China Vacation II: Yangshou

Rode back to out to Guilin on another 19 hour sleeper train. Took the bus from Guilin, and I arrived in Yangshuo around 3pm. After a bit of searching, I found my hostel amid the town’s tout-infested pedestrian arcade. Monkey Jane’s hostel-and-bar is in a narrow, six or seven story building tucked into a back alley. The big draw for the hostel is the rooftop bar, sporting a panoramic view of the city and the Li river. Nice place, nice people, and frequent beerpong tournaments.
On my first full day in town, I took a bus out to Yangdi, a little river town north of Yangshuo. From here, people frequently take leisurely bamboo boat rides down through what is considered the most beautiful section of the Li river. The river banks are lined with persimmon orchards and vegetable fields, and water buffalo frequent the shore. Most people arriving into Yangdi are quickly herded into bamboo boats or ferries. There is a hiking path that follows the river, however you have to cross the river three times to get to the village at the end. This presents a problem, because trips across the river are not free. You need to negotiate for each ride, often with little knowledge of what constitutes a fair price and with few alternate options. The folks in Yangdi got me and a nice Dutch couple for 10 Yuan a person, and getting across for so little was like pulling teeth. The other boat rides cost 5 just for myself.
Got to Yiping, the town on the other end of the trail, and found a bus to take me back to Yangshuo. Yangshuo is filled with tourists, a surprising percentage of whom are Israeli. Israelis are common travelers across the non-Muslim countries in East Asia (as in, not Indonesia or Malaysia). Americans are, comparatively, not. I saw the most Israelis while staying at Mama Naxi’s in Lijiang, but Yangshuo had plenty to put together a quite large Rosh Hashana dinner. The people who were organizing it were nice enough to invite me.
Celebrating Jewish holidays with Israelis was strange. I am not an especially religious person, but I always celebrate the holidays because I like the familiarity of them. Familiar, this dinner was not. For one, though I was not the only American, I was the only person who did not speak Hebrew. American Jews typically put something of a tune to their prayers to help remember them. Israelis can understand the prayers word-for-word, so they recite them somewhat conversationally. They also include more Sephardic (Middle Eastern) traditions, whereas most American Jews are Ashkenazi (European). I was surprised at some of the differences, such as blessing pomegranates, whereas they assumed such traditions were universal.
However, strangely, they didn’t find my unfamiliarity surprising, and insisted on explaining the common prayers along with the different ones. This gets to the other thing. This might just be my own insecurities, but I felt many Israelis saw me as less Jewish, because I was not Israeli. Again, this is just the impression I got, and it might not have been anything.

A casual observer might have noticed how I am not in any photos, or that I clearly took all my pictures from Google Image Search. On my last day in China, tragedy struck. I was sitting on the roof in the early afternoon reading my email when some guys who worked at the hostel invited me to go climbing with them. We were going to the “secret beach” along the Li river, which they said was neither much of a secret nor much of a beach, but did have a cliff you could climb up and jump off into the river. I was told to not bring anything too valuable, so I left my laptop, money, and passport in the safe at the hostel. I brought my wallet so I could rent a bike and climbing shoes, my camera and a backpack to put it all in.
This was a mistake, and I recognized it as such as soon as I arrived at the beach. You see, the cliffs are on the far side of the river from the beach, and we had to swim to reach it. The idea of keeping an eye on my bag became unrealistic. I could risk having it stolen, or just turn around and back back to town. I hid my bag under our bikes, in the hope that moving them all around would protect me. There was an foreigner hanging out at the beach, and I figured that his presence would dissuade thieves. I also, stupidly, thought that I might improve my chances by hiding my valuables within my bag, so that anyone rummaging through would have a hard time grabbing something quickly. So I put my wallet in my shirt and left the camera at the bottom of the bag.

The swim across the river would not be easy in the best conditions. The river is about 30 or 40m across and quite deep, with a slight current. Big ferries hauling tourists from Guilin to Yangshuo frequently appeared at the bend of the river, leaving the water choppy with their wake. Worse, we were swimming in climbing shoes which pretty much meant our legs were useless for forward propulsion. The swim to the cliffs was a bit difficult. It became much more so after I had tired my arms out climbing up the cliffs.
After we had been climbing for about fifteen minutes, the old guy started waving to us and shouting. I swam back to the other side (which in it self was a bit scary. I am not the strongest swimmer to begin with and I got caught in the middle with a procession of ferries to dodge) and asked him what was up. “Um, yeah, well I took a short nap. I heard something moving the bikes, but I figures it was nothing. Then, when I woke up, your bag was gone.”
Let’s recap. Within my bag was my wallet, camera (with every picture I took), glasses, raincoat, shoes and shirt. I was left with nothing but a bathing suit I was wearing and some soaked rental climbing shoes. We looked around for a while to see if the bag was stashed, and then headed back to town. On the way, I ran over some broken glass and popped my tires(couldn’t see it, no glasses). The guys from the hostel had to get back into town to get to work, so I was left walking barefoot and half-naked back to Yangshuo. This is also the state I went to the bank in to get some money to buy some sandals once I reached town. Needless to say, it was uncomfortable.
I took a night bus back to Hong Kong and flew to New York the next day. Because I could not access my Taiwanese bank account in China, I carried all the money I spent on the whole two-and-a-half week trip with me. This saved me after I lost my wallet, because I had enough cash on hand to finish the trip. Arrived in JFK in New York with exactly five US dollars. I kicked around Westchester for a week then flew back to Taipei.

Fourth-quarter theft aside, the trip was great. The places I went were beautiful beyond description. However, I was disappointed about one aspect of the trip; I wish I had more opportunities to talk to the local people in the places I went. My only real conversations with Chinese people were other tourists, on trains or in bars, and almost never with people living in the places I visited.
Part of the reason for this is my crap Chinese. I just did not have enough skill with the language to hold a substantive conversation. But the bigger reason was that it was hard to find people who were not trying to sell me something. Once I left Guangzhou, all the places I visited were very poor. Even middle-class Chinese view Westerners as obscenely rich, pampered, and lazy. The idea of taking an extended vacation half way across the world just proves this stereotype to them. I was fish to be hooked, a rich fool to be taken.

Despite the above, the trip was fantastic. Southern China is beautiful and I would recommend it over the typical Beijing-Shanghai tour everyone does in China. There was just more to do at every place, and otherworldly terrain to do it in.

China Vacation II: Yunnan

I arrived in Kunming mid-day and quickly made my way to the hostel, Cloudland. Kunming is not a town with a whole lot of worth to tourists. Like Guilin, there is a serious lack of restaurants and street food. Unfortunately, the hostel had very good food, both Western and Chinese. I say unfortunately, because I am sure I could have found somewhere to eat and explored the city to boot, but the hostel’s restaurant reduced my incentive.


Kunming was a nice spot to do my laundry. But while I was there, I headed out to West Hill, a big cliff overlooking the lake and the city. The cliff was nice, as were the various little temples carved into the high cliff face. The surrounding countryside is littered with half finished Chinese Mcmansion developments and tiny farms, leading straight up to the city limits. Then, pavement as far as the eye can see. The lake is an obscene bright milky green color, with so much crap in it that even the waves and splashes are opaque green. The whole lake looked like a green tea latte. A dock worker with five teeth was confident that the color is natural.


Hopped a night train out of Kunming. After an agonizingly slow approach into town, I arrived in Dali in the early morning. Dali is an odd town, in that many of its hostels and restaurants are run by expats and the focus of its tourism industry is backpackers. The “old town” sits beside Erhai lake, in a large valley surrounded by mountains. The Swedish guys and I took a gondola up into the mountains directly overlooking the town and hiked along the old road there. There were a bunch of Chinese tourists at the start, some of which decided that a 12k hike is a good thing to attempt in heels. Nearly every woman who reached the chairlift down the mountain at the end of the path was carrying her shoes.


Dali is a nice town, but I was on a tight schedule so I left the next morning for Lijiang. In Lijiang I stayed at Mama Naxi’s, a family-run hostel in the backstreets of Lijiang’s old town. Mama Naxi’s hostel is a tornado of good food and disorganization. Mama Naxi is happy to help you plan your trips to wherever, but sometimes getting her to do so involves chasing her around the hostel as she finds empty beds for new arrivals, cares for the multitude of cats and dogs that live in the courtyard, and critiques and criticizes the staff in their waitressing or food preparation. It is quite an experience.
At about 1pm, the crowds of Chinese tour groups arrive to Lijiang’s once-pleasant streets and transform it into Disneyland. One of the biggest draws of Chinese tourists to Yunnan are the minority groups that reside there. This creates an odd situation where most shopkeepers end up wearing decorative “ethnic” costumes that would not look inappropriate in Latin America over their jeans and t-shirts. The Chines tourists also seem to get a kick out of foreigners, and would try to take photos of any they came across.

One night I went out to the bars with a guy from Morocco and two Danish girls. We started drinking with some businessmen from Hong Kong, and watched the strange festivities at the bar. The music was kinda weird, and the dance floor was set up like a stage and was surrounded by cops. However, the oddest thing was absolutely the drink auction. The owners of the bar made a Bloody Mary, than held an auction for it. Not for a charity; all proceeds went to the bar. It was just a regular mixed drink. And it sold for $20,000 yuan. That is almost $3,000 U.S. Dollars. The guys we were drinking with said the auction winner gives the drink to his girlfriend as a gift. According to my expert analysis, the whole enterprise was freaking insane. Maybe I am just not a romantic.

Mama Naxi arranged a van out to Leaping Tiger Gorge, and since she runs the biggest hostel in Lijiang, about half the people on the trail at any given day come from her place. The van driver demonstrated the typical Chinese driving method; lean on the horn and pass everyone, at any time, in any place, regardless of incoming traffic. Now, make no mistake, the van did not drive especially fast. No one in China does. But everyone wants to pass regardless. It could be because of the little engine-drawn carts that get the peasantry from A to B. These three-wheeled boxes are powered by an exterior engine that Henry Ford would have scoffed at. They run at about the same pace as the bicycle or donkey drawn cards, but the pull loads of unrestrained bricks that occasionally fall off the back.

After three hours of windy mountain roads, we arrived at the town by the beginning of the gorge, had lunch, and started on the trail around noon. It was hot. There is next to no tree cover until you get to the high point of the gorge, about the “28 turns” or switchbacks of the ascent. Along the trail are farms and villages, plus about seven or eight guesthouses. It is not too hard, but the sun is strong and because of the trip from Lijiang people end up doing the hardest part of the trip at hottest point of the day. I got to the guesthouse around 4:30. The guesthouse was cheap and clean, with a mountain view room for about $8. A Norwegian guy ho had been hiking with me sat and drank beer and bet how long it would take everyone else to reach the way-point.
When traveling on the cheap, you deal with a lot of things that make life harder. Long bus rides, crap food and accommodations, questionable hygiene, etc. At a certain point, you convince yourself that the difficulty of the trip makes you tough. I met some people that completely dispelled this notion, by comparison. In Lijiang, I met an orthodox couple from Israel,who kept kosher. Vegetarian food is almost non-existent in China, mind you, so this meant they cooked everything for themselves. Vegetables, mostly. With them, they carried their own miniature kitchen by necessity. But they were traveling easy compared to a Dutch couple who were on a bike trip. From Amsterdam. By bike. They traveled through Germany, the Balkans, Turkey, to Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, to China. They said they were traveling to Melbourne. In Leaping Tiger Gorge, I met a friendly Brit with one leg. He did all twelve kilometers of the trek, with mountainous elevation change, on crutches. Planned to see Tibet the same way.
As I noticed the last time I was in China, one of the most frustrating things about the country is how the locals treat you like walking wallets to be plundered at every opportunity. You pay about $50 Yuan to enter the gorge. But then the locals set them selves up in little pissant toll booths at every scenic spot. The most aggravating example of this is the decent to the river, at the end of the trek. You pay $10 Yuan to take the trail down. But then, you have to pay another $10 Yuan to get back up. I don’t mind paying $20 Yuan (less than $3USD), but being nickle-and-dimed at every corner is not fun.
After finishing the hike, the next step is finding a ride back to Lijiang. After waiting for the prerequisite number of weary hikers to fill out the van, we headed back down the gorge via the low road. Decades ago, the low road was a different hiking route. Now, it is a partly paved, avalanche-prone vehicle road. In fact, an avalanche happened mere minutes before we embarked, and a large part of the hillside had been deposited onto the road and over the cliff on the other side. Trees and the remaining embankment hung precariously about a hundred and fifty feet above the road. The driver, along with every other person in the van, kept a very nervous eye upwards while driving over the gravel-covered section of the road in the fall-zone.
Mama Naxi gave me a hug and a good luck charm on my way out of Lijiang, which I hung off my daypack. I took a night bus to Kunming, arriving at 5:30. After buying my train ticket ticket, I went back to Cloudland Hostel to wash up and eat breakfast. I found a couple of British girls to go with me, I hopped on a bus for a short visit to the Stone Forest. The Stone Forest is a series of stone pillars and narrow canyons and boulders jutting naturally from the rolling hills.
Anyone who thinks America’s national parks are too disneyfied, too accessible and commercialized, should contemplate China. China’s geographically convenient wonders are ruthlessly exploited, and set up for the inevitable crowded busloads of flag-following tourists from the coastal cities. In the Stone Forest, tour groups wearing “indigenous” fake-leather cowboy hats or ethnic costumes shout and spit and point their way through the central labyrinth of paths and view-spots. At times, they seem like a nasty caricature of tourists from any country, simultaneously herded moneypots to be leeched off by the locals and shameless exploiters, gawking and mocking the local culture and people.
Luckily, Chinese tourists by and large are a tame lot, not likely to stray from the beaten, paved, railed, flag-led path. This left decent chunk of largely unoccupied park to explore, and explore I did. Deep in the back of the (not that large)park, there is a trail leading off the map to the “Eternal Mushroom”. Remembering the Chinese penchant for grandiose names for unassuming locations, I was skeptical. However, with time to kill and a desire to avoid the camera-wielding masses, the girls I was with and I headed out to see that fungus-like rock. The mushroom was predictably a non-sight, but on the way we saw pagodas, fields of corn and rice growing out from among the otherworldly rocks, and dilapidated shacks perched on the edge of muddy ponds. Really beautiful stuff.
After getting back to Kunming, I hopped in a sleeper train back towards Guilin.
Next, Yangshou!

China Vacation II: Return of the Dragon!

Here comes the much delayed, 80's style sequel to my trip from last March.

So, when I traveled around southern China in September, I wrote a pretty detailed account of my trip. I became very busy since then and it has been taking up space on my harddrive and doing little else. No Longer. Here is the first piece.

I arrived in Hongkong around noonish, and hectic does not begin to describe the location of my hostel. Chungking Mansion is a 17 story apartment complex, broken into four blocks each with its own pair of elevators. The ground floor is devoted to money exchanges, samosa stands, and cellphone accessory stores. There are few Chinese people to be seen, and inhabitants are largely Indian and Nigerian.
The building must have at least twenty hostels, all of which have their own touts looking for people with luggage to bring in. One pitchman even went as far as to give me the wrong floor number when I asked how to get to my hostel, as if I just wouldn’t notice. My room in the hostel is a very decent sized closet, roughly 6ft/8ft if you include the bathroom. That said, it is clean and relatively cheap, and comes with a private bathroom and in-room wifi and air conditioning. Honestly, I couldn’t ask for more.

As I have recently discovered, I am in desperate need of a tailor. I know this, because every ten feet I walked outside of Chungking Mansions, a new Indian fellow would tell me and then kindly offer to help remedy my problem. They were rarely impressed with my professed poverty or my lack of desire to haul formal wear a thousand miles across China and back.

I will say that, were I of the shopping persuasion, Hong Kong would have been a great place to free myself from the burden of having money. Many have described Hong Kong as one big shopping mall, and while that is an exaggeration I can see how people would get that impression. The sidewalks are crowded, messy places, and wholly unfriendly to pedestrian use. Luckily, woven through the city’s center is a string of pedestrian walkways. Many of these walkways actually run through shopping malls, with is great in that you pray for even momentary breaths of air-conditioning after walking around for a couple hours, but crappy in that it made me want to sucker-punch the next person I come across wearing Burberry. People shouldn’t be allowed to look both entitled and emo. It is like their marketing department took the villain in every 80’s highschool movie and made them watch Requiem for a Dream 12 times, and then photographed them.
From Hong Kong, I went to Guangzhou. The less said about Guangzhou, the better. It seems like a great city to build a factory in. I did a run with the local hash runners, which was nice. I won too, though it hardly counts. Great group of guys, but they didn’t really run. 90% were walking the whole way. Afterwards, the bash was at this odd restaurant where the menu consisted of emus and ostriches and crocodiles and the like, and the entrées are displayed in a small zoo. The run itself was a bit odd too, because we saw many homeless families who appear to live in the park we were running through. I do mean families, too, living with kids around little campfires with plastic jugs of water and maybe a hammock. They seemed as surprised to have an American bounding through their ranks as I was to happen upon them.
I grabbed a sleeper bus out of Guangzhou to Guilin. The beds on the bus were a cozy five feet long, and curled in such a way as to make sleeping on your side highly uncomfortable. I got a decent amount of sleep, but was surprised to find that I had to unexpectedly switch busses. In a half-asleep daze I forgot my hat and compass, but managed not to lose anything more vital than that.
Guilin was a bit disappointing, honestly. The area features this amazing Karst Topography, giant rock pillars and bulges jutting out of the otherwise flat ground. Unfortunately, the city has a shocking dearth of street food, or even restaurants or coffee shops. Really, its a travesty. I was in town only a couple hours in between my bus dropping me off at 8am and my 19 hour train ride to Kunming at 5pm. I saw a couple parks and really walked my feet off, but the lack of eats, or just places to sit down, hurt the whole experience. I will have to return to Guilin on the way back from Kunming, but I will keep my trip as short as possible and instead go quickly to backpacker-Mecca Yangshou, an hour to the south.

Next, on to Kunming.