rain

In Hong Kong it was raining, but the rain was coming from my body due the humidity (and not from the sky). Even at night, on the 38th floor with the window open, and without moving, i started to sweat. Yikes, though HK is a great place, i dislike having to sleep with air conditioning on, or carrying around 3 spare shirts... (though the taxis are nice and cold).

In Xi'an there was rain for about 4 hours combined out of the week i was there. Well, it's a start. In Beijing there was also some rain, though it was the day before I arrived there, so that meant the few days I was there were nice and cool. In Shanghai it has been drizzling non-stop. Drizzle is great cause you don't get soaked or drowned in puddles. The only problem is, along with the rain, come the Mosquitos :(

The week in Xi'an was quiet. The 4 days in Beijing a bit hectic. The week in Shanghai totally hectic. Just the way I like it. It is not that Xi'an is so bad, or that I struggle to work effectively there (how to set-up and manage corporate partnerships when there are no corporations there?), but that I am just not that busy there... the only things to do are eat, drink, work, study or escape the pollution. Having said that, the cycle to the mountains-climb the mountain-cycle back was fantastic and the ride is much more enjoyable than Beijing; where it takes an hour to get out of the city and another 30 minutes to escape off the highways.

I am staying in a Hostel in Shanghai as it is in a very central location with wireless internet -perfect for in between meeting times (plus there are 3 crazy kittens running all over which adds some life compared to staying in friend's empty apartments during the daytime). You'd think hostels are full of travellers. Not Shanghai's -they are full of opportunity-seekers. People live here whilst job hunting, whilst working (it is cheaper than trying to rent an appartment, if you are happy sharing a room with 5 others and a good way to make friends) and whilst planning their new business venture. Walk into the hostel and not only do you find the 2 computers permanently in use, you find several people with laptops...Typical Shanghai.

oxygen

Only 1 day left to enjoy clean air, clean rain and 'freshness'. I've got a lot of oxygen on this trip, hopefully enough to last until my next trip back here (or out of China -though to be fair, there are places in China with some oxygen)... although Xi'an is 25 degrees, which is nice.

A lot of my outdoor activity has involved exercising. Well, I say exercising; mostly it has been pleasurable cycling or walking. Some of it has been more challenging (5 mile cross-country, 6 mile road races and a triathlon) though some has been quite relaxing (outdoor hot tub!). There is a reason for so much exercise, other than just a dash for air (which is not that bad, I am totally over-exaggerating a lot of the time; please feel free to still visit!). 1 is that my Dad does this kind of stuff all the time, so I might as well join him. Though he beat me on the 5 mile-er by 4 minutes and the 6 mile-er by 2 minutes, I beat him on the Triathlon by 2 minutes, cause his swimming is useless! The 2nd reason is that my family does have a bit of a liking to chocolate and deserts in general. My mum is a great cook and even when I'm out, I can't not buy desert.

Why? Because China does not have deserts. It is not just that everything comes at once in cheap restaurants (there is a bit more order in posh places), but just that there is no concept really of cakes or similar sweet things (not helped by the lack of ovens). Such a shame. The ice cream is not bad in China (though avoid the weird flavours, e.g. green pea, sweetcorn etc), but the chocolate is awful and the birthday cakes are very very similar to the cream pies that you shove in someone's face for a joke. Despite the exercise, I have most definitely regained my sweet tooth and put on weight. My suitcase has also gained weight: you have no idea how much chocolate is inside it (but no Apple Crumble, sorry Fumi!).

It is a bid sad (and pretty poor writing for me to even try this ending for this post) but you could almost say deserts and chocolate are as important as oxygen for my Mum and sisters especially. That is the real reason they could never come to China for too long!

p.s. For the BLCU/Wudaokou gang, i do have to make a special 'shout' out to the 'Fish Man' by BLCU west gate selling fish shaped waffles filled with chocolate sauce. 1 RMB... buying just 2 is never enough!

Memories

A long time ago I came to realise, or rather accept, that people come and go. There comes a point where there is little point setting wrong expectations that friendships can be maintained when (normally due to changing circumstances) people end up moving in different circles. Then if a friend does end up in contact again for various reasons, intentionally or otherwise, no-one need feel embarrassed. Each accepts people come and go; and 'catching-up' is still a good thing to do as a one-off.

Though, it does seem due to social networking sites like Facebook, My Space, Linked In etc that everyone any of us have ever come across in our entire lifetime could get back in touch with us. What are we supposed to do with thousands of friends, most of whom were barely friends of friends and whom we cannot remember?

Since the family house is going to be sold soon; I've been packing up my few possessions (there have been many a tidy-up before to reduce what i own to just 1 satchel or 2 apart from clothes) and finding fantastic things: pen pal's letters (i can barely remember what a letter is now!), swimming certificates, pens bought on school trips, photos from primary school, school projects, contact details of people on group trips I took and so on. Weird to think how much has been achieved so far in just 25 years, how many people have come and gone. Nice to keep some memories, though I am not entirely sure.

A lot more still to come, presumably, though the memories of the future might be some what greater since there are so many more emails/photos/videos/documents and other tangible evidence of relationships nowadays. The good news is most of this stuff is virtual -can be taken anywhere easily and cannot be lost thanks to google/yahoo's fantastic online servers :-)

My room is currently a mess; only a few more nights in a bed I've slept in for 22 years pretty much. All that is left is to ask: Does anyone want to volunteer to scan in hundreds of photos going back 25 years, name them and tag them?

Wonders...

(a few of my favourite things not to be found in China)
Supermarkets with great food, easy to find, from all over the World, in all kinds of weird combinations
Food with little marks all over them telling you how much fat, calories, sugar etc in them
Intercity motorways with cars on them
Weddings in Churches
Clear blue skies; birds singing; freshly cut grass; the smell of flowers
Ale, Ale, Ale, wonderful Ale: beer without bubbles but with plenty of taste
Fields full of nothingness; just grass and sometimes some sheep/cows
Country houses made of sturdy, attractive brick, with flower gardens
Pubs with huge portions, lots of sauce, footy on tele and wireless internet
Train stations with electronic ticket machines and online booking facilities
Seat-belts in buses, taxis and cars
Car Parks
Deserts/Puddings, Chocolate, Ice Cream and all 3 mixed together
Footpaths, signposts, maps, stiles, kissing gates and the like
Real, wood fires
Couples in love and friends with new surnames
Discussions about religion
Discussions about politicis
Music: new, old and very old
TV with funny ads, funny shows and funny presenters
Interesting, stimulating newspapers full of debate, analysis, criticisms, humiliations, revelations, endless regurgitations, enticing advertisements......

Old friends together and it is like nothing has changed

home

Sitting outside in the sun eating a pub lunch with fat chips
Sitting inside a pub watching the football, pint in hand
Commuting to London on the tube, paying ridiculous amounts for peak-time tickets
Walking in the woods, with the dog
Eating home-cooked deserts
Cooking a BBQ
Sleeping in a comfortable bed
Lying outside in a garden, in the sun, breathing in fresh air, with birds all around

... a typical trip home

Topped off with a visit to Jongleurs for some live comedy (sorry, but the Chinese are not known for their sense of humour!), a walk around Hampstead (one of the poshest areas in London with expensive houses, trendy cafes etc), a trip to some 'fringe' theatre (intimate theatre with only 80 seats, that is not in the West End) and catching up with friends/family.

London is, and always will be, such a special place full of wonderful drinking establishments, eateries and people from all over the World... I am still recovering from seeing so many non-Asians! It has been a perfect week of walking around, seeing the history, culture and chic-ness of london. Plus meeting all the Plan UK people has been a real pleasure; partly as most of them are all young ladies!

If only London was not so damn expensive...
p.s. i had forgotten what it is like to drive... on the left... in a little car in areas full of posh cars... and had to park between 2 Porsches on a hill. Good job I remembered.

the good and the bad

I have always said that China is a paradox (though i suppose most countries are the same, though China might be more than most). Though most of last week was actually quite unpolluted (1 day i could see 'as far as the eye could see' for the 1st time ever in Xi'an), on friday it started to get bad again, and especially dusty (since all the building near the apartment). Thus, yesterday we went down to the Qin Ling Mountains a couple of hours away for some fresh air.

There are at least 8 panda reserves in these mountains, and we ended up in the worst. The 'zoo' is more like a jail in a war zone: full of concrete and metal bars. There is more money and space devoted to the trees by the paths in the zoo than on the animals in the zoo. It really was that depressing. There was no grass inside any of the cages -even the leopard was stuck in a 3x3m concrete and steel jail cell. It is a crime. And so depressing. Ironically WWF do a lot of work with other panda reserves and zoos in this area; I presume they do not even know that this zoo exists. The highlight of the zoo trip was when a peacock opened its feathers; the lowlight when some kids threw stones at the leopard trying to get it to move.

Thoroughly depressed we almost ran out out of the zoo angry at all things Chinese (not all zoos are this bad in China, honest) and drove West parallel to the mountains, spotted a village by the side of the road and thought that would be a good place to start our camping trip. The driver thought we were a bit weird; the locals in the village thought we were even more so, as we sauntered through heading along a small river in a valley, deep into the mountains. The village was named after a 1,000 year old pagoda nearby which we quickly checked out and discovered that most of the pagoda complex had been destroyed during the cultural revolution (10 year period from 1966 where Mao encouraged everyone to destroy anything of cultural value and defy elders and academics -which is somewhat weird, since China's 5000 year culture is based on the 2 elements of family and education; but hey, that is Mao -the evil dictator)

Thankfully the water, the green, the smells and the exercise made us forget the morning and after a few hours we were exploring villages that consisted of 3 buildings in a 1 mile stretch with the only transport to them being a footpath. It was great (again) to be in places untouched by development. No phone lines and even no electricity at the farthest village we reached to, and the views of the mountains were beautiful.

We camped along the stream and spent a while talking to a local who had 4 sons (20-30), but none of them were married (as no woman wants them, they are so poor) and only 1 was left at home (the others were working in the cities). He only had 2 cows for ploughing but spent ages telling us about the plants that could be eaten and the ones that could be used for medicine. He had lived on the hill for 50 years (though he had been to Xi'an infrequently). It is a joy to still talk to some of those 25-120 million people who are still in relative poverty in China (25m is china's number of extreme poor, 120m is World Bank's definition of poverty) who Plan is focused on helping (though we do not work in the area we were hiking in). Although this guy (in his 70s but still working the fields) is probably in the 120m bracket not the 25m, he lives mostly off what he grows and a few things to trade to buy other food. If anyone is near Xi'an; I highly recommend heading south and then west tot he edge of the mountains, picking a village and go off exploring. We'll be doing it again, that is for sure.

The water was so fresh and clean, as to be drinkable (according to the man, and verified by us); the people were so kind to us strangers it really is the opposite of Chinese cities where people and cars seem to actively barge or crash into other people and cars; where there is trash and pollution everywhere. I guess I'll be talking more about China over the next month in the UK to my Plan colleagues, and of course to friends and family, most of whom I have not seen for 18 months.

Chai

Chai (拆) is the character for Destroy and last month started appearing on a couple of the buildings on my little alleyway where i live. It is, the ultimate alleyway, with all kinds of shops selling useful and yummy stuff. A real, bustling, street full of people shopping and with a great vegetable market and small restaurants to sit outside of and eat in the summer. However after my 2 weeks out of Xi'an (Beijing -Thailand -Beijing), I returned to find 3 buildings already knocked down and another 10-15 marked. I guess it is only a matter of time until my alley with just a couple of apartment buildings becomes yet another cluster of 20 storey buildings and cars parked everywhere. Such is China.

It will be a shame, I like the cheap food and being so close to 'real China' where migrant workers live and work. I hope those who are losing their homes are being compensated enough (they are usually not). Keep watching to find out how quick the buildings disappear and what will replace them... there could be a miracle and some green space might appear, but it is unlikely!

Last night, leaving a club (the 1st i have been to in Xi'an in 8 months, since I normally stick to restaurants and bars) that was (predictably) pretty crap, me and my friends started chatting to the kids who were selling roses on the street. We gathered they all live together and some guy is looking after them. They say they are surviving ok with money, food etc; but who knows how much they get for doing what they do. They don't live with their parents, anyway.

There is a big problem of children being kidnapped, or being bought from their parents, to work for 'paymasters', and then (sometimes) returned to their parents later. In this case, parents are often so poor (or do not want their kids) that they willingly give up their children (though often without knowing what will actually happen to them). We are not sure how these children are (abused or not etc); but they said their parents are still in their hometown, so it seems likely they were either sold by their parents or kidnapped. Neither is good. So sad, and not just a Developing country problem, but one that is closely related to poverty and gender issues.

It seems that having an (new) Australian flat-mate is going to cost me money and brain cells with the amount of alcohol she consumes and the impact it has on me. Oh dear, perfect preparation for the trip home and plenty of partying at Ian's (Uni flat-mate) wedding in a few weeks!

Work and Fun in Thailand -a tough life

A 4 day trip to Thailand has been great for recharging the batteries. Remembering how beautiful nature is (i seem to need this reminder on a monthly basis due to the urban sprawl and lack of nature in Chinese cities!) I spent a day on a slightly random island which houses a few thousand muslim Thais, who that night just happened to be celebrating the birth of Muhammed.

So what would have been an incredibly boring night on an island with about 2 local shops, no other tourists (although i met 2 friends there) and no alcohol (when all the other islands are full of alcohol, parties, people, music and so on) ended up as a cultural experience as my 2 egyptian friends were able to talk to one of the locals who has studied the Koran in Egypt and thus explain everything to us. Good luck to Fadi who will spend another 3 months on the island (working). Good job he has the satellite thing for internet access otherwise it would be a lonely few months -but hey, at least his Thai will have to improve!

I suppose the island was what i though Indonesia might be like. 1 day maybe i'll find out. The beach though was beautiful -especially since there was no one on it; and i had fun riding a scooter around the island checking out the local's way of life (economy is all fishing). Then the next day, catching 1 of the 2 boats that leave the island each day I headed to a bay/island full of backpackers and cafe/bars that were all wooden shacks and fit in perfectly. It was, as Echo had promised, the 'pretty people beach' since everyone headed over there for rock climbing. I only had a few hours for lunch, so i missed the partying and was not keen to embarrass myself in front of so many climbing experts who were talking in another language all together. But it was still worth going to see the 'pretty people' especially since the other beaches nearby were full of their fair share of 'non-pretty' people. In other words, the overweight 50 somethings who like to sunbathe topless and get so red they glow in the day-time!

Yesterday was a work day at a conference that went well; despite UNICEF over-running and using up some of my presentation time... grr, damn UN people. Never mind, I am sure my presentation was better than theirs! Today was going to be half-pool and half-palace visiting, but the palace just was not as important as the pool-ipod-sun combo which lasted until the sun went down. Who cares about big empty golden buildings anyway?

Thailand is an unusual country, with a very very strong buddhist population yet huge problems in prostitution, trafficking and drugs. They have a vibrant democracy with frequent protests and an open media, yet admire their King like a god and have military coups every 3 years, like clock work. They have wonderful wonderful food but are so thin; 1 huge city but almost no others... The country is so full of foreigners it is crazy: beach-tourists, backpacker-tourists, sex-tourists and more. I am not used to seeing so many white people! Having said I am not used to seeing so much sun. And I am sure I won't be seeing too much sun in the next couple of weeks either -Sand storm season is coming, yay!

chinese language

Over the last 10 days I had my first 2 guests stay over in the Xi'an apartment: now more prove of how bad Xi'an is. Actually I do get a bit carried away. Xi'an is not THAT bad. I am just spoiled having lived in such great cities as London, Manchester and Beijing most of my life. Maybe I am just feeling Xi'an is getting better since it has risen above 20 degrees (though still rarely much sun to be seen!).

Work has been busy and my chinese lessons have been really interesting with discussions about China's feudal system and power/control structure, constant invasions, role of religion and confucianism and how this might impact the future. Of course the level of language used was quite basic and a few english words were used here and again; but such intellectual conversations are the only way to stay awake at 7.30 am after 5 hours sleep (we actually went to a Bar 1 night!).

I keep meaning to write more about these conversations, I will 1 day. I also keep meaning to write a bit more about the Chinese language -which I'll summarise incredibly briefly now. Chinese writing system has changed very little over 5,000 years, though the way words are pronounced varies: and there are at least 4 distinct 'languages' which are intelligible from each other. There are few rules. Most words can be nouns as well as verbs; no real fancy tenses to worry about or anything else that french, german and latin (my other experiences with languages) have. Characters are either pictographic or an addition of 2 parts of a character stuck together. Some examples are 'fu' -happiness which is a person, a mouth, a field and clothes (this person is pretty content) or 'hao' -good, which is a woman and a son. Some cool words include the word for pet which has 2 characters. 1 for animal and 1 made up of a dragon underneath a roof. This week I also learn what you get when you combine the character for movement and the character for strength: motivation (i.e. the ability to make someone move).

Just a taster, but you can see that it is a very interesting language to learn, with stories behind most characters and reasons for them being what they are. Unfortunately it is not always easy to work these out unless previously told, and the characters can be spoken in any of 4 tones (which totally alters the meaning).; plus the Chinese often shorten words (e.g. If -Ru Guo, but often just said and written as Ru), speak ridiculously fast in different accents, use lots of idioms ... and so on. Anyway my chinese is slowly getting better. Another couple of years should do it.

Now for some good news: Flights are booked back home for 26th April (staying possibly up to 6 weeks for work and pleasure), I played football tonight in Beijing and in 1 day's time I will be in 35 degree heat on a beach in Thailand.

Western delights

A few busy days later and I am back in Beijing. Let me introduce a typical Beijing trip:

Thursday morning, arrive in Beijing on overnight train. Get to office by 8.30am. Boss takes me out to lunch at the 'First kosher restaurant in Beijing' -not too impressed. Consumption of Western food: Steak sandwich with fries/salad

Thursday evening, head to a trendy bar in a hotel where the British Chamber of Commerce have a monthly networking event to meet new and old people. Grab some Chinese pancake and Peperami equivalent on way to a friend's apartment.

Friday morning, 10am, head to the Bookworm (a western style cafe/restaurant/library) for a 2 hour meeting/coffee. Consumption of Western drink: 2 Mochas.

Friday lunch, still in the Bookworm have 'business related' lunch with a friend before going back to the office to work. Consumption of western food: Steak sandwich with fries/salad

Friday evening, meet a friend for a couple of beers and go to Hot Pot (Every one sits around a pot of boiling water and puts uncooked food in and then eat -yummy and very sociable). End the night in Latinos (Latin Club).

Saturday, go for lunch at GrandMa's Kitchen (American style place). Consumption of western food: Grandma's Skillet (sort of like a fry-up) and Chocolate cake.

Saturday evening, go for dinner at Purple Haze (Thai restaurant). Consumption of non-chinese food: Red Chicken pineapple curry. Consumption of western drink: Long Island Ice Tea.

End the night at Brown's pub for St. Patrick's Day drinking Carlsberg. We get bored and buy 'Monty Python's the holy grail' for 1 pound (expensive, good quality DVD) head back to watch it and eat Ice Cream. Movie dies after an hour. So much for the expensive good quality DVD! Will buy cheap ones next time, that are of same quality.

Sunday, flat mate cooks salad and sandwich style lunch. Dinner is planned at another restaurant. Back to Xi'an on 7pm train tomorrow.

Coming to Beijing is expensive. None of the drinks (including beer) were less than 2 pounds; most up to 3 pounds. Food starting at 3-4 pounds. Yikes. The previous 3 days in Xi'an cost me 6 pounds in total, for 3 dinners and 3 lunches!

Chinese food is great: there is so much choice and variation, but it is certainly nice to eat Western again. But it is not a financially sustainable lifestyle... less time in Beijing (especially with today's awful pollution) in the future I think!

a weekend in xi'an

Possibly only the 3rd weekend in Xi'an since i moved here in August -I am quite proud of that actually! The reason is that it is still pretty cold, so no point traveling and I decided to clean my apartment for the first time properly, since i moved in (I have only spent about 14 nights here in 2 months) in preparation for the arrival of a flat mate soon.

I also played football at one of the local universities with a bunch of Uighurs (from Xinjiang, in north-west China) which meant i could not understand a word (their language is more like Turkish than Chinese) -but they were pretty good and it was fun. So now i have played football 4 times since the summer -hopefully i can play more often in xi'an if i am ever 'stuck' here again at a weekend. It feels good to run around lots :)

Xinjiang is a place i want to go to more than Tibet. It has been in and out of Chinese rule for 2 millennium and always 'fighting' the invaders, including nowadays. Though there is much less resistance since a) punishment is severe, b) the economic growth and c) more than half the people there are not Uighurs at all. Some argue the Chinese were forcefully moving people there to make it more Han (and certainly none of the government jobs there go to the locals) but the several Han people I have met from Xinjiang all fled there during the famine of the 1960s, since XinJiang is vast and mostly empty full of good-ish land. I suppose it still happens a lot nowadays in Africa -entire families are forced to abandon their homes and flee to somewhere else because of a simple lack of food!

The last 2 weeks were ok, since the Chunjie trip. Despite having to adjust to the cold weather (although over zero), the early starts (still waking up at 6.30 for Chinese lessons) and spending my days in an office work has been ok, I have been back to Beijing (in time for the end of Chinese New Year, which is another occasion for World War to break out) and I only fell asleep in the office for a few minutes on International Women's Day. Not a political statement, on my behalf, just the office was so quiet and dull with all the women getting a half day extra holiday!

I wonder what all our women did on that half day -probably just get extra time to clean the house or prepare dinner, which is kind of ironic isn't it? I also wonder why most countries barely give a damn about such a day. Well, there were some interesting (depressing) statistics in the UK papers, so maybe people do notice. Unfortunately it seems that most people use the occasion to 'thank women for all the hard work they do', rather than actually try to fight to increase the rights and position that women are in. Much easier to thank someone than try to help them :-)

Macau photos

Church, Casinos, Fishing Village and the remains (only the front is left) of St Peter's Church

Hong Kong photos

Rice fields in rural Hong Kong, Beach on Lamma Island, Neon advertising signs in Kowloon and an arty picture of Central, Hong Kong Island

Guizhou and Hunan Photos

Bridge in Fenghuang lit up at night, Fenghuang houses by the river, Zhang Jia Jie peaks in the snow, Dad eating dinner with a local family in the countryside

Sichuan photos

Mum and me with the pandas, Pearl Waterfall at Jiu Zhai Gou, Horse Riding in the Tibetan hills and a gorgeous lake in Jiu Zhai Gou

how many people live in your house?

Quanzhou is not a place many people have heard off but several hundred years ago (back when China was responsible for more than 40% of World GDP and much of the World's trade along the land/sea silk road) it was famous as one of the biggest ports in the World. There were even 6 Mosques for the Arabic residents/traders. Today there are plenty of temples and 1 mosque left standing; though not much else.

It is now, though 1 of the many ports in China at the forefront of exporting goods to the rest of the World. In fact the area of east and south-east china is full of cities that come to specialise in certain products. 1 city makes something ridiculous like 95% of the world's plastic lighters; another makes shoes; another makes ceramics; another makes stone statues... most of them don't just sell out of China but of course to the huge market inside of China too -and every finished product requires many more people working to create the components too.

After Quanzhou I headed into the mountains to an area now inhabited by the Hakka People, who lost many battles against the Han Chinese a thousand or so years ago and were forced into the mountains. Their language is (as is typical of China) as different to Mandarin Chinese as Italian is to English though their writing is mostly the same. What makes the area attractive to tourists is that the Hakka people built their homes out of mud, straw and so on and in square and circular shapes for protection. Typically the 'Tu Lou" (Earth Buildings) are 3-4 stories with the ground level being for cooking, the next level for storage and the next couple for accommodation. The bottom 2 levels had no windows whatsoever, and there was only 1 entrance into these massive structures (with walls around 2m thick).

Of course many of them are still standing (i saw one almost 900 years old), and what makes the area so interesting is that they are all still inhabited and new buildings are still created in the same style (though with some mod-cons, like taps a long with the well). Visiting the Tu lou (and there are thosuands in the area; most villages are full of them) is a glimpse into a way of life little changed for a thousand years -and still ongoing. The only real changes are that many of the young people migrate to the cities to work, so most of the tu lou are half-empty and motorbikes are the method of transportation of choice.

The people are extremely kind with several families offering me in for tea and feeding me -making it hard to leave politely. Each Tu lou houses several families with the biggest holding 2-300 rooms: around 1,000 inhabitants! Quite a sight -and great if all the families get on well; though i am not sure if i can handle the closeness of these kinds of communities (brought up, as i was, in a house of just 5 people and a couple of pets). Actually the most annoying thing from staying in these tulou was not the lack of toilets inside, the hardness of the beds or the smell from the animals downstairs (though these might be too much if i was staying more than just a night or two!), but the damn cockrells that never shut up and could be heard through the open windows!

legacies of colonialism

A great deal of China was actually colonised by the western powers. During the 19th century after the Brits and a few others forced China into giving us Hong Kong, over the next 60 years many Foreign powers actually ended up with whole tracts of land in the most important trading cities. This meant these 'foreign concessions' were just like bits of Europe in China: old brick buildings, real sewers, street lights and so on.

Although owning a few bits of a few cities was not enough for japan, who invaded about half of China for its raw materials before and during world war 2 (The Allied powers were giving China weapons and so on to help them defeat the Japanese, but the Japanese only really left because they lost to the USA in WW2).

Anyway, I am now in one of those cities (Xiamen) that had a bunch of foreigners living there a while ago. In fact the foreigners set up home on a little island nearby, because the city itself was too 'dirty'! Thus in the period before and after 1900 over a thousand western style villas were built: grand mansions with columns, balconies, turrets, domes and so on. Some are more 'Mediterranean', others more 'American' depending on who the owners were.

Now the traffic-less island is a wonderful place with many tiny, winding alleys between grand mansions (there were 13 consulates amongst other residences) and not-so-grand-but-not-so-bad chinese buildings. There are beautiful trees everywhere that are 1-200 years old although many of the buildings are now falling into disrepair as the chinese owners have no need for 20 room mansion! They use 4 rooms and leave the rest in a mess, unfortunately (it is possible to have a look in some actually homes, due to some enterprising locals).

Weirdly 1 now houses a museum of art made from fish bones -surprisingly good (photos up later hopefully). Most of the pianos that the foreigners took there seem to be housed in the museums on the island, though in the past you would hear the pianos being played everywhere it seems. It is a wonderful place to relax with some great beaches and parks, fresh sea food and, despite the tens of thousands of tourists each day (compared to the 5,000 or so residents!), still quite quiet off the main streets.

It is definitely much 'better' than either Macau, Qingdao or Shanghai which also have great foreign concessions. Here so much has been left and not knocked down, not filled in with horrible cheap buildings, not destroyed by traffic noise and fumes and not turned into bars! highly recommended. A shame all us foreigners left during the war (taking all the nice stuff with us i presume), because now the houses are kind of bare :-(

tea

Not the best of starts to a holiday when it all the travel agencies take the day off for chinese new year's eve; and hence had no tours available -so i left Nanchang quickly for Wu Yi Mountain to meet 2 Japanese Girls and spend New Year's Eve letting off fireworks in the street and drinking beer on a bridge (in the drizzling rain).

Then followed 2 days of fantastic hiking -some times following hundreds of people up steps, sometimes alone on paths that were not just fun but also difficult -cut out of the rock in crazy ways (if there were no handrails, it would be almost impossible) and sometimes trying to follow footpaths that do not exist. Chinese people tend to only go to an attraction, then back to the bus (and then onto the next one). Hence, though a map hints at paths between 'sites' they actually do not exist really... just lots and lots of paths used by the farmers during the harvest to 'harvest' (or whatever you do to tea when it is ready to sell!).

Anyway, after carefully leaving my GPS behind in the hotel the one time when i could actually use it, I wondered off finding a house (and some maybe crazy guy in it) hours from the nearest road and 4 hours later i managed to crawl down an embankment on a main road to hitch a ride on a motorbike back to town (the driver complained i was too heavy for his bike!). It was, though, a great trip.

Many of the real signposted paths were also pretty and full of waterfalls/ I splashed out 5 pounds to drink some supposedly amazing tea (supposedly, i can't really tell the difference) but thought 'what the hell' -bringing on another bouth of hundreds of people staring at the white person drinking tea. To be honest I was looking very confused, trying to understand the lecture the tea woman was giving me about the history of the tea and traditions of pouring, drinking etc... not understand a word.

For some reason, though I am in south-east coastal China (which has been growing fast in the last 20 years), everyone is more suprised to see a foreigner than in the back waters. Or, maybe the parents are just much more vocal about telling their kids about the 'laowai', whilst the teenagers are braver in shouting 'hello'. I do try to reply hello back.. but after hundreds of times in 5 days my mind is saying other things, much less polite (though i do keep my mouth shut, just).

Chinese New Year

Train Tickets just delivered by agent... 3 hours before train leaves...with a note "if anyone asks, tell them you queued for a looong time to get the ticket from the return's office". Whatever, he got his commission and i got my ticket for a 23 hour journey down south-east to coastal (and hopefully warmer) China. Hopefully it will rain -although i can barely remember what rain is like!

On Sunday, it is Chinese New Year. Now it's time to leave on holiday!

Pigs, Taxi Drivers and more

Today was a wonderful day: shorts and t-shirts weather (well, whilst playing football anyway!) and it was about 15 degrees in the sun: evidence of global warming maybe -the lake where we go ice skating froze 1 week later this year than last year and unfroze another week early. I am talking about Beijing of course; Xi'an never has beautiful days -just a few 'nice' days.

Xi'an only had 1 real period of rain in 2006; it had 4 in 2005 according to my chinese teacher here -and currently Shaanxi province is in the middle of a serious drought forcing the government to bring in drinking water for many places in the countryside. It means that I feel like a girl using 'moisturizing lotion' and the pollution will probably be awful in the spring with more violent dust storms than usual. Beijing won't be much better (though it has more 'induced rain' -through putting chemicals into the clouds), so it is a good thing that the Olympics are only 16 months away -another few years and even the Chinese government might not be able to stop the dust!

On that note, I heard that half of the new subway lines in Beijing won't be finished in time for the Olympics -proof that there are still some things beyond the means of the all-powerful Chinese government in Beijing. Actually, there are many things beyond their means (corruption, controlling the faraway provinces, enforcing the law....), but I am surprised at this. A real shame, because the traffic continues to get worse. A presentation by GM recently mentioned that the growth in automobiles in the last 5 years has been twice as much as their most ambitious prediction (the GM speaker had a big smile on his face -any environmentalists less so!)

More excitement in Beijing comes from the taxi drivers who have now started learning English (all of them will be tested before the Olympics) and english words are translated into phonetics based on chinese characters. This is hilarious and really hard to understand: I am trying to remember some examples; but imagine someone trying to pronounce Bowel but saying it: Bo-Ah-Le or Bo-Way-Le. Poor guys. I think all foreigners should help them during journeys.

In 1 week's time it is Chinese New Year (so start preparing your hong bao now -red envelopes with money in to give to those younger than you) -so on monday i am going to call our 'train ticket' guy who promises train tickets no matter what... to see if he can live up to his word. This year tickets went on sale a whole month before new year (rather than the usual 4 days!) and still for at least the first 10 days of that period people were lining up at 7am; 90 minutes before the ticket office opens!

Next year is the year of the pig- a year that is supposed to be very lucky (this was the year everyone was getting pregnant so next year they can give birth), so there will be lots more chinese people being born -which means lots more boys than girls as usual.

In case you didn't know 123 boys are born for every 100 girls on average: and in some parts it is more than 150-100. Predictions are that more than 20m males will never be able to get married (unless China gets into divorces and remarriages in a really big way) -now that is going to be a lot of frustrated men (whose mothers will be screaming at them until they die for not having children) which will be yet another social issue for the government, along with the increasing trade in wife-trafficking (a national and international problem throughout SE Asia because of China). It is funny how when there are so many people in a country, that even tiny little inbalances involve millions of people: HIV/AIDS, unemployment, job-hunting graduates, migrant workers... even if it only affects a tiny proportion, it still affects so many people!