China - an interim status update from Xi'an

Just a small update to tell you how we've been doing!!! (have an additional 20 minutes on the computer in the hostel by coincidence...)

China so far has been treating us really kind. In Beijing we got to stay at two couchsurfers, in Xi'an we decided it would be nice to have a hostel, and not be bothered about searching for a place to stay every day. Also quite refreshing. Although, then we ran into the "we dont have a pc challenge.."  We'll see how that will go in the next couple of days. 

We clearly figured out quite fast that our Lonely Planet of 2011 is totally out of date!!! All the prices have doubled, and much information is missing. Seems like the Olympic Games attracted a lot of people, and the country benefited much from it. Our purse does not. It is still possible to eat for 1 euro per day, but you do have to search for it a bit more!!! 

In Beijing, we were a bit disappointed that it felt so Western-like. Same goes for Xi'an, although when you get of the beaten track here, it 's more feeling like " real China and we would have imagined it to be, with lots of people, food on the street and noise everywhere. 

We've managed to see the Forbidden City (its a real shame that there is so little explanation, feels a bit like a tourist trap). take some breath in the Temples that are actually just parks, walked around the Hutongs looking for a new diary, and ate crazy deep fried stuff that was unrecognizable.... We didn't get to the Olympic stadium :-) but we did get to climb the Great Wall, even if it was not where we wanted to climb it!!! (ended up in Mutianyu instead of Huang Hua) On the way, we got lured into a minivan almost twice. Once the lady looking like a real bus-employee was too interested in getting us to the Jinshanling-part, but we seen through her trick, But the second guy (on the bus) actually got half of our group out... just to lure us into his minivan..... Luckily another public bus came and a very friendly Mandarin speaking Canadian negotiated a better price for the remaining trip. We learnt that he was himself actually going to another part of the wall, quickly changed our mind and then had a wonderful trip after all!!!.An adventure and a good learning experience!!!

We're also getting much better in negotiating (exercised a lot with stuff we really don't want to buy). Start with 1/10 of what they mention, end with about 1/4th and even then it is sometimes too much. At first we really felt bad about it, now we don't anymore. It's just part of their culture here.....  And we figured out that Ali G's " Buyakasha" really means " No I don't want it - really not" . The language is a huge challenge here, much more difficult than in Mongolia even. Those Chinese that do speak English are too shy to say it!!! We find ourselves running around with the Lonely Planet vocabulary and the Point it books a lot!!! Still most of the food we are eating we call it " mystery meat". 

In Beijing we learnt that for 20 yuan you get a head-neck massage at the hairdresser's, who adore having white & blond people in their shop and all take pictures of you!! For another 20 yuan (2,5 euro) you get your hair cut. Everything cool, except for the fact that my hair is cut a bit in an Asian style, short and straight on the front  (Ilja, I can see you laughing :-D) The massage thing is really cool by the way; with 2 other friends we went yesterday, here in Xi'an, and for about 10 euro you get over an hour massage (No happy ending, sorry for those of you thinking like that!!) Although I must say that even though the little Chinese didn't weigh a thing, having his knees and full weight on my back reminded me a bit more about a chiropractor.... I can still feel it :-)

Getting from Beijing to Xi'an was fun; 12 hours on a hardseat (no beds available). Filled with Chinese (lying on the floor, really jammed full) that smoke, eat loud and on two seats that are really too small for us, we managed to get 1 hour of sleep. Not a recommendation to do again, but at least it was cheap, 

The terracotta warriors were ok. Impressive on the one hand, but we would have expected more, and some more background / details. Still a must see, although the pricing has become really cheap... you feel like it is a real tourist trap!!!

So after a relaxing three days here, tomorrow we are heading off to the south west, the Sizhouan province. The area must be wonderful, it is close to the Himalaya. Our own Himalaya project seems to have died: As we are not of the same nationality we will never to be able to get in the northern part. Nepal is still on the wishlist, but we will see..... Chengdu is the next stop. Another 16 hours on a hardseat as the sleepers were sold out again...)

(by the way - we cannot access facebook, nor can the blog sent the update there. Gmail works, the blog as well :-) so at least some communication lines are still open. For those who are interested: our Chinese mobile is +86 - one- three - two - 414 899 - five- zero. Just bear in mind the time difference of six hours!!