Beijing

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I've just had my last night in Beijing, with my train buddies Sue, Roddie, Disa, Nami and Travis. We all got on and off at different times from Moscow but some of us ended up in Mongolia at the same time and everyone met up at the end of the line in Beijing. We have become a four headed monster, doing everything together and becoming like a strange family here in Beijing, with family outings, dysfunctionality and a hierarchy of parental roleplay (Sue = toilet paper provider, Roddie = protector of women and polygamist when we had unwanted male attention at all) and so on.

We have turned into Japanese tourists: at first for a laugh, but now we are all slipping into cheesy poses and making V signs every time a camera is pointed at us, without even thinking. The chinese people seem to be gobsmacked at any one of us and keep taking photos. I feel like a prize exhibit. I still haven't worked out whether that is a good or bad thing.

I feel totally at ease in Beijing which I really didn't expect. Just zipping about on the metro or buses is great and so cheap (1-2 yuan!). I have developed an unhealthy obsession with the Silk Market, and went back today to buy 2 more watches, and pairs of Diesel and Miss Sixty jeans for 200 yuan, plus some bootleg raybans. Thank god I am leaving tomorrow...

Due to the public holiday here all hell has broken loose and suddenly where there were 2 people per square foot in Beijing there are now at least nine, plus several food stalls. Because the entire country moves around during this week, public transport is severely booked up. My original plan has been scuppered and I was told that the first train I could get get out of Beijing was on 4 October. Way too late as I wanted to leave by tomorrow at latest. So I have booked a flight to Chengdu in western China leaving tomorrow, and will loiter there for a few days whilst deciding on my plan to crack Tibet.

At the moment it is looking very difficult because it takes 7-10 days to get the Tibet travel permit, and they won't start processing it until after the holiday is over, and I need to find other people wanting to do the exact route I want at the same time, and I think they need to be fellow national passport holders. All this means just about everything is against me but I just need to get to Chengdu, see what the gossip is there about entering Tibet and see if I can find any groups to attach myself to.

Trans sib - Moscow to Ulan Bator

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Mongolia to Beijing

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Mongolia to Beijing

This leg was like a trip from heaven. Having endured the 5 day stint Moscow – Ulan Bator, with its russian restaurant car staffed by someone with huge boils on his face and a chef whose clothes were so dirty he may as well as have been an abbatoir worker, this Mongolian train was something else. It must have been brand new stock. I had my own TV at the end of my bunk, the entire train was spotless (including the windows, which you could even see out of) and the toilets were cleaner and more deluxe than any I have seen since leaving Bristol. The restaurant car was like a 5 star dining area, with a menu to match – I felt underdressed in my shabby outfit of unwashed garments with array of food smears down the front. It was like a luxury aeroplane on wheels.

The views out of the the windows were breathtaking, and sunset across the mongolian steppes viewed through the restaurant windows in the jampacked car actually produced an awestruck, collective, appreciative 'oooooh'. Everyone was rammed in there trying to spend the last of their mongolian tugriks before hitting the chinese border. I had 4 beers without even realising it, having hooked up with a couple of swedes – one a young death metaller called Jonas who despite his menacing appearance was sweet and lightness itself. Another mature swede joined us – she was a tour guide but was a chain smoking party animal who produced a pot of 'snooz' – small teabags of tobacco you insert inside your upper lip. When Jonas realised she had them he begged her for one as he had been without it for two weeks. Intrigued (and drunk, obviously) I asked for one and shoved it up my philtrum, waiting for something to happen. It was actually quite pleasant, flavoured with liquorice. It was obviously my first 'snooz' though because whilst the other two continued to look normal, my upper lip bulged out on one side and my teeth were involuntarily displayed, creating a lop-sided sneer. I only realised this when I went to the toilet after another beer.

During the Mongolia-China border crossing we were shepherded back to our cabins. Because my agency in Ulan Bator had managed to lose my ticket and got a replacement at last minute it meant I was in the Mongolian carriage. All the others were packed to the rafters with international backpackers. It turns out that my mongolian room-mates were very welcoming and when I returned from the restaurant car they were really worred as I had been gone for several hours and they knew I was travelling alone. I was feeling quite inebriated and they offered me their food – homecooked delicious stuff – and gave me juice. I only remembered the snooz too late when it became mixed up with the dumpling I was eating and I chewed on it for about 30 seconds before spitting it out. I don't think I could have been more disrespectful to my mongolian friends. Then they asked why I was travelling, and I told them, and then I asked them, and two of them were brother and sister on their way to Beijing for medical treatment for some kind of terminal illness. I felt like such an arse. It sobered me up quite quickly.

When I thought I could not be more of a waste of space, ever, they then started to grill me about english football. I don't think it could have got any worse. I felt like such a failure. There can't be anyone less informed about football than me, but I struggled on, making uninformed and madeup statements statements about Chelsea and Gary Lineker, and the mongolians corrected me continuously, but ever graciously. I eventually crawled up to my bunk with a newfound level of self hatred and disappointment and fell unconscious with a bag of biscuits open in my sleeping bag, so that on waking this morning I had them stuck at various locations across to my body and face. I think this must be karma of some sort.

They changed the wheels on the train last night – I thought they did that in Russia too but I was mistaken. Last night we got shunted into a big shed and they lifted the train carriages up on hydraulic lifts and slid out the wheels then replaced them with different width ones in order to fit chinese rail tracks.

This morning we woke in China proper – and I am beside myself with excitement. It is everything I imagined – I really cannot recommend the train journey and experience from Ulan Bator to Beijing enough. We have passed through tunnels cut straight through the rocky hillsides, suddenly revealing lakes nestling deep within the mountains, and now we are less than an hour from Beijing. ARGH!!!!

I have located some people on this train who are staying in the same hostel as me so we will club together on the platform and venture forward as a group to get ripped off by a hookie taxi driver outside the station. I can't wait!!!!!

Terelj National Park - Ger Camp

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After the ugliness of UB, all my prayers were answered, and the trip to the ger camp provided the perfect tonic. I shared a ger with 4 others (german, dutch and kiwis). We were in a small camp so only four gers in total, and it was so peaceful. I went horseriding and had must be my most awkward experience on a horse. Ever. The stirrups were way too short (ludicrously so), the horse was way too small, so my knees seized up and I flailed about completely out of control like a total beginner. Not a good look for someone who once represented Ivel Valley Pony Club in cross-country and showjumping teams...!!! Ahem... But the pain was worth it just to see more of the national park the our immediate surroundings - herds of cows and horses roamed freely, we bumped into loads of lairy sheep and goats, and stopped at a stream so the horses could drink up.

Dinner back at the camp was a delicious huge serving of some kind of hot pot of rice and unidentified meat. Only small bits of meat were involved so it was easy to digest, whatever its origin.

The gers got roasting hot at night due to the wood burning stoves inside. I sat stargazing outside my ger after dinner with one of the dogs to cool down.

Every so often a herd of horses galloped wandered pat, and one morning as I lay in bed looking out of the open door a camel ambled past in the distance.

I finished reading Shantaram too, six days after receiving it, which shows how much downtime I've had on the train and at the ger camp (it has 933 pages). It is perfect timing too as the owner, who gave it to me on day 2 from Moscow, is arriving in UB from Irkutsk today so I can give it back to him. I am definitely not lugging it around as it weighs a frigging tonne...

I'e definitely got fatter in the last week. On the train, you lose the need for limbs as each day goes past, settling into an alternative reality where you sit up to eat or look out of the window, then lie back down to sleep, read, drink vodka, play cards or talk nonsense with fellow travellers. Everyone I met on the train became like thi, and by day 4 you forget that you are actually on a journey with a beginning and an end. You become brainwashed into the idea that the train ride is never ending, and will just continue going round the world forever, stopping only for 10 or 23 minutes several times a day so you can buy unidentifiable dumplings and potato doughnuts from stern russian ladies with metal teeth, on the platform.

When Roddy, the first of our motley crew to break the spell and get off at Irkutsk late on day 4, we all exchanged a look of fearful unknowing and terror. Even he seemed to be in shock at the idea of actually getting off the train, our steel cage of self-imposed security, that had become our universe. Facing the outside world seemed more scary than meeting the devil himself.

But saying that, 24 hrs on and cabin fever had set in for me so Ulan Bator couldn't come soon enough. I left my companions continuing onto Beijing on the train, unable to hide my relief at standing on still ground, and watched the glossy-eyed stare of the soon-to-be-mad eyeball me with more than a hint of darkness. They still had 30 hours to go before getting off. Ouch.

I've got that to look forward to tomorrow morning when I catch the No24 to Beijing. But with my Mongolian break I am looking forward to it. And also the prospect of arriving in China on a train, being dropped off in central Beijing, is just incomprehensible at this point.

Mongolia

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Mongolia is the business. I awoke 4 days ago, still on the train from Moscow (5 days straight) to the rural steppes and plains of Mongolia. It was jut before sunrise and the rocky horizon glowed pink. The grassy yellow plains swept past in a blur, dotted with the odd lone or cluster of gers (yurts). It was a different world to the grimness of Russia. With it land-raping policies of open coal mines, chemical plants dominating vast rural areas, huge industrial chimneys belching out black smoke across the landscape, and desolate, gargantuan disused factories ruining any chances of a pleasant view from the train. Couple that with the shifty-eyed locals with the look of the experimented-on, full of disdain and rudeness towards any living thing not Russian, and Mongolia was a treat and a half.

The Russia-Mongolia border crossing took 7.5 hours. It was nice to get off the train for the first couple of hours and stroll about, visit the local shop, queue up for 20 minutes to buy some biscuits and marvel at the selection of tinned horsemeat on sale. But then it dragged on. So waking this morning was waking into a different realm.

Ulan Bator is a hideous dint on the landscape, thanks to Soviet town planning intervention, but relatively low-rise with gers intertwined with the city outskirts. My hostel is very well-run although the place itself is quite cramped. Free breakfast of white bread and Mongolian bootleg Nutella tasted like amber nectar after 5 days on the train with Russian bread and supernoodles.

Moscow breakfast No 1

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This morning, found a lovely little cafe to have breakfast in. I was accompanied by two from the hostel, a german called Tobias and a Canadian called Pete. Tobias speak russian and works it at every opportunity. He also knows ludicrous and highly debatable stories about everything. An excellent companion (in short doses).

We went inside once Tobias had agreed that the coffee, whilst not cheap, was not expensive (which took several minutes). Inside we found a cavernous little grotto and slunk down at a corner table. The place was on the bohemian side for Muscovite culture; dreadlocked people with yellow wellies populated one table. The menu was excellent and I ordered a cherry, espresso and yoghurt smoothie, and hazelnut latte. Pete ordered a spinach pie which came out like a half pie/half pancake, with pine nuts and delicious pastry. I took a picture of the menu because it was all in russian and looked really nice scribbled on the large blackboard. Then heaven ended and the previously friendly man making my smoothie demanded to have my camera and made me delete the photo I took of the menu. It was a fantastic smoothie selection admittedly, but I felt his need to protect it was slightly overzealous. He was shouting and everything. Talk about not blending in with the surroundings. I stiffened myself and picked up my bag, readying myself for the imminent iron grip round the back of my neck and the obligatory kicking out onto the street. He gesticulated a lot and made me feel very scared, then Tobias asked if we were about to get kicked out (which I thought was obvious at this point), and the man said no, and told us to sit down in no uncertain terms. I've never had a breakfast like it. The smoothie was excellent, thank god. I would have hated to have some kind of complaint (and probably would not have left able-bodied).

Afterwards we headed to Red Square, which was within sight behind a small church. Despite this Tobias asked every russian that walked past for directions. Hilariously everyone was non-russian and answered in english. You could almost see the steam coming out of Tobias's ears. Eventually he found a russian lady on the steps of the metro and talked to her for 10 minutes about her family. By the time we got to Red Square I was exhausted. And we had only moved 100 metres.

Moskva!

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Another amazing night's sleep! What's going on???? My dorm bed in Napoleon Hostel was amazing. I lied in til 10.30am. I'm in a mixed dorm, and this morning realised it was basically a male dorm with me in it. Everyone else went out on the piss last night but I didn't hear them come in. This morning I heard a german and russian arguing over whether the window would open. An american stepped into the room and said 'it smells like dead bodies in here'. I realised I was unaware of this change since I had been in the room since last night. I went out to have a shower and there was a queue, so I just washed my face, went back to the dorm, wrestled with the eastern bloc window frame and yanked it open. Everyone is in there now standing around discussing that it actually DID open.

Out on reception is a strange militant russian of oriental origin. I couldn't work out if he was guest last night. He was at in front of the TV watching some kind of game show on his own, shouting the answers out aggressively. but he is sitting behind reception this morning playing cossack music really loudly. I suppose there is a chance he still doesn't work here and is just a regular. I'm just avoiding him in general. I got in his line of communication earlier as I came back from the sink where I thought he was saying to me "Are you using this?", motioning to the iron. I said a simple 'no', and he turned to look at me with disgust and shouted "No, nyot you!".

Whatever.

Anyway I'm off out with a couple of people to a cafe nearby for some brekkie. It is rather cold here - I thought at this time of year it would be warmer. But winter clothing is needed. I am still braving it in my flip flops but it takes a lot for me to put actual proper shoes on. I checked out Red Square yesterday and it was great walking around it. The traffic here is hideous but strangely silent. I think everyone had their engines turned off. Cars sit in seven or eight rows across the huge streets, nothing moving and everyone pointing in different directions, but it is really quiet. The metro is definitely the way to go in Moscow...

The train journey from Amsterdam to Moscow was great. It was a little crampe in my cabin due to the unfortunate luck of all three of us inhabitants having huge bits of luggage. But the time zoomed past and it was great moving through Germany, Poland, not so great going through Belarus but that is a personal thing of mine, then on through Russia and arriving at Moscow Bellorussky station at 11am yesterday. I am now 2 hours ahead of the UK. From now on I am entering time zone hell, as it changes every hour on the trans siberian.

One thing I will not be doing again is forgetting to take water and money on the train. I stocked up on fruit and tea bags in Amsterdam and jumped on the train thinking I was sorted on Friday night. I went to get some cold water and they only sold it in small bottles for E2.90. That cleared out all the money I had - not a good look for a 37 hour train journey. So for the rest of the trip I survived on hot water from the frau attendant's hot water heater. I sneaked in a couple of times ewhen she wasn't there and ran the cold tap and actually got some cold water. It was heaven. But she was one stout and firm russian woman who was taking no nonsense, so I daren't try it again. She had already reprimanded me for using the teaspoon she gave me to stir my tea to eat my pasta with. She walked past as I was eating it and whiped the teaspoon out of my hand, cursing me in cyrillic.

More finished earthship pics

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These are ones from around the world

Earthship Days 3&4

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This week has been great. I've learned some hands-on skills like tyre pounding, making glass bricks out of old wine bottles and also laid a wall with wine bottles and cement. The project is really coming along and I think early next week the trusses will go on and then it will really be taking shape.

The effects of using wine bottles cut in half and stuck together to make a cylindrical brick is shown above. Here are more pics of this earthship in progress: