Guilin to Qingdao

Distance covered since last blog: 3,045km

After bidding a tearful farewell to Lisa (all her tears), I boarded an overnight train to the southern city of Shenzhen, which is the gateway into Hong Kong. Stupidly I had got on the train with no cash, so was unable to purchase any refreshments, which meant that by the time my train arrived at 9am I was dying of thirst. First I had to track down an ATM, which I managed to do in a nearby shopping centre, then find a bloke selling cold water. I chinned two bottles then set off to find the taxi rank. It was on my way that I felt that familiar feeling in my bowels which simply means ‘Get to a toilet immediately’. Shenzhen train station is a maze and I had no idea where to find one, besides, walking was making it worse. I dropped my bag in the middle of the concourse and stood there, without shame, clenching my buttocks with a look of steely-eyed determination on my face. Unless you’ve experienced this, it is difficult to fully understand the agony I was in – I genuinely contemplated deliberately pooing myself right there, in the middle of the train station, just to end the pain. In the end I made a mad dash to a nearby private health spa and basically demanded that either they let me use their toilet or I was involuntarily going to do it in their lobby. As it happens the girl was very helpful and literally ran with me to show me where to go. I spent that night in a youth hostel, and crossed the border into Hong Kong the next day.、

A typically foggy Hong Kong

My accommodation was another one recommended by Thomas – Chumking Mansions, right in the heart of central Kowloon. It is a monstrous building with 19 vast floors, filled mainly with guest houses and Indian restaurants and shops. It is well-known in Hong Kong as the main hub of immigrants from India and Africa, and this was apparent from the moment I walked in. It was like being back in India – I was immediately set upon by people trying to sell me a place to sleep, fake Rolexes, ‘hashish’, chicken byriani – you name it! In the end I settled for a guest house on the ninth floor and was led proudly to one of their ‘deluxe’ suites.

I didn’t really care about it being so small, just as long as it was clean – which it was. After venturing out into Hong Kong, the most urgent business was to find an Irish pub which would be showing the football that evening – it was the final day of the Premier League season. It took no longer than 20 seconds until I stumbled upon the rather predictably named‘Murphys’. I only nipped in to ask if it would be showing the football later, but as it happens they had the big AFC Wimbledon vs Luton match on the telly at the time, so I stayed and watched the entire thing. When I returned later, I attached myself to a group consisting of an American lad, a Norwegian girl and an Aussie girl and spent the night bantsing with them. Blackpool were relegated and I got surprisingly depressed about it.

The next two days were spent dominating Hong Kong, and seeing all that the small country has to offer. I purchased a ticket that allowed me to use the ‘Big Bus Tour’ (you may have seen these around London) for two days, so on the first day I did a tour around the main city area of Hong Kong Island. I’ll be honest – I didn’t get to sleep until about 5am the night before, and nodded off for quite a lot of the bus tour. This area of Hong Kong Island is mainly skyscrapers, and clearly wasn’t enough to keep my attention. After 2 hours I got off the bus (having dribbled down the front my t-shirt). For the second day of my bus tour I visited the south of HK Island, specifically the areas of Repulse Bay and Stanley – where one Richard Mogridge used to live as a youngster. I found a pub called the ‘Pickled Pelican’ (brilliant name) and got chatting to some Americans who had disembarked from an aircraft carrier which had docked in the harbour the day before. They made me do some shots with them, and I returned to my bus slightly more off-balance than when I got off. That night I had dinner from my usual Pakistani restaurant – the ‘Paki Mess’ (that was its actual name), then headed back to Murphy’s to see if I could make any more new friends. As it happens I couldn’t, but did pick up an amusing nickname from the bar girls: Mr. Hairy.

The plan for the next day was a visit to the other main island of Hong Kong – Lantau. The weather was pretty awful, but I went anyway. The main site there is a large Buddha statue up on a hill, but the weather was so bad that they had closed the cable car, so access was impossible. I thought I would hang around anyway (after all, I’d spent 30p on a tube ticket!), so I had a few pints then went to see Pirates of the Caribbean 4 – it was average. After a final night in the lovely Chumking Mansions, I boarded the ferry to the nearby island of Macau. Macau is an old Portuguese colony and is technically not part of China and many people still speak that language. That meant I was able to use my entire Portuguese vocabulary at every possible opportunity (obrigado – ‘thank you’; cerveja – ‘beer’). I hadn’t booked any accommodation in Macau, because I was sure that when I got off the ferry there would be a bevy of hawkers trying to sell me a cheap room for the night. This turned out not to be the case, so after some advise from the tourist information office, I got on the #3 bus into town, and preceded to wander aimlessly for 3 hours (yes, 3 hours!) hoping to find a cheap hotel. After a while, exhausted and dripping wet, I was literally stopping every Westerner I saw asking them where they were staying, but most people just come to Macau for a day trip and don’t spend the night. I was at my wits end. Eventually I spoke to a well-off Malaysian bloke, who organised his personal driver to come and pick me up (in a plush BMW) and take me to a cheap hotel. What a hero!!

Macau rage

I did a Macau walking tour, then headed back to Hong Kong the next day – checking back into Chumking Mansions. This was the night of the Champions League final, so I stayed up until kick-off (02:45 local time) and watched it in my local. I befriended an English lad named Steve and we watched the match together in an incredibly packed pub – I was obviously thrilled to see Man Utd taken to pieces by a team of such obvious superiority. Went to bed at 6am. The next day didn’t involve much – just a trip to the train station to purchase my next train ticket, then waiting for the Monaco Grand Prix to start. For dinner I finally sold-out and, for the first time on tour had a full blown Western meal; I felt that if I was going to do that, I needed to do it properly, so I had roast beef, roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, carrots, sprouts, gravy and horseradish. Worth the 11 quid! I literally licked the plate clean.

Mouse and I had agreed that if he paid for half my travel, I would make the 2,500km journey back north to visit him in Tianjin, so early on that Tuesday morning I set off for Kowloon train station to catch the T98 train to Beijing, where I would connect for the short journey to Tianjin. I had some minor trouble getting through Customs – the photo in my passport, where I am a pasty 16 year old, confuses people who see the 25 year old bearded ‘vagrant’ in front of them. I smoothed things over with the Customs officials nicely though by accidently making them laugh: I dropped my bottle of water, and after bending down to pick it up with my huge backpack on, I realised I had no strength left in my legs and was unable to stand up. It was like my trekking fail all over again! After trying and failing for a while, I had to shed my backpack and ask for assistance. The journey itself took 24 hours and was relatively easy going. I couldn’t get much sleep though because the couple in the bed next to me decided to ‘get frisky’ in the middle of the night, which was rather off putting. To escape their moans and groans I ventured down to the restaurant car, which involved passing through First Class. It seemed quite empty, so after purchasing a ‘pijo’ and some noodles I went and sat there. No one questioned a Western person’s rite to be there, so I enjoyed the comfort of First Class for a few hours!

 24 hours to Beijing

I arrived in Beijing in the early afternoon, and after throwing a minor public strop (just like last time), I made my way back to the same hostel from a few weeks ago. I was meant to go on to Tianjin but was too tired, mardy and sweaty to tackle another Chinese train journey. So after some R&R I headed off the next day, catching the bullet train to Tianjin, where Mouse met me at the station. I ended up spending a week with him, sleeping on his sofa and basically having a great time. Our main activities were nights out, watching cricket, doing walking tours and eating. The food I had in Tianjin was incredible, and Mouse took me on a culinary tour of Asia: classic Chinese dishes, noodles, dumplings, Tianjin specialties, Sichuan dishes, Korean, Thai, Hong Kong, Japanese. All amazing! We had some fun nights with his fellow teachers as well. One night in with Dilly and Jordan playing cards, where we picked up the nicknames ‘Maestro’ and ‘Bistro’ (you can guess who was who); another night out on the massive smash with David, Mike and Gerald to the famous ‘Citong’ nightclub. I was on my standard drunk club form – hating the ear-splitting hip hop, minesweeping drinks, sitting on my own. Gerald bought us an entire table worth of Heineken though, so I tucked into that with gay abandon. Mouse pulled a midget (sort of).

 Leaving Citong at 6am

As you may know, Mouse is teaching English in Tianjin, and he invited me along to his weekly ‘free talk’ class. ‘Free talk’ is a much more informal class, where students are encouraged to speak and use their English in a more chilled-out setting. I opened things up with a short photo presentation of my travels so far, then Mouse set them the task of writing their own fictional travel diary which they would then present to the class later, and I would judge who was best. I meandered from group to group, chatting to them about various things and helping them with their English (I spoke to no men). It was really fun, and one of the highlights of my time in China – you really can’t beat speaking to Chinese people.

On one of my last nights, Mouse cooked up a brilliant dinner of pork ribs and pork belly in a delightful sauce, with a side dish of green peppers and bok choy. We settled in to watch the Test Match. Could there be a more brilliant night in? Sadly I eventually had to leave, and caught the 05:33 train to Qingdao (pronounced ‘Ching-dow’). I hadn’t had much sleep the night before, and half way through the journey I nodded off and toppled off my seat into the aisle. It was mightily embarrassing and I was the laughing stock of the carriage for the remainder of the journey. This was made even more embarrassing because I had been seriously ‘eye-flirting’ with a girl opposite me for a while. We had had a rather basic conversation in both English and Chinese and shared headphones for a while. I think my collapse ruined my chances. Qingdao seems nice enough, but I need to start thinking about heading south, so I immediately booked my transport onwards – a 41 hour, 2,600km train to Chengdu. The definition of ‘admin’?

 Mouse getting his cook on

I’m a little bit worried to see that I am 106 days into my 189 days travelling. However much I like England, my family and my friends, I really don’t ever want to come back. Can you all move to China please?

 Beard coming on nicely