Everything was telling me to stay put. I really love Fenghuang and found a great hostel, I really hate Hong Kong and haven’t found a decent place to stay so far, and it was pissing down with rain. I should have followed my instincts and stayed in Fenghuang for a few more days.

But instict be damned, I decided to leave. I trekked through the rain to the bus station to find that the bus to Huaihua was full. Another pulled up soon after and I waited on it for an hour for it to leave. On the journey I had the only gigantic man in China sitting beside me and not only was he expanding over onto my side of the seat, he also kept falling alseep and his head kept falling onto my shoulder. Eventually I came up with a plan to reverse my position, face him, and back as far away from him as far as I could before hitting the side of the bus. This created a bit of space between us for awhile but then he did some sort of manoever where he stealthily filled up the space I’d just created with his ass. Now we were spooning. I was about to start whispering sweet nothings into his ear when the bus came to a sudden halt and he got up and left. I felt so used.

By my calculations we should have had about 30 more minutes to go in our ride to Huaihua where I’d be (hopefully) catching a night train down towards Hong Kong. I knew we hadn’t arrived because everyone who got off left their stuff on the bus. I thought at first it was a massive smoke/pee break but as the break dragged on I started to wonder. I attempted to ask the bus driver if we had arrived and he mimed back to me something that resembled two things (his fists) crashing together. I took this to mean there had been an accident so went for a look to confirm whether or not my mime understanding skills were up to scratch.

Sure enough, two minutes up the road was a house with the back end of an SUV sticking out of it. The police were doing what seemed to be an in depth investigation complete with video, but I noticed that the road wasn’t actually blocked. Cars, vans, buses and even a truck full of chickens were all forbidden to pass not because of the investigation, but because of the villagers.

The police told us the road wouldn’t be opening anytime soon so everyone on my bus grabbed their stuff and started walking. I really had no choice so grabbed my bag and wandered off with the rest of my stranded bus mates in what I assumed to be the general direction of Huaihua. A couple of young people adopted me and told me that three people had died in the crash, a baby had been seriously injured, the driver had done a runner and the villagers were not letting any vehicles pass until… well I’m not sure when. Eventually after about 20 minutes some of us got picked up by a suicidal minivan driver and got to Huaihua in one piece.

Delayed by about 3 hours at this point, I didn’t get a ticket on any of the late afternoon trains and could only swing a spot on the midnight train. So I had six hours to kill. Great. I was starving and in search of food and wandering around, looking lost when I was approached by a youngish girl who spoke a bit of English. She asked what I wanted, I said food, she thought I wanted to eat with foreigners and proceeded to take me to the town’s only five-star hotel. But we passed a KFC on the way and I was able to spare the five star people from a visit from my smelly self and my dirty bags.

I chatted with the girl for a while and she asked if I wanted to hang out at her place until my train. She kept telling me over and over how terrible a place it was and I countered, telling her about the squalor I used to live in in London. Well her place was worse (but didn’t have the mushrooms growing in it like my old house did). It was super small consisting only of one room about two meters wide and 6 meters long, a single bed, a desk, a table but no cooker or fridge, and the toilet/shower was actually an add on that was outside on the roof! She was about seven floors up so that made for a pretty impressive place to pee. But for $30/month, what can you expect?

She kept telling me how brave I was to be travelling on my own. That seems to be a trend with Chinese people. They seem to think that they live in some sort of scary, dangerous place when in truth, it’s one of the safest places I’ve ever been. I went on my spiel about how most people in the world are good, if you trust people great things will happen, people look out for a lone female traveller blah blah blah and by the end of it I think I had convinced her to travel the world.

So for a day that started out questionably, it turned out to be a pretty interesting one. I had some good chats with some locals, got to my destination in one piece and got to see what $30 a month buys these days in Huaihua. Success!

I have just escaped the noisiest hotel I have ever experienced. The hotel is made of wood and I think it has a family of elephants living on the floor above me. I have no idea how it’s possible to stomp around so much. Plus the lock on the toilet outside of my room is broken which meant that people were getting stuck in there (myself included) every hour or so and banging the hell out of the door for their freedom. Also, there’s a highway across the river and the vehicles barrelling down the road are all equipped with ear shattering horns that they like to honk as often as possible. And last but not least, boat tours head up and down the river and loud singalongs seem to break out willy nilly starting at about 7am.

As if the noise wasn’t bad enough, the smells surrounding this place are nasty. I managed to give myself food poisening yesterday. I suspect a dodgy bowl of breakfast noodles. Beef, chili peppers and noodles are not meant to be breakfast food. I was hanging out in a coffee shop across the river from my hotel when I suddenly came to the conclusion that I should be back at the hotel in bed and in close proximity to the toilet so I bolted for home.

To get back to my hotel I had to cross over a bridge which had a slew of salespeople on the other side. Normally, not a problem. In this case they were peddling tiny shrimp and other fishy things that had been baking in the hot sun for most of the afternoon. I pushed through the pain and managed not to puke. Test number two came in the alley on the way to the hotel where a man had set up shop selling ’stinky tofu’. Yes that’s its name and yes, it stinks. Plus it looks like fried testicles. Not that I know what fried testicles looks like, mind you. I managed to hold my breath as I barrelled down the alleyway elbowing wmen and children from my path for the greater good of not having me vomit all over them.

Other than my crappy hotel, Fenghuang is actually a pretty nice place. It’s under seige from Chinese tourists but foreigners seem to be a rarity. The touts here haven’t yet learned their sales pitches in English and they generally leave me alone and instead harass my Chinese friend. We’ve since discovered a very cool hostel with a cafe and wifi and I think I’ll park myself here for a few days, try to get some work done and hope that the noise and smells don’t follow me here.

After two years of being a member of Couchsurfing, I have finally surfed for the first time and it was great! I stayed with a local girl in Guanxhi province and it was more than I could have hoped for although, at first, I was a bit worried. She was meeting up with a friend of hers and told me that the woman was working as a missionary. She also asked if it would be ok if she told the woman that I was a Christian because the missionary chick doesn’t like her having non-Christian friends.

I really can’t stand missionaries, I’m hugely unreligious, and I’m a terrible liar so agreeing to this sort of thing was tough. But what the hell, why not. I was secretly hoping to get an invite to a local, underground church because it would have been interesting, but it was not to be. Instead I bowed my head for grace (not really knowing what I was doing), said ‘amen’ at the right time (I think) and was on my best behaviour. I managed to get through lunch without exposing myself as the heathen that I am or insulting the Christians so I figured I was off to a good start. What’s the deal with that lady only wanting her to be friends with Christians? Did I mention I can’t stand missionaries?

Ok less ranting, more posting. So that night we headed to a Chinese nightclub complete with Western music from the late nineties, cage dancers and a flame throwing bartender. My host was a dancing machine who wouldn’t let me sit down. Normally this would be ok except that I had spent all day on buses and felt really gross, the bar was strangely well lit, the area where we were dancing was elevated, and being the only foreigner in there meant that escaping the staring crowds was impossible.

Normally in situations like these I would drink lots and forget my worries but this was impossible since the Chinese have developed some kind of crazy system for drinking in bars which involves downing beer in shots all at the same time. This meant that sucking back a couple of bottles of beer quickly was not an option. So I put on a brave face and danced badly in a well lit bar on a podium with all eyes staring at me and just went with it.

The next day we hopped on a bus with a couple of her friends and headed out of town a bit to a local swimming spot. Guanxhi province is beautiful with rivers snaking through mountain scenery and the swimming spot was gorgeous. Chinese families and groups of friends were downing beers, barbequing, playing mahjong, swimming and enjoying the sunshine. It was pretty cool. I got to barbeque and coat my meat in a spicy MSG concoction. Good stuff.

Overall the experience was pretty amazing. I ended up making some new friends, learned a lot about Chinese culture, and discovered nightclubs and rivers that I would never have found on my own. Couchsurfing is the way forward.

After three uneventful but very relaxing nights at the Dragon’s Backbone Rice Terraces, it was time to make a move. The morning of my departure though saw the village explode with colours and music as the locals got out their best traditional dress and instruments and celebrated something. Who knows what. But it was pretty cool.

After the festivities it was time to make the journey to Chengyang. A short journey on a cramped local bus was followed by a somewhat more comfortable journey on a regular bus for 5 hours. At one point woman sat down beside me with a little kid on her lap. I hate sitting beside people with small children sitting on them because eventually they always let the kids slide from their grip and next thing you know you’ve got half a smelly baby on your lap or its hair is touching your arm or something equally annoying. But then again, I am pretty easily annoyed.

I was staring out the window at the beautiful scenery, listening to some music, and just relaxing when the woman with the kid sort of reached across me with her hand and threw something out the window. Turns out the kid had eaten one grape too many and had puked into grannie’s hand. If that doesn’t kill a chilled out mood, I don’t know what will. Toilet paper was passed around, hands and mouths were wiped, and a plastic bag was positioned in front of the barf baby.

Later on, the bag sort of drifted my way and I caught it before it went out the window and went to give it back to the grannie. She motioned for me to throw it out the window and I was going to be annoying and set an example by putting it the offending trash into my bag to throw away later in a garbage bin. But then I caught a quick glimpse of something purple on the bag that I suspect was baby grape spew. So out the bus window went the bag. Do I feel guilty? Yes. But there is no way I’m carrying around baby puke in my purse. Environment be damned in that case.

Yangshuo is the kind of place you hate to love. It’s touristy as hell and doesn’t really even feel like it’s in China, but it’s beautiful, fun, packed with things to do and I’m finding it hard to tear myself away.

Plus I have a bit of a purpose here beyond just guzzling beer and checking out the sights. I’ve been working at an English school here in town. The deal is pretty sweet - free accommodation, food and beer in exchange for spending two hours a night chatting to groups of students about anything at all. The students are great! They’re so eager to learn it’s almost scary. Friday nights spent studying aren’t uncommon and they’re not shy about vying for your attention so they can practice what they learned in class that day. The best part for me is being able to find out about their lives and learn a lot about China in the process.

As if getting to interact with the students isn’t enough, Yangshuo itself has a lot on offer. There are karst mountains that stick up from the ground like shards of glass all around this area. They’re beautiful and bizarre and exploring the area around town by bike is a great way to spend a day. There are opportunities to go bamboo rafting, climbing, hiking, caving, or if you’re not feeling energetic, hanging out in the bars and cafes around town is a great way to spend some time.

This is the sort of place I could stick around for a long time. I was contemplating spending the whole month here and maybe taking a crash course in Chinese, but I think I should do a bit more exploring of the area so have reluctantly changed my mind. I’m heading off tomorrow with only vague plans of heading north towards Chengdu to see some friends. What happens in between is up for debate!

When I headed off travelling back in 2001 I had with me a big bag of art supplies that I proceeded to carry around the world with me. Twice. They were heavy, bulky and did I use them? Hell no. I decided I needed to accept that I would probably never actually use them and decided to say goodbye to my neglected, dusty, stowaway art supplies in December. I donated them to a charity shop and rejoiced at the extra space in my backpack.

Well a couple days ago I found myself inside an art supplies store. I probably never should have darkened its doorstep because I know what I’m like. But I can’t resist them and once I got inside and saw how cheap everything was, well it was game over. Now I am the proud owner of about 20 tubes of oil paint, paintbrushes, turpentine, pencils, sharpeners, erasers, a sketch pad, canvases, and a palette. I even bought a plastic toolbox type thing to put them all in. Damn.

So now I have a heavy, bulky purple plastic box of art supplies that I really hope I use more than once or twice. Fortunately, in Beijing there’s inspiration everywhere and it seems like a pretty artsy place. I’ve been hanging out with a couple I met in The Philippines who are really into art and tagging along with them to meetups with local artists, galleries and stuff like that.

We went out to dinner with a Japanese artist living here, headed out to 798, a collection of galleries on the outskirts of Beijing, and went to a presentation of artsy types called Pecha Kucha. We even managed to accidentally catch the tail end of a Chinese opera and I don’t think my eardrums will ever forgive me for it. Holy crap it was high pitched. I didn’t know that noises like that existed.

My excuse in the past was that I never had time to draw and paint. Well now time is one thing I have plenty of so if those art supplies find themselves on another journey around the world without leaving the confines of the purple box, I’ll be really annoyed.

The first time I ever felt an earthquake I was in a little village in New Zealand. I was pretty sure that I’d heard somewhere that, during an earthquake, you should get outdoors or at the very least find a doorway to stand in. I decided that it was too cold so snuggled up under my duvet instead with the assumption that the building was too small to crush me to death. It stopped a few seconds later and in the morning I had to verify that it wasn’t just a dream.

I felt my second earthquake this afternoon here in Beijing and my reaction was similarly relaxed (irresponsible?) but not on purpose. I was sitting at my desk in my room doing some work and sort of felt like I was swaying from side to side. I had gone out the previous night and chalked it up to a hangover and instead of rushing into the streets with the rest of Beijing’s Central Business District where I live, I decided I needed a nap. I only found out a few hours later than it had been an earthquake. Oops.

It looks like this earthquake in Sichuan has been a major event with five deaths becoming 5,000 potentially. In Myanmar it’s looking like things are spiraling way out of control and will only get worse as the government keeps denying access to relief workers and supplies. Having had the opportunity to put faces, names and stories to the disaster in Bangladesh has made me take these recent events a little more personally than I might have before.

So I’m holding off on the Chinese lessons and waiting to see what happens in Myanmar and with this earthquake in China because there’s nothing I’d rather be doing than relief work with HODR. Does that make me a disaster chaser? Creepy.

I have to admit that I haven’t really done much (any) sightseeing since I arrived about 10 days ago. I have managed to join a gym, buy bedding, find a good supermarket near my house, eat lots of Mexican food (?), scope out some language courses, locate the main bar area, do some work on my websites and watch a bunch of pirated DVDs.

I was out today and finally saw the children’s ass crack pants in action but it was a pee, not a poo. Apparently the ass crack extends to the crotch region. Great. There’s something disconcerting about seeing a puddle of human pee on a busy sidewalk in Beijing’s Central Business District. There’s somethine even more disconcerting about the idea of little baby jobbies booby trapping the sidewalks. There’s something especially disconcerting knowing that a pair of pants has been designed specifically with this in mind.

As far as my attempt at Chinese, I’m still sadly stuck on ‘hello’ and ‘thank you’. Hello is ‘nihao’ and apparently ‘ni’ means ‘you’ and ‘hao’ means ‘good’. So I guess I know four words. Fours words in over a week is pretty slow going. Although I did have to learn the world for bridge to tell taxi drivers where I live so I guess I’m at five. Of course I say all of these words completely wrong and have no grasp on the world of tones so I might as well be a mute. Chinese is scary.

I’ve been in Beijing now for a few days and I have to be honest that, due to the discovery of giant beers for less than a buck and a really fun hostel, I have probably spent more time hungover than being productive.

But I have managed to get a few things done in the five days I’ve been here. On Monday I headed up to the University district where I was planning on living and studying. I was wandering by a real estate office sipping on my iced tea when I was whisked inside and they tried to help me with the apartment search. With me speaking no Chinese and them speaking no English, we were communicating with a Google translating website. Their first question for me was ‘Are you anxious?’ I assume they were wondering how soon I wanted an apartment as opposed to enquiring about my state of the mind at the time. After a few more similarly confusing questions I made a hasty exit and was still apartmentless.

The subway here spells like kilbossa and their stairways smell like spearmint. It makes me hungry every time I travel on it. Something that doesn’t make me hungry… I saw a little kid wearing a pair of pants with a slit in the ass crack which is rumoured to be for unleashing poops on location, on demand. Fortunately I didn’t see this device in action but I’m sure I will soon enough. But back to the subway… it’s really, really busy. There are people going everywhere at all times and I have no idea how the thing survives during rush hour. It looks like there are fences and things set up to corral commuters into lines when it gets really busy. I just can’t see myself wanting to wait in a giant line for the underground when taxis here only cost a few bucks to get anywhere.

So on to taxis… if I don’t get mowed down by one of them soon I will be surprised. If I don’t get moved down by a bke, car or bus I will be more surprised. The corners of the major streets (highways?) are manned by men who direct traffic while you cross the street and even with them there it’s a really scary experience getting anywhere in this place. I just kind of close my eyes and walk off into the street hoping for the best which is probably a strategy that could use some work.

It also doesn’t help that I have no idea where I live. I have  a vague idea where I am on a map of the city but I’m not totally sure how to say it and none of the maps are accurate enough for me to be able to point. This is the most confusing place I’ve ever been but I guess I can’t be too hard on myself after only a week. I don’t think I’ve eaten dog yet by accident and I haven’t been swindled so I’m not doing too bad I suppose.

So ya… I got an apartment. This sounds really dodgy but I met an American guy in a bar the other night and he needed a housemate, I needed a house, and there you have it. Easy as that. So two days later I am sitting in a swish apartment for way less than I was expecting to pay and way way less hassle than I would have had to go through if I got my own place. Internet set up, cleaner arranged, lease under his name, and all that good stuff.

I went to a language school this afternoon and think I might be lazy again and sign up for them because I can’t figure out how to get around this damned city and that place is a 15 minute walk away. The only horrible, horrible problem is that classes start at 8:30am and go for four hours a day, Monday to Friday. That sounds like hell. I might just go for four weeks and see if I can hack it. I have my doubts though.

So all up, Beijing is a pretty cool place. Once I figure out how to leave my house and get back in one piece and learn some of the language and stop feeling like such a moron I think things will be really good here. Looking forward to it!

I’m in Beijing! I arrived late last night. I had no idea how I was getting from the airport to my hotel or even where in the city the hotel is located but as we were coming in for a landing I had that same feeling I had when I was heading nowhere on a bus in Bangladesh. Not really having total control over every detail is kind of a great feeling and I couldn’t stop smiling.

I really had no master plan for getting to my hotel. I’d heard that no cabbies speak English so my plan had been to show them the hotel’s address in Mandarin, work out a price with some sort of system of grunts and hand signals, and then head off for a good nights sleep. As it turns out, I found an English speaking guy posing as a taxi driver who led me to his beat up car outside, drove like a crazy person and had bad late 90’s dance tunes cranking the whole way. I probably paid way too much for the honour but I was happy to be on my way.

So it’s morning now and I’m sitting in my really nice hotel room watching painting shows on TV. I still have no idea where in the city I am except that I’m a hell of a long way out so I’m mustering up the energy to relocate myself to my hostel, buy a mobile phone, start the apartment hunt, look for a language school and call some friends I have here to arrange to meet up.

It’s all giving me a bit of a headache thinking about it but I’m really excited to get life in China rolling. But first I’ve got to tear myself away from the TV. China’s main news channel is called ‘CCTV’. Surely I can’t be the only person who finds that funny?