to some young travellers, and also to finally experience some good weather and a really nice beach, two things Mui Ne severely lacked. We signed up to a booze cruise on our second day there, after spending the first one relaxing and getting a feel for the place. The booze cruise was pretty fun, and gave us a chance to get to know some of the people who were staying at our hostel. The best parts included a “free bar” in the ice cold water, the crew pulling out instruments and singing songs for all the nationalities on the boat, and Mitchell getting so drunk so quickly that he passed out about 4 o’clock and then almost missed the bus back to the hostel. That night we went for dinner with our new friends to a barbeque restaurant, where copious amounts of rum were consumed, eating contests were agreed upon and certain people (Mitchell) had to be taken home early. My own night ended with me lost in an alleyway and paying a man with a moped to take me home, which took about 10 minutes so lord only knows where I went. I found out the next morning that I almost got thrown out of a bar for being to violent, so presumably I must have stormed of and then gotten lost in my way back.

 The following day was spent recovering on the beach with our new friends, and trying to build up an appetite for the eating contest I had agreed to the night before. I ended up losing this contest, albeit it to a self-proclaimed professional, with him eating 8 burgers to my 5. I must day I let myself and my wallet down that day, and have challenged the lad to a rematch if we ever encounter each other again. That night we went to a beach party at the Sailing Club on the beach. They had brought over a DJ from Canada and overall it was a pretty good event, from what little we all remember. In the morning I woke up with about 50 new insect bites, Jo woke up having lost something from her purse, and Mitchell and James woke up with horrendous sunburn, just like the rest of us. That day was spent mainly indoors, keeping our sunburn from the blaring heat and watching Jackass 3D on repeat. That night we got on a 36 hour bus journey to Ha Noi, but at least we had beds, so it was practically a walk in the park.

 Ha Noi overall was pretty cool, but was a shock to the system after Nah Trang, no longer being able to walk around in flip flops and shorts as the weather suddenly got cold and damp. Again we didn’t do too much in Ha Noi, mainly eating and doing lots of walking, with a little sight seeing on the side. The main part of our stay here was a booze cruise we did to Halong Bay.

 This was were the real fun began. We opted for the 2 day trip, mainly because we were on a tight budget, but also because the 3 day trip is more suited to when the weather is sunny and warm, as it includes water sports. We arranged it through the main party hostel in Ha Noi, and set off rather early in the morning as it is a 4 hour drive to Halong Bay from Ha Noi city. Once on the boat we had about an hour journey into the bay, were we sat down to eat, had the drinking rules explained to us, were allocated rooms and met our fellow travellers. After this the drinking began, about 12 o’clock in the afternoon and just continued from there. We did a couple other activities, such as jumping off the boat, which was a bloody high thing, kayaking around a part of the bay, and then returning for dinner and to get ready for the meat of the experience, which was the evening’s group drinking game. The game that ensued was pure madness, and gave me a bunch of brilliant ideas should I choose to attend another initiation when I return to England next year. It was like an evolution of Ring of Fire, but expanded to be suitable for a large group, and entertaining enough to keep everyone’s attention. Suffice to say that we all woke up the next day feeling more than a little worse for wear, and being quite content that we didn’t have another night if it to come. After that we spent another couple of nights in Ha Noi, not really doing much, and then set off for China.

 I’m going to stop this post hear, mainly because I’m tired and need to get some sleep for class tomorrow, so I’ll pick up the next post on the way back to China, and our travels around there.

Peace 

This was the Ice Festival. Yes that is all ice, apart from the Neon lights obviously!

I’m Getting Hand Cramp Already…..

So as a lot of you are aware, my parents came to visit me recently. I say recently, but it is over a month ago now, the time over here really is flying by. Like the amazing parents they are they decided to come out and see me for my 21st, something that I really appreciate now that I had to spend Christmas without my family, but that was in another post. Suffice to say that not being able to see your family around important holidays and dates is a difficult thing to do, and I really appreciate my parents making the trip over to see me on my birthday, especially considering that the weather over here at the moment is a lot worse than in England. 

 Anyways they stayed here for about 10 days in all. The day they arrived, I greeted an emotional pair of grown-ups, one who was tearful at the mere sight of me. We then had the arduous task of getting a taxi to their hotel. After initially following what turned out to be an illegal taxi driver, during which my mother managed to fall over, we got into the real taxi queue. The next hurdle was getting all the luggage into a single taxi. They initially told us we needed to get a big taxi, but after they quoted me a ridiculous price, I settled on getting to separate taxis, meaning I spent the whole journey there with only my driver as company, not the best start. Once there we were slightly overcharged, but I didn’t bother to argue as at least we had arrived. I got them checked into their ridiculously nice hotel, and went to check out there room. At this point they began to unpack, sat on the bed for what seemed like only a minute, and then fell straight asleep, both of them. I didn’t really know what to do to be honest, so contented myself with watching Harry Potter with Chinese subtitles, and let them have a little nap. When they decided to wake up we headed out for their first taste of real Chinese food, and I’m glad to say they weren’t disappointed. 

 The next few days were really a mixture of the parents doing touristy things in the mornings and early afternoons, as I still had class, then me taking them to the various markets to sample the delights of shopping for fake goods in China. They both purchased rather excellent versions of their desired watches at the palatable price of £10 each, and a few bags were purchased as presents for my sister back home. This was the schedule for most of the days they were in China, while at night I took them to places I couldn’t afford before they arrived but had wanted to try for the majority of my stay. Let’s just say I didn’t go hungry during their time here.

 The two tourist attractions I accompanied them to were The Temple Of Heaven and The Great Wall. The Temple of Heaven is one of the famous temples in Beijing, and is a really nice and beautiful complex, especially when covered in snow, which it was as it decided to snow only 3 days after my parents arrived. Still, cold weather aside it was a really nice day out, highlights being watching Chinese women struggle to walk on the snow/ ice in their heels, and my mother becoming all emotional at a group of old Chinese men and Women singing in part of the temple, for no reason at all. 

 The Great Wall was an even better experience though. I had been meaning to go, but its kind of an all-day this, and I hadn’t really had a full day to spare for a while, but it was the one thing my dad really wanted to do, so I made sure to make time for it, on their last day ofcourse. I booked it through an agency so we got a car for the day, a ‘tour guide’ - who did nothing but say random facts all day and didn’t even climb the wall with us - and ‘free’ trips to other interesting places along the way, such as a Silk Factory and a Jade Factory. Anyway accidentally chose the part of the wall which involves quite a lot of actual climbing, as it is quite steep. It initially seemed busy until we got to what looked like the top, and saw there was much more wall still left to got. This happened a further 3 times, but we eventually made it to the top in just under 2 hours. And boy was the view worth it, really rewarding, even my mother said so. After a brief rest at the top, we headed back down and went to the Sill Factory for a free tour, because apparently the Ming Tombs that all the other tourists go to see aren’t very interesting, at least this is what our ‘tour guide’ said. Anyway it was one of those ‘free tours’ that are brief, then you have to pass through a load of shops to actually exit the factory, with the point being to entice you to by some silk products as you leave.

 After these stops we decided to make full use of out ‘tour guide’ and got her to buy us tickets for an acrobats show that night - it was all part of the package trust me- and were on our merry way. At least we were until the tour guide then asked for a tip. Now this was awkward because tips are considered rude in China, yet this was someone openly asking for a tip, which I don’t like in anyway. Luckily my father was there and handled it better than anyone else could, and so we left them having giving only a slight tip, but feeling no guilt for this. This occurrence was soon forgotten though as we were watching the acrobats who, although only teenagers not older than say 17, were absolutely amazing. More amazing still was that this was a relatively cheap show, and so I can only imagine how good the more expensive ones are. 

 My parents trip ended in China with an early morning flight, so early that I had to wait a further 2 hours in the airport for the subway to re-open so I could get home, a fact made worse due to the subway being crowded at 6 am in the morning, 6AM! Suffice to say it was really nice to see them after so long, and nice to see them enjoy a holiday that didn’t involve sunbathing for once, sure they got enough sun in the 5 days they went on to spend in Dubai. I think my favourite moment of their trip was on their 2nd or 3rd day in China, when my mum simply stated “I’m bored of using chopsticks.”, suffice to say she probably couldn’t hack it full time out here. Mum and Dad, if you’re reading this I love you and miss you loads. 

 I promise the next post will be a heck of a lot less soppy than this one, sorry about that.

Peace x