The train, T27 departed from Beijing Xi railway station at at 21:30 and I was in carriage 2 and on the top bunk in berth 19. We left on the 2nd of September and arrived at the newly built Lhasa train station on the 4th at around 20:15. We had travelled an amazing 4,064km through the most breathtaking scenery and passing major such as Shijiazhuang, Xi'an, Lanzhou, Xining.
The 1,956-km-long Qinghai-Tibet railway stretches from Xining to Lhasa. It is the world's highest and longest plateau railroad and also the first railway to connect Tibet with the rest of China. The 4,064-kilometer trip took us about 47 hours and 28 minutes some 960 kilometers of the new line's tracks are 4,000 meters above sea level, and the loftiest point is 5,072 meters, at least 200 meters higher than the Peruvian railway in the Andes, which was formerly the world's highest altitude railway.
We entered the train and everything was spotless and absolutely beautiful. There was even toilet paper in the toilets and the ends were even folded into a triangle. Unfortunately, after 2 days when we left, the train was absolutely disgusting and has put me off train travel in china a bit. Unlike the Russians who are so clean, the chinese seem to have no sense of hygiene. They spit everywhere (the hard sleepers had no spitting signs where as in the soft sleepers this sign was ommited) and food is thrown all over the place and the toilets..let's just not go there.
But apart from this the train journey was worth every cent...there were breathtaking landscapes every second of the journey. So this is how the train is mostly organised, the tibetans on the hard seats, the chinese in the hard sleepers and the foreigners in the soft sleepers where they have western toilets and 4 beds in a cabin with closed doors. However, most of us foreigners seemed to be in hard sleepers and a couple of crazy ones even in the hard seats,
It didn't matter though as we spent most of our time in the dining cart watching the views go by and just swapping stories again. There are people who have been travelling in Asia for years and I wonder why it has taken me so long to get here.
Anyway, among the many other tourists, I met Amanda and Ingrid and we are now travelling companions for a while, all staying in the same hsotel. Arriving into Lhasa, it was really dark and raining and I just felt a huge sense of disappointment as we drove to the hostel and saw neon lights and shoping malls and chinese restaurants. This was not the Tibet I was expecting at all.
But this morning we walked out of the hostel and crossed the street and were just absolutely amazed. Just spending a few minutes here and I knew I was meant to come here and i know that I want to spend as much time here as I possibly can. Do you remember, Sam and Luzma, you told me about that special feeling you guys had when you went into the Ngorogoro crater, well when I entered this street, I felt like that. Tibetans walking around with their prayer wheels chanting Om Mani Padme Hum, monks, nuns, tibetans with traditional clothes and beautiful faces, prostrating to gain merit, the smells of yak butter and insence everywhere.,..i haven't got enough words to describe the scenes that unfolded before us as we turned each corner. So we spent our day walking among the devotees and just getting used to the altitude. Bought some jewelry made from yak bones, ate some chips on the street and then dinner in a local restaurant and just sat gazing at teh amazing faces that kept passing us by. Unable to help myself I just kept clicking away with my camera and I just cannot wait to show you the little but of Lhasa that we have seen today.
Wednesday, 5 September 2007
Beijing
When I got back to Beijing most of the people I had left there were still there waiting to find out if Datong was worth a visit. Definitely. I also met Avishai again and we arranged to go visit the Lama temple the next day and then take the taxi to the station together as we both had trains at the same time..him to Xian and me to TIBET:) So on our way to the Lama temple we got a little distracted. In the Hu Tong where our hostel is there are many people from the North west region of China..a mainly muslim region and since initially I couldn't get tickets to Lhasa I was going to go to this region. It seems a fascinating region and no one seems to be going there. In fact I still think I will be going there...I already have 2 good reasons to go there. I sound like most tourists...ironic..all of us want to see the touristic sights and yet I keep hearing 'which bit of the wall has no tourists so I can go there' or 'I wanna go where there are not hoards of tourists' and yet we all seem to end up in the same youth hostels following each other on the Backpackers TOURIST trail. But 'I' am going to be different:) hehe..I really wanna see Kashgar and see how China has kept buddhism and Islam alive together in such harmony. They have just built a new railway there so I should get there before all the tourists flock here...hehehe
Anyway, back to our detour...so this guy from Kashgar in our Hutong who was there every morning selling deliciously sweet melons..we asked him where he was from and where he went to pray and we ended up in a mosque where the Quran was translated from Arabic into chinese, A chinese muslim showed us around and asked Avishai to translate all the arabic on the walls. It was a great experience.
Two religious places in a day...the gods can't do anything else but look after me:) Next we took the subway and got off at the Lama temple. A beautiful temple where they practise Tibetan Buddhism. It is the largest and most perfectly preserved lamasery in present day China.
After seeing huge Buddha statues and just enjoying the calm and holy atmosphere of the temple where throngs of Buddhists came to light insence and say their prayers, we went out and walked around the Hutongs nearby. It was great to just sit in the compound of the temple and absorb the smells and sounds that just heal the soul.
We had a lovely lunch in a local restaurant, where as foreigners we got to sit in the air conditioned section, and then walked and walked just enjoying Beijing. We walked back to the hostel, had showers, talked a bit to Florence, who is constantly a wealth of helpful information, and then made our way to the train station.
As we stood their checking our tickets for the platforms we realised we were both on the same train. So I could delay this goodbye till the next morning.
Anyway, back to our detour...so this guy from Kashgar in our Hutong who was there every morning selling deliciously sweet melons..we asked him where he was from and where he went to pray and we ended up in a mosque where the Quran was translated from Arabic into chinese, A chinese muslim showed us around and asked Avishai to translate all the arabic on the walls. It was a great experience.
Two religious places in a day...the gods can't do anything else but look after me:) Next we took the subway and got off at the Lama temple. A beautiful temple where they practise Tibetan Buddhism. It is the largest and most perfectly preserved lamasery in present day China.
After seeing huge Buddha statues and just enjoying the calm and holy atmosphere of the temple where throngs of Buddhists came to light insence and say their prayers, we went out and walked around the Hutongs nearby. It was great to just sit in the compound of the temple and absorb the smells and sounds that just heal the soul.
We had a lovely lunch in a local restaurant, where as foreigners we got to sit in the air conditioned section, and then walked and walked just enjoying Beijing. We walked back to the hostel, had showers, talked a bit to Florence, who is constantly a wealth of helpful information, and then made our way to the train station.
As we stood their checking our tickets for the platforms we realised we were both on the same train. So I could delay this goodbye till the next morning.
Beijing - Datong - Beijing
I'm now in Lhasa but I have seen sop much in the last few days I have to backtrack. I want to write about Tibet and Lhasa as I have just spent the most amazing day here but I guess it's unfair to the all the other beautiful places and they deserve just as much attention as they were absolutely stunning too.
Anyway so Yana, Rojelho and I took our first ever hard seater train to Datong (a 7 hour train ride away from Beijing) and I don't know about the other two but in my head I had images of from indian movies of the train rides where people are sitting on top of each other and the animals on top of them. There were no sleeper seats availabe so I had to take the hard seater. The train set off at 10:15 in the morning and it was actually another great train ride. The other two were in a different carriage and when I first went to my carriage the looks and gestures I got made me feel like I didn't belong there. They were all gesturing to me that I really should be in the sleeper carriage and not in 3rd class seats. And actually it was not as I had imagined at all but actually quite civilized. Instead of wooden seats we had kind of a 'soft' cushion and there was a table in between and a woman sat next to me and an elderly couple on the opposite side. So i had enough space and amazing scenery (parts of the great wall, and everyday village life) to keep me occupied. Then slowly yana and Rojelho moved to my cabin and since he could speak a little bit of chinese he translated. The initial feelings of discomfort were all based on a false sense on my part. The old man sitting opposite me thought I was a 19 year old girl travelling on my own and was just concerned for me. Since then he kept giving me food and staring at me coz 'I was so beautiful':) He even gave a little poke in the arm to check that I was real hehehe.. Anyway as soon as they found out that we spoke English they found the only guy on the whole seater carriages who speke English, brought him to us and the whole carriage gathered around us and listened to the occasional translations and the English that they did not understand.
It was amazing talking to him as he spoke quite good English. He went to a school near the coast where there were many foreign teachers (beach = english teachers:) and he told us that for these foreign teachers who found it too hard to use their chinese names (or couldn't be bothered) all the students had second English names too. His was Peter .....others were Lydia? Mariah? Madona:):) But he wanted to be a tour guide and so he felt quite priviledges that his family was able to pay 8000yuan for him to attend this school. Like most young people he was on his way back to school from his home town...hence the impossible task of buying train tickets in china at the end of August.
So we arrived at Datong in the evening and while we were exiting we walked into a representative for the CITS (China International Travel Service) who was kind of fishing out all the western tourists that were being carried past in the surging crowd. He showed us a tour which would take in the two sights that we came to see. We organised everything with the gent, he even showed us where to stay, a hotel right next to the station. We walked around Datong in the evening, had roasted yam on the street and hot chocolate from Mcdonalds:) and then went back for an early night. We had great views of the city from our room and it was nice just to chill. Yana and Rojelo were so easy to travel with.
Next morning we were at the CITS office at nine in the morning and there was a whole van load of tourists waiting. It was great though coz we met some really nice guys. It's always the same..a whole group of a hundered different nationalities...south africa, turkey, france, italy... and I always love exchanging the thousands of different travel stories. But before that we had a real chinese breakfast at the hotel...dumplings with a yellow, wattery soup, boiled egg, salad and fried bread...wierd but filling.
We set off (not promptly, unlike the trains which are impeccably efficient) towards the Hanging Monastery, this lies 75km southeast of Datong and took a couple of hours. This monastery is built perilously on sheer cliffs above Jinlong Canyon. It used to reside 100m above the river bed but over time the river has deposited silt, soil and rocks in the canyon (before being dammed) so now the monastery is only 50m up. The monastery dates back more than 1400 years (pretty old) and is resting on beams that are drilled 2/3 of the way into the cliff face with the rest sticking out supporting the buildings. The buildings contain bronze, iron and stone statues of Gods and Buddha’s from Chinas three principal religions/philosophies, Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. We walked and climbed all over the monastery following our tour group leader as she described the meaning behind a lot of the statues and artefacts within the different rooms. I was a little disappointed to find out that the monastery literally hangs out on the cliff edge as I thought maybe they would have excavated within the cliff, the part that we see being a front for a much bigger structure within. After a quick lunch we hopped back aboard the minibus and headed back towards the town. Yungang Caves lie 16km west of Datong. These caves have been cut into the cliffs and contain over 50,000 Buddhist statues (also carved out of the cliffs); they also stretch for about 1km. Our tour guide showed us around the best caves (~caves 5-20) and described the treasures within each. The first one we entered had sitting carved from the stone a colossal seated Buddha over 17m high. Also every wall within the cave was also intricately carved leaving no blank stone anywhere. This pretty much set the tone for every cave we entered. Each had its own story to tell, some were better preserved than others but all were amazing. As expected the light within the caves was quite dim and trying to take pictures of huge statues when you’re standing at their feet in the gloom is quite difficult so no photos could really do them justice. Luckily one of the caves further down had completely eroded away leaving the huge carved Buddha out in the open, just perfect for taking photos. Our tour guide joked that they called him China's foreign minister as there were photos of him everywhere, in China and abroad. After the caves we made our way back to the bus and were dropped back off at the train station.
It was great coz all of us went out to a local restaurant and had a great meal for only a pound each. We were stuffed and tired and ready for bed.
Next day, I said goodbye to Yana and Rojelho...the trouble with travelling with different people...too many goodbyes...went to see the famous 9 dragon wall which was built for the prince and then bought some chinese paintbrushes. It was time to head back to Beijing and this time I had a hard sleeper...6 beds in a cabin, 3 on each side and I had the lower one so I didn't have to climb up and down all the time. Unlike the Russian trains though, these cabins have no doors so there is a much more communal feel and atmosphere to them. Gao Bei (returning to her university) and Helen (returning to her teaching job) both lived in Datong and had been visiting families and were on their way back at the end of their holiday. Both spoke great English and again fed me and looked after me and wanted to take me home. But I had my big back pack at the hostel and mypermit for tibet to pick up so i promised them that when I returned to Beijing I'd definitely go stay with them. Helen has even invited me to go to her place and stay during the Olympics next year...guess that's my next visit to China sorted.
Anyway so Yana, Rojelho and I took our first ever hard seater train to Datong (a 7 hour train ride away from Beijing) and I don't know about the other two but in my head I had images of from indian movies of the train rides where people are sitting on top of each other and the animals on top of them. There were no sleeper seats availabe so I had to take the hard seater. The train set off at 10:15 in the morning and it was actually another great train ride. The other two were in a different carriage and when I first went to my carriage the looks and gestures I got made me feel like I didn't belong there. They were all gesturing to me that I really should be in the sleeper carriage and not in 3rd class seats. And actually it was not as I had imagined at all but actually quite civilized. Instead of wooden seats we had kind of a 'soft' cushion and there was a table in between and a woman sat next to me and an elderly couple on the opposite side. So i had enough space and amazing scenery (parts of the great wall, and everyday village life) to keep me occupied. Then slowly yana and Rojelho moved to my cabin and since he could speak a little bit of chinese he translated. The initial feelings of discomfort were all based on a false sense on my part. The old man sitting opposite me thought I was a 19 year old girl travelling on my own and was just concerned for me. Since then he kept giving me food and staring at me coz 'I was so beautiful':) He even gave a little poke in the arm to check that I was real hehehe.. Anyway as soon as they found out that we spoke English they found the only guy on the whole seater carriages who speke English, brought him to us and the whole carriage gathered around us and listened to the occasional translations and the English that they did not understand.
It was amazing talking to him as he spoke quite good English. He went to a school near the coast where there were many foreign teachers (beach = english teachers:) and he told us that for these foreign teachers who found it too hard to use their chinese names (or couldn't be bothered) all the students had second English names too. His was Peter .....others were Lydia? Mariah? Madona:):) But he wanted to be a tour guide and so he felt quite priviledges that his family was able to pay 8000yuan for him to attend this school. Like most young people he was on his way back to school from his home town...hence the impossible task of buying train tickets in china at the end of August.
So we arrived at Datong in the evening and while we were exiting we walked into a representative for the CITS (China International Travel Service) who was kind of fishing out all the western tourists that were being carried past in the surging crowd. He showed us a tour which would take in the two sights that we came to see. We organised everything with the gent, he even showed us where to stay, a hotel right next to the station. We walked around Datong in the evening, had roasted yam on the street and hot chocolate from Mcdonalds:) and then went back for an early night. We had great views of the city from our room and it was nice just to chill. Yana and Rojelo were so easy to travel with.
Next morning we were at the CITS office at nine in the morning and there was a whole van load of tourists waiting. It was great though coz we met some really nice guys. It's always the same..a whole group of a hundered different nationalities...south africa, turkey, france, italy... and I always love exchanging the thousands of different travel stories. But before that we had a real chinese breakfast at the hotel...dumplings with a yellow, wattery soup, boiled egg, salad and fried bread...wierd but filling.
We set off (not promptly, unlike the trains which are impeccably efficient) towards the Hanging Monastery, this lies 75km southeast of Datong and took a couple of hours. This monastery is built perilously on sheer cliffs above Jinlong Canyon. It used to reside 100m above the river bed but over time the river has deposited silt, soil and rocks in the canyon (before being dammed) so now the monastery is only 50m up. The monastery dates back more than 1400 years (pretty old) and is resting on beams that are drilled 2/3 of the way into the cliff face with the rest sticking out supporting the buildings. The buildings contain bronze, iron and stone statues of Gods and Buddha’s from Chinas three principal religions/philosophies, Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. We walked and climbed all over the monastery following our tour group leader as she described the meaning behind a lot of the statues and artefacts within the different rooms. I was a little disappointed to find out that the monastery literally hangs out on the cliff edge as I thought maybe they would have excavated within the cliff, the part that we see being a front for a much bigger structure within. After a quick lunch we hopped back aboard the minibus and headed back towards the town. Yungang Caves lie 16km west of Datong. These caves have been cut into the cliffs and contain over 50,000 Buddhist statues (also carved out of the cliffs); they also stretch for about 1km. Our tour guide showed us around the best caves (~caves 5-20) and described the treasures within each. The first one we entered had sitting carved from the stone a colossal seated Buddha over 17m high. Also every wall within the cave was also intricately carved leaving no blank stone anywhere. This pretty much set the tone for every cave we entered. Each had its own story to tell, some were better preserved than others but all were amazing. As expected the light within the caves was quite dim and trying to take pictures of huge statues when you’re standing at their feet in the gloom is quite difficult so no photos could really do them justice. Luckily one of the caves further down had completely eroded away leaving the huge carved Buddha out in the open, just perfect for taking photos. Our tour guide joked that they called him China's foreign minister as there were photos of him everywhere, in China and abroad. After the caves we made our way back to the bus and were dropped back off at the train station.
It was great coz all of us went out to a local restaurant and had a great meal for only a pound each. We were stuffed and tired and ready for bed.
Next day, I said goodbye to Yana and Rojelho...the trouble with travelling with different people...too many goodbyes...went to see the famous 9 dragon wall which was built for the prince and then bought some chinese paintbrushes. It was time to head back to Beijing and this time I had a hard sleeper...6 beds in a cabin, 3 on each side and I had the lower one so I didn't have to climb up and down all the time. Unlike the Russian trains though, these cabins have no doors so there is a much more communal feel and atmosphere to them. Gao Bei (returning to her university) and Helen (returning to her teaching job) both lived in Datong and had been visiting families and were on their way back at the end of their holiday. Both spoke great English and again fed me and looked after me and wanted to take me home. But I had my big back pack at the hostel and mypermit for tibet to pick up so i promised them that when I returned to Beijing I'd definitely go stay with them. Helen has even invited me to go to her place and stay during the Olympics next year...guess that's my next visit to China sorted.
Tuesday, 28 August 2007
Beijing
Coming into a country by train is just a completely new different experience for me and so much nicer that I now wonder why I haven't though of taking the train instead of flying, before. The landscape were breathtaking and we even got to see parts of the Great Wall. It was morning so we got to see the beginning of the day in rural china. Farmers with their round straw hats walking to their farms, neighbours gathering for a morning chat...it was just a really nice way to easy myself into a new country, culture and way of life. And then coming into Beijing itself, the city with it's tall tower blocks and construction everywhere, but even here you saw everday life passing you by and it just felt so much better because you felt part of it instead of just landing straight into it.
We took the metro and arrived straight into Tiananmen square. What a way to say Niho to China. A rare occasion, but it was blue skies and we could even see the sun so it was twice as nice when our arrival into China was straight into one of the biggest squares in the world. The hostel is right in the centre but in one of beijings few traditional Hu tongs. So it has a great authentic chinese atmosphere and it was an immediate introduction into the chinese way of life as we walked down to the street to our hostel.
But as soon as we were settled in the real China hit us. Train tickets are an absolute nightmare. they are sold out as soon as they are released and it is just impossible to go anywhere in China.
BUT I GOT REALLY LUCKY TODAY AND I AM SO HAPPY THAT I AM GOING TO TIBET:)
We took the metro and arrived straight into Tiananmen square. What a way to say Niho to China. A rare occasion, but it was blue skies and we could even see the sun so it was twice as nice when our arrival into China was straight into one of the biggest squares in the world. The hostel is right in the centre but in one of beijings few traditional Hu tongs. So it has a great authentic chinese atmosphere and it was an immediate introduction into the chinese way of life as we walked down to the street to our hostel.
But as soon as we were settled in the real China hit us. Train tickets are an absolute nightmare. they are sold out as soon as they are released and it is just impossible to go anywhere in China.
BUT I GOT REALLY LUCKY TODAY AND I AM SO HAPPY THAT I AM GOING TO TIBET:)
Friday, 24 August 2007
BELARUS
Talking to people along the way about my little Belarus adventure I am wondering why I was the only person who didn't know that Belarus is just a country that is completely crazy. Everyone except me planned their trip so that it was especially organised to avoid Belarus. People have been around it, over it but I am yet to meet a person who has been through it. The immigration there is so unbelievably strict, stricter even than Russia and the Visas so difficult to get and expensive that it is just better left alone. But it certainly presents a challenge. Anyone up for a trip to Belarus especially sometime next year? I'd love to go and see what's so special there that they do not easily allow ordinary people like us in there.
But I guess my mad adventure was nothing. There are moments when I think I could be sitting at home, watching eastenders and eating some proper home cooked food and my life would be nice and simple and predicatable again. Sometimes when I run into a little bit of hassle, I wonder why I decided to be on the road, so to speak, instead of staying at home. And then I meet people who put me to shame. The other day I met a German couple with a 10 month old baby. They have been cycling all the way round India, China and are now in Mongolia. They use cotton nappies and leave them to dry on the handlebars of the bike as they cycle along to the next destination. With their baby they cycle about 20 km a day. There are some people doing some amazing things and my travels and troubles along the way comparatively seem so miniscule.
But anyway, I guess I'm allowed to be a little homesick now and then. So of course I miss you all and hope some of you will keep me updated on what's going on in Eastenders and all the rest...
But I guess my mad adventure was nothing. There are moments when I think I could be sitting at home, watching eastenders and eating some proper home cooked food and my life would be nice and simple and predicatable again. Sometimes when I run into a little bit of hassle, I wonder why I decided to be on the road, so to speak, instead of staying at home. And then I meet people who put me to shame. The other day I met a German couple with a 10 month old baby. They have been cycling all the way round India, China and are now in Mongolia. They use cotton nappies and leave them to dry on the handlebars of the bike as they cycle along to the next destination. With their baby they cycle about 20 km a day. There are some people doing some amazing things and my travels and troubles along the way comparatively seem so miniscule.
But anyway, I guess I'm allowed to be a little homesick now and then. So of course I miss you all and hope some of you will keep me updated on what's going on in Eastenders and all the rest...
Beautiful Mongolia
Everytime I come into a new city, I'm overwhelmed by all the activity that goes on around me. Sometimes a new language, a new way of interacting, a new transport system to get to grips with, maps and diections to comprehend but if the city is beautiful and the people nice it makes the arrival so much easier and nicer. I think I am yet to wait for both. Ulanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia is in a beautiful setting, nestled in a valley, surrounded by beautiful, green rolling hills and mountains, BUT it is one of the ugliest cities I have seen. Russian type asphalt concrete towers loom from every direction, traffic jams with cars going wherever they please (and if you want to cross the road you do it at your own risk), cheap restaurants serving cuisine from the world over, dust and dirt everywhere, drunks wanderng around, wooden houses that are almost falling apart, narrow muddy alleys, cables and wires everywhere...it really is an ugly city.
After spending a day in Ulanbaatar, I couldn't wait to get out. And once out of the city, Mongolia is a truly magnificently beautiful county. In every direction you look there are breathtaking landscapes. Lush valleys, plateaus, mountains is all you see in whichever direction you look. Mongolians dressed in their traditional clothes herding their horses, sheep, cows, yak.. gers dotted in among the landscape, mongolians sitting tall on their horses galloping away into the distance, motorbikes carrying a passenger and an occasional sheep... it's just breathtaking. And the people are so friendly and hospitable. I spent 5 nights in different gers along the way, galloped through the hills, rode a camel into the desert, tasted fermented mare's milk and fresh yogurt made from sheep milk, listened to some traditional mongolian folk music and although I was looking forward to getting back to Ulaanbaatar for a good long shower, when I actually saw the city as we were heading back, I was really sad. The mongolian countyside is so vast, so varied and so beautiful, I could have easily spent a lot, lot longer here. unfortunately though the roads are all grade 3 or 4 and I spent every second that we were on the road bouncing around and every bone in my body being shaken till there is nothing left to shake.
Mongolia is definitely an amazing place, outside the city, it still retains all it's culture and traditional ways and the landscapes are truly breathtaking.
Monday, 20 August 2007
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