A week of travel in China
We were given 1700 RMB (about 215 USD) to travel anywhere in China for 8 days. Start in Tianjin, end in Shanghai, they said. This is our story---
Here is Aaron at Carrefour. We had just stocked up on sugar and caffeine and feel like superheroes. No long train ride could get us down. P.S. Greg, this picture is for you.
Sometimes you just take pictures of things you want to remember. RainboWHAT?
Really though, we visited many McDonald's sites. It's nothing to be ashamed about. They're open 24 hours a day, and in China, they're classy. I'll say, though, we sure were nine conspicuous foreigners with our luggage.
Here's Vanessa, Angie and Aaron doing scared faces in our first train station. It was kind of late at night, everyone was watching us, and all of our Zhongguo pengyou (Chinese friends) had warned us many times to be careful of our things here. P.S. Kath or Noelle, your favorite movie?
Top bunk in a hard sleeper baby. The first time, it was an experience. The second time, it was still kind of an experience. As for the third, fourth, fifth times.....
Here's the view from our first hotel in Datong. It was a nice place, considering we paid for one (very cheap) night, but arrived at 5:30 in the morning and didn't really leave until 10pm the next night.
Hey, a donkey.
Believe it or not, we were a spectacle. The van we hired to drive us to the hanging monastery was, as we so often say, sketchy. B efore we had even left the city, our driver was looking for new passengers and stopping to do his errands.
We took this picture in case he decided to take off. What a creep.
Hey, the monastery. 1400 years old, 100 meters high, home to statues of Confucius, Lao Tzu and Buddha.
View from the top.
Many people had problems convincing themselves to come down the stairs. We actually thought the hanging monasteries would be a lot more -- hanging --
Khanh contemplating life, as always.
King Kong anyone? Angie being swallowed up by the dragon.
Aaron and I complacently succumbing to the same awful fate.
The nastiest bathroom in all of China.
Again with taking pictures of things you'd like to remember. We had already paid 10 kuai to see a "reservoir," but at this point had only seen the bathroom and some dirty water. We laughed and laughed when a man asked us if we wanted to ride this boat.
Climbing up, up, up. Risk assessment?
They look so small.
Good view, though.
View of the reservoir-ish.
Another one of the monastery.
The steps we had to climb down were huge. Preparing to jump.
Here we are eating Datong's specialty noodles and hearing the funniest joke in the world (not).
Lonely Planet told us to go here for a happenin expat scene and good pub grub. There wasn't a soul in the place, but the sign was funny.
Peddlers outside of the Yungang Grottoes. Notice the animal skins.
Guys, hey guys, shouldn't we go look at the grottoes? History is riveting, but greenery is rare in the China we know. We stop to explore the gardens.
Returning to the grottoes.
Modern art Buddha?
Aaron and I looking up at the giant cave Buddha. I like the lighting. We almost didn't go into this cave.
Funny.
Honest, this wasn't posing. This place was overwhelming.
You can see where the sun took the color and where the shade left it.
The grottoes are home ot over 50,000 Buddha statues.
Pictures were hard to take, so here is a video. HUGE.
A video of the big cave Buddha.
A man sleeping in the place we ate lunch. Remember that time Angie yelled at the poor man walking in the door?
Ahhahahah. Lonely Planet said we could walk 15 minutes east of the grottoes and reach a little-known chunk of Great Wall. I saw this coming, but a few of us asked how to get to the Wall only to hear -- go to Beijing. We said, no no, the piece of the Great Wall you can walk to, and she kept telling us to take a train to Beijing. Then the nice Chinese lady missed her bus.
Here's everyone looking upset. We decided to see if we could still find a piece of the Wall. Is that the Great Wall? we'd ask every few minutes.
The Hai-Keyi Wall, the okay wall. A man on a motorcycle asked, are you looking for the wall? Because it's not here, all you foreigners looking for the wall....
Dang. Before we played the ABC game and lifted our spirits.
You might notice two children wrestling each other on the bus next door.
This man was supremely interested in Aaron. At least the hat only cost 4 kuai.
We took a train to Taiyuan with plans to stay there a day, but instead ended up in a McDonald's for an hour or two. We brushed our teeth and met up with a teacher's friends. We told them we wouldn't be able to hang out, but the Taiyuan friends literally said -- oh no, I really wanted to see foreigners -- so we talked for a little while.
Old man and Ronald and a guy running into my picture.
The cutest cat in the world.
A long (and surprise) train ride from Taiyuan to Xi'an.
Here's a piece of the wall at the backpackers' hangout we bunked down at --- Ludao Binguan, run by the unforgettable Mr. Jim Beam. When he met Shilpa, he told her she was cute like a baby, hen ke'ai. He told Angie he liked Korean women because they were sometimes hard (like Chinese women) but sometimes soft (like Japanese women).
It rained for all of day one. We stuck it out and went to a great history museum and the Muslim Quarter.
What a silly sign.
Our rainy day museum.
This 10 yr old Chinese girl spoke impeccable English. She told us her parents didn't speak at all, that she learned everything from Hollywood.
Pracicing taijiquan in the rain in front of the drum tower.
Oh man, the army of terracotta warriors. Qin Shi Huang had this built by his tomb.
Posing like the bingmayong. You can't even imagine how many of them there are.
An old couple scanning Xi'an from the Drum Tower.
Me doing the same.
A performance we pretty much missed. Notice the guy on the right losing his ball.
Well said --- how hard did this neighborhood have to fight to preserve itself right by the tower? Perhaps because their dried fruit was so delightful.
Our mark at Jim Beam's. Really, if you're ever in Xi'an, you have to go to Ludao Binguan. Anyone have a non-blurry picture?
Backpackers.
The way to the Banpo Neolithic Village was a little shady, at least compared to ultra-historic/ultra-modern Xi'an.
Here's a video of what the site almost entirely looked like (pits).
I think this was my favorite site. And no one was even around.
Aaron looks like a bingmayong.
A video of the site.
Model house.
This site had a dinosaur skeleton. What the heck. Doing the T-rex, of course.
You can tell how bored I was by the kind of pictures I took. Some statue looking at the Little Goose Pagoda.
Well said, my friends.
What, so I was a little sick of pagodas. And we still had to make it to the Big Goose Pagoda before our train ride to Hangzhou.
Basically the story of the trip was Aaron trying to pull his pants up. I have so many pictures of him.
Buddha hand in front of Big Goose Pagoda.
Now us.
These people took pictures of us and laughed, so I turned right back around and took a picture of them. They were quite surprised.
Incense.
Surveying the city.
There it is. Too bad about the fog.
They were doing cool reprints of the Buddha's footprint.
After a 24 hour train ride, we arrived in Hangzhou. The hotel representatives were hassling us and competing for our business. And lying.
Oh yeah, remember that time the police sent us packing? Turns out the manager wasn't allowed to host foreigners, despite his words declaring otherwise. At least it only took us three hours to find the place.
For memory's sake, a video of our (loud) escape.
We decided to stay up all night, so much fun, so much fun, we chirped.
A beacon. We left our luggage in a janitor's closet, crossed our fingers and crossed the stadium. We encountered many setbacks, but eventually made our way to our embassy of choice --- 24 hr McDonald's.
Everybody sleeping.
This is when I began to lose it. Not only were people sleeping in the play place, not only had I been awake for two days, but McDonald's exercised its option to play LOUD dance music at 4 in the morning. No more sleeping, kiddos.
Finally morning! A silly traffic jam caused by a lonely bike.
Is this West Lake?
Unloading a truck. Are we at West Lake yet, no guys, is this West Lake?
We finally reached West Lake, and only had time to stay a half hour or so.
Just a shot to remember what train stations are like. With that, we set off for Shanghai.
Here is Aaron at Carrefour. We had just stocked up on sugar and caffeine and feel like superheroes. No long train ride could get us down. P.S. Greg, this picture is for you.
Sometimes you just take pictures of things you want to remember. RainboWHAT?
Really though, we visited many McDonald's sites. It's nothing to be ashamed about. They're open 24 hours a day, and in China, they're classy. I'll say, though, we sure were nine conspicuous foreigners with our luggage.
Here's Vanessa, Angie and Aaron doing scared faces in our first train station. It was kind of late at night, everyone was watching us, and all of our Zhongguo pengyou (Chinese friends) had warned us many times to be careful of our things here. P.S. Kath or Noelle, your favorite movie?
Top bunk in a hard sleeper baby. The first time, it was an experience. The second time, it was still kind of an experience. As for the third, fourth, fifth times.....
Here's the view from our first hotel in Datong. It was a nice place, considering we paid for one (very cheap) night, but arrived at 5:30 in the morning and didn't really leave until 10pm the next night.
Hey, a donkey.
Believe it or not, we were a spectacle. The van we hired to drive us to the hanging monastery was, as we so often say, sketchy. B efore we had even left the city, our driver was looking for new passengers and stopping to do his errands.
We took this picture in case he decided to take off. What a creep.
Hey, the monastery. 1400 years old, 100 meters high, home to statues of Confucius, Lao Tzu and Buddha.
View from the top.
Many people had problems convincing themselves to come down the stairs. We actually thought the hanging monasteries would be a lot more -- hanging --
Khanh contemplating life, as always.
King Kong anyone? Angie being swallowed up by the dragon.
Aaron and I complacently succumbing to the same awful fate.
The nastiest bathroom in all of China.
Again with taking pictures of things you'd like to remember. We had already paid 10 kuai to see a "reservoir," but at this point had only seen the bathroom and some dirty water. We laughed and laughed when a man asked us if we wanted to ride this boat.
Climbing up, up, up. Risk assessment?
They look so small.
Good view, though.
View of the reservoir-ish.
Another one of the monastery.
The steps we had to climb down were huge. Preparing to jump.
Here we are eating Datong's specialty noodles and hearing the funniest joke in the world (not).
Lonely Planet told us to go here for a happenin expat scene and good pub grub. There wasn't a soul in the place, but the sign was funny.
Peddlers outside of the Yungang Grottoes. Notice the animal skins.
Guys, hey guys, shouldn't we go look at the grottoes? History is riveting, but greenery is rare in the China we know. We stop to explore the gardens.
Returning to the grottoes.
Modern art Buddha?
Aaron and I looking up at the giant cave Buddha. I like the lighting. We almost didn't go into this cave.
Funny.
Honest, this wasn't posing. This place was overwhelming.
You can see where the sun took the color and where the shade left it.
The grottoes are home ot over 50,000 Buddha statues.
Pictures were hard to take, so here is a video. HUGE.
A video of the big cave Buddha.
A man sleeping in the place we ate lunch. Remember that time Angie yelled at the poor man walking in the door?
Ahhahahah. Lonely Planet said we could walk 15 minutes east of the grottoes and reach a little-known chunk of Great Wall. I saw this coming, but a few of us asked how to get to the Wall only to hear -- go to Beijing. We said, no no, the piece of the Great Wall you can walk to, and she kept telling us to take a train to Beijing. Then the nice Chinese lady missed her bus.
Here's everyone looking upset. We decided to see if we could still find a piece of the Wall. Is that the Great Wall? we'd ask every few minutes.
The Hai-Keyi Wall, the okay wall. A man on a motorcycle asked, are you looking for the wall? Because it's not here, all you foreigners looking for the wall....
Dang. Before we played the ABC game and lifted our spirits.
You might notice two children wrestling each other on the bus next door.
This man was supremely interested in Aaron. At least the hat only cost 4 kuai.
We took a train to Taiyuan with plans to stay there a day, but instead ended up in a McDonald's for an hour or two. We brushed our teeth and met up with a teacher's friends. We told them we wouldn't be able to hang out, but the Taiyuan friends literally said -- oh no, I really wanted to see foreigners -- so we talked for a little while.
Old man and Ronald and a guy running into my picture.
The cutest cat in the world.
A long (and surprise) train ride from Taiyuan to Xi'an.
Here's a piece of the wall at the backpackers' hangout we bunked down at --- Ludao Binguan, run by the unforgettable Mr. Jim Beam. When he met Shilpa, he told her she was cute like a baby, hen ke'ai. He told Angie he liked Korean women because they were sometimes hard (like Chinese women) but sometimes soft (like Japanese women).
It rained for all of day one. We stuck it out and went to a great history museum and the Muslim Quarter.
What a silly sign.
Our rainy day museum.
This 10 yr old Chinese girl spoke impeccable English. She told us her parents didn't speak at all, that she learned everything from Hollywood.
Pracicing taijiquan in the rain in front of the drum tower.
Oh man, the army of terracotta warriors. Qin Shi Huang had this built by his tomb.
Posing like the bingmayong. You can't even imagine how many of them there are.
An old couple scanning Xi'an from the Drum Tower.
Me doing the same.
A performance we pretty much missed. Notice the guy on the right losing his ball.
Well said --- how hard did this neighborhood have to fight to preserve itself right by the tower? Perhaps because their dried fruit was so delightful.
Our mark at Jim Beam's. Really, if you're ever in Xi'an, you have to go to Ludao Binguan. Anyone have a non-blurry picture?
Backpackers.
The way to the Banpo Neolithic Village was a little shady, at least compared to ultra-historic/ultra-modern Xi'an.
Here's a video of what the site almost entirely looked like (pits).
I think this was my favorite site. And no one was even around.
Aaron looks like a bingmayong.
A video of the site.
Model house.
This site had a dinosaur skeleton. What the heck. Doing the T-rex, of course.
You can tell how bored I was by the kind of pictures I took. Some statue looking at the Little Goose Pagoda.
Well said, my friends.
What, so I was a little sick of pagodas. And we still had to make it to the Big Goose Pagoda before our train ride to Hangzhou.
Basically the story of the trip was Aaron trying to pull his pants up. I have so many pictures of him.
Buddha hand in front of Big Goose Pagoda.
Now us.
These people took pictures of us and laughed, so I turned right back around and took a picture of them. They were quite surprised.
Incense.
Surveying the city.
There it is. Too bad about the fog.
They were doing cool reprints of the Buddha's footprint.
After a 24 hour train ride, we arrived in Hangzhou. The hotel representatives were hassling us and competing for our business. And lying.
Oh yeah, remember that time the police sent us packing? Turns out the manager wasn't allowed to host foreigners, despite his words declaring otherwise. At least it only took us three hours to find the place.
For memory's sake, a video of our (loud) escape.
We decided to stay up all night, so much fun, so much fun, we chirped.
A beacon. We left our luggage in a janitor's closet, crossed our fingers and crossed the stadium. We encountered many setbacks, but eventually made our way to our embassy of choice --- 24 hr McDonald's.
Everybody sleeping.
This is when I began to lose it. Not only were people sleeping in the play place, not only had I been awake for two days, but McDonald's exercised its option to play LOUD dance music at 4 in the morning. No more sleeping, kiddos.
Finally morning! A silly traffic jam caused by a lonely bike.
Is this West Lake?
Unloading a truck. Are we at West Lake yet, no guys, is this West Lake?
We finally reached West Lake, and only had time to stay a half hour or so.
Just a shot to remember what train stations are like. With that, we set off for Shanghai.