Just a quick hello.....

... to say that I am in Bangkok and alright, except for my big toenail on my right foot, which has died off completely and was pulled out today. Bloody and painful - much more so than wat i had thought! Yes, I know, I am lazy keeping up with where I am and what has been going on here. And no time is no excuse. I think I just need some space to digest all the impressions before writing about them - and even now it seems a bit fake, generalized, crammed. Mayeb I put too much thought into it?

I flew to Bangkok in the beginning of last week and spent two days in this huge city going around various markets and the must-see touristattractions, i.e. all the temples. Everything takes some time, especially since a lot of water (and thus a toilet in regular intervals) is an absolut necessity: it's too hot and humid to feel good without! Moreover, public transport is only efficient in the eastern part of the town with a cool skytrain carrying passengers above (most) rooftops (yielding some greatpictures) and a brand-new subway line. The west relies on boats, tuk tuks, buses and taxis only. A complete chaos!

Thursday last weekI left by bus to Cambodia - google for the Poipet border crossing and you will come up with a lot of horror stories about scams, 18h- bus trips etc. One reason I was a bit freaked out... well, everything went fine (yeah, the road is dusty and bumpy) and I got to Siem Reap the same evening. I spent two days at the Temples of Angkor - an amazing experience- and then went back the same way. What is there to sayabout Cambodia? One of the poorest and least developed countries of the world (according to the UN, 2004). The official currency is the Riel, but nothing moves without USD. Until recently, there was 1 (one!) ATM in the whole country (in Pnomh Penh). The roadsare dirt and turn into mud each afternoon when it rains. Kids are selling all kinds of stuff for "uon dolla" everywhere. There are a lot of beggars which in the evenings are kept out of the "tourist" part of Siem Reap with fences. The nature and cultural heritage are amazing. Still digesting the combination....

And now I have to run to pick up my suits. Tomorrow I will be on my flight back to HK!

What I hate

rice

people slurping their food, burping

chinese tours groups with guides who carry headseats but still shout as if they had no microphone.

the craze for kitsch.

s e r v i c e a t t i t u d e

chinese or any Asians, who in any weather tend to walk around with umbrellas - a good alternative to sunlotion, but since most of them are tiny (in length) the umbrellas always threathen to punch out my eyes. I do not like the thought of that.

quequeing at the bus counter. watch your sides and use elbow tactics (FCFS).

spitting and the sound of the spit being generated in the throat of the person in question.

people throwign their trash... literally anywhere.

bargaining with someone who does not like to play the game.

hospitals in china.

carrying around toilet papaer 24/7.

artificial made-to-be tourist attractions - a result of the cultural revolution.

white is rich and rippig them off is ok.

red bean coconut milk.

night trains with only hard seats available.

skies made invisible by pollution.

historical ignorance.

individual and collective ingnorance. Stop bumping into me!

westerners in chinese exile who think they can make the world better by smoking weed and living in Dali.

hello kitty!

thank Jayavarman VII I am going to Cambodia!

The Orange Juice Index

Below: View on the Skyline of Shanghai from the Pudong district. Shanghai is huge- by far the biggest city I have ever been to (approximately 17 million inhabitants). After: Jack, our friend from HK (he studies at Shanghai Jiaotong University, is originally from Xi'an) with whom we were staying and his girlfriend. After a long night out singing karaoke and partying we had a great dumpling breakfast! Above: View on Tian'anmen square. We spent altogether 4 days in Beijing, which was enough, just because of the pollution (as you can see, it is pretty foggy in the picture). This was one the first day (Monday). We spent one day at the Temple of Heaven and walking around Qianmen, one day on the wall near Simatai (below). The weather was great and we walked 10km on the wall, which was partly crumbling so badly that we had to climb down. There were no tourists -we saw maybe 10 other people except for us- which was the good part, but since there were no tourists, walking was sometimes really difficult because of the condition of the wall. A good tradeoff however!

In Beijing we had to have the infamous Beijing duck. And we paid 30 yuan for an orange juice- from then onwe measure everything judging for whether it is a complete rip-off in terms of the "Orange juice Index". 30 yuan for one litre of juice....ok, food for 1 yuan? A bed for 20 yuan? Perfect...

Below: Terracotta warriorrs in Xi'an. Amazing, but a lot of tourists... much better was the arab quarter (2nd below): a chaos full of people (a lot of them in traditional clothing and head scarves), streetfood, bikes.... Xi'an has also big city wall and old towers (Drum and Bell Tower) and temples worth visiting.

Below: Tibetan monastery in Shangri-La. We came here yesterday with the night bus from Kunming (we flew from Xi'an to Kunming), which was a very interesting experience (unfortunately I cannot upload more pictures). Shangri-La : A place that does (should) not exist, lies 3220 above sea level -the nights are cold (around 8C), the days windy- is a town in north-western Yunnan province, close to the Tibetan border. Or well, in China, the border does not officially exist, so one might call it Tibet. Everything is inTibetan and Chinese, most people are mixed Naxi/Tibetan, there are some Han of course as well. Pretty remote. The monastery seemed like a little Lhasa.

Hong Kong - Shanghai - Beijing

I can't see my blog! Am trying to figure out, where my last entry ended, but the page won't open. Probably Chinese censorship! (everytime you enter the internet in an internet cafe you have to show your passport...) *just kidding*

To start from the beginning (or a bit later): I am traveling with Erkki (my flatmate-turned-travel-companion). We booked tickets for Shanghai last week on Tuesday and left on Thursday to Shenzhen (cheaper (domestic) flight from there). The time in between was really busy with booking my onward flights to NZ, cleaning the apartment (which we got in a terrible fight over since I felt I was doing it all on my own; men are just all lazy or then I just "put my priorities wrong"), packing (i.e. throwing stuff away). The ususal. I left with two backpacks (a 10l and a 20l one, not much for 7 weeks!) but have diminished my belongings further (now to about 1 backpack, let's see how much I buy!).
Shanghai was awesome! We had 3 days there, of which we spent one in Hangzhou in the bordering Zhejiang province. Hangzhou has a huge lake (West lake), formerly a lagoon, with a lot of temples and pagodas. (interesting?) The other two days, we went to Nanjing Road, the People's square and up Jin Mao Tower in the Pudong financial district, which consisted of merely a couple of rice fields around 10 years ago. Coming to speak of high buildings, this is the 5th highest or so in the world (and after being in HK I have seen or been on 5 of the top ten highest buildings, only missing the Empire State and everything in Chcago. Weird to think that a lot of the skyscrapers are actually in Asia!). We took a lot of time getting around- Shanghai is huge (by far the biggest city I have ever been to). Finding the right bus or train and buying the right tickets is sometimes challenging especially since I have forgotten most of my Chinese (if it was ever "my" Chinese) except for the numbers and "thank you". Shanghai will be also remembered for the BEST dumpling I have ever had! Thanks Jack!

One day was spent with Erkki's friend Jack on the campus in the Shanghai Jiaotong University (in English: The Shanghai Normal University of Transportation, one of the top universities in China.... what a (c******** translation!), having a 5 hour dinner at a Xinjiang restaurant (no pork, great food!, a lot of booze....), meeting a lot of friends friends and going to sing karaoke until 4 am! It was one of the best nights; I felt very much at home and seeing Chinese culture at its purest *smile*.

Sunday night we hopped on the night train, but got only seats, no sleepers. The train stations work perfectly, there re waiting rooms assigned for each train from which everyone enters the platform and is led to one's carriage and place. The night was long and a bit sleepless, but we got to Beijing early on Monday morning, which left the whole day for sightseeing.

After finding a hostel, I went to Tian'anmen square and the Forbidden City - massive, amazing... Exciting the north gate, I took some random bus east and got out at Dongsi from which I walked a couple of kilometres south to Wangfujing. The smog and heat make walking quite strenuous. Head, throat and eyes start hurting. I fell into bed after a short night in Sanlitun (Beijing LKF) and good kebab pizza (???).

Beijing is apart from the major sights like any other Chinese city, nothing special. I thought it would be much more problematic. It is big, but still easy to get around. A lot fo construction going on, as everywhere else in the booming parts of China. The smog is worse than in HK, that as the only minus. A lot of beggars and others trying to sell you things, but I guess that is normal. And it is not cheap - ok, we are "Chinese" students with our HK student IDs and get a lot of things cheaper (that was one of Erkki's clever tricks), but still: food, entrance tickets to sights... the money goes!

Today we went to some clothes and silk market to order a suit for Erkki's dad who had provided us with all the measures. The bargaining took 40 minutes or so, but we got the price for a kashmir suit down to 1500 yuan... I guess it is ok (they said we are "almost" Chinese). After that we went by subway to Qianmen, where the LP indicated a shopping street -everything was however empty and ready to be torn dopwn. Would be interesting to know, what will stand there next (and when) - everything in China changes so fast! We walked to the Temple of Heaven park which was very impressive ( a lot of tourists though) and continued from there to the silk market, a mall a la Shenzhen (been there, done that... a lot of little things nobody REALLY needs, but I had to buy pearl earrings for one ten yuan anyways ... But I have to limit my shopping just because I do not want to have to carry everything with me!). From there back to the hostel and off to get tickets for the night train on Thursday to Xi'an. And now trying to organize our trip to the great wall tomorrow....

Read a horrible book by a German author btw. About a rich women finding the love of her life, who uses her as a cash cow for his ex-wife-turned misstress. In the end he kills her (and himself) by poison in their summer cottage in rural Spain. Literary worth little; content awful. Don't read!