Thursday,
22/11/2012 – 161 A.D.
I woke up this
morning with no clue as to what day it was. Monday, Wednesday, weekend –
absolutely no idea! I also did not wake up alone. Whoa, now! Don’t be getting
excited. The person I speak of was my own brother and he was sleeping in the bed
next to mine. Unfortunately the heater in his room was not working – didn’t have
the correct remote control for it, and despite the manageress bringing up many,
many remotes to try out, none of them worked. So she promised to get the handyman
to fix it the next day, but it meant that Tim and I would have to wait a little
longer before we got to sleep in our private rooms.
It was Thursday, I
established that shortly after getting up. We needed to do one thing today –
buy our train ticket from Beijing to Xi`an, and we wanted to do two things –
visit the Mausoleum of Chairman Mao and go to The Forbidden City. Give that Mao’s
tomb closed at 12, we had to get our skates on to get down to Tiananmen Square
where the building is right in the centre. Anyone who read this blog when I was
in Hanoi will know that in a slightly morbid way I was disappointed not to get
to see the body of Ho Chi Minh lying in state. Therefore I might actually get
to break my duck of seeing the preserved corpse of a revolutionary leader. The
square was bitingly cold today, with a chill wind coming in from the north. With 30
minutes to spare, we arrived at the end of the line, but were sent away by a
soldier pointing to our rucksacks. We knew they had to be stored somewhere, but
didn’t know the place would be a large building on one side of the square. As I’ve
already mentioned, Tiananmen is the largest open air square in the world, so
you don’t just get from one side to the other in a click of your fingers.
By the time we reached the building we realised we’d blown our chance for today
and would have to come back some other time. Still not got to see a revolutionary cadaver!
We caught the subway to
Beijing Central train station, where we’d arrived the other day from Shanghai.
The English-speaking ticket desk was clearly marked and, after holding the
queue jumpers at bay by spreading my frame out to the sides, we were able to
book our tickets. Only down side (of sorts) was that there were no hard
sleepers available, so we’re back to soft sleepers. That means more comfort,
but also more money. Hey ho - The Road dishes out what The Road dishes out.
The afternoon
dished out a trip to the Forbidden City, just as planned. It was only a short
walk past Tiananmen Square and cost 45 yuan to enter (£4.50 – I love it when
currency conversions are a piece of cake to perform!) The skies above were still grey,
and though the weather remained dry, it seemed to get even colder with that
wind chill coming in. However, some among us had a rather alternative method
for dealing with such elemental exposure….
So, the Forbidden City…what
is it? Or what was it? Well it was the
home of the Chinese emperors for nearly 500 years, right up until the last
emperor, Puyi. Its use spanned the Ming and the Qing dynasties. And not just
the emperors lived here, their families and concubines hung out as well. There
were also buildings for the ceremonial and political functions of the Chinese
government. All in all, it was a pretty important place; still is a pretty important place.
All in all, it was
a very grand spectacle, only marred by the chill. At one point I even ducked
into the gift shop to warm up, much to the chagrin of Spiderman Tim. It
was easy to imagine the place filled with hundreds of guards, courtiers and
various important people running about performing their duties. We could not go
inside most of the main rooms that the emperor used, merely peep in from
behind a cordon. Maybe I was a bit spoilt by the gleaming golden palaces and
statues of the Bhuddist countries we visited, but I found the thrones and furnishings
here a little drab. Stick a bit of neon in there, maybe a glitterball or two
and they’ll look fit for a king…or an emperor.
Anyone ever had
chapped lips before? I haven’t. But I have them now. Seemed to come on around
Shanghai, i.e. once things got a little cooler after leaving Hong Kong. It’s only
on the tip of my top lip, and at first I thought it was a reaction to the spicy
food and the Tsingtao beer. But no, it’s dee cold weather dat’s done it. Isn’t
it strange how you might suffer from a particular ailment in one place, but
go to another country in winter and something new (yet reasonably harmless)
comes along. And how to combat this? Less Tsingtao – I’ve already switched to
rice wine.
Upon returning
home in the afternoon I logged onto the computer to see that I had an email
message from Haven – that’s her English name, whereas her Chinese name is Jing
Wong (‘Jing’ being the forename). Her mum calls her “Jing-Jing”, but I’ll stick
to Haven. You may remember that Haven is a young lass who we met on the train
and who our scarred minds were slightly suspicious of, even though on the
surface there was absolutely no reason to doubt her friendliness. So, she’d sent an email saying that she was free this evening if we fancied going for a
drink. This is my fault because she said she’d never been to a bar before,
which made me offer to introduce her to the scene, even though I’ve no idea
what the bar scene is like in Beijing. We ummed and ahhhed about whether we
should go, but ultimately decided that it can be a drag staying in the hotel
every single night and we owed it to ourselves to get out there and do
something once the sun went down. So, after forgetting about my chapped lips
and accidentally ordering some spicy beef in the hotel restaurant (some of
which I tried to give to the resident cat), we hit the metro yet again.
[Tiananmen Square by night.]
The traditional
bar area of Beijing is called Chaoyang District, though there are a few more that
have developed in recent times. Within Chaoyang is a place called Sanlitun Bar Street, famous for
containing the watering holes that sozzled expats attend, where loud music is
the norm and you really should ask how much a drink costs before you buy one.
In the absence of anywhere else to go, we decided to head there. After all,
Haven supposedly wanted an authentic bar experience – if we got it right (or
wrong) tonight then we could potentially put her off for life! Poor girl, she
had the weight of the Chinese nation on her shoulders, hoping to get back into
our good books and no longer be treated with suspicion. Would she rise to the
challenge?
We met her at
Dongsishitiao station (try pronouncing that one when you’ve got a cold!) and
headed towards Sanlitun. Haven was full of energy and enthusiasm, just as she
had been on the train. One slight moment of uncertainty arose when we had to
ask her to ask the railway staff what time the last train was – shouldn’t this
be common, pre-loaded knowledge when having a night out? There was always the option to get
a taxi, but we’d see how it went. Haven, however, seemed to have other ideas,
suggesting that if she did miss the last train then she could get a taxi with
us back to our hotel and get a room there. Okaaaaaay…why does that sound just a
little bit dodgy to us? We’ll give it some time and see how it sounds after a
beer.
Sanlitun was more
of a walk than we thought, and I was worried that the cold would drive us into
the first place we came to, no matter how iffy it was. It turned out that the
closest place we came to was only selling beers at 12 for the equivalent of a
tenner. “Yes, I agree, mate, that is a
great price. But what if we don’t actually want to drink 12 beers?” We moved
on. The place we ended up at was dark and dingy, and this is the only photo
that I could get without embarrassing myself by putting the flash on…
…but it wasn’t all
that bad. There was a warm, homeliness to it, and the music wasn’t too loud,
which was an important fact given that Haven’s English is good, but not that good. And so, after offering her
the chance to have a “girly drink”, she opted for a beer and I got a round in. Then we spent the next hour having some pretty
good conversations, despite the language limitations. Unfortunately, although
she claimed to like her beer, she drank maybe three millilitres-worth, so the
Grayboys had to help her finish it when the music was turned up at 22:00 and it
became too loud to talk. Initially we went out to find somewhere else, but upon
checking her watch, Haven realised that if she was going to return to the university campus where her former
classmate lived, she’d have to head for the metro at that exact moment. Or else
she could come to our hotel and get a room there. I looked at Tim, he looked at
me, we exchanged telepathic messages and agreed it was best for her to go back
to her classmate’s. Although she had been perfectly pleasant company and had done
nothing whatsoever to make us think she was on the scam, the thought of someone
we didn’t know too well in close proximity to our valuables tipped the scales.
We offered to walk her back to the metro, which she was cool with. Not much of
a night out, I know, but at least we had fun! Oh and she said I looked like a teacher in my new coat...well, I was aiming for the image of cool, college professor, so I'll take her words as a compliment!
Upon entering the
metro, it was about 22:40, the last train leaving at 22:57. Plenty of time? Not
so. Haven put in a call to classmate and realised just how many stops she would
have to change at to get back, and classmate seemed to suggest that she would
not make it in time. So, again she suggested coming back to our hotel for a
room! To be fair, the metro didn’t stay open late, so it was perfectly plausible
that she might get stuck. Better to at least know she’s got a room somewhere
than to be wandering a city she’s a stranger in and looking for a hotel.
Finally we said okay, with the proviso that the hotel might not have any beds
available, though secretly we knew they would, given that it’s out of season
and we hear hardly any other guests in the evenings. But there was a further
twist to this tale, because as our bar conversations had gone on we'd mentioned
how the hotel had given us a room each, both of which contain two beds. Haven
suggested having one of those beds, though she was not specific. Now we had the
thought of someone we didn’t really know being in the same room as our
valuables! But we had a trick up our sleeve – most hotels do not allow visitors
in guests’ rooms after hours, so that was that, wasn't it?
Not so. Upon
arriving at the hotel, Haven spoke to the receptionist in Chinese; the
conversation lasted some time, but I get the feeling that most Asian languages
often use lots of words to say very little. Tim and I watched with interest as
she handed over some money, then turned to us excitedly and said, “They are
very nice, they say I can stay in your room with you guys!” The receptionist
added that because we already had a family room, it was okay for another person
to share. Umm, alright then! On our way through the courtyard, I found out that
Haven had paid 80 yuan to share our room, whereas a room on her own would be
120, so I guess it made financial sense. But who the heck would want to share a
room with a couple of Englishmen like us - filthy in body, mind and clothes
after over five months on The Road?
[Along with many of life's complexities, Tim and Haven discuss the meaning of the words, "trust", "foolishness" and "freezing bloody bathroom with a leaky sink".]
With our new
roommate (with zero luggage) settled-in, I cracked open a nightcap beer and we
all talked a little more. We had a laugh, it’s fair to say. And at one point
Haven asked me why I liked beer. I replied, “Why do you like swimming?” “Because
it makes me feel good.” I smiled, “There’s your answer!” Why can’t every debate
be that simple? Thanks to my grandma for that one – her response to me as a little
boy asking why she smoked was to ask me why I liked chocolate. I didn’t quite
get it at first, but I figured it out later, i.e. when I was on a packet Marlboros
a day in my early 20s!
At a little after
midnight, we all realised how tired we were and offered Haven food and water,
both of which she refused, as well as reading material, the use of the telly,
etc. But she was ready for sleeping after spending the previous night on her
classmate's floor. So, feeling quite confident that everything would be okay,
and with only a small amount of suspicion in our minds, Tim and I said
goodnight and went into the next room. Then we locked away all of our valuables
and prised the bin against the door. You can’t be too careful in our world!
So, that's two night's running in which I haven't had a room to myself!
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