Symbolism

So here is the collection of lucky iconography displayed by our tour bus driver. The Chinese cabbage in the middle has to have the pointy bit facing inside 'to bring money in to the household' (or motor vehicle one is to presume)

There was much arguing in the latter part of the day about the relative positioning of the above objects, probably due to the fact that Pat and myself were not spending any money in the numerous 'gift shop stops' imposed on us whilst on our tour.

So much for lucky symbols. Try picking up rich American tourists instead, it's much more effective.

Buildings

Here's the new Beijing olympic stadium. I suspect they might have finished it in time for the games, unlike the Greeks. It may already be finished, it's hard to say.

Olympics here? Really? EVERYTHING has Olympic branding on it already. The only thing left is the toilet paper and I'm sure that's only because we're in a two star hotel, we're probably using up the paper left over from the other hotels. The performations don't work properly either, but that's another blog story...

Nice colour scheme..

News Flash!

Yes, there is a Starbucks in the Forbidden City. No you can't actually see it, the locals complained and they had to hide it away next to a bookshop. Still, we had to give it a try..

Hats off..

They give the Chinese tour groups coloured caps to identify them. No cowboy hats rather disappointingly. No green hats either it would appear. Apparently if your husband gives you a green hat he is accusing you of adultery.. Could have done with one of those a few years ago...

Toilet Humour

In China public toilets get star ratings, somewhat like hotels. This is a four star hotel, I mean toilet. That presumably means there will be toilet paper and no err, left overs from previous customers.

I've yet to find a five star one, although I'm quite excited at the prospect.

The Forbidden City

We embarked on a whirl-wind tour of the "Forbidden City' and the "Summer Palace' Strangely enough so did the rest of Beijing.

Here's everyone else with us, trying to get in the gates.

A yellow roof indicates the home of the Emperor. I will obviously be changing the colour of my roofing tiles on returning to Ealing.

I love the Chinese attitude to ancient relics. 'It's old it needs painting, lets paint it.' None of this conservation nonsense. With the Beijing Olympics coming up soon they're repainting everything, hence the scaffolding.

Some sanding required.

A pointy thing.

The Emperor's path, with Pat on it. I don't think the Emperor would approve. Good job he died some centuries ago.

Newly painted decor. At least they didn't get some cowboys from Ealing to do it. They would have ended up with it painted egg-shell white in some of Wickes' finest bargain emulsion.


A marble boat. Yes, that is utterly ridiculous in my books.

Bicycle Race

Yup, you can carry pretty much anything around on a bike.

Finding your bike after parking it can be a little tricky. Park it next to a landmark is my advice.

Aluminium composite material. Presumably the same as having racing stripes on your Escort RS Turbo.

Mobile pottery shop.

Hair cut - Chinese style

I've started to look a bit like a shaggy dog, or maybe a slightly older member of a Northern 'Madchester' band - my budget Bangkok haircut was well past its sell by date. It was time to get it cut.

Venturing out onto the street I picked a hairdresser's with the least amount of neon on its façade. I'm not sure by what logic I decided on that, but hey, you've got to make a choice somehow.

The great thing about being in China and being a Westerner is everyone greets you like a celebrity. The hairdressers proved to be no exception. Within fifteen seconds of getting through the door everyone had come to meet me and I'd had several of those amusing exchanges where no one speaks each others language, but there is a shared exchange of smiles and friendship.

It did occur to me that trying to explain how I wanted my hair cut might be a little bit of an issue, but I reckoned I could probably gesticulate my way though it, or maybe say 'Brad Pitt' in a somewhat overly optimistic way.

I was ushered to a plush red upholstered chair and began trying to explain the concept of 'clippers' and 'No. 3' in my best mime fashion. I think my skill at charades have improved immeasurably after a month in China. Still, the results seem to fall on blind eyes, the young girl hovering behind me looked vaguely confused, but smiled anyway. I began to suspect I might be jumping the gun a little.

She then proceeded to swath me in towels and tip shampoo on my head. This I have to admit came as somewhat of a surprise. Traditionally washing your hair takes place somewhere within the vicinity of a sink.

Continuing with the shampoo, she dexterously added water to work up a lather until my whole head was a big foamy mass. I looked somewhat like an overgrown child at bath time. All this was miraculously achieved without the shampoo going everywhere. I have to say I was suitably impressed by the feat of manual dexterity.

Once fully lathered she began massaging my head. It's bloody good when someone can do this properly I can tell you. After about fifteen minutes of this, by which point I had drifted off into some sort of shampoo induced ecstasy she pointed me in the direction of what appeared to be a bed with a sink at the end of it.

She then proceeded to give my hair the most thorough washing I think it's ever had. I was rather hoping she might be able to scrub the grey bits out it was that thorough. To say it was squeaky clean is the understatement of the century, it sounded like a window cleaner squeegeeing a piece of glass.

By this point I was considering moving to Beijing permanently, or at least flying over for haircuts. After some thorough towel drying I was shown to yet another seat - of the reclining variety, where she set about massaging my arms and shoulders.

Suddenly, she appeared to stop. Half opening one eye from my blissed out state I caught her comparing her perfectly hairless arm with my moderately furry one. She giggled so I pulled my tee-shirt down to flash a bit of hairy chest. That solicited a scream followed by a fit of hysterics. Not exactly the reaction I'd hoped for, but hey, anything to provide a bit of free entertainment.

Turning me over she then started working on my back. By now I was beginning to think perhaps they'd misunderstood my request for a haircut and interpreted it as a massage instead. Then I remembered my hair was still wet. Well, had been wet, it was pretty much dry by now.

Just as I was giving up hope of ever seeing a pair of scissors, I was awoken from my massage-induced Zen state and escorted to yet another chair where the maestro of the scissors finally made his entrance.

He had, it has to be said, a very impressive cut. It looked somewhat like the sculptured plastic model that a Manga cartoon sports rather than anything the body would naturally produce. He set about my head with all the fervour of a Tasmanian devil, periodically showing me the tools of his trade. I nodded in vague approval, he seemed to know what he was doing.

After no time at all he'd whipped my head or rather my hair into shape. There was more washing, more screaming as the massage girl fondled my two day's worth of beard, some frenzied drying with a hurricane force hairdryer and the job was proclaimed complete. I felt and looked about 10 years younger. OK, that might be a slight exaggeration.

The price for the world's best haircut? 3 quid.

No, well not in Chinese anyway.

Random trivial fact language fact, there is not a word for 'no' in Chinese. Instead you negate the previous sentence. So, for example if some one asks you 'Do you like football?' you would reply with 'I do not like football'

This goes a long way to explaining why arguments seem to go on so long.

Cable car trip.

Fun with a spinning table.

Don't confuse the tourists

You see, the Chinese have it sorted, no danger of us going the wrong way or getting in the wrong cab here.

Way back down...

Apologies for the colour balance, normally I'm well, more human coloured. I put it down to the altitude.

Great Wall

Very cool, me thinks.

This is the toilet, I felt obliged to use it as it was there.

Big eh?

Top of the world?

Yes, it really does go right over the top. Fortunately they are not quite stupid enough to let you go climbing on that bit, otherwise we would certainly have tried.

Cable car to the great wall

It's a bit like Blackpool with better scenery.

That'll be the wall then.

Be civilised visitor...

In transit entertainment

It's curious the music inflicted upon you on a coach tour. This I presume is what our Chinese driver thinks we will like and I suppose if you are about 65 or over you would. The trouble is the average age of this group has to be about 30.

Hotel California - The Eagles
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme - Simon & Garfunkel
Rivers of Babylon - Boney M
I am Sailing - Rod Stewart
Take my Breath Away - Berlin
Anything by Celine Dion
Anything by Marian Carrey
Saving the Best for Last - Someone nauseating I don't remember
Kings and Vagabonds - Elton John
Don't Cry for Me Argentina - Madonna

The music I've heard in China has been uniformly terrible, whether it be slushy pop-trash from the west or home spun wailing. I suppose it's good news for the British - at least we have one thing left to export here.

Travel rumours - China's hidden treasure

When you're on the road meetings other travellers rumours abound about the good and bad sights to see. Sometimes you pick up a hot tip about some undiscovered site yet to be picked up by the masses. Thus, we find ourselves on a bus to go and see some secret unpublicised gem of China's heritage, some sort of large wall.

OK. Enough of the bullshit, we're off to see the 'Great Wall of China' or rather one bit of it. Possibly one of the best known tourist attractions after the Pyramids in Egypt and Ealing Broadway's bunny park.

I'm not really sure what I'm going to make of a bit of a very long wall, it seems to me a bit like looking at a heavily magnified area of the Mona Lisa. Hmmm, 'nice brush strokes' you say unable to take in its whole grandeur. Still, until space tourism becomes a reality and Easyjet start doing flights I suppose I'll have to settle for looking at a bit of it.

....Some hours later....

Blimey, it's very impressive. My first reaction was 'How the hell did they build that there?' What I had singularly failed to grasp from looking at photographs is that it runs along the peaks of a mountain range. Think about that for a moment, that's a very silly place to build a wall.

The section we visited is so high up we had to get a cable car followed by a funicular railway and then hike up a hundred feet of steps to reach it. That my friends is a long way up.
Think about carrying up all the bricks and the mugs of tea, it'd be cold by the time you got there.

Fortuitously, there was no danger of being alone at the top of the world and of course shopping opportunities abound. One dear old lady 'Not guide, only farmer' I shall call her huffed and puffed around with me for almost the entire duration. She kept complaining I was going too fast 'you young, me old' she repeatedly endlessly, which struck me as a rather odd complaint for a tout, a little bit like the policeman chasing a robber and complaining he's running too fast.

Anyway she didn't seem to be having any trouble keeping up even as I leapt up several precarious flights of stairs and then ducked into a watch tower in an attempt to lose her. I suspect she's ex Chinese secret police with trailing skills like those.

I eventually found here Achilles heel, she didn't have the fare for the cable car, although she could still be heard yelling as I sailed off in to the distance... 'No guide, only farmer'

'Why aren't you tilling your bloody land then' I uttered under my breath.

If you can't fight, wear a daft hat...

..as my Dad used to say. Thinking about it, I'm not sure exactly what that is supposed to mean. Will a potential assailant be scared off by the ludicrousness of your headgear? Or will the bravado you are displaying by wearing a stupid hat mark you out as someone to be reckoned with? Perhaps my Dad knows.

Either way I've got a fairly daft cowboy hat and I'm very fond of it. Apart from making me look daft and I think that's an admirable job in itself, it has immense practical value. It has kept the sun from my eyes whilst riding a moped, the sun off my neck whilst lounging on the beach, the rain off my head whilst cycling in the mountains, kept my head warm in Xi'an and pulled over the eyes has allowed me to get some sleep on endless bus and train journeys. It also double as a handy fan and a convenient receptacle for the contents of your pockets before putting them through the airport x-ray machine. I've even stuck my wallet under there whilst having to wade back from an island in Thailand after the tide came in.

The best use of the cowboy hat however is to make people smile. Smiles lead to conversations and that, in my book beats all the other uses hand down.

Hats off to the hat, a much underrated object I think.

Tian'anmen Square

There's that bloke again, he seems to be everywhere..



Just after taking this a squadron of soldiers marched out the front doors and ushered us out of the way in comedy fashion. Actually I'm not sure they thought it was very comic but the throngs of people around us did. It turned out that they were doing some changing-the-guard, lowering-the-flag ceremony.

Is it me or are those military ceremonies almost terminally boring? I mean, what sort of people actually enjoy the changing of the guard and such like? Tourists I suspect, duped into thinking something exciting is going to happen. "Ooh look, men with guns and pointy hats all walking in unison." There's an aquatic version of that. It's called synchronised swimming and you can't tell me anyone takes that seriously.

Anyway, I found it all rather reminiscent of that Monty Python "Marching up and down the square" sketch. I half expected one of them to try and get out of it with the excuse "Actually I've got rather a good book to read."

Greasy Duck

A warning to would-be China travellers, don't order 'roast duck' thinking it is 'crispy duck' it is NOT the same thing. Not good if your compadre has "Jack Sprat' like sensibilities when it comes to food.

Can you see how shiny it is? That's GREASE!

I'll stick to the beer..

Camera Customisation #2

I think he should try and return it, it's still under warranty after all.

Temple Fever (again)

I think I'm suffering temple fatigue, as an athiest the novelty soon wears a bit thin. At least this one was at the top of a hill so you got a nice view.

You've got to love the woman in the background.

A stroll down the road.

This is apparently advertising the local police. I'm not sure why the police need a PR job, but hey, there you go.

No back garden? No problem, hang your clothes in the street. It's probably best to not do this with your very expensive Diesel jeans however.

Advance strategy for dealing with unsolicited callers at your front door: Make the door knocker so intimidating your dare not use it.

Electric bikes of every description abound here. I really want to have a go, but you don't seem to be able to hire them. Boo. I like the modification to fit an extra couple of people on the back.


A sign for a new London post production facility perhaps? Or a swanky new restaurant? Actually it was the local sign writing company drying the letters in the street.

Nothing goes to waste..

Even the coat hangers get repaired.

Sunbathing, Chinese style

As we are white most of the time in England we like to get a tan. Change is as good as a rest I suppose. The Chinese like to stay white (think classic porcelain Geisha) It doesn't seem to stop them sunbathing however, they just seem to go about it in a rather unconventional way.

Beijing.

We had a little trouble when we first arrived in Beijing.

Everything started off swimmingly, the rucksacks trundled off the conveyor in express time. I'm never sure whether this is traveller serendipity or baggage handlers stacking the big cases towards the bottom of the pile. Either way it generally seems to work out for us.

We piled aboard a bus city bound headed vaguely in the direction of a hostel we had plucked from the lonely planet with the intention of jumping into a cab once we got closer.

It was a grim misty grey day, the sort of day London specialises in at this time of year. My first impressions of Beijing were uninspiring, the roads were huge and clogged with traffic. We dived off the bus at our appointed stop, it was akin to being dropped off somewhere on the M1 as it enters central London. Not exactly an ideal first impression.

Scratching our heads at the Chinese road signs we got a vague idea of our location and decided to hail a cab to get us the last few miles to our guest house.

Now Beijing is a big city, unfortunately I hadn't grasped quite how big it is. We showed the name and address of our place to a few drivers who scratched their respective heads before zooming off to pick up someone who actually knew where the hell they were going. Finally we found a driver who was in less of a rush. Whipping out his mobile phone he called our guest house to find out where it was located. Bless him and bless modern technology. We'd still be stood there now otherwise.

Later, reading the Lonely Planet I began to realise the lunacy of what we were asking. Beijing is actually the size of Belgium. Yes, I mean the country Belgium. What we were asking was akin to arriving at Euston station and asking if the taxi driver knew of a little B&B somewhere in Brighton. No wonder they all looked non-plused.

Once you get into the back streets of the city you realise what a great city it is. There's a myriad of great places to eat and drink and Beijing is as flat as a pancake so tootling around on a bicycle is ideal.

Our first port of call after checking into our hotel? An Indian restaurant for a Lamb Rogan Josh. Well, why the hell not?

sPolling Misttooks

I thought I'd point out to all you pedants out there that my spelling has not taken a sudden turn for the worst, it just that Blogger is actually banned by the China "firewall" therefore I have absolutely no way of checking what I've just published.

I will therefore try doubly hard to not spell anything wrong. If you email me any mistakes I promise to cut and paste them a hundred thousand times.

Thank you for your patience in this matter.

Rock Holsill (Age 38 3/4)

Spot of dinner..

Mauve sofas, nice one.

Trying to look cool and failing.

Las Vegas in China?