We attempted to (and somewhat successfully) spend a week traveling over-land from Xi’an to Beijing to see some cool sounding sites along the way, but really it was a week of expending an exorbitant amount of energy trying to get around and dealing with new rules on personal space.

CHINESE NEGOTIATIONS
Most of our local interactions consisted of fierce Chinese negotiations. They negotiate over everything from clothing to train tickets to food (even in South America a banana was not this hard to buy). Usually we were trying to set straight some situation where we got ripped-off or screwed. The Communism must have made its mark on many people’s thinking ability because the universal response to our objections or confusion was: “Impossible” or “There is no other way.” My usual response back was, “of course there are other ways” and proceeded to list all options for their choosing. I tried desperately to find ways of negotiating with the people, always being sensitive to their cultural need of not loosing face. That was until we sat next to a woman on the plane that got into an open and LOUD argument with the guy seated behind her. I figured since I was quickly educated in all the ways to say “You F-ing Bastard” (and vise versa) in Mandarin that I could let loose my NY impatience when I was being ripped-off for a few hundred yuan…a substantial amount on a backpacker’s budget.

THE SITES
We did see a few cool sites – Terracotta Warriors (did you know they were only discovered in the 70’s – crazy), The Yungang Cave (Buddha’s carved into a mountain…amazing), the hanging temples (the name really says it all – they were temple’s hanging on a cliff) and the ins and outs of Beijing. But overall, it was difficult to get to these sites on a ‘make-it-up-as-you-go’ short break and well, there was not too much else to see in-between the sparse sites. We wanted to get lost in towns of dirty chaotic windy haphazard streets and alleys that make Asia so incredible to wander through. What we found were only signs of modern China with factories and sky scrapers towering above, and skylines of construction cranes. If we happen to find one of the few and far between “hutongs” or alleyways left from old China, we knew their days were numbered by the 50+ storey apartment block going up along side.

LOCAL INTERACTIONS
Our best local experiences were over meals. Tony and I love seeking out local dives for games of sign language and mystery meals. I had a few written out phrases that stated I was a vegetarian, but the only one that was ever understood translated to: ‘I’m a Buddhist.’ Who knew they were one in the same…good thing it’s not a persecuted religion in China. One night we found ourselves on stools placed on piles of leftover pieces of past diner’s meals waiting for kebabs (for Tony) and shredded tofu (did I say yum?). I could have sworn the restaurant was a car mechanics shop during the day, but here they were with a BBQ grilling away. As usual, the whities were the center of attention with all eyes on our every embarrassing moment as we ordered food from a woman with absolutely no English and no understanding of our bad attempts to ask for food items in Mandarin. (I can barely get the right pronunciation in Spanish, let alone a language that made my lips and mouth move in ways I didn’t know they could!) The locals, especially this two-year old boy thought we were aliens descended upon their little local haunt. The fascination prompted them to buy us beer after beer (experimentation I think) and we were edged on to scull glasses of the nasty formaldehyde tasting stuff. We wondered if the sculling was a Chinese version of a frat party or was it a way to get the drunken foreigner’s groovy digital camera. We left before we found out.

BIZARRE INCIDENTS
We were seated on a train out to Datong and Tony was kicked off his train seat so the pint-sized official could reach the rafters and straighten the alignment of our backpacks. She literally lined up every bag on the rafters in the car. Our first day in Bejing we decided to go check out the Forbidden City. It was definitely the name that drew us there. Despite having to battle your way through all the people it was truly an amazing place. On the map it did not seem so far, but then as we walked from section to section, courtyard to courtyard I became very weary. I sat down and dreamed about having a nice refreshing ice-coffee to get me through the rest of the grounds…and what do you know there in the middle of this ancient city, historically significant monument to a past history, was a Starbucks. Very capitalist, huh?

RECOMMENDATION
I’m not completely writing off this country of 1.2 billion people, but I recommend one of the following solutions: 1. Go to China for a long backpacking trip where you have time to muck about and deal with their craziness, OR 2. If you go for a short period of time then stick to the major cities (Shanghai ROCKS!) or get a local tour/guide to set things up for you.

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