Well, I’m a week into this adventure and I really couldn’t have asked for more here. True, the situation in the city is pretty dire and the poverty isn’t something that’s easy to look past, but the work here has been really rewarding. There are a lot of local Haitian volunteers involved in this deloyment and working side by side with them is really what’s made this first week so great.

• Day One - Arrival. Went out to a job site for a couple of hours in the afternoon and witnessed a man sort of attack one of the local volunteers for dumping mud in front of his house. We regrouped and continued the work after finding a new mud dumping site but it was a bit of a harsh introduction to the area. The volunteer was ok but a bit shaken.
• Day Two - Oxfam tool distribution. This was an interesting day consisting mostly of waiting around with a few hours of furious activity in between. Hands On teamed up with Oxfam Spain to distribute sets of tools to fifty families with the idea being that they would work together with other families in the neighbourhood to clear mud from their homes. The distribution went well after a bit of chaos at the beginning and it was very interesting to see a major international organisation like Oxfam at work. Besides sending wheelbarrows out unassabled to people who probably don’t own the tools to put them together, it all went smoothly. We later found out that people in this area didn’t actually have nearly as much mud to clear as the homes we were helping and learned that the Oxfam people didn’t even know about the extreme need in the areas we’d been in.
• Day Three - Day off. I attempted to sort out my stuff by building a shelf out of plywood but mostly took it easy and let my sore bones rest. There are lots of really nice, funny people here and finding someone to chat with each night is definitely so problem.
• Day Four - Clearing an easy house. Worked on a house that was totally empty of furniture and filled with pretty good mud. There are many classifications of mud here (mostly made up by the volunteers) ranging from sticky to heavy to dry to wet and everything in between. The mud in this house was heavy and sticky but, because it broke off into chunks, it was easy to handle. I spent the day shovelling and can safely say I have never worked so hard or sweated so much, not even when I was picking fruit in Australia. We finished the house in one day and it was really satisfying to know that we all worked hard and got someone back into their house faster than expected.
• Day Five - Clearing a difficult house. Went to a home that had been under mud over six feet high. Hands On have been working at this place for over a week now but, because of the amount of mud and lack of space to use wheelbarrows (buckets are passed between people instead) things have been very slow going. I ended up getting water in my rubber boots so it was kind of a miserable day but even the bad days are never that bad.
• Day Six - Painting a school. Spent the day painting windows and doors at a school that Hands On have been working on since they started the project on October 10th. When the work began, the courtyard and all of the classroms were under several feet of mud and now everything is mud free and in need of some coats of paint. Even though I wasn’t here to see the school at its worst, I can completely imagine what it was like and seeing it cleared up and having the painters moving in is a cool thing. Pretty tedious work but it was a relaxing day and there was a bit of a leaving party at night for a few people so beers were drunk.
• Day Seven - Clearing Happy Lady’s house. Worked on clearing a foot of sticky mud and lots of furniture from a lovely lady’s home who thanked us with kisses at the end of the job. She was very thankful that we were doing this work for free and it was great to see that she understood this point because, often, our people think our local volunteers are getting paid and it’s nice to see them get credit for being volunteers.

So it’s day seven and, after watching an awesome sunrise from the roof of the house here and eating a yummy dinner made up entirely of mystery dishes, I’m surfing on a super fast net connection and attempting to get caught up on emails.

I really think this is going to be an amazing experience and I’m really looking forward to seeing what the next two months have in store. If things continue to be as good as the first week then I’m in for an awesome time!

There’s something seedy and a bit dodgy about Khao San Road and for some reason the travel agents in that area don’t really instill a lot of confidence in me. It probably has something to do with the shady VIP buses they organise that never seem to go all the way to their destinations and tend to arrive with things missing. So when we decided to get out of Bangkok on a short break, I wasn’t exactly totally confident in our friendly local travel agent.

We had originally planned to do a day trip but as we looked at the various options, escaping Bangkok for two days and a night seemed like the best bet. Three of our friends who were arriving that night decided that they were keen so we decided to do a bit of bargaining. The tour was to take in the River Kwai, a train ride, some museums, a waterfall, Hellfire Pass, elephant riding, bamboo rafting and had the option to give some elephants a bath and visit the Tiger Temple. Pretty much your standard trip out to the Kanchanaburi area. We bargained the guy down fro 950B to 810B each so we were pretty happy with ourselves but still not totally convinced that it’d be a good tour.

I started the day hungover which seems to have bcome a theme over the past month so the early hours of the tour are a blur. The first stop after a long drive was at a cemetery in Kanchanaburi, then a museum, and then I walked along the bridge over the River Kwai and tried not to throw up on it. Time ticked on and I started to feel more normal and enjoyed a train ride before having lunch at our accommodation on a floating house on the river.

In the afternoon we were dropped off at possibly the most pitiful looking waterfall I have come across. We were all looking forward to a swim but the water at the bottom was pretty festy so opted instead to climb up to the top and dunk our heads under the flowing water. My friend Kempy slipped and stacked it hard at the top which was the highlight of the day. Sympathetic friends we are not.

I took in an awesome sunset and then opted for a rare quiet night. A few of us got up early to give some elephants a bath. We had no idea what to expect but were happy to see that the elephants were well looked after. I clung onto the head of mine for dear life and made sure to clean behind his ears.f The elephant guys seemed to have a good relationship with their beasties and it was a pretty awesome thing getting to sit on an elephant as it dunked itself into the water.

We also opted to visit the Tiger Temple which is a sactuary run by monks. It was a pretty strange place. The tigers were pretty out of it, most barely awake and some outright passed out. The guy working there said it’s because tigers are nocturnal. Hrm… not sure about that explanation. It was kind of sad to see so we wandered off to other areas of the park and found a couple of random lions in a cage which was pretty cool.

So over all our mystery tour was really good. Most importantly, it was a booze free event and I was starting to feel normal again.

I attended the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and lived to tell the tale. I’m not sure how I did it, but I managed to pull it off. I knew it would be a big party, but I never expected it to be THAT big. I escaped Beijing as a shadow of my former self, my liver no doubt hating me and in need of some serious nap time. Rather than go over the Games day by day (which would be impossible given that they all sort of blend into one) I’ve highlighted a few things that stand out about my Olympic experience. I loved every moment of it, but one thing is sure, I’m glad it’s over. I’ll need four years to recover before London 2012.

• Volunteers - The volunteers were unreal. I have never seen people be that friendly before in my life and it was great. They all seemed to be having a blast as well and it showed.
• Spectators - Chinese people attending the Games were super friendly too and it was easy to get them cheering for your team or to get them to cheer along with you for China. Wearing China gear to events was a hit and we’d often have to spend an hour leaving an event due to all the photos people wanted with us. They taught us songs, gave us presents, and left us both with a great impression of Chinese people. Fans from other countries were great too and we discovered early on that cheering with a group of fans sitting nearby is a fun way to get into a sport if Canada or Australia weren’t competing.
• Venues - All of the venues were great and except for the occasional long line for the toilet or food stalls, everything went smoothly. It was great to get to see inside the Bird’s Nest and Water Cube. Those were both highlights. The Olympic Green could have been a bit more green and a bit less concrete but overall it was a cool place to spend the day. The food at the venues was terrible with the only edible things being Snickers bars and Oreo cookies but fortunately the beer was cheap. Eating is cheating anyways.
• Venue seating - Seat numbers seemed to be optional and sneaking into the better seating sections was a piece of cake. Everyone seemed to sit wherever they wanted which meant forming massive cheerig sections of your country’s fans was easy and made the whole experience much more exciting.
• Events - My friend and I have been planning this trip for over a year and as a result had lots of tickets to lots of different sporting events. She wanted mainly swimming, I wanted more random things and it turned out well for me. We only got one swimming ticket and filled the rest of our time with things like weightlifting (very fun), handball (awesome sport), wrestling (made some friends from Khazakstan and scored a flag) and other sports that don’t really get publicity any other time of the year. Got to see Canada win gold at rowing too which was pretty cool.
• Parties - I had two friends in town who used to be my roommates in London and we did our best to live up to those crazy days. I nearly broke myself but it was worth it. The town was pumping every night and the atmosphere was equal parts friendly and rowdy which always makes for a great night out.

So the Olympics are over, I spent too much money, drank too much and remember very little but it was worth it. I’ve got a week in Bangkok with my friends and then they’ll all be heading back to reality in Australia and I think I’ll be off to Burma for some low key travels for a month. I’ve really loved China and will miss it but am lookig forward to some blue skies and a bit of relaxation in Thailand.

We couldn’t have asked for a better introduction to the Olympic spirit than our first day of events. We had a 2pm women’s basketball game to kick off our ridiculously huge schedule of events and it was an awesome day all around.

The venue was great, the game was fun, beers were less than a buck, plus we wore a load of China gear complete with t-shirts, headbands and massive flags and were a hit with the Chinese fans. Inside the stadium we joined along with their cheers and outside, after the game, we were mobbed by camera-toting Chinese people.

We soaked up our newfound celebrity status for about an hour before we were able to make our escape to the train. A huge group of people in mysterious yellow shirts befriended us and posed with us for ages. At the end of the photoshoot a couple of the ladies gave us their souveneir opening ceremony wristbands wihch were only given to people who went to the opening ceremonies. I think. They’re numbered and in demand so for them to give them to us was a big deal. For us it was at least.

Hugs were exchanged, goodbyes said and we wandered off towards the train only to be reunited with them all inside the station. We boarded the train and the singalongs and that’s when the good times began! They were singing some Chinese song with the tune of ‘Jingle Bells’ and ‘Auld Lang Syne’ (the New Years song) was a popular favourite as well although nobody really sang any words, it was more about noise making. It was possibly one of the most bizarre and funny experiences of my life and an awesome way to kick off the Olympics.

In an effort to cram as much in as possible before our busy Olympics schedule was to begin, we booked to head out on a tour of the Great Wall the day after getting back from Xi’an. Two major attractions in two days… looks like my lazy travel days are a thing of the past.

I stayed at Leo Hostel when I first arrived in Beijing and had heard good things about their ‘Secret Wall’ tour. People were raving about it, actually, so I figured it must be a pretty good day out. I had heard loads of times about people’s disappointment with the restored, super-touristy areas of the wall so was after something a wee bit different. I’m not sure my friends were convinced but eventually they decided to give it a go.

Another early morning saw us in a minivan with a nice group of travellers. We drove for about three hours, chatted a bit, slept a bit and eventually made it to a road with a police blockade on it. We passed through that without much delay and then a few minutes later we were detained by a bunch of villagers apparently hoping to swindle some money out of us. We waited them out for about 20 minutes and they gave up and waved us through towards our destination.

We were met by a little old man who spoke no English who led us up a hill. We couldn’t see the wall due to some serious fog/smog so we climbed up the hill blindly waiting for it to appear from the mist. When we first got to it I could tell everyone was a bit under whelmed, myself included. All that was left of it was a short, crumbling brick wall with weeds and grass growing out of every nook and cranny. But after following along for a little while we finally saw what all the fuss was about. The towers were huge and seeing the wall spread across the peaks of the hills was amazing. Unfortunately we couldn’t see too far ahead because of the fog but it sort of added a bit of mystery to the whole experience not knowing what was coming next.

We were pretty surprised to see a guy waving to us from one of the towers about two hours into our walk and even more surprised to find that he was operating a makeshift corner store inside the tower complete with snacks, souvenir books and beer. We figured a beer on the Great Wall was too good a chance to pass up and cracked one open on top of the tower and toasted our trek. Apparently the shop guy has to walk two hours to work and back carting a whole load of stuff with him and sometimes he doesn’t even have any groups passing through. Nice place to work but it’s a bit of a crap commute.

After about three hours of hiking along the wall we meandered down into a small village, had a tasty meal and were soon on our way back to Beijing. The ‘Secret Wall’ tour turned out to be a pretty good day out but I think I’d also like to see other parts to see for myself if it really is a disappointing tourist trap.

I have to admit that I’m a bit of a crap traveller. Given the choice of seeing something famous or actually doing something and meeting people, I’d probably choose the latter and just buy a postcard. As an example, I’m probably one of the few people who’ve been to New York City and not seen that big statue… whatever it’s called. Instead I spent my trip building igloos in a park, sliding down snowy hills on baking trays, and hitting the bars of Yonkers. I doubt any of those things are on anyone’s ‘must do’ list for New York.

So when a couple of my friends were coming to stay with me for the Olympics and suggested a trip to Xi’an, I wasn’t really too keen. I was hoping to dissuade them with time limits but the idea of flying came from somewhere and the new plan was to head to Xi’an on a 24 hour whirlwind tour to visit the Terracotta Warriors. At first I was going to give it a miss and let them go alone but I was eventually persuaded and I skeptically went along with the plan.

We’d had a big night the night before and had to get up for an 11am flight. My friend’s alarm clock was still on Australian time though so we ended up getting up two hours earlier than we needed and headed out to the airport very early and very hungover. It worked out well though because our flight had been cancelled and we were able to jump on an earlier one.

We all sort of wandered around aimlessly our first day in Xian. Taking in some markets, a park, loads of food stalls and walked along the inside of the city walls for awhile. I was pretty sleep deprived and sort of operating in zombie mode so can’t say I really took in a lot of what we saw in. We had booked ourselves onto an early tour the next morning to go say g’day to the warriors so learning from our mistakes, we had an early night.

The next day we went on a tour with a couple of other people from our hostel. We were taken to a place that makes giant warrior statues and were kidnapped into a silk place as well. The silk place was sort of funny. It was attempting to look like a factory but the machines were only turned on as we arrived and turned off as we left. Then we were sort of herded into a room with loads of clothes and had a hard time escaping due to the exit being sort of hidden. Do people ever buy things when they’re kidnapped into a store? It must work some of the time.

So after our forced non-shopping spree and a yummy lunch we were finally off to see some Terracotta Warriors. They’re housed in three huge warehouse type things and I have to say that it’s pretty impressive to see. The detail in them really is life like all the way down to individual strands of hair. They’ve each got their own weapons and even the horses are impressive. Loads are smashed and loads more still haven’t even been uncovered but it really is pretty awe-inspiring when you think of all the work that went into creating them. It’s even more mind-boggling when you think about them all being created just to be buried.

Overall I’m glad I went but I still can’t help but I still can’t help but feel guilty for popping into the city just to see a major attraction to check it off my list. Spending 24 hours in Xi’an really didn’t do it justice. It was a fun little escape but I’m not in any rush to do a whirlwind visit again anytime soon.

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.