Tired day of Travel

Pingyao 2012 (22/23-09-2012)- FRIDAY

This past weekend, the photography members of our friend-ship set sail for Pingyao- a county in central Shanxi province. We left school a lesson early (around 11am) to begin the 10 hour trip- including in it two taxis, a bullet train, two slow trains, and a buggy car to our hostel. 

With very little Chinese between the four of us, and very little idea of where we were going, we set off hoping for the best- and that we hopefully wouldn’t find ourselves sleeping on the floor of a train station. Arriving off the bullet train in Beijing Nan (South), we attempted to get a taxi to take us to the Beijing Xie (West) station to catch our four hour train to Taiyuan. Holding my phrase book and looking like an obvious tourist as we approached the taxis wasn’t a great idea. Within seconds, we were surrounded by taxi drivers yelling broken English at us. ‘Taxi for you, taxi I take’. Showing them the address, most of them said they could take us, for a small price of 120 yuan. Roughly 100 yuan more than it should cost. Eventually, we found a man kind enough to take us for 40. 

Arriving at Beijing Xie already hungry, hot and tired, we sought out food before our four hour train ride to Taiyuan. We realised very quickly that the locals travelling chose instant cup noodles as their travel food of choice. Boiling water taps were set up next to the toilets, and noodles cost around 60 cents. Throughout the travel over the next couple of days in train stations, I would come to eat four sets of cup noodles. The last of which had a suspicious sausage with it. Which was probably cat. Ate it anyway. 

Changing at Taiyuan station to the Taiyuan-Pingyao train at around 8pm, we were all exhausted and just wanted to stay in one place for a bit. The train to Pingyao took an hour and a half- but luckily it went relatively quickly. And was certainly the most culturally exciting. We boarded the train to realise that our assigned seats had been taken by locals. After a bit of pointing at tickets, we managed to obtain our rightful seats. Smoke filled the train, as people smoked in each carriage. About half way through our trip, a woman burst into our carriage yelling something in Chinese. A saleswoman, she came around to every table and handed out two small bits of metal stuck together. A mind game puzzle- the aim was to get the pieces apart. Within a few minutes, we were all crowded around with the locals trying to disentangle the puzzle. Gesturing wildly and laughing at each other’s frustration- some things really do break down even the most severe language barriers. 

We were picked up at Pingyao station at around 10pm, and taken on a golf buggy type car to our hostel- situated in the old town. From a distance, the ancient walled city was visible- and it instantly became clear why many considered it to be one of the most beautiful walled cities in the world. Driving through one of the entrances of the wall, the roads narrowed, and a myriad of red lanterns appeared. Our driver swerved and dodged stray dogs, other cars and bikes and we quickly arrived at our hostel, a little shaken by the drive- having narrowly missed going straight into the back of a parked car.

After a day or travel, we all settled in the Cozy bar with a beer and ordered some dinner. Here, we met Giles, a graduate from our course at RMIT- who was exhibiting in the festival. We all sat and talked before retiring for the night, in our two ‘twin rooms’ that turned out to have only one big bed in each. Oh China, always spoiling us with surprises.