Beijing

Ah, Beijing. Tomorrow we’re finally off to placement. Finally is the operative word there, but I’ll tell that story in due course. This week has been a great introduction to China, in every possible way (positive and negative – see later!) but although this next bit is what I’m been trying to distract myself from thinking about for the last six months, I’m looking forward to getting settled and into a routine. I might come back down to earth and feel a bit more normal again then.

The journey into Beijing train station was one of the most nerve-wracking things I have ever done; time just slowed right down like it does when you know you’re about to fall over or off something and the enormity of the next five months hit me. I’ll admit I had a serious wobble, but then getting off the train, adrenaline kicked in and I remembered that I’d done a triathlon and taken the Trans-Mongolian Express – Beijing metro, how hard could that be? It’s colours and counting, simple. Yes, friends, simple, if you know which metro station you’re going to. I picked the wrong one from  Huixinxiqiao Nankou and Huixinxiqiao Beikou and it took me about an hour and a half of wandering and trying out my best ‘Nihao *points at Chinese address*’ to find the hotel! Once I eventually reached the Huiqiao Hotel, the day’s humidity combined with the stress sweats and six days with only whore’s baths (strategic wetwipes) on the train meant I was a prime candidate for any ‘Most Needed Shower in the History of Desperately Needed Showers’ award going. I checked in by paying my visa extension fee (just short of £200, who needs money anyway right?) handing over my passport for said visa extension, then being forced to have my photo taken THREE TIMES. I’m surprised the lens didn’t crack.

My roommate Laura, who it turns out is also my placement buddy – hold onto your hats, I’m getting to that too – wasn’t in when I arrived. Once I’d showered and life was once again worth living, I hopped online to update you lovely people of my train adventures. That’s right, first thing I did in Beijing was get online; I am truly a child of my times. People were still arriving all Monday evening and into Tuesday, so it wasn’t until Tuesday night that we had our Welcome Dinner. Monday night was mostly meeting people and trying not to bore people silly with train stories!

On Tuesday we had a few orientation things, a tour in the morning and a lecture covering the basics of what we’re here to do followed by a rah-rah session come game show style quiz. The lecture was hard work – it covered lots of things we all already knew and was interspersed by some really frustratingly unnecessary questions, but I got quite into the rah-rah session because I’m very impressionable like that. Did you know, the emergency number for Fire Rescue here (119) sounds, in Chinese, like the words for “need...need...rescue” or that chrysanthemums are used for mourning or that it’s offensive to give clocks as presents to old people? You do now! The cheering to see which group registered the most decibels was a step too far though. I managed my first bit of sightseeing – Tian’anmen Square, and the courtyards of the Forbidden Palace. A group of us popped out between the morning and afternoon sessions because we didn’t have much free time and the only sightseeing planned was Thursday’s big tour. It took about forty-five minutes to get to the centre of Beijing, and as we only had, literally a couple of hours, we decided that to pay the entrance fee into the Forbidden Palace itself would have been a waste, so I’ve that to do another day. Tian’anmen though, that was something else. Indescribably enormous, oppressively hot, stereotypically smoggy and I got stopped by a Chinese girl and asked if she could take a photo with me!

Unfortunately, time constraints and the way that the week has been organised meant that I haven’t seen as much of Beijing as I’d like to have done. On Tuesday evening (after the Welcome Feast) our placements were posted – I’m going to Handan in Heibei province (which is the one surrounding the Beijing municipality) so we should be able to come in for the odd weekend trip and more sightseeing. I was initially a bit disappointed about not being in the south of the country, but as I don’t cope with heat very well I suppose it’s for the best and I can always make my way south once I’ve finished teaching. There isn’t anything about the place in the Lonely Planet, so it’s another mystery, but Laura and I are keeping each other motivated and we’ll take it as it comes. We signed our contracts and had a lecture about what to expect from a Chinese school on Wednesday and got a (comparatively!) early night.

Thursday was epic. We were down in the lobby at 6.30 to go on our day’s tour. Breakfast on the coach was an interesting, but surprisingly tasty, cake/loaf with the texture of sponge cake and the taste of mild cheese. Our first stop was the Ming Tomb, about an hour’s drive from the hotel. It was quiet enough when we got there for the illusion of tranquillity, especially since I darted ahead of the tour party! The tomb we visited belonged to the third Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, but there are about 13 tombs in total including a boulevard with giant stone animal statues which we didn’t see. Maybe another day... After that we drove to the Great Wall of China. I’ve been using a lot of superlatives in the last couple of weeks, but the Great Wall was exactly that. It was one of the pinch-me-I-can’t-quite-believe-this moments of the trip, and despite the heat and the steep steps I practically skipped up from sheer exhilaration!

Lunch came next and then we went to see the Olympic complex – the Birds’ Nest stadium and the Watercube. It was only a brief stop, literally enough time to walk from the coach park, take a couple of pictures and walk back again so I didn’t get to see inside in the flesh. At least I watched when it was all on TV, and it was still enough to imagine how glorious it must feel to be good enough to represent your country at something. The next stop on our whirlwind day was a market – everything and anything you could possibly want spread across six floors jumbled up with everything and anything you don’t and never would need, but really want! There were some visor sunglasses that caught my eye and an ‘I <3 BJ’ t-shirt that had me in stitches. I was really hoping for some more comedy souvenirs – ‘my friend went to Beijing and all I got was this pollution mask’ or something, but alas no. Maybe a business opportunity in the making! I was almost sucked into buying two winter hats (on the hottest day of my life!) but Niamh rescued me and I left with my purse intact...this time. I kind of regret not buying the visor sunglasses though! Dinner and an acrobatics show started off the evening. It was incredible – I don’t think my mouth was closed from start to finish, and I didn’t think half of what the performers were doing was physically possible. Amazing, amazing, amazing!

That was the end of our official sightseeing day, but TTC had organised a leaving party for the group which I went along to. The party was alright, but the drinks were free and I finally got a night of dancing in, which is always good. I shepherded a few lost souls back to the hotel and negotiated with an irate Chinese taxi driver, got into bed, decided I still had life in me, got dressed again and took my roommate back to the bar down the road, saw the sun and rolled into bed again after a full on 24hours! Excellent. Laura and I were up, reasonably bright-eyed and bushy tailed for our ‘cultural classes’ on Friday - Mandarin, tai’chi and calligraphy and packing for departure on Saturday. Or so we thought.

We were duplicated on the departure list and there was some serious miscommunication all over the shop, so come Saturday morning we checked out at 9 and sat in the lobby for four hours before TTC confirmed that actually we’d be leaving on Sunday afternoon and getting the train rather than being driven. Hugely frustrating, but there was nothing we could do about it so Laura and I chilled out for the afternoon (too hot for wandering) before finding the local supermarket and heading back into the centre of town a bit later to see a bit more of the place and treating ourselves to some comfort food. Not our greatest day, not TTC’s greatest hour, but never mind. I’ve enjoyed this week, but it’s felt like a holiday and I’m ready to not be in limbo any more so just as well it’s coming to a close. I don’t know when I’ll have internet in Handan yet, but when I do I’ll be a full on teacher...sort of. Oh god. Send me vibes please, I’m absolutely terrified!

Trans-Mongolian Express

August 23rd 2010

I like a challenge and I needed an adventure which is how I decided to do the i-to-i China Internship in the first place. I also like to do things properly, so I went all or nothing on both the challenge and the adventure fronts; that’s how I ended up doing a triathlon and taking the Trans-Mongolian Express to Beijing instead of flying. Both of those things have turned out to be brilliant experiences that I’m really proud of, so I’ve got high hopes for China! This right here is the story of me getting my train-legs.

I flew to Moscow with from Heathrow on Tuesday 17^th August, sitting opposite from a man who was constantly chewing and came out as a ‘Stealth Dandy’ on a men’s magazine accessory quiz. That was literally the most exciting thing about the flight, and I daresay flying to Beijing would have been equally uneventful. Fortunately for me (and for your vicarious kicks readers!) that was pretty much the last dull thing about my journey to China. Having said that, I’d booked a transfer to the Yaroslavskaya train station, rather than negotiate the Moscow metro on the clock, so once I’d found the taxi desk getting across Moscow was (to quote that Meerkat) simples. My taxi driver didn’t speak English, I don’t speak Russian, but we exchanged smiles and grimaces at the artistic licence which was taken with lane discipline and he pulled over so that I could take a picture of St Basil’s cathedral from a distance.

I was about an hour and a half early for the train, so after sitting for a bit, buying myself a big bottle of water (sparking by accident, damn it!) I experienced my first squat loo, which was no joke with the amount of baggage I had with me! Anyway, on to the train. I was in a 2^nd class four berth compartment towards the back of the train, sharing with two American guys (Landon and Eric) from Moscow to Ulaan - Baatar (capital of Mongolia) who are English teachers in Korea, then an English couple on a year out from UB to Beijing. There’s a German girl called Lena down the corridor and a Swedish guy called Magnus who both came all the way to Beijing, so I spent most of my time with those two and the Americans. Also in my carriage were some English guys who were doing the London – Ulaan - Baatar rally, but broke down in Kazakhstan and joined the train at Omsk, two Russian ladies who feed Magnus within an inch of his life and two girls from the Netherlands who kept themselves to themselves. There was a mass exodus at UB where all the above left the train and new people joined but as there was only one more night after there, I didn’t really get to know anyone except the couple in my cabin after that.

Staff wise, the guards were all Chinese men who either gamble for cigarettes in their compartment, or cook things that smell almost too good for someone who is living off packet noodles! As we went across Russia there was a really sweet and smiley Russian lady who ran the dining car and pushed a snack trolley along occasionally and her two grumpy assistants who both looked about four. On the third night, after we’d been poring over my Russian phrasebook and she’d been poring over her English one, she declaimed proudly ‘VAT VOULD YOU LIKE?’ to which I replied ‘ya bit khat-yel...umm...banana’ (I’d like...umm...banana) Alas, no further progress was made, hopefully my Mandarin will end up being better! In Mongolia we got a new dining car, the inside was gorgeously decorated with carved wooden booths and Ghengis Khan inspired decorations including two shields with a bow and arrows and a fur hat. Lena and Magnus and I used up our roubles on a sumptuous breakfast – an omelette with sausage and spring onions, “toast” with “butter” and “jam”, orange juice with enough E-numbers and sugar to give us all superpowers and a mug of tea each. The Chinese dining car was nothing to blog about, but we were given coupons for free breakfast (boiled eggs, bread and tea) and lunch as we crossed the border.

There’s a sort of a boiler thing (samovar) at the end of the corridor which we can get unlimited boiling water from. I brought plenty of teabags and cuppasoups and I’ve eaten a lot of the local versions of pot noodles as well, because the dining car is expensive in every country! Fortunately there is usually a marvellous gaggle of enterprising Babushkas when we stop for any length of time at a station that saved me from scurvy and complete carb-overload! In Russia the Babushkas were mostly tiny old grannies, some of who wore housecoats, headscarves and beards and some who were too much fond of lyrca and  generally looked like they’ve been on the game.  They grabbed a patch on the platforms to sell food they’ve cooked from assorted baskets and trays. I’ve seen boiled eggs, bags of fruit, pickles, dried fish, shrink-wrapped meat and potato meals... all sorts. I bought a big meatball in a poly bag, some goats cheese pancakes, a chicken leg, apples, a litre can of beer, bread and boiled eggs from these fine ladies. In Mongolia this changed to ladies and children who smiled more but had less variety, and they disappeared completely in China.

The time passed surprisingly quickly, especially given that I only brought one book with me that I finished on Day 2! Because there’s been nothing to do but slow down, slow down I have. We spent a fair amount of time playing games and looking at photos on Landon’s ipad, playing monopoly on Eric’s ipod touch and listening to music on my netbook, looking at Leila’s maps, being lectured by Magnus and generally chatting, but I’ve also spent literally hours looking out the windows. Like a dog in front of a washing machine, I’m fascinated.

It’s a seven day journey straight through, five of which are spent in Russia. European Russia passed mostly in the dark on the night of Day 1, but what I did see wasn’t particularly gripping. As we travelled further East across Siberia on Day 2 - 3 it became more silver birch trees than I thought actually existed! Beautiful at first, but you can see why they sent convicts to Siberia as punishment. Fun fact for you about Siberia though – the top brand of Russian rucksack ‘Yermack’ is named after the man who brought Siberia under Russian control in the 1580’s; that’s Ivan the Terrible’s time history fans. Day 4  was a slow transition from swampy and desolate (silver birch peppered) taiga into mountains and forests straight out of any fairytale you care to name, including wooden herringbone cottages with intricately carved and brightly painted shutters and graveyards in the tree line. Further east, but still in Russia, still we skirted around Lake Baikal (deepest and oldest freshwater lake on the planet) at dawn on Day 5 which was utterly, utterly breathtaking. For the rest of the day we had vast plains with occasional scrubby bushes and rocky scree as we crossed from Russia into Mongolia. It was the biggest, emptiest sky I’ve ever seen, until we got onto the Mongolian plains and the Gobi desert on Day 6! I have to say, I started getting some serious locomotive ennui on Day 5, but I think that was mostly a product of the epic waits we had on each side of the Russia/Mongolia border because after some poker, chocolate and discussing the surprising amount of good movies that Keanu Reeves has been in (apparently, anyway) I felt much better.

The Mongolian plains made me think of being on a gigantic train set as it was all wide and green and hilly, and the train wove around the base of hills so you could see where you’d been. Around UB there was lots of heavy industry and Soviet style buildings, a bit further out there were wooden houses, cottages and yurts all jumbled up together, shanty town style. It was all a bit incongruous with the most beautiful misty mountains rising up behind them, but people have to live I guess! Most of Mongolia’s population lives in UB, apparently, so once we were clear of that it was pretty empty except for the odd yurt. Just as I was starting to day-dream about living hundreds of years ago and galloping across the plains like Genghis Khan, I saw a guy herding horses on a motorbike and it made me glad I live now when things as cool as that happen and shampoo exists. The bit of the Gobi desert that we passed through is a flat-ish rocky/sandy expanse with tufty grass rather than sweeping dunes, but we did see some galloping camels which was properly exciting. Camels are cool. I’ve never been to a desert before, so I took the opportunity to use my solar panel to charge up my mobile charger because it seemed like the most appropriate place!

The border crossings have been a pain in the arse, not to mince my words! You have to stop and be checked each side of each border, so it takes forever! The Russian side of the Russia/Mongolia border was OK – we arrived late afternoon, it was warm and sunny and after we’d had our passports taken for checking we all piled off the train and after the obligatory station photos and walk up and down the platform, Lena, Landon, Magnus and I went off with Magnus’ Russian lady to the local shop. It was outside the station, so we felt very daring being more than a few metres from the thing – they don’t wait for strays you see. We bought ice creams and, accidently, I bought powdered mash potatoes in a pot instead of more noodles. Pointing coupled with no knowledge of Cyrillic is somewhat hit and miss I’ve found! After they’d all had a good laugh at me, we sat down and played poker on the platform and watched a pack of small dogs beg for scraps from the train guards. So far, so good. On the Mongolian side it was altogether a stricter affair. Grim faced, military dressed officials got on, glared at our photos and generally made us all feel like we were on the point of being arrested! It didn’t help that the train kept going back towards Russia then forward a bit, then backwards again. The wait to get out of Mongolia was less stressful, except for when a very tall military type opened up the ceiling of our cabin to check behind the light fitting and showered my bunk (and teddy!) with dust. Brilliant.

The guidebook promised me a fairy-light strewn entry into China, serenaded by the Vienna Waltz...and I wasn’t disappointed! It was like going into a really bizarre version of Disneyland, until the passport collector looked at my photo about five times and asked me my name to confirm it’s me! I know I look really, really young in my picture – it’s from the days where you were still allowed to smile after all – but I still look like me. We started crossing the Mongolian border at 7.30pm and we didn’t finish getting into China until about 1am. This was mostly because all the wheels (bogies, I think is the term) have to be changed on each carriage to fit the narrower gauge tracks in China, and it takes ages. They have to take all the carriages apart, raise them up on hydraulic lifts (so slowly I don’t notice it, even though I was on the alert ready to film – damn!) shunt all the old wheels out and pull new ones through then put the train back together. Once all that rigmarole was done with, we were finally allowed off the train. Another milestone: my first Chinese squat toilet. There was a little supermarket in the border building, so I bought some sweets, fruit and water for Y18 which is probably extortionate, but is only about £1.80 sterling. Outside, they’d move on from playing the Vienna Waltz to Shirley Bassey, and once I’d recovered from the shock I decided to call it a night.

We’re about five hours out of Beijing now, so I’ll bring this mammoth essay to an end! It has been the most amazing week. I’ve met some great people and seen some amazing sights that there is no way I’d’ve ordinarily even thought to go and see. I’m feeling about as ready for the next step as I’ve ever been – I left my comfort zone way back in Derby and right now I’m actually feeling ‘brave as a lion’ like the sticker on the back of my phrasebook says; I got it from the travel nurse for it when I got my jabs - you’re never too old for bravery stickers!

TEFL, here I come!