Guilin to Yangshuo...then back to Guilin

Distance covered since last blog: 190km

For my final evening in Guilin I headed out alone to track down a local restaurant and really try out my Chinese speaking. My plan was to do the entire thing without saying a word of English, and without resorting to simply pointing vaguely at the menu. I strolled in confidently and immediately caused a stir (not helped by the fact that I was wearing my China basketball vest). I successfully said ‘Hello. One beer please’, which she understood. But when I tried ‘Fried noodles with meat’ she stared blankly back at me. When I tried again she had a total panic and went and got 3 other members of staff. Everyone else in the restaurant was looking over and laughing. I tried again with the new staff members but was no more successful. In the end I gave up and pointed to a photo of some different noodles that was on the wall. So my attempt to speak only in Chinese lasted for 4 words. Tough language. Good noodles though!

When I got back to my hostel I noticed that one of the two ‘smoking hot Swedish girls’ from the backwaters tour that Squad and I went on in Kerala was sitting in the bar. After procrastinating for about 20 minutes, I went over to her and thankfully she remembered me. Me, her (Ida) and her friend (Faye) spent a few hours chatting and agreed to travel together to Yangshuo together the next day.

Yangshuo

I was slightly more successful in dealing with Chinese people at the bus station the next morning, when I haggled our tickets down from 30Y each, to 18Y each (I didn’t use any Chinese though – just raised my voice and pointed at numbers on a calculator). Yangshuo’s kast mountains are some of the most stunning landscape in the world, so it was a pity that it was pouring with rain. There are lots of outdoor activities to get involved in such as rock-climbing, cycling, bamboo raft tours on the river etc. But unfortunately it rained for the next 5 days, so I was ‘forced’ to stay in the hostel and frequent the bar with all the other travellers. I stayed in a hostel called ‘Monkey Jane’s’ which Thomas had mentioned in his blog. It is famous for its lively fifth floor roof-top bar and party atmosphere – I can vouch for both!

Day 1：After getting a bowl of the brilliant local rice noodles (60p), I headed straight up to the bar to see what all the fuss was about. It was all pretty chilled out at first, so I settled in with a Canadian lad named Tyler and one of the bar girls to watch ‘Quantum of Solace’ (a tricky film to explain to someone who’s English isn’t great). When the bar started to fill up, Tyler and I teamed-up and started challenging people to ‘Beer Pong’. ‘Beer Pong’ basically involves having to throw ping-pong balls across a table into the other teams’ glasses – if they go in, they have to finish their beer. Tyler and I were tipsy and overconfident, and consequently lost our first 3 games. We came back to win the next 2 though! More and more people came into the bar and everyone was getting involved in the drinking games: English, Australian, Dutch, American, Norweigian, Danish, Swedish, Israeli, French, Russian, and of course all the gorgeous Chinese bar girls. At midnight we all piled out onto the town’s main street and hit a bar full of exciteable Chinese people. They love having foreigners around, and none of us paid for a drink all night – the bar manager just kept bringing us bucket after bucket filled with cans of Budweiser! It was amazing! After lots of comical dancing and arm-wrestling tournaments, I stumbled back to the hostel at 4am.

 Me and Tyler playing Beer Pong

Day 2: I rose at about 11 and rummaged around for my iPod charger. I couldn’t find it. And on closer inspection found that my English adaptor and my precious journal were also missing. I had been so excited when I saw Swedish Ida in the bar in Guilin I had forgotten to pick anything up from the table I had been sitting at. Damn! I just had to hope that Jason, the friendly hostel owner, would keep them safe for me until I returned. I headed up to the bar and found a few other bleary-eyed people from the night before watching a strange Chinese film with (terrible) English subtitles, so I joined them. After the film a Danish chap named Jeppe (or ‘The Bearded Dane’ as I called him) suggested we get the beers in. Frankly, I was horrified at the idea, but didn't want to disappoint him, so agreed. I struggled through my first few sips of my ‘Tsingtao’, but soon enough it was going down a treat – and I was ready for Beer Pong again! Tyler wasn’t around, so I partnered up with Lisa, the good-looking Chinese girl I had been checking out the night before. We went on a huge winning streak and were just one game away from winning coverted Monkey Jane t-shirts until I choked and missed the final cup. Someone introduced the bar to a new drinking game called ‘Flip Cup’ which is incredibly fun, rowdy and involves loads of people – which is perfect for big groups of people who don’t really know each other! We managed to get two teams of five together and played for an hour or so. I turned out to be a natural – Beer Pong and Flip Cup success in the same night! Once again we headed out to the bars and did very much the same as the night before. Beer Pong Lisa tried to kiss me, but I rejected her – I was keen, but thought I would keep her waiting. I knew I had her in the palm of my hand.

Rejecting Lisa

Day 3: Ida and Faye left in the morning, so I had the whole dorm to myself. I cooked up a tub of Roasted Beef Noodles and as usual headed up to the bar to watch the days films – ‘Dead Silence’, ‘Bruno’ and ‘Kick-Ass’. I also challenged the beautiful barmaid, Kathy, to some Connect 4. We ended up playing 17 consecutive games and I was soundly beaten. There was a little bit of Beer Pong played, but this was the night dominated by a huge, 7 vs 7, boys vs girls game of Flip Cup. Some bright spark decided to play with bigger cups and demand that the boys team play topless. Things got totally out of hand, and it was one of my favourite nights of the entire tour so far. I finally let Lisa get her way.

The Topless Flip Cup lads

Day 4: My body was really feeling the burn by this time, so I didn't really achieve anything on this day. In fact, I only properly surfaced at 5pm. Lisa and I went out for some dumplings then she headed back home to Guilin with the promise that I could go and stay with her when I return. Keen! It was more sedate in the bar on this evening. Well, the ‘Topless Flip Cup’ team got together for a reunion, but we called it a night at 1am.

Day 5: Checked-out and headed back to Guilin.

So that was a day-by-day run through of my time in Yangshuo! As you can tell, I had a total sight-seeing fail, yet had some of the most fun times I have had since leaving England!

I had emailed Lisa the day before, asking for her address, but I had no response by the time I got to Guilin so I checked back into the hostel from last time. Jason had kept all the things I had left behind and immediately presented them to me on my arrival. Legend! Shortly afterwards, Lisa did get back to me and I went round to her apartment for a home-cooked meal while we watched ‘The Devil Wears Prada’. Tomato and egg (sounds rubbish, but is actually really good), beef and peppers, pork and shredded potatoes, vegetables and rice. So she can play Beer Pong AND cook. She might be a keeper! Well, for three days anyway.

I have already done all my sight-seeing in Guilin, so during the day when Lisa is at work (as an English translator for the Chinese government) I just loaf about in the old hostel. They quite like me there and don’t seem to mind the fact I spend my whole time sitting there but not buying any of their expensive food. For that, Lisa meets me in her lunch hour and takes me to little hidden restaurants in the backstreets of Guilin that serve incredible Chinese food at nothing prices – 30p for a bowl of noodles.

We met after work yesterday and went out for some nooldes with a couple of her friends. They spoke good English so it was fun. Out with the girls! They insisted that we go to a KTV bar – KTV is what the Chinese call karaoke. I was initially nervous, but decided that the best way to tackle the nerves was to throw myself into it whole-heartedly, so I took on the opening song and did ‘Everything I Do’ by Bryan Adams. I gave it my all (including an air guitar solo), and before I knew it I was hooked! I did some Beatles, some Blue, some Queen, some Black Eyed Peas. You couldn’t get the microphone out of my hand! I even tried my hand at a Chinese song – which was appauling. Afterwards we hit a bar called ‘Joyce’s’ which was packed. I was the only Westerner in the whole place and was having drinks forced on me all night, so never once had to reach into my wallet. Perfect! My status as a sex symbol in China seems to be on the rise and I had to fend off a pretty blunt advance from one of Lisa's friends (it doesn't get much more blunt than "Please come home with me, not Lisa"). It was a great night out!

Out in Guilin

We have another DVD night planned for this evening, then tomorrow I leave for Shenzhen which is on the border with Hong Kong. The end of a beautiful relationship!

Xi'an to Guilin

Distance covered since last blog: 2900km

The overnight train from Xi’an to Shanghai was much more enjoyable than my first train experience in China because thankfully we had got tickets in ‘Hard Sleeper’ class, so we had a bed each. The journey passed without incident and we arrived into Shanghai at midday. My first impressions of Shanghai were positive: clean, friendly, and absolutely brimming with incredible Chinese totty. After calming myself down, we ventured into the subway and headed for ‘East Nanjing Road’ where our hostel was. We found it with little fuss, which was a relief after Mouse revealed he had thrown the directions away by accident.

We immediately set off on one of my trademark ‘Walking tours’. First stop was a stroll down ‘the Bund’, which is an area of colonial buildings on the riverfront, which offer a lovely view of the Pudong skyline. Unfortunately it was the May Day public holiday and half the city had decended upon the Bund, so a lot of my time was spent shuffling past dawdling Chinese people. Being someone who walks quickly, over-taking slow moving people is a constant problem for me in big cities. We popped into the frankly forgettable ‘Shanghai Natural History Museum’, then proceeded on to People’s Square in the heart of the city, and finally headed home along the famous Nanjing Road. It was absolutely packed with shoppers, and I struggled to keep my cool over-taking them all. I’m not sure what they were all shopping for though – every other building was either a McDonalds or a KFC. I didn’t care for Nanjing Road and was happy to be off it. That evening we found a little local place that was serving a dish Mouse highly recommended – la mien – which literally means ‘pulled noodles’. I loved it, and will be endevouring to find it everywhere I go in China. This also seems like an opportune moment to mention that I have been fully converted to chopsticks. At first I thought they were a stupid idea, but actually they work quite well and are pretty easy to master. We tracked down a bar and watched Arsenal beat Manchester United. The atmosphere of the evening was soured sadly after I mentioned that I quite liked Chelsea, which led Mouse to call me a glory supporter. After a few beers I didn't take it very well and sat seething for the last part of the match.

The next day was primarily based around food. For lunch we tracked down a place which was serving huǒ guō (or ‘hot pot’ for those not fully versed in Mandarin). It is basically like a Chinese version of a fondu, where you cook meat and vegetables in one of two choices of broth – one spicy, one mild. It was pretty nice, but I don’t think I’ll go back and have another. For dinner was another huge bowl of la mien with some pork kebabs. Much more my thing!

We decided to move away from Shanghai and spend a day in the nearby town of Suzhou, which is described as the ‘Venice of the East’ because it is picturesque and built on a series of canals. We caught the 335km/h ‘bullet train’, and were there in no time. After checking into our hostel, we found a little restaurant where Mouse’s Chinese really came into its own. He is very modest, and always tells people that he can’t really speak any, but when it comes down to it he is pretty good. He ordered us a banquet! A chicken dish, a pork dish, an aubergine dish, an egg and tomato dish, and of course loads of rice. We got quite a lot of very good natured banter from the staff, which added to the overall enjoyment of the meal. After our feast we rented a couple of bikes from the hostel and set off on my first ever ‘Cycling tour’ of a town. Thomas was in Suzhou about a month prior to me, and stayed in the same hostel. He also rented a bike, and by the sounds of it we may well have had exactly the same bike: “The wheels were tiny, it genuinely had no brakes and lacked the most important feature in China – a bell. Luxuries such as gears were well out of the question...” A bell is most certainly crucial - Mouse had hit a pedestrain within 10 metres of the hostel. Cycling round Suzhou was a fantastic way to see the city, and I was a big fan.

This was Mouse’s last night ‘on tour’ with me before returning to Tianjin, so naturally we had to make it a big night. First of all was another huge feed, which was set up by some more brilliant Chinese from Mouse – battered pork, pork ribs, spinach, shredded potatoes and plenty of rice. Then we headed out on the town. First port of call was ‘Backstreet Bar’ where we got chatting to a bunch of young Chinese people who all spoke decent English. Mouse gave a masterclass in flirting with Chinese girls, who were eating out the palm of his hand. I got stuck speaking to ‘Jimmy’ who was a huge British pop music fan – I humoured him and we did a short duet of ‘I Want You Back’ by Take That. Jimmy and the gang had to leave, but pointed us in the direction of what they called ‘Bar Street’. That sounded ideal, so we headed towards it. We went into a place called ‘Medusa Bar’ and were immediately set upon by a couple of Chinese girls. The girl chatting up Mouse was a bit of a rotter, but the one next to me was tip-top! I bought her a peach flavoured milk (her choice!), then proceeded to give her the full-blown ‘Flirty James Mogridge’ routine. Combine that with her fascination with my eyelashes, and the result was practically a no-brainer. A Chinese pull on debut! I’d only been in the country 9 days! In celebration I bought an Australian bloke a beer, sung ‘Paradise City’ by Guns n Roses with him for a bit, then retired to bed at 3am. A day to remember!

Feeling a little bit worse for wear in the morning, we went out for some incredibly tasty baozi (steamed dumplings), did a short walking tour of the areas where bikes are prohibited, then headed back to the station and caught to bullet train back to Shanghai. Suzhou – totally dominated in 24 hours! Mouse and I parted company that evening, and I spent the rest of the day reading my book in the hostel bar (after having nipped out for a quick bowl of la mien).

I didn’t really have a whole lot planned for my day alone in Shanghai. I decided to get the subway under the river to the Pudong district and do a little walking tour. It was a lovely day, so I went down to the riverfront and soaked up some sun. I haven’t shaved in about 6 weeks, and I’m slightly concerned that when I eventually do half my face will be sun-tanned and half won’t. On my walking tour I stopped in a couple of bars for some refreshment, and was annoyed that I no longer had Mouse to help me with my Mandarin. Therefore I set off on a hunt for a Chinese phrasebook to assist me. Chinese people love it when you make an effort to speak their language. I found a foreign language bookstore, got my phrasebook, and also bought a Lonely Planet guide to ‘Vietnam, Cambodia, Loas and Northern Thailand’. I was thrilled with my new purchases and used some of my Chinese on the bar staff.

The next morning I had an early train to Wuhan, so, having packed the night before, I was able to get up at 6am and slip out of my dormitory in the dark without waking anyone up. Little did I know at the time, I had left the plastic bag with all my Lonely Planet books next to my bed. £45 worth of books lost!

My train to Wuhan was another bullet train, and covered the 900km in about 5 hours. I never really planned to go to Wuhan, but as it was where Morts and Mouse lived for a year, I felt that I should swing by and have a look. Unfortunately the first thing that happened to me outside Wuchang train station was to be massively ripped off by a taxi driver. He charged me 100Y (£10) for a 15 minute journey. I was furious, but obviously haggling is difficult when you don’t speak Chinese (and have lost your precious new phrasebook). Upon arrival at my hostel, I was immediately invited to a BBQ they were hosting that night, which I thought was very friendly of them. As it turned out, there were 17 people at the BBQ – 16 Chinese people and me. Only one person spoke English, who I immediately latched on to. Obviously I was the centre of attention, which I didn’t really mind because everyone was so friendly - a girl said that I looked like a 'pop star', and a lad called me 'handsome'. Well, what can I say? I would have to agree on both counts! The food was pretty ropey (you try filleting a fish with chopsticks! Or eating a BBQ’d chicken heart!), but it was an enjoyable evening. Afterwards, Sophie (the English speaking Chinese girl) took me down to the banks of the Yangtze river to see Wuhan by night. It isn’t the most attractive city in the world to be honest, so the view wasn’t a classic.

The next day I set off on one of my trademark walking tours. Wuhan is by far the hottest place I have been so far, so I left the hostel early to try and miss the heat. This didn’t go to plan sadly, and by 10am it was already 30 degrees, my t-shirt was drenched, and beads of sweat were dripping from my nose. It was quite a nice walk nonetheless. For lunch Sophie bought me a Wuhan speciality, re gan mien, (hot-dry noodles), which were very tasty. In the late afternoon I headed off to find a bar Morts and Mouse had recommended as good for watching live sport called ‘Blue Sky Cafe’. I spent a good 45 minutes trying to hail a taxi, but failed miserably. Some local chap obviously saw this and offered to drive me there on the back of his motorbike. What a good lad! As it turned out, I went to a different bar called ‘Brussels Beer Garden’ owned by a Belgian lad who greeted me enthusiastically. There was also a gorgeous Chinese waitress, as well a midget chef! Why would I want to go anywhere else?! I stayed in there for almost 6 hours, watching the Turkish Grand Prix, as well as some football. Man Utd beat Chelsea and will now almost certainly win the Premier League. But obviously as a glory supporter, I don’t really care.

The following day I got a 13 hour train to Guilin. Guilin is a beautifully situated city amongst a stunning landscape of kast mountains. As usual, my plan was to embark upon a lengthy walking tour of the city. This lasted about 4 hours, during which time I managed to cover the main city centre as well as the charming lakes that the city is built around. I stopped for lunch in a Spanish cafe and sat outside. This turned out to be a big mistake, because during the time it took me to eat 4 spring rolls I was photoed 8 times. Sometimes just me, but other times a Chinese person would sit on the table next to me and pose. I smiled and waved for all of them!

The girls are just as stunning here as they are everywhere else in China. When eating my lunch, I was so mesmerised by a passing beauty in a tiny denim skirt that I forgot to close my mouth when taking a sip of my drink and poured a load of beer down my t-shirt.

I have recently edited my plans, and will now be staying in China for an extra month. It may or may not have anything to do with the girls.

Pokhara to Xi'an

Distance covered since last blog: 3,400km (mainly by plane)

First of all an explanation. My blog has been missing for a while because China, with their pesky internet block, don’t let me access the website. Then my previous post was deleted because I used ‘inappropriate language’. Then when I managed to negotiate around the internet block, my account was disabled because I was trying to access it from a weird location. Basically, it has been a bucket load of admin. But I’m back! My second explanation is that my camera is having a breakdown at the moment and is refusing to connect to computers, so there aren’t any photos in this blog. So get used to reading paragraphs of text. Right. Where was I? Pokhara in Nepal…

In the days following the failed trek, I relaxed in Pokhara and planned my next move. It was clear that getting to Tibet was going to be far too expensive, so I decided to fly from Kathmandu to Beijing instead, so I could meet up with Mouse. For those who don’t know, ‘Mouse’ is my mate who is teaching English at a school in China for a year. First of all I had to get to Kathmandu on a local bus. Like most of my long distance journeys, this was a nightmare from the start. I arrived at the bus terminal, only to find that my passport wasn’t in my pocket – cue a total panic, quick hailing of a taxi, a race back to the hotel, where it was still nowhere to be seen. Upon closer inspection I found it in the trousers I had been wearing the previous day. When I calmed down and got on the bus, I discovered to my horror I had the worst possible seat – on the back row, squeezed between an American girl and a French bloke, who were both really into yoga and insisted on discussing it at length. Seven hours later we arrived in Kathmandu.

 Kathmandu is pretty similar to most of the big Asian cities that I have visited – vast, hectic and a little bit smelly. In all honesty I wasn’t massively won over by it. I had my final ‘dhal bhat’ with a girl who funnily enough lived in Surbiton, and went to bed quite early. Unfortunately I was awoken in the night with a worrying rumble in my stomach, and had to make a mad dash to the toilet. This was one of about 15 visits I had to make to the (communal) bathroom that evening, made worse by the fact that I had no toilet paper so had to resort to using pages torn from my Nepal Lonely Planet book – not recommended. I was in a pretty bad way at 7am the next morning when my taxi arrived to take me to the airport. My journey to Beijing was comical and deserves its own paragraph:

Negotiating Kathmandu International Airport was surprisingly easy, and I settled down in the departure lounge with ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ and a packet of Ritz crackers. Soon enough a glance at the big screen informed me that my flight was delayed by two hours – this wouldn’t be a huge problem normally, but I had to make a connecting flight later in the day. When I got on the plane, I found myself in seat 1C. Business class! I put my concerns behind me and enjoyed my complimentary apple juice. For some odd reason the plane decided to land in Lhasa – the ‘capital’ city of Tibet. I was able to get off the plane and have a little wander around the airport. It was very strange. More like a military airbase than a civilian airport – there were fighter jets on the runway and most of the buildings were painted in camouflage paint. Pleasant as this this stop was, it was further delaying me. We left Lhasa promptly and continued on our way to Chengdu. We landed 50 minutes after my connecting flight to Beijing was scheduled to depart, so I had resigned myself to missing it. However, after collecting my bag I noticed that the CA1408 to Beijing hadn’t yet departed. I flew into action and legged it to the Air China information desk to see what they could do. I shamelessly barged my way to the front of the queue and began frantically waving my passport and flight details at the bemused woman. She tapped at her computer for a second, and printed me off a ticket, 6 minutes before the gate closed. I charged across the terminal to security, once again pushed to the front of the queue, and made it to gate C5 with seconds to spare. I was frankly disappointed to be sitting with the riff-raff in ‘Economy’ class, but at least I was on the plane. We then sat on the tarmac for two hours. We landed in Beijing at 01:45, and I found that my hostel was closed so I would need to find alternative accommodation for the night. I trekked it out to the airport hotel and parted company with 480Y for the night. I hadn’t got my head around the exchange rate at the time, so was unaware that I was spending £50 for a night in the brilliantly named ‘Beijing 100% Perfect Hotel’. I frankly didn’t care though, and 18 hours after leaving my hotel in Kathmandu, I was able to lie down.

The next day would be better though wouldn’t it? Surely! Of course it wasn’t. It took me three hours to find the hostel, using a combination of two taxis, two subway trains and an aimless wander through suburban Beijing. This all became too much for me, and eventually I had a childish strop in the street, threw my backpack to the pavement and sulked for a while. During my sulk I realised that I could quite easily call the hostel and ask them to explain to a taxi driver how to get me there. I did just that, and 3 minutes later was checking-in.

Beijing is a pretty cool city, and so vastly different to everywhere else I have been so far. It’s clean and has an easy to navigate subway system which makes getting from place to place incredibly simple. The language barrier I feared isn’t the problem I thought it was going to be, and lots of the signs are in English as well as Mandarin. My sight-seeing began in the famous Tiananmen Square which I got to at about 11am, which is prime time for huge groups of Chinese tourists being led about by women with megaphones. I didn’t find this too irritating though, and thoroughly enjoyed strolling around the largest city square in the world. I didn’t have long to sight-see before my train, and soon enough I was making my way to West Beijing Station for the T55 to Xi’an. The only tickets they had available were for ‘Hard Seater’ class, which turned out to be just as unpleasant as it sounds. Imagine being on the Leatherhead to London Waterloo train for 13 hours – then add hundreds of loud Chinese people.  It was a nightmare. At the time I drew up a comparison chart with Indian trains. This is exactly what I wrote:

India: the doors are left open; about ten times cheaper; you have control over the light/fan

China: fractionally better onboard food; marginally more comfortable; less people staring at me; no beggars

I arrived into Xi’an at 7am, and was greeted by Mouse at the train station. Xi’an (pronounced ‘she-an’) is one of my favourite places of the entire tour so far. It is a small city by Chinese standards, and in the days we were there we explored it extensively on foot and by bike. It isn’t a particularly attractive city, but it has a charm that I found irresistible. This may well have something to do with the ladies…

Ok. Let’s just get this out in the open – I have fallen massively in love with Chinese girls. It’s difficult to explain exactly why, but I’ll give it a go: petite, friendly, cute, helpful and totally naive as to how attractive they are walking around town in tiny shorts. And it seemed that all the best looking ones were working in our hostel. Sophie, Daisy, Betty, Linda, Pi Pi, Joanna, Ivy, Joyce…the list is endless! We pulled out our best flirting (Mouse sung at the receptionist in his best Chinese), and before we knew it we were hostel celebrities. I really don’t think they could have liked us more. Three of them got us leaving presents!

Leaving gorgeous Chinese girls alone for a moment, we did a day trip to the Terracotta Army. For those not in the know, the Terracotta Army are an estimated 8,000 individually crafted life-size figures of warriors, built 2000 years ago to ‘protect’ the grave of Emperor Qin Shi Huang. We boarded our tour bus at the hostel, and what got on with us? A smoking hot Chinese tour guide named Zsa Zsa, who took a particular liking to us – although much to my annoyance she took more of a liking to Mouse. I was slightly underwhelmed by the Terracotta Army to be honest. The individual warriors and the story that accompanies them is fascinating, but it was nowhere near as big as I was expecting. But I must admit I was slightly distracted from the Army by battling with Mouse for Zsa Zsa’s attention.

Back at the hostel we were continuing to be immensely popular. The next evening (the day of the Royal Wedding as it happens) we attended the weekly ‘dumpling party’, where you cook and eat your own Chinese dumplings with fellow guests/dumpling enthusiasts. Afterwards we headed down to the hostel bar with our new American mates for a few shandies. At about 1am we decided to make a move to bed, and on our way came across a girl who had clearly had one too many. Upon closer inspection we noticed that she had been sick in a large bowl full of turtles which the hostel keeps as pets. Over our time there we had grown quite attached to these turtles, so were horrified to see what had happened. We mobilised immediately. I took the turtles out and put them in a sink full of clean water, while Mouse took the bowl to the shower. We rinsed out the bowl, cleaned all the rocks, then returned to turtles to their home. A small crowd had formed by this time (one guy filmed the entire thing) and we were applauded as heroes when the job was done. The girl was sent to bed in disgrace.

We didn’t have much to do the next day, and basically spent it loafing around the hostel playing Yahtzee and chatting to the lovely staff. Our final act was to make a poster of a Union Jack, write ‘James and Phil on Tour 2011’, and get all the girls to sign it. It was put up in the bar – a permanent reminder of the greatest guests the ‘Shuyuan Youth Hostel’ ever had. That evening we bid a fond farewell to Xi’an, and boarded the overnight train to Shanghai.