Leo and Sonya on TourHey lovely friends
Having spent three weeks in China we are now in japan. China was absolutely incredible, a truly beautiful country, with HUGE cities that are forever expanding and the food was delicious. We tried lots of local specialities from each region, starting with the famous Peking Duck which tasted so different to the version you get in restaurants in Europe. We found a restaurant in Beijing that specialised in the dish and had been running since the early 1800's, Lonely Planet, we love you! We spent the first few days with some family friends who moved to Beijing a couple of years ago and they made us feel incredibly welcome and took us round all the usual sights like the Forbidden City, the Temple of heaven, one of the largest Buddhist temples in the city and a tour of the old parts of the city known as Hudongs.We were also lucky enough to see a different side to the city as Laurence and Annick had lived there for so long and had got to know much of the city over this time.
Beijing was probably the highlight of the stay on mainland China as we had such a great time with Laurence and Annick. They live in the amazing park, yes a park which is open to the public til 9:00pm every day. We couldn't believe that there were public parks that people actually lived in, that was totally nuts to start with. 6 houses were built on the grounds but only four of them are currently occupied, so their backyard is pretty huge. It was built like a traditional Chinese house with a courtyard as the focal point and all the rooms built around it on one floor. The park itself was really pretty and we went for strolls in the morning around its mini lake and little pavilions that were dotted around the place. Lots of people were busy doing their tai chi. Our friends had warned us on our first night that we would probably be woken up by lots of loud singing, a tradition still very much practised in?@China. Apparently it was the only way in which they could express themselves during the Mao regime. One morning we found a couple practising their ballroom dancing skills in the middle of this park!
On our first day in Beijing we had lunch in the courtyard at Laurence and Annik's house and then they took us to the temple of heaven which is a beautiful and very old temple that now sits in the grounds of this huge park in the city. They really wanted us to see one particular corner of the park where huge crowds would gather and sing lots of old folk songs, opera and more modern tunes. All these different groups of people would compete to be heard and they would all sing at the top of their lungs, the noise was quite impressive as they were all singing different songs. We climbed up to a viewing point at dusk and caught a glimpse of how vast the city was and i think it was the first time that it really hit me that we had started this very long and exciting trip. In the evening they took us to this really funky little restaurant in one of the old quarters of the city, the Chinese call them Hudongs. These are very rapidly disappearing as the government is keen to replace the old traditional structures with very large and modern apartment blocks. The restaurant owner converted the old Chinese home into a restaurant, filling it with loads of Mao memorabilia which was really interesting. An old black car with the communist flag was parked outside the restaurant and the very small and cute smoking room had all kinds of things dating back to his government, including some old office chairs that were used by one of his high ranking officials, some black and white photos and other nick-knacks. The food was amazing, but i must say that i was rubbish at eating with chop-sticks. Thank goodness i am getting better as it was really embarrassing! Everyone else was really good, particularly Laurence and Annick as they had lived in Japan for three years.
At the weekend they took us for a drive out into the countryside and suggested we go for a walk to see the wall. We got to this beautiful area where you could see bits of the wall stretching out into the distance and we were told that the walk would last around 2 and a half hours. Once we started our walk up to the wall we soon realised that the area where you could actually walk along the wall was closed for repairs but we took an alternative route along the hills around this massive lake which was really beautiful. The walk along a very old and rickety wooden bridge was a little scary but definitely worth it as the views right at the top were breathtaking. A little old lady was sat at one of these viewing points and insisted that we scramble up a very old and crumbling bit of the wall which was pretty much covered in thorny bushes. We did make it to the top and we couldn't quite believe we were standing on such an old part of the wall. That evening we were taken to a cocktail bar where a live jazz band was playing which was very good fun.
One of the best ways to see the city is by bike and during the week, Annick, Leo and I went for bike rides to most of the sites. It was definitely a fun way to see this vast city but a little scary as they are totally mad on the roads. Annick gave us one piece of advice before we headed out "Don't stop, keep going as everyone will avoid you"....hmmm my first go on a bike for years and now i was having to dodge cyclists coming from all directions, cars, buses and pedestrians. We soon discovered that pedestrian crossings with lights don't mean much as cars still jump the lights anyway. They also don't signal if they are changing lanes or turning, instead, they honk their horn to warn others not to suddenly swerve or change directions as they might hit them. The one way systems didn't always work as you could occasionally see a car driving in the wrong direction and no-one seemed to really think anything of it. Despite all the scares, we soon got the hang of it and it was really good fun and we are definitely going to hire some bikes in Japan and Vietnam.
On another day we cycled to a lake near one of the hudongs and got a rickshaw to take us through the old streets where we got a chance to visit one of the old houses that's still lived in by a family. This is something that a lot of families are now doing in order to earn a little extra cash. So the place was pretty full with lots of tourist groups wondering through the rooms. On another day we went to the Forbidden City which was incredibly beautiful. Just walking through it you got a good idea of how big it was but how cut-off the people were from?@outside world. Laurence had suggested walking through the city and then walking through the park opposite one of the main entrances and climbing to the top of this viewing point where you could get a fantastic view of the entire city. It was unbelievable and i couldn't believe that emperors had lived within these walls up until 1911. After our visit to the Forbidden City we went to a little restaurant that Annick had been to before that served noodles and dumplings, it was amazing, although we did get a lot of stares as we were the only foreigners there and we had no idea what we were ordering as it was all in Chinese. We just pointed at things on the menu. We couldn't quite believe how large this city was, everything was built to such a large and quite intimidating scale, the squares, government buildings, even the large avenues made the Champs Elysees look quite mini.
After a few days in Beijing, we flew out to Yichang, a port City where we boarded a boat to sail up the Yangtze river to see the famous three three gorges and the dam project. The trip was going to last four days. This part of the country was so beautiful and peaceful, we had lots of time to read, admire the amazing views but occasionally the peaceful contemplation was interrupted by the very loud Americans yelling at each other "Gee isn't this AWESOME?, Larry did you get a picture of that ancient coffin buried in the rocks?" . I was in the middle of reading a book called "Wild Swans, three daughters of China" and all the regions we were visiting featured in this book as it tracks the lives of three generations of Chinese women from the 19th century right through to the end of the Mao government. It was fantastic to learn so much about the history of the country and its culture whilst travelling through it so many years later.
We realised very quickly that most of the passengers were over the age of 40 and mostly Americans judging by how loud they were but we did meet some really lovely people, a girl called Prash who was a doctor from Leeds who was our age, two lovely little biddies called Nancy and Averil who were absolutely bonkers and brilliant fun and two Americans who had lived in Europe so were well aware of how loud and annoying their fellow Americans could be when travelling abroad. They were very quiet and pretty much kept to themselves.
The evening entertainment was hilarious, one night the crew encouraged the passengers to take part in the Cabaret show and you can imagine that the Americans were the first ones to volunteer their entertaining skills. One guy who must have been around 70 sang "Cabaret" with no assistance from any musicians and was pretty appalling. A girl who must have been around 19 and travelling with parents or grandparents, decided it would be a great idea to treat everyone to " I could have danced all night" from "My fair lady". It was massively WRONG! Just as we were thinking the entertainment couldn't get any worst, one of the larger groups of yanks came up on stage and sang "Old McDonald had a farm", which they seemed to think was incredibly amusing. It was very hard not to laugh and the audience was giving us lots of evil stares when we were busy pissing ourselves with Prash. Along the Yangtze river we stopped off at various sites, including an amazing Pagoda ( these normally house religious relics and are made of wood). We found out that so many of these places would be under water once the dam project was completed and the government?@was arranging for these structures to be moved to a higher point to avoid flooding. On another day we visited an old fishing village along one of the smaller gorges which was beautiful. We were put into mini Chinese style canoes which were manned by local farmers as this was their part-time job. They rowed for quite a while and then they all got out near the bank of the river and started to haul this boat up the river against the currents. These guys were probably in their 40's and 50's and were so skinny, we couldn't believe how strong they were. We both wanted to jump out of the boat and give them a hand as it looked incredibly hard.
After the cruise up the Yangtze, we visited the city of Chongqing which has a population of 33 million. Unfortunately it rained all day but we still managed to visit the new dam project museum, the building itself was impressive and we couldn't believe how cheap it was to get in, a mere quid. There was an artist there who had been commissioned by the government to explore that entire region and to record all the changes taking place. He had travelled extensively for 25 years to be able to paint his impressions and it was incredible to see how much the landscape had changed since the start of the project. We went for a great Sechuan region meal which was really spicy and in a restaurant full of locals which was great, especially after the boat meals that had catered for non-adventurous Americans. Right i am going to stop my rant about Americans.
That day we boarded a plane to go to Xian where the famous Terracotta Warriors were discovered. We visited an old Pagoda which was built in the middle of this beautiful park and climbed to the top floor to see the views over the city. The museum was located about an hour's drive outside the city. Some farmers had stumbled across the warriors which were buried under the ground whilst digging for a well. Apparently up until the 1960's the surrounding countryside was mainly agricultural land, but as soon as the sight was discovered the city expanded very quickly and most of the fields have now disappeared. Hundreds of these warriors were buried underground surrounding their emperor's burial sight as it was believed they would protect him in the next life. These warriors were all made life-size and were painted in very vivid colours which have now disappeared because of exposure to light etc. There were different regiments facing North, South, East and West and in defencive positions. Chariots and horses were also found and all of these had been buried in tunnels. Some of the soldiers were displayed in cases for people to see the detail on them, you could actually see the strands of hair, the different designs on their uniforms and apparently in each regiment every soldier had a completely different face to make them look as real as possible.
A couple of days later we flew out to Shanghai which was like no other city in China. The architecture was incredible and could definitely give Manhattan's skyline a good run for its money. The area along the river called The Bund used to be the old colonial centre where all the banks had been and really did resemble so many of the buildings on the Strand, particularly at night when they were all lit up. The Chinese are really keen for Shanghai to take over from Hong Kong as the financial centre for the country and you can see how rapidly this city is expanding as there is construction work going on everywhere. We had a fantastic dinner at a restaurant listed in the Lonely Planet which was across the river and on the top floor where the views at night were spectacular, this was one of our treats from our lovely wedding gifts. We took a piccie which we hope to get loaded up onto a site very soon. We had some bubbly and spoiled ourselves quite a bit, so thank you so much! We had 3 days in Shanghai so we were able to explore the very old parts of the city which was fascinating as so many of these very old buildings were crumbling but people still lived in them and there was such a huge community there. We walked through the streets where they were selling anything from fish that looked barely alive, to turtles to dildos and lots of Hello Kitty stuff which i loved. We had a wander round one of the old flea markets and saw so much stuff that we really wanted to take back with us. There was a little old shop in this market area that was filled with lots of very old radios, desk lamps, typewriters and desk fans dating all the way back to the 1920's which the owner had taken the time to repair and restore and showed us this 1930's radio that worked perfectly well.
I think Leo is going to tell you about our week in Hong Kong which was equally brilliant and totally different to mainland China. Hannah and Si, we thought lots about when we were there.
Some of the things that will stick in my mind about China:
The insane driving, pretty much anything goes and you just have to do what you want and hope that everyone else around you will avoid crashing into you.
The beauty of the country
The Chinese love to start a conversation by guessing games e.g. Can you guess what this particular Buddha is for? Can you guess what this was used for?, No incorrect, i will now tell you.
We read in our Lonely Planet guides that spitting is a totally normal habit and everyone will spit anywhere, on restaurant floors and even in the sick bags on planes. And sure enough it happened whilst sitting in the back of rickshaw, in the passenger seat whilst sat in front in a cab and on a plan on the way to Xian. The guy i was next to just reached for the sick bag and very casually spat into it several times throughout the flight.
Their love of fishies, particularly gold fish. They are everywhere. They have very large beautiful fish bowls in their gardens with HUGE goldfish which made us think of Ambs lots. We have taken lots of photos which will follow shortly.
Overall a truly beautiful and interesting country and i would love to come back and explore more of it as it is such a huge country.
Hope you are all well and sending you much love xx Son and Leo
Next bit...
Hong Kong
Lantau Island
Arrived in the morning to discover that HK was in the middle of an unseasonal heatwave. It was 28 degrees in the shade and very humid. After shedding virtually all our clothes, we hopped on a local bus to an area which promised some kind of beach side stuff as we wanted to relax a bit after the rigours of China. The area we found though was a bit of a poor mans Blackpool with ferries arriving every 3 microseconds, and the sea was a little polluted. Also discovered that it was "golden week" in Hong Kong. Sounds exciting, I thought, until I found an ex pat on the street to explain that this meant every price was doubled as it`s a national holiday. However, he advised me to outright reject any price thrown at me in Hong Kong - to half if and subtract 10% and start the bidding from there.
It worked too, but took a long while to convince the assistant manager of this crummy hotel (the only hotel) that he was not in fact selling me the Joanna Lumley suite at the Ritz, but actually a sweaty mosquito hole in a condemned building. Managed to get him down to about 60% of the price, but still a rip off for what it was...
We had a lot of fun nevertheless and went to a nice little expat shack by the ferry for some home comfort food - beer and burgers. Next day spent lazing by the pool before setting off on the ferry to Hong Kong Island for some glitzy fun.
Hong Kong Island
Now this place is niiiiiice. After China which, despite being incredible in a million different ways, was actually quite dirty and far too busy to be able to relax for even a minute, Hong Kong central was an oasis of city life as you want it to be. Little evident pollution, easy transport around, cheap but bling hotels (if you book last minute on www.wotif.com - hot tip #1), very reasonable restaurants, and loads of shops to browse. This would be a top place to get a work posting to in case anyone is getting itchy feet...
First evening we just went for a bit of Japanese in an excellent chain place, about 15 quid for some shabu-shabu type stuff (meat and veg in broth), as well as some sashimi, sushi and lots of sake. 15 quid in China could have fed us for a week, but compared to what you get in England for the same, neither of us were complaining for this meal.
Stayed the night in a hotel called Metropark overlooking a huge park with about 20 tennis courts, basketball, football, 2 swimming pools, squash club... I was having issues about the availability of such things in the UK, but I bored Sonny enough with all that.
Next day, we went up the mountain on the funicular tram thingy. Astounding view. Did the 2-3km walk around the top and got a full 360 of Hong Kong. Minor issues with stability of tree top walk, but just got on with it.. Some of the sky scrapers in Hong Kong are spectacular. It`s like New York, but designed in the 90s. Some amazing buildings. Check the photos when I find a way of posting them.
Lunches in the shopping malls are the way to go. They have food courts (like other places in Asia and oz) where you can get an enormous Thai/Chinese/Japanese/anything meal for a couple of quid.
Went to the botanical gardens to see a sensibly sleeping jaguar (temp about 30 by this point), then went back to the rooftop (20th floor - yikes) pool of the hotel for some sleeeeep.
Macao
Next day, took ferry to Macao which is a combination of
1) beautiful colonial Portuguese architecture. Yellow/green/red/blue fronted villas with intricate details, museums, hotels, town hall. All made you feel like you were in Lisbon or Madrid. This was amazing
2) garish run-down casinos - all poor-man version of Las Vegas hotels. And they are building more at an ever increasing rate. Argh.
We hired a couple of bikes on the island we we`re staying on (not Macao mainland, but only a bridge away), and went to the old town which was all beautiful little squares with names like Joao-herez something something.
Next day we got the bus into town and went on a tour of the the city looking at the buildings and walked about 8 km around getting very very hot. Rewarding though. There is a beautiful looking hotel which someone recommended to us (but we didn`t stay at) built into an old fort on the hillside. The Posada something or other... go and see it if you are ever in Macao.
Spent most of the next day sitting round the pool in a rather lovely hotel which we got last minute for peanuts on the website mentioned earlier. Nice.
Kowloon
Back on ferry to Kowloon Island for a night in a hotel on Nathan Road which is the place to go apparently. Think we must have got the wrong end as it was distinctly crap. Went to the night market, which just sold a load of tat. I think we were tired as a lot of people like Kowloon and we didn`t. Also, the promise of the next day kind of dwarfed it....the next day being...
Disneyland!
Yes, the eternal kids in us literally forced us to book a room at the Disneyland hotel in the grounds. You get the tube to a place called Sunny bay, where you get off and switch to the special Disney train with Mickey mouse windows....oh baby.
The park itself is still pretty small but it`s only "phase 1" - much more is promised, although presumably only will materialise if the population of China is willing to spend 3 months salary bringing the kids for the weekend of a lifetime. Seemed to be working when we we`re there.
At present you can do the whole park in half a day (1 day with kids as they would want to go round twice no doubt). Space mountain was excellent - better, faster and more twisty/turny than the one in Florida. That was about the only real `ride` - the rest were kind of kiddy rides. The best bit was the hotel we stayed in - a kind of Victorian palace with great food (first and only really posh Chinese we went to) and mickey mouse and co coming round to your dinner table for pictures etc. Ahh.
There were loads of couples just like us as it was midweek, so it didn`t feel weird that we weren`t there with bairns. I (Leo) fell in love with the tennis ball machine and played with myself about 3 times...mmm. We left on Saturday just as the under 7 population of Hong Kong and China turned up and turned the hotel into hell in nappies.
This was our last night of comparative luxury before jetting off to Japan where everything is going to be expensive and we are going to be reduced to sleeping on a mat begging for rice...sigh.
