Hard Seats, Softs Seats, Too Many Choices

Traveling by train in China is all about choices. Slow trains, high speed trains, express trains and milk runs. Once you have waded through the myriad of speed options then you must decide on what kind of seat you want. There are five options. From the highest to lowest they include, soft berth, hard berth, soft seat, hard seat and the dreaded standing option. Don't be fooled by the term soft. There is nothing soft in China. The Chinese believe that sitting or laying on something soft is not good for your health. Mattress comfort ratings come in plywood, particle board and the extra plush ironing board. But I digress, the term soft referred to in train travel is not about padding but about how many people they can stuff into a train car. New contest! What class of travel are Nonie and I enjoying in the above picture. Send your guesses to our e-mail address as access to the blog continues to be a fight.


If Doctor J decides to give up her PHD, she can easily make a good living as a tour director. Using her highly honed doctoral skills she organized a wonderful trip to Shenyang for Nonie and I. Shenyang is located in the Liaoning Province and is the administrative hub for North East China. The area has been inhabited for over 7,200 years. It was also the birth place and for a while the capital of the Qing dynasty. There is a well maintained tomb site as well as a beautiful palace second only to the Forbidden Palace in Beijing.


We took the overnight train from Harbin arriving in Shenyang at just past 5:00 am. An all night MacDonald's serving piping hot coffee was our home for the next hour or so while we woke up and allowed the caffeine to do its work. Dropping our bags off at the hotel, the plan was to spend the morning at the Qing Tombs and the afternoon at the Palace. The tombs were magnificent and the Palace was meticulously well maintained. It was a long day capped off by a feast of chuar at a little street side restaurant. Back to the hotel and in bed by 9:00

We awoke to another beautiful day. Our plans today was to visit to the site of the 2006 World Horticultural Exhibition now known as the Shenyang Botanical Gardens, located about an hour out of the city. The site was huge and contained large planted areas containing plants and trees from all over world as well as from different areas around China. The Canadian zone, was of course well endowed with maple trees and dandelions. There was much to see and we were on the move for over 5 hours. Very enjoyable day.

Back to Shenyang in the late afternoon. Time for a quick dinner at the train station before we boarded our high speed train for the four hour return trip to Harbin. Thanks Doctor J.

Tea Pot and Hot Pot

There is a perception that tea is the most popular drink in China. Nothing could be further from the truth. China is famous for tea but as a daily drink, not so much. In fact while you can buy 100's of different bottled tea drinks, you cannot get a pot of hot tea in most restaurants. Mai you! (Chinese for "Don't have!") Drinking tea in China requires more than just a cup and a kettle, it is a ritual to be followed religiously. One wrong move and you have ruined the tea. To purchase tea you must find a tea market. The markets we have visited are quite large but most shopping malls will have one or two chain tea stores located on the premises. The markets can be two or three story buildings filled with dozens of small little tea shops. Each shop selling tea from a different areas of China, Taiwan and other tea growing countries. Buying tea is a lot buying wine. You spend a lot of time sampling the various teas, lots of sipping but no spitting. Some teas are made with boiling water while other teas require water heated to just below the boiling point. The contact time is very important. Water left to long in the tea leaves, blasphemy, to short and you miss the subtle flavours and bouquet of the tea. Tea can be carefully aged like wine. Finally, tea is not cheap. I have seen costs running to $250 CAD for a kilogram of tea grown at the top of mountains in Taiwan. So if you like your tea and are planning to visit China, pack some Red Rose.

Hotpot! A distinctly Chinese cuisine. The basic premise of hot pot is much like fondue. Replace the oil or cheese with boiling hot plain or spiced water. Then boil what ever you want to eat. As the story goes in China, hot point was invented by a famous general. Prior to a big battle, the general had to move his men a long distance to reach the battle field. There was no time time cook a proper meal for his men before the battle so he ordered his cooks to heat huge pots of water, cut the meat up into thin slices, boil and serve. A quick and hearty meal for his men who went on to defeat the other army. As we all know, an army travels on it's stomach. Without hard facts, I believe I can safely say there are more hotpot restaurants then their are MacDonalds in China. The beauty of hotpot is you can do it anywhere anytime. All you need is a pot, hotplate and chopsticks. Doctor J hosted us in her dorm room. We ate on the bed. Eating hotpot is not a quick meal, like fondue is can last for hours. So if you have a few hours, I recommend you give it a try. Don't burn your lips like I did.

Saving Face in Daching-

Daching a smallish provincial city just North of Harbin with a population of just over a 1,000,000 did not exist 60 years ago. It was only due to the discovery of oil in the early 5o's did it come into being. I image this is what Fort MacMurray will look like in 60 years. It is a typical Chinese city with no rhyme or reason to how the streets are laid out. The streets just sort of wander around looking for a place to come to an end. One distinctive architectural touch is the donkeys that you see in all parts of the city pumping oil into a huge gathering system. Nonie and I actually considered Daching as an option for or first year teaching in China.

Arriving at the train station were met by family of the boss of one our our newest younguns, Viki. Viki and her boss had arranged the entire trip. Two cars were provided for our use (Mercedes and an Audi) and after a quick lunch we hit the road for a visit to the largest wet lands in China which are located a few hours out of Daching near the small city of Quiquihar. Along the way we passed through several picturesque villages. It was not uncommon to see mud walled houses with thatched roofs and a shiny new car parked out front, the modern China. The wetlands are a temporary home for the famous Chinese cranes. Sadly, we were about two weeks late with most of the cranes having moved on and only a few domesticated cranes left for us to see. Back in the cars and off to a local hot springs for some relaxing spa time. The hot springs were interesting and sadly not very hot. Tepid springs might be more descriptive. Although one pool was maintained at a hot spring like temperature. Excited by our find of a hot pool, I dipped my feet in to immediately receive first degree burns to the souls of my feet. There was probably a warning sign but not in English. With our spa time over, it was a quick ride back to Daching for a late dinner and into our hotel.
A late start the next day. Nonie, Viki, branson and I wandered around in search of a coffee. Thanks to branson's good eyes we discovered a coffee/ice cream place with an open door. They were closed but some fast talking by branson how his old father was is in desperate need of a coffee fix, they relented and boiled up a cup of instant for me. Armed with some caffeine we enjoyed a breakfast of fried dumplings then headed to the local petroleum museum. A stunning building about the size of the SOEC, only more ornate and dedicated to the men and women who came in the fifties drilled for oil. Specifically one man called the "Iron Man", who it seems single handedly was responsible for sinking the fastest wells of all the drilling groups. It appeared that a photographer and camera man seem to follow him around where ever he went because they had thousands of photographs and quite a bit of film of his exploits and heroic acts. Lunch was the most interesting of places. Called the Little Piggy, it was dedicated to the glorification of pork. No part of the pork was left uneaten. We sampled tail and face. Numnum. I walked by the show case to see heart, liver, and and especially tasty looking brain on display.

A bit of time to explore Daching before it was time to head back to the train station, a quick shoe shine and on to Harbin on an even more crowded train then our previous one.

Putting the Long into the Long Weekend

For many years now, we have chosen not to travel at Christmas. We have found it just plain crazy. To many people and to many things that can go wrong when 2 or 3 million people over whelm the transportation industry. Throw in a little nasty weather and forget about it. Now imagine if over 230 million decided to travel for the holidays. Now imagine if they all decided to travel on the same weekend. Now imagine yourself in the middle of it. You have just imagined our recent weekend. It was billed as quiet little get away to Daching, a small city about two hours away from Harbin. Most Chinese do not get paid vacations and have no choice when they may take their vacation except those holidays mandated by the central government in Beijing. Recently January 1st was added to the list of approved holidays. In addition, a week off is provided during the Chinese New Year in January and the Autumn Festival in October. Spread through the rest of the year are a few long weekends. They include the Tomb Sweeping and the Dragon Boat Festivals. Air travel is still in its infancy here but is growing quickly. The primary mode of travel is train. The train system in China is huge and growing at a rate that is not equalled by the rest of the world. They are poised to take over ownership of the high speed train industry from Japan in the next few years. When a holiday comes along, even a long weekend, the Chinese hit the road in massive numbers. We traveled outbound on a Sunday. Even on Sunday the train was full. To assure as many people as possible can travel, they sell standing room tickets once the trains are full.

Talking with my students, it is not uncommon for travelers to spend their entire trip standing. To add more challenges, if their trip requires them to transfer to another train in another city, they may not be allowed to purchase a ticket for that leg of the journey till they arrive in the city. Some students have told me that they can spend 30 hours getting home for the holidays, leaving them only a few days to visit before they have to turn around and make the return trip. Our horrible Christmas travel stories pale in comparison. Our trip at just under two hours was a breeze compared to that. More on our trip next blog. The wall is starting to rear its head and I keep dropping out every few minutes.

When is Home a Home

I don't know exactly when it happened and I am not sure why it happened but as we traveled around the world this last break and we were asked where we lived, we responded with Harbin and not Penticton as we usually did. They say "home is where your heart is" and ours is certainly still in Penticton. But it took a e-mail from a friend last week to remind us that we are facing our last few months in Harbin and we realized that we will be leaving a bit of our heart here when we leave and that this has been our home not just a stop in our relentless drive to see the world.

The memory card that we were using for our camera had a melt down and at this point it looks like we lost all of our pictures that we have taken since we returned to Harbin. Thankfully we have been able to tap into those of our extended family and can share them with you. A picture is worth a thousand words especially with my commentary. It has been almost 10 weeks since we returned to Harbin and we quickly picked up where we left of. First up was the Persian New Year. A fabulous evening at Solmaz and Abbas's.

Before we knew it, St. Patricks day was upon us. It isn't easy being green. As I am 1/4 Irish it just seemed like the right thing to do. Can you pick out the other person in the picture who lays claim to Irish descent. Nonie cooked up an extravaganza of green baked products for the event. We played Toss the Coin into the Pot of Gold and had a lively game of Pass the Irish Potato. We even had a Russian leprechaun show up for the festivities. The Qingmin Festival or "Tomb Sweeping Festival" closely followed St. Paddy's Day. It is a time to honor and remember our ancestors. The Chinese burn paper offerings so that there ancestors can have better lives in the hereafter. With the help of Janie, Nonie and I were able send an offering to all our ancestors. See my blog of March 2009 for more on the Qingmin Festival.

This weekend is Easter Weekend. Nonie has some time on her hands this semester. She is teaching six classes a week of first year students. She only see each class once in the semester so her preparations time is almost zero along with zero administration time. Her classes will end around the middle of May and at this point in time, she has no other work scheduled. With all this spare time, she decided to create an Easter that HIT would not forget. She enlisted an multinational task force to create and paint 100 paper mache Easter eggs that she planned to hang in the trees located in the courtyard in front of our dorm. The task force comprised 3 Iranians, 2 Iraqis, 6 Chinese, 2 Russians, 3 Americans, 1 Japanese and 1 Phillipino. Did I mention they were all women, no men allowed. Needless to say, I either locked myself in the bedroom or one night I met up with Abbas to play some some pool. Too many women in one place always makes me very nervous. On Good Friday, we let the men in on the secret and everyone got together to hand the eggs. Sadly, the weather did not cooperate and rain forced us to hang them in the lobby our dormitory. Nonie once again cooked up a storm and everyone came back to our apartment for drinks, cookies and cake. We enjoyed hearing and singing songs from our native countries. Nonie, Armin and I sang Frere Jaques with much gusto. It was surprising how many of our other guests knew the lyrics.

Spicy Hot

At some point in the mid 20th Century, Zanzibar and Tangyanika (sp) joined countries to become Tanzania. Zanzibar was actually a group of islands with the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba making up the majority of the total land mass. Up till the late 19th Century, the city of Zanzibar was the centre for the world's spice trade as well as the main market for the slave trade serving the Middle East and Asia. Till the the early part of the 20th Century, it was the capital of the Omani Empire that stretched across the entire Middle East.

Since the breakup of the Omani Empire, Zanzibar has fallen on hard times and has been remaking itself into a destination for tourists, mostly from Europe. Actually, if you think about that, it is not a far cry from it roots as the centre for the Middle Eastern slave trade. Just replace the Africans with the Europeans. Slave trade / Tourist trade. You be the judge.

Leaving the Serengeti with temperatures in the mid 30's to Zanzibar where the temperatures were in the mid 30's but with a Humidex of around 90% was a definite shock to the senses. As they say, it's not the heat it's the humidity. No airconditioning to be found at the Zanzibar International Airport. Thankfully we were coming in from Dar es salam and were able to avoid the long lines of tourists waiting to purchase their visas and clear customs. Moving out of the airport quickly and into the much appreciated air conditioned car that was awaiting our arrival. This trip has been a guided one from start to finish. Not our normal mode of travel but starting to see the benefits.

An hour later found us once again, safely behind guarded walls drinking our first of many fruity drinks. The plan was to spend the next five days laying on the beach, reading the entire Harry Potter series and drinking every fruity drink on the extensive menu of fruity drinks all while sucking up as much heat as possible before our return to the arctic temperatures of Harbin. Mission accomplished. The resort was typical of every all-inclusive resort that we have visited. This one catered to Italians. The buffet was a fusion of African and Italian cuisine sauteed and sauced into some interesting and not so interesting dishes. We quickly learned which ones to avoid. Safely behind walls, did not allow us to get a real feel for the Zanzibarian way of life. Leaving the resort was not recommended as stated by a large sign on the beach warning us not to use the beach after sundown. The resort was located in a very remote area with a limited number of organized excursions. We did take the the highly recommended "Spice Tour" which involved wondering around a couple of acres that were sparsely planted with various spices that had once made Zanzibar famous along with some spices never grown on Zanzibar. We tipped big and bought several overpriced souvenirs and hopefully made the day for the folks who tended the gardens, grounds, acted as tour guides and just generally hung around adding some local colour.

To ease us back in to some sense of reality, we booked a hotel for two days in Stone City, the historic heart of Zanzibar City. Hopefully this would be an opportunity to see the Zanzibarians in their natural environment. No Land Cruisers for protection here, just our cunning and fleet feet. We did hire a guide to give a short orientation tour of the City.

As you can see from the pictures, Stone City has all the necessary ammenities to keep the Omani Sultans happy, but since they were sent packing, things have gone a little down hill. Happily, it did not take a lot of imagination to see the beauty that first attracted the Sultans to Zanzibar.

It reminded me of Cuba in some ways but with out the Communism. Unlike the Cubans who seemed to enjoy life, the Zanzibarians seemed a little defeated by life. Until recently, they did not have a strong central government and what they had was rampant with corruption and economic mismangement. Elections held a few months ago has seen a change in the governing party and they have a faint ray of hope that change is on the way. Time will tell.

Another childhood dream smashed. On the last night of our resort stay, they advertised a traditional African dance show. But once again, the only bare chests I saw were on the men. Damn those missionaries. A little excitement on our outbound flight back to China. An explosion in a military base located adjacent to the internation airport in Dar es salam caused them to close the airport. When we arrived at the airport in Zanzibar we were told that a bomb had gone off at the airport in Dar and that it was closed till further notice. Whoa! We had watched both BBC and CNN that morning and no mention was made of this event. Given what was happening around the Middle East and North Africa, we though the worse. We were given no information but I smoozed the guy in the Duty Free shop. He had a radio and was able to give me the real story on what was happening. The explosion was an accident but it was in an ammunition bunker and exploding ordinace went on for hours as the fire department could not get close enough to fight the fire. It seems that a same incident had occured about 12 months before. No lesson learned, I guess. The airport eventually opened and we made our flight for Doha and onward to Beijing. Harbin is looking really good.

Call Me Bwanna

It's good to be the King but if you can't be the King then being Bwanna is not half bad.

No four stars out on the Serengeti. We had to tough it out in tents. Nonie is seen here waiting patiently for her afternoon tea.

Our tent was small and lacked even the simplest necessities such as a large screen tv. Don't get me started on the bush toilet which was located at the back of our tent. The lack of a tv was more than made up for by the low growling of the lions that could be heard outside our tent late at night. Those canvas walls became very thin in our minds and the whistle they provided for our protection only added to the discomfort.

A Serengeti, instantaneous hot water supply system. Step 1- Warm water up on a campfire. Step 2- Carry water to tent. Step 3- Pour water into large bucket and hoist up into a tree. Step 4- Turn on shower and get wet. Step 5- Turn off shower and lather up. Step 6- Repeat step 4.

  No stewardesses, in-flight meals or entertainment system and they told us to have a nice flight. Dave our pilot from Quebec with a brother in Kelowna looked to be all of 18. I swear he doesn't shave yet. It was with some small regrets that we said good bye to George and moved on to our next adventure. The island of Zanzibar, the centre of the slave trade and the spice capital for the Eastern world. Perhaps there may still be a chance to see some bare breasts.