Jakey Jake

Monday 31st May
So the blurb was wrong… however this time it was wrong in a good way. This place was by far the most beautiful natural scenery i have seen so far. Stunning. We started at the base of the mountains, apparently it was 7km to the top and at its highest it was 1894m above sea level (which i think is slightly smaller than kosiusko, i could be wrong ill have to google it) anyway if you decide to visit this place be warned, the climb up is very tiring and long. by the time i got to the top i was soaked in sweat, there is a cable car but i decided to get fit it was well worth it, and once you get to the top the view is nothing short of breathtaking. The tops of mountains breaking through the low clouds making you feel as though you were somewhere in heaven. Spent the rest of the day walking around looking at various mountain areas before decending, youll have to check out the photos to really appreciate how amazing this place truly was. By the time i arrved at the bottom, most of the rest of the group were already back down, having caught the cable car. My legs were like jelly and they couldnt stop shaking once i had stopped. Once we got back to the hotel i indulged in a bath, my muscles where aching and it was just what the doctor ordered, as well as watching fletch lives for the 12th time TOnight we were going to have our end of tour party as the last night was going to be spent on the all night sleeper train. It was never going to be a big one as we were all utterly stuffed. i was in bed by 10.30

Sunday 30th May
As we drove out of Huanghzo i got to see a lot of the city, it was a pretty cosmopolitan place, although with all chinese cities it was covered in a thick blanket of smog. Anyway we jumped on this small crappy little bus that was headed for yellow mountain, the place where most of “crouching tiger hidden dragon was filmed” apparently its not just one mountain but an area which includes a lot of mountains and rivers and waterfalls and breathtaking natural beauty. Although thats what it said on a chinese brochure ill wait and see if it lives up to expectations, as any chinese blurb rarely does. We pulled into town at about 4.30 after 7 hours of bum numbing touring on the ricketty bus across some pretty poor roads. Tonight was free, although we had dinner at 8. didnt do a heck of a lot as we had to be up at 6am tomorrow.

Saturday 29th May
We caught a train from SHanghai to Huanghzo, which was a pleasant city, although still ensconsed in smog. They had adsl in their hotel room, so basically i spent the whole day on the internet. There wasnt a whole lot to see and do here, the tour had organised a bike ride around the city, but considering it was raining i decided to skip on it.

Friday 28th May
We went to explore some famous garden just around the corner from the hotel room. It was pretty nice with the skyscrapers in the background but realy i just longed for some starbucks coffee so i didnt stick around too long and decided to explore the cty on my own. I headed around the bund and down the main street looking for a foreign language bookshop, i really wanted this carl jung book, but again no luck whatsoever im just going to have to wait for that one. Still it let me have a good wonder around the city and see what they had on offer. If it wasnt so damn smoggy im sure it would be a very prety city. i wanted to check out the pearl of the orient building, it the strange looking one with the three sprheres hanging on three large concrete cylinders. THe only way to get there was to cross the river, and the best way to do that is near the top of the bund, there is a little rail carriage system thing that takes you through a tunnel in some weird light extravaganza thing… quite bazaar. On the other side i foud the tower and paid my 50 yeun to get just below the top. Once up there i realised what a waste of money it was because the only thing i could see was the road below and i could just make out some shadows of other buildings that the smog was covering from the view.

Thursday 27th May
This morning i awoke with some answers to questions i had the night before, love it when you get the answer after sleeping with it. Anyway i started plugging away at it again and writing in the diary. Today we were catching a train to Shanghai, just 2 hours away. We stuck the telly on just for some backgroud listening. Its truly amazing how far reaching their censorship is. Pretty much anything that makes china look bad is not aired or spoken about in public, or for that matter even in private. Anything that makes the US and europe look like they are evil in contrast to a good china is put on the box, the propaganda machine gives the most skewed view of china and the government. Talk about gagging free speech. makes me think of that jack nicholson line “the truth?? you cant handle the truth”. Today we were catching the train to Shanghai. I was looking forward to seeing this city id heard a lot of hype about it expanding rapidly and becoming the new mecca of capitalism. On the train coming into the city, you could easliy get a feel for just how large a city it was, with huge apartment highrises begining from the outskirts of towm. there was very little that was under 4 storeys high. After we actually pulled into the train station, and jumped into cabs you could really see just how massive it truly was, with big buildings scattered around everywhere, and in the distance a bunch of skyscrapers in all sorts of shapes, although they were difficult to see through the smog.

Wednesday 26th May
This morning we arrived in Su Zhou, and caught a cab to the hotel, its a nice little city with incredible amount of pollution, We were only going to be here for one night, and there wasnt a lot to see here. There is an old garden that is called the leisure garden, it failed to ignite anything in me other than “seen better gardens in backyards at home” well perhaps that mightve been a bit too critical, it was a decent garden, but i was pretty over it. We were sposed to go bike riding this afternoon but i wasnt feeling the greatest and decided to give it a miss. sat in an internet cafe for a few hours looking for acomodation adn things to do in cape town. decided to get back to the hotel and hack away at the smith and smith database again. I got Heaps done, but i was super strung out on caffine til about 4am, and we were leaving at 11.30 so i HAD to get to sleep.

Tuesday 25th May
Today was spent trying to recover from the night before, and slowly remembering all those things you said and did which make you feel like the biggest idiot that ever walked the face of the earth. Ahhh the blessings of alcohol. Basically just wandered around Beijing, had another game of bowling and went to an internet cafe as well as the supermarket. We were catching a train at 7.30pm to take us to Su Zhou, two hours north of Shanghai. I decided to eat on the train, however they didnt have an english menu, luckily there was this chinese guy who had lived in europe for 3 years and spoke excellent english who managed to get me what i wanted. We had a beer and a chat and then we sat down for dinner. There was a lot of those awkward silences. Not sure why people who help think they need to hang out with you, especially when they dont try and make an effort to make conversation. ahh well as soon as i had finished i was out of there. I wanted to finish the book i was reading, a chris ryan book called the watchman. a very good book.

Monday 24th May
Today we were in for a big day, the Great Wall, The Ming Tombs and The summer Palace. First stop the great wall. Its vastly impressive as you see this wall snaking along the spine of a mountain range, making twists and turns and ascents and descents that make you wonder just how physically fit the warriors who patrolled the walls would have had to have been. We finally arrived at the really touristy part of the wall that you are allowed to walk along (there are a few places but we didnt have the option) anyway of course there were a million hagglers, there were also a lot of bears in an enclosure that the RSPCA wouldve closed down yesterday. Poor things. There was also a toboggan ride down from the top of the wall and a cable car for those unable to walk it. The going was tough in certain bits, you cannot possibly imagine what it wouldve been like to build this 5000km wall, at parts it would be over 15m high and generally around 4m wide, with turrets every couple of hundred meters or so. It ranks up there as 3rd to Taj Mahal and the Angkor temples. definately a must see. The ming tombs were hohum, really nothing much there to see at all….. but the summer palace well, that was another story, that was very nice indeed. We only had about 30 minutes to explore as we had run out of time, shouldve skipped the Ming Tombs. Still i managed to hot foot it around to most of the interesting sites, except i missed the giat marble boat that sits on the lake where the emperor/sses used to eat and pretend they were sailing. Tongiht we were having a big one, as our group actually consisted of two groups, and the other groupd were finishing up today. We headed out to a nice restraunt for some peking duck, and we had an awards ceremony. I received the price for the person who stresses out our tour guide the most, and also the award for not listening. Yes yes i hear you say. But i already know what they are talking about cause ive already read about it, and at the end of the day you often need an interpreter for the interpreter, takes a lot of energy to struggle to understand someone, and its much easier to read yourself. anyway winners of awards recieved a shot of snake wine…. BLEHHHHHHH. makes you want to barf. i also managed to polish off a bottle of wine… so i was a tad bit under the influence. We were kicked out from there at 11… apparently all the staff had gone home. So we all trundled down to the local karaoke bar. We took the place over, and i somehow got it into my head that i could sing (although every now and again i would hear myself screaming down the mic and hearing just how bad i sounded through the speakers, but by this time i didnt really care, the booze had managed to make me think i was ‘the king’. countless beers later we were all kicked out, we said our goodbyes and went home to do a lot of hangover curing.

Sunday 23rd May
Today we arrived in Beijing at 1pm, the food on that train had been excellent, i really like my scrambled eggs with tomato We caught Taxis from the train station to our hotel, the rainbow hotel. When we arrived we thought we were in heaven, unfortunately the hotel has a good part and a bad part, and guess where we arrived?? and guess where we were staying??? The redeeming feature of this place was that the good part had an AMF bowling alley in it, so i got in some bowling, though never breaking 150 This afternoon we visited Tiannamen Square, its pretty big and its difficult to imagine all those tanks rolling over those poor protestors there. Wonder how long it took them to scrub the blood off the pavement?? now there are just a bunch of tourists (mostly chinese) and people flying kites and people selling junk. No sign of the massacre. Across the road is the forbidden palace. You cant really tell how big it is from the outside, but once youve walked through a couple of walls you get the idea. Its a very impressive and very imposing palace, the biggest in the world. The architecture is stunning. There seems to be a lot of hostoric buildings, gardens etc. Very many more than in Japan (although Kyoto has tonnes) After walking around there for a few hours, and seeing the intricate detail in everything that was the palace, i decided i wanted to get back to the hotel for some more bowling. Tonight we went to a chinese acrobatic microcosm. It was pretty spectacular. The way they can move and twist and blanace, still it wasnt quite as polished as the cirque du soleil.

Saturday 22nd May
This morning i was up early for a jog. it still amazes me how funnily they react. there was a group of military all serious standing around yellling orders at each other, until i ran past when they all stopped and stared and then giggled like they were 8 year old little girls. Anyway everyone was up for breakfast by 8.30, unfortunately the highfly pizza place wasnt open until 9 and the staff were sleeping on the seats of the restraunt. We got them up early…. oops… and we took seats while they scurried around trynig to get ready. we ordered at 9.15am, slowly one by one the meals came out. we were supposed to be ready for the warriors by 9.30, but my breakfast didnt arrive until 10.20…. arrrrrgh. eventually we were all done and on our way about an hours drive out of xian to the warriors. there are 3 main pits. pit 1 is the only one to be fairly extensively excavated, there are around 1000 warriors that have been realised rom the earth. pit 2 is still basically unexcavated and is pretty much a big hall looking down onto mounds of earth… interesting i hear you say… thats what i thought too. pit 3 was the smallest pit but apparently because the warriors were found facing each other, this was central command. As you can probably tell i wasnt THAT impressed with the discovery. dont get me wrong, its ok, and its pretty amazing that there aer around 7 thousand terracotta warriors each individually different, with different faces, shoes, clothes, armour, hairdos etc. but really at the end of the day, its one mans hommage to himself (read another omnipotent king) and he forced many people to work for his tomb. I guess each to their own though, and i am glad i went to see it, but we certainly didnt need 3 hours there…. you cant really even get close enough to the warriors to make out their individual styles, and you will certainly get harrassed near the entrance to purchase some warriors of your own (though if your into that you will certainly be able to get an excellent bargain – the supply is FAR more than is being demanded) anyway we went back to the nearby town for luch which was a massive banquet of pretty crap food. afterwards we were back to the train station for yet another overnighter to beijing, and the great wall…. oooh exciting.