Mongolia to Russia

on the trans-siberian there are certain attendants who have a certain 'reputation' as being fire-breathing babooshkas but after we'd eventually managed to wrestle our way onto the train Mr P and I were delighted to find that our attendant was a blonde-haired quiet lady called Carla. she was very helpful as we left the station, coming and delivering our linen without throwing it at my head and storming out as Nash had done on the previous leg. what a relief. she returned 5 minutes after brininging the linen with 2 forms that we had to fill out for customs. after working out what 'Patronomyic' meant we settled down into watching the view go by. Carla then appeared again with another form that we had to fill out. on this occasion she'd changed out of her uniform and was in a low-cut skimpy top with no bra. i thought Mr P would have a coronary the way his eyes popped out of his head. still, Carla was very professional and she even helped us with the translation of the new forms we had to complete as there was no English translation at all. she left and Mr P sighed - either from relief or angina, who knew? 10 minutes later Carla was back with ANOTHER bloody form. i was annoyed but the skimpy top & no bra won Mr P over. he'd have been happy with another 10 forms from what i could see. i my mind i went over CPR techniques that i'd recently witnessed being done on a Mongolian horse - you never know. Carla, having successfully gotten all our forms out of us, jumped up and her boobs carried on bouncing around for another few minutes after that. i'd never seen eyeballs popping out on stalks before. Mr P's did then.

and so we were off. this was the trans-siberian proper: 5 days on a train to Moscow. we'd left about 2pm and so Mr P and myself caught up with each other (his real name was Wad from an unusual anglo-saxon word Wadavern) and unpacked all our stuff. there didn't appear to be a restaurant car on the train at this point so the realisation hit that we'd be eating noodles for a little while longer. our carriage was quite full with 2 backpackers next door and a whole heap of older Aussies up the end of the carriage. they'd started drinking before we'd even left the station and then started running up and down the carriage having 'little chats' with each other whilst running to the toilet and then running back to get more beer. that's what you do in Australia when you get older: get pissed and talk to anyone who'll listen about anything at all.

the scenery leaving Mongolia was the same dry dusty sandy landscape we'd already been through before and it was the same again. we did pass through a few soviet-inspired towns with a 'concrete-block' style of architecture before hitting the steppes and some much greener grassland. there were a few gers scattered across the wide, wide plains but they were few and far between, just nestled in the valleys of ragged hills, or clustered together like little villages. as the train rumbled on we passed groups of wild horses running together, some having foals,and then even a group of camels slowly plodding their way across the landscape. that was pretty special. the light was superb: the sun lighting up mountains on the far horizon with the electric green steppes contrasting with huge hilly clouds that clustered thick and white under a bright blue sky. the landscape rumbled by and then the sun started to die and sunset slowly emerged from the brightness of the day. it got dark late in these regions: night seems half-hearted and almost welcomes the light.

i went and stood in the corridor window, looking out at the sunset as 4 or 5 older Aussies staggered by clinking and pissed. soon the train ground to a slow halt and skimpy Maria got changed back into her uniform as Mongolian border guards got on and started inspecting our documentation. this took an hour and it was near midnight by now. we were all knackered and tired aside from the Aussies who seemed to have a karaoke machine going down their end of the corridor. i half expected a disco ball to come down and start spinning around with all the Aussie women coming out with golden knickers on.

after the Mongolian side of the border had finished with us the train slowly started up again and then another hour later, full of dozy sleep, we were at the Russian border. more guards came on, much more serious this time and with hardly a smile between them. i tried to hand out some friendly koalas but one of them looked at me with a look that siad' sit down or i'll shoot.' you don't argue with a look like that. after another hour and half we were done and the train started up for the final time that night and then we crossed the border and were in Russia. i went to ask Carla if she could unlock the toilets (they were locked at every major stop) only to find that she wasn't in her carriage. in her place had appeared a tall Russian lady with a sour face, model looks, hair dyed bright-red, a tight mini-skirt and stilettoes.

this was The Evil One. she glowered at me, darkly ...

back on the trans-siberian

so leaving Mongolia wasn't too unpleasant. the heat, humidity, dust and general poverty meant that a week was enough. next time i'll probably go in colder weather and get out into the country a bit. still, getting back on the tran-sib was very exciting. the first problem was arriving at the station and finding numerous other westerners wandering about looking for 'Carriage 6'. there was a Carriage 5 and next to that was a Carriage 7 but inbetween - nothing, nada, zilch. i looked at my ticket: Berth 17, Carriage 6.

great.

so then in the blazing hot sun it was up and down the platform trying to find someone who could find the mysterious Carriage 6. it kind resembled Harry Potter trying to find the train to Hogwarts and in a similar fashion to poor Harry i kept running into walls. unlike Harry i didn't go through them. first of all up to the ticket office to ask the lovely officer behind if she could help: 'Excuse me but where is Carriage 6?' 'ASK ON TRAIN'. window slammed shut. i'm sure if she'd been allowed to spit in my eye then she would have done. if only i'd had a wand ...

next, search up and down train for an attendant. found one: 'Excuse me but where is Carriage 6?'. this resulted in an evil glare and the train door slamming shut. no help there then. i waved a stick i'd found. nothing happened. damn pretend wand. an evil eye peered through the smokey train door. better hide down the platform somewhere ...

so there we were: a little cluster of lost westerners with no Carriage and the trans-sib due to depart in 30 mins. it wasn't looking good. we had a little-min-conference & after numerous power-point presentations, an intensive brainstorming session & some data analysis we'd decided on a sneaky and brilliantly cunning plan. we'd sit and wait.

20 minutes to departure. nothing.

15 minutes to departure. nothing.

10 minutes to departure. Carriage number 5's sign was taken down and up went a sign saying 'Carriage Number 6'.

they can play mind-games well, the Russians.

of course with just 10 minutes to go there was yet another version of 'Bunnnndddlllleee' this time with the added incentive of missing the train. it was kind of like sumo wrestling but with rucksacks. needless to say i managed to get on first. elbows - i love 'um.

once ensconsed in my little compartment i waited to see who might be my companion for this leg of the journey. on the first part of the journey i'd thought that it was a skinny chinese guy who turned out to be escorting Mr Plutonium. we were very near departure time and then suddenly 2 skinny Mongolians arrived with 2 bags of luggage. jeez - 2 of them? they huffed and puffed and got the bags in and then turned around to face .... Mr Plutonium!!! yep, they were just putting his bags on for him and me & Mr P were travel companions once again ...

& little did we know that we would bond in adversity against the resident carriage attendant who became known as 'The Evil One' ...

last days in Mongolia

i'm leaving on the trans-siberian agin in 2 hours and have been desperate to get on the internet and do my final blog before leaving but guess what - a little kid was on the bloody thing playing Warcraft and i didn't have the heart to chuck him off. the ironies of life ... !

so, back to the archery. the Mongolians were all kitted up in traditional gear and my god they could shoot an arrow. it was phenomenal. the women were as good as the men - in archery as horseracing. the only sport the women couldn't compete in was the wrestling even though some years ago a woman had entered in disguise and won - only to be discovered at the final moment when she had to take her top off in the traditional way of acknowledging victory. seems a bit of a shame to me. the men were wearing little skimpy satin shorts that wouldn't have looked out of place on a Mardi Gras float i can tell you. after the wrestling and the archery i wandered into a big hall where there was a very intense atmosphere of men playing a game of what looked like dice but played with sheep ankle bones that they had to hit with a flick of their fingers using another piece of bone from about 2 metres away - it was quite something. the ankle bone flicking is quite a national sport - they even had a TV show with it playing the other day. believe me it wasn't that exciting on TV. by this point i was pretty knackered and the rain was still coming down but we decided (Margaret, the American woman) & myself to head over to a nearby temple where they were having a 'throat singing' display. when i went to Xinjiang many years ago (where the riots are now happening) we went out one night and saw some similar singing where the singers made incredible sounds, like birds, and i thought this might be similar. it was nothing like it. the singers were big burly men who sang from the pit of their stomach and made a noise that went straight to the heart and tingled the spine. it quite literally brought tears to my eyes. so that was it for the day & i went home and slept like a log.

the next day it was up early for horseracing. i avoided another omelette and instead fell asleep on the crowded tourist bus taking us the 37km out of town. it wasn't too bad getting there and the weather was actually quite nice. the racing was taking place over a huge grassy valley with darkened blue hills lying close to the horizon in the background. it was a very festive atmosphere with kite-flying going on everywhere, gers litterering the hillside and horseriders galloping by in traditional costume. there were about 300 riders all classed into different horsey age-groups. the one we watched was the 4 year olds: first they had to ride 25km up the track and then gallop the same 25km back. it wasn't that interesting until one of the horses collapsed and the poor kid riding him was trying to peform CPR which really wasn't going to work. you can bounce off the chest all you like but you do need the air being pumped in mouth-to-mouth. it was a sad sight but the day before 8 horses had died in a similar way. apparently they hadn't been trained in the correct way due to the late summer. what can you say?

the day was nearly over so we spent it wandering in and out of the gers before having an goddam-awful BBQ (potato covered in mutton-fat which i vommed up) and then getting stuck in a traffic jam on the way back as the Mongolians couldn't figure out that when a train goes by you nreally do have to leave some free lanes on either side or else gridlock will result. we were stuck for 1 hr 40 mins.

and now its off again, leaving on the trans-sib. i'm sad to go but also ready to depart. i haven't seen the best of Mongolia but also know that being a veggie it'd be difficult for me to travel a wide area unless i'm more prepared. maybe next time ...

Naadam begins ...

i worked out the dust issue: there's too much of it so they don't bother anymore. makes sense to me. Mongolians are obsessed by Ghengis Khan. he reigned over 800 years ago but made such an impression on the national psyche that everything seems to come back to him. the Mongolians have a sense of pride in him and in themselves, connected to the land and to their horses that seems quite unique. this pride is, of course, under pressure due to the demands made upon them in a time when cities are growing expedentially at the expense of more 'traditional' lifestyles. UB acts like a magnet drawing in the young from the steppes but not offering them the dreams they expect. there are no jobs for a start & accomodation is scarce so gers appear on the hillsides in a kind of gentle urban sprawl. they have no sanitation, no running water and no infrastructure but despite this they spread like forests of little white mushrooms on the hills outside the main city. with this comes the associated problems of poverty and disillusion: alcoholism, domestic violence, increased morality and morbidity and a lot of corruption. bonded labour and trafficked womn are common, as is child sex abuse and street kids. up until recently there was a huge community of kids living in the sewers where it was warm and offered some kind of shelter for them in the middle of the freezing winters. Naadam is the main festival of the Mongolian year and is usually celebrated in every village - the biggest being in UB. i paid $75 for a 2-day trip to see it here which is not what i'd normally do. one problem in Mongolia is that you just can't figure out how to do things: often the locals have no more idea than you do. they're also terrible at place and street names. asking for directions they look at you blankly, give your map a cursory glance and then wave in the general direction of another block diametrically opposite to where you know it should be. they just want to get rid of you half the time. so trying to find where to buy a ticket for the big stadium event proved more difficult than i'd thought. the horse racing was 37km out of town so that seemed even more complicated so buying a 2-day pass seemed the answer to all that. on the first day we all had to meet at a local cafe for breakfast where i had one of the worst omlettes i've ever had in my entire life. the 'chef' seemed to have emptied half a bottle of dried herbs into it - old and chewy ones at that. combine the herbs with half a litre of sunflower oil and it really wasn't pleasant and repeated on me all day with a taste of stale oregano. anyway we all all nearly threw up and then headed out the door. the stadium was just up the road but the weather didn't look good - overcast & ready to rain. settling into our seats the heavens opened and we had to watch the big event hiding under raincoats. it was quite entertaining: first of all some Mongolian riders dressed in full Ghengis Khan military gear rode in waving huge flags. they went round twice and then sped out again. then a few jeeps arrived carrying Mongolia's first ever Olympic Gold winners from Beijing - in Judo and Boxing. another jeep carried a middle aged guy with a long ponytail (never a good look on an older guy) wailing into a microphone - i think he was attempting a song. then a few more horses came riding by with a few flags, followed by some marching army-types. then out of the clouds in true Crouching Tiger fashion came a white figure sliding along a trapeze with a long trail behind. i think they were meant to land on a horse but it didn't seem to go right as they ended up landing in a patch on muddy grass and then had to be shoved up on a horses back. not that it mattered: the crowd went crazy. there were a few more marches around on horseback, then some kids did a ribbon dance then climbed on each others shoulders and made a tower. some women went by in traditional dress having a few problems with their non-traditional stillettoes and then there was a speech by the democratic president. it was still raining at this point and as i was still burping dried stale oregano i decided to get a drink before the wrestling started. leaving the stadium was difficut as the spectators seemed to be having an inpromptu wrestling match themselves as they tired to leave. over to the archery ...

dust, dust and more dust

UB: its a bit wild west. the population is only about 2.5 million but a large number of people are now drifting towatds city life. UB holds about 700,000 and of those about 67% are under the age of 35, 30% under the age of 16. the Soviets had control up until 1990 but after the collapse of communism Mongolia became self-governing. The Communists had control still up until very recently - in fact similar events happening in Iran now were played out here just a short time ago when election results in favour of the democratic party were alleged to have been rigged in favour of the communists which then lead to riots. its settled down a bit and they now have a democratic president but who know where it will lead what with the disappearance of the agrarian life, the rise of the city and resulting unemployment following the world-wide economic collapse. my first few days here were spent just exploring UB which, to be quite frank, is tiny. most of my exploration ended up in museums or cafes. in part i was limited due to my travel plans: i'd come to do the tran-siberian and see Naadam, not to travel much in Mongolia itself. the festival fell 3 days after my arrival so a trip somewhere deep into the interior of the land of the open sky wasn't going to be that easy and besides which it was Naadam i wanted to see. the museums were a study in dust, like many of the streets. the Natural History Museum consisted of a number of stuffed animals presented behind glass that looked as if they'd been there since the 1950's and were still looking miserable at being caught. most of the fish and worms were in jars of formaldahyde which were as interesting as they sounded. the best exhibit were dinsoaur skeletons found in the Gobi, 2 of which were found fighting. thus Mongolia holds one of the most interesting dinosaur specimens in the world. still covered in dust. why don't they buy dusters? they're cheap!!! the Gobi is where many dinosaur specimens are still found and if you travel there apparently the locals try to sell you dinosaur eggs. not in an omlette i hope. the National Museum of Mongolia was a bit more interesting as it went back to the stone age with some of the first known examples of writing in Deep Stupas ... the main one of which is at the Hermitage in St Petersburg where i'm heading soon. a bit weary from museuming i went to visit numerous cafes and despite being desperate for coffee i couldn't find a decent one anywhere: sydney ruins travel to the rest of the world purely on the basis that it serves the best coffee in the world. the locals here distance themselves from tourists - party as English is not commonly spoken but also due to the tourist-local divide. to engage more you'd have to spend longer with a few locals and i knew this wouldn't happen in the time i had so i resigned myself to just going with the flow and not getting to know many people as i'd usually try to. i guess this is party because i'm so used to working in developing countries and getting to know what lies behind the scenes so to speak. however being a tourist here, to a certain degree i had to act the part. this changed a bit when Naadam started as i met an American woman, Margaret, on placement for a Master in Public Health and Social Work. having a similar porfessional background and having worked in similar situations i could relate to what she was experiencing and she also enlightened me as to what was going on behind the scenes ...

the land of the open sky

correction to my last post: i wasn't 2 hours from Mongolia as i was actually travelling though Mongolia, the Land of the Open Sky, already & just 2 hrs away from Ulaan Bataar, the capital. as it turned out this was a little optimistic as we arrived another 5 hrs after that. everyone was getting excited as we drew near even though we couldn't see much due to the sandstorm outside. as usual in these situations some irritating backpackers decided they wanted more of the action and opened a window so that the sandstorm quickly invaded the carriage & we were all immediately covered in a light layer of red dust and sand. great. Mr Plutonium heaved himself up and went to look in the corridor. he was a little on the plump side which meant that everytime someone went past he had to suck his stomach in and place it on the window ledge whilst the person passing by had to quickly deviate into our cabin before continuing on. these unexpected guests were happening a little too frequently for my liking but i'm sure Mr Plutonium liked people squeezing past him. it was a little bit icky. the last stop before UB we pulled into a run-down place that looked as if it existed at the end of the earth. which in some ways it did. a group of kids clustered outside the windows with an empty egg carton full of stones which they started yelling were valuable gems. i went back to my sand-covered rucksack and got out some little toy koalas i'd bought for such occasions and threw a couple out the window. the kids ran for them like you wouldn't believe and the gemstones went flying. they didn't bother to pick them up. gemstones or koalas - which are the more valuable?. evidence seemed to point towards the latter rather than the former. ce la vie. time inched forward slowly and so did the train but eventually a huge sprawling city appeared through the sandstorm on the horizon: UB, at last. we got off the train with no trouble and i said a fond goodbye to Mr Plutonium, then Nash and Giggler, giving the last 2 a fluffy koala each. Nash looked a little moved and spat gently on the ground. Giggler giggled, we shook hands and then said goodbye ...

almost immediately i ran into somone holding up my name which was great - my hostel was very organised. i'd been worried as, due to the big fesival of Naadam, i'd had problems booking a suitable place. there were really no mid-range hotels but just backpacker hostels or huge intercontinental places. the one i'd chosen, Gana's Hostel, was family run with gers (yurts) on the roof. it'd looked good. so i said 'hello' to my hosts and was taken off down the platform and into the carpark. we walked round the carpark twice and then ended up back on the platform where i'd started from. marvellous in 32 degrees heat and carrying a 20kg backpack. it turned out we were looking for other tourists which eventually we found and then were off. the hostel wasn't too far away: just down the road from one of the major temples and just 5mins from the city centre. however for those who've been backpacking before you know what its like when you've gotten used to slumming it aross various countries; you get used to the dust, flies and dirt. however, coming nearly straight from Australia, i need to acclimatise a bit more. its not that the place was flea-ridden as the fleas were already packed and ready to leave. lets just say it wasn't as nice as that pictured on the website. however, in for a penny in for a pound and it was only for 6 nights... might as well go with it. i dumped my bags, quickly showered and changed clothes and went out exploring. on first impressions UB was grey, crumbling and dirty. the sun was hot but this stirred up more dust from the mud lining the streets and everything, just everything seemed covered in dust. crossing the streets was an experience as the cars didn't stop for pedestrians - they sped up! i'd had my time in India negotiating many a tricky road-crossing but this was entirely different and felt a lot more dangerous. i found out later that the reason they sped up was to warn you that a car was coming. like i had no eyes.

a sorry tale of a little green plastic mug

Elbows. they're good. after living in Kowloon in Hong Kong for a few months and then in India for 2 years i knew the use of them well. Old Granny had reminded me on the way into China and now stuck in a small supermarket on the Chinese-Mongolian border with 100 other travellers all desperate for food i knew it was time to act. Elbows out, chin tucked in, march towards the exit and take no prisoners. it worked and i burst through the tightly-packed throng paying for their goods and onto the platform one more. phew. what a relief. everyone was milling around, eating, drinking and generally just waiting for the train to come back. one hour went by and i decided to brave the supermarket again. most of the shelves had been stripped of everything except some lovely dried cuttlefish, some artificial 'cake' and a few noodles but there was one thing i desperately needed - a mug. being stuck on a long train journey without the ability to have a cuppa was a serious issue but of course the mugs they had in the supermarket offended my gay sensibility. a Snoppy mug? i just couldn't. 2 cups in a joint set covered in love hearts? i couldn't see me and Mr Plutonium drinking out of those somehow. i then stumbled across some 'fruit' in syrup that was contained within what looked a like a lovely green mug! ideal. i could eat the fruit, keep the mug and all would be happy with the world. the strange thing about the mug was that the fruit just stayed suspened within it like a lava lamp: the body of the mug was transparent plastic, the top and handle bright green and when i turned the mug over the fruit stayed in the same position, moving just a fraction. it was a bit weird. anyway, i got outside and went to open it but couldn't do it after 10 minutes of wrestling around and so went back to the shop. the people in there couldn't do it either so i decided to wait for the train - if anyone could do it Mr Plutonium could. by this time nearly 2 hours had passed and no train. it was 12.50am and we were all getting testy. 1am no train. 1.15 no train. 1.20 - the train!!! Nash was standing on the side of my carriage as it puffed back in and i looked at him quite affectionately, pleased to see him after all this time. he blinked, pushed his glasses up and spat on the platform. what a sweetheart. so, all back on and off we went. i got my bed ready (top bunk), put my earplugs in and settled down to sleep. 5 minutes later i was woken up by Nash - we were at the Mongolian border and had to get all our documents out again. jezus christ!

next morning i work up early to the sound of the train rumbling along trying to compete with Mr Plutonium's snoring. i'm not sure who was winning but it was a tight competititon. the landscape had changed dramatically during the night and now we were passing through dry, dusty desert with low-lying hills, covered in redded-copper sand with the occasional fence standing in the middle of nowhere. there were hardly any features at all and great clouds of sand blowing against the windows - stark, barren and distinctly alien. it was time for brekkie but to my astonishment when i went to enter the restaurant carriage it'd gone, replaced by a sci-fi version of the one that'd been there before: shiny blue-white plastic with bright clean surfaces. it was like stumbling across the cafeteria of the spaceship in 2001. of course i'd woken up at 6 and the place wasn't open until 8 so i just had to sit there for 2 hrs reading 'War & Peace' and looking out at the dusty sand dunes rumbling by. a few other people started to drift in nearer 8 and then the serving lady came out with a face like thunder. one look at her and the hairs rose up on the back of my neck. 'War & Peace' was about right. i sat politely and waited ... and waited ... and waited. 'could i have a menu please?' i eventually got up the courage to ask as she passed by for the 5th time. 'WAIT!" shot the reply with a narrowing of the eyes. she obviously thought i was trouble and i knew she was. what did the Russians do when attacked by Napoleon? Retreat. Damn. by this time the carriage was half full and the menus appeared. another 2. that was it but i managed to get hold of one. as opposed to the menu on the Chinese side it was packed full of options: 2/3rds of which they didn't have according to Mrs Khan's very curt introduction to the delicacies on offer: the cabbage was looking good again. Mrs Khan went off to serve someone else, taking the menu with her but not my order so i gave up the ghost and went back to my compartment to eat some nuts. great breakfast. Mr Plutonium was up and about by the time i got back so i decided to enlist his help in getting my new mug unscrewed so i could at least have a cuppa. after 5 minutes and seeing his face go bright red and his breathing becoming rather laboured i decided i didn't want a repeat of my plane experience and took it back off him. we looked at each other and then at the mug. what a bugger. just at that moment Nash went by with a giggling colleague - ideal. if the Chinese couldn't do it then no-one could so i went off to follow them. arriving at their little carriage i managed to indicate that i needed their help getting the lid off the mug and they both gave me a look like Mrs Khan in the breakfast carriage i.e. 'bloody stupid tourist. can't you do anything for yourself?' Nash's giggling mate got hold of it, wrestled around a bit and had no luck. Nash raised an eyebrow, as did i. bloody stupid tourist eh? Nash then took up the challenge with even greater gusto than his mate. he slapped the top, he slapped the bottom. he slapped the sides, he slapped the middle and then went back to slapping the top. he then got hold of it with both hands and gripped as hard as he could, his face going orange. then he got down on the floor, got it between his feet and turned the lid as hard as he could. no luck but his mate was giggling like nobodies business. most miraculously of all the fruit still hadn't moved. i felt like plugging it in and seeing if a light came on. Nash and his mate both looked at me and shook their heads defeated. damn, damn and damn! giggler was still giggling so i gave up and went back to the carriage & got out my penknife. Mr Plutonium was nowhere to be seen but turned up 30 minutes later saying what a lovely breakfast he'd had. bastard. i ate a nut. 'no luck with the mug then?' he enquired. the mug was sitting on the table with a chunk missing from the lid and the carriage filled with green plastic confetti where i'd been sawing away with my penknife. the bloody thing still wouldn't open and i'd managed to get shards of plastic in my eyes so it looked as i was crying. which i was. nearly. the mug ended up in the bin: i just couldn't take anymore but luckily Mongolia was only 2 hrs away.

Mr Plutonium and I

Mr Plutonium and i settled down nicely: he snored, i sat with my earplugs in & within 5 minutes it was like we'd been married 15 years. of course he wouldn't do anything around the compartment, spent all his time down the restaurant carriage and really had gotten out of shape but aside from that all was well. leaving Beijing was a trawl through urban neighbourhoods until we hit some grassy plains then high hilly mountains, grey-brown sand covered in wisps of green, through small Chinese villages, larger industrial towns, valleys covered in vines and then winding by rivers and by the side of other greener hills. it was beautiful. our compartment was one of 8 in the carriage, served by an individual guard who seemed to have the responsibility of taking care of us which he did in an inimitable style: he simply ignored us most of the time and then upon other occasions came into the compartment yelling at the top of his voice. it did rather liven up the day as we sat terrified wondering if he was going to call in his red guard pals to beat the door down and search our bags. i realised he was a little, well, very 'Chinese', when a pile of sheets hit me in the side of the head rather unexpectedly jolting me out of my window-gazing daze. when i turned round in surprise he yelled at me in Mandarin whilst nashing his rather outgrowing teeth and pushing his glasses back up his nose about 3 times before storming off to the next compartment to repeat the same gracious delivery of our linen. luckily he didn't wake Mr Plutonium who just snored, burped and turned over. i've had enough: i'm leaving him for the Spaniard next door. i wish. the day went on and soon the sun set over the dusty plains we were travelling through and soon we were due to arrive at the Chinese-Mongolian border as we neared 11pm. i knew this as Mr Nash arrived yelling, seemingly trying to get his teeth back under the control of his gums, and pointing at his watch. 11pm and we were knackered: me as i'd been up since 5am and Mr Plutonium due to the effort expended snoring. getting off the train was fine as i knew that at this point it had to have its wheels changed: the track gauge was of a different size on the Mongolian side of the border from the Chinese. 'how long we wait?' i asked Mr Nash, nursing a linen-sized lump on the side of my head. 'Un hour' he nashed back, giving me a nasty look (strangely looking like Old Granny which worried me in a vague kind of way). he got back on the train which then was shunted round the corner waving as he went. maybe he did like me after all. he spat on the ground and had a light nash. maybe not. so there we were: about 100 tourists all waiting on a dark Chinese platform late at night and, guess what, one solitary 'supermarket'. i used to play a game called 'bundle' at school where if a person fell over in the playground then someone would shout 'bunnnndddlllleeee' and half the playground would then dive on top of the person who'd fallen over until there was a huge pile of kids and one poor kid stuck on the bottom. well finding this supermarket was like playing 'Bundle - The Adult Version' with a race towards the door, fights in the aisles and shelves being stripped of everything edible you could imagine. mainly beer. i was about half way in when i realised i'd made a mistake and tried to head back out again. another mistake. try playing 'Supermarket Sweep' in 3 aisles, one exit and 100 people: i was stuck and couldn't move

a city of old

well, back to blogging. a rainy day in Mongolia means you have to find lots of things to do!!! my thoughts on Beijing now that i've left it for the second time: well, it certainly was a better experience for me this time than last but i don't think i'll hurry back. its certainly cleaned up after the Olympics and the main difference is that people no longer spit everywhere. that common sound of 'hurrrrggghhh ppputtttttt' followed by a 'splat' on the ground is not one i'll miss. the most common impression to me was how the Chinese have swiftly adoped Western aspirations - wearing the same clothes, imitating our pop music and tv shows, wanting the same goods. its all there. of course they celebrate their own culture too but really its the Western lifestyle they want. and who can blame them - it suits us! still, i had a good few days wandering down local streets and smiling at the old ladies sitting outside fanning themselves, one tooth between 3 of them. then it was up early and heading down to the train station to pick up the first leg of the trans-siberian - whoaa! i was very excited. of course when i arrived it was just a big train and we've all seen one of them, but the feeling in the air was different and it did feel a bit special. i settled in quite well, wondering who my travel companion might be when a skinny Chinese guy came in. i was secretly relieved as it would give me the ideal excuse not to talk but just look out of the window at the changing landscape and read to my heart's content. of course this was too much to ask as just behind the Chinese guy huffed and puffed a big fat British guy complete with all the latest travel gear. he was twice my size and i knew he would snore. he did, and told me as much in the first 2 sentences we spoke to seach other. great. accepting my fate i enquired what he did and was told that he works at Sellafield and was responsible for disposing of the radioactive plutonium. just goes to show - you meet all kinds travelling! the train was full of other Westerners - Spanish, Dutch, Israeli. all with varying degrees of body odour and speed with which they raced towards the only restaurant on our section of the train. the carriages were all wooden, like an old Agatha Christie film, with even a hot boiler at the end of each compartment. but enough about her. food being a main interest on a long train ride, the restaurant car became a study in social norms. there was of course a queue but no respect as to the position you were in. you could arrive late and be served first. daggered looks became quite an art form. there were about 20 seats and double the number of people trying to get in them. and just 2 menus for the whole compartment. some people ate and left immediately allowing others to sit down, others just sat there ordering beer after beer whilst stomachs rumbled aound them. once i'd managed (after the 6th request) to steal a quick look at the all-treasured menu i found that, as sometimes happens, veggie options were limited. its a painful subject as i'm sure that those who know my love of food well will surely understand. lets just say that the veggie 'highlight' was cabbage and mushroms and even that was a poor description as there were no 'mushrooms' as such but just one in the singular and it tasted as if the chef had waved the mushroom at the dish from the other side of the room rather than introducing them and taking the opportunity to cook them together as would seem courteous. still, chew and gulp is what i say in these situations and so i did thanking god for the 3 bars of chocolate in my rucksack. heading back to my carriage i looked forward to opening 'War & Peace' and starting a nice prolonged and quiet readathon. this proved to be somewhat optimistic due to the horrendous rumbing of the train down the tracks which, when i got to my carriage, found was not the train but Mr Plutonium. Snoring.

Beijing ...

so, Old Granny dealt with successfully, i got off the plane in Beijing a full 12 years after being there last. it was quite a change. last time i arrived absolutely knackered on the back of 6 weeks backpacking around China, and that after travelling Vietnam, Burma, Cambodia and Thailand. Needless to say i was a bit over travelling and just needed a rest, which Beijing really didn't provide. Leaving my friend Jane to stalk an Israeli i just wandered the city reading Dickens which seemed to encapsulate the state of the city at that time: the poverty, pollution, street kids and all the miseries of 19th century industrial London alive and kicking in 20th century China. i read 10 books of Dickens in a month and never felt closer to an author. with small flurries of trepidation fluttering in my stomach, i disembarked from the plane and then joined one of the many queues i was later to face in my 2 days there. the first surprise was the airport: it was HUGE: clean and sparking and VERY efficient. even Old Granny seemed happy as she elbowed her way past me in the exit queue. the stewardess went by yelling 'THANK YOU DOCTOR' and pointing at me which, as the whole queue turned and looked too which as well as being inaccurate i did feel rather put me on the spot. i caught Old Granny giving me an even nastier look. after getting through customs i then had to work out how to get to my hotel. a small problem occured which with all my travelling experience i should readily have anticipated: the address was in English & the drivers can only read Chinese. ah ha! foxed, yet again. still, it didn't prove hard to fix - a bus journey, a taxi and a short walk and i was there & seeing a sign for a vegetarian restaurant on the way made me feel like i was on the right track. it was a great choice for a hotel too - right in the middle of an old area of Beijing called the hutuong it was all done up in reds, golds and greys with a lovely little courtyard right outside my room. i felt great and even the bruises from Old Granny's elbows didn't ache so much. i'd arrived early: 7am sunday morning and was leaving first thing tuesday so i had to make the most of my 2 full days. what i hadn't counted on was the weather: the humidity was through the roof, the sky overcast with dense white cloud, the streets hot, dusty and dry. walking 5 paces i broke out in a sweat. still, not to be disuaded i set off. in the wrong direction. an hour later i was in a taxi heading in the right direction (hopefully as the taxi driver couldn't speak english and i had to use the 'stop and point' means of communication). my first stop was the old Drum Tower and Clock Tower. the Drum Tower turned out to be closed and the Clock Tower was a thousand or so steps and another 5,000 tourists. i gave that one a miss. nice to see, but really! strangely my travels had brought me to an area of Beijing i'd never seen the first time around: a beautiful lake with a lovely walking path right round it. this was a highlight: in the terrible oppressing humidity i was able to walk around a clear calm lake watching the elderly Chinese folk swimming peacefully under the 'no swimming' signs whilst others were doing the splits and even more playing table-tennis. quite a hive of activity for the pensioners. it took me an hour to walk around until i arrived at the other side but couldn't figure out where the hell i was. luckily a Metro stop was right next door and lucky it was coz i was nowhere near where i'd thought i should be. the Metro was another revelation: clean, white and cheap. it was packed to the gills but no worse than London and so i took my self off to Tiannamen Square. Arriving there i marched up the steps to the sound of thunder in the air. a lovely couple went walking by and the man came up to speak to me. 'It's Destiny' he said. 'No i'm not a child,' i thought. just at that moment the heavens opened and literally hundreds of Chinese ran this way and that, screaming and screaming. It was like the Tiannamen Square uprising all over again but no guns or tanks, just umbrellas and raindrops. I'm gay: i think musicals. Mr Destiny took control of the situation and guided me rapidy towards a covering, inside of which happened to be an Art Shop the owner of which he happened to know and the paintings within which he happened to be able to offer me a discount. What a strange coincidence. Needless to say i informed Mr Destiny of his precise destiny at that particular moment in time (which wasn't good) and went back out into the rain. it was torrential so i quickly ran back to the Metro station and crammed myself in with hundreds of Chinese still running, screaming and cramming up in a very small space, everyone fighting and with torrents of water flooding down the steps and umbrellas being shoved in faces and still more people coming down. i did wonder if it was going to get nasty at one point: there were too many people in too small a space. but then the storm passed over and things settled back to normal. as it was Sunday the square and the Forbidden City were packed and as i'd seen both before i wasn't that bothered to explore them all again. it was snooze time so i headed back to the hotel, quickly bowsing some lovely locals magazines called 'DogFan' and 'CatFan' (pics to follow) before bedding down for some much needed shut-eye

the plane, the plane ...

right, did everything go according to plan? you bet not! it started off on the plane ... the first time i've had to be involved in a real emergency in the air (aside from when they ran out of gin once, but that's another story) ... there i was snozzing away quite peacfully when i was woken up by the sound of a call: 'is there a dr or nurse on the flight?' of course i reacted as anyone would in the same situation: swearing 'oh shit'. i then had to try & wrestle past the 80-year old granny in the seat next to me who, for some reason, kept pointing to her belt and refusing to get up. i had to clamber over her using the back of the seat behind and the armrests whilst i had visions of a cardiac or respiratory arrest down the back of the plane. thanks old granny. flying Air China meant, of course, that by the time i'd wrestled past her and gotten down the back there was a queue 5-people thick that i had to then wrestle my way through again. luckily no cameras were out but i knew it wouldn't take long. &, typically, i was the only medic on the plane so it was all down to me. the scenario: chinese woman, mid=40's, pale, clammy, unresponsive, pulse 50, resps shallow at about 6, husband and daughter looking anxiously on. she had the oxygen going already. i looked up and 20 pairs of eyes looked back. no pressure then. first we had to clear the area, then lay her out on the seats, the do a full physical. she was so grey & her resps so shallow i thought she had arrested, then realised it was quite simple: she'd fainted. phew!!! luckily that meant i could act the consumate professional whilst knowing all would be ok. there was an awkward moment when shining a light in her eyes, the plane hit some turbulance and i nearly fell on top of her but i'm sure her husband didn't object in the circumstances. emergency over, i went back to my seat relieved all was well ... only to find Old Granny giving me a very nasty stare indeed ...