Lhasa part 2

The next day I meet my guide at 9 am and went to the Potala. It was amazing. When we arrived there was a group of Tibetan girls tamping the new concrete roof down on the potala. They sang these lovely songs while they worked.

The Potala

Local Tibetans singing as they work

We were not allowed to take photos inside the temple but I did take this one.

The Potala was a typical Buddhist temple with lots of gold Buddhas and candles with yak butter as wax. I soon discovered from my guide that Tibet was very rich in gold and other natural resources. One of the many reasons why the Chinese want to keep control of Tibet.


After the Potala I was meant to meet my guide at 3 pm to see the Jokhang but he cancelled on me. It was clear that you get what you pay for in guides and as I didn't pay very much for my guide I was not going to get much of a tour. So instead I worked out with my Dad and Sister, Steph, that they were not coming to Tibet as it was too expensive to organise from Australia and instead I would meet them in Xian on 10th of June.

That arvo i got my train ticket and went to the Jokhang with the Russian lady Galina. While walking around the Jokhang we got lost and ended up in the Muslim part of Lhasa. It felt a bit odd to be surrounded by Muslims in Lhasa, Tibet but everyone was really friendly and you saw monks and Muslims talking together.

On the way back to the hostel we looked for some tours for Galina to go on as she really wanted to go to Mt Everest. While looking at one of the local notice broads I found a flyer for the "Vegetarian house" restaurant which I had read about in the book Trish gave me. The restaurant claimed said it was ideal for people worried about cancer and many other illnesses.

The flyer for the restaurant.

Back at the hostel I meet up with 3 dutch girls {two of whom where a couple} and 2 American guys. I told them about the Vegetarian house and asked if they wanted to come. But it was the dutch girl and one of the American guys last night so we headed off to a yak dinner instead.

The dutch girls

One of the dutch girls and an American guy who have been living together in Beijing for the past year.

Lee, the American and Me

So we all went to this restaurant down Beijing road which served yak meals. After dinner we headed out for a few drinks. First at a bar owned by two Canadians which is the only bar owned by foreigners in Lhasa.

At the bar we meet up with a Tibetan guy who took us to a local Tibetan nightclub called Queen. We danced the night away with locals,who all seemed to enjoy our company. At one stage we had all the locals copying our dance moves. I didn't drink due to the altitude but the club must have had oxygen pumped in cos we were all dancing like normal and jumping around, while for the past few days in Lhasa I couldn't even walk up stairs without getting out of breath.

Us dancing in the nightclub

The locals dancing in the club

We made our way back home at 3am. I had to get up at 9.30am to go to Sera Monastery. The others were going in the afternoon to see the Monks debate but I had already seen it.

Lhasa

In the morning I had the free Chinese breakfast at the hostel, which consisted of Cong (tasteless rice porridge) and some veggies that had been cooked in oil and coated in soy. Not exactly what I felt like. My guts were now not feeling the best. After breakfast i went to the snowland hotel to work out this 'tour' I was booked on. Foreigners can not travel to Lhasa without a permit and they can not get a permit without being on a tour. You are only meant to stay in Lhasa for the length of your tour but everyone stays longer. I was booked in to a 2 day city tour which cost me around $AUS100 with a $AUS170 deposit. I was a bit concern that I wouldn't see the deposit again but it all worked out fine in the end.

At the snowland hotel they told me to call my guide and I could start my tour tomorrow. At this stage I thought my Dad and sister were coming to meet me in Lhasa so tried to see if there was an trips to Everest I could fit in before they arrived. It didn't look likely and I was a bit scared of Altitude sickness and wanted to spend a few days in Lhasa before trying to go higher.

After catching to my guide on the phone I went to the Potala to organise my ticket to get in the next day. While in the line I meet this really nice Chinese- American family who were very concerned about me travelling alone. It was nice they were concerned but I had found China a really easy place to travel alone and felt reasonable safe the whole time.

After getting my ticket for the Potala I headed off on the local bus for the Drepung Monastery. The bus ride was great fun being the only foreigner on the bus. The Lonely Planet made it sound like the walk to the monastery was really easy but after 30min walking up hill in the heat I was stuffed.

Stuffed after my hike!

The monastery was not what I expected and looked like Middle eastern houses. The Tibetan writing is also sand script which added to this middle eastern feeling.

Drepung Monastery

While at the Monastery I was able to see the Monks debate. The noise was so loud. I walked into a court yard and saw a few hundred monks debating. In the debates one monk sits on the ground and answers with other standings monks questions. At the end of a question the standing monk claps. Each pairs of monks do this at their own pace so the sound is amazing loud. I sat on the ground between some monks for about an hour. It was just such an amazing sight. The Tibetan language is much softer on the ear than the Chinese.

After the Monastery I went to a small Tibetan restaurant down the hill which only had Tibetan writing so I assumed it would serve local food. I really wanted to try some local Tibetan food like yak butter tea. The restaurant was run by a local woman and her three girls. I instantly really liked the family. The three girls were aged 13, 19 and 21.

Mum and Me


The restaurant was mainly visited by monks and they didn't seem to have served many foreigners. There was a fancy place next door aimed at foreigners. The rest of the afternoon I sent talking to the girls and eating. The 13 year old got her English text book from school out and tried to talk to me. At school she had to learn Chinese and English but spoke only Tibetan at home. I took some photos of the family and promised to come back in a few days to given them some copies of it. Me and the 13 year old

At around 6pm I made the long walk back to my bus. Apparently it was technically illegal for me to take the local bus and the bus drivers could have be fined for carrying a foreigner but I had no trouble and no one seemed to mind. That night I didn't do much just took it easy.

Train from Xian to Lhasa

At around 8.30am I boarded my train to Lhasa. The train trip was meant to take 32 hours. My longest trip yet. While on the platform getting on the train I meet this Russian woman called Galina. She could only speak Russian so with the help of my Trans- Siberian Lonely Planet (thanks Lee!!) I was able to work out her name and that she was heading to Lhasa too. After this initial conversation the language barrier became a bit too hard and I left her to read her book. Russian is a really really hard language to speak! I don't know what I am going to do in Russia as very few people in Russia over the age of 25 can speak any English.

I then went to my hard sleeper and tried to talk to my "room mates" but my Chinese seemed to only confuse them and one guy called his English teacher to find out what I was trying to say. I felt really bad as I just wanted to practise the things the Swiss couple had taught me the night before.

Finally I met Werner from Austria. He had assumed I was Russian due to my earlier attempt to talk to Galina. Haha too funny! Werner has been living in northern China with his wife and kids for the past 15 months. He is working for an automotive company and his wife is working as a teacher. We got along really well and I tried to speak a bit of German to him.

Werner on the train in the dining cart. The try to make the dining cart all romantic with the fake red rose. haha!

While we were drinking in the dining cart we meet this Father and son from the UK. They ran a backpacker company and were travelling to Lhasa to look at setting up a new hostel there. I have to admit I didn't like the thought of Lhasa and Tibet becoming really touristy but it was still interesting to learn about their company and setting up hostels all over the world. They also offered me accommodation in London and Edinburgh at their hostels, which was really nice.

On the train we reached 5000m above sea level. I felt OK but my guts started to get bad and remained bad for the who time in Lhasa.

The train trip was amazing. And I would recommended it to everyone. You get to watch the landscape change as you get higher and higher. None of the pictures I have taken can even began to show how incredible the landscape is. As we travelled towards Lhasa the scenery would change. Initially we had the planes of the Gobi desert with distant hills.

The desert soon become grassy and we would see the occasional yak and nomadic person. It was crazy to see this random person walking in the middle of nowhere with no housing or tent in sight. I would have loved to gotten off the train and just walked with them to see how they live and what they do.

Some yaks

Then slowly small "town" would appear and the distant mountains became snow capped.

A small town somewhere between Xian and Lhasa.

The mountains began to grow as we reached 5000m above sea level

We saw an army convoy of around 100 trucks travelling to Lhasa. This was not a surprise to me as in the book Trish gave me it talked about the army presents in Tibet and that they often have military training in the Tibet area.

One of the army trucks

As we got closer the Lhasa the number of yaks increased and snow appeared on the side of the train tracks. We past a few rivers which were solid ice. I was glad the train was heated!

Finally we descent into Lhasa ( 3700m above sea level). When we arrived in Lhasa it was around getting dark. The Russian woman I had meet before on the train asked me for help with accommodation. I had already organised accommodation and was getting a free lift to the hostel so Galina joined me. It started raining and my first impression of Lhasa was not what I expected. The city looked like most other cities in China.

That night was really cold so I bought a fake "north face" jacket for $AUS15. It was too wet and cold to bargaining too much on price. We ate some street food which was deep fried skewers of veggies and meat. Yum!! Then quickly off to bed. I was staying in a dorm of 6 but it was only Galina and myself in the room. That night I slept soo well!I think the cold helped.

Xian Day 2

Early in the morning Amy. Adam and I set off on our tour of the Terra-cotta warriors. Adam and I were a bit tried due to the clubbing the night before but managed to make it on the bus by 9am.

The first stop of our tour was at this government factory which made models of the warriors for tourist. The made them from everything. You could get a terracotta one, a copper one a jade one. Their was no way we were going to buy anything but it was interesting to learning about the different types of warriors and their roles. The guide at the factory spoke great English with this strong American accent and kept saying 'you all'. I loved it.

The different Warriors

After the government factory we headed off to a museum to look at some of the relics from different dynasties. Did you know that the Chinese were the first to invent paper? well according to them. After the museum we went to the Huaqing Hot Springs. Emperor Xuanzong, with Yang Guifei, the Imperial Concubine spent every winter there. Our tour guide the whole bus ride and tour so far had told us about this fat concubine.When we looked around the springs it was revealed that the fat concubine was a normal sized woman with a good figure.

A statue of the so called 'fat' concubine.I think she looks great!

At the hot springs we got to learn more about the Chinese version of the history of Mao and Chiang Kai-Shek. According Amy, our history expert everything they said conflicted with what we had learnt on the history of China. Including somethings that are hard to argue like when Chiang Kai-Shek died. There was this Dutch guy on our tour who asked our guide why Mao ordered for all the trees to be cut down. The guide gave a few typical propaganda answers and then finally said that Mao was an old man at the time and had been given some bad advice from other people. It appears he can never be blamed for anything.

We then went to the warriors. The dutch guy suggested that we saw the smallest room first and then the largest one last, which is the opposite from the "normal way" but makes the larger rooms look more impressive. Our guide agreed so after watching a quality film about the first Emperor of china, which had some really bad acting, we headed to pit 3.

Pit 3 and some of the headless warriors.

The horse of pit 3

The warriors were amazing. They had been created 2000 years ago and every warrior had a different face because they had been based on really people. It is just mind blowing. They were first discovered when this farm tried to dig a well on his farm. Imagine discovering your farm was on top of an army of 2000 year old terracotta warriors. It is just insane.

The pits just got bigger. Pit 1 was so big but they had not done much excavating compared to the smaller pits but it was still very impressive!

Pit 1. it is just huge!!!

After the warriors we went to a museum to see the bronze four drawn horse carts and some art from Taiwan. Finally we climbed this hill which was the tomb of the one of the Emperor but they have not started excavating it yet. So we just walked to the top of the hill and looked around.

That night I was so tried. We got back to the hostel at around 7 and I got my permit for Tibet. I headed off to the station to book my ticket. for Lhasa. The train for 8am for the next day was full so I got a ticket for the day after (3rd June). Amy and Adam were leaving on the 2nd so we had a big breakfast fest together in the morning of the 2nd. We got a watermelon from down the street, so Singapore cereal and some weird Chinese dessert thing that I was given by that Chinese couple in Shanghai whose house I went to. The breakfast was yum and the best part was we ate it in a restaurant which we only order 3 coffees from and bought the food ourselves.Haha! The joys of being a foreigner.

That afternoon we walked through the Muslim markets and around Xian. We meet this Chinese guy who wanted to practise his English with us. We asked him all the normal politically sensitive questions about Taiwan and Tibet. This as normal didn't work very well and we only got a list of propaganda answers. Adam then confused the guy by telling him about books the Chinese government has banned. The guy must of thought we were nuts with this talk about government control over Internet and books. He did admit that China was not really communist anymore but now worship money instead.

After our discussion with our new friend Adam and Amy left for the airport on the bus and I returned to the hostel for my last night in Xian. Back at the hostel I meet this Swiss couple (who were from the French part) who wanted to move to China. They had been travelling around China for 14 months and had learnt a fair bit of Chinese. The rest of the evening was spent teaching me Chinese. i finally got the basics down like how to count and order food.

I was really interested what made them want to move to China. They explained that even though you have more freedom in Switzerland, they do not make enough money to really enjoy the freedom. They would prefer to live in a country with less freedom but with more opportunities to make money and create your own freedom. I found this really interesting.

Xian- day 1

I arrived at Xian and was met at the station by one of the guys from the hostel. Naturally Amy and Adam had organised this. They are too good to me! We walked the 200m from the station to the hostel and I saw Amy and Adam. They had planned to do heaps of sightseeing but it had not happened yet, it was 2pm. So we set off to look around the Town. Xian is famous for the Terra-cotta Warriors which was created by Qin Dynasty (211-206 BC). So Amy,Adam and I booked into a tour to see this 8th wonder of the world tomorrow.

The city of Xian is surrounded by a huge wall but it was too expensive for is walk around it and we were trying to save money after this tour so we instead headed off to the Muslim area of town. I was craving Lamb and I think with all my talk about was also making Amy and Adam want it. After searching for ages for this restaurant recommended by LP we finally got our lamb.

The excitement of eating lamb!!! Even if it was a really small plate of it.

After the lamb which did not really fill us up but stopped the craving we headed to Amy and Adam's new fav place which was a huge Chinese food court. I have to admit the food was great and well priced. After stuffing ourselves we headed back to the hostel. Amy wasn't up for a big night so Adam and I headed out to the club '1+1'. Once in the club we had only walked for a few meters before we had made some friends who wanted to get the foreigners drunk!! Yeah!

Adam dancing at the club. Looking more Chinese than English

They were all from Chengdu. Adam and I joined them for a few beers before they took us to a different part of the club. It was so much fun but i felt bad cos they would not let us pay. Like most Chinese drinking game the aim seemed to be to get us drunk while they stayed sober. It was rather successful. Before we got too drunk to walk we headed back to the hostel. I have no idea what time we went to bed.

Nanjing

The next morning I got on a bus from the side of the road which claimed to be going to Nanjing. The bus ride went for 3.5 hours and when I got off the train I had no idea what I was doing. I knew I wanted to try and see Amy and Adam before they left for Xian in 6 hours but was not sure where they were. Then just as I exited the bus station Adam called me and told me to find a taxi driver and he would get someone at there hostel to give him direction in Chinese. I was so happy. I could not believe he was so nice. I had only spend one night drinking with him and Amy in Guangzhou and now they were my personal tour agent. How great!!!

The hostel was a really nice. I saw Amy and Adam and meet their new friend Brandan (who was from America but had been in China for the past 8 months teaching English and could speaka lot of Chinese, yeah!) The four of us headed out for a bit of a sightseeing tour of the town. Amy is going to study history at uni later this year so was so excited to be in home of the 'rape of nanjing' and we headed off to the monument to learn more about it. But it was closed and will not reopen until jan 2008!!! Boo!!

So we then went to the Nanjing Museum and the a temple. Both were really interesting but I forgot my camera so will update this latter with some pics from Amy and Adam.

Adam and Amy where off to Xian and told me that the Lonely Planet said there was a guy there who could do Tibet visa in a day. I thought I might as well join them so went to the train station with them and said my farewells and got a ticket for the same train as them but for the next day. I then took the bus back to the hostel and went out for dinner and a walk around the area.

Nanjing by night

Nanjing by night

After looking around the town and the night market I headed back to the hostel. As I arrived at the hostel Brandan was returning from his date so we went out to find sime local pubs. We were in search of a small pub but the first place we went was a large nightclub with all Chinese except two Russian prostitutes, whom Brandan wanted to chat to but i was not so keen. After getting two over priced drinks we headed off in search of a bar.

The next bar we went to had the same name as the nightclub but was great. I met four Austrian guys there who had been working in Nanjing for the past 3 months. I loved it cos I got to practise my German but Brandan was a bit bored so headed off home and left me chatting a mixture of Germany and English with these guys. Most of the guys were much older than me but one called Dominik was only 27. He invited to go skiing with him in Austria. Yeah skiing!

Well at around 3 am I finally made my way back to the hostel and slept in until 11am. Ohh it was so nice. Than Brandan and I went a looked at the Presidential Palace which was the home of Chiang Kai-shek.It was really interesting as normal the history was distorted but i still really enjoyed it.

The man himself, Chiang Kai-shek

The palace ground are lovely!!

Tourism Chinese style. You must have a matching hat and follow the lady with the flag and loud speaker.

After the Presidential Palace we went to the heavenly temple museum but had to be quick as I needed to catch my train to Xian and see Adam and Amy again. So at 5pm I headed off to take another train. Brandan at the heavenly temple museum

Haian

On Monday morning I got up at 5.45am and took the subway to the bus station. It took me a while to find the bus station again even thou I was only there the day before. I finally found it and then played match the Chinese characters to find the bus going to Haian. No one at the bus station could speak English but I check with a few people if I was on the right bus and then off we went.

At the bus station. Once again the only foreigner

I slept most of the 4 hour bus ride to Haian. However about 1 hour away from Haian the bus was stopped by police. The Police officer wanted to see the bus driver's licence however it did not appear he had one. I normally base my level of concern on however one else reacts on around me. Once on the subway in Shanghai the train stopped in a tunnel no one even looked remotely concerned so i didn't even stress at all and the train started again 5 mins later. This time however everyone on the bus was freaking out and I assumed that this was not a normal event. I wasn't stressed as i was so stuffed if the bus driver didn't get back on the bus that it was just funny. I had no idea where I was and only a rough idea of where I wanted to be. Ha ha!

Lucky the driver gave some cash to the cop and we headed off again. I was greeted at the bus station in Haian by 3 guys from the factory. One of them could speak really good English. We went out for lunch with the company chairman and I managed to avoid most of the drinking contests.

After lunch I got to have a look around the factory. The factory was huge. It contained 6 workshops that where each 500m by 500m. They were still in the process of moving into the factory so not all the workshops were filled with machinery yet.

Inside the factory

After looking around the factory one of the guys took me to the local museum called 7 battles 7 victories. It was all about how fast Mao and his army over thrown the KTM in the area. It was really interesting and full of Chinese propaganda.

After the museum we headed to the old area of town. It was like the Hutongs. They were really great. I loved seeing how China once was.

My guide from the factory in the old part of town


We then went to textiles factory so my guide to see a friend. It was the biggest place I have ever seen. I was on the outer region of town and cos it was so big it even had it's own power station at the factory!!! Crazy! Inside i got to see how sweat shops in asia work. There were just so many machines the photos just can not show how big this place was. i estimate the factory was at least 1km wide and the same long. And there where 4 of them. Just nuts!!

I then headed by to my hotel for a rest until dinner. My hotel room had cigarette burns all over the carpet and smelt a bit like smoke but other then take it was fine. I was meet at the hotel by another one of the guys from the factory who then took me on his scooter to dinner.

Dinner was filled with important people from the factory including the chairman and a few government officials. I was already told by the guy who could speak English earlier that day that their company was trying to get on the government committee so they could have more influence over the running of China. He also told me that all Chinese school students and high class business men had to read these politically books produced by the government and even sit exams on them. The book outlines the aims for the future of China and talks about where the country is heading (the prefect "solicits society") and what they need to get there. I was surprise but not really shocked and exampled however one seems fine with having little rights.





Anyway back to dinner. It appeared my attendance at the dinner was going to help the company's relationship with the government. So for the next 3 hour we ate and drank. They first started me on really strong rice wine but a quickly got onto American beer (it does not taste great but at least i was going to be able to walk.) At dinner everyone wants to make you drink and you don't just get to take a sip you have to drink the whole glass. Being the only foreigner getting me drunk was everyone's aim. I was ok as the glasses are really small. After a few too many drinks I got a lift back to the hotel on the scooter.





The next morning I decide to take a bus to Nanjing to meet up with Amy and Adam my mate I meet in Guangzhou.