Dan Washburn's Shanghai Diaries

I returned to Shanghai a day early for two reasons: to surprise my very patient girlfriend … and to help her prepare the intimate Thanksgiving feast she has planned. Well, I kind of surprised her — she said certain events of the day made her “suspicious.” And I kind of helped her prepare the mashed potatoes and stuffing — I served as the “taster.” I did actually help a bit during our trip to the grocery store … OK, several grocery stores. I carried many bags — and one box, containing our new mini “electric oven,” with which we will bake our RMB 100 frozen Sara Lee apple pie. That’s right, $12 for a frozen apple pie. Think that’s bad? A pumpkin pie would have set us back RMB 180 — $22!

Put another way: Two pumpkin pies would cost more than our new oven. Three pumpkin pies would cost more than my plane ticket from Xiamen to Shanghai. There’s something for you to be thankful for back in the United States — you can afford to eat pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving Day. Not us poor schmoes in Shanghai. We have to slum it … with a $12 apple pie.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Excuse me while I go spend the holiday with my girlfriend, who — thankfully — didn’t ditch me when I ditched her to spend more than four months on the lonesome China road.

The final 66 photos from Xiamen have been posted — and thus, the final 66 photos from The Trip have been posted (sob, sob). These pics take you to a decaying colonial island, put faces on the men behind oceansbridge.com … and introduce you to perhaps the largest sofa in China. Enjoy the new photos. And thanks for joining me on my little journey through China. It’s been a wild ride — and it’s far from over. I’ve got many, many, many more tales to tell. And now I’ve finally got the time to write them.

My second batch of Fujian photos is up. Take a stroll through Xiamen’s Zheng Cuo An fishing village … now.

and help cure my guilt at the same time! The guys at oceansbridge.com — James, Cory and Kevin — have been amazingly nice to me, providing me my own bedroom and bathroom for my stay here in Xiamen (of course, their palatial estate does have five bathrooms … for three people). They’ve also provided unlimited internet access and, more importantly, unlimited beer. In return, I have given them … um, well, absolutely nothing. That’s where you come in! It’s Christmas time — buy something from their store! They do art reproductions and originals, and their artists do a pretty damn good job. I’m going to order something as soon as I get back to Shanghai. If you buy something, tell them I sent you.

Speaking of art, the girl who introduced me to James, Cory and Kevin — Andrea See — has some of the coolest tattoos on the mainland. She’s been a good friend to me down here, so give her some love at her sites: serialdeviant.org and whatsonxiamen.com. OK, I’ve got some sightseeing to do. Or should I just head to the beach? Decisions, decisions.

The first batch of Fujian photos are now online. Check out oceansbridge.com headquarters — and spend five hours on the water with Fujian fishermen. Go to the photos now!

I fell asleep rather early and easily on the train last night … way before 10 p.m., the mandatory lights-out time on most Chinese trains. It was unusual. And after exactly four months of traveling through China, it was welcome. The stubby fingers poking me in my back two hours later were most unwelcome, however.

The portly man in the bunk opposite me was preparing to go to sleep, and he needed to tell me something: He asked me to turn down the volume on my iPod. Actually, he asked me to turn it off. That’s right, my headphones were too loud for this guy. In two years living in China — home of some of the world’s loudest, most inconsiderate people — this was a first for me. I was the loud one?
I was startled and rather confused. Is it possible for Sufjan Stevens to be too loud? Anyway, I turned the volume down a couple notches, and tried to go back to sleep. Ten minutes later, I turned the volume up again. I had to. The guy — the same f**king guy — turns out to be one of the loudest snorers this side of Brian Dominguez.
Why is it that the loudest snorers are always the soundest sleepers, always the guys who fall asleep the minute they hit the bed? Why do fat guys almost always snore? I wanted to poke the guy in the back and tell him to turn his noise down. I wanted to smack the guy in the head and tell him some other, not-so-friendly things, too — but, alas, I lack the vocabulary. Is it bad that one of my main motivations for studying Chinese upon my return to Shanghai is to be able to tell off stupid Chinese people?
I didn’t sleep well the rest of the night. Then, the next morning, as I sat next to to the window, peeling an orange and looking out the window, the fat snoring man with stubby fingers motioned that he wanted to tell me something.
“You haven’t washed your face,” he said. “You can wash your face back there.”
I turned my iPod back on and continued to peel my orange. I looked out my window. I was in Fujian now, the southeastern province just across the Taiwan Strait from Taiwan. I saw blue skies, water, broad green leaves, sugar cane fields and cactus farms.
From my train’s approach, Xiamen, with its clean air and sparkling new high-rises, looked like a city that had been built just yesterday. Or maybe, judging from all the construction cranes, it was being built today. And at the speed things progress in China, the entire city will likely be completed sometime tonight — and it will all look like crap tomorrow.
Or maybe not. There actually seems to have been some thought put into the island of Xiamen, now, I have been told, second only to Dalian in the ever-so-competitive cleanest-Chinese-city sweepstakes. On some parts of the island car horns are actually banned. They are doing away with motorcycles. Pretty much all industry is being forced off the island. A resident told me that the city has purposefully neglected its not-so-reliable electrical system in an effort to speed the exit of some factories.
When you exit the Xiamen train station, the first thing you see is a — you guessed it — Wal-Mart Supercenter. McDonald’s and KFC share the same building. (And, by the way, McDonald’s down here now serve a Western breakfast. I had scrambled eggs, sausage, an English muffin and hashbrowns for 14 kuai. They also have pancakes for 7. I believe these items were added to the menu just a month ago. Have these changes been made in Shanghai, as well? If so, I now have a reason to visit McD’s … other than 2 kuai ice cream cones.)
I am living with the guys from oceansbridge.com, an online store — run by a Brit, two Candians and an American — that specializes in oil paintings, copies and originals. Check the site out. I’ve seen the work first-hand. And the quality seems first-rate.
That is likely because the guys do none of the painting themselves. I thought it a natural question to ask James, the Brit, upon my arrival: “So, are you an artist?” And then I heard laughter coming from the adjacent office. It was Cory, one of the Canadians. These guys are internet guys, business guys. Not artists. They hire local talent to do all the brushwork. They work cheaper — and they can actually paint.
The company’s offices and studios are in a large gated compound within a fishing village, of all places. But this is not your ordinary fishing village … property values are skyrocketing since its part of the island — a former military zone — was opened to folks without uniforms. So, families who might earn a couple hundred dollars a month from fishing could be sitting on a relative goldmine if the government decides to buy them out and develop the area.
James, Cory and the rest of the gang might be sitting on a goldmine of their own if everything pans out the way they plan. Sales are increasing. And word-of-mouth has been good. They have a customer-satisfaction guarantee. If you don’t like your painting, they will keep working on it until you do. If only that was the way all Chinese-based companies operated. Of course it’s all about building the business now for the oceansbridge.com guys, not lining their pockets. James, 32, told me he’s more broke now than he was when he was 17. But when he was 17, he didn’t have a badminton court in a dried-out swimming pool. He does now. It’s just a short walk from where the paintings are made.
I went for a bike ride north along the coast this afternoon on a lazy road lined with palm trees. It’s a beautiful area. Very — how should I say? — un-Chinese. Fishing boats bob up and down in the breeze. There are nice-enough beaches, and they are dotted with odd old bunkers here and there. I even saw a windsurfer. Maybe it was Joel, the other Canadian at oceansbridge.com. He tries to get out on the water almost every day.
But most Chinese head up in this direction to get their photo taken in front of a huge sign. It’s really huge. Big enough, I believe, to be seen from Jinmen island, which just happens to be two kilometers off the shore — and just happens to have been occupied by Taiwanese Nationalist troops since the Communist takeover in 1949. This is the English translation of the sign: “One country. Two systems. A unified China.”
Tomorrow: Heading out on a fishing boat at 9 a.m. Will try to check in after that.

Several of them, actually. Really, we should probably call these creatures water beetles, but everyone — including me — seems to call them cockroaches in an effort to boost their indie-cred. Here’s a photo. They weren’t that bad, either. More crunchy than gooey. Kind of like eating a corn nut. I took off the head and the wings before popping the first one in my mouth. And on all the ones that followed, I tore off the legs, too. They felt a little funny on my tongue.

The main reason we went to this restaurant was to eat scorpions. It’s not that I had a particular craving for poisonous insects, but everyone who knew I was in Guangzhou had asked me the same question: “So, have you eaten any crazy shit yet?” You see, they have a saying down here that goes something like this: The only think with four legs that we don’t eat is the table, the only thing with wings we don’t eat is the airplane. I think there are some other parts of that saying — probably something about water creatures or insects — but I forget. Many believe it was the Guangdongese’s proclivity for munching on anything that moves that got the whole SARS thing started. Mmmmmm. Civet cats.
I first heard of people eating scorpions in Beijing. There, they skewer the scorpion while they are still wiggling, fry them in hot oil and eat them. Tony, down here in Guangzhou, told me that he had tried a scorpion in a local park. They drowned it in bai jiu … and it came back to life in his mouth. Sounded like “crazy shit” to me. But I forgot the name of the park that Tony told me. And he’s in Hong Kong now. So, my friend Brian, who moved to Guangzhou from Shanghai earlier this year, took me to the Jiang Nan Restaurant, which came highly recommended for its scorpion soup.
The scorpion soup ended up being turtle and scorpion soup — which I thought made it even crazier shit. The bowl was filled with what appeared to be a rather large turtle — all chopped up, shell and all (tastes kind of like dry tuna) — and a couple dozen small scorpions. We asked the waitresses (and the beer girls) how we were supposed to go about eating the scorpions. They didn’t know. “No one has ever eaten the scorpions before,” one said.
“Why?” we asked. “What would happen if we ate one?”
“We don’t know.”
I thought about eating one anyway. I mean, I knew people had eaten these things elsewhere and survived. And they had put them in our soup — they wouldn’t do that if they were dangerous, would they? But then I thought: “Wait, I’m in Guangzhou. And even people here refuse to eat these scorpions.” So we didn’t eat the scorpions. The water beetles — and the turtle — would have to be enough crazy shit. (By the way, for desert we had some pastries made from durian — the “King of Fruits” — which is famous for its awful smell, and less-awful taste. I preferred the cockroaches.
I like my tea strong: Two nights ago, my mystery dinner with Winter Lin, the guy I met through hospitalityclub.com, actually went really well. His Chinese name is Lin Xiao. He’s a 21-year-old recent college grad who now works both as a life insurance salesman and a translator for an Israeli import/export company. Oh, and his family lives in the crouch-space (a little taller than a crawl-space) above the curtain shop that they own. Here are some photos. Anyway, his family cooked me dinner (the kicthen is downstairs at the curtain shop) and made me tea — kong-fu tea! I took a video of the process.
Four months down … one week to go: As of tomorrow, I will have been on the road for four months. And I have just one more week to go. Then I can actually start writing real stories again. I am leaving Guangzhou for Xiamen by sleeper train tonight. I’ll arrive tomorrow morning. I’ll try to check in then.

I had read that Guangzhou was just one endless stretch of shopping malls. That is simply not true. Check out my photos. (But they do have a lot of shopping malls.)

From Guizhou to Guangzhou … and I’m going to try to write it all in 7 minutes!

11.09.2004: The Lusheng Festival — a Miao minority tradition — in Chong’an, a small village in eastern Guizhou, was a striking mix of color and culture, with teen girls in big silver head dresses, cute costumed babies in backpacks, and big water buffaloes sporting red bows … ready to bash each other’s head in. The bull fights were actually rather boring — and that’s a good thing. The less blood the better, according to me. (Click here for photos)

11.10.2004: Driving on dusty roads through the Guizhou hills — terraced farmland pock-marked with teepees of harvested rice stalks — is like taking a trip though Middle Earth. Otherworldly. The festival in Gulong was similar to Chong’an … but was a muddy mess. It poured and hailed when we arrived. The buffalo fights were better here, usally ending with a bull running crazily into the crowd. But the cock fights on the other hand … (Click here for photos)

11.11.2004: Finally traveling with my Guizhou contact, CITS tour guide Henry He (previously, I was with his older brother and his friends — who curiously all wore similar light-colored soft leather loafers), we headed to Guizhou’s top tourist destination, Huangguoshu Waterfall, which is China’s largest. It was impressive, and actually rather peaceful. We spent the night in Anshun, which may very well be the dog-meat capital of the world. Mmmmmmm. (Click here for photos)

11.12.2004: When traveling with a member of Lao Han minority, which Henry is, it seems natural to visit a Lao Han village, which we did. Tianlong Ancient Village has stone walls, stone walkways, stone roofs, stone bridges and a close-knit population, many of whom still live like it’s the Ming Dynasty. The women have a curious tradition of removing the hair from the top of their heads — monk-like — post-marriage. (Click here for photos)

11.13.2004: I spent most of this day on a train, so I will write about the previous evening, instead. They sound like firecrackers or popcorn from a distance, but tuo long are really big wooden tops that people keep spinning for hours by cracking them with big leather whips. I tried it. A nice solid pop lifts your spirits … until you realize you almost took out someone’s eye with your backswing. (Click here for photos)

11.14.2004: You know, 25-hour train rides really aren’t too bad … unless the two old ladies in the bunks below you decide to wake up at 3:40 a.m. They talked in normal tones, and anyone familiar with old Chinese ladies knows that means they screamed. No one said a thing. Until I did. I told them to stop talking, that I was trying to sleep. They kept talking. And then other people joined them. Went to see the Guangzhou Orchestra that night … and people talked through that, too. Tell me, how long has being inconsiderate been a Chinese tradition?

11.15.2004: One of my hosts here in Guangzhou is Tony, the American timpanist for the city orchestra. We headed to Shamian Island, home of some crumbling Western architecture … and the American Consulate. That explains all the foreign couples pushing around Chinese babies in strollers. American couples adopting babies in China must go through Guangzhou on the way home. Fun to people watch here. Well, fun to baby watch.

11.16.2004: I know this is Day 8, but what the hell. Spent most of today on Tony’s computer … and watching his satellite TV. Seahawks vs. Rams is on right now. I know it’s a replay, but it is so nice to watch football. Tony is off to Hong Kong and Tuan, the Vietnamese trumpeter I’m staying with, is in Shenzhen. So I am on my own. Thankfully, Winter Lin, a local guy I contacted through hospitalityclub.com, called me. I’m leaving for dinner at his house soon. Should be interesting. I know absolutely nothing about this guy.

Future: I hope to get to Xiamen, in Fujian Province, on Friday. I’ll be living in a fishing village … with a guy who runs an internet company. Go figure. By the following Thursday — Thanksgiving — I’ll be back in Shanghai. The trip will be over.

And then the real writing begins. Of course my iBook is still broken. Sigh.

You know, when your host is a CITS tour guide — who likes to socialize at night — your computer time is very limited. Let’s just say my four-plus days in Guizhou were jam-packed … and we only did about half the stuff he had on our itinerary. More explanation and hundreds of photos will be on the way as soon as I can find time, which won’t be for at least a day — my 25-hour train ride to Guangzhou leaves at noon. There, I have a Sunday night date with the Guangzhou Orchestra. (Yes, Guangxi is getting skipped on this trip. My contact there is busy with exams. So it looks like I’ll be back “home” in Shanghai for Thanksgiving!)

I spent a good chunk of today uploading photos — just for you! There are 124 photos from my amazing trip down to Xishuangbanna, a sub-tropical region near the Burmese border. I lived with a family in tiny Bayi Village, where almost everyone makes a living milking sap from forests full of rubber trees. I spent a day out in the woods watching the whole process — check out the photos, and you can too. I also uploaded 41 photos from my new favorite Chinese city, Kunming. I’ve got one word for you: breakdancing! (Wait, should that be two words? Anyway, go look at the new photos. I’ve got a train to catch.)

So much for staying and listening to Kunming’s beat for a while. I heard from my contact in Guiyang, Guizhou Province … and he is ready for me. Actually, he said he has “been waiting for (me) for a long time.” So I bought a train ticket — for today. My 12-hour sleeper leaves in two hours. And guess what? I got the top bunk again!

Just a quick note to let you know I am alive and well — and really enjoying life in Kunming. This city has a vibe that is inviting. Days just seem to pile up … and nothing seems to get accomplished. I am emailing you from a place called the French Cafe, one of several laid back hangouts with an easy atmosphere and surprisingly tasty (and amazingly cheap) Western fare in the area surrounding Yunnan University. The French Cafe seems authentic enough. One of the owners is French. Hell, the Internet Explorer is even French — to write this I opened a new fenetre.

Last night I went to a bar called Speakeasy, drank 8 kuai beers and watched Chinese kids breakdance. There is a kind of relaxed hipster/hippie subculture in Kunming that is really refreshing. (Maybe it’s all the really cheap pot.) People are experimenting. They are creating. This is the most un-Chinese Chinese city I have ever been in. Kunming has its own beat. I may stay and listen for awhile.

And a majority of them have said, “We are absolute friggin’ morons!” Guess I’ll be spending the next four years in China. We are witnessing the beginning of the fall of the American empire. And I can’t think of a better place to be than a remote forest of rubber trees in a place called Xishuangbanna — about as far from this mess as I can get. This is embarrassing. Very embarrassing.

I remember nearly every minute of my 14-hour overnight bus ride from Lijiang to Kunming rather vividly. This is not a good thing — I was supposed to be sleeping.

I remember initially thinking that my bed on the bus was OK. Of the other 20 or so beds, mine was closest to the door — more fresh air for me.

I remember, then, actually trying to lie down on the bed. It would have been a perfect fit … had there been a saw lying about with which I could have cut my legs off at the knees.

I remember thinking that it was OK, I had been through worse. That 18-hour bus ride last October to Kanas Lake in Xinjiang didn’t kill me and that road was awful … I mean even worse than roads in Alabama. And besides, the longest stretch of this trip was between Dali and Kunming, two fairly often-touristed cities. Surely there the road quality would be much better.

I remember settling, best I could, into my bed and staring out my window, watching night fall on greater Lijiang. Mountains turned into shadows, big sleeping monsters on the horizon. And the clouds — wispy thought balloons, visible only because of the beaming full moon — were their dreams. Soon the mountains and the monsters disappeared and everything faded to black, except for the odd swath of farmland illuminated by the moon.

I remember fading out, as well. Crooked and uncomfortable, I turned on my iPod and fell asleep. I woke up soon, though. At 9 p.m., two-and-a-half hours into the trip, we made a scheduled stop.

I remember someone saying we would be pausing for dinner near Dali, and maybe we were near Dali, but all I saw was a restaurant, more like an open garage with tables, on the side of a dark and empty road. I ordered a plate of fried noodles and a tall bottle of beer — thought it would help me sleep through the night.

I remember, after nearly an hour eating, drinking and watching game shows on television, wondering why we weren’t being ushered back into the bus by our two-man tag-team of bus drivers. Our stop was only supposed to be 45 minutes. I looked inside the bus and saw our drivers — their hands, black with car grease, holding wrenches and other items that didn’t suggest we’d be leaving any time soon. I walked down the road a piece, unzipped, and took a piss. We didn’t get moving again for more than an hour.

I remember wondering what exactly was wrong with the bus and whether it would continue to be a problem throughout the ride — we still had about 10 hours to go. And then I thought about that tiny restaurant that we spilled into: Was it where we had planned on stopping, or was it just where the bus happened to stop?

I remember trying not to think about it and trying to fall back asleep. I was unsuccessful. But it didn’t matter anyway — breakdown No. 2 was just a couple hundred kilometers down the road. And breakdown No. 3 was shortly after that one.

I remember looking on with awe at the swiftness with which the drivers started addressing each problem. They were like firefighters moving into action. One lifted the mattress from the drivers’ bed — directly across from mine — and from beneath removed a rubber bin full of grimy tools. The other driver snatched some other fix-it items from under my bed. Then they lifted the giant console to the right of the driver’s seat to reveal the engine, a patched together mass of tubes and pipes and other mechanical things that I have no interest in seeing, especially when they are responsible for moving the bus in which I am a passenger, especially when it is after midnight. It was all very well orchestrated, though — almost like they had done the very same thing many times before. The smell from the engine didn’t sit well with me, so I opened my window. That was the first time during the ride that I felt nauseous.

I remember that some of the other passengers snored through all of this, and I couldn’t understand how. First of all, a bright fluorescent light flashed on every time we stopped — the drivers/repairmen needed to see what they were doing with those tubes and pipes. Second of all, the clanging of tools sounded like … well, it sounded like the clanging of tools. Maybe it was harder to hear all the way in the back of the bus — because the noise was drowned out by all that snoring.

I remember thinking that the Chinese sure are good at enduring, good at ignoring annoyances. Maybe they just know to expect them. Maybe they just know that complaining will get them nowhere — customer service hasn’t made its way to the mainland yet. I have encountered this stark reality several times during this trip, most recently dealing with mobile phone monopoly China Mobile. When a bill gave us only very vague details — i.e., no mention of minutes used — as to why I somehow had rung up $100 worth of charges in about two days, a Chinese friend of mine said, “It won’t get that detailed.”

“But minutes are basic information,” I said.

“I’ve long heard about China Mobile’s bills,” he added.

“Your country perplexes me.”

“They don’t give a damn,” he continued. “They just don’t take us too seriously.”

“No one seems to.”

“Well, that’s what an average Chinese has to live with. No wonder people are emigrating. One of the things I am losing faith in.”

A bus full of Americans would have been crying bloody murder after the second breakdown, or at least crying for the arrival of a new bus. My Chinese companions stayed silent. Well, some of them snored.

I remember that my lower back really started to hurt. I could either lie in the fetal position on my left side, or on my back with my feet propped on the railings several feet above my bed. Those seemed to be my only options. There were other beds, aligned side by side. I looked at them longingly. Next time I would buy two beds. F**k it, next time I’ll fly.

I remember realizing that the road between Dali and Kunming was far from finished. And looking out the window, I never saw anything parked by the side of the road that looked like it could be used to finish it. It was bumpy and dusty and when I opened the window to escape the engine smell something usually flew into my eye.

I remember the fourth breakdown the best, because it lasted the longest. One of the drivers played mechanic from inside the bus, the other crawled underneath the bus this time. I watched as they took apart the entire clutch. That didn’t work, so they tried something else. I started to feel very nauseous, so I headed outside.

I remember that the air was brisk, and that the moonlight allowed me to make out mountains and farmland in the distance. Mountains and farmland. This what you always see when traveling through most parts of China. Often it’s farmland on top of mountains. Something like 80 percent of China’s workers toil in agriculture, despite the fact that something like 20 percent of the country’s land is arable. And yet somehow this country feeds itself. 1.3 billion mouths too feed. And, largely, they are fed. Amazing. Produce stands throughout the country are always overflowing. Farming is one thing the Chinese have down pat.

I remember trying to throw up. I was hacking on the side of a dusty road, where every passing vehicle meant a cloud of dirt. But then, suddenly, I realized that I might also have to take a shit. And I was afraid if I chose to do one, the other would just kind of simultaneously happen. And that wouldn’t have been good for anybody. I contemplated walking further down the road and squatting — but was afraid I would be left behind. I looked out at the mountains and farmland, and the starry skies above, and wished that I was somewhere, anywhere in the world other than the side of this dusty road in the middle of Yunnan Province.

I remember looking back into the bus and being surprised to see many more parts of the engine’s inner workings, thanks to several removable parts of the floor — all of which were right next to my bed. It was nearly 5 a.m. I asked one of the drivers — not the one who blinked violently, as if he was getting used to a new set of eyeballs, but the calm one with the crewcut and mustache — how much time we had left on the trip. He rubbed his thumb and index finger though the hair on his lip and said around two hours, which would have us arriving in Kunming exactly on time.

I remember wondering: How the f**k could that be possible?

I remember the people finally started to get restless. They said things to the drivers, things you would expect passengers would say during the fourth breakdown of an overnight bus ride on a bumpy dirt road. And the drivers said things, too, things you would expect a driver — or any other customer service representative — to say … in China. They responded with anger. How dare we get upset? You see, they were doing us a favor, driving us through the night on this terrible road. But what about these RMB 120 tickets we all purchased? Shut up.

I remember actually smiling at the look of disbelief on the mustached driver’s face when he saw the footprints on his mattress. Removed to fetch some tools, it had been left in the aisle, and passengers hadn’t bothered to walk around it during our fourth prolonged pit stop. He was irate. The blinking driver started lecturing us like school children. Then he pointed at me! “Look at the foreigner,” he pleaded. “What is he going to think of Chinese people now?!” I looked at my fellow passengers, rolled my eyes and shook my head.

I remember breakdown No. 4 lasted more than an hour, and that made breakdowns No. 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 feel rather insignificant by comparison. Really, No. 7 might have been considered an extended stall at best. After 5 a.m., the blinking driver talked incessantly. No, he yelled, even though his mustached conversation partner was seated on the console beside him. His voice was high-pitched and offensive — like a human alarm clock. He knew his passengers were in desperate need of sleep, but he didn’t care. Hell, if the drivers didn’t need any sleep, why should we? They had to drive and fix greasy things. All we had to do was lie there … awkwardly … and try not to throw up … or shit … or both at the same time.

I remember, as the sky became light again, the passengers impatience growing, and their jabs at the drivers becoming more pointed. And then the blinking driver pointed to me again. “He is a journalist,” he said, repeating a fact I had forgotten he had been told back in Lijiang, by the man who owned the guesthouse I stayed in there, the same man who helped me buy my unfortunate ticket for this bus ride. “You better watch what you say. What is he going to think? What are his readers going to think?”

I remember being amazed that we arrived in Kunming before 8:30 a.m. — we were less than one hour late. Perhaps the estimated travel time allows for a half dozen or so breakdowns. Sore and sleepless, I lugged my big backpack to the nearest taxi. I felt like shit. Actually, I felt like shitting. But I had to hold it for nearly another hour. It was rush hour, and checking in to my hotel proved to be a chore, as well.

But once I did check in, I never left. It was bed and then bathroom, bed and then bathroom for nearly 48 hours. I caught a violent case of food poisoning somewhere — probably back at the site of breakdown No. 1.

Looks like my Halloween costume this year will be a bed comforter. Sometime during my overnight, nine-breakdown bus ride from Lijiang to Kunming — easily the worst experience of this trip (and I will write about it as soon as I can stay upright for more than a few minutes) — I came down with either food poisoning or the flu. Whatever it is, it sucks … and now — yesterday, especially — I am the sickest I’ve been in China. I am getting better, though, thanks to a steady diet of Imodium AD and Cipro. And, thankfully, I am not living with strangers here. My Kunming contacts are old friends Bryan and Shannon, who recently relocated here. This is good — I don’t know how to say anti-diarrheal medicine in Chinese. (At least I have my Pocket PC back, and the wireless internet is working. So I was able to write this in bed … and in the bathroom.)

Someone yelled “Dan Washburn!” This doesn’t happen very often on this trip. OK, it never happens. And I never thought it would happen in Southwest China, in an obscure corner of Lijiang’s ancient town. But there was Rose, sitting by a fountain, all the way from New York University. Wild. I am leaving Lijiang today. My 12-hour sleeper bus for Kunming departs at 6:30 pm. Anyone know of a good Halloween party … in Kunming?

… earlier this week, there is a good chance I never got it. Why? Because nothing freakin’ works on this trip. Anyway, my email works now, so if you haven’t heard from me regarding an email you sent, go ahead and send it again — but not if you are trying to sell me a Rolex, some Cialis or a penis-enlargement pill. (I buy that stuff on the streets of China.)

So, if you are keeping track of my technology woes, here it goes: email broke for two days (unknown reason), camera broke (had to buy new one for $450), iBook broke (my fault … still searching for a remedy), mobile phone lost or stolen (using backup phone now), internet on Pocket PC broke (now fixed and awaiting me in Kunming … just in time for the last four weeks of the trip).

Everyone who has met me since, oh let’s say Harbin, has told me that I look tired. Very tired. Even strangers have said this. Think they’re on to something? One person — a tour guide here in Lijiang — took it a step further, however. After he told me I looked tired, he told me I look like Luis Figo, the Portuguese soccer star. Yes, Portuguese. Interestingly, he is not the first Chinese person to make this comparison. Eagle, the front desk guy at the Le Hu Guesthouse at Shanghai University actually used to call me “Figo.” Yes, his name is Eagle. OK, I need to go. Guess what … I am tired.

And no, my parents didn’t go away on a week’s vacation. (Everyone loves a Fresh Prince reference. Right? Right?) The situation is this: I am running out of time on this trip. I have about a month of travel time left — and around eight places (Dali, Kunming, Xishuangbanna, Guiyang, Nanning, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Xiamen) left to visit. It’s going to be tricky, but I think I can pull it off. But here’s the rub: All this time traveling leaves very little for writing. Stories of 3,000-6,000 words don’t just appear on the screen by typing the F9 key. There. I just tried it. Nothing.

This trip’s previous long entries have required a solid day or two spent sitting in front of a computer (I fill most of the time by fiddling with my fantasy football roster, until I think of words worth putting together into sentences). I won’t be able to dedicate entire days to typing during this home stretch, so it will be the TripTik and the Photo Gallery.
Now, please don’t think I am ditching this project. I think I have proven my dedication (did I mention I tried yak butter tea a few days ago?). This is just a minor delay. Everything will get written. Everything. Don’t forget: I am a freelance writer. This basically means that I am unemployed. So I will have plenty of time to dedicate to the completion of the writing portion of this trip project. So the stories will keep coming long after the trip has been completed. Not exactly the way I imagined it — but it’s the way it’s got to be. Hope you understand. Think of this as the trip that keeps on giving.

Just might be the Mosuo minority of Lugu Lake, a pristine body of water — nearly 9,000 feet above sea level — which blesses both Sichuan and Yunnan with its presence. I loved this place and its people. No wonder 80 percent of the Mosuo live to be 100 years old. In time — in other words, a couple months from now — I will write thousands and thousands of words about Lugu Lake. For now, please take a look at the photos from my visit. You’ll be glad that you did. It was one of the friendliest places I’ve ever been too. It’s also one of the world’s last active matriarchal societies. Coincidence?

But my camera is not. I will write more about both of us tomorrow. Right now, I need food and sleep … and the front gate of my Lijiang guesthouse closes at midnight (52 minutes from now). Expect photos from Lugu Lake tomorrow — and expect to start planning your own trip there after seeing them. I won’t spend too much time on the computer tomorrow, however. Lijiang is pretty damn nice itself, and I plan on doing some exploring — with my new $450 camera in tow. More soon.

OK, it’s not forbidden — just a forced Neil Young reference. About 5km north of Xichang is Qionghai Lake. Take bus No. 14 or 22 and it will cost you a whole 1 yuan to get there. The bus will spit you out at Qionghai Lake Park, entrance to which costs 6 yuan … or 5 yuan if you only have a 10 and the cashier doesn’t feel like scrounging up some singles. The park, as is the case with many Chinese parks, has seen better days. But the lake, and the mountains that serve as its backdrop, are what your eyes will spend most of their time focusing on.

Actually, there are likely better locations from which to enjoy the lake. In fact, I’m sure there are. Across the way, appeared to be not much other than countryside. But it was the middle of the afternoon. I knew I was heading to Lugu Lake the following day. And the park is where the bus plopped me. So I checked it out.
It is my suspicion that all amusment rides found at Chinese parks were constructed at approximately the same time … the 1950s. They are scary looking machines, rusty with faded paint and images of psychotic cartoon monkeys. A walk though a deserted park is like living in a creepy Ray Bradbury novel. In the rare instance that a parent allows a child to occupy one of these contraptions, the child usually cries. Today, all the rides sat empty. (I, by the way, can never say no to bumper cars. No matter how rusty. Alas, no bumper cars here.)
Most of the people at the park — the ones who weren’t shooting bee-bees at balloons — were wiling their time away on the water or by the water or eating things that were once in the water. The lake is loaded with long, narrow boats. There are boats you can ride in, rusty ones you steer yourself, wooden ones that come with your own personal upright rower — and, it seemed, another person who barbecues fish. Other boats were occupied by those who supplied the fish. I saw one very big boat. It docked late in the afternoon and said in big gold letters “WELCOME TO SATELLITE CITY.” Xichang is home to the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, famous for its Long March rocket program, which is infamous for a couple serious crashes, one of which killed a family of six — or perhaps hundreds of villagers … depends on who you ask.
A smattering of people line the lake with poles, bobbing for tiny fish with hooks and bits of worm. One fisherman told me that big fish — he held his hands three feet apart to give me an idea just how big — occupy Qionghai Lake further from the shore. I didn’t see any big fish, but I ate one pretty damn big clam. There is a tent filled with many people barbecuing pretty much the same stuff, and you can eat it at tables right along the lake. It’s all fresh, too. Directly from Qionghai. Not sure if that is good or bad, considering China’s poor record of water quality.
I tested three items: two types of kebabs (chuan in Chinese), and the clam. The first kebabs were typical, bits of fish meet on a skewer, 2 mao per stick. The next was an entire fish (3 yuan), cut in half and flattened, sticks stuck through the poor guy’s eyes. But he tasted good.
The clam — as big as my hand — was my favorite, however … probably just because of the way it was prepared. The meat was chopped up and placed in one half of the shell which, once cleaned, was a beautiful iridescent purple-ish hue. The other half was on the grill, serving as a bowl, in which a mix of liquids, seasonings and, um, other stuff sizzled. Then the meat was added, and after cooking for a while longer, the whole concoction was served in the shell. All for 4 yuan (which, I have a feeling, was a laowai special — locals likely pay much less). I washed it all down with some beer that a friendly customer insisted I chug with him. We actually chatted for a while. About what, I am not completely sure.
I have photos of all of this — the beer, the boats, the big clam — and I’d love to share them with you … but the USB connections at this internet bar, as they are at most Chinese internet bars, are for display only.
Bus for Lugu Lake leaves in eight hours. Not sure if I’ll have internet access there or not. You’ll be the first to know.
NOTE: There are few things more sad than watching a desperately bored girl sit in an internet bar while her boyfriend ignores her and plays Counter Strike. She slept a little, I believe. And then she started coughing. You know, the cough that says, “I know one target you won’t be hitting if you keep playing that game.” He didn’t seem to care … and kept on playing. … Wait, I can think of at least one thing sadder than that story: The Yankees losing four straight to the f**king Red Sox!

We need the curse … and soon. Yankees down 8-1 in the top of the sixth to the f**king Red Sox. I arrived in Sichuan Province’s Xichang in the middle of the first inning. Right now, there is no place I’d rather be — as far from the bloody mess going on in Yankee Stadium as possible. Hopefully, Kevin Brown punched a locker room wall again … this time with his pitching hand.

Well, no more run-ins with the police here in Chengdu — but I did have a run-in with a big plate of meatloaf last night. And that was followed by some warm apple pie and vanilla ice cream. I washed it all down with a mug of root beer. Gotta love the new China … or at least Grandma’s Kitchen in Chengdu, a restaurant that is about as close to small-town America as you’ll ever get in big-city China. There’s a lot to like about Chengdu — and it goes beyond the city’s surprisingly expansive, tasty and affordable selection of Western food.

It’s also a modern-ish city that is a great hub for travel through one of China’s most dynamic and outdoorsy regions. Which is why there is a pretty steady flow of backpackers here. Which is why there are a good number of affordable guesthouses, bars and, yes, Western restaurants here. See, it always comes back to the food. But, actually, I’ve been eating a lot of local cuisine in Chengdu. Very local. As in home-cooked. My host’s mother seems to be cooking for me constantly. And then we sit alone together and eat in relative silence — I can’t understand her Mandarin and she can’t understand mine — while her son Bo, my host, is off at school doing what medical students do … studying. She is not as constant a cooker as the woman downstairs, however. She was cooking this morning. She was cooking this afternoon. She is cooking now — after I thought I already heard her complete dinner. It’s the clang clang clang of spatula on wok or the chop chop chop of knife on cutting board. The acoustics are rather good here in the apartment complex. Or, I suppose they are bad if you are trying to sleep. Noises carry from ground level outside, or from inside through open windows. Right now, in addition to the kitchen sounds, I hear someone practicing a wooden flute, the loud clatter of some sort of building-up or tearing-down project — a constant in China — and several people talking in normal tones (which for Chinese means they sound like they are sitting on the bed next to me). But at any time you can also hear singing, children screaming, dogs yelping, vendors hocking rice and tofu — and everybody else hawking up phlegm. I’m not sure how Bo sleeps at night. Maybe he’s so tired from studying — he’s preparing for the GREs, as well — it doesn’t matter. Me, I would be lost in China without my earplugs, handy tools that don’t exist in China. I will need the earplugs tonight … I will be on a train. I am heading to a town called Xichang, home of the Yi minority, which someone told me has a strange tradition: stealing. “They think nothing of it,” I was told. Guess I’ll have to take this 10-hour “sleeper” ride with one eye open. After Xichang, it’s a rough bus ride to remote Lugu Lake, reportedly the the Shangri-La James Hilton wrote about in his “Lost Horizon” novel, and definitely home to the Mosu people, the only matriarchal society in the very patriarchal China. Then I’ll be in Yunnan Province for a while: Lijiang, Dali, Kunming, Xishuangbanna. Not sure how long this will all take. Also not sure how much time I will have to sit in front of a computer and write another one of my 4,000-word diddies. So the TripTik will have to suffice for a while. I hope you understand.

Actually, I got them involved. I didn’t know what else to do. You know your back’s against the wall when you turn to the Chinese police for help. But the damn guy just wouldn’t stop following me. And for a while there, it actually seemed like the police were on my side. I wonder what the crowd was thinking — maybe a hundred strong … crowds gather quickly in a nation of 1.3 billion — as they looked upon the laowai, the two police officers and the man in camouflage pants.

I wonder if any of them took a photo of us. It would have been a good one. But, then again, taking photos is how all of this got started. Foreigners, I now know, are not allowed to photograph Chengdu’s “human market.” Well, unless you are willing to pay someone off.
It all started with my host Bo, who I met through hospitalityclub.com. He is a good host. And for a 21-year-old, he is rather wise regarding the way people think beyond China’s borders. When I asked him to recommend some Chengdu sites for me to check out, he didn’t spout off a list of the city’s “famous” sites — you know … parks, pavilions and pandas. He told me three things: the “she-male street,” the “stolen bike market” and something he called the “human market.”
Yesterday, I chose the human market, also known as the “labor market,” which is similar to the painters’ corner in Xi’an I wrote about — only much larger, much more depressing and, theoretically at least, more organized. The security guard didn’t say anything as I walked on in. There was no reason for him to say anything. Anyone can enter. But some of us have more trouble staying inconspicuous than others.
If you’ve ever been to China, you have likely been to an open market before. And you’ve likely seen the rows and rows of stalls selling fruits, vegetables and about 1,001 kinds of animals and their respective parts (all of them). The stalls are always overflowing with produce.
Well, in your mind, substitute the produce with people. Now you know why Bo calls it the human market. That’s exactly what it is. Hundreds and hundreds of unemployed human beings sitting patiently, hopefully, waiting to be bought. Imagine the heartache you feel when visiting the pound — and double it. At least the pound feeds all the homeless dogs.
The women and the men are separated. Everyone has a sheet of paper — a resume of sorts — on which is written their field of expertise and their various skills. Some people hold these papers at their chest, the same way criminals display their booking number for a mug shot. Others lay the paper on the ground, near their feet. With a handful of the prospective employees, no paper is necessary. I spotted three men sitting expressionless, a chef’s hat balanced on each head. There was no mystery regarding their desired job.
Beyond the people are numbered cubicles containing people behind desks. I assumed that is where all the processing was done. After they complete the paperwork, you can take home your new employee. I think this whole operation is government run. It seemed rather official.
I was walking by myself, but not for long. Soon, a young man wearing a black polo shirt, camouflage pants and shiny black loafers was walking with me. He was very smiley and friendly and looked a little more clean-cut that the folks at the market looking for work. I thought I understood, from what he told me, that he worked for the market. And I thought he understood, from what I told him that I was just looking around. I was just a tourist. I had no need for any employees. It seemed like he had no problem with that. But he still continued to walk with me.
And so did dozens of others. I was left alone, initially. But once the man in camouflage pants joined me, and once people heard me speak a little Chinese, I was mobbed. It was a controlled mob, mind you. But everywhere I went, at least two dozen others went with me. Some seemed to tag along just for the novelty of it all — the man in camouflage pants told me I was the first foreigner ever to enter the place — but most, understandably so, followed me because they thought I would hire them to, to … I don’t know what they thought I would need them for. But I was a foreigner. And all foreigners are wealthy. Maybe they thought I would pay them to count all my rich foreigner money. They shoved their “resumes” in my face.
I felt uncomfortable. I didn’t know what I had gotten myself into. I felt bad for getting their hopes up. I told the man in camouflage pants again that I didn’t need any workers. He told the crowd, but it didn’t make them disperse. I wanted to get out of there. I told the man in camouflage pants that I was going to take a couple photos and then I would leave.
“Photos?” he said. “Can I see your name card?”
Surrounded by 30 or so people, I pulled out my wallet and gave him a business card. I put my wallet back in my pocket, pushing it down as far as it would go. He looked at the card briefly and said, “OK.”
I snapped a few photos, quick ones. They were crowd shots. I didn’t want to focus on individuals. I thought that would be too humiliating. But even the crowd shots made me feel bad. I put my camera away and started to head for the exit. The man in camouflage pants followed me, as did our entire entourage.
I asked the man for his name card. He didn’t have one, but agreed to write down his information in my notepad. I had him write down his job title in Chinese. Later, an owner of a bar translated it for me: “Freelancer,” he said. “That’s never a good sign. Usually it means they’re some sort of rascal.”
I said goodbye, shook his hand and left. He left with me. I thought perhaps he was just being kind, perhaps he just wanted to make sure I made it past the crowds and through the gate OK. But we made it through the gate, and he remained by my side. I said goodbye again and smiled. I told him I was just going to go and see some sites. I told him I could do it by myself.
“No,” was his reply.
“Yes,” I said. “I am going to go by myself.”
I walked away again. And, again, he followed me.
“You took photos,” he said.
“I know. You told me I could.” I kept on walking.
He grabbed my arm. He had a strong grip, and seemed like a rather physically fit young man. “Money,” he said in English.
“What?” I said, forcibly removing his hand from my arm.
“Money,” he repeated in English. And then he said again in Chinese, “You took photos.”
“I am not going to pay you to take photos.”
He said something about the police, but I didn’t quite catch it. Was he with the police? I decided to stop talking to him.
I walked on. And so did he, matching me step for step. It was a slow-paced chase scene. I’d circle back, and so would he. I would cross the street, and so would he. It was a busy street, too. Four lanes. For a moment there, we stood side-by-side on the double yellow lines, traffic whizzing by before and behind us. If he was really crazy, I thought, he could have pushed me into traffic. He didn’t. Wouldn’t have gotten his money that way.
Across the street, I hailed a taxi. I opened the front door, and the man in camouflage pants opened the back. I shut my door. He shut his. He smiled, one of those evil smiles from a likable villain in the movies. Was he enjoying this?
I walked on. I made eye contact with the taxi driver. He creeped his car along and then stopped. I broke for it and opened the front door. The man in camouflage pants opened the back. I slammed the door, and walked away. The taxi sped off.
I wasn’t sure what to do. I was the only foreigner walking along a busy street in a strange city. I couldn’t turn down a side street — or, I should say, I wouldn’t. I needed to stay where the crowds were. My heart was beating quickly. I was sweating — and not just because I decided to wear long underwear on an unseasonably warm October day.
I called Bo.
“Just walk away,” was his advice.
“I tried that,” I said. “He has already grabbed my arm.”
“Oh my God.”
“OK. I see a police car. Think I should approach them?”
“Give it a try.”
“I’m going to give my phone to a police officer. You can talk to them.”
That the man followed me to the police car and stood beside me at the door did not make me feel any better about the situation. Shouldn’t he have run away? I mean he was the one shaking me down for money. The cop talking to Bo on my phone, made eye contact with me — I was leaning over, looking into the car window — and he moved his eyes toward the man’s camouflage pants as if to say, “Is that the guy?” I nodded. Maybe the cops were on my side, after all.
The police officer gave the phone back to me. “They are going to pull over and talk to him,” Bo said.
As they did, I slowly walked away, thinking that was the plan — they distract him, while I escape in a taxi.
I had one leg over a short street barrier, and my eyes focused on a getaway cab, when the policeman called me back over.
“Did you take photos in there?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“You are not allowed to do that.”
“But he told me I could.”
“You are not allowed to take photos in there.”
“I understand you. But he told me I could.”
The police officer shook his head in disapproval. Meanwhile a crowd had gathered. Suddenly. It was a large one. I’m not sure where they came from. But I have seen crowds like this in China before. They surround traffic accidents and arguments on the street. Usually, there is a lot of yelling. Guilt and innocence are decided right then and there. There’s no justice quite like mob justice.
“Wait,” I said. “I will call my friend again. You can talk to him.”
I called Bo, and handed the phone to the police officer. After a short conversation, he handed the phone back to me.
“They want you to delete the photos,” Bo said.
So the problem was the photos. But the problem wasn’t really the photos, because if I had paid the man in camouflage pants — how much money, he never said — he would have never followed me and the police would have never been involved. I’m not sure if the police ever knew of the man’s monetary demands, and I’m not sure if they would have cared. The Chinese police are about as corrupt as they come.
So, I let them watch as I deleted the photographs. I said I was sorry. I shook their hands. The man in camouflage pants said “sorry”, too — in English — and smiled a less evil smile. He didn’t get his money, but maybe he got some sense of satisfaction. The foreigner was forced to delete his photos.
I hopped in the first cab that drove by. And I locked all the doors after I got in.
“I want to go here,” I said to the driver, pointing to my map.
Here was a place called Dave’s Oasis, a bar with a very friendly Chinese owner and a clientele that is 100 percent, Grade-A laowai. The menu has not one Chinese character on it. Dave’s is an American-style dive bar in every sense of the phrase. It was perfect. It was just what I needed.
I sat down, had a couple 5 kuai beers and listened to Joel, REM, Hendrix and Floyd. I chatted for a while with a Canadian guy who was trying to make a living as a pedicab driver. He faces some obstacles, of course: Most noticeably, his poor Chinese skills, his lack of knowledge of Chengdu streets … and the fact that most of his waking hours are spent drinking beer at Dave’s Oasis. He is homeless, sleeping on 15 kuai a night dorm beds — or one of the couches at Dave’s Oasis. Maybe he should try to get a job back at the human market — if they let him in.
Back at Bo’s, we laughed about the day. He told me that the police told him that the man in camouflage pants was a recently retired military man. He also told me of an unwritten rule in China (well, he thinks it is unwritten): “Foreigners aren’t allowed to take photos of everything.” Especially if that thing is considered a societal stain by the government.
And then I showed Bo my photos from the human market — the two that I “forgot” to delete.

I didn’t know what to expect from Mianyang. But I definitely didn’t expect this little Sichuan city to be home to some of the best original live rock music I’ve seen in China. That’s not saying much, but the college students I heard last night at a bar called Mandian were definitely better than I expected. And yes, it was rock music. No ballads. No boy bands. No Carpenters or Eagles covers. That says a lot here in China. (You can see and hear these bands in my Photo Gallery.)

This was a no-frills show. It was all about music. Well, OK, there was a smoke machine, and one of the bands did have matching necklaces with big hanging pendants engraved with their English initials. It was kind of a battle of the bands format — although many bands featured some of the same musicians. We heard Red Hot Chili Peppers covers, post-punk and indie rock (featuring a violin), 80s power rock, GWAR-esque thrash metal and jangly power pop. No group played more than two songs. And they all used the same instruments — poor college students and can’t afford their own.
The two-song sets served a purpose, too. Even though it was a Friday night, all of the bands — mostly students from Southwest University of Science and Technology — had an 11 p.m. curfew back at the dorms (this is the norm at Chinese universities). So much for the rock ‘n roll lifestyle. But, one of the lead singers admitted, his band couldn’t have played more than two songs anyway — they only had one day to practice. Sadly, the same guy told me that concerts like this only happen about once a year. He ran out the door, to beat the curfew, before I could ask him why.
Mandian was a very laid back American-style bar … the kind I wish we had more of in Shanghai. The walls were brick, the rest was wood. The beers were 10 kuai. There was a dart board, a pool table, animal skulls and soccer posters on the walls — and Kenny Rogers’ smiling mug taped next to the bathroom mirror.
It’s been a relaxing couple days here in Mianyang, an interesting little city of less than 1 million people. Emily and Brandon have been great hosts. They have a great apartment, plenty of DVDs and, most importantly, an ADSL internet connection. Brandon even cooked pancakes and scrambled eggs this morning. I’m well-rested, well-fed and, after two days living in a very comfortable American bubble, ready to once again tackle China. I leave for Chengdu this afternoon.

I was going to write a longer piece about my 21-hour train ride from Lanzhou to Mianyang — to where I arrived safely this afternoon — but, frankly, I am tired. Let’s just say I got along great with the three Chinese men who were my bunk mates: I was sipping bai jiu with them at 9:30 this morning. Blech. The previous evening, we drank beer together, and one of the men offered me something from a plastic package. It was some kind of meat, but I couldn’t understand what the man called it. He said it twice, but it was not a name I was familiar with. I asked to look at the bag, which surprisingly had a description in English on it. Here it is in its entirety:

“Our Company products five spices donkey meat, smoked hoof, smoked chicken, eight treasures phoenix claw, five spices beef, pungency tripe slice, niubian and donkey kidney, etc.
“This product is made of high quality donkey meat and add 22 kinds of condiments with washing, steeping, cooking, smoking, disinfecting and vacuum packing, etc.
“The donkey meat is rich nutrition, high protein, low fat and contains many kinds of vitamin and mineral, fragrant and delicious, good to stomach and spleen, so it is a kind of best food for party, feast, travelling, old and young, relatives and friends.
“Main ingredients: Donkey meat, salt, daxiang, anise, the root of membranous mile vetch, etc.”
He squeezed the fibrous pink substance to the top corner of the bag and urged me to try it. I politely declined.

The darn thing nearly overflowed. I think the gods of plumbing are telling me I’m overstaying my welcome and it’s time to leave. Of course, my Lanzhou hosts — Cai Lanzhen, a former student of my father, and her 16-year-old son Du Fan — would never say as much. They have been amazingly gracious. I have dominated their computer for the past few days working on, among other things, my latest story. And Du Fan was kind enough to offer up the top bunk in his bedroom to a 6-foot-3, 30-year-old American. He talks in his sleep, by the way — sometimes in English!

Lanzhen said I could stay indefinitely — and I think her dog Dou Dou did, too — but it’s time to move on. Next stop: Sichuan Province’s Mianyang, an oft-ignored city a couple hours north of Chengdu. I leave at 3:46 p.m. today. In Mianyang I will visit Emily and Brandon, who have kindly offered up their couch to a total stranger. After Mianyang, I head to Chengdu as the guest of Bo Feng, a university medical student who I met through a site called Hospitality Club, basically an international community of freeloaders. I’ve always been a little wary of the whole meeting people online thing. In fact, I still think it’s a little strange. But I’ll try just about anything on this trip. And, based on emails and phone messages, Bo seems like a pretty cool guy. I had considered first traveling further north to some other sites in Gansu, or west to Qinghai, or to northern Sichuan’s famous Jiuzhaigou National Park. But I decided against it. I need to stick to the places where I have contacts. The stories, I believe, are better off that way. I could go crazy — literally, I believe — trying to track down every famous or almost-famous site in China. And besides, I am running out of time. The original aim was to get back to Shanghai before Thanksgiving, and right now I have serious doubts about that happening. Still left to visit: Mianyang, Chengdu, Kunming, Dali, Guiyang, Nanning, Guangzhou and hopefully some place in Fujian (I don’t have a contact there yet). I am slightly concerned that my final southern swing looks to be simply a tour of big-ticket attractions, often-visited cities that have been written about at length. But I need to go where my contacts are. So, if any of you live in an out-of-the-way place along my route — or if you know of anyone who does — please let me know. Maybe I can pay a visit. OK, I need to finish packing. I’ve got a 20-hour train ride soon … and, unfortunately, no Pocket PC on which to type. It’s strange. I’ve been traveling through China for nearly three months now, and the most frustrating part of the whole trip has been dealing with an electronics company back in Shanghai. Everything else has been — dare I say it — pretty easy. Well, easy for China. It’s all relative.

Saw Bliss off at the airport yesterday afternoon. Part of me really wanted to follow her on that plane and head back to Shanghai. I could start over, have some sort of normal life — sleep in my own bed. The idea sounds rather inviting. But I started this trip project — back in July — and I am going to finish it. Besides, I’m still having a good bit of fun out here on the China road. Still in Lanzhou. And I am quite sure that is what my hosts will be saying soon: “Dan is still in Lanzhou.” I was originally going to wait for my Pocket PC to be shipped here before leaving, but I can’t wait any longer. I have no idea when it will be fixed or shipped by the Panda Corporation. I don’t get any straight answers. It’s been a real pain in the ass. So f**k it. I’m

moving on. Sichuan looks to be next on my agenda. After a few stops there, it’s off to either Yunnan or Guizhou. I haven’t decided which to tackle first. Tibet and Qinghai will have to wait (I visited Xinjiang last year). I just don’t have the time or money to make the vast west part of this trip — I am trying to get back to Shanghai by the end of November — but I am pretty sure I will make that region the focus of a separate trip sometime next year (when it is a little bit warmer). I have spent the better part of today working on my story from Dandong in Liaoning Province, which I know happened almost six weeks ago. Blame the Panda Corporation. The story will be posted sometime on Tuesday. And I promise every single location on the trip will get written about before it’s all said and done. The trip may conclude in November. The stories will likely keep coming after the new year. OK, time for bed. I get to sleep on the top bunk. Evan, in the bottom bunk, leaves for high school early in the morning.

I have cast my vote. I mailed in my absentee ballot yesterday. Or, at least I think I did. I have a feeling mine was the first piece of mail the post office here in Lanzhou had ever been asked to send to America. I got many confused looks. And then the workers scrambled around to find a chart that would tell them how much to charge to send this oversized envelope off to this far-off place. I hope it arrives in time — I am registered in Pennsylvania, one of those crucial swing states. The deadline, I believe, is October 29. Who did I vote for? Glad you asked. His name is Paul E. Reichart … and he’s the Democrat nominee for Representative in the General Assembly of Pennsylvania’s 109th Legislative District. I know you’ve been following that race closely.

I didn’t know they existed … until perhaps the only one in the entire country woke me up this morning. They’ve been playing the same 20-second refrain since 8 a.m. Over and over and over and over again. I could see them from my hotel window here in Lanzhou, marching around in their little powder blue uniforms. It is now past 11:30 a.m. And they were still playing when I escaped my hotel room. Why all the practice? Does a Chinese marching band actually ever get to perform? Doesn’t Lanzhou already have enough of the other kinds of pollution? Why add noise pollution into the toxic mix? I could forgive them for the noise — actually, I might even enjoy it — if there was a chance their performance would be followed by a football game … an American football game. Saturdays and Sundays in the fall just seem rather empty when they are filled with hand-pulled noodles and eight treasure tea — not hand-offs and touchdowns.

If somebody tells you it takes eight hours to get from Lanzhou to Guyuan, they really mean nine-and-a-half hours. If somebody tells you it takes seven hours to get from Guyuan to Lanzhou, they really mean nine-and-a-half hours. Not interested in squeezing into another minibus for our trip back over the mountains to Lanzhou, we took Benjamin’s advice and made our return trip to Lanzhou via Pingliang, a small Gansu city that, if you check it out on the map, is in exactly the opposite direction we wanted to go. But, we were assured, the trip from Pingliang to Lanzhou is fast — “maybe five hours, maybe four” — because the buses can use the freeway. So we squeezed into a minbus at 8 o’clock Thursday morning and headed east to Pingliang so we could then head west to Lanzhou. “Fifty-two yuan,” the super-friendly (seriously!) ticket lady at the Guyuan bus station told me when I ordered our tickets to Pingliang. “One foreigner and one Chinese, right?” (Bliss is American-born Chinese.) “No,” I corrected her. “Two foreigners.” She looked a bit confused, said “Oh,” and then quickly canceled our order and started typing in a new one, this time for two waiguoren. I stopped smiling, expecting the price to double, even triple. She finished typing and said, “Fifty-two yuan.” Now I was the

confused one. “It’s the same?” I asked. She continued smiling and said, “Yes.” The ride from Guyuan to Pingliang takes two hours, but it could easily take half that. The first 45 minutes are spent creeping away from the city — seriously, we maybe hit 10 mph — while the bus “pimp” hops out and tries to round up passengers for the ride to Pingliang. Empty seats mean empty pockets. From what I gather, money from passengers that join the ride after the bus leaves the station goes directly into the wallets of the driver and his tout. Every bus does this. As we crawled along, we were actually gaining on a bus in front of us that was going even slower. In Pingliang, we easily purchased tickets for a “fast” bus that was leaving in around 45 minutes. Lanzhou-bound buses leave almost every hour — perhaps even more often than that — and perhaps we should have waited for the bus that left after ours … or perhaps, when ordering our tickets, we should have requested “faster” instead of “fast.” Because, as we lumbered along the “freeway” — which turned out to be a bumpy two-lane road — at least five other buses headed to Lanzhou sped past us. But at least the bus was relatively comfortable — everyone had seats … and one of those seats was not my lap. And the scenery, as usual in rural China, was easily worth the price of the bus ticket. Gansu’s terraced mountains remind me of a chocolate layer cake covered in cocoa powder. It’s the people — the region’s Muslim minority, which often feels more like a majority in these parts — that add color to the largely colorless landscape: The men in their brilliant white pillbox caps, the women in their brightly hued headscarves, the children with their ruddy cheeks of red. The area is torture for a fledgling photographer speeding by in a bus — so many images, but no way to capture them, no way to make them last. We arrived in Lanzhou at 5:30 p.m., exactly nine-and-a-half hours after our first bus crept out of Guyuan. NOTE: Expect the next extended story from the trip early next week. Sorry for the delay, but even those of us on “vacation” need a vacation sometimes.

OK, I’m really going to keep this one short. (Missed the hot water deadline last night … and Bliss has “hinted” that could really use a shower.) Just wanted to let you know that I actually found a tourist attraction that I enjoyed today. Actually, the Buddhist caves of Xumi Shan — about an hour drive from Guyuan — may very well be one of my favorite sites in all of China. Carved into a reddish rocky mountainside (think the American southwest) are literally hundreds of caves, each the home or former home of Buddhist sculptures and paintings more than 1,000 years old. The most prominent cave — it’s actually viewable from the roadside — houses a huge handsome Buddha who has aged rather well. He is in fantastic condition, and more than 20 meters tall. Most tourists, and there weren’t too many today, stick to the caves that are relatively close to the big Buddha. But if you hike a bit further — to the top of the mountain and over to the other side — you are blessed with better caves … and silence. Scrambling down a crumbly ridge, wandering through narrow passgeways created by tall walls of rock, I was all alone. It was peaceful. The sky was blue, and the weather was just cool enough to be comfortable. The last cave on the trail is the best — a large room occupied by seven large Buddhas. It was slightly cooler in the cavern, and each tiny move I made echoed from ceiling to floor. But it’s best to just stand still and stare anyway. The Buddhas are beautiful. But, be warned that not all are as impressed by the Xumi Shan caves as I was. “I don’t find them interesting,” said my local contact Benjamin, a Guyuan native. “I have no interest in history.” This, I have found, is a common way of thinking in China — a country whose long history, it seems, can be overwhelming.

My Pocket PC should be shipped to me soon, which means I will finally be able to write and post stories from places other than internet bars again, which will greatly increase my productivity — long train rides are great places to get writing done. This ordeal has been a colossal one-and-a-half month headache that has made me never want to buy anything in China again … ever. The motto here: The customer is always wrong. (I should note that the problem was not the Pocket PC itself. It was with the GPRS compact flash adapter and SIM card that allowed me to access the wireless internet.) Anyway, hopefully I’ll be writing on trains and buses again soon. Another thing. You’ll have to wait until after this weekend for new photos — and there are many. Bliss brought my iBook to Lanzhou, but I “accidently” hit it with my fist when it froze on me — the road is starting to wear on my nerves, I think — and now all I get is a blinking question mark when I turn it on. This is not a good thing. About 10 years of stuff are on that hard drive. Hopefully, it is a fixable problem. Regardless, Bliss will upload the new photos from her iBook — which she treats very nicely — when she gets back to Shanghai. (In brighter news, I just won my fantasy baseball league. Not bad for a guy traveling through China.)

I need to keep this quick — my hotel cuts off the hot water in 55 minutes … and I need a shower. The bus ride from Lanzhou was not enjoyable. It began at 6:30 a.m. and lasted close to 10 hours (not eight, making my previous TripTik post even more frustrating). The bus was a small one, with only 28 seats. Not to worry: we still managed to squeeze about 48 bodies in at one time or another. I had an aisle seat, which meant I served as a human arm rest, a human stool and, at one point, a human snot rag. The ride was bumpy. The road was curvy. And the terraced mountains we traveled through were the color of a brown paper bag. When I get around to writing my extended Ningxia and Gansu entries, expect to read a lot about potatoes and bricks. If you’ve ever traveled in this part of the world, you know what I am talking about. They are piled everywhere. Guyuan itself is a small, nondescript city in southern Ningxia that is famous, according to my contact Benjamin, “for its poverty.” Guyuan straddles

the line between deserts and mountain forests. Today we hit the mountains, and it turned out to be a relaxing getaway. Liupan Shan’s foliage is beautiful this time of year — even the evergreens turn a brilliant yellow here … weird — and there are plenty of brooks and streams and hiking trails alongside them. (Real trails. Rugged ones. Dirt ones. And oddity in pave-everything-in-sight China.) We dined at Benjamin’s family home in the “suburbs,” a part-brick-part-adobe-part-tile mini-estate in a poor dirt-blown part of the city. His mother, part of the region’s Hui minority, cooked us rabbit — killed in large quantities because they destroy the potato plants — and, of course, several dishes made from potatoes. There was some very interesting dinner talk … but you will have to wait until my extended Ningxia entry to hear about it. (And at my current pace, that post will probably be written sometime next spring. But my current pace should get better soon. Read my next TripTik entry for details about that.) Only 30 minutes of hot water left!

Or, at least, it can be. Take today, for example. Tomorrow we leave for a short stay in Guyuan, a poor city in southern Ningxia. The bus ride there will take up much of the day. And much of today — almost all of it, actually — was taken up by failed attempts to purchase the ticket that will allow us to spend most of tomorrow on a bus. Let me explain. Late this morning — we thought we could get this task out of the way before lunch — we asked the friendly girls at the hotel front desk which bus station we could use to get to Guyuan. South Bus Station was their answer. They both seemed very sure. Forty-five minutes and a traffic jam later, our taxi dropped us off at the South Bus Station, where we learned that we needed to go to the East Bus Station if we wanted to go to Guyuan. So, at the East Bus Station, a 30-minute ride away, we discovered that we could indeed get a 6:30 a.m. ticket to Guyuan there … but, we were told, the ride would be 10 hours, not the eight hours we had expected. I called my contact in Guyuan (more on him later) and he said maybe it was the train that was eight hours. We went to the train station, and there we learned that the train, too, takes 10 hours … and it doesn’t leave until the evening, which doesn’t fit into our time frame. I decided to check with a travel agency — in the clusterf—k that is China, there are always other options, other methods of getting from one place to another … you just need to find the person who has access to the magical information, and is willing to share it with you. So, we went to

a nearby internet bar and looked up some travel agents.

There were several different listings for China International Travel Service — allegedly they all accuse the other ones of being frauds — but none of them answered their phones. We planned to visit a recommended branch in person, but when we asked an internet bar worker whether its address was near or far from our current location, he said — after checking with his associates — “That street doesn’t exist.” So we set off in a three-wheeled taxi for a CITS situated on a road that, we were assured, did exist — but its building number did not. We instead got dropped off near our hotel. Lunchtime had long since passed. We had no tickets, and our patience was wearing thin.

On the walk back to our hotel, we spotted a sign that said “Western Travel Agency — Welcome To You.” We decided to give it a shot. The door appeared to be locked. We knocked anyway. No answer. I called the 24-hour “hotline” posted on the door. I was told to knock again — someone was supposed to be at the office. I knocked again. That knock managed to wake up the worker, who answered the door still groggy from his midday nap. He mumbled, in very good English, “How can I help you?” We asked for the fastest method of travel to Guyuan. He recommended the train — it was “much safer” than the bus — but the only train was still the one that left at night. We asked about the bus.

“The bus leaves at 6:30 in the morning,” he said.

“And it’s 10 hours?” I asked.

“No. Eight. It arrives at 2:30 in the afternoon.”

“Is this from the East Bus Station?”

“Yes. Correct.”

“They told us it arrived at 4:30.”

“They were wrong.”

He suggested we head back to the East Bus Station to buy our tickets. At least we knew exactly where we had to go.

Back at the East Bus Station, the ticket-purchasing process went smoothly … until we were asked for our insurance certificates. Gansu is perhaps the only province in China that requires travelers to purchase insurance for bus travel, and the insurance is separate of the bus ticket itself. And according to some sources, this insurance doesn’t insure anything other than the fact the government can’t be sued in the event of an accident. Whatever. We didn’t have insurance. And we needed it.

“Where can we buy insurance?” we asked the ticket lady.

Of course, we couldn’t buy insurance from her. That would be too easy. That would make too much sense. She told us there was a travel agency right next to to the bus station that could take care of us. We went there. And they couldn’t take care of us.

“Sorry!” the man at the office said with a big smile. “You can’t buy insurance today.” It seems the one person at the office who sells insurance wasn’t at the office today.

“Is there any other place we can buy insurance?” I asked.

He pointed us down the road. In 10 minutes, he said, we would see another place that sold insurance. The Chinese are perhaps the worst direction givers in the world. Rarely are numbers or names used. No specifics. Just a wave of the hand in a general direction. Walk that way a little, and you have to ask someone else — and they do the exact same thing. We walked 10 minutes, asked someone else, and he pointed us down a different road.

I called our friend at Western Travel Agency. He said he could help us out.

This time when we arrived, he hadn’t been napping. But he still appeared tired. Tired of life, perhaps. Lanzhou seems to do that to people.

“Why do we need to buy bus insurance?” I asked.

He shook his head and sighed. He didn’t understand, either. “I don’t know,” he said with a hint of helplessness. “It’s just a policy.”

He helped us fill out the papers. He never asked us for an ID. The information we provided him didn’t seem to matter. Just the fact that we paid our RMB 50. Just the fact that the paperwork had the all-important red stamp. I looked at the back of our insurance certificates. All the information was in English.

“Do Chinese have to get insurance?” I asked.

“It’s different for Chinese,” he said.

“How much do they pay?”

“About two yuan a day.” He looked at our papers and said, “This is expensive.”

“So,” I said, “if our bus crashes, I can use this insurance? I can get some money out of it?”

This seemed to cheer him up. He chuckled — laughed, even. “Sure,” he said with a smile. “Right.”

He gave us our halves of the forms, and stuffed his into a desk drawer.

“Do you have to file this information with anyone?” I asked.

“No,” he said.

“So, you just keep it in your desk?”

“Yes.”

It was approaching dinner time as we arrived at the East Bus Station for the third time of the day. They got their red stamps. We got our tickets. No one ever checked to see if the information on our insurance forms was correct. No one cared.

I need to go now. My bus leaves in six hours. Well, it’s supposed to. You never know when traveling in China.

NOTE: I met my Guyuan contact — a college student with the English name Benjamin — at an internet bar back in Yinchuan. After a couple minutes of talking, he invited me and my girlfriend to visit his hometown while he was back home for the National Day holiday. He seemed really excited about the idea. I accepted the invitation with little hesitation … and little information about the person or place I owuld be visiting. Seemed like it might make for an interesting story. Add this to the long list of things that I have done on this trip that I would never consider doing in America.

It seems even the hotels here in Lanzhou wonder why the hell their guests would ever want to come to Lanzhou, a city of 3 million that in 1998 was named the world’s most polluted city. In our desk drawer our hotel has provided us with a guidebook … for Guizhou, a province located several hundred miles to the south. We are staying in one of Gansu Province’s only four-star hotels, which means a nightly rate of $50 — but no heat. And the October nights can get chilly up here at 5,070 feet. You see, China has this rule: Only buildings located north of the Yellow River are allowed to come equipped with central heating systems, which explains why winters in “southern” Shanghai suck so much. Lanzhou, part of it at least, is north of the Yellow River (which is actually very brown). But, you see, China also has this other rule: Buildings equipped with central heating can’t simply turn it on when the people inside start to feel cold — they must wait until the government tells them it is cold. And, I have been informed, the government doesn’t start to feel the chill until November. That’s OK, the maid brought us an extra comforter. Somehow, the lobby and restaurant manage to stay relatively warm. Maybe it’s the music. Our hotel’s soundtrack is a short and eclectic loop, instrumental versions of all of your favorites: “The Theme From Godfather,” “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” “Memories,” “Auld Lang Syne,” “Silent Night,” “Moon River” and, of course, “Yesterday Once More.” It just wouldn’t be China without The Carpenters.

So, I am getting drunk, and I thought I would send you a note before I actually got drunk. I am currently drinking Blue Diamond beer, which has this English slogan on its can: “Blue Diamond Beer is suitable for all seasons and all the people.” I believe the beer is brewed in Guangzhou. I am drinking with the owner of a car parts distributor. This was his answer to the question, “Do you like Lanzhou?”: “I have no choice. It is my fate.” Yikes. No wonder we are drinking so much. The game we are playing you will see played out at many restaurants and bars throughout the greater Gansu area. It involves two men sticking up fingers and shouting numbers at each other. If the number you shout out equals the total number of fingers shown, you win. And the other guy drinks. Although everyone pretty much seems to continuously drink here. Helps us forget that we are in Lanzhou. Tomorrow my beautiful girlfriend arrives in Lanzhou, and we get to spend more than a week together. Don’t expect to hear from me much. Happy National Day, you commies!

Does anyone have anything good to say about Lanzhou? Anyone? Anything? Even the locals — or perhaps especially the locals — have trouble coming up with ideas. “Lanzhou is not very beautiful,” one man told me today, my first day in Gansu’s capital. “But the people are very hospitable.” Oh, and the noodles. Can’t forget the noodles. Lanzhou is famous for its noodles — must be something in the dirt. So today, in addition to playing 3-on-3 basketball — in my jeans, as is the Chinese custom — with two middle-aged women and three teenage boys (the middle-aged women and I housed the teenagers, by the way), I was the guest of honor at an English class for pre-teens. My contact here, a professor at Northwest Normal University, does these night classes on the side. Most of the students likely had never interacted with a foreigner before, but that didn’t stop them from asking more questions than my Shanghai University students probably would have (although some of these questions were a tad vague). Here is a sampling:

• What do you usually do?
• What do you like?
• Do you like to swim?
• Do you know Jay?
• Which do you like better: China or America?
• What is the climate in America?
• What is your favorite color?
• I think you like computer games. Do you?
• Do you have a girlfriend? Yes. Is she beautiful?
• Do you like Chinese food? Yes. Why?
• Do you like Yao Ming? Yes. I think he is a good player and he seems like a nice guy, too. Do you? No. Why? I think he is bad. And he is too old. Too old? Who do you like? Who is your favorite player? Jordan.

And isn’t it now October? Has anyone turned on CCTV-5 recently? Are there any other countries on Earth still replaying — over and over again — Olympics coverage? I mean, I love a good badminton match as much as the next guy … oh, wait, no I don’t.

I have been rather amazed on this trip by the Chinese families who have let me — an American and, often, a total stranger — into their homes. I have heard many foreigners complain upon visiting China that the Chinese are rude or cold. But I have found that once you break down that initial wall — which is often rather easy to do — most Chinese are amazingly gracious and warm* (*not including ticket sellers at most train stations … or almost any Chinese person who sits behind a counter and wears a badge with a number and no name). Take last night, for example. Allen, my contact here, a college student who barely knows me — he is an acquaintance of a friend of a co-worker of a friend — invited me to his uncle’s home for Mid-Autumn Festival dinner. “Are you sure I am really invited?” I wanted

to make sure. “Of course,” Allen said, as if I was stupid for asking. And so, just like that, I became the guest of honor on one of the biggest Chinese holidays of the year, joining Allen, his 16-year-old cousin, his aunt and his uncle around the dinner table for a wonderful home-cooked meal. There was nothing awkward about it, either. We ate and talked and laughed and, of course, drank some bai jiu. (Well, the uncle and I drank bai jiu. I haven’t figured out how to say no.) It wasn’t until after dinner, that the family even thought to ask Allen exactly how it was that he knew me. Several times, I was told to act as though I was home. And they made doing so incredibly easy. It was a relaxing evening. After dinner, we all took to the living room and watched a holiday music extravaganza live from Shanghai. We sat together around the television. We talked some more. We laughed some more. And I, the American stranger sitting on the couch, felt like the long lost family member recently returned home after an extended stay abroad.

Paul Theroux once wrote, “Sight-seeing is one of the more doubtful aspects of travel, and in China it is one of the least rewarding things a traveler can do — primarily a distraction and seldom even an amusement. It has all the boredom and ritual of a pilgrimage and none of the spiritual benefits.” My experiences here in Yinchuan (and elsewhere) support this theory. I always have much more fun, and find much more to write about, when nosing around town or mingling with the locals. Still, sometimes something in one of the guide books catches my eye, or a local tells me of a place that I “must see.” Why do I keep falling for it? Two days ago, I visited the Western Xia Tombs, an ancient burial site with an interesting backstory that is allegedly the top tourist attraction in the area

… for foreigners, at least. But ancient sites in China always feel oddly prefabricated to me. There is just too much kitsch, too much clutter encroaching on the old stuff. All the mystery, all the sense of discovery is lost. (And the old stuff in this case — no matter how many people try to label it the “Pyramids of China” — is basically, when you get right down to it, several big mounds of dirt.) In the desert surrounding the site, are more structures associated with the tombs, and from my taxi they looked more impressive, more natural, to me. I asked the cabbie if I could walk to them. He said it was possible, but it would require two hours of hiking through the desert and, more importantly, there was a military airport in the area. “So maybe it wouldn’t be safe,” said Allen, my contact here. “They might think you are a spy.” The Helan Shan Mountains looked nice in the distance. I wish I had decided to go there. Yesterday, I took Allen’s advice (and my taxi driver’s) and went to Sand Lake, considered the area’s best site by most locals. It’s a big amoeba-like pool of water surrounded by desert, and would be a very nice, peaceful and picturesque place to visit … had they not decided to turn it into some sort of amusement park. Isn’t a beautiful lake abutted by big sand dunes enough? No, according to Allen. The Chinese would be bored by it. So now the area is awash with new and delapidated red-roofed buildings and a variety of other attractions guaranteed to pollute with both noise and noxious gases. There are jeeps, four-wheelers, go karts and various carnival rides. There are speed boats, zip lines and hot air baloons. Of course, you can also ride a camel (or even an ostrich!). I went on a beautiful day that also happened to be a national holiday … and the place was virtually empty, definitely more workers than visitors. The people manning the games passed time by playing their own games, or sleeping. The non-existent crowds may have been due to the fact that I visited during low season, or it may just be what happens when you try to open an amusement park in one of the poorest provinces in China. The cheapest admission ticket to Sand Lake was RMB 80 ($10). They went up to RMB 140. And nearly every activity inside the park costs extra. As a point of comparison, according to Chinese government statistics, the average urban household in Ningxia has RMB 535 of disposable income every month. Anyway, Sand Lake was a pretty sad place the day I visited. What fun are bumper boats with no one to bump into? What fun is riding an ostrich with no one to watch and laugh? And have you every really looked at an ostrich? I mean, have you taken the time to stop and stare? I did yesterday. Ostriches scare the hell out of me.

So, I am staying in a cheap hotel on the campus of Ningxia University, which is in new Yinchuan, which is an RMB 15 drive from old Yinchuan, which doesn’t seem very old at all. In fact, new Yinchuan doesn’t seem very new, either. Both are dirty … but, I have been assured, not as dirty as Lanzhou — my next stop, and according to some, the most polluted city on Earth. The shopping is better in old Yinchuan. Actually, I think most things are better in the old town (except, perhaps, the internet bars — I am currently sitting in a smoke-free environment in a big, cushy chair). Still, for some reason, there are two Yinchuans, and they are separated by a wide, flat and empty highway. I was going to write more — and I will — but it looks as though I am getting kicked off of my computer. I guess the nice places close early. More soon.

Had some time to kill here in Beijing while waiting for a train, so I sought out one of the capital city’s more peculiar attractions, Dixia Cheng, or the Underground City. Masterminded by Mao at his most paranoid, this complex web of tunnels was built between 1969 and 1979 to help secure Beijing in the event of an attack … from the Soviet Union, according to my guide. If connected end-to-end, the tunnels would stretch longer than the Great Wall, I was told. There were schools and a hospital built underground, and even a theater in which Mao and his men would watch “military documentary movies.” If they weren’t blocked off, the tunnels could take you almost anywhere you wanted to go in the city, and even many places outside Beijing. As we passed one blocked corridor, I was told if we hiked through it for three days we would end up in Tianjin.

The tunnels are decorated rather cheesily today, with camouflage hanging from walls adorned with photos of famous-and-not-so-famous communists, tanks, missiles, explosions and other stock military images. There are also mannequins — almost all female — decked out in army gear and gasmasks. Also underground is, of course, a store. There, you can purchase silk blankets, just like the ones the eldery and children would use down in the tunnels to stave off rheumatism — it’s pretty damp and cold down there. But for RMB 20, the tunnels still make for an interesting tour that adds to the mystery of Chairman Mao. There are entrances to the tunnels hidden all over the city. As we passed the hallway that would have led us to Tiananmen Square, I asked my guide where in the square it would take us. “Where would it come out?” she repeated with a giggle. “That is a military secret.” The Underground City is located at 62 Xi Damochang Lu in a hutong neighborhood near Qianmen Dajie. RMB 20 per person. 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m. daily. Phone 67022657 or 67011389.

I have been traveling through China for around nine weeks now. Been to a good number of places, big and small. Today was the first day somebody actually took down my passport number. Why? I wanted to use the internet. I’m in Beijing now — a seven-hour layover before my train leaves for Yinchuan, Ningxia — and evidently internet bars here are cracking down … on something. No, it’s not just foreigners. No, it’s not just me — the writer who got blacklisted in Shenyang. Everyone must show ID to enter this place. We are all being watched. Perhaps the government is trying to recruit players for the National Counter Strike Team. There are a couple hot prospects sitting behind me right now.

Or at least it was three years ago. I’ll see for myself when I arrive in the capital of Ningxia Autonomous Region. I leave Harbin tonight … and I don’t get to Yinchuan until Sunday morning. Which means I get to spend 30 hours on Chinese trains! (And seven hours passing time in Beijing.) My contact in Ningxia is named Allen. He is a college junior. And now you know as much about Allen as I do. By the way, if you ever need any travel-related help in Harbin, I had a very good experience dealing with Sun De’an at the CITS office here. Mr. Sun speaks great English and he and his staff are very helpful and friendly. Contact the office at (0451) 53642339 or visit their website.

I could never live in Harbin. Me and minus-22-degrees-Fahrenheit temperatures just don’t mix. But I discovered a little microbrewery — yes, a microbrewery in China — that would make dealing with the long winters a little easier. Nothing like a frosty mug to help soothe some frostbite. They’ve got black beer and, yes, the yellow stuff, too. It is tasty … and it’s only RMB 5 per pint. That’s around 60 cents, which will get you exactly one-thirteenth of a Guinness back in Shanghai. So, if you find yourself up this way, remember this address: 117 Ren He Jie, just off of Guo Ge Li Da Jie. The name of the place is Shi Xiang Shao Kao and it says it on the outdoor sign in big English letters. I am heading there now. The food is pretty good there, too.

In some cities, it is impossible to catch a cab. Here in Harbin, it is impossible to avoid them. The city really appears to be overpopulated … with maroon Volkswagen taxis, each one outfitted with strange flashing disco lights on the dash. Maybe the lights are there to hypnotize you into wanting to be driven somewhere. The taxi drivers here are desperate bullies. They try to scare you into wanting a ride. Empty cabs beep at pedestrians — pedestrians on the sidewalk — in an effort, I assume, to remind walkers that they are only walking. If that doesn’t work, they slow down and stalk you, drive slowly beside you, taking a page from the Kidnapper’s Guide to Cab Driving. This morning, as I was heading to this very internet bar, a taxi cab blocked my progress, obviously hoping this surprise tactic would confuse me and I would unwittingly climb into the door that suddenly appeared in front of me. “Hmmm. Well, I was just trying to cross the street. But now that you have stopped your car in front of me, I guess I would like you to drive me … somewhere … please … Mr. Cab Driver … sir.” I haven’t seen anything like this since SARS-scared Shanghai, when no one wanted to ride in a cab, and taxis drove around like lost puppies, trying to guilt you into hopping in.

Well, not really. But to all you Chinese journalism students out there, you may want to read this Guardian story: China’s rise in wealth brings fall in health. The story says, “A study by the Red Cross Society of China found that more than 70% of the residents of the three wealthiest conurbations, Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, were ill, unfit or short of energy.” But here is the really scary part: “A study by 10 news organisations in Shanghai showed that the average lifespan of a reporter was 45 years.” Maybe I should move. (For more great news links, check out this site’s Newsworthy section.)

For those of you following the gripping discussion about the origins of the elaborate Chinese character biang — yes, both of you — Johnson has added his two cents, including a nice little poem (in Chinese). You can see the character and read all the comments in the Photo Gallery. You can read more about biang in my story from Xi’an. Also, Prince Roy has written about the topic at his site.

After a weekend of Bliss here in Harbin, it’s back to the grind. I’ve picked up a cold — my third of the trip, I believe — so at least I can’t smell what is going on around me here at the internet bar. Today, I uploaded more than 200 photos, from Shenyang, Dandong, Changbai Shan, Suifenhe and Harbin. You can find direct links to them in this page’s New Photos section (below), or by clicking here. I plan on hanging out here in Harbin for another day or two. I need to knock out another story before I hit the road and head to Ningxia. For the forseeable future, I hope to post at least one of my longer stories from the road each week and update this TripTik almost daily. I think those are reasonable goals, considering my Pocket PC is now back in Shanghai, therefore forcing me to do all of my writing in internet bars — from which I always emerge feeling as though I spent the evening at Kramer’s smoking club (Kramer: Hey, you should come over. Tonight’s pipe night. Jerry: What? What happened to your face? It looks like an old catcher’s mitt.) Still no contact in Ningxia. Who knows, maybe I’ll end up hanging around with this guy.

Because I just had a Chinese massage. Oooh, this one hurt. He found all the right — or wrong — places. And he could tell I had a history of lower back pain … by looking at my ear. I have found most of my massages in China to be very relaxing — when they are finished.

I wonder how many years I am erasing from my life by sitting in Chinese internet bars. They are disgusting smoke-and-spit-filled places. The men smoke. The women smoke. The boys smoke. The girls smoke. Everybody smokes. There often is no ventilation. And there are usually puddles of phlegm on the floor. Earlier today at a “nice” internet bar in Harbin, a man actually spit under his mouse pad. I have been to packed internet bars all over this country, and I have never — I repeat, NEVER — seen anyone use the internet for informational purposes, even though plenty of off-limits info is out there despite the Chinese government’s best efforts to censor it. Maybe that’s why people always stare over my shoulder quizzically at what is going on on my screen — “The white man is using Internet Explorer! He is actually using his computer to read words! Look! Look!” Everyone at internet bars in China either plays games, chats or watches movies. Nothing else. Last night, a couple seated at the computer next to me watched an entire soft-core porn flick. I just wanted to let you know that I am sacrificing both my health and my sanity for you, readers. OK, gotta go. The guy next to me just angled his computer camera my way, to prove to the person on the other end that he was sitting next to a real live laowai. Now they both can watch me wash my hands with Purell Instant Hand Sanitizer.

Did you know that Australians call a comforter a doona? Did you know that they call a party a do? I didn’t until I arrived in Harbin last night. What does any of this have to do with China, you ask? Well, not much. Other than the fact that in Harbin I am staying with a ponytailed former plumber from Melbourne named Stavros Mavropoulos. He’s teaching English here and was nice enough to offer up his couch (I wonder if that’s what they call it in Australia). The weather is actually rather pleasant here in a city famous for ice festivals and temperatures that reach minus-30 degrees Celsius. It seems the locals, understandably, like to draw out their summers as long as possible. As I waited for Stavros in front of the Wal-Mart — yes, another one — the temperature was maybe 55 degrees Fahrenheit, but I still saw two men walking down the street with their shirts pulled above their bellies, as Chinese men are wont to do in “balmy” weather.

That is my question. I need to decide soon whether I am going there. It was the original “plan,” to make it an actual cross-country trip. But now I am wondering whether it would be too large of an investment both time-wise and money-wise. I’m not sure if a week is enough time to do Tibet justice. And I’m not sure if I can afford to dedicate more time than that — I eventually have to get back to a life in Shanghai, and I still have the entire southern strip of China to cover. Also, I have a friend who recently spent two weeks in Tibet and spent $1,500. I simply cannot afford that. I can’t even afford half of that. And anyway, I likely wouldn’t get to Tibet until early October. Is that too late in the year, too cold, for a northern approach into Tibet? I’d appreciate any thoughts or suggestions. (Btw, bus for Harbin leaves in two hours.)