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Eventually arrive in Hanoi. so just find a hotel and get some food. Book a trip to Halong Bay for the next day. then arrange to get a tuk tuk over to the FedEx office, to ship home all the new clothes!! Agree a proce of 50,000 VND with the drivers to take both of us to the office and back again. so off we go (dont want to die in a tuk tuk either!!)  we have 20kg of stuff to send home between us!! however, after going through all the paperwork and bixing all the stuff up, the fedex woman says they dont take Visa - argh. so off to find the EMS office, who are slower but cheaper, so we can actually get enough money to pay in cash. so I go off to the bank to get money and the tuk tuk driver starts shouting at me that he cant wait and that he wants his money. so i give him half and say to split it with the other guy. he continues shouting but i tell him that as he has only brought us halfway he is only gettin ghalf the price. so i walk off anf the other guy follows me into the EMS office and starts shouting looking for his money. i tell him his friend has it and he continues roaring at me. the woman behind the wounter translates and says that we owe him another 25,000 VND. I tell her that they havent brought us the full  way and she say Oh, he didnt mention that. so she tells him to get lost.  eventually, get all the stuff sent and just head back to the hotel for the evening.   

up early and head over to get the bus. Its going to be fun - we have tickets for the fancy bus, but my idea of fancy and the vietnamese idea of fancy are not exactly on the same page!!  anyway, after a long trip to Nha Trang, we get about an hours break before getting on the night bus to Hoi An. Journey should take about 22hrs in total. Did i mention that the vietnamese are not too fussed about which lane they drive in and they also drive with their horn constantly blowing and the buses blare out vietnamese karoke at full volume. so all in all, my earplugs and 3 sleeping tablets dont allow for a good nights sleep!! and when the bus stops randomly, Im allowed to think that we might be able to go to the loo - NO. the bus stopped and a few of us get off and go into the nearest building looking for a toilet. we have actually gone into someones house - oops!! then notice that the drivers are looking at the wheels?? back on the bus and we literally go about 2km when we stop again. yes, the wheel is broken and has to be taken off!! great!! so all off the bus, and we end up peeing down a little alleyway in the dark! then we proceed to watch the drivers use a hammer to bang at teh wheel for 45 mins and then put it back on hte bus!! now, its about 11.30 at night, so very dark. it could be a very interesting journey to Hoi An!!!

2nd July 2007

finally arrive in Hoi An and check into hotel. have a snooze, as sleep wasnt exactly happening last night!! wander around town to check out the tailors - oh dear, i could be in trouble!! there are tailors every second shop and within 2hrs I have been measured up for two dresses and a coat!! I think my dwindling bank balance is going to take a massive hit!! (All donations will be accepted graciously!!)  basically spend the day looking at fabrics and clothes and have a wander around the town. its quite a nice place. it has a good feel to it and some of teh buildings are full of character and are really pretty.

3rd July 2007

I hate to admit it, but today is a repeat of yesterday - spend pretty much the entire day looking around for good deals on tailor made clothes. all i have to do is to remember to tell them to make them a bit bigger, as im pretty confident that i will put the weight back on once i get home!! its the only positive thing about getting massive doses of travellers diarrohea - it does wonders for your figure!!

4th July 2007

in between all the fittings, we actually do something today. we go on a walking tour around town. some of the archetecture is lovely and the small streets are really nice. quite a few of teh buildings are a bit run down, but it adds to their character. there are a few chinese buildings still remaining. then we wander in to the market. there are dozens of stalls with all sorts of fruit anf veg, meat and fish and lots of other foods and spices - its great. then head into the clothes market. its basically a big warehouse, bureting at teh seams (no pun intended!!) with bolts of fabric and silks and lots of women sitting behind sewing machines. Actually, quite a few of them are asleep!!  they all come over to try and get you to just look at their stuff. out the back there are lots of places where you can get shoes and other leather goods made. somehow, i manage to avoid all the shoes!! I know, clearly something has happened to me while Ive been travelling!! the market stretches out to be quite large and also has handbags, beads and lots of other good stuff. continue on to the Japanese bridge, that the Japs built to connect both sides of town. its quite pretty. its very arched and is all enclosed, like a little building. its very decorative with dragons on the roof. after all that, we head back for the last fitting - excellent. am very pleased with all the clothes i got made. go for dinner and then the fun begins trying to pack all the new clothes!!

5th July 2007

up relatively early and go for breakfast. play online for a bit and hten get picked up at 2 for another 22hrs on a bus to Hanoi. So all set for another fun trip on a vietnamese bus!! my all time favourite piece of driving, was when the driver went to overtake another bus, which was already overtaking another bus!! yes, so there are 3 full sized buses all trying to overtake each other, so two are in the wrong lane and we are heading into on coming traffic in the dark!!! I dont want to die on a vietnamese bus!!  I do also enjoy seeing the police out on ht erodas trying to sort out the other bus crashes that have just happened - super!!

 

up early and head over to the tour office - going for two days down the Mekong Delta. Am really looking forward to it, so hopefully it will be good. its a long drive to My Tho and you can see the poverty much more so than in the city. the bus is fairly packed, but the guide is a complete character. he tells us that " I look at you and you all look same, same but different, and you look at me and think, he look same same but different. so we all look st each other and we all think same same but different" - what?? I think what he is trying to tell us, is that we should follow him so we dont get lost!! then he proceeds to sing a song that he wrote and translated himself!!it goes something like this - " good morning ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my country. you can go from north to south and you can go from south to north. you can buy tickets for trains and planes. you can stay in hotels. you can see mountinas, rivers and fields, mountains rivers and fields" etc. now imagine this being sung in a very random out of tune way and you get what we are listening to!! all os us tried to stiffle our laughter. eventually we get to a small port and we all get aboard a little wooden boat. its quite similiar to the Amazon in appearence. loads of small wooden boats, which most of the people actually live in as well.  stop on Dragon island and have a look around. its quite pretty and has some lovely trees and flowers and fruits. stop at a little place where we get to taste some honey tea (yum) and some rice wine (toxic - like paint stripper!) and banana wine ( less toxic, but could still double as white spirits!!).  then i get to hold a Python. its about 1.5m long and quite heavy.  it feels weird, but really cool. then move onto a smaller place where we can listen to some traditional vietnamese music. Now, as far as my ears go, its sounds awful and the song and music just dont seem to go together at all!! then our guide starts to sing his special song along with the unco-ordinated music. oh dear, the music distracts him and he forgets the words, so he starts all over again!! move back to the boat and then we go on some really small wooden boats. there are 4 of us in each one and we get to wear the traditional cone shaped basket hats.  its a cool trip and we get to go around, in what I think is a big loop, and there are loads of other boats going in all directions.  we get off and check out a place where they make coconut candy.  they make sweets like toffees and they are really nice. they make them all by hand.  you can also buy snakes and scorpions in jars, if you fancy that sort of thing!!  back onto the boat and float around the islands. there are loads of different islands around. back on dry land, we have a long journey to Can Tho. we arrive at a dock and all get off the bus.  so we join the hoards of motorbikes and other people all waiting for the next ferry. Oh My GOD, there are at least 200 motorbikes and walk on passengers and its a case of the fastest ones get on board!. well, the gate opens and chaos ensues!! everyone makes a run for the gate - its an electric gate, so you dont want to get stuck in tiwhen it closes!!  so we all pile into the baot and there are 2 guys having their dinner on the roof of a bus!!  so we get to the other side and the mayhem starts again in order to get off the ferry!!  then we have to wait for our bus to get off a different one. its a few mins drive to the hotel. most of us get off there, but soem of the others are at a homestay.  we all go for dinner and our guide brings us to somewhere downtown. food is alright. but there is a massive statue of Ho Chi Minh in the town centre. Quite frankly, it just looks like a hugh tin man to me!!  the guide leaves early with his girlfreind, who grabs his ass on the way out!! He is about 60 and she is 35ish!! Nice!  head back to bed and just go to sleep.

30th June 2007

up at 6 - yipee!! have breakfast and all onto the bus. the guide picks up two ither new passengers as well. drive for about 15 mins to a small market\port. the market has all sorts of fruit and veg and fish - its quite colourful. most of it looks quite good and really fresh. hop aboard a small wooden boat to go down the river to see the floating markets. meet up with the rest of our group, the ones who were in the homestay - they are on another boat. float around the river and check out the floating market. its basically a food market , but all on different boats. one boats sells pineapples, another sells dragon fruits etc. its really col and very different. the people live on th eboats so amongst all teh fruit and veg are clothes lines full of washing, and a combination of dogs and children!  its a tough way to live and you can see the poor conditioons along the river banks. they are living in corregated iron shacks. head further down the river to another market. its much the same but is a lot further in to the jungle, so has some great scenery along the way. life revolves totally around the river and in the middle of it all is a big floating BP petrol station!!  along the way, we see the so called "monkey bridges". they are called that cos the locals made them out of bamboo and as they wobble the people walk like monkeys to get across them!!  then we sail over to a place that makes rice paper - the edible variety. they dont waste any of the rice. they burn the husks in a fire to heat the plates that they use to make the rice paper. they pour the liquid mixture over a hot plate - kind of like making a crepe - and then roll it out onto a wicker board to dry in th esun fo ra few hours. its cool to see them making it and they can make a couple of thousand a day. the place also has about 15 pigs, all down the side of the building!! Dinner I guess!! back to the baot and further up the river we stop at a rice plant. its where they process it all.  i never knew that one grain of rice could be seperated in to so many different sections. then the guy tries to sell us a 10kg bag of rice for 10,000 VND (less than 1 euro) -  seriously, what am i going to do with 10kg of rice in my rucksack! unbelievably sheap though. the place is right next door to the coffin shop!!   back on the baot and go back to where we started at the market\port this morning. all back on hte bus, and the guide is genuinely surprised that the bus is overloaded by two people. Doh, that would be the extra two you picked up this morning!!  on the drive back, the girlfriend picks his grey hair and leaves them on th eseat beside me - ah, it must be true love!! then he proceeds to tell us all that he has been working with tourists for years. he has noticed that western woem are "BIG women, and so I like BIG women, and that is why i have picked a BIG girlfriend. BIG women equals good babies. she is allowed come on tour now, but soon she has to stay at home and have babies". now most of the bus is western women (big and all that we are!!) and we are all going ooohh. to which he says, "you are not in your countris now, you are in Vietnam" . he is absolutely hilarious, and clearly likes big boobs from the hand gestures that accompanied the BIG women statement!!  so after lunch, we head back to hte ferry and all off teh bus again. we have to wait over 1hr for the boat. at least 7 ferries come and go within that time. teh guide is telling us that it is safer to wait on this side and we have to wait for the bus to get on a ferry first - ok?? so we all watch Vietnam idol on hte tele while we wait. Oh dear, music here is just noise!! but it gives us all a good laugh - Congratulations, you are going to Hanoi (probably on the back of a moped!!). the same madness erupts when its time to board the ferry - basically run quickly and you may get on!! once i get to the other side, i can see wht the guide meant about it not being safe. we get surrounded by people begging and trying to sell all sorts of stuff. Apparently, they are nifty pick pockets as well. back on the bus and its about 4hrs back to Saigon. arrive and just eat adn go to bed.

Sleep in and just potter around town to get our bearings and book a few tours. relax fo rthe day and spend some time online sorting out photos.

28th June 2007

up early and head over to the tour office - going to the Chu Chi tunnels today. So 8am comes and there is no sign of the bus and then suddenly the bus drives past and a guy says "come on". so we literally run after the bus that has just driven around the corner. so get on the bus and discover that all our shopping sround yesterday for the best tour was a complete waste of time, as all the companies are mixed in together anyway!! get moving and of course, there is a stop at a local handicraft market place!! its employees are all handicapped as a result of the agent orange that the americans used during the war. i have to say, i was expecting worse deformaties, and am surprised to see that some of them are quite mild. they are making stuff out of wood and use eggshells to make designs. they are really beautiful, but are risiculously overprices eg a picture is USD1,200!! move on and head out to Chu Chi. go to the tv room first and watch a short documentary about how the Vietcong fought the americans there. its quite funny to watch, as its obvoiusly done from the vietnamese point of view. it goes into detail about the awards the vietcong people got for different fighting skills. one was for being "best killer of americans" and another was for "best american tank blower upper" - its so funny to watch, hilarious! then our guides talks us through the model of the tunnels. they are built on 3 levels, starting at 100m below ground. the first 40km are smaller than the next 200km, the latter being built during the american war and allowed for carrying ammunition. when i say bigger, i mean that they are 80cm high and 120cm wide. first we walk in to to the replanted forest area when the guide says ok, where is the secret entrance. none of us can see it. he moves a few leaves and a tiny trap door thing appears - its really cool and extremely well hidden. the guide says it 34cm across and a guard gives a demonstration on how to get in and out. the guide tells us that only some of us can try it, as we are fatter then Vietnamese people and tend to get stuck!! i give it a go and fit - yipee!! its quiet a drop down to where you can put your feet. however, i dont have the upper body strength to pull myself out of the tunnel, so some guy has to help me!! but thankfully, some of the other girls have the same issue. move on and see some of the traps they used. some of them are really clever and would completely maime you. they vary from bamboo traps to steel ones - all with very sharp points that can impale you. some of them would do serious damage and are all designed differently so as to injure different parts of the body. then we see an M-41 tank, an american tank that the vietcong blew up. they vietcong used to collect spent ammunition at night, and then recycle it for their own benefit! they were seriously clever people. no wonder they beat the US. their sandals were made of tyre rubber and the soles were designed so that the footprints were going in the opposite direction to the person wearing them - ingenius. there is also a big crater from where the americans dropped a bomb. then we head over to the shooting range and for a grand total of E4.50, I get 5 bullets to use in an AK-47. so get to shoot at a paper donkey about 100m away. dont know how many hit as the push back from the gun was so strong, so missed where they went!! the noise is deafening, even with earmuffs. Im glad the AK-47 was grouned to a wall thing, otherwise the push back would have made me loose my balance. plus, it also prevents some nutjob going on a complete rampage!! finally get to check out the tunnels. we go into the larger ones, with a special entrance made for fat westerners!! there are entrances every 30ms and this section is a total of 90m. there is very dim lighting, again for tourists benefit. they are so tiny and now understand why the guide has been telling us that only very fit people can do the full 90m. its so tiny in here, you need to scrunch down really small. I wouldnt like to know how claustrophobic people react in here!! if you have a bag, you need to squish it up into your stomach, otherwise you wont fit. I manage 60m and then climb out. they are incredibly, really fascinating. I dont know how the Vietcong lived down there for so long, amazing. Im completely sweating, both from the heat and the challenge it was just to keep moving donw there. go over to see the kitchen next. its connected by two tunnels. it was originally 100m below ground, but now is only a few steps down. its just incredible as to how clever they were. the smoke from the kitchen went out some vents that were funnelled to go at least 100m away and the smoke came out flat at ground level, so as not to be seen. teh Vietcong even washed in american soap, so as to smell friendly to US dogs - brilliant! then we get some tea and a weird tappioca thing with sugar and peanut stuff. back on the bus and head back to Saigon. its boiling hot and raining heavily, so just play on the internet and go for dinner with two of the girls form the tour.  

its absolutely boiling hot today, 37 centigrade, so pretty much stay indoors as its just too hot to go outside.

24th June 2007

sleep in - yay!! then head over to the Natural History Museum. its not great and only has some very random english translations. waht I really want to see is the Hall of Human Bodies. after we walk through a closed exhibit and out through a set of locked doors - oops!! we head down into the aquarium. its not too bad, but does have some dead fish on display!! the live fish are pretty cool, but there is nothing in the tanks with them, so no fake trees etc. after searching and asking where the human cadavers are, we finally give upo and go to leave. but, on the way out we find the hall of human bodies - it has its own seperate little building.  its morbidly fascinating - there are actual human bodies in massive jars!! its nuts. there are featuses, brains, arms, legs and interanl organs all on show. one of the full bodies has its head covered, but you can still see that he died screaming! its just totally bizarre. then head off to the Temple of Heaven. its set in beautiful gardens and again some of the buildings are getting a makeover for the olympics, so they are all covered up. there is one circular building that is surrounded by a seperate outer wall, that echos all around when you shout at it. its pretty funky. its boiling hot, 38C, so after checking out the rouch alter, we just go back to the hostel and relax.

25th June 2007

its a whoping 40 C today and is so horrible outside that the tele, the air conditioner and I spend a wonderful day together inside!

26th June 2007

excellent, up at 4.30am!! pick up for the airport is at 5am - i love early flights!! car comes and would you believe it, but Tianenmen square is packed and its 5am. the Chinese are just weird! what they are doing here at 5am is just beyond me! anyway, get to the airport and check in all the way through to Saigon. board the plane and i recline my seat and the guy behind me complains that he has no room - here we go again!! so I tell him that if he wanted more room, he should have paid for a first class seat. then the trolley dolley appeared and told him that I had the right to put my seat back and then she moved him away from me!! so arrive in Hong kong and have 5hrs to kill. so go for a ridiculously overpriced burger, but it was worth. I was dying for something greasy and cheesy, there is only so much rice one can take!! have a bit of a nap on the fllor and eventually get to board. so get to the gate and Emer goes through fine, but my card beeps and the woman tears it up and says that i have been given a new seat, ok. so get onto the plane and it turns out that eceonomy is overbooked, so Im going business class - fantastic! I love cathay pacific!So i get my warm towels as i sip my champaign and read my menu. teh fully reclining seat is very welcome and the non-stop chanpaigne is fab. I only wish the flight was longer than 2hrs! it was a welcome treat from the usual cheap backpacking stuff. arrive in Ho Chi Minh and get a taxi to the backpacking district. traipse around looking for somewhere to stay and finally get somehwere in budget. Sleep is the only thing on the cards.

 

up early and head across town to collect our passports and visas. they are trying to teach the chinese some manners before the olympics, one thing learning how to let people off the train before you push your way on. they actually have guards there doing this!! Shameful that their own government has hired guards to teach its people how to behave!! anyway, get our visas and passports and its all fine. the streets surrounding the embassys have built in spikes for running across the roads, in case of a runaway cars!!! on the way one of teh policemen at one of the other embasseys says hello, how are you? we are so stunned, that we actually stop - it must be nice to foreigners day!! so we get him to pose for a photo with us!! head over to the Confuses Temple and the Imperial College. the buildings are beautiful, but again are all covered in scaffolding and hoarding, as they are being painted for the olympics. The temple has some lovely little gazebos at teh side and inside these are hugh stone pillars with inscriptions all over them.  they are fab and are sitting on a dragons back. the courtyards are covered in building materials, so presume they normally look great! around the back of the temple, there is a big warehouse that contains at least 100 more stone pillars, all with inscriptions on them. dont know why they are all out of the way, but Ive learned not to ask question in China!! potter around for a bit and then head over  to the Lam Temple. its the only Tibetan Temple in China and it is truely magnificant. the statues are very impossing and some of them look quite menacing. the temple buildings are spectacular - i think the most impressive so far. the gold decorations throughout are amazing, its pure decadene and indulgence. the most spectacular thing is the Worlds Largest Buddha Statue carved from one single piece of wood and gold plated. Oh my god, its enormous. its approx 40m high, its insane. have a wander around the complex and try to take it all in - very impressive temple. its incredibly hot, so head back to the hostel and enjoy the air conditioning fo rthe evening.

22nd June 2007

up early and get the subway and then a taxi out to the Summer Palace. Again, a big chunk of it is covered in scaffolding and hoarding - its having its olympic makeover!! its spread out over some beautiful gardens and is quite a big area. the small lake is gorgeous and is filled with nice lillypads. its surrounded by a stunning ornate, open air corridor that goes all the way around the lake. then, we accidentally come across the theatre area and there is a performance just about to start. the theatre building is gorgeous and the stage section is quite large. the performance consists of an instrumental piece, followed by girls dancing. they are stunning and their costumes have extra long sleeves so they float as they move - really pretty. then a few guys do some kung fu and acrobats - they are really cool. head around to the main lake, Kumming Lake - its hugh. you can go on boat rides if you fancy it. teh buildings around it are spectacular and there is a "Long Corridor", which not surprisingly is a beautifully decorated and coloured and is very long!! the place is pakced and getting a bit tired so just go back to the hostel. relax for a while and then go to the Lao She Teahouse to see a traditional Chinese show. the teahouse is lovely. its spread out over three levels. the stage are is set out like a big dining room with the stage at teh front. take our seats adn the performance consits of some traditional music and some opera. there is one guy who can whistle like a bird and is able to do it for ages - really cool. then two guys do some amazing shadow shapes from behind a screen. they are brilliant, they make animals and people and they are only using their hands. then the traditional face changing - wow, its fascinating. i dont know how they can do that so fast. two women come out and sing while  playing instruments and having a mouthpiece thing with 3 lit candels on it. its nuts!! then there is some traditional dance with acrobats and finally some kung fu. its a really impressive show. so after the show, we decide to head over to tianenmen square to see it at night. some of the buildings are outlined in fairy lights and look lovely. so wander about and we are down at Chairman Mao picture when we notice that there are loads of Iraqi flags up, along side the red falg, of course! then remember that there were a load of arabs at teh teahouse, all in their full tea towel headgear!! there is some Chinese/Iraqi diplomatic thing - could be interesting! anyway, at 10pm the police start announing over loudspeakers the the square is closing and to leave immediately. then the police van drives over to us and orders us out - so decide its probably best to do as the chinese policeman says!! so leave at a quick and steady pace!!

up early and head over to the Vietnamese Embassy to get our visas for Vietnam/ hop on the subway to get across town and go to get passport photos - a very interesting process!!  pitstop into a Kodak shop to get pictures taken. so your woman takes our pictures with a digital camera and downloads them onto the computer - all well so far. then she proceeds to airbursh us so we look better!! seriously love, we are backpacking, so a few stray hairs are inevitible!! she shaves off the sides of my face, including my ears!! then she touches up my hair and lightens the skin around my eyes. clearly, I have a fat head and am not the right colour!! off to the embassy and the place is full of diplomatic consulates, so is all policed and fenced off. we have to show our passports to the police to get past them in order to look for the right embassy. show our passports again and we're in!! apply and pay and can collect them in two days. go for coffee and check out the "friendship store" - a shop with western foods and overpriced tourist tat. the official olympic store has lifesize teddies of the olympic mascots, ironically called the "Friendlies"!!! Not in China !! head back over to the silk market and manage to not get slapped this time!! at one point, I am a few stalls ahead of Emer and Emer calls me to look at something by saying  "hey Jude" - well, at least 6 of the mental woman working there repeat, at full volume "hey Jude" - all I could do was burst out laughing, priceless!! head back outside to go for the subway, and notice an O'Briens irish Sandwich Bar outside - more laughter!! head back across town and just eat for the evening.

20th June 2007

up early and its off to the Forbidden City for the day. it has the largest and best preserved cluster of ancient building in China. there are loads of different buildings throughour the complex, except quite a few of them are closed and boarded up for maintenance work for the olympics - but you still pay full admission!! the main courtyards are beautiful, with decorative marble bridges and balconies. then raised on a massive marble terrace are three buildings - the hall of supreme harmony, hall of middle harmony and the hall of preserving harmony - the chinese are not very original when it comes to names!! they are all covered in scaffolding, so you cant see the beautiful colours and designs. we go in to one of the museums along the side, where loads of differener dynastic artifacts are on show.  quite interesting. oh, did i mention that little boys are treated like kings - we have called them all Prince!! or as one couple we met put it, they all suffer from LIttle Emperor Syndrome. as they have 4 grandparents, and 2 parents and no cousins etc, they are treated like kings, the sun shines out of every little orofice!! well, I am up against the glass reading one of the little explanations of what im looking at, when prince and granny come towards me. now, i was there first, so they can go around me. Well, No. Granny proceeds to push prince forward - I am not moving - so much that his head gets wedged in between my arm and the glass. Granny suggest that i move and i suggest that she go around me. NO - she continues to push prince until his head is getting squashed and only then does she move around me. But silly me, Im only a woman and if prince wants to puch me, well then he can!!  move on and the next group of buildings is similiar, all covered in scaffolding and hoarding. its begining to rain, so we throw our principles out the window and have a coffee in the Starbucks that has made its way into the Fobidden City!  the weather is pretty miserable, wet and grey but we potter around the Imperial Garden anyway. its reallybeautiful with perfect landscaping with rockeries, walkways and pavillions.  the gazebos are like little pagodasand are truely magnificant. you can just imagine how it looked at its peak with the emperor surrounded by stunning concubines all dressed in fabulous silks. as we are wandering towards the Clock exhibition hall, we have a look at the jewellery room, where all the concubines jewels and decorations are on show. they are incredible. the stones and the sizes of some of the pieces, from head pieces to rings, are just fascinating. it must have been a total pain in the ass getting dressed back in those days!! at 2 o'clock the clocks perform!! so go over to teh clock hall. Wow, im seriously impressed. its a definite highlight of the forbidden city. some of the clocks are larger then grown men - really enormous. they must be worth a fortune. they are all decorated with rubies, gold, gems, diamonds, ivory. they are the most elaborate collection of clocks i have ever seen. most of them are 18th Century pieces from Europe and there are dozens of them.  at 2pm, 3 of the central clocks are wound up and "perform" and ring on the hour. its nuts, some of them have peices that write, others have people dancing etc. they are mental and will leave you wide-eyed. the rain is still coming down, but both agree that walking in the rain is easier than fighting with a retarded chinese taxi driver. on the way back, Emer buys a local favourite - pea flavoured ice cream. im not messing, they have pea ice cream and boy is it disgusting. yuck, yuck, yuck. it goes in the bin immediately. I have to say, im a little disappointed with the firbidden city. the weather and the fact that most of it was covered up just didnt help!! 

up early and go to meet our group - we are going to do th e"Secret wall " tour. most of the great wall tours go to Badaling, but its supposed to be full of tourists and hawkers, so we decide to go for teh less famous route. there are 10 of us going and none of us actually know where we are going to - its a secret!! Seriously though, a great example of how china works on a need to know basis, and clearly we do  not need to know where we are going!! all i know is that its past Badaling. its only about 80km out of Beijing, but it stakes 2.5hrs due to the insane amount of traffic. get to a tiny remore little village, and i use the word village lightly, its more a hamlet, and we meet our guide. now our guide is just one of the local men, who doesnt have a word of english, but leads us off up some tiny trailway up the side of the mountains. you can see the wall and it look fantastic. its so remote, we dont even pay an entrance fee!! so after about 45mins up a very steep climb, we we set foot on the wall. its amazing up here. the views are stunning, even through the ever present smog. there is absolutely no one else here, its just great. its extra special by the fact that parts of the wall are still in their original state, they havent been renovated yet, like sections in the main tourist drag. so we get to climb and scramble over sections - its brilliant. its mindblowing to see it stretch up and down  and over the mountain tops. its impossible to fathom the fact that its over 3,000 miles long - it really is breathtaking. its quite steep in parts and we climb up to a little fortress thing and there is actually a guy selling drinks and tshirts!! It makes all of us laugh, you just cant get away from the hawkers!its very hard to describe, its so amazing to see and to climb - you just have to do it once in your life. after about 1.5hrs on the wall, we head off down a tiny trail down the mountian and back to the tiny village fro lunch. its in a tiny "restaurant", which I think is just someones house and they feed us to earn some extra cash. its delicious and the portions are really big. time to head back to Beijing. once you leave Beijing, you can see all the military bases surrounding it - very interesting!!  get back and just have a shower and dinner and watch a dvd.  

up early, as didnt get a great nights sleep. bad news, teh western loo has overflowed and is pretty filthy!! and I noticed this on the other train as well, teh chinese have a habit of getting teh conductors to lock the toilets - its really annoying. I understand why they do it in stations - the waste just drops straight down on to the tracks!! but not while the train is moving. anyway, find a conductor who, rather annoyed, opens the toilet for me. arrive in Beijing and get into a taxi. well, again i must admit my severe impatience with the chinese pops its ugly head up again. while we are putting our luggage in the boot, some guy tries to get into the car. well, i turn around and roar into his face to get out - which he does after saying something angry back at me in chinese. am really having my tolerance levels tested in China. then the taxi driver, who seem to all be retarded, is having issues finding teh place, even though i have it in chinese characters and english. its only 4km away from the station and by my reading of the map is a straight run with a left and a right turn - but we take absolutely ages. he stops to ask directions at least three times. then when he gets out of the cab, getting directions again, he gestures that its only across the road so we can walk!! so i gesture back towards the steering whell so he can drive us there. he continues to make angry tut tutting noisese as we are clearly asking too much for a taxi friver to drive us to our hostel, which is only 4km away if he actually knew where she was going!! anyway check into the hostel and its very nice. go have breakfast and a shower. muster up enough energy to go to Tainenmen square. tip if you ever come to China, dont visit major sites on a weekend. you will be reminded very quickly that China has the largest population in the world!! dozens of hawkers are trying to seel us all sorts of kites and postcards etc. I point out to one of them that the postcards he is selling all have clear blue skies, when I havent seen the sun through the smog since entering china a week earlier!! one guy tries to sell us a Chairman Mao watch and Im not kidding, he gets all worked up and excited that Mao is on it - "Chairnman Mao"!! His eyes nearly pop out of his head. teh square is enormous - i know its teh largest public square in the world, but hard to get a proper view as the smog just takes away from it. check out the massive clock counting down teh days to the olympics - only 416 days to go!! anyway, wander over to the Gate of Heavenly Peace - quite ironic as there is a vast likeness of Mao on it! really dont understand how they can still worship they guy - hes been dead for 30 yrs and was a complete dictator. then again, teh chinese are brainwashed and propaganda is alive and kicking. Hundreds of tourists and chinese alike are trying to get their photo taken under the Mao painting. you must remember that you are not allowed to cycle across tianenmen square but you can drive a tank across it!! there are CCTV cameras everywhere, to make sure you stay in line. tired after the joureny so just potter about teh square and look at teh gate of heavenly peace, the duan gate, the front gate and the great hall of the people. we dont bother going to the Chairman Mao Memorial hall, where his body is displayed in a glass cabinet , as he is away for some maintenance work fo rthe olympics - getting his make up touched up!!  decide to go for food and have a good old rant about how difficult and ignorant the chinese are - it fdoes wonders for our moods!!  have had enough for the day so head back to the hostel and watch dvd's and go to bed.

17th June 2007

just get up when we wake up. decide to check out some fo teh markets, so head over to the Silk Market. we need to get the subway across town and to my delight, it is very easy to manage and teh stuff is written in both mandarin and english. come out of the station and cop out - decide to go to McDonalds for lunch. i know, pathetic to actually choose McD's for food!! then wander across teh road to the silk street market - oh my god, you have to see it to believe it. the market sprawls riotously over 5 massive floors, showing piles of rucksacks, shoes, silks, clothes, cashmere, rugs, jade, pearls and loads more. its absolutely mental and packed. make our way to through some of the stalls and the women are all whouting "cheap price" at you. I made the crucial error of trying on a caot and when i didnt want to buy it, they woman slapped me and then roared after me "hey, crazy lady, whats wrong with you". potter around for a few hours - the jewellery and bags floors are nuts. designers would be horrified at teh cheap knowck offs. you need to haggle like mad and slash the price by at least 75% and you should do fine. head bacl top the hostel and relax for the evening.   

arrive in XI'an about 12.30. a guy from teh hostel meets us. so we all walk over to the hostel and check in. time for a shower and soem food. Xian is fabled to be the begining and end of teh Silk Road and was also home to many of the Chinese dynasties. its a very big city and is surrounded by a hugh city wall. you can actually hire bikes and cycle on top of teh wall - it takes about 2hrs. potter around town and check out some fo teh shops and the small streets. they have all the fashion labels and the latest mobile phones etc. the traffic is mental. its quite hot and humid, but you cant see teh sun because of teh smog. seriously, it just hangs over the city. again lots of people spitting and staring - lovely!! relax for the evening and have some good food in the restaurant in the hotel.

14th June 2007

up early and go for breakfast. the chinese dont do toast very well - mine appears to be warm bread!! the guy at eth next table says to send it back, so i do. it eventually appears as toast a bit later!! turns out the guys have been sending it back every morning and they still havent caught on!! in total, 6 people have send their warm bread back!! anyway, we are all off to see the Terracotta Warriors today, so our guide appears and we all climb aboard a small minivan. our first stop is about an hour out of Xian, so our guide tries to teach us some chinese while we are driving. its more like a load of sound effects rather than words. bless her, her accent makes it a little difficult to understand her. there are a few french canadians and dutch people who are looking at us for translations and wanting to know can we understand her english - NO!! so we go to this factory first, where they manufacture replicas of the warriors in a variety of sizes. they also do chinese furniture and ceramics. they are really beautiful and the detail is incredible. so, apparently, we have wasted too much time here, we are supposed to be having lunch at 12.30, so we muct hurry. or as the giude puts it "we are having a time emergence". then its off to the Lintong Museum. we are only allowed 20 mins here as we are having a time emergence!! the museum is a beautiful building - the eaves are coloured red, blue, gold and yellow and are really detailed. there are pots and various other artifacts that teh different emperors used. the highlight is the chinese security guard, who is standing against teh wall, fast asleep! we all get pictures and have a good laugh. better leave as miss time emergence is getting abit frustrated with us. the whole group is now taking teh piss out of our time keeping!! teh dutch guy starts making cracking whip noises!! then we head across teh road to the Huaqing Hot Springs. teh natural hot springs in the park were once teh favoured retreat of emporers and their concubines during the Tang dynasty. the place is absolutely beautiful - there are doaens of different buildings and bath houses. the guide is showing us around and keep saying "quickly please" and "we have a time emergence"!! teh park is amazing - you can just picture it at its peak with emperors and beautifully made up concubines at his service!!  we are having such a time emergence that she wont allow me to go to the loo! She wont tell me where is it! keep moving, we are at least 30 mins off schedule so "quickly please" is getting quicker! eventually, when 5 of us say that we need to go to the loo, she finally gives in to our time wasting toilet trip!! on a major time emergence now and creates much laughter amongst us as we note that she always says please when she herds us through each building. sprint back to the bus and its off to a late lunch - oops!! shock, horror, its way overpriced as its across teh road from the terracotta army. food is somewhat edible, but we are convinced we have been given recycled chopsticks!! must dash as we should have been finished lunch an hour ago! so finally get to teh terracotta warriors and the chinese are so rubbish that you dont even get a map of the complex when you pay for your ticket. So you dont know where the stuff is!! Quickly please rushes us into teh cinema bit first. its a proper 360 degree screen, so you need to keep turining around for complete views. its pretty cool. it goes through the history of the warriors etc. then she ushers us out to the different pits. she gives us a meeting point for 4 o'clock, just in case we get seperated. and within minutes the group has scattered leaving "quickly please" standing alone!! teh terracotta warriors is a sub-terraneanlife-size army of thousands of soldierswhich have stood gurad over the soul of chinas fisrt unifer for over two millenia. they were discovered by accident in 1974 and have thousands of soldiers and horses standing in battle formation. we head in to pit 1 first, its teh biggest pit. its incredible, there are thousands, alledgedly 6,000 , warriors and horses in here, all in battle array, facing east. its insane, they have different facial expressions and haridos and different armour, depending on what weapon they were holding. the detail is awesoma - very hard to describe. their expressions and even the thread of their footware are all unique. Pit 2, is smaller and quite frankly only has broken bits of soldiers and horses on view. its still being worked on by archeologists and not much really in pit 2. supposedly it has lots of horse and carriage formations, rumoured to be approx 1,300. pit 3 is the smallest and is believed to be the army headquarters. it only has a few soldiers, but they are believed to be high ranking officers. they truely are amazing and its incredible to believe that no one actually knows how many of them exist. its an archeologists playground!! its 4pm already and we havent seen the museum yet, so we wander over there and have a look at teh exhibits. not much in the museum except for two chariots made of bronze, which are really exquisite. Miss time emergence has spotted us - oops!! she wants to know who else from the group is inside. so we are instructed to "stay there" until she has rounded everyone else up as well. no one is going to let her rush through teh warriors , as it all everyone wanted to see. so while we are waiting, some random chinese woman sits next to me and gets her daughter to take a picture of us!! Miss time emergence has reappeared with peopl in tow - must move quickly!! she finally gets us all back on the bus and we head off to see teh tomb of Qin Sin Huang. We are all pretty knackered after traipsing around in the heat all day and now we can climb approx 175 steps up to the top of this tomb and we have exactly 15 mins to do it in!!  there are beautiful gardens surrounding it, wiht splendid manicured lawns and bushes. however, as it is still unexcavated, all you can see is a great big mound of earth!! apparently, its rumoured to contain great palaces filled with precious stones etc and took 38yrs to complete. oh, and the emperor was such a lovely man, he left orders that all his concubines that didnt bear him children (some 341 women!!) were to be buried alive with him  -nice!!  According to historians, it hasnt been disturbed because it is rigged with such an ingenius defence mechanism, including a river of mercury, that you would die if you touch anything - dont want to be the first to test that theory!! anyway, back on the bus - pretty cool day, except for miss tiem emergence every few mins. get back to the hostel and have a shower and go for dinner with the others. but i need to get money, so after wandering around looking fo ran ATM, i go in to teh "China Foreign Travellers INformation Service". Now stupid me for thinking that they would be able to help me. teh woman actually said "bank, no" and then laughed in my face. Am really no liking the chinese people. So no money for me!!  go for dinner and have a good laugh.

15th June 2007

sleep in and go for a late breakfast. actually get toast today!! however, i do have difficulty in getting tea without sugar - i fail miserably on that front!! check out and go for a wander around town. pass the makeshift brothels, which consist of a room filled with dildos, condoms etc and a measly little curtain seperating the "shop" front from the "activity" area. also, lets just say that teh ladies have seen better days!! eventually, find an ATM that will give me money - yay!! wander into teh mickey mouse store fo ra look. well, it proves to be a lot of fun!! as with all the overstaffed places in china, the saleswoman is on to us in about 2 seconds flat!! so we decide to have a bit of fun at her expense. we start turning things up side down and she fixes them immediately. this continues for a while until Mickey gets himslef into a precarious position with Minnie!! I know, childish, but very funny!! then we decide to confuse her and split up. but once we rejoin, she is back. its like a sketch out of a cheesy spy film - we walk two steps and she walks two steps, we stop and then she stops!! so i manage to get behind her and then i follow her around the shop  - she has finally got it!!  we are in hysterics as we leave the shop. head wodn to the shopping centre to go to the loo. well, lets just say that teh chinese dont bring out the best in me - a woman cuts in front of me and i actually grab her by teh arm and swing her out of my way and say " I dont think so" . oops!! oh well, over to teh Bell Tower and drum towers. teh bell tower originally held an enormous bell that would ring at dawn. the building id beautiful and so ornate. although, it is situated in the middle of a massive roundabout!! teh drum tower, teh bell towers alter ego, was used to mark nightfall. some of the drums are enormous adn the painting on them is really something else. head over to the market next. its mostly food and fruits, but has some touristy tat as well. the colours of the fruit and veg stalls are really pretty. end up wandering down a small alleyway, near teh great mosque, where the better market is. there are tons of beautiful bags, belts, silks, ormnaments, pictures and lots of other nice things. buy a few bits and head back to the hostel. have dinner and meet the others. we all head over to teh train station, we are getting an overnight train to Beijing. so we check our bags through the metal detectors and find teh correct waiting room. get aboard and you can see the difference in the train. they are putting new trains on routes coming in and out of beijing - all part of the olympic preparations. there are two chinese sharing with us, but they stay in their bunks and we stick to ours. to my delight, there is a western toilet on board. Believe me, trying to use a squat toilet on a moving train is not easy!! go to sleep and should hopefully wake up in beijing in 13hrs.