middle kingdom

i'm in hong kong public library right now, using their excellent free internet service. i've been away from home since 26/12/04. In case you didn't know, i've been on a tour backpacking throughout china. the cities i've been to are beijing, xi'an and shanghai. i have to say that travelling to china on this intrepid tour has been are very cool experience. china is an awesome place, full of things to do, and of course full of FOBS.

City to city breakdown

beijing - the capital

beijing is friggin freezing. when i went out the first day, i was wearing some jeans and three layers of clothing and the coldness just killed me. i couldn't believe how cold it was, it makes your teeth clatter, and your hands numb. there's snow and ice around but its the dry wind that cuts you up.

we stayed near beijing train station, in the center of town, which was close to everything. my impression of beijing is that there are some cool things to do (touristy) but its pretty bland. i went to the temple of heaven and saw massive temples, and buddas. then tim and i went to the summer palace, and walked around for like ages, until we decided to cross this frozen lake which went for kilometres.

i also visited the silk markets (sorta like paddy's market, but selling more clothes). Prices are like fully negotiable. the rule of thumb is pay one quarter. its like a game when your in the markets. they start way high, you start way low. you make an offer, then walk away for 4 secounds, then the shopkeepr chases after you and agrees.

going to tinanmen square was also cool. the forbidden palace is behind this massive wall, and its the place where only the nobles could go...or if you pay the entry fee you can also get in. i just can;t believe the size of this place and all the palace buildings inside. this emperor who build this also buit the great wall of china, and the terracotta warriors so it doens't really surprise me.

i purchased a new pair of fake timberland shoes and i decided to break them in whilst walking along the great wall of china. hmmmmmm..prolly not the smartest thing to do and my feet were all blistered afterwards. aside from that, the wall is insipiring. it stretches for as far as the eye can see. guess what they used to hold the wall togeher..as in the glue/cement stuff? it was chinese goosebeeries....more commonly known as KIWI FRUIT! i'll never look at thtat fruit the same way again. btw flying down from the chinese wall to the base of the mountain (which is normally like a one -two hour walk or so) on a toboggan was fun!

Xi'an - small but eventful

this is a city famed for one attraction - the terracotta warriors. there were literally like thousands of them - up to ten thousand that have been discovered, all in perfect battle formation, each with individual faces, in life size, in battle poses with horses and weapons (that haev been destroyed). this is just an incredible feat. they also had these big ass drum tower which we visited, with the biggest drums you'll ever see. had a nice foot massage in xian too!

xi'an is a very cool place. it a city surrounded by a city wall...sorta like a fortefied city. in fact i cycled along the city wall on a crappy pink fob bike. the ground was frozen but the bikes still worked and i was doing drive by's shootings at Tim. we also saw like some kind of Fob ghetto jam session where a bunch of old people were playiing various instruments and singing.

i also saw something very shocking. in china, there's a lot of hustlers/touts. people come up to you selilng you all types of crap and usuaally you ignore them. we were out one night at the Feeling Bar and this little kid approached us trying to sell us a rose. we ignored him and walked away. so the kid walked up to some ohter dude nad tried to sell it to him. but what did this dickhead do? he karate kicked the little kid into this steel bar fence. it was like some full frontal -solar plexus- bruce lee- i think i am a big man by knocking out a five year old into a fence-kick. we were all pretty shocked and christian was protesting and i thinked a couple of us wanted to do soemthing....but we walked away. you just don;t know what to do in that kind of sitautaion.

shanghai - the future

if there ever was a definition of a booming town, it has to be shanghai. there's just a certain vibe to this place. it will be the next hong kong/tokyo, and it may even surpass that. it's just amazing at night. it's like las vegas with the flashging lights and excellent night life. you know how i said everythig was negotiable? we didn't have enough money for the bill at the bar so we had to negotiate and said like 90% of the price. try doing that in sydney.

i went on a river cruise along the huang pu jiang river and you could see two sides of shanghai . on the one side was the traditinoal old style buildings that were built by the europeans in the early 1900's. on the opposite bank of the river was the future - pudong. futuristic skyscrapers, and hundereds of buildings that were unfinished.

shanghai is the shiznit. it's the place to be ya'll. they even had the breathtaking shanghai acrobats. the stuff that they did was just freaky/backbreaking and just plain unbelievable.

i took a lot of pics so i'll upload them when i get back.

HK - honkie land

I'm currently staying with Ip, so big ups to him for the free accomodation. I really appreciate it. we supposed to see Kung Fu hustle tonite so i better get going soon. when you buy movie tickets here you can actually buy them well in adavance......i bought tix to a session at 7.30pm at 11am and i was actaully able to select my seats, kinda like when you watch a kings game.

Hk is a happening place. You can see the hustle and bustle and the street life. i went to Victoria peak today, which is the highest point. it was aiight, but not that great coz of the crappy smog which made everything beyond the first row of buildings disappear.

i really need to start eating some proper fill me up meals. i've been eating a lot of crap lately. i potentaiily had the worst meal of my life today at macca's. do not eat the beef "prosperity burger".it's gross. i think i almost threw up whilst eating.

I've written a lot to make up for the one month i was away. so enjoy !

Gotta run,

DJ HO.