Pingyao - Day 2

Had a pleasant breakfast at the hostel and then headed out to the government building. We had tried to go the day before, but we felt there were to many Chinese tourists groups with blaring megaphones for us. On our way there, we decided to go the newspaper museum, which was on the way. It wasn't particularly interesting. The government building was already swarming even at this point early in the morning. We got inside the complex shortly before ten and saw that they had a performance at ten. The performance was very lame and all in Chinese, so we decided to look at the rest of the complex. The complex contained what is apparently the only surviving prison from the Qing era. It was in use until the 1960s.

Pingyao - Day 1

The area around the train station did not impress me too much, as it looked like any other Chinese city, with ghastly bathroom tile buildings everywhere. Where was the best preserved city in China? It turned out to be quite close to the train station. The first site of the city wall was impressive, and inside the wall it felt like we had stepped back in time! Pingyao is what China is supposed to be like, filled with traditional buildings that have not been 'restored'. There is an air of shabbiness that pervades the areas not directly used by tourists. I predict that within a few years Pingyao will be like a theme park and lose much of its scruffy charm after all its buildings have been restored and the locals kicked out to make way for businesses catering to tourists.

Our hotel is located in one of the old Qing-era buildings on one of the main streets. In some ways it feels magical to stay in a building from the 19th century in China, as there are so few that remain. We had breakfast while waiting for our room to be prepared. I had a coffee that made me feel much better and woke me up. Our room contains a triple bed that was apparently used by couples to 'play' during Qing times. After briefly settling into our room, we began to walk through the town. It truly is remarkable how well preserved it is. I bought some old money at one of the faux antique shops lining the street, although I think I paid too much. On our way up the street we went into one of the few non-Qing buildings in town, what looked like a building built during the 50s. Inside they had an auction preview of Chinese antiques. Of particular note was a scroll that they expected would sell for 10 to 20 million kuai. There is only one ticket for all the attractions in Pingyao, so we had to go to the place selling these tickets before going into any of the nineteen sights that line the streets. After buying the tickets, we went into a buildig which turned out to formerly be a bank. During the 19th century, Pingyao was the banking center of China. The bank was very interesting and contained many features that I have never seen in a bank, such as a kitchen for the servants, and an inn for guests. Our second attraction was a house owned by a martial arts master. Unfortunately, nothing ws translated into English, so it wasn't as interesting as it could have been. I did like the taijitiu symbols inlaid in the floor.

At this point we were hungry so we decided to have lunch. We went into one of the many restaurants lining the streets. The restaurant we chose actually turned out to be quite good, although we were appalled when we found out the tea cost 30 kuai! We got Pingyao dumplings, although we all agreed that they were too doughy. But, the traditional Shanxi pork dish we ordered was excellent. Because we were so tired, we returned to the hostel for a nap, which took a couple of hours. I also showered at this time, and it felt good to feel clean after that long train ride. After waking up, we went some more of the many attractions in Pingyao. Near our hotel, we went to the former residence of Liu Lutai, an owner of one of the banks. Many of the rooms had giant heated beds for the winter, including the servant's rooms. Nearby Liu Leitai's residence the map indicated that there was a temple, called the temple of Guanyu. We looked around in vain for a while until we found it inside an elementary school. Apparently at some point the temple was converted into a school. The main temple hall is still there, but looks like it is about to collapse. Next we went to the Town God temple, a Daoist temple. It had a number of interesting things, including a room displaying the kind of tortures that go on in hell. On the other side of the temple was shrine for fertility that had lots of bady statues. Apparently the head of the temple had a special hall at the back for his concubines. Seems a bit odd to me. At the temple, I noticed Martin had been in the same spot for a while. It turns out he had gotten a poem created from his name by someone. You gave him your name and he created a quick poem out of it on the fly. It was only ten kuai as well! We all decided to get one. Across the street from the Town God temple was the Confucian temple, the last stop for the day. A fairly standard temple, the only thing of interest there was a teacher who approached us and asked for help on how to pronounce certain things in a textbook. She taught twelve year-olds at school. Her English was not spectacular, but it was nice that she was making an effort to improve her own English. After dinner, we went to have a foot massage to sooth our aching feet after our ascent of Huashan the day before. It was quite pleasant, although the women thought our legs were very strange due to the hair on them.

Hua Shan

After a pleasant night's sleep in our two-star hotel, we left shortly after eight in the morning. We had a mediocre breakfast a restaurant nearby, which consisted of zhou (porridge), fried vegetables and some buns that the locals seem to like. We walked up the street and entered a temple on our way to the Huashan ticket gate. It turns out the student tickets are only ten kuai cheaper than the reglar ones (90 versus 100). Not much of a discount. There was a hilarious sign right after the ticket gate. The first two and a half hours of our ascent was through a verdant valley. Every half kilometer or so there was a shop selling food and water. Prices rose the further you up you went. Some of the nasty things on sale included a chicken foot in plastic and ancient eggs. Some of the bathrooms were truly awful. I felt sorry for all the porters that were carrying back-breaking loads up the mountain. The porters offered to be in tourist's photos to make more money. One porter even wanted us to see if we could lift his load. We could not. As the path gained altitude, it also gained steepness. A slight incline turned into stairs which progressively got steeper until we arrived at a section that was nearly vertical. Finally, shortly before one in the afternoon we got to the top. However, we only really got to the top of the North Peak, which is roughly 1500 M high. The back peaks are over 2000 M high. Therefore we decided to make a further trek up to the West Peak, the most picturesque of the peaks. It took about an hour and a half to get up there, although we did stop for a brief lunch of noodles on the way. The mountain itself is extremely beautiful, with luch vegetation interspersed with bare rock. The smog wasn't nearly as bad at higher heights, leading to fresher air. The top of the peak was pleasant, and the sense of achievement at having completed the climb was satisfying. As it was now nearing four inteh afternoon, we decided to head back down, fearful that the cable car could close at five. While we didn't want to take the cable car up, our legs were very sore, and facing a near vertical descent had little appeal for us. At the bottom of the cable car, we took a shuttle bus back to town and picked up or bags before heading to the train station.

The train station is not actually in the town of Huashan itself, but in a nearby town called Mengyuan. Unfortunately we were not able to get sleeper tickets to Pingyao, so we had to get hard seats! We also have to wait until one in the morning to leave! We rented a room in the worst hotel I have ever seen to store our luggage during our down time. The room was filthy and I didn't want to lie down. One look at the bathroom made my stomach turn. We went to dinner but wanted to avoid the restauarants near the train station. We walked quite distance and got a an area where a kid was yelling 'laowai' at us constantly. That was enough for me. We went back up the road and went into a whole in the wall restuarant where we ate jiaozi. After dinner, we went back to the rvolting hotel. While the other two members of my group napped, I could not due to how horrible the place was.

I was delighted to leave at around 12:30 AM and we got on the train with no problem. Besides us, there were only four other people getting on the train at the station. While I was initially delighted that the train was a double-decker, my delight turned to dismay when we got on the train and saw that it was over-sold and there were people roaming around. We had assigned seats, thank goodness, and we had to kick some Chinese people out of our seats. I initially could not sleep because Martin was talking to the girl sitting next to us. She was interesting enough though, and when I didn't feel like shutting my eyes, I participated. She was studying in Xian and was going home for the holiday. Her name was Zhou Fan, and as she didn't have an English name, I suggested giving her the name Josephine, but she wasn't too keen. After she got off the train at around three, things quieted down, and I fell into a restless sleep. I woke up at around six with a very sore neck and very tired. The train was positively filthy by this time, with garbage everywhere and appalling bathrooms. Crouch toilets do not work well on trains, as people can miss. Shortly before eight AM we pulled into Pingyao.

Xian - Day 3

Since studying Daoism in university, I had always wanted to go to a temple called Louguan Tai. It is reputedly the birthplace of Laozi and a major center of Daoist teaching beginning in the 5^th century. The temple is located about seventy kilometers to the southwest of Xian. While transportation to the temple may have been difficult it is also the location of a panda rescue center. Since Pandas are so adorable, many of the hostels offer tours to the center. We asked our hotel whether they could tack on a trip to the temple alongside a trip to the panda center. They said they could, so we booked our trip for Monday morning at eight in the morning.

The drive took an hour through the smoggy countryside. Also going with the three of us were two girls, an Australian and a Japanese. After about an hour and a half of driving we turned and drove past a large temple. Alongside the road were buildings built in the old-style, but that looked half abandoned. I don't think the tourists have discovered Louguan Tai yet. Finally we pulled into a parking lot and got off. We had arrived. We followed our driver into the 'rescue center', and he gave us a bit of a tour. The first panda was quite near the entrance, but I was dismayed to see that the habitats were not great, with a lot of concrete and iron bars. The panda was not black and snow white like the photogenic pandas seen in the media, but had some light brown fur. I later found-out that the pandas from Shaanxi province actually belong to a different sub-species from the ones in Sichuan and are coloured differently. In addition, the panda was injured and limping. She had a huge sore on her leg. According to our guide she was injured while mating. The panda walked around for a bit before going inside, after which we moved on to see more pandas. Perhaps the most interesting panda was a baby, who had his own very large habitat. While the members of our group were oogling him, I put my shirt on the ledge just next to the bars so I could have two free hands to put on my contact lenses. The panda came over and nearly snatched my shirt. I even managed to touch him, although he shrunk back when I did.

There were also a number of other animals in the 'rescue center', all native to the area. The next animal we went to see was the Golden Takin, a type of antelope. Surprisingly one of them was ranging freely throughout the grounds. We were told that it was a baby and wasn't aggressive. One of the staff members came up to us and asked about how farming was in our own country. He was obviosuly from the countryside and thus had a nearly impenetrable accent.

Xian - Day 1

The hostel picked us up at the train station, which was a nice gesture, and drove us to the hostel, which took about twenty minutes. Xian seems to be quite nice, but is quite different from what I remember. There many more tall buildings, and it does seem to be much more modern. The hostel I booked, the Shuyuan, is very nice, and has a lovely courtyard and friendly staff. Our room is not ideal, as it is located next to bar and a bit noisy until about midnight, but the bathroom is very nice.

Once we finished settling in, our first sight was the nearby drum tower. We watched a mediocre drum performance while there. Just behind the drum tower is the Muslim quarter. When I visited Xian is 2002, there was an antique market just off the Muslim quarter, and I hoped that it would still be there. Unfortunately, a tacky tourist market had replaced it. One stall was selling fake LaCoste shirts, and since I was wearing my own LaCoste shirt, I decided to compare them. The fake one really did have much poorer craftsmanship than the fake one. The lady selling them assured me it was real and the one I was wearing was fake! For lunch, we ducked into a hole-in-the-wall Muslim restaurant and ordered some mutton soup, which was quite good. It had square dumplings in it. The Muslim quarter is quite nice, and definitely feels somewhat authentic. There are lots of people wearing the hats that identify them as Muslim. After luch we headed to the Great Mosque. Outside, I bought a Muslim hat and put it on.

The mosque is quite a remarkable building. It is built in the Chinese style, and looks somewhat like any other temple. There are a few notable differences, though. The mosque is oriented towards the west (to face Mecca), unlike every other temple in China, which is oriented north-south. Also, the pagoda-like structure in the middle of the mosque is actually a minaret. In addition, there are lots of arabic inscriptions all around the structure. One old man thought I was a Muslim because of the hat I was wearing!

From the Muslim quarter we took a taxi to the provincial museum, but were appalled by the lineup. Like the museum in Zhengzhou, the line to the Shanxi museum was impossibly long and would have likely taken an hour to get through. I had no desire to wait for that long, so instead we went to the nearby Big Wild Goose Pagoda. In front of the pagoda was what appeared to be a large fountain, but it wasn't working. We wondered when it would work. While climbing up the pagoda, I was disturbed by Viennese music. I looked out the window of the pagoda, and saw that the fountain was spewing water to the music. Apparently at night they have the same show, but it is set to light as well. From the pagoda we could also see the nearby Tang Paradise park, a park built to replicate Tang times. We decided to go there after finishing at the pagoda.

The Tang Paradise park was rather expensive at 60 kaui a person. Nevertheless, we still entered. The park was quite nicely landscaped, but while the buildings looked good from the top of the pagoda, they looked fake from up close. The entire park felt completely artificial. We were hungry, so we stopped for some Baozi. Martin got a phone call while we in one of the buildings, so I watched a dress rehearsal of the evening performance with people who wore no costumes. The music became repetitive and tedious after a while. Behind the building we were in, there was very loud French music blaring. Just south of the main park was a mini theme park. We had one free ride, so we went on one of the those swinging pirate ships. It was horrible. I shut my eyes for the entire time. We went around the park's lake, and then left. Boy was I glad to be out of the worst tourist attraction in China!

We took a taxi to the Little Wild Goose Pagoda hoping that it would still be open at 5:30. It was not, so we tried to find a restaurant recommended in the lonely planet guide that was nearby. It was no longer there, so we took a route that would lead us back to our hostel. We stopped in a Sichuanense restaurant on the way, and had a terrific meal. Martin went to the bathroom there, and said he saw the kitchen, and that it absolutely filthy. I had been thinking of returning to that restaurant as well! Once returned to the hostel, we relaxed and had our free beer at 8:30. The hostel gives each of its guests a free beer in the evening. Quite tired we went to bed early, but knew we'd be woken up when Caitlin, the third member of our group arrived. She eventually arrived at about one AM.

Beijing - Xian

We have a week long holiday at Tsinghua, that technically starts on Sunday the 27th of April. However, we decided to leave on Friday night and miss the Saturday class. I had purchased tickets for the train ten days earlier, recalling how difficult it was to get tickets for our prior trip to Henan. Martin is coming with me again for this trip, before going to the train station, we had a quick dinner at the Muslim restaurant. The train station was chaos as always, but we boarded our train an hour before it was to leave. For this train, I purchased soft sleepers to try out, as I've already been on hard sleepers, and wanted to see the alternative. Ironically, the soft sleepers aren't really any softer than the hard sleepers. Each compartment had four beds, each with their own TV. The bathroom facilities were not bad. Sharing our compartment was a couple and a small child. He was a bit noisy for a while, but eventually quieted down. Shortly before arriving into Xian, I saw Huashan from the train, which is a sacred mountain we intend to climb after visiting Xian. It was quite beautiful. I didn't sleep all that well on the train, and when we arrived just before nine in the morning, I was quite tired.

Henan

The past weekend was a long weekend in China, so I took the opportunity to do some traveling. I travelled with two other people, Martin and Jeff. Jeff is an overseas Chinese and speaks near-perfect Chinese, so getting around was no problem. We initially had wanted to go to Shanxi to see Pingyao and Datong, but we did not know that everyone in China also wants to travel on the long weekend. Because of this all of the sleeper trains to any destination in China were fully booked for the day we wanted to leave. So, instead of not going at all we decided to leave early on Friday morning and take an express train to Zhengzhou in Henan. While much farther than Pingyao, the train only took five hours, vs. the twelve that the Pingyao train would have required. China is gradually introducing bullet trains, and the Beijing - Zhengzhou route is quite fast as a result.

We got into Zhengzhou shortly before noon, and went to the market to get some 'xiaochi' (snacks) for lunch. I noticed immediately that it was hot and humid in Henan. I ended getting a squid kebab, a sort of spicy lettuce wrap and a pineapple on a stick. According to the guidebook, there is only one touristy thing to do in Zhengzhou, and that is to go see the Henan Provincial Museum (which looks like pyramid). Outside the museum, we were appalled to see how long the lineup was. Apparently the museum recently became free, and since the Friday was a holiday, it seems as though everyone in Zhengzhou wanted to get in. While I was ready to give up, Martin went and asked the guard at the front of the line whether he could get tickets for us. Surprisingly, he was happy to help us, and brought us some tickets which allowed us to avoid wating in line for an hour! Apparently Chinese speaking white-people are well-liked by the Chinese. The museum was quite interesting and contained many bronzes, especially from the Shang Dynasty that were unearthed in Zhengzhou, the site of a former Shang city. Sadly, there were not many mirrors there.

After finishing in the museum, we went to the bus station to go to Luoyang, a couple of hours away. The bus drive took longer than expected due to appallingly bad traffic out of Zhengzhou, but the drive was interesting. There were many cliffs with caves in them and villages built in deep valleys. We hadn't booked any hotels and finding one in Luoyang was bit of an issue. Nevertheless, we did manage to get one, although it was more expensive than we hoped for. It was also strange, and our room had filthy carpets and an electronic Mahjong table.

The next day we had a pretty mediocre breakfast at the hotel (although it was free), and headed out to the Longmen grottoes. The grottoes are a world heritage sight, and built beginning in the Northern Wei Dynasty, although most of the statues were carved during the Tang dynasty. We were dropped off near the grottoes, and had to walk past about a kilometer of tourist shops built in the old-style to get to the entrance to the grottoes. Unfortunately they were swarming with tourists. Being grottoes built alongside a cliff-face, the paths to the individual grottoes were quite narrow. tihs created bottlenecks in which it was difficult to move. The grottoes were extremely impressive though. Built on two cliff-faces with a river separating them, the scenery was also lovely. The best grotto wasn't even a grotto per say as the statues were so large, an entire segment of cliff had to be cut out. On the other side of the river, therewere several smaller grottoes, and a temple that was being rebuilt. After finishing the grottoes, we we stopped at the Guanlin temple on the way back, built at the burial site of a famous general of the Three Kingdom period. Afterwards we went into old Luoyang and walked around, visiting a drum tower, and enjoying what little traditional architecture remained.

For dinner we went to a restaurant recommended in the guide to try Luoyang's famous 'Water Banquet', a series of 24 dishes all cooked in liquid. Of course, we could not order 24, so we just ordered 6. Overall, they weren't that exciting, but I was glad ot have tried them. On the wall of the restaurant there was a photo of Pierre Trudeau and Zhou Enlai. Apparently in the 1970s they ate at that very restaurant!

On Sunday we left relatively early because we were going to Dengfeng, about an hour and a half away. Dengfeng is the locasion of Songshan, one of China's sacred Daoist mountains. Its most famous attraction is the Shaolin monastery. Before going to Dengfeng, Jeff wanted to go see the Peony garden that Luoyang was apparently famous for. The garden was dreadful however, with none of the floweres being in bloom, and being of generally poor design. After the garden, we went to the bus station and were cajoled into taking a minibus to Dengfeng by an aggressive driver. The drive was quite picturesque, especially the part that took us through the mountains. Upon arrival in Dengfeng, we checked into an extremely cheap hotel and ate at a hole-in-the wall restaurant. Dengfeng is a typical Chinese city being quite ugly. However it was located in a spectacular natural setting, surrounded by mountains. The Shaolin temple was expensive to get into (100 kaui), and swarming with tourists. Because the temple was burned down in the 1920s, most of the buildings date from the 1980s. It was altogether quite a tacky attraction.
The Pagoda forest nearby was much more impressive, and a trip by chairlift was aslo quite pleasant, apart from the repetitive music they played from the loudspeakers. After finishing at the temple, we returned to the city. The taxi driver recommended we try some Dengfeng snack food, which was tofu and spicy sauce stuffed into a bun. It wasn't that great actually. The following morning we decided to go Zhongyue temple, which actually ended up being much more interesting than the Shaolin temple. While we there, they were conducting a ceremony to unveil some new statues. There were lots of people, and they stared at us. Afterwards we caught a minibus to Zhengzhou and caught the train back to Beijing.