Greetings From Beijing

My last few days in Xinjiang passed pretty quickly. I visited a few temples around the city, ate at the nicer restaurants and generally lazed about until it was time to leave. The next day I got up early to catch the train to Beijing.

I’d met two Australian girls at the hostel who were going to be on my train and in the same carriage as me. Maree and Carol were both highly energised people, especially Carol who was entirely mad. They were great company on the train and when we weren’t sleeping we either hung out in my compartment or drank Golden Gobi beer in the dining car.

The train journey was great. I spent most of it snoozing or otherwise relaxing and could have happily stayed on for an extra day, not just the required 36 hours. There were views of the Gobi for the first day and when we woke up the next morning it was to the northern Chinese mountains and the Great Wall. Beautifully, the only moment of discomfort came when we were crossing the border – a three hour affair involving changing all the wheels on the carriages to fit the Chinese tracks. During this time the toilets are locked. Of course this was when my system decided it just had to go! I’d had lots of practise holding on, though. Ever since leaving Beijing it seemed like every time I got up to go to the loo they’d just locked the toilets in anticipation of passing through a station.

When we got to Beijing, Maree, Pilar and Gabriel decided to accompany me to Leo hostel on my sterling recommendations. First we had to find Carol’s friend, which was no mean feat. After we’d finally found him we began the challenge of finding a taxi to take us to the hostel. It was ridiculously difficult. For half an hour we were refused by taxi after taxi – not because we had big bags but because the fare was too small. It’s just as well none of the drivers spoke any English because I was using some pretty uncouth language on them by the end of it. One driver offered to take us, but at five times the metered fare. Ha! We finally got a cab at a taxi stand but only with the help of the attendant. After a few minutes of driving I recognised the area, thanks to the unmistakable Tiananmen Square, so I was confident we were at least going in the right direction. Despite my increasingly emphatic pointing at the map and gesturing to turn left, our driver continued straight past the square and pulled over further up the road and mimed that we should walk the rest of the way. He just didn’t want to drive down a one way road to get to the right hutong, the bastard. It was only a ten minute walk to the hostel but we all had packs and it was a lot hotter than Ulaanbaatar had been. I was impressed with myself for recognizing the little street the hostel was on after six weeks away.

That evening I got some great tips for travelling in South America from Gabriel, so that is another adventure to get cracking soon. Maree and I decided to try out the massage centre next door to the hostel. They had a sign outside advertising foot massage for 20 yuan ($4) and a full health massage for 38 yuan. There were other services offered but they didn’t have an English translation. It was a very strange experience. When we walked in we were asked to remove our shoes and were led downstairs. We then went through what I assumed was the women’s changing room, complete with naked Chinese women having showers. I assumed that it was also a bath house. Then we went into a room that was full of rows of beds, all facing an empty stage that was backed by a huge love heart. We started to wonder what we’d got ourselves into. There were a few customers there already. They all seemed to be middle aged Chinese men and they were all in their pyjamas. Some of them were snoring peacefully, all wrapped up in duvets and blankets. The staff were an odd lot, also. There was a young man with his shirt open to show his chest, some older women in business suits, even a young woman who spent the whole time we were there wandering around the room in a set of teddy bear print pyjamas and eating popcorn. Bizarre. Nothing happened on the stage while we were there to give us more clues. The massage was great though. We left feeling relaxed but a little bit confused. China is a strange place.

The next morning I had breakfast with Maree and then caught a cab to the airport for my next China destination.

James Ashe is an American traveller, who loves trave all over the world. Kungfu Panda is his pet name for his China travel articles as he travel around China . See more about his China tours blog and tips about China travel, China Hotels, China Flights just log on the ChinaTravelDepot.com, which sponsor his China hotel in China.

Mei Jia Wu Tea Culture Village

Not too many cities deserve such a name as paradise on earth, but Hang Zhou in China does. Too many cities now in China, desperate with economic development, are losing their souls, but Hang Zhou is not. Why so? Nature blessing and human efforts are the answers. One is tea culture, Mei Jia Wu Longjing Tea and its culture village.

The name of Longjing, directly translated as Dragon Well comes from 4 sources, tea tree, the well, the temple and the spring. This tea comes from the shores of West Lake (Xi-hu), at Hangzhou City Zhejiang Province. By far, Longjing is highly praised because of its absolute beauty in four aspects: greenish color, elegant fragrance, mellow taste and prettiness in appearance. The delicate fragrance is very long-lasting, and the bright liquor gives a refreshing, brisk, mellow, and sweet after taste. To process Longjing, the tea leaf must undergo the intensive pan-frying steps by hands during the entire process. In a custom-made pan, the leaves are repeatedly stirred and agitated by hand, with different hand gesture: as much as 10 different styles are a must.

There are many Longjing found in the market, nevertheless, the best Longjing comes from its original places, the Longjing Village which covers several historically renowned production areas. At this moment, there are many tea produced from other places in Zhejiang Province, which is known as Zhejiang Longjing . However, due to the localized climatic environment and different manufacturing expertise, the quality is different from its origin. Besides, the production areas at certain places of Zhejiang Province are located in the city area, which is exposed to the risk of heavy metal contamination from vehicles and industrial area.

In Hangzhou , dont forget to try some Longjing (Dragon Well) tea. It is a famous variety of green tea from Hangzhou and is produced pan fried by hand to stop the fermentation process, which refers to drying of the freshly picked leaves, resulting in enzymatic oxidation. We visited Mei Jia Wu Tea Village for its Longjing Tea. Mei Jia Wu Longjing tea has a light nutty aroma, smell of fresh leaves, very smooth taste and a pleasant flowery aftertaste. The tea leaves are green, flat and slender. One container of half a catty , equivalent to 500 grams in China, costs around S$50 (about US$36). Not cheap. The promoter motivated us by stuffing and compressing the tea leaves into one container, to make it look like we got more tea leaves! But remember to tape the container cover, as the pressured leaves might pop the cover and create a mess in your bag!

Most people go to Mei Jia Wu for three reasons: to drink tea, buy tea and eat Nong Jia Cai, or peasant family dishes. My reasons were slightly different. Instead of buying the tea, I took pictures. Longjin Cha, or Dragon Well tea, known as the best green tea in China, is so far a pure luxury for me. It is not a secret that agricultural fields can be really picturesque in China, such as the rice paddies and terraces. The tea plantations at Mei Jia Wu are as good as them, if not better. Neatly planted rows of tea bushes line up the hillside; meandering soil paths, like brown threads, sew the pieces of green together; villagers pick up tea sprouts in their wide-brimmed straw hats; bamboo forests swing along the top of the hills?

James Ashe is an American traveller, who loves trave all over the world. Kungfu Panda is his pet name for his china travelarticles. See more about his China vacationsblog and tips just log on the ChinaTravelDepot.com, which sponsor his China vacations in China.

The Busiest Nanjing Road East

After being used to the sweltering heat of Shanghai, we went for our walk around Shanghai. Nanjing Road East is a pedestrian street that is one of the busiest of its kind in the world – it has thousands of shops, millions of people, and a whole lot of street hawkers shouting “Hey mister, hey lady, wanna buy a watch?”. The road goes for a couple of kilometers and ends at the Bund, which is a large pedestrian walkway bordering the Huangpu River.

So the walk down Nanjing was a bit of a gauntlet for us. We clearly stood out from the crowd as foreigners and as a result were easy targets for the street hawkers. One thing I’m finding in this city is that a smile gets you a long way and is almost always reciprocated. We were here during the daytime but at night it’s absolutely lit up with dazzling lights…there’s definitely no place like it at home. Eventually it turns back into a “regular” street (with very narrow sidewalks!!) and leads you down to the river.

To actually get to the Bund you have to go through an underground walkway since it crosses a perpendicular street. When you emerge at the other side, if you look back at the area from which you came you’re immediately faced with a street lines with beautiful European colonial buildings that make you think you’re back in the 1920s. The Bund itself is a bustling, wide walkway that locals and foreigners alike can enjoy. Directly across the river is the area known as Pudong, which 10 years ago was swampland but today is a showcase for some of the most modern architecture in the world. That’s the area where you can see the Oriental Pearl Tower, Shanghai’s answer to the Eiffel Tower. At night it’s lit up and is a very impressive sight to see. The day we went to the Bund was especially hot and muggy, and the heavy smog reduced our visibility somewhat but you can still see the main sights in the pictures. On our walk back to the hotel we stopped in one of the colonial buildings along the Bund. It housed numerous high fashion retailers including an Ermenegildo Zegna shop, which as most of my friends here know is one of my popular men’s fashion houses. It certainly didn’t disappoint – it was three floors of men’s fashion nirvana. That said, the prices certainly weren’t any lower than you’d find in other parts of the world – so I didn’t buy anything. But I’ll be back!!

That night I wasn’t in as good spirits as I was earlier in the day. I was dealing with a couple of things with the hotel staff and some of the immigration folks that frustrated me because of the language barrier. This is a place, as I’ve been saying, that you need to process bit by bit. Otherwise you become frustrated and burned out. For example if someone here doesn’t quite understand what you’re asking of them, rather than admit it and ask for clarification they’ll give you an answer they hope is as close to the mark as possible, and that it will satisfy your query. Or they’ll give you the answer they think you WANT to hear rather than the one you NEED to hear. I know it’s a way of helping you (and them) to save face but it can be very frustrating since you sometimes feel like you need to process their answer, ask yourself if their answer truly reflects an understanding of the question, and evaluate whether you need to pursue it further. Since we don’t always know what we don’t know, it also puts you at risk for hearing an answer that misdirects you – potentially in ways that aren’t always easy to rectify. Anyway I guess it was a combination of fatigue from the jet lag and profound frustration. That said, it was a lesson learned and I’ll try to keep it in mind for the next time. Besides, nobody told me this would be easy.

The Bund area is also a popular destination for Chinese tourists and a couple of these groups even requested to take pictures with us. We noticed others trying to sneak pictures of us. While Western tourists are not new to Shanghai, it is uncommon sight outside of the China’s major cities. Communication so far is not easy but it is manageable. Its always helpful to have one person who can speak mandarin in the group. Hopefully my ability to communicate improves as I progress in Chinese class.

James Ashe is an American traveller, who loves trave all over the world. Kungfu Panda is his pet name for his China travel articles as he travel around China by China Domestic Flights. See more about his China tours blog and China Airfare tips just log on the ChinaTravelDepot.com, which sponsor his China vacations in China.

Three Gorges River Cruise

As there was a long weekend at the beginning of May for Labor Day in China, so we decided to go on another China vacation to go the Three Gorges Dam. The dam itself is one of Chinas most expansive undertakings, which is located in Yichang set to become the worlds largest hydro-electric power station, along the Yangtze River. Construction began in December of 1994 and it is not expected to be fully operational until 2011. While there are many benefits to the dam, such as flood control and clean power, it has also been a controversial project because the flooding of the reservoir has already displaced approximately 1.4 million people and submerged many cultural relics. The water wont reach its maximum level of 175m until the end of 2008.

We booked a Yangtze Cruise tour. For any kind of trip to a scenic spot or tourist attraction, you really need to go through an China Tour agent. We settled on a 3 day/2 night trip through the China Travel Depot. We would take a bus due east to YiChang where we would board a boat. The boat would take us through the locks of the dam and into the gorges. We had an incredibly vague itinerary, but for the most part we had no idea what was going to happen over the next few days. We were lucky enough to get a private mini-bus to take us all the way to YiChang. The short 4 hour bus ride ended up being closer to 6 hours, so I spent most of May Day sitting/sleeping en route to the boat. We boarded the ship of dreams around 7pm and we took off immediately. We didnt really know what to expect, so I was pleasantly surprised when we had nice, 4 person rooms on the third floor complete with their own bathroom/shower.

The evening was quite warm and the air was hot and still as we worked our way through the series of locks. In addition to the air being stagnant, it was also noxious from fleet of boats all packed together in the lock spewing black smoke out of their smoke stacks. After dinner, we went back up to the third floor and sat in the lounge area at the back of the boat. There were tables and chairs so we could talk and just hang out as we worked our way to the reservoir. Shortly after 9am, we headed off of our boat toward shore. We were docked up against another boat, so we had to walk through 3 other boats until we actually got to land. We were walking through the crews quarters and they had their laundry hanging out to dry. It was a cloudy and smoggy day, but it was pleasantly cool. I was so glad that it wasnt hot and humid like it had been for the previous few days. The trip through the gorges was really amazing. The natural beauty of the rocky cliff faces was stunning. As we cruised along, I couldnt help thinking of all of the people who had lived here for generations that were suddenly told that they had to leave. Or, I wondered what treasures were now submerged deep in the water that took us between the cliffs.

After cruising through the Lesser Three Gorges, we got onto even smaller boats. We had a very energetic and enthusiastic guide who was emphatically describingsomething. I wish I had been able to understand him. It was a nice change to be so close to the water, rather than being up a few levels on the bigger boats. We returned to Boat-The Second, and we were all pretty hungry. It didnt look like we were going to be stopping any time soon, so most of us caved in and got a cup of ramen noodles. We made it back to our original Ship of Dreams in the early afternoon. We lazed around reading, playing mahjong and napping until we got off again in the early evening. This time, we were headed to a temple. The temple itself was kind of underwhelming. We have seen so many beautiful temples that this one was not that impressive. There were some beautiful tablets with Chinese script carved into them. Ever since I took the Chinese Literati class, I have a great appreciation for calligraphy and beautiful characters. It is hard enough to capture the elegance and energy of each stroke when you are using a brush, so I cant imagine how hard it is to achieve that same effect while chiseling out of stone.

Friday morning began with the same shouting speaker waking us up at 5:30am. We got a knock on the door and it was our guide. Laura asked her what the plan was for the day and she said, Sleep and then get on the bus. We were going to be on the boat until 6pm when we transferred to the bus. I was in no hurry to sit around and wait. When I finally got up, we went to the lounge and played mahjong and cards for a few hours. We ate some more ramen. In the early afternoon, it started raining. Then, it started to HAIL! I couldnt believe it. The hail was big, too. I would say it ranged from peanut sized to grape sized. We were all starting to get a bit stir crazy by the time we started to head back through the locks. It was much better going through them in the daylight. We could actually see the gates opening and closing around us. The fumes were just as bad, but it wasnt as hot. Finally, around 6pm, we left the boat and headed for the bus. It was good to be on the water and see the gorges. There had clearly been some intense storms here, as well, because streets were flooded and there were trees down everywhere. Out poor taxi driver had to drive far out of his way to find a path that would get us home. We were all hungry, so even though it was about midnight, we went straight to our favorite place for noodles and had a late dinner. When we finally got home, I took one of the most refreshing showers of my life. It felt so good to wash away all of the boat grunge and smog film.

James Ashe is an American traveller, who loves trave all over the world. Kungfu Panda is his pet name for his China Tourarticles. See more about his China Toursblog and tips just log on the ChinaTravelDepot.com, which sponsor his China vacations in China.

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