August Diary | September Diary | October Diary | November Diary | December Diary

Subject: Don't Throw Chinese Fireworks

Date: 05 December 2001 13:39

Hello from the Road South.

Remember we had got be beijing? We are now right in the middle of China in a
city called Wohan, Level with Texas in the states only its bloody freezing
with rain and hail and we're not even in the hills yet.

Beijing is a really big place and like London it took most of the day to
break free of the satalite towns. Even then it was less like countryside
with the occalional town, and more like cities and towns interspersed with
the occasional bit of countryside. Every available inch of arible land is
cultivated making decent camping spots difficult to find and with our "big
noses' its impossible to stay anonimous.

3 nights out of beijing I woke at 3am and pulled on my shoes to reluctantly
face the cold wind. Turning away from my chosen tree I saw a shooting star.
After seeing one you want to see another so I stood for a second and there
was another. Then several more. Is anyone awake I loudly whispered. "I'm up"
said Stephan.
"did you see the shooting stars"?
"yea I've been watching them for an hour"
Bloody hell I thought.
As somone who has on a couple of occasions tried to catch a metorite shower
only to see my hands turn blue I realised how special this was.

"Hey everone wake up"! I shouted.
"What" groaned Scott"
I heard shuffelling
"F**king Hell" yelled Nick.- The first time I'd heard him swear,
"what"? I said, thinking he was in pain.
He had looked out of his tent to see parallel stars streaking overhead.
They were arriving so fast you could hardly track them.
Some were fast and bright bright white, Others were much slower and orangy.
All left a erie tail lingering in the sky for a second afterwards.
Ocasionally two would arrive at the same time parallel to each other.
Stephan counted 90 in 5 minuted but we had camped close to a wood and could
only see half the sky.

Tobes didn't wake up and knowing that he wasn't feeling well we let him
sleep.
Big Mistake,
Scott has since heard that the shower was predicted and it will be more than
100 years befoer such a spectical is repeated. I'll certainly never forget
it.

Miow served us at a cafe one evening and invited us back to stay indicating
it would be no problem for 6 lads to decend on her family and camp.

Stephan had just esablished from Miow that her parents were away and that
her sister was going to stay with a friend when phut phut phut - her dad
turned up on his phut phut. (well what else do you call 3 wheels and an
engine that goes phut phut?). Then Mum and sister arrived. Then Granma and
Grandad. Then some locals.
We were given another meal, managed to find sleeping space in and around the
court yard and retired. In the niddle of the night there was a crash. Ho Hum
most of us thought and fell asleep again.

Toby and Andy had been running a relay race to the brick enclosure in the
corner of the yard for most of the night as somthing they had eaten was
disagreeing with them.
As Toby, understandably feeling a little feignt, had tried to steady hinself
on the privicy wall the combination of noxious gasses and exploding arses
was just too much and the entire brick s**t house gave way. We are not
letting him live this one down just yet as Toby "destroyer of brick s**t
houses" continues on his tour of China.

The main road we had taken was awful. The wide bike lanes found near beijing
had dissapeared. There are no emmisions controlls on vehicles and the 1st 10
days was a constant headwind. The Phut Phuts travel at between 20 and 30 Kph
and we frequently darted in behind them riding inches from their perroulous
high loads of everything from rocks of granet to TV sets to escape the
monotous wind.

All 6 of us had had enough. The traffic, the dirt (coal dust and diesel
smoke), the wind and cafe's constantly trying to overcharge us (we now
barter the price before ordering, 6 hungry people is a lot of custom to
loose). So we headed for a minor road to discover that it was in the process
of being turned into a hiway. Miles of beautiful new road intersperced with
occasional dirt track closed to all but local traffic. Away from the traffic
fumes, visability increased so at times you could see possibly 2 km but the
whole country is under a pall of smoke and dust. When not cloudy you can
look directly at the midday sun, most of the time its just looks like a
setting moon but you can clearly make out a sun spot just up to the left of
the center.

Then we discovered fireworks. Not your ordanary namby pamby squibs you get
at home, these are made by anachists with no such rubbish as regulations to
worry about. I had been trying to think of a fitting end to my worn out 10
year old cycleing shoes and settled on death by gunpowder. Hung by its laces
one shoe disintigrated, the toung was 15 feet away hanging in a tree, the
sole blown to pieces and the upper took off on all directions. We collected
and made a bonfire of the debris. Those were the small poppers. The big ones
are the size of my calf but we don't play games with those. Honest;)

On the the new road we were bypassing the villages and the cafe's had not
been established yet so we rejoined the old road through a small town in
search of food. We drew a larger than usual crowd, mostly children from the
local school who were constantly being hearded out so a new lot could come
in and take a look at the foreigners. The crowd milling around outside our
cafe was numbered in the hundreds. A local introduced himself as one of the
english teachers at the local secondary school. With him leading the way we
set off (with our now familier pied piper effect) for a cheep hotel. Just as
we had finished bartering the price (1 pound each) an offocial looking man
marched in accompanied with a army officer in full combats.

We were told that we were not safe and must go to the police station "for
our protection"
"protection from what"?
"you must go to a different hotel for your protection"
"but we can look after ourselves, who are our enemies"
"They will make you comfortable, You must go with them."

We had no choice, with the help of our english guide we were escorted past
the police station to a slightly grotter and less secure hotel (probably
family of the police) and settled down.
The police returned for our passport and visa details then left again.

We were just settleing down again when in came our teacher friend, some of
his collegues, the head of english at the school and the head of Police, Mrs
Wong.

"This is Mrs Wong, she is here to make you feel comfortable... please fill
in these forms."
Forms duely filled, scrutinised against the passports, given to the head
teacher for verification and put away."

" Mrs Wong wants to offer you better service, is you service ok"?
It had all been going on for a while and was getting tedious, we assuered
her everything was perfect nothing could be improved on. Nevertheless, she
posted two police at reception who stayed there all night "for our
protection"

We had agreed to talk to some of the children at the school the next
morning. We knew that there were 1500 kids at the school (1556 actually) and
that we were going to address about 100 of them.

As it transpired we took 13 classes between us, and managed to speek to the
whole school. We were the first foreign visitors the school had ever had and
were made to feel very special. I succeeded in making them laugh frequently
and virtually had a standing ovation from 150 kids (2 classes squeezed into
one room) as I left.

"I know you must be very tired but can you speak to some of the junior
school students please"?

So we did. Far from being tired we were loving it, exchanging stories of the
childrens questions and discussing how good their level of english was.

We left the town, escorted by the policeman on a motorbike for a few miles
before greatfully being left in peace.

--------------------------------------------------------

As we speak a web site is being prepaired so you can put some pictures to
the stories.

Any comments on narration greatfully received.
Hope everyone is well.
From China With Love.
Rory

OK, OK ........ The bit I left out as written by Scott. Bare in mind that
these were the incy wincy fire crackers. At least that's what I thought
until I partially lost hearing in one ear and one exploded on my leg and I
flew the white flag, this is no place to get injured.

From Scotts email:

China has been a very dangerous place. Not so much the people or the
traffic, but we are now a danger to ourselves. Our little group has
discovered fireworks. Stuff you just can not get in the west. I'm not sure
where the classification for dynamite technically ends and Chinese
firecrackers begin but these things are great. It is even better than a Red
Rider BB gun. Not only can you lose an eye, but a whole assortment of body
parts. We get to do all the stuff our parents told us not to do as kids,
like shoot bottle rockets at each other.

I sat and witnessed trench warfare between Rory and the combined force of
Andy and Nick. Not satisfied with just lobbing the firecrackers at each
other, Andy held the the slingshot and Nick loaded the back with a lit
firecracker and let it fly in Rory's direction. Rory thought he would be
safe hiding behind Andy's tent, but to no avail. In the dark, I could catch
glimpses of faces from the flashes before the report. The war quickly
escalated from single firecrackers to strips of 10 to 100 being lobbed at
Andy and Nick by an outnumbered Rory. Toby wisely stayed in his tent but
was producing dangerous amounts of methane from a continuing case of bad
guts. I half expected his tent to go up in a fireball from a errant spark.
Stephane and I claimed neutrality, but I kept a healthy stash of 'crackers
nearby in case either of the Brits decided to try to colonize my patch of
soil.

August Diary | September Diary | October Diary | November Diary | December Diary | top