Last Days of Shanghai

Goodbye, Shanghai.

What a difference a year makes. When I first arrived in China, I had never worked abroad, never lived on my own and knew no Chinese. Now I feel like I've adapted to one of the biggest cities in the world.

I feel proud of myself for not giving up, since everything went to hell my first month here. To protect against that possibility, I came to China with an open-ended return ticket. My friends were amazed that I stuck it out. It wasn't like I stayed in China because I ran out of money. Most of my friends said if things had gone as badly for them as it did for me, they would definitely have gone home. Especially if home was Hawaii!

This might be melodramatic, but I felt I had to stay in China for a year. If I had gone home, I think my spirit would have been broken, and I'd never have the confidence to travel on my own again.

Now that I've been able to survive for a year, the world has opened up to me. I feel like I can go anywhere and actually live there, not just travel through like a tourist. I think the first year in a developing country is the hardest experience; after that, things become more bearable. Shanghai is actually not bad, after hearing from friends who've been to places like Africa and India.

The key thing that kept me sane was my friends. I was lucky to hang out with a wonderful group of people. Since the world is coming to do business in Shanghai, my friends came from everywhere. So many of my friends were English, it was like I was back studying abroad in England. China, Europe, Canada, Australia and the United States were also well-represented in my social circle. All the people I met were so supportive, giving me the encouragement I needed just when I was ready to quit and go home.

I'm not big on throwing parties in my own honor. I usually let my birthday slip by without telling anyone. This time, I threw a farewell party, just so I could see my friends before I left.

I chose to have it at Cotton's Bar, because it's my favorite bar in Shanghai. It's a house, so it feels cozy and comfortable. There's outdoor seating on wooden furniture amidst leafy greenery, which makes for a beautiful backdrop for lazy conversations. Cotton's is also the site for one of the best parties I'd ever been to, for New Year's 2006. My friends and I totally destroyed that place, dancing on chairs, tables, going totally nuts. Like trashing someone's house at a house party, except for not having to clean up.

People came and went at different times, so it was a weird dynamic. It was like being at several different parties. Richard and Andy were the first to show up, and they had known me since I first came to Shanghai. It was fun to reminisce about the old days.




Richard and Andy at my farewell party at Cotton's Bar.

They left early, and the rest of my friends came later. Looking at all of these awesome people, I felt blessed. I hadn't even left yet, and I was already planning to come back and visit them.

The Shanghai Gang. So many parties, so many memories.

The popular conversation topic was taking the next step. Melissa and Shauna moved up to teaching at international schools. My roommate Elizabeth was looking into working for a multinational company. Some of our friends had gone home to attend grad school. Others stayed to study Chinese, which would improve their career prospects.

As for me, I was going to move to a new country. Staying in China would have been so easy, since I had friends and knew my way around. But I wanted to keep moving, to see what else was out there. If I ever changed my mind, there was always Shanghai.

Inside Information

Getting into the city

Arrival: Most international flights land in Pudong airport. The Maglev train is not convenient for getting into the city. It's difficult to transfer from the airport to the Maglev, and it goes to Longyang metro station, which is still on the outskirts of Shanghai.

Airport buses are a better choice. Bus #2 is the most useful, as it goes directly to Jing'an Temple.

Where to stay

I stayed at Le Tour Travelers Rest. Nice hostel, and a great location near Jing'an Temple. Convenient for bars, clubs, and restaurants. Mingtown ETour Hostel has a super-central location near People's Square, a hub for the metro lines. It has gotten good reviews in guidebooks and online, but I haven't stayed there.

Captain Hostel (Bund branch) is one of the oldest hostels in Shanghai. Even if you don't stay there, it's worth going to the rooftop bar. Great views of the skyline in Pudong, at a fraction of the cost of other bars on the riverfront.

The information below is accumulated from my time living in Shanghai. Good for if you've decided to move there.

Appendix 1: Living Costs in Shanghai

What does it cost to live in Shanghai? Mercer Human Resources Consulting compiles a list of the world's most expensive cities every year. There's a link to the complete list over at CNN.

Shanghai ranked #30 overall. This list is skewed, though. Companies hire Mercer to calculate compensation packages for the American executives they send abroad. The Director of China Operations for a multinational corporation will demand a higher standard of living than a poor college graduate on a student budget. Shanghai can be very expensive or very cheap, depending on the person.

Enough talk. Time to show you the money!

My Monthly Expenses (estimates in RMB):

1400 Rent
1200 Food
200 Utilities
64 Bus
80 Taxi
80 Subway
300 Clubbing (Drinking and Cover Charges)
80 DVDs
300 Books
50 Mobile phone
+100 Long-distance phone calls

3854 RMB TOTAL US$477.58 a month, using the Universal Currency Converter

Comments on Costs

Rent -- Housing is the biggest expense, just like it would be anywhere else. Executive expats live in country club-style communities that can cost over $10,000 a month. Serviced apartments, which are basically long-stay hotel rooms, cost almost as much.

Younger expats usually share apartments. Smart Shanghai is the best to look for apartments (and jobs). Shanghai Expat, and Craig's List Shanghai are also worth a look. If you are fluent in Chinese, you can find some spectacular deals on Anjia.

If you have one roommate and a 2-bedroom apartment in the city, your rent shouldn't cost more than 2500 RMB ($310). If you live further from the city, that much could get you your own 1-bedroom apartment. 3-bedroom apartments can be had for less than 8000 RMB ($1000). For more info, check out this rental chart.

The bigger the apartment, the better the value. 1-bedroom apartments are usually bad and overpriced. 2-bedroom apartments range from okay to somewhat nice. 3-bedroom apartments are huge, new, and are well-located. Not to mention cheaper, because the rent is split among three people. The difference in price between 2-bedroom and 3-bedroom apartments is not that much sometimes. One of my friends said, "When it comes to apartments, 3 is the magic number."

Emoo is an expat services company that has excellent move-to-Shanghai packages. For one price, they'll pick you up at the airport, put you in a hotel, find you an apartment, and even toss in an international phone card. They also help with visas. Click on "Traveling." The special offers aren't there now, but should be back up soon. You can probably find a cheaper apartment on your own, but I think Emoo is the most convenient way to move to Shanghai for the first time.

Food -- Good news for people like me who are too lazy to cook. I average 40 RMB ($5) a day on food, eating out three times a day. If you stick to water and stuffed steam buns (baozi), could spend less than $1 a day. I tend to mix Western and Asian food. Pizza is expensive, so most of my friends eat Hello Pizza, a cheap local chain.

The bad news is cheese. There's no cheese in China! Carrefour (Jialefu in Chinese) is one of the few places that carry a decent selection, because they're like the French version of Costco. The Chinese I talk to say they don't like cheese, it smells too bad. Ironic, since one whiff of their stinky doufu could knock out a rampaging elephant.

Utilities -- These usually don't amount to much, but paying them can be a pain in the ass. You have to go to a convenience store like KEDI or Lawson's. You give them the bill, they scan it, and you pay. Some of the clerks can be anal about only accepting utility bills at certain times of the day. I get the best service when I pay at the post office, so now I do all my business there.

Bus -- on old buses (no air-conditioning), it costs 1 RMB for a one-way bus ticket. New buses cost 2 RMB. An old woman will come along the aisle with a dirty purse, collecting money, making change, and handing out bus tickets. The newer buses have coin machines and card scanners

Taxi -- The base fee is 10 RMB ($1.25) for the first kilometer and 2 RMB each kilometer afterwads. After 11:00PM, the base fee is 13 RMB ($1.61) There's a ton of taxis in Shanghai, and the drivers are very professional. At least compared to what I experienced in Beijing. Typically, they wear suits, ties, and white driving gloves. They don't speak English, so you'll have learn a little Chinese. Lu ("loo") means road. Nanjing Road becomes Nanjing Lu. Give the driver the street and cross-street, and you'll be fine.

Taxis come in different colors (each with a different company), but 99% of them are Volkswagen Santanas. Volkswagen was one of the first companies to enter the China market, so their cars are everywhere. The Santana is relatively cheap and super-reliable. But it's almost impossible to get a taxi when it's raining.

My favorite taxi company is Da Zhong Taxi, they're turquoise in color. They're part of a state-owned enterprise that enforces professional standards. Qiansheng taxis, which are yellow, are pretty good too. I thought the worst taxis were the maroon-colored ones, I forget the name. Old cars and the drivers didn't know where anything was.

Always keep the taxi receipt, you can use it to recover lost belongings or complain about a taxi driver. You can call the taxi company, and they can use the receipt to resolve any problems. Stay away from abnormal-looking taxis. They're private taxis and generate the most complaints.

Subway -- Shanghai's subway system is clean and efficient, but there's only 4 lines right now. The good news is that they're planning to add 8 lines.

It's highly recommended to get a Shanghai Public Transportation Card. It can be used on the subway, taxi, and some buses. The lines at subway ticket booths can be really long during peak times. It's faster to just pass the card over the scanner at the turnstiles. The scanners are powerful; I've seen women hold huge handbags over the scanner and it still detected the card.

Clubbing -- Drinking is expensive compared to other living costs, especially if you drink in the trendy Xintiandi area. The clubs I've gone to so far charge about 60 RMB ($7.44) for entry and about 50 RMB ($6.20) for mixed drinks. That's why my friends and I always end up at Windows Too, which has 10 RMB ($1.25) drinks. So far, my favorite club is Guandii. It was founded by Hong Kong media stars and has good hip-hop music. The place is always packed with overseas Chinese and ABCs (American-Born Chinese).

Here are some of the main clubbing areas:
The New Factories
The Bund
Tongren Road
Hengshan Road
Fuxing Park
Maoming Road

SH Magazine is a free weekly publication that has all the latest restaurant and clubbing info. You can pick it up at most Starbucks and Western restaurants. Smart Shanghai is another great source. Their venue listings also have the useful option of printing out directions in Chinese for a taxi driver.

There's a great service called Guanxi. If you send a text with the name of a bar, restaurant, or nightclub, it will reply with the address and contact info of that venue. You can also get Guanxi to translate those details into Chinese, so you can show it to a taxi driver.

DVDs -- China is heaven for movie lovers, since pirated DVDs are everywhere. DVDs in shops go for about 10 RMB ($1.25). On the street, they can go as low as 5 RMB ($0.62). I got a Philips DVD player for 400 RMB ($50) at Gome, a big electronics store. It's best to stay away from the newest Hollywood movies. Many times they're bad because the movie was recorded with a home video camera someone snuck into a movie theater. The annoying thing is that they often don't have the special features, like deleted scenes, director commentary, etc.

Books -- Books are relatively expensive. Paperback copies of literary classics are the best bargains at about 18 RMB ($2.25). Any other book can cost over 200 RMB ($24.81). Thanks to government censorship, there is a lack of variety, except for books about learning the Chinese language and doing business in China. Most bookstores will have a small section of English-language books, usually guidebooks and classic literature. The best bookstore is the Foreign Languages Bookstore, on Fuzhou Road.

Mobile Phone -- They say "mobile phone" more than "cell phone" here. Good ones usually cost more than 1000 RMB ($124.03). I got a Motorola for about 500 RMB ($62.01). One of my Chinese friends took me to a mobile phone store at Middle Henan Road subway station, Exit 1. You can sign up with China Mobile and pay a monthly fee. My friends and I buy phone cards and add credit as we go. Phone cards come in 50 RMB or 100 RMB. Since I mostly send text messages instead of talk, a 50 RMB card can last me a month.

Long-Distance Calls -- Just like with mobile phone cards, long-distance ones come in denominations of 50 RMB or 100 RMB. Try to buy them off the street from the shabbiest operator you can find. Normally you can buy for 50% or 66% off the face value. If you look Caucasian, you'll probably end up paying full price. A 100 RMB card lasts 45-50 minutes when calling America.

Appendix 2: Average Salaries in Shanghai

After talking to some people, here's what I came up with. Strictly word-of-mouth, no statistics to back these up. All numbers are monthly figures.

1000-3000 RMB ($124-$372) Recent College Graduate

5000-7000 RMB ($620-$868) Mid-level Employee

10,000 + RMB ($1240) Executive

Looking at this list, I can see why Western companies are in such a rush to send jobs overseas. You could pay a Chinese CEO half of what an American high school student makes at McDonald's. Note that factory workers make even less. Since rents are often higher than starting salaries in Shanghai, many young professionals live with their parents.

English is in such demand that I make more as an English teacher than many of my students. People are paid monthly here, rather than biweekly like the U.S. Some employers do direct deposits to bank accounts, while many still pay in cash.

Appendix 3: Exchanging Money

The yuan is a closed currency, meaning it is difficult to change. There's all sorts of exchange controls to let money come into China, but not go out. For example, when you change money at the airport or a bank, you are given an exchange memo. You always have to show that exchange memo before you can change yuan back into dollars. You can't get back more dollars than you first exchanged. Exchange memos are only valid for 6 months. Customs regualations prohibit carrying more than $5000 or 20,000 RMB in cash out of the country.

The best of all worlds is to have an American employer who pays you in dollars. Executive-level expats usually have their main salary wired to their U.S. bank account, while taking living allowances in cash for daily expenses.

Then there's the black market. Outside the main Bank of China headquarters near the Bund, there's street currency traders who will happily change as many dollars as you want. If they're blatant, they might run away with your money. If they have some subtlety, they'll yell "Police!" and then run away with your money. Or they will be totally professional: once back at your hotel, you'll discover you got carefully cut pieces of newspaper, even if you swear the money never left your hands.

The Hong Kong Dollar is freely convertible, so one of my friends proposed opening a bank account there if I ever visit Hong Kong to buy a Chinese visa. Wire the money to Hong Kong, then America. Or carry bundles of cash to Hong Kong. Some of the other schemes expats have come up with are too crazy to mention here.

Channel to China! -- Tiger Leaping Gorge

Living on the edge: click on the photo to see the full album.

I'm not actually an outdoors person. Hiking, trekking and camping are not my thing. Being from an island and surrounded by nature all the time, I prefer to travel to big cities instead.

But Tiger Leaping Gorge just sounded too cool to pass up. Claire convinced me to gather more info, then maybe give it a shot.

We went to a hiking club in Lijiang and asked some of the Chinese staff about how difficult the gorge was. They assured us that it was a relatively safe hike, with lots of guesthouses along the way to eat and rest.

I had only alloted four days in Lijiang, and the hike would take at least two. If I wanted to do it, I had to decide today and go tomorrow. I told Claire I'd do it. She was excited.

I couldn't sleep that night, because I totally believed I was getting in way over my head. I'm not in the best physical condition, so I worried that I would slow Claire down. She'd down some hardcore trekking in the highlands of Vietnam. When I travel, I hang out at cafes and bookstores. I couldn't resist the symmetry of it, though. I started my China trip at the Great Wall, one of the biggest manmade wonders of the world. I would end my trip at Tiger Leaping Gorge, the deepest gorge in the world, a natural wonder.

We took a bus bound for Zhongdian and got off at Qiaotou, a small town at the beginning of the trek. To get the latest info, we hit up the Gorged Tiger Cafe. It's run by a cool Australian lady named Margo.

We had coffee and cookies while she gave us advice about the trek. The most important thing was the weather. Margo said that the weather was supposed to be perfect, so now was definitely the time to do it. Once we finished our coffee and used the bathroom, we were off!

The trek wasn't too bad, at first. We were mostly walking on trails. Everything changed once we turned around our first mountain:




After that, I was hooked. Now I could see why people were willing to get sweaty and push themselves to the limit on treks. When you see stunning natural vistas like these, it more than made up for all the hassle involved.

Although Tiger Leaping Gorge is a really popular thing for tourists to do, we were alone for most of the time. We did walk for a while with a small group of people from Hong Kong that had been with us on the bus to Qiaotou. One of the women was an investment banker, so I ended up talking to her about business in China. She recommended some Chinese companies that would make good investments. I felt weird though, getting stock tips while walking thousands of meters above sea level. Travel sometimes brings out these totally weird situations that would just not happen back home.

While the Hong Kongers were cool, sometimes the locals could be annoying. Local folk on horses would walk behind us for hours at a time, hoping we would get tired and pay them for a horse ride.

Touts in China are legendary. Wherever there's tourists, they'll be people trying to sell you stuff. I've had touts try to sell me picture books at the Great Wall and now the horse rides. What's worse is that the horses would sniff at my ass while I climbed.




At the end of the day, we encountered the 28 Bends. It's a murderous path of sudden turns and switchbacks at steep angles. I couldn't enjoy the scenery because I had to concentrate 100% on mantaining my balance. By the time we finished, I thought my knees were destroyed.

I'd never been so excited to rest in my life. We spent the night at the Tea Horse Guesthouse. The rooms were perfect, a beautiful wooden lodge.





The bathrooms were another story. The "toilets" were a set of bleak concrete stalls. I had to squat over a little gutter and the water would sluice my donations off to their fate. As for the shower, it was an absolutely disgusting wooden shack with a single showerhead. I felt more dirty than clean after bathing in that place. I've spared you guys the photos here, but you can find them in the photo album.

One benefit was that we met this cool couple from Denmark, Peter and Mette. They joined us when we hiked the next day.




The second day was when I saw the coolest stuff. The rock formations become much more different and weird-looking. I probably took more pictures that day then the day before. Here's one of my favorite shots, I snapped it when my hiking mates were treading under an outcropping of rocks:




The best was still yet to come. We came across a waterfall. As we got closer, it got bigger and bigger, until the waterfall took up the whole side of the mountain.




I learned something that day. Waterfalls are pretty to look at, but a pain in the ass to cross. The rocks were unbelievably slippery, so I was freaked out that I'd fall over and get swept by water off the mountain.

I managed to make it across alive, much to my relief. My feet hurt, but the trek was almost over.

We ended our trek at Walnut Garden, a guesthouse run by Sean, a Chinese man with a deformed arm. Nearly everyone uses copies of his hand-drawn map when hiking Tiger Leaping Gorge, since it's available in all the backpacker-oriented cafes in Lijiang. It was so nice to sit back in a beach chair and enjoy the scenery. After everyone finished their drinks, it was time to figure out how to get back to Qiaotou. From there, we'd get another bus back to Lijiang.

I asked some of the waitresses if there were any buses, but they said there were none. Maybe their English wasn't good enough to understand. I sought out Sean, the manager.

"Excuse me, is there a bus back to Qiaotou?" I asked.

"You already asked the waitresses! Why do you ask again?! No! There's no buses!" Sean said.

Taken aback by his vehement response, I asked, "When is the next bus?"

"No buses! Not until tomorrow! Why do you keep asking for bus?! Why should I have to get you a bus?"

Claire broke in, "Because you're the manager and we're customers."

"What? You have my map, everyone have my map, you think is free to print so many maps?!" Sean went on.

"Do you know how much I paid to fly to China from England?" Claire countered.

I gave up on him by this point. Claire stayed to argue with him longer. A German backpacker I'd met at the guesthouse went down to the street with me to look for a ride. She needed to get back to Lijiang as well. In a minute, we flagged down a van that would give us a ride for a low price. No rides until tomorrow, yeah right. The German girl said she couldn't go with us now, she was still waiting for a few friends. I thanked her profusely.

I retrieved Claire and we piled into the van. She was as angry as I was. It sucks when you put so much time, money and effort into a trip, and some jerk ruins it like Sean did. He soured me on the whole hike.

Claire was more street-smart than me. She said Sean must have been lying about the lack of buses, just so we'd be forced to spend a night at his guesthouse. What a hustler.

Our driver was an old Chinese man who chain-smoked as he drove us back along the mountain road, whipping around curves and barely bothering to use the brakes. This wouldn't have been that scary, except there was no guardrail on the road. So if he took a turn too fast and skidded to the side, there was no barrier to keep us from falling off the mountain.

The crisis point hit when we passed under the waterfall we'd crossed earlier by foot. Water flooded the road, the tires lost traction and we started to slip sideways--toward the edge.

I was sitting next to the window that overlooked the cliff. I wish I could say I was brave when I looked death in the face, but I cringed away from that window as much as possible. Meanwhile, Claire leaned past me to take a look. The driver, he just didn't care. He was puffing on his cigarette and steering as if nothing was wrong.

Finally, the tires bit back into the ground and the van heaved back from the edge. It took me a while before I remembered to breathe again.

Channel to China! -- Lijiang

A typical alley in Lijiang. Click on the photo to see the full album.

Lijiang was the China I dreamed about: peaceful canals, cobblestone streets, winding alleys, and red lanterns dazzling the night.

My first day was rough, though. I didn't have any accommodation booked when I arrived. I usually like to reserve a place in advance, but after Dali, I was starting to see the virtues of winging it. It's much better to see a place before booking it. The quality of cheap accommodation really varies.

I met Claire, a backpacker from England, on the bus to Lijiang. Once we got off, we searched for a place to stay. The Lonely Planet China was pretty useless. Every place they recommended was pure crap. Finally, we found a place on our own: the Old Town Long Yuan Hotel. The staff didn't speak English, but I spoke enough Chinese to secure rooms for Claire and I. We each paid 70 RMB a night for a private room and a Western toilet. I was happy. Here's a picture of the courtyard:

While Dali was laid out in a neat grid pattern, the old town of Lijiang was a maze of alleys and side streets. A lot of the streets looked the same. The twisty turns made it impossible to see around corners. It took me a while to orient myself and start to find my way around.

One of the must-do things in Lijiang is to attend a Naxi orchestra. The Naxi are the minority people of Lijiang. During the Cultural Revolution, Naxi musicians hid their instruments underground to prevent them from being destroyed by the Red Guards. Now, their musical traditions are trotted out as a tourist attraction.







I have this new obsession: I really like taking pictures of old people. They just add so much character and authenticity to a scene. So the Naxi concert was photo heaven for me. According to the host (who spoke in Chinese), some of the Naxi musicians were over 80 years old!







Lijiang came alive at night. Claire and I walked along a canal that had restaurants in long rows of traditional buildings. Red lanterns were lit everywhere, casting China's favorite color all over the place. Waitresses in Naxi dresses and their customers had singing competitions with restaurants on other sides of the canal, trying to sing louder than each other.

As well as old people, I also like taking pictures of funny signs. This last picture has both, so I couldn't resist putting it in. Whenever I see something like this, I just say, "Only in China."

Channel to China! -- Dali

Fuxing Road in downtown Dali. Click on the photo to see the album.

There are some places where backpackers go and never leave. Dali is one of those places. It vies with Lijiang and Yangshuo for being the top backpackers' hangout in China. Traditional architecture, beautiful natural scenery, loads of cheap guesthouses, and restaurants serving Western cuisine are the ingredients for a travelers' paradise.

Aside from Kunming, there aren't many trains within Yunnan province. There is a train between Kunming and Dali, but it's usually faster to travel by long-distance bus. I know some Chinese people who prefer deluxe buses to soft-seat trains. Deluxe buses have cushioned seats, TVs playing Hong Kong movies, hostesses, and sometimes even on-board toilets.

Travelers talk about the toilets in China the way soldiers tell war stories. Some of the worst toilets I've seen are at the rest stops during long bus trips. Probably even worse in remote villages.

Again, the possibility of finding a Western toilet in a hostel pretty much ends after Kunming. I stayed at the No. 5 Guesthouse (a.k.a. Old Dali Inn) my first night in Dali. It's really big and social, with a jungle treehouse atmosphere. The rooms were uninspiring: the beds consisted of a wooden board on chairs at each end, with a paper-thin mattress on top. Then I saw the bathrooms. The urinals were carved-out wooden barrels! The urine-stained squat toilets were the last straw.

I visited every hotel and guesthouse on Huguo Road, the main drag for bars and restaurants in Dali. I saw lots of clean beds at reasonable prices. The deal-breaker was always the bathrooms. The rooms with private bathrooms had Western toilets, but those rooms were too expensive. When an 80 RMB ($10 USD) - a- night hotel room was "too expensive," it meant that I'd been in China too long. I could have gotten a cheap private room and use the common bathrooms, but they had squat toilets. Unacceptable.

At long last, I came across the No. 3 Guesthouse. It's attached to a good Korean restaurant. The shared dorm rooms were spotless, with wooden bunks that allowed you to draw a curtain across your bunk for privacy. The showers were nice, with lots of shelves and coat hooks to put your stuff. The finishing touch was that the common bathroom had a Western toilet! All of this was mine at 20 RMB ($2.50 USD) a night. I moved in the next day.

Now that I had proper accommodations, I could get on with enjoying the city. I booked a trip to the Shaping Market. One of the interesting things about Yunnan was the abundance of minority groups. The main minority in Dali were the Bai. Shaping Market was supposed to be a great place to observe them in action.

I was walking around the stalls when I saw something that stopped me dead in my tracks. It wasn't some weird Chinese thing. Not snakes in a jar or little kids shitting on the street. No, instead it was a reminder of a place that was as far from China as I could imagine.

It was a girl wearing a university sweater. I could have been more polite when I said hello, but instead I said this:

"HOLY SHIT! You went to Redlands?!"

She froze and said, "Oh my God."

"What are you doing here?" I asked.

"I was studying up in Beijing. What are you doing here?" Jenny asked.

"I was teaching English in Shanghai. How could this happen?" I wondered.

"Whoa," Jenny said. "Like the other side of the world!"

There were so many factors against me meeting someone from my own university. First of all, my university was small. The student population increased to over 2000 only recently. Second of all, we didn't stumble into each other in a major city like Beijing or Shanghai. We were in the Shaping market, which was an hour away from Dali and 5 hours from Kunming. This was in the middle of nowhere.

Once we settled down, we caught up on what what we'd been doing in China. Jenny talked about how she was into "social entrepreneurship," promoting local business as a way to preserve indigenous culture.

Luckily enough, we ran into her business partner when we got back to Dali. The woman took us back to her shop. The colorful patterns and designs of the Bai minority were a far cry from the usual Han Chinese things I'd seen.

While Jenny and her talked business, I wandered around the shop. In a back room, I found the coolest blue shoulder bag.










On the outside, it looked ordinary. But when I turned up the flap, it revealed an intricately-woven picture underneath. I wasn't planning on buying any souvenirs, but I had to have this bag. I needed a smaller bag anyway to hold a map, umbrella, and other traveler essentials when I walked around a city.

The woman gave the bag over to her older sister, so she could adjust the shoulder strap for me.

The next day, I had lunch with Elmer, an American I'd met at the Old Dali Inn, before I moved over to the No. 3 Guesthouse. Elmer was one of those backpackers who came to a place and just never left. After we finished eating, he spotted a Chinese guy he knew and waved him over. Turned out that this guy knew kung fu. I told him I was interested in wing chun. Some of my friends who study kung fu recommended wing chun for its practicality. It's designed for little people fighting against big people. Maximum damage using minimum effort. The kung fu teacher agreed to give me a lesson.

We said goodbye to Elmer and he took me to a park. Some of the moves he showed me looked ridiculous, until he explained what they were for. There was this one hopping sideways move that looked stupid, until he said that it was one method of deflecting a kick. The one thing I learned from that afternoon was not to use high kicks. There were too many ways to take someone down if they tried to kick you.

The lesson went well, until he got too excited once and backfisted me in the face. NOT COOL.

Channel to China! -- Kunming

Tourists dropping coins into a fountain for good luck at the Western Hills. Click on the photo to see the full album.
By the way, I think those Tibetan hats are awesome. Makes those guys look like Chinese cowboys!
* * *
Now I could relax. After Beijing and Xi'an, I didn't have to endure an endless marathon of sightseeing. Time to kick back and take it easy.

Yunnan province was actually the place I was the most excited to visit. If you could only backpack through one province in China, then Yunnan was it. It's one of the most culturally, racially, and environmentally diverse places in the world. The northern part of Yunnan leads into Tibet. The southern and western parts of Yunnan share borders with Laos, Vietnam, and Myanmar (a.k.a. Burma). In between you have a rich mixture of minorities to balance against the dominant Han Chinese.

The first stop was the provincial capital, Kunming. It's nicknamed "The Spring City" because it's supposed to have great weather year-round. It didn't live up to the hype. Rain dogged my entire visit there, but it didn't diminish the charm of the city.

On the surface, it looked like any other Chinese city: big billboards, department stores, etc. I stayed there a week to hide from the onslaught of tourists during the National Day holiday, so I had more time to appreciate the differences. People seemed more casual and laidback than Shanghai. I was grateful for the wide, relatively clean streets. That made Kunming much more pedestrian-friendly than good ol' SH. There were a lot of cafes and restaurants that catered to Western backpackers; later I found that this was a trend throughout some of the other main cities in Yunnan.

I stayed at the Camellia Hostel. It's actually a hotel with a floor in another building set aside for dormitories. I was relieved to find that it was clean and had good service. They're also a good place to get visas for Laos and Vietnam.

The best thing about Kunming was the backpackers. Kunming is the closest major city in China to Southeast Asia. I met tons of travelers going down to Southeast Asia or coming up to China from there. As cheap as I thought China was, I heard from my roommates that SEA was even cheaper! They were full of stories about their adventures: crappy sleeper buses where everyone smoked, finding strange animals in their soup, and motorcycle trips through the jungle. I was so jealous of them.

Although I swore off sightseeing after Xi'an, I did drag myself to a few sights. I went to the Western Hills first. It's a string of pagodas and temples on a mountain with great views of Lake Dian.







Getting there was easy: take Bus No. 5 to the Yunnan Hotel, then switch to a minibus going to the Western Hills. Getting back to Kunming was a nightmare. There were a million tourists pushing into the cheaper buses. I almost wanted to give up and splurge on a taxi. Instead, my friends and I hunkered our shoulders and charged into a bus.
I slacked off for the next few days, afraid of having to deal with crowds again. On my last day, I summoned up the courage to see another local attraction: the Stone Forest in Shilin. I'm really glad I did. The scenery was beautiful and the rocks were different than anything I've seen before.







Another interesting thing is that I'm meeting different kinds of backpackers. When I backpacked through Europe, it was mostly Australians, Canadians, and Americans. In China, I'm running into lots of Europeans. Many are French-speaking -- Swiss, Belgians, and well, French. It's a trend I've encountered before. When I go somewhere, I meet more travelers than locals. I've made more British friends in Shanghai than when I studied in England. Strangers in a strange land tend to flock together.

Channel to China! -- Xi'an

The Terracotta Warriors of Xi'an. Click on the photo to see the full album.

I heard bad things about Xi'an, so I made my visit short. Just three nights. I was hoping that my friends were wrong.

Unfortunately, they weren't. Xi'an is an ugly industrial city, especially in the surrounding outskirts. As I rode into town on a bus, I saw demolished buildings, huge trucks hauling construction materials, and miserable weather.

Things improved at the border. Xi'an has a well-preserved city wall that encloses the city center. After Beijing and Shanghai, Chinese cities are all starting to look the same. I keep seeing the same big billboards and department stores everywhere. That's what happens with central government planning. I've heard Hong Kong has been the prototype for the modern cities springing up all over China.

I stayed at the Han Tang Inn. Big mistake! The outside looked nice enough, but the inside might as well have been a condemned building. Graffiti lined the walls, empty beer bottles littered the stair landings, and the concrete floors were dirty.

I took one look at the grim bunker that was supposed to be my dorm room and immediately switched to a private double room. I should have changed hostels altogether, but I was too lazy to find another one. The room was a little nicer. But the bathroom wasn't much of an improvement. There was no curtain to separate the shower from the toilet, so water would splash everywhere. When I flushed the toilet, water leaked out from the base of the bowl. Totally disgusting.

Going to the Terracotta Warriors lifted my spirits. In Beijing, an Australian backpacker told me it was better to go there by public bus instead of taking a tour. If I took a tour, I'd get up way early in the morning, be led to one tourist trap after another, and get only a little time with the Warriors.

The best way to see the Warriors is to take the green 306 bus. It picks up passengers across the street in front of Xi'an train station, near a China Post office. Costs 7 RMB for a one-way ticket and takes about 1.5 hours to get there. It's always cool when you can dodge the tourist vortex and bask in local culture on the cheap.

I met Sophie my last night at the hostel. She worked there part-time while studying to become an English teacher. When she talked about her aspirations, I was struck by how similar they were to Americans. She wanted to move to Beijing or Shanghai to find a better life. Going to the big city to make your dreams come true; that's a story everone can relate to. I guess the Chinese aren't always so different from us.

Channel to China! -- Beijing

Caroline and me at the Forbidden City. Click on the photo to see Beijing album #1.

More photos in Bejing album #2

I've finished up my contract teaching English, so I've set out to travel across China. Choosing the first stop was easy. Beijing has the classic relics of ancient China. At the same time, it's at the forefront of a nation modernizing in a hurry.

Part 1: New Friends

I always feel the same nervousness when I arrive at a new place. Not because I'm worried about my safety; Los Angeles felt more dangerous than any other place I've been. It's because traveling by myself it gets lonely sometimes. This is especially true on my first night at a hostel. Everyone else seems to be laughing together, talking, all the old-timers know each other. I'm the new kid with no friends.

I stayed at the Beijing Jade International Youth Hostel. The place was really nice, but there was still another important factor that wasn't certain. In the elevator, I actually crossed my fingers and prayed for cool roommates. The people you meet on the road can make or break your experience.

This time, I hit the jackpot! My two roommates were Ben and Colin, two cool guys from Scotland. The story got better. They were studying abroad in Singapore with loads of other students from all over Europe. A big group of them were visiting Bejing and staying at the same hostel! I was happy beyond belief. My first night, and I've already made like 20 new friends!

The Singapore group, on our way to the Great Wall

Part 2: Beijing Roast Duck

One of the joys of China is the food. The flavors run the gamut from the fiery peppers of Sichuan to the refined cuisine of Hong Kong.

Beijing Roast Duck is one of the most popular dishes in China. I've found it on pizza, at Kentucky Fried Chicken, practically every restaurant has some version of it.

The place to go in Bejing is the Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant. The walls carry framed photos of Fidel Castro, former U.S. President George H.W. Bush, and other world leaders who've dined on the best roast duck in Beijing.

The service is excellent. A dapper chef carves up a fresh roast duck at your table:

Looking at these pictures makes me wish I could go back there!

Part 3: The Wall

"All those other places are okay, but it's really all about The Wall. It's such a fucking big wall!"
--Joe, roommate at my hostel

The Great Wall is divided into sections, so you have to pick which spot to visit. Badaling is the most touristy and commercial. Jiankou is really remote and more authentic. A popular option for hardy trekkers is to walk from the Jinshanling section to the Simatai section.

Our group settled on Simatai. It's a good middle-ground choice. Simatai has the restrooms and conveniences of a tourist trap; but it also had considerably less tourists.

Most tours to the Great Wall go to Badaling and include a visit to the Ming Tombs. My friends who've been there said the Ming Tombs were empty and boring. Luckily, our group got around that by chartering a minibus and going on our own.

Bring comfortable shoes! There's a lot of walking up steep steps. Learn to say, "Bu yao [don't want]," because hawkers will try to sell you postcards, picture books, and other crap along the way. If there's one thing that almost ruined Beijing for me, it was the hawkers. They're lurking at every major tourist attraction.

At Simatai, you walk up a mountain pass. You make a turn into a rock building, and suddenly you're on the Great Wall!

I was so excited I never felt tired. Every step was like walking across the top of China. Just when I felt like stopping, there was a always another tower in the distance promising even greater views.

Finally, I felt the climb starting to catch up with me. Just one more tower! As I wheezed over the last step, here's the sight that greeted me:








Another tacky souvenir shop! I couldn't believe it! I climbed up the Great Wall for this?!

I gave up and bought some ice cream bars. Food never tasted so good. It wasn't just the ice cream. My one year in China flashed in front of me: I spent my first month in Hell, studied one of the most difficult languages in the world, and finally made it to the Great Wall. This was the sweet taste of victory.