At Datong train station, have just boarded the hard sleeper to Taiyuan - with easily over 1000 other passengers. Em is very excited at the prospect of sleeping in one of these boxes and just had a good experience going to the toilet - which is something that we wouldn't have dared do on our last train journey, a 6 hour hard seat from beijing - I didn't actaully see the toilet itself but on a brief walk to stretch my legs after sitting in the same spot for 4 hours I found a baby girl doing a poo on the floor outside the toilet, with her mother holding apart the kid's shorts - in china they don't have nappies, they just rip the middle seem of their shorts - easy access - less to clean up, cheaper? I don't know. Anyway, at that point I remembered chris' advice to take imodium before long train journeys.

This is an 8.5 hour journey arriving at 7 am - we've got two bags of food supplies and I've just finished the last (and only) beer. In our food bag we have the usual chinese super market wares - two rolls of sweet bread (should last a few months) 1pk of frankfurters, 2 packs of nuts 1 of them is pretty much unidentifiable - later turned out to taste of old socks - everything seems to have that aroma - I should change my socks), 1 jar of pear balls in sugar water, 1 pack of sweet corn jellies and two chinese pot noodles - good stuff. In the second bag we've got the left overs from our meal at the restuarant in Datong - spicy pork, sweet and sour pork and rice...I think I know which bag will go first!

This is a good nopprtunity to fill in what has happenend over the past few days - em has done a sterling job keeping this thing updated so I'll try not to repeat too much. So, without going into too much detail...the great wall was amazing, peking duck in beijing is over rated, hard seat trains are fine - don't see what all the fuss is about (for jouneys under 7 hours and during the day) china is much poorer than they make out, 500 million people in poverty, the peple in datong look at us like they've never seen westerners before - but mostly it is with smiles and good natured gawping. Being on a year long break from work is good for your health - three weeks feels like three months! I must write to my work lot - they'll be missing me.