The blog entry this week is written by our guests and feature writers, Stefan and Christine from Germany.
It’s Friday, October 26th, 9:03 am and Christine and I are just about to take off back to Germany. After three weeks in China we’ve seen a lot of exciting places, we’ve met many nice and interesting people and we had some truly unique experiences that we will certainly keep in our memories for a long time. Looking out of the window of Alecia’s and Andy’s apartment across the Huangpu River, seeing the huge boats floating down the stream and appearing rather small from the 35th floor, I honestly feel sorry that we already have to leave this part of the world that – less than a month ago – we basically didn’t know anything about and that we just started to grasp a little bit. But maybe I should start at the beginning…
October, 6th, 10:30 pm
Christine and I take off from Frankfurt airport, Germany, for a three week vacation. The basic plan is to fly into Beijing and leave from Shanghai about three weeks later. We have reservations at a hostel in Beijing for the first three nights, everything else we’ll have to figure out in China. Well, of course we talked to a lot of people who have been in China, so we know where to go and how to get there. In general we want to head straight down south from Beijing to Shanghai, stopping over at Tai’an and the holy mountain of Tai Shan.
October 7th, 11 pm
We arrive in Beijing. Surprisingly it is no problem at all to catch a taxi from the airport to our hostel. The views from the new airport expressway to downtown Beijing are really stunning. We didn’t really expect anything certain at all, but we certainly did not expect Beijing to look like an Asian Version of Las Vegas: Huge lit up hotels everywhere. The train station, where our hostel is located at, looks like a giant ancient temple illuminated by thousand of small light bulbs. The hostel is very pretty. Having stayed in quite a few hostels around the world I can definitely say: this is the neatest and cleanest hostel I have stayed at. Christine and I enjoy our first Beijing beer in the travelers cafe watching German Bundesliga on Chinese TV. The world has become small.
October 8th, all day
Our first day in China. We want to explore the city. On our way to Tian Anmen we meet Wang and his uncle. They are tourists from Shanghai. We talk as we wander around the square. Wang explains a lot of things, we learn quite a few interesting stories about this country. They ask if we’d like to see the famous Hutong area south of Tian Anmen. We agree since we don’t have any special plans for the first day. The Hutong are really amazing. We come across a tea house. They ask us if we’d like to have a cup of tea. We don’t want to be rude so we say yes. A very nice teahouse. We have at least nine different kinds of tea and end up buying some tea for taking home. The rest of the story can be read in the book “Major scams in China or how to rip off tourists on their first day”: The bill was devastating. Keeping in mind all the stuff we read about a society where everything is about not losing your face etc. I pay without saying a word. About an hour later I have my credit card cancelled because I am not quite sure about Wang and his uncle anymore. A setback in a trip that started so greatly.
October 9th
We explore the forbidden city and the coal hill. A great day in a great city even though due to our experiences on the first day we seem to get paranoid.
October 10th
We hike along the Great Wall from Jinshanling to Simatai. A true experience I will never forget. Already this was worth the trip to China. We almost forget about Wang.
October 11th
We extend our visit to Beijing for one day because we want to see the summer palace before me leave. A wise choice: The summer palace is fantastic and already the Great Wall seems to be far away. It is also the first day in China we experience a devastating air pollution. Even though it is a “clear” day (no clouds) you can look straight into the sun with your bare eyes due to the smog…
On the way back we learned another lesson about the (few!) Chinese who want to take advantage of foreigners. And we learned that not everything that looks like a taxi has to be a taxi. We knew something was wrong once we entered the cab and the driver takes down the taxi sign, locks the doors and stows away his meter. We end up paying 145 Yuan for a 30 Yuan ride. Even worse: The driver hands me back “my” 100 Yuan-bill because of a missing corner. Knowing about the locked doors I give him another bill. Back at the hostel I tell the ladies at the counter and ask them to check if it is real money. Without looking at it they say it is not. Then they explain how to tell by looking at the money. From now on we will be more cautious.
October 12th
Our first train ride in China. We decided to go to Pingyao on our way to Tai An. We have a hard sleeper on a night train arriving in Pingyao at 4.20 am. Supposedly we will be picked up by the hostel there. The lady at the hostel in Beijing arranged everything for us and was very, very helpful.
The night trains in China are great: Everybody is chatting and eating, it seems like a big party with a lot of small talk. We really enjoy it even though at first we are not part of it. They have music on the train: First they play a song known in Germany by the name “Nehmt Abschied Brueder”, then they play “Lemon Tree”, a song from a German group. Later we get to know a Chinese family on the way to Linfen. The son knows a little English so we get a pretty good conversation. All of a sudden he whips out his notebook and we play games. We also learn that the most popular series in China right now is “Prison Break”. We end up watching “The fantastic four”. Other people join in. Everybody is very friendly towards each other. We really love the train ride even though Chinese obviously spit on the ground even on a train.
October 13th
We arrive in Pingyao. Being picked up by a motorrikscha. The city looks awesome. Our hostel is one of the old buildings in this middle-age chinese city. We actually can have our room right way so we’ll go to sleep again. During the day we wander around Pingyao. There is only one word for it: Amazing! We meet two English travelers we had already met at the Great Wall.
October 14th
We decide to go to Xi An instead of Tai An. We can catch a bus to go there. The bus is awesome once we survived the drive to the Freeway in a motorrikscha again. We are traveling together with a Polish couple: the two girls in one rikscha, the two guys in the other rikscha. The drivers are having a race. We learn that you actually can take a roundabout in the wrong direction if you want to safe time on a left turn. We lost anyways to the girls, probably they had less luggage. Later on we will learn from Mr. Cheng something interesting about traffic in China: In the cities they at least have traffic rules.
In the evening we explore Xi An. In the bustling muslim quarter we meet the two English travelers again. What a small country after all.
October 15th
We go to see the famous Terracotta Army. Unfortunately we booked a tour so we also see another small museum with a gift shop, a terracotta factory with a gift shop, a restaurant for feeding thousand of western tourists within a few hours (also comes along with a gift shop) and a silk factory where they try to sell us blankets.
October 16th
We ride bikes on the famous city wall of Xi An. Very nice!! At night we catch the Tibet Express to Shanghai. On the train we meet Sharon, a nice Chinese women, and her son. He is really cute. Sharon also used to work for HP, now she is with Ebay. Seems we are getting closer to Shanghai. Sharon translates for us on the train and shows us around once we arrive. Thank you, Sharon!!
October 17th
We meet up with Andy and Alecia! Great! Have a Paulaner on the Riverside. Awesome! We start to get some rest from a most exciting but also exhausting trip around China.
October 18th
I order a tailor made suit and we tour around the major touristic highlights of Shanghai. Really great! We eat street food for lunch! The best noodles I ever had.
October 19th
We cancelled our originally planned trip to Suzhou and just relax.
October 20th
We learn how to make Chinese dumplings. Yummie! We’ll have to try that at home.
October 21st
Andy takes us out to the lake for a great sailing trip. After some general lessons about sailing we participate in a regatta. We get in second in our class (out of three boats). We had a lot of fun and enjoyed being out in the nature after traveling through all the cities.
October 22nd
We are headed toward the Huang Shan. Unfortunately we couldn’t get reservations for any of the hotels up the mountain. So we go there without reservation trying out our luck…
October 26th
It is 10.23 am by now so we have to leave. About our trip to the Huang Shan all there is to say is: Thanks to Mr. Hu and Mr. Cheng we made it up the mountain, enjoyed a beautiful sunrise with the “monkey watching the sea”, climbed across the “carps back bridge” and saw one of the most beautiful sceneries there is in the world. Who cares that we shared it with about 3.5 million Chinese tourists, out of which 15 stayed in my room, at least 50 had used my sheet before me and one was smoking in the room…
Now here we are, getting ready to leave this most thrilling country. But one is for sure: I’ll be back!
Many, many thanks to Alecia and Andy who where our great hosts in Shanghai. You two pick the continent where we’ll meet next…
Stefan and Christine
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