Note: The China entry has dozens of pictures uploaded. Unless your internet connection is pretty quick, they might saturate your bandwidth downloading stream, so some of the pics might appear as a blank square with tiny red cross in the upper corner. If so, simply place the mouse cursor over the blank square, right click and select "Show picture".   Shanghai The Whore of Orient. That's how Shanghai has been re-branded over the years. A mid XIX century Western creation rather than an ancient Chinese city, Shanghai has become today China's second trading hub (and catching up quickly with Hong Kong), and economic experts point at Shanghai as the XXII century world's leading city, just as New York has been for the XX century, or London had been in the XIX. Indeed, the first impression I got from Shanghai as I arrived was: "where the hell is China here?" Due to all those manga cartoons and low-budget kung-fu films I had watched in my childhood, I surely had pictured China in a different way. Shanghai is a capitalism-pumping clockwork machinery where skyscrapers and deluxe shopping malls pact the city's broad avenues. However, I must say that I have been positively impressed as of how China's approaching full development. Despite other Asia's capitalism-embracing cities such as Bangkok or Saigon, Shanghai is doing it in a very organized manner: the streets are clean and wide, traffic and pollution levels are sensibly lower, and overall you don't sense the chaos you'd feel in those other Asian cities. China is certainly doing a good job. Anyway, I arrived at Shanghai Airport the 13th of July 2004 from Hanoi at midnight, 2 hours delayed behind schedule. Unfortunately, all bus services towards downtown had ceased serviced at 11:00 pm, so I had to spend the night at a 20 euros per night hotel nearby the airport. Not a good start. Actually, I was soon to learn that Shanghai and the rest of China's main cities are not as well catered for budget travelers as other South East Asian countries. It really is impossible to find a decent individual room for less than 15 euros/night, and going out is fairly pricey too, beers costing around the 3 to 4 euros mark easily and entrance fees to a night club up to 8 euros. I know it might not seem too much for you guys sitting on your couch back home, but it's an awful dent on the average backpacker's thin wallet. So, the morning after I headed downtown and met my two french friends Guillaume and Francois whom I had met in Syria three months before. It was really great to see'em again, thousands of kilometers away from our first meeting point, and with three months worth of traveling experiences under the belt. After a warm welcome, hand-shakings and travel-updatings, the three of us got on business and went out to beat the streets of Shanghai, our first destination being Nanjing Lu, a pedestrian-only street where shopping extravaganza reaches new heights. A pair of comfortable shoes, a free morning and a Visa Gold is all you need to feel at home here at Nanjing Lu. In the other end of this shop-till-you-drop heaven lies the town's number one site, the Bund: the river front from where the skyscrapers loom over Shanghai blatantly ignoring any trace of communism left in today's China. Nothing better than a short cruise on ferry up and down the river for picture-shooting. May the following collection of pics serve to give you and idea of what modern Shanghai looks like.

One of my favorite pictures, taken at sunset		Shanghai's financial district
The Jinmao Tower, with a tourist observatory in the 88th floor		The Orient Pearl Tower, a monstrous show-off that has become Shanghai's most portrayed sight and the city's trademark
Shanghai's got to be an architect's heaven		Yet another sky-high one, this one right off the notorious People's Square
The Bund from the terrace on the 17th floor of an adjacent hotel		The Bund at night lights up like a Christmas tree
No city in Europe has this ultra-tech feeling, not even London's arch famous The City's Natwest Tower would clearly stand out in Shanghai's sky-line, and it'd most likely be dwarfed by the Jinmao Tower.
There is another reknown district in Shanghai, the Yu Gardens, with its very cheesy Bazaar next by. Basically, the Chinese traditional architecture and the narrow passages are nothing but a lame disguise to this otherwise obvious tourist trap: Kodak stores, KFCs, Starbucks and the kind. The Gardens themselves are quite picturesque, and reminded me on what I had imagined as a villa for feudal Chinese nobility, with its wooden temples, bridges, ponds, pointy roofs, etc. However, we had a wonderful lunch here. There's a restaurant in the Yu Gardens serving over a hundred of small typical Chinese snacks in wooden dishes for one euro each. We picked up a bunch of them (didn't even ask what they were made of) and proceeded to devour'em with pleasure! By the way, did you know that Chinese people don't eat spring rolls? But they are in every Chinese restaurant's menu back home. Weird uh?   But the Gardens themselves are sweet enough		Don't let it fool you, the Yu Gardens Bazaar is a shameless tourist trap!
		The hundred-snacks lunch was definitely the best part of the day. The real Chinese cuisine is so different that what we eat in the Chinese restaurants back in Europe!
We spent five days in Shanghai, and even though we tried hard to taste the local nightlife, I must say that we were sort of disappointed. Considering this is one of the most up-front and dynamic cities in the world, we could not find much excitement past mid-night. There sure are some clubs and bars and stuff, but nothing really to get your underwear wet at. However, there seem to be a healthy ex-pat community here, mostly compounded by the corporate sort on a mid/long term assignment overseas. Fair enough, Shanghai might not be the most attractive town around from the touristic point of view, but it sure as fuck must be a thrilling place to work and live in for a year or two.
In case you haven't read the travel entry for Syria, Guillaume and Francois are traveling for six months all the way from Turkey to China with a very special cause: filming a wedding celebration at every country they visit. It's sort of a social research, you know, to register the differences between the societies and their wedding customs. Well, while we were in Shanghai they got invited to a Chinese wedding, and I decided to merrily join along. It was definitely an interesting experience, and I got to learn some details about Chinese customs that otherwise I wouldn't ever have. For example, the bride wears three different wedding dresses throughout the ceremony, one of them being always red, the color of love and fertility for Chinese people. Also interesting was the menu: turtle for the main course. And a myriad of other small details worth knowing. From here, I wish them a long and loving life together!
A Chinese wedding		Guillaume and Francois testing their kung-fu skills against a dangerous-looking two meters tall bonsai
There is one thing that has heavily struck me so far in China: despite the explicit progress and development Chinese people are experiencing, the language barrier is still atrocious. I mean, 99% of the Chinese population doesn't speak jackshit of english, and I literally mean jack-fucking-shit. They do not even understand words so universally spread as internet, restaurant, America or hotel, and once again I am being literal here. Trying to communicate with them is extremely exhausting, even via mimics. This is the one rant I have about China: the problem is not that they don't speak english (that's OK, I don't speak Chinese either so why should they speak english?) but rather that they do not attempt to even try to understand you or have you understanding them. There you are, drawing a picture and waving your arms silly trying to mimic whatever you want to communicate, and there they stand, simply saying no with horizontal movements of their head, and by no they don't mean they don't know nor they don't understand, but rather that they do not want to take the effort to make the whole thing approachable between the two of you. Someone explained me that for Chinese people, showing emotions is kind of embarrassing, so they prefer to walk away (and remain ignorant of whatever you've got to tell them) rather than look silly trying to communicate with you via mimics or drawings. I swear on God I cannot understand why they lock themselves out when it comes to communication with non-Chinese speakers. It's like enforcing their cultural principles over a human universal and fundamental value: communication and personal approach.		Ordering a simple lunch at a restaurant and trying to figure out what the hell are you ordering before hand is as frustrating as it gets. Even if you'd put your two index fingers over your head and shouted out loud a mighty Moooooooh they'd still not get (or wouldn't even try to get) that you want beef. Why, I dunno.
So, after five days in Shanghai, we were ready to move onto our next destination: Beijing, capital of the People's Republic of China.
Beijing The bus ride from Shanghai to Beijng was surprisingly smooth, covering the 1000-plus kilometers in about 15 hours. There, Guillaume, Francois and I splat up as they were to sleep in an old friend's apartment, so I'd have to find a room by myself (and thus paying full amount for a 14 euros/night double room, ouch!). However, we'd meet almost every evening to have a beer and enjoy Beijing's nightlife. One thing that has struck me dearly about Chinese people is their physical appearance. Thai, Cambodyan and Vietnamese people are really small, both in height and size, but Chinese people are nothing of the sort, and you can even find a number of obese individuals (gasp!). Also remarkable was to observe the fact that in modern, westernized and tech-driven China there are still some communism remaining firmly rooted into the society, such as overstaffing governmental offices and even privately-owned stores. For example: to get into the subway, you have got to buy the ticket off the ticket counter officer, and right next show it to a ticket inspector, who marks it out as used. The two employees are literally a meter from each other, making the ticket inspector utterly redundant. Couldn't the issuer hand the tickets already marked out? Another example: if you go to a drug store, as you pick up the chosen products from the shelf, someone comes up and issues an invoice bill on a piece of paper with the total amount of your purchase. Then you go to the cashier, show the itemized bill and pay up the amount due to a second employee. The funny thing is that this cashier ticks every product into the computer again (which of course gives him, yet again, the total amount due to pay). So what's the point in having this first dude issuing invoices if the whole process is to be repeated by the cashier? Basically, from what I have seen in communist countries, unployement is often fought by artificially creating pointless jobs out of the blue. If that is the case, why not simply mailing a subsidiary monthly check to these people's homes in stead of having them wasting everyone's time? or better yet, how about investing that money in infrastructure that will consequently create further justified jobs? oh well, such is the joy of communism I guess. Anyway, Beijing is supposedly as opposed to Shanghai as it gets: the former is an ancient city, center of a time-old empire and rich in cultural assets whereas the later is barely a century-old trading outpost where concrete and fiber-glass dominate the city's lookout. However, I was to learn that Beijing is experiencing a phenomenal economic success too and becoming an important financial hub itself. The city layout resembles an extensive grid with Tian'Anmen Square and the Forbidden City as center point. Avenues are wide and mint neat.
Like I said, the Tian'Anmen Square is the city center. It was created by Mao himself, and it claims to be the largest square in the world. Indeed, it's a vast pavement feast that has been acting during the last decades as the gathering point for crowds supporting this or that cause. In 1989, the Tian' Anmen Square became world wide notorious when the army tanks and soldiers silenced a number of pro-democratic demonstrators. The square is guarded by significant buildings such as Mao's Mausoleum, the Chinese Revolution Museum, the Forbidden City or the City Great Hall. Now a days, kids come here to fly decorative kites, lovers to kiss, Chinese to pay their respect's at Mao's Mausoleum, and tourists to start their Beijing explorations. By the way, there is an ever-constant mist or fog floating over Beijing, graying out the overall colors array. It is not pollution (doesn't smell on pollution in here), nor it's dust. It's more like smoke or something. I haven't quite figured it out, but this fact has also being observed by other travelers Pictures of the Tian'Anmen Square bellow. Please note the fog business I was mentioning above. Do you see how all the colors look washed out? Seriously, I don't know what is it.
My first destination would be, of course, the world acclaimed Forbidden City. Originally built in the XV century and hosting the Ming and Qing dynasties for the following 500 years, the Forbidden City was designed to operate as the Emperor's micro-universe from where he'd live and rule the empire. It was also an off-limits territory, meaning that only the Emperor and those related to the court could enter within. Unfortunately, for some reason the emperors eventually sort of self-locked themselves within the complex walls and would grow unaware of the real issues concerning the outer world. Also, the information they'd receive from their counselors would be heavy filtered. This situation led to the Emperor being merely a dignified figure without knowledge nor action upon the State matters, and therefore the court eunuchs took over as the real executive power in the backstage. Such eunuchs grew more and more powerful till they became the virtual rulers of China whereas the emperors would dedicate their lives to wander about the temples and conducting mundane interests such as arts and stuff. The Forbidden City itself is an enormous cluster of consecutive courtyards, temples and gates: you pass through a gate, enter an oversized courtyard fronted and surrounded by temples and traditionally-styled buildings. At the other end of the courtyard, there's another gate that leads further to yet another vast courtyard with more temples, and so on. I must shamelessly acknowledge that the Forbidden City didn't impress me much. It sure is massive, but it lacks the inspiring and sheer beauty of another mankind wonders such as Angkor Wat or Petra. I guess had I started my trip in China, the Forbidden City would have made a deep impact on me, but after almost five months traveling and having seen already so many UNESCO World Heritage sites, this one kinda falls behind. Non the less, it's a must see to any China traveler to better understand the nation's history.
This is one of the many courtyards fronted by a temple. Behind that temple there's a gate leading to yet another courtyard.		Another angle or the same courtyard, or maybe just another courtyard altogether, can't remember. They all look alike
The royal throne		A hundred years ago, you'd get your life immediately executed by simply setting a foot within the Forbidden City walls. Now a days, Starbucks Coffee has settled a branch in the very heart of this holy site. I guess the meaning of Forbidden has changed over the years...
The portray of Mao looms over the Forbidden City south gate
I also visited the Temple of Heaven Park, a blissfully quite park hosting a pagoda-shaped temple dedicated to Heaven and good harvests. This is one of the most postcarded sights in Beijing, alas not quite spectacular. Picture of the Temple of Heaven on the right.   Another Beijing's number one is The Summer Palace, the imperial family's summer hide out. Located in the outer suburbs, the Summer Palace features royal buildings abound a central lake, surrounded by trees over a steep hill. Despite being a relaxing ground for a sunday picnic, I fail to understand why The Summer Palace is considered among the country's top 10 touristic sights. Pictures of the Summer Palace bellow and bellow right.
One of the most interesting evenings I had in Beijing was exploring by myself the old neighborhoods whereabouts, shooting pictures of the back streets and Chinese people's everyday life scenes. It's the only way to lie a brief glance at traditional China in today's bustling Beijing. Pictures of Beijing's back alleys on the right and bellow.		Locals gather around a board nightly to play a popular Chinese game: the Mah Jong
Of course, another must-visit site is The Great Wall, and Guillaume, Francois and myself promptly found our way there. Undisputed king in China's tourism scheme, The Great Wall stretches out east-to-west over 5000 km worth of land throughout the northern end of China. The original planification begun 200 years before Christ, and despite the fact that it never were truly successful at its primary goal (keeping outer tribal armies such as Mongols at bay), it became useful as an elevated highway for supplies and soldiers transportation. Unfortunately, the Wall today shows a severe decay symptom, and in many areas off the touristic hubs it's nothing but a mere shadow of what once was. Around Beijing though, due to the extraordinary high attendance of visitors, the Wall has benefited from an exhaustive restoration program. The Wall's truly overwhelming kick does not come from the Wall itself, but rather from the ambition and size of the construction project as a whole. Please keep in mind that The Great Wall is the world's only structure created by Mankind that can be seen from outer space. Also worth noticing was the fact that engineers lay the wall all along the hills's top edge for further defensiveness, and it's quite a sight to see it crawling over the mountains like a windsurf board over the waves. Unfortunately, the number of tourists here (mostly Chinese) is uncountable, cheapening the experience in a sort of way. It receives thousands of visitors on daily basis. We were not lucky as far as the weather conditions were concerned either, as a thick fog covered the whole area shortening the photographs's range of sight and thus they won't be able to show you their full dramatic display. You'll have to go there and see it yourself I guess :)
One of the highlights of the week I spent in Beijing was without a doubt the famous China Acrobatics Troupe show. Someone had recommended it to us, so we gave it a go. Basically, it is a choreographed acrobatic performance where young acrobats (some under 10 years old) awe the audience with on-the-edge, breathtaking displays of skills, physical coordination and flexibility. It lasted one hour and a half, and for that long we couldn't manage to close our mouths up with constant ooooww's and aaaahhh's. Tickets were a bit pricey, but none of us regretted it one bit. Pictures of the China Acrobatics Troupe show bellow.
I shamelessly acknowledge that by then I was severely templed out (they all look identical), and I still had two days left to burn in Beijing. So those two last days were spent going out clubbing with Francois and Guillaume and a friendly gang of young french ex-pats living in there, enfattening their respective CVs working abroad once their college studies had been concluded. Should I have to work one or two years in China, Hong Kong or Shanghai would definitely look more appealing to me than Beijing, but each to their own I guess. Anyway, I had a good laugh with those frenchies! We went to this massive mega-karaokee complex, a whole building hosting hundreds of private karaoke rooms to be rented by groups of friends for the evening. I cannot get over the embarrassment of karaoke singing, but chinese (all asian actually) people love it. I almost puked the guts out when my french friends sang Macarena in english. Ugly business..
I also had the chance to see again my friend Carol, whom I had met few weeks before in Vietnam, as she arrived to Beijing the day before my own departure. We went out for a brief dinner at the night market, a compendium of street stalls serving from snake skin, to frog legs, to pastry deserts, or deep fried grasshoppers. I devoured whatever ended up in my hands, while she gave it a mighty miss haha! By the way Carol, thank's for mailing me those pictures (finally!). Picture of the night market on the right.
And with that said, my week in Beijing had come to an end. I must say that I'm not particularly crazy about this city. It's far left old China behind in its own capitalism chase, but it lacks the pump of Shanghai or Hong Kong. It's in a blurry middle, trying to accommodate its millennia worth of history and strong cultural roots, with the never-stopping economic wave; the outcome is, in my opinion, so-so'ish. I was a bit uncertain as far as my next destination in China would be. I wanted to move away from the cities, so a trip to the inland provinces was due. After much thinking, I decided to go to Tibet after seeing the stunning pictures Francois and Guillaume had just brought from their recent trip there. Scenery's supposed to be world-class. Unfortunately, as Tibet is an occupied territory, the Chinese government demands a special permit to foreigners entering Tibet. That permit is either provided by signing in an organized tour from Beijing, or by letting a travel agent deal with the red tape for you (upon US$100 payment, please). I was told that the easiest way to proceed with this second option was to fly to the city of Cheng Du, in the very center of China and half way between Beijing and Tibet. The next day over, a flight ticket was booked to Chengdu with Hector Yague as the subscriber.
Cheng Du Note: from now on, I must apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. The thing is that my digital camera got screwed up and it wouldn't shoot pictures for whatever reason, so I have been taking instead one-second videos and picking up a single frame off them, dismissing the rest out. As you know, the picture quality of a video is lower than that of a photo, so... The bloody manufacturer better fix this shit up as soon as possible (still under warranty) or else I will publish the camera brand and model in this web site and not recommend it to any of my readers. Customer power go go! All right, after a two hours delay in my flight from Beijing, I was to find out that the staff at Cheng Du airport had lost my backpack and another passenger's too. He was Syrian, and we talked for a long while about my trip in his country few months back. Eventually, we found our stuff ready to embark another random flight towards God knows where. Pissed off as hell at the whole issue, I finally arrived at Cheng Du's Molly's Guesthouse (I recommend it if any of you guys ever go there). As I was to stay in Cheng Du for a brief period of time -couple of days top- while the permit to enter Tibet was being worked out, I decided to pay a visit only to the area's two main attraction: the Giant Panda Breeding Research Base and the Grand Buddha of Leshan. Cheng Du is a massive city itself with 10+ million inhabitants, but I just didn't have time for it.
So the morning after, I woke up early to take the bus to the Giant Panda Breeding Research Base, a panda-only zoo-alike organization where an ever-going effort to study and procreate pandas has been taking place for over 10 years. It's a unique opportunity to see these incredible creatures. I know there are other zoos around the globe with giant pandas, and I know I've said that this research base does look like a zoo itself, but its exclusive approach and the specialization and maximum understanding (and care) towards the pandas puts it worlds ahead the rest. I'm glad I went there early in the morning because pandas are bamboo-fed at 9:00 am, spending the rest of the day sleeping. And they say we spaniards are masters on the ancient art of siesta. My ass! Pandas ought to be the sweetest animals, I swear. There were some cubs there playing around, jumping on each other, biting each other's ears and basically running loose all over the place. Sweetest thing I have seen in my life other than my own two cats, Mushroom and Gorron. Unfortunately, the info we were giving at the Base is most disheartening: the panda population living in their wild environment is decreasing lightning-fast, and should this rate continue, they estimate that there'll be no panda alive out the zoos fences at some point of this very century. Come on people, it's our responsibility to do something about it. Let's try to protect the natural environment with our daily actions: recycle, don't litter about, etc. It's no effort and makes a hell of a difference!		Giant Panda eating bamboo. It's very interesting to observe how skillfully they grab and operate the bamboo trunks with their paws. That's possible because their thumb is positioned inwards, just like monkey's and human's
The night before I had met at the guesthouse what would become my group of pals for the rest of the trip in Tibet: Leila (from Morocco but living in Paris) and the couple formed by Ben (England) and Judith (Germany). They all had been living in Asia for months working in different assignments. Judith and Leila spoke fluently I don't know how many different languages each (Chinese included) and Leila herself, barely 24 y/o, has traveled throughout the whole world: South America, Africa, Europe, Asia, etc. You name it, she's been there and has done fucking it. Man, I do envy these worldly people. I just hope one day I'll be able to tell my grandson half the stories these peeps got under their belt. Anyway, after the morning excursion to the panda base, Leila and I took a bus to the town of Leshan, two hours away from Cheng Du, in order to pay a tribute to the world's largest Buddha: The Grand Buddha of Leshan. Nothing less than 71 meters worth of Buddha! Carved in the rock during the VIII century, there are two levels from which you can see it: the top level, at the Buddha's head level, and the bottom. The problem comes when you want to climb the stairs down the cliff. It's a very narrow staircase, and there are hundreds of tourists and pilgrims literally elbowing each other to squeeze on. Of course, the staircase is fenced so there's no danger of falling down, but it's a full hour of hard work and sweat to get down there. Fortunately, the pain was worthy. Pictures bellow!
Upper level		Lower level
Upon returning to the guesthouse, weary from the bus ride back, the few of us gathered for an evening beer. Well, that was the original plan, because that initial beer somehow evolved into a much nastier business: Leila taught us how to play a french cards game, the loser having to drink a shot of a local Chinese spirit that'd put absenta to shame (what was the name of that drink again guys?). Anyway, thanks God there was this Israeli fellow with us, sort of untalented for cards games, and he got to knock back almost the whole 4 bottles of it by himself huhu! Needless to say, he passed out on top of the guesthouse's pool table by 2 or 3 am. Ooooohhhh I almost forgot! Ben and Judith, in case you're reading these lines: I know how to do the card guessing trick Leila used to perform. She told me how to do it, it's neat! hahaha!		Playing silly card games in Cheng Du - Left to right: Ben, me (above), the Israeli guy who got drunk the bejesus outta himself, Leila and Judith.
All right, the next morning over we'd all fly to Lhasa, capital of Tibet. However, all our flights were scheduled at different hours, so we set up a meeting time at a specific meeting point: the Yak Hotel in Lhasa, 3:00 pm local time. However, due to a massive mess up from Air China, none of us would make it to the appointed hotel at the scheduled time haha!
Lhasa (Tibet) Like I just said, fucking Air China fucked it all up big time yet again. I got to sat my royal butt down at Cheng Du international airport for five hours before my plane took off. Five fucking hours! Geeeez... Surprisingly, the plane was a massive Airbus 340, a four-engined 400 seats beast, and there are five flights daily! How come the Cheng Du - Lhasa route gets so busy? I mean, I know Lhasa is a heavy touristic destination but there's only 200,000 people living there at the end of the day. I cannot figure it out... Well, anyway, after a bit of initial confusion, the four of us (Ben, Judith, Leila and myself) eventually got together by the evening. Lhasa sure made an impact on us. I cannot really describe it, but there's something special about it: It's calm, but yet charismatic. It's colorful, but yet stylish. It's crowded, but yet peaceful. It's, after all, Lhasa - capital of Tibet, and the four of us loved it at first sight. Just by walking through its narrow back streets, bargaining at its frenzy market, watching at the pilgrims perform their praying rituals, their brightly-colored traditional costumes, and a no-end of subtle details one can feel that there's something... spiritual about this place. I know I'm making no damn sense whatsoever here. The fact is that Lhasa is extremely charming, a place to get lost and wander about without rush, digging into it at your own pace.
At the heart of Lhasa lies the Barkhor, a pilgrim circuit that circumnavigates clockwise about the Jokhang Temple. This temple is one of the holiest and most active buddhist shrines in Tibet. Every day, hundreds of tibetans come here to voice their prayers away. Most interesting of all is the ritual used to conduct the praying: basically, it's a stand up - lie belly down, push-up alike motion that can go on for up to half an hour. I have witnessed elder people (some of'em really old) stand up and lie down continuously for longer than I myself could have endured. They also held wooden boards on the palms to ease the sliding-forward motion. Picture of faithful believers praying in front of the Jokhang Temple on the right.   Also worth noticing is the gyrating golden scepter they spin all day long. This rod has the praying carved around the central drum, an by spinning the pendulum with a fast wrist motion, the prayers are supposedly recited automatically over and over, without actually needing the believer to chant them out at all. Smart, uh?
The gyrating scepter I was referring to above		Another close-up of the same phenomenon
People-watching at Lhasa's Barkhor is a wonderful pastime. Costumes are so colorful!		All these people are walking around the Jokhang Temple following the Barkhor pilgrim circuit, always clockwise
Inside the Jokhang Temple, a very typical sight of Tibetan life can be found: the rolling drums. The Barkhor pilgrimage circuit ends inside the temple, at a squared courtyard where dozens of rolling drums line up one after the other. The pilgrims walk along these drums, teasing them up as they walk and thus having them spin. As you can see in the picture bellow, prayers are carved just like they are on the gyrating scepters, so I assume they follow the same principle: if you have them roll, they chant away for you. I find this an extremely amusing concept. Pictures bellow!
I can now say, without fear of making a fool of myself, that religion has a deeper presence here in Tibet than in the Middle East countries from what I've seen. Buddhism is everywhere here, its doctrines constantly displayed by pilgrims and monks. There are so many of them! My take on the matter, as a non-religious driven person, is sort of mixed. In one hand, every activity human beings undertake is a meaning to reach further happiness, and obviously religion does bring some enlightening and happiness upon these people. In the other hand, there is obvious proof of poverty in the streets here. Wouldn't they become happier too as a community if they dedicated their time and energy to help each other out and work their way out of poverty in stead of so much praying? Like I say, I am not a believer, so I guess I don't understand jackshit when it comes to religion, but I merely wonder what's the point in focusing your attention in what's beyond when your children are running naked in the streets begging around for food... Ugh!, never mind Hector, let's drop the issue.
Of course, no trip to Lhasa would be such without a visit to the magnificent Potala Palace, a UNESCO human heritage site. The Potala Palace is the home of the Dalai Lama. Well, officially, since he's been exiled for years already and now lives in India. This gigantic structure was erected under its current form by the fifth Dalai Lama in the XVII century, but there'd been a royal palace in that very spot for many more centuries before. The Potala follows a bi-color structural distribution: the white buildings for the Dalai Lama's quarters, and the red buildings dedicated to religious functions. Overall, there are over a thousand rooms inside this juggernaut, and the 10 euros entrance fee can buy you hours of pleasant exploring within. The interiors of the Palace very much differ from the outer look: whereas the external design is dominated by its straight angles and long, flat walled facades, the interior feels introverted, private, intimate. Dark wood and red fabrics cover every inch of the walls and ceiling, and the light is certainly dim. Should I have to describe the Potala Palace from the inside with just one word, that'd be hommy. As a side note, I'll state that within the Palace complex rests the Dalai Lama V's tomb, manufactured out of almost 4 tons of gold layers and decorated with over 10,000 gems. Whenever I die, I'll order a similar sarcophagus for myself too.
The Potala Palace's front facade up the hill. Please note its bi-color distribution code and its square-angled buildings		Pale colors, dim lights, dark wood are to be found in the interior
Wax and candles play a fundamental role in Buddhism praying rituals		The back side of one of the buildings
An outer corridor. Yellow, red, green and blue are the predominant colors		An inner yard. Golden and black dominate the scene
Hehe I couldn't help uploading this pic. Lots of cats sleeping around inside the Palace, some of them on the monks's laps!
Everest Base Camp During the last few days we'd been talking about organizing a few days tour to the Everest Base Camp, the base point used for professional climbers to summit the Mt. Everest. It's at 5200 meters altitude more less, and it requires two full days of serious driving across the Himalayas to get there from Lhasa. After some discussion back and forth between us regarding budget, schedules, availably and other logistic-related matters, we all four decided to give it go, and in order to ease down the cost of the car rental, we hung some notes around at the hostels's notice boards asking for a fifth member. We got lucky, as two days later we managed to recruit Jeff (from USA) for our expedition. Jeff, 25 y/o, was on a short two weeks holidays in China before returning back to his Business School in Malibu. The two of us ended up becoming good pals and we sure had a good laugh about it all. Overall, the five days expedition to the Everest Base Camp rounded up to 140 dollars each. That's renting a Toyota Land Cruiser 4x4 (with driver of course) and all the entrance fees to the National Park. By the way, if any of you incidentally happen to be thinking about taking this same trip, I recommend you the travel agency inside the Snowlands hostel in Lhasa and ask for a guy called Lhakba. Not only they quoted us competitive prices, but they also helped me big time booking my flight tickets once the tour was concluded. Nice people. All right, so we woke up early in the morning and got on our 10 years old Toyota Land Cruiser, ready to follow the two days long trail that'd take us to the Mt. Everest itself. Well, from that moment on, what happened inside that car during those two days was sort of surreal. First of all, the road was way bumpier than we'd expected, our speedometer averaging at a striking 40 km/h for most of the trip. Also, having taken a fifth member along, we were quite squeezed in there. Indeed, we'd have to take turns to sit at the back-end with all the backpacks and stuff. Not very comfortable as you might guess. Moreover, we all got a cold, with runny noses and the rest of the package. Whenever one of us would sneeze, the rest would chorus along: Bless yooouuuuu, specially if it had been Ben or Judith, whose sneezes were very very weird (we'd joke saying that Ben's sneezes were half sneeze, half cough and half bark. haha!). However, the real kick came from the music tape the driver brought with him: can you imagine what kind horrendous psychological torture is to listen to the cheesiest mix of Tibetan techno during 48 hours non-fucking-stop?! The same tape, same songs (God damned awful songs) day in and day out, ever-hammering our poor eardrums. Now a days, when I go to bed late night, I can still hear far in the distance a high-pitched Tibetan voice crying out loud "go! go! go!". Aaahhh you guys weren't there so you probably think I've lost it, but ask any of the other four fellahs that were with me in that car... they know... Nevermind me, let's carry on. Like I said, the ride up there was totally F.U.B.A.R. -Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition- (did I get that straight Jeff?), but I must acknowledge that the scenery was breath-taking all the way along. Tibet is nicknamed The Land of Snow, of course as a reminiscence of all those snowed peaks towering about, but I was more impressed myself about the vast, wind-rocked grasslands: enormous extensions of grass surrounding fertile valleys. Coming up next, some random pictures of Tibet's country side taken during those two days on the car. Once again, I must apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. Such a shame... If I grab my camera company's Quality Control Department supervisor I'd kick his ass to the Everest Base Camp and back!
This is one hell of a picture in my opinion. In Tibet you have the feeling of being closer to the sky (well, you actually are since you're over 4000 meters altitude). The sun light is just so bright, and the clouds so near!		Tibet seriously is a beauty
Twin mountains		A river flowing down the valley
Another valley. See what I meant by the closeness of the sky?		Good ole Toyota Land Cruiser
More mountains, more valleys, more rivers. Can't get enough of them!		You know you've gone quite up high when you're over the clouds level!
At night, we'd sleep in different towns along the way such as Shigatse or Tingri, but I won't elaborate further on either of them as nothing significant to this web site occurred there. I will however explain a bit further as far as Tibetan diet goes. Basically, there are four ingredients: noodles, rice, curry potatoes and yak. Please note that I haven't said four main ingredients. There's four of them, period! Now Hector, what the hell is a yak? oh boy young grasshopper, take a sit over here. The yak is the Ave Maria of Tibetan cuisine; the A-B-C of their lifestyle; the Bible of their shopping list... well, you got my point... The fact is that yak is a mountain bovine, sort of a hairy cow, from which Tibetans elaborate many of their basics: butter, milk, meat, fabrics, etc. I can hardly think of any other community so linked to a single animal as the core for their existence. But again, we mustn't forget that Tibet lies 4000+ meters high, and you don't get many options at these extreme conditions. The yak meat itself tastes strong. It's not bad, but it's strong, and when you've been eating the same bloody thing for a week for lunch, dinner, breakfast and with the mid-afternoon tea, you start making disturbing references about it. I remember Jeff and I joking all day long about yak. Yak this, yak that. At one point, I got completely delirious and went on singing the classic All you need is yak, wah wah wah waaaah... All you need is yak...		(drumrolls playing) Ladies and gentlemen, meet the omnipresent yak!
Eventually, after two full days of non stop driving, our hurting asses arrived to the final destinations. The Jeep cannot go all the way up to the Base Camp (it's a national park and all that legal mumbo-jambo). Alternatively, you can either hike the ascending eight kilometer trek to the camp or you can rent a carriage to bring you atop. I, surprise surprise, opted for the second. The horse galloped along a rocky valley naked of any vegetation whatsoever (we were at over 5000 meters altitude by then, well above the vegetation level of course). This valley was guarded by titanicesque, snow-tipped mountains, and the sun was beating of us hard, sun protection and sun glasses being a must up here because the atmosphere's protective blessing is not so when you're this high. And then, as we patiently rode up... the path took a sudden turn... the wind quickly cleared the sky off clouds... we lifted our tired eyes... and there it was... awaiting at the far end of the road... imposing, proud, magnanimous, aware of its superiority, dwarfing all around... a once in a lifetime sight... The Mount Everest...		You cannot imagine the excitement that pumps through your entire body as you slowly ride up the hill when you can see what awaits at the other end... The Mount fucking Everest stood up in front of me for the first time ever!
There's no words to describe such initial moments. I simply lack of them. It's one of those things that, once you've finally pulled'em off, you silently think to yourself: I did it, I fucking did it. God, I can't believe I've made it this far! It was truly magical, and I did feel privileged for having seen what less than a 0.0001% of the people get to see in their life. I mean, me in the Everest! It was insane! Oh boy, no words can... The Everest Base Camp is a compendium of communal tents operated by Tibetans offering raw meals and a place to sleep to all those adventurous souls on their way to the summit. I of course wasn't going to, as it'd be a positive suicide to attempt to get any higher up that beast with my minimum experience and equipment. We did however take a short trek in the area visiting the tombs of various people who've died trying to climb the Everest, the last one being a Japanese doctor early this year of 2004. But I'll shamelessly say that we had to call it off very soon. And this leads me to my next point: Altitude Sickness. Some of you might have never heard of such silly thing as Altitude Sickness, but let me tell you that it's anything but silly. When I dived in the Red Sea, I explained the effects of depth pressure. Well, being at high altitudes also carry some physical desembalance (spelling?). First of all, the most notorious symptom is the lack of air. Indeed, the percentage of oxygen in the air is so poor at those heights, that no matter how hard you breath nothing fills in your lungs. It's like smoking one of those ultra light cigarettes, no matter how hard you pull the fag, no smoke comes outta your end. Well, this is something similar. Consequence: extreme exhaustation. Ever 100 meters walked you gotta stop because you just cannot catch your breath, like if you'd just run the bloody marathon. Another common symptom are headaches; continuous and persistent headaches. And, for those least acclimatized, there's the ever-appealing puking. We all felt the Altitude Sickness on our respective organisms, but poor Jeff felt it the worst. He spent all night long puking his guts inside out. I myself couldn't sleep either due to the intense cold up there during the night time. Severely bloody chilly, like if you were in a God damned mountain or something, geeez! Now seriously, Altitude Sickness is nothing to joke about, and it can get you killed if it catches you mid-climbing the Everest. Please allow me to show you some stunning pictures of the Everest and it's surroundings, but I'm afraid pictures won't do justice to the absolutely unique natural setting upon which the Everest is placed. I guess it's one of those things you gotta see by yourself to fully appreciate its gigantic magnitude.
Like I said, it's mastodontic. Its sheer size, overwhelming. Simply put: the biggest single object I have ever seen. Freud, analyze that!		Another clearer picture from the same side
When you stare at The Mt. Everest, you keep your mouth shut and thank heavens for having given you the chance to see it		Photo taken from the Base Camp
Photo also taken from the Base Camp. These are all 7000+ meters mountains. For your information, there's nowhere in the world where you can find 7k+ m. peaks other than here in the Himalayas, but you just don't pay them attention. The Everest (8848 m.) makes them all look like mere sand dunes.		Mountains? where?!
You see this river by these mountains's feet bathed by the clouds? well, the Base Camp lounges by its shore. This pic was actually taken from my very tent. What an incredible place indeed!		August the 1st, 2004. Mandatory proof of been there, done that: Me with Mister Eve on the background (I call him Eve since we're mates now)
5220 meters altitude... getting sort of chilly here, ain't it?		The wonderful gang that made it possible. Left to right: Jeff (crouching), Ben (arms wide spread), Judith, me and Leila. And also two tibetans that were hanging out there
Left to right: our Tibetan guide, Jeff, Leila, Ben (I love your hat man) and Judith. On the background behind the clouds, Mt. Everest		Once again, left to right: Leila, Jeff, Ben and Judith. This time around, the Everest did show up for the picture
I'm so sorry guys I cannot show you pictures with sharper resolution, my camera sucks ass. Hey Leila, if you're reading this, send me some nice pictures of the Everest if you got time and I will upload them on my web site (Leila is a photo-maniac, shooting pics left, right and center at every step she took hehe).   Well, my adventures in the Land of Snow had come to an end, and there was only one thing left to do: another two days driving back all the way to Lhasa; another two days of non-stop Tibetan techno (same tape, of course); another two days of yak jokes. Eventually, weary and tired as old dogs, we arrived at Lhasa. Ben, Judith, Leila and myself went out for a good-bye dinner (western food please, enough of the Tibetan four-ingredients diet), and we sure had a pleasant evening. That group of people I explored Tibet with was a top notch bunch: cheery, easy going, generous, interesting, friendly and all around good fellows, specially Leila who is a total riot! Cheers guys, it's been indeed a pleasure to meet you. Hopefully, one day our paths will cross again... Posterior entry: I met Leila again in Paris after finishing my journey around the world long months later! Even more so posterior entry: Upon returning from my trip, I initiated a sentimental relationship with Leila, we fell crazily in love, and I moved to Paris with her, where we lived together for a full year until we painfully split up. It was a wonderful experience in every single way (read all about it in my Expat Chronicles section). Leila, if you are reading these lines: te mando mis besos, pequenia. No te olvidare nunca... AOU AOU !!! At that's it, the morning over I had a flight ticket reserved back to Cheng Du. Incidentally, Jeff was flying in the same plane as the first leg of an exhausting trip that'd take him all the way back to California. Oddly enough (pun intended), my flight was delayed three hours once again. However, and I guess as a compensation, Jeff and I were offered two seats in first class. There we were, two backpackers in pesky clothes sitting in first class, eating smoked salmon for lunch and reading The Financial Times hahaha! Sometimes life still manages to surprise you, doesn't it? Jeff and I couldn't help laughing our tits off at the whole thing. I spent one eventless day in Cheng Du sorting out my bus ticket to my next destination: Guilin and the nearby town of Yangshuo , in the south-eastern province of Guangxi. I had heard that this is a very laid back area with world class country side landscape, and that's exactly what I needed. Let's face, the previous ten days in Tibet had been sort of stressful and tiresome, organizing the expedition to the Everest Base Camp and the Altitude Sickness and some other non-related issues, and I was longing for a relaxing week in a quiet place. Yangshuo seemed to fit the bill just perfectly. However, I was not to be that lucky, at least not as far as getting there went. The bus ride was an absolute nightmare. Scheduled to take 23 hours from Cheng Du to Guilin, it actually mounted up to 40 due to mechanical problems, heavy traffic and whatnot. exasperating beyond sanity is a mild way to put it, but two days later I did make it there, somehow...
Yangshuo The 7th of August, 2004, the bus dropped me off at the small but incredible town of Yangshuo, 60 km. south of Guilin. Yangshuo is a very popular touristic destination, specially for Chinese (there are gazillions of them packed up in annoying organized tours). As a matter of fact, the area's landscape has been the inspiration for Chinese artists for millennia, and the reason is because the karst rock formations here are unique, with thousands of limestone pillars emerging skywards among green fields of rice plantations. Something similar to Vietnam's Halong Bay but in the country side instead of water; I liked this one much better though. Scenes of rice-harvesting follow their daily activity with the breathtaking karst formations passively overseeing it all on the background. I couldn't say why, but just like the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan had appealed me as a sight taken right off Mars, Yangshuo's surrounding delivers a prehistoric aura to it. Should I ever work as a director for a Jurassic Era based film, I'd definitely come here to Yangshuo for the outdoors shooting. I must say that I didn't do much at all those 10 days I spent here in Yangshuo. Like I said before, Tibet had been quite exhausting for me and I needed a holidays from my traveling routine, so basically I lounged about the coffee shops, reading a book, writing emails to my friends and watching DVDs all day long for a full week. You know, I switched my brains on stand-by, and it felt damn good. Besides, I was waiting for the Chinese PSB office in Guiling to renew my tourist visa, so not that I could have gone anywhere far anyway. To make it short: I did some hardcore buttscratching here in Yangshuo. Of course, I also explored the region's most significant sites. For example, one day I took a two hours boat trip along the river. Let me show you some pictures of that day:
See what I mean? doesn't it cast a Jurassic Park feeling or something with the exuberant foliage and those weird mountains and stuff?		This pic is a personal favorite because of its sense of perspective - Cruising along the Li Jiang river
Definitely, this province in southern China is a natural beauty, top among China's tops.   Another day, I rented a mountain bike and cycled around for few hours into the country side. There's this peak called Yueliang Shan few kilometers south from Yangshuo upon which you can climb (over a 1000 stair-steps though!) for the best 360 degrees over-view you could dream of. Simply incredible! By the way, as I was reaching the summit, there was this fellow jumping off the top with a paraglide, flying far into the distance. I would have traded my left nut for the chance to do that! I will now show you some pictures I took that day on my bike.
Yangshuo's surroundings		Yangshuo's surroundings
Rice plantations and incredible karst formations. That's what this place is all about		Rice plantations and incredible karst formations. That's what this place is all about
Panoramic view atop Yueliang Shan: fields and villages take shelter among hundreds of massive limestone pillars		Panoramic view atop Yueliang Shan: fields and villages take shelter among hundreds of massive limestone pillars
Another must-see if you ever come around here is Longsheng and its most charming Dragon's Backbone Rice Terraces (these Chinese people sure pick grandiloquent nicknames). Three to four hours drive north of Yangshuo, the rice terraces are cloistered in a vast greenly valley, ramping up the surrounding hills in a staircase-alike shape. Indeed, the best way to appreciate the view is following a small path hiking up on top of a hill, which I diligently did. On my way up, I met a friendly Spanish couple (Patricia and Javier), whom had been in a number of countries around the world for their summer vacations, and I sure enjoyed a pleasant afternoon with them. Basically, the terraces are built in such shape because rice plantations require to be flooded with water to grow, so when it rains the upper floors get saturated with water, consequently over flooding over upon the floor right bellow, and so on, eventually having all the consecutive terraces swimming in water, which is precisely what the rice needs. By the way, as we were coming back down the hill, it starting raining like there was no tomorrow, soaking us up to the bones hehe. It was pretty funny. Picture bellow of the rice terraces. It's a shame I don't have a better camera, 'cause it was really impressive to see how all these terraces covered the whole valley, as far as your sight could go.
Eventually, the PSB office in Guilin finished the process to renew my tourist visa, so I took the bus to Guilin to pick my passport up and decided to spend the rest of the day there checking the region's main town out. It's a nice city, very touristic, with around 1.5 million population. Like Yangshuo, it's been built up among karst formations, and the city still grows now a days negotiating it's way around them just like it always has. By the way, there's a very impressive grotto here called Reed Flute Cave worth visiting. Also worth mentioning is that I had a lovely Big Mac with king-sized fries for lunch that day. Enough of steamed rice and noodles, for Christ's love! Panoramic view over Guilin on the right.
And that's it, nothing really else to say about those 10 days in Yangshuo. Like I said, I spent most of my time sipping cappuccinos, updating this web site (hadn't done it since Beijing) and reading a book. But what I will tell you is that my 5th month traveling anniversary did occur here. Five months already on the road, geeez! Overall, I am traveling slightly faster than I had originally expected, as I had scheduled this journey around the world for a full year and it will probably be closer to the 10 months mark. As a matter of fact, I must acknowledge that I'm starting to get burnt out from traveling. Well, not from traveling itself, but rather from Asia. I am definitely Asia'ed out, if you can say such thing, and I'm very ready to move onto the next world region down the list. However, I got this problem: after Asia, Australia and New Zealand were due, but we are in middle august now, which means that it's mid-winter in Australia. I dunno, I had always related Australia to sunny beaches, cold beer and bikini parties, and the thought of going there at the coldest time of the year sort of puts me off. Very off indeed actually. So I guess I'd still have to hang around Asia for a couple of months waiting for the fucking spring to bloom up in Australia, and I just don't know what to do with myself for another two month in Asia. I have discarded Japan already for being stupidly expensive. Mongolia is in the middle of nowhere so I'd have to backtrack thousands of kilometers afterwards. South Korea doesn't get me wet in the pants. Not coming back to Thailand again. Not getting anywhere near India's whereabouts, since from what I have heard from other travelers, India is not the place I would enjoy. Hhmmmm... This is the first time ever since I left home that I just cannot figure out where the hell to go next. I guess I could follow the overland route down the south eastern end of Asia towards Australia, you know: Malaysia, Indonesia, etc. I hadn't planned to hit those latitudes, but I just cannot think of any other option. I have been seriously squeezing my rickety brains for the last week without luck. We'll see where the hell I end up during the following few months.
Heng Shan Scattered throughout China there are five hills known as Holy Taoist Mountains. Believed to be related in one way or another to Chinese popular mythology, these five mountains have been portrayed by Chinese artists since like ever, serving as both artistic inspiration and religious enlightening. Well, I couldn't just fly out of China without having seen first person what I had been seeing dozens of times before in paintings hanging on every Chinese restaurant. Supposedly, all these mountains have extraordinary views from up top and attract Chinese tourists in droves. So I traveled north from Yangshuo into the province of Hunan, in central China, being the town of Heng Shan my destination. A rather uninteresting city, Heng Shan is only re-known as the host of the nearby namesake Holy Mountain. The trek from the base to the summit took me around 4 hours, and it sure knocked the wind outta me (1290m above sea level). There are a number of temples to see on the way up. None of them are breath-taking to be honest, but the peaceful, forestry scenery makes of the hike a very pleasant early morning activity. Unfortunately, I must had chosen the foggiest day of the century, because as I reached the tourist observatory at the mountain's top, I stared in disbelief at a whole vast mass of... nothing! I couldn't see jack-fucking-shit 10 meters in front of my nose! If I took a shit right there I couldn't have seen the turd coming outta my own ass. Man, it was so bloody frustrating, having woken up at 7:00 am and trekked for four fucking hours up a steep hill and to have nothing to show for it. So much for the reportedly amazing panoramic view! Sorry fellows, no pictures today. However, it was interesting to see how the Chinese people conduct their taoist praying rituals. Basically, they throw handfuls of firecrackers into a collective fireplace, filling the air with gunpowder smoke and continuousbangs and booms. Pretty amusing the whole thing; I have never seen any other religion using explosive flares during their praying activities. Also worth mentioning is the fact that I was the only westerner in town, and I arose a surprising curiosity from locals. They'd stare and me and whisper on my back, not in malice but rather astonished to have a white man in their village, approaching up to me and saying a shy Hello and uncontrollably giggling afterwards. I wonder why there were hardly any backpacker whatsoever in rural China. Funny.
Wulingyuan Alright, so Heng Shan sucked. Well, I was not going home without properly seeing one bloody Holy Mountain at its full display. So I took a bus further into central China towards the city of Zhangjiajie, where one of the country's most acclaimed sites is to be found: the poetic mountain of Wulingyuan. National tourism is at an all times high, and organized tours of Chinese tourists swarm the place day in and day out, armed with videocam recorders and led by a speaker-holding guide who's not afraid of using it. Not a pleasant sight, trust me. Chinese tourists are really a loud and littering bunch. Wulingyuan kicks mean butt, seriously. Declared an UNESCO world heritage and protected National Park, the scenery is just anotherwordly. The bus connections are awfully inconvenient (I had to commute with three different buses to get there within barely 500 km worth of distance and they are all crawling slow, making the whole thing a painful 24 hours ride), and the US$20 entrance fee doesn't help either, but when you finally do get there your weary spirit cheers up at the first glance. Needless to say, there's a nice hike to endure before reaching the top, however not as hard as that in Heng Shan. But once you are up there... oh man... 100 meters high, vertiginous cliffs dominate the area falling into a sea of pine tree forests, so high and so square angled that you could feasibly parachute your way down. Enormous blocks of rock chaotically shoot upwards granting the spectator with a most uncommon view. I'm not very good at describing, specially not in english as it ain't my first language, so may the pictures below speak out the words I lack of.
Wherever you look, you see something like this		This lonely pillar stands out proud
More of the same		Thousands of stairs on the way up surrounded by a thick forest
Pine trees cover the cliff facade		Cliffs form almost perfect squared angles
Yup, Wulingyuan was worth the visit despite the horrendous string of bus commutings and hassle to get there and away form there..   An here is where I decided to end my tour around China, booking the day after a long distance bus ticket (yet another 30 hours straight worth of bus changes, bus station sit downs and lack of sleep) to my final stop in the country: the very charismatic Hong Kong, from where I had planned to fly out during the next few days. To be honest, I was very fed up of China by this point and I had been looking forward moving onto the next country for already two weeks. Let me elaborate on this a bit further, as I believe it's somewhat important: China has left both a sweet and sour (pun intended) taste in my mouth. In one hand, this country sure is a beauty. The natural scenery is among the most incredible I've seen in my entire journey. Regions such as Tibet, Yangshuo or Wulingyuan are something worth seeing, if even only once in your life. Moreover, China presents a wide variety of environments: from the high-tech megapolis of Shanghai or Hong Kong to the snow-tipped mastodons of the Himalayas. From the sub-tropical rainforests of the Yunnan province to the endless grasslands of Outer Mongolia. From the muslim-influenced Kashgar in the far-west end of the country (next to the Afghanistan border) to the splendid Empire-centric Beijing, etc. China is a world in itself that'd take an experienced traveler one whole year to fully explore it out. There is just SO much to see in this country... But in the other hand I shamelessly declare that I have found Chinese people themselves lacking. What I will write ahead might be foul of me, and I certainly don't pretend to be an expert in Chinese society. It's simply what I have observed during my seven weeks in China and what I have gathered from my conversations with other westerners traveling and living here. The reason as of why I dislike Chinese people is because, in my opinion, they have given up their individuality as single beings for the sake of the global, the community. The origin of it all I believe to root in Confucianism. Confucianism, as opposed to what many believe, is not a religious nor a philosophical doctrine, but rather a social postulate of Confucius' understanding as of how the society should be structured plus a code of values between the citizens. According to him, the youngsters should respect and obey the old men, the son the father, the younger brother the elder, the peasant the landlord, the landlord the noble, the noble the emperor. Basically, a medievalesque social hierarchy with binding links between the casts. Everyone's got someone who guides his steps and in return respect and obedience are due to be paid. In the other hand, western values, derived from Ancient Greece's sages, declares man as the center of everything. The individual does matter and does count, and society expects, encourages and further promotes those who take risks, active roles and finally succeed. The society's unit for the western cultures is the individual, whereas the unit for the Chinese society is the community, be it the family, the company, the collective or whatever. The dichotomy thus lies in that one needs and, moreover, requires of the global to operate and to identify himself whereas the other is more self-dependant and less bound to the environment he's grown in. Confucianism has stuck deeply within Chinese society for centuries up to our very days, and in many ways it's been officially supported by emperors and rulers. At the end of the day, it benefits them as the final stage in the society's food chain. I read in an english written Beijing-based newspaper a story that caused a sort of social uproar few years ago in China. It was the story of a father who wholeheartedly disagreed with Chinese education system for considering it a failure as far as transforming students into grown ups. He therefore de-listed his son out of school and even forced him to leave the parents home at the age of 13, obliging him to find a job and survive by himself in an exacerbated attempt to have him mature into a worthy man. Well, from that event a group of scholars and sociologists conducted a research upon the Chinese traditional education system and they all concluded that indeed students were being taught into sheep (their words, not mine); sheep that needed a shepard (meaning the family, the community) or else they'd be eaten by the wolf (meaning the real world out there). The ending result is a society of Lemmings, sheep or however you wanna put it. I know a sociologist expert in Chinese society could and would probably bitch-slap me in the ass for what I'm saying here, and once again this is only my opinion based on what I have seen in my daily interaction with Chinese people. Let me illustrate my point further exposing a real example I have gone through repeatedly: I remember when I first arrived to Shanghai, map in hand like a good tourist, and getting lost beyond all recognition. Well, I hailed one fellow walking by and asked him where in the map we were. He looked at the map, studied it in depth, looked up at me, and kept on studying the map. I was like "hmmm this is your city buddy, don't you recognize the layout?". Anyway, after a whole minute staring at the map from every possible angle, he stopped yet another man walking pass. Then the two of them would look at the map, talk about God knows what, and kept on talking while pointing different spots on the map. Then along came a third guy, who merrily joined the gang and there they went on looking at the map while heatedly discussing and much map-pointing. By then, like 5 minutes had passed and I was thinking to myself "Either I am the unluckiest tourist in Shanghai and I have picked up three guys who have recently arrived to the city themselves, or these three guys's intellects added up together equal to that of a shoe". Eventually, after endless talking between the three of them, the first guy I had stopped by pointed at a specific location and said We are here. Alright, fair enough, that took a bit longer than expected but that's OK. But then few days later I experienced the same phenomenon, this time in Beijing: I got lost, I asked a random man, and the whole process begun all over again; more people joined in, more talking among them, yet more talking, and finally more talking. I was like "something fishy happens here everytime I ask for directions". Well, after having seen it all repeated countless of times, I eventually realized what the fuck was going on for real: the first guy I'd asked had known from the beginning where in the map we were; of course he did, like I said it's his city afterall. But he needed, he required further confirmation from others in order to outcast an opinion (a fact, since he had always known). A westerner would have picked up the map, recognized the locations, and actively speak out whatever his opinion was. But the Chinese don't, they wouldn't operate without the global despite the fact that it's not necessary! It's like if that first guy had been afraid of pointing out an answer by himself, and hence he would seek for coverage provided by the crowd before standing out and taking a decision. Like I said, this same example happened a number of times, and I believe it to be very illustrating. Another funny anecdote: many times I encountered chinese people who, upon utter impossibility to communicate with me due to my total lack of any knowledge of the chinese language, they'd resort to write whatever they wanted to say in a piece of paper... in Chinese characters! Haha! Yeah buddy, it's all now much clearer... What am I getting down to with so much crap-talking? that, in my opinion, dealing with Chinese people has been frustrating like hell, to the point of getting seriously pissed off at their incapacity to react, to operate by themselves. I am not saying they are stupid (we all have the same gen-code, same IQ potential), but I will risk it and openly say that their cultural heritage and their archaic education system does indeed hold them back when it comes to facing new situations never faced before by themselves. In my experience, they just wouldn't analyze the presented scenario and bounce back an counteracting decision (whether rightly or wrongly is irrelevant). Instead, they would approach the community to seek guidance. Not for a second opinion mind you, but guidance. Really, Chinese people ended up getting so badly on my nerves that I just couldn't carry on exploring this enormous and beautiful country. I know, right now I'm probably not the most popular guy among you readers, but that's the way I feel and that's the way I express it. I guess I lack the patience or something, but after facing the same tremendous hassle day after day to gather any tiny piece of useful information off them, they eventually just wore me out. Fucking Confucius should have shut the fuck up, really.
Hong Kong Money, money, money, money, money... or so sang Liza Minelli over her classic Cabaret. I wonder if Hong Kong inspired that song, but if it didn't it bloody well could have. Hong Kong's official language, as opposed to what many believe, is not Cantonese nor English but rather Hong Kong dollarese. If you speak that language you'll fit right in. In Hong Kong, money is religion, dogma and faith all packaged in fuzzy wrap paper. I have never seen such exhibition of mass wealth anywhere in the world as I have in Hong Kong Island, the financial district: super cars, Armani suits and last generation electronic gadgets are every day's bread and butter, all among glassy, cloud piercing skyscrapers, neon lights, posh restaurants, oversized flat screens outcasting stock indexes to the pedestrians in the street and herds of awed tourists walking about holding bags from a myriad of different retail stores. Someone once said that Hong Kong is the world's other Manhattan, and he couldn't have been more accurate. Populated by over seven million people, Hong Kong is formed by four areas: Hong Kong Island (the financial district), Kowloon peninsula (the commercial district), the New Territories (mostly residential and hilly) and the Outlying Islands (barely inhabitated), but Kowloon and HK Island are where it's all cooking despite their relative small size. Hong Kong had been a British colony for over 150 years. At some point around the mid-XIX century, England screwed China's ass without lubrication in what history would come to know as the Opium Wars. China had been exporting ungodly amounts of tea to the British crown, and since England had nothing to trade in exchange, they began running opium into China to equilibrate the commercial scale. China took some actions in order to keep the drug from flooding into the country and thus the military conflict burped out. Like I said, England won the campaign and in return Hong Kong and the adjacent territories were handed to the all mighty British crown. However, an accord was reached: Hong Kong was to be returned back to China on July the 1st, 1997. And so it was. I'm sure you guys remember the event some years ago, for it was first-paged in every single newspaper around the globe. To be precise, Hong Kong is not just another Chinese province but a Special Administrative Region, which grants them with a sort of independence from Beijing, specially as far as economic and trading policies is concerned. But Chinese or not, the cold truth is that Hong Kong and its citizens are decades ahead of the rest of China: economically, culturally, civically, educationally and as many -ly's are you can think of. They are just two entities entirely in different levels. There are hundreds of small details that incriminates HK as an ex-british colony. For example, the car plates borrow the same design as those in England (white color for the front plate and yellow for the rear one); the electricity plugs and sockets are equal too (and completely different from those in China, so you need an adaptor); drivers do so on the left; the underground speakers chant the "mind the gap" mantra haha!; you cannot miss the double-decker buses either; I'm surprised the local currency is the Hong Kong dollar instead of the Hong Kong pound... Oh, and last but not least, english is widely spoken, which has been a relief after the idiomatically-challenged inland China. I booked a room in a guesthouse at the very freaky Chungking Mansions, an enormous and decrepit building located at the best area of Kowloon with over fifty tiny guesthouses within, hosting a large community of indian, arabic and black immigrants. My room was ridiculously small, being just as long as the bed length, plus one meter at most by the side. I'll simply state that the toilet in my apartment in Madrid is roomier than this room. And it wasn't cheap on top of that. Although cheaper than Europe, Hong Kong price tags are significantly higher than those in the rest of China, but then again so are wages (wages here in HK are extremely high. It's a great place to work). Anyway, I sincerely admit having become a Hong Kong lover. What can I say guys, this super capitalistic megapolis gets me horny. I have always been a city bug and this place is as "city" as it gets. It's just so dynamic! People-watching in Queen's Road (Hong Kong Island's central artery) is so amusing: everyone's busy, everyone's gotta get somewhere now, everyone's spouting orders to their minimalist mobile phones, everyone's pounding their PDAs with the optic pen. In Kowloon's Nathan Road absolutely every single item that's been manufactured by humankind (and some that haven't) is sold at its side streets for relatively cheap prices. Hong Kong is a shopping theme park. You cannot help pulling out your wallet and dive right into the general buying frenzy. I myself, the anti-shopping paradigm, finally gave in and bought some digital items, some out of need and some others out of consuming lust. Like I said, you seriously can fetch some bargains here if you know where to look. For example, I bought a 3 megapixel, 3x optical zoom brand new compact digital camera for 57 euros (US$70). That's a gift! Of course, the brand name is unknown even to the manufacturer's CEO, but let's not digress here with the fine print, shall we? US$70 all the way baby! I assume the origin of this camera is sort of unclear, but being brand new and stuff I opted not to enquire further about it.
The first thing that strikes dearly on the visitor is the Honk Kong Island's skyline as viewed from Kowloon harbor, specially at night when all the water-front skyscrapers bulb up in colors. This is, in my opinion, one of most impressive views on Earth. Have a look at the picture on the right and judge for yourself. Oh by the way, I dedicate this picture to Robert, Jesus, J.C. and Irola, my friends from Marbella, a coastal town in southern Spain. They know why...
Another must-do while in Hong Kong is getting on the Peak Tram after sunset. This peak is a steep and exuberant hill in the back-side of Hong Kong Island, and you can ride atop in a touristic tram for US$4 for the best panoramic sight you'll ever get of a city in your life. In the picture on the right, you can see three different elements: HK Island's skyscrapers at the front, then the mass of water forming the bay, and then the Kowloon peninsula stretching out in the other side. Note: thanks Carol for this wonderful picture. You might be good at shooting pictures, but you still suck at pool though haha!
I'd like to mention the fact that Hong Kong Island is built in three different heights: the ground floor is cars and shops's territory, the mid-level is shaped by a web of interlinked pedestrian passages as the ground floor is just too busy for people to walk on, and the third level compounded by towering buildings looming over the city. Alright, now I will upload a collection of random pictures of Hong Kong for your pleasure.
See the three levels I was referring to? the road at the bottom, the pedestrian passage above (right side of the picture), and the buildings above		I love glassy skyscrapers
The Bank of China tower, the most charismatic building in Hong Kong, alas not the tallest one		The very busy Queen's Road, the heart of the financial district. Here, millions of dollars change hands on daily basis
Massive screens monitoring the stock exchange activity		Side street nearby Kowloon's Nathan Road. Need to buy something? this is the one place to go
The City Group tower, with the Bank of China tower reflected on it. I love this picture!		The IFC tower with its 90'ish storeys is HK's tallest boy
Panoramic view of Hong Kong Island skyline a very cloudy morning
And so was how on the 25th of August, 2004 I turned 28 years old in Hong Kong woohoooo! Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Hector, happy birthday to me! Errrr... time for my medication, please excuse me for a second... Overall, I really enjoyed Hong Kong. Definitely not the place where I'd settle down and grow my kids, but I absolutely wouldn't mind at all working and living here for a year or two. This is a pumping, bustling, fast-paced city, and best to be experienced from within. And that's it ladies and gentlemen, I spent most of my 5 days in Hong Kong wandering among these immense skyscrapers -I just couldn't get enough of them-, bargain-hunting at the electronic gadget markets and shopping around for a flight ticket towards the next country. I don't know if you guys remember but I was elaborating before as of how I was totally at a dead-end trying to figure out my next destination after China. Well, I finally picked up a country using the time-old but categorical method of flipping a coin... Indonesia, I'm coming!
Without a doubt, the Oscar goes to Tibet. Downtown Lhasa is as charming as it gets, and seeing the Mount Everest is definitely something I will never forget. Granted, driving up there had been a serious pain in the behind, but watching that mountain when we finally arrived was quite a climax.
Yangshuo, alas over-touristic, is a beauty on its own. Everyone should ride a mountain bike around Yangshuo at least once in a lifetime. Hong Kong. If glassy skyscrapers, neon lights and more activity than you can bare with are your drug, HK will be you Golden Triangle. The group of people I met in Tibet. You guys owned, honestly. The chance of meeting my french friends, Guillaume and Francois, after 3 months traveling over different paths. It was cool to update each other on what we had been up to ever since the last time I saw'em in Syria. Having fulfilled a childhood dream, despite of not having been my favorite country by far. Non-the-less, I have always wanted to come here, and now finally I have done it. Wullingyuan, one of the sacred mountains. Very very scenic indeed, but terribly inconvenient to get to.
Chinese people: the most uninspiring and unenlightening/-ed people of all the countries in my journey. And I'm not the only traveler who believes so. Language barrier is horrendous (Hong Kong being the only exception). I swear on God 99% of the population doesn't speak a word of english. I had not expected the inability to express yourself and understand others could get so frustrating. Food: after 4 months in Asia, I can safely postulate that I just don't like Oriental cuisine. Special mention goes to Tibetan food as the world's shortest range of variety (unless you're crazy about Yak meat). Chinese package tourists: noisy, littering and disrespectful with their own natural environment. And they are everywhere! Chinese airlines: either I'm the unluckiest frequent flyer in this country, or Chinese airlines are a piece of steaming shit. I took four flights within Chinese territory, all four of them got delayed at least 2 to 3 hours and one of them even managed to lose my luggage. How about that for customer satisfaction? Decen