China, Kunming and Bank of China, renting bike, hotels, language and prepare for Laos
It’s 18.33, Tuesday 8th August. I’m at a massive internet cafe on ChunChen Lu in Kunming. Since arriving yesterday morning at 6.09am, Seb and I have been getting to know the area on our rented bicycles. This is the best way to get around. Most people ride bicycles, motorbikes are fewer than Vietnam and the city was less polluted. We could have gone to the various touristy places like the Stone Forest etc but we decided to chill and prepare for the 14 hour bus journey from Kunming to Mengla and across the Laos border. Getting to Kunming, we travelled from PingXiang to Nanning by bus and the most beautiful landscape tour for 52 yuan – I definitely recommend it. From Nanning we took a taxi (tuk tuk’s were hidden a little further so we didn’t see and can be less comfortable for people with big butts to endure the approx 10km to the train station) and got a sleeping compartment for 118-122 yuan (hard sleeper – the best soft sleepers for 4 were all full) on the next train, the one at 15.36 and arriving at 6.09 (the next one was at 18.09). We were lucky we didn’t have to wait long. After food, and an hour delay, we boarded the train. The waiting area on the ground floor was packed, hot and unbearable so Seb and I waited on the first floor away from people. I saw guards below noticing us and talking on their walkie talkie and minutes later another guard approached us (man, we couldn’t possibly be a security risk), checked our tickets and told us the waiting area was downstairs. I told him we knew but there were too many people. He was satisfied with that explanation and left. I didn’t know what to expect with the train. Sleeper coaches I’ve tried but not sleeper trains. We had tickets for a bottom bed and a middle bed; the bottom was more expensive, I guess because you didn’t have to be athletic and move like a monkey. We dumped our backpacks under the bottom bunk and I was to have the middle. There was no air conditioning, just a small fan in the ceiling. One Chinese guy was really friendly, tried to communicate about International telephone numbers etc but I kept saying we didn’t understand. Another guy, mafia-type, big belly, rounded face and forever will be remembered by Seb as the stinking and smoking b**stard occupied the other bottom bunk. Stinking and smoking b**stard stripped revealing fat belly and stinking nylon-cladded feet; he started munching roasted peanuts and making himself at home. I asked Seb if he wanted to change booths with my middle bunk neighbour a tanned thinner Chinese guy who was more than happy to swap. Later stinking guy and thinner guy shared peanuts. Seb met a 16 year old Chinese guy who spoke relatively good English and who wanted photos of us. I was trying to finish Paulo Coelho’s ‘By the River of Piedra I Sat Down and Wept’ which was slow starting, with a character who irritated a little but was much better at the end; and aiming to finish his other book ‘Eleven Minutes’ which I thoroughly enjoyed and recommend. ‘The Alchemist’, a story that touched me, Seb bought for me, I enjoyed so much, that when these two books were offered for very little in Ho Chi Minh City, I couldn’t resist. Later, I realised why the books cost so little, they were copies; obviously photocopied once you start reading, disguised by a good-looking front title page.
Anyway, back to the train. I stayed in my booth most of the time, reading. Seb, I’d find wandering the place, talking to people and at one time, scared me to death by popping outside the train and calling me from the station platform. Again, I can’t say enough, how important cleansing wipes (wet tissue) and tissue is here in China. You’re lucky to find tissue and soap in toilets and restaurants. But we were prepared, with water, snacks and lots of tissue. In smaller places like PingXiang and Nanning, they can charge you a lot for tissue and cleansing wipes are hard to find but in Kunming, they’re everywhere.
In Kunming most do not speak Cantonese; we found one. Everyone speaks Mandarin. Also hotels can be 3 times more expensive, well, especially compared to PingXiang. Most hotels offer twin bedrooms from 188-300 yuan and that’s the bottom selection. After arriving at Kunming, we ate some food at a nearby restaurant. No food stalls for us for awhile as our stomachs were playing up. After food, we walked looking for a hotel. Most hotels near the station were way too expensive charging 70USD or more. I had read about the Camellia Hotel so we headed for it. They showed us a twin bedroom but it hadn’t been cleaned since the last occupants left and looked dingy. We decided against it. For 2 or more hours, we searched the area but came to the conclusion that the hotels that were available were too pricey for us and the ones we liked were full (The Hump hostel had a great atmosphere; we didn’t see the bedrooms and it was full). It was back to the Camellia Hotel. This time round the only available twin rooms were at 200 yuan. We took it; by that time, we were tired, desperate for a shower, food and rest. The room we did get, room 722, is much better than we had expected though we had difficulty finding it, the signs by the lift didn’t show it existed and after asking someone we finally found it located in between rooms 712 and 716!
Today we got passport photos done by a guy who made Seb and I put on a suit jacket because they were black and we wore white which was the same colour as the background and wouldn’t do; he clicked with his camera and then tapped fast on the computer and presto, 8 passport photos the same size as Seb’s photo in his passport (but not the same sizes they were offering which were either a little too big or a little too small), opposite the Camellia Hotel. After, we tried to get some money changed to Laos currency but after taking two numbers for their frustrating queuing system in the Bank of China and missing one and then being told by hawkers that the bank doesn’t change to Laos money, we left the building confident we’d find another solution.
Tomorrow we’re going to head for Laos.
***
To Adam: Thanks for commenting. Though there are now over 2185 visitors to my blog and 11937 pages read, it’s nice to know some of the people reading are people I actually know. Also, I have a bad memory so if I don’t keep up the blog, I will forget and though I jot down things I’ve done to remember, I really don’t want to keep bits of paper on me all the time. Seb nearly lost his French journal – some of my journal/memories will at least be saved on a computer and accessible for when I get back. It saves carry a bulky journal about.
***
 |
|
When we are tired, we are attacked by ideas we conquered long ago 
Tags: China, Kunming, Language, Travel, Travel, Travel
monkamonkamoo
Leave a Reply