The year I discovered the Chinese

I arrived in Lijiang in Yunnan province in south east China in the late evening. Although Lijiang, the old town is a world heritage site and often referred to as a travelers Mecca most of it has now been built specifically for tourists and thus for me, it lacked authenticity. However, I stay with a traditional Naxi family one of China's 55 minority ethnic groups who are native to the area. Mamma Naxi was very pleasant she sorted out all my transport and cooked for me for free on more than one occasion. The old town is a charming place it resembles a land taken straight out of a fairy tale with Jade dragon snow mountain providing a majestic backdropto the town, the Chinese believe that here you are destined to find true romance. However the purpose of my stay here was to trek along the famous Tiger Leaping Gorge. I was lucky whilst in an internet café and I met a rather charming Chinese girl who introduced herself as DJ. DJ had studied English so for once I could have a decent conversation with a local, she was very kind to set me up with a friend of hers who works as a guide in the area, she agreed to assist me with at least getting to the starting point of tiger leaping gorge. After a few hours DJ came back and she invited me to go to lunch with her, we had some great noodles, and it was particularly enjoyable as I could communicate with the locals by using her as a translator. I had previously eaten at this venue and the staff had many questions for me that I knew the owner was dying to ask me. He new now where I was from and understood that I'm allergic to peanuts and that I was trying to explain that I didn't like coriander, which despite the long drama the day before he now understood with a entertaining look. I couldn't believe how spicy DJ had her food! way to spicy for me and I can handle my spice, she said the girls in particular like their food very spicy here which I found unusual.After lunch she took me on the bus to the most beautiful lake I've ever seen which was where she used to go swimming, there was a blue sky not a cloud in sight. I noticed a sign written in Chinese characters, she translated it for me it read: 'no swimming' she explained that so many people were drowning they had banned swimming! I just couldn't understand there were no rocks, no current and sloped entrances all around the lake, she explained that here very few people can swim and once they got in the water people would panic and drown. We had our photo take in font of the lake which captured Jade Dragon Snow Mountain in the background with its snow covered peak. As we gazed over the bridge at our reflections in the water she asked me if this was what the ocean was like, I was quite shocked as I live by the sea I couldn't image anyone who hadn't seen the ocean, 'she had never seen the sea' I hadn't realized how poor she was.

Lijiang is like a labyrinth I got lost amongst the cobbled pathways on numerous occasions Luckily found a girl who guided me all the way back to Mamma Naxi guest house, she was from the Yi minority, a group of which I hadn't encountered. Whist walking I found out much about her culture as we chatted along the way. The funny thing was the second time I got lost it was purely coincidental the she found me again.

The next day I met DJ 's friend and we caught a bus together heading to wards Tiger Leaping Gorge .A group of ladies got on the bus that looked different andappeared not to be talking mandarin, it turned out they wereTibetan and they gave me some of there lunch and taught me some Tibetan words! Very friendly bunch!

You come to realiseAsian people always get travel sick I couldn't help but to make fun of DJ's friend because she found it comforting to hold my orange peel at her nose , she said the smell takes her mind of her stomach.My theory is there have been fewer generations using vehicles in most of Asia so the adapted traveling gene hasn't passed on. Anyway she didn't throw up in the end even through I insisted on taking photos of her. She took me as far as she could towards the gorge then I was on my own with a rather poor map which was worrying because the Gorge is around 15 km in length. It was a scorching day so I took my t-shirt off, when I saw the size and amount of spider's webs scattered along my route I quickly put it back on, the large yellow spiders could easily end up on my back as I was brushing past the bushes and according to the locals they were poisonous. The views were amazing especially with the mountains in the background; I was told the gorge is a contender for the world's deepest river canyon. The climb was tougher than I had perceived at one stage I thought I was lost and had to ask where I was when I stumbled upon a handful of hamlets, although they couldn't speak any English the indigenous Naxi people pointed me in the right direction, after this I found red markings on the rocks to guide me. Along the way I came across a few farmers who were working on the hills, the people I encountered were always women and looked very poor. I gave one elderly lady some of my lunch she showed much appreciation, she had a sickle in one hand and couldn't walk very well she was very old and when she opened her mouth you really see what a state her teeth were in! (see photos). I found it difficult to take pictures of myself as I was on my own I tried holding my camera out but resorted to using the timer function and managed a few. Eventually I met a German couple and an Italian guy who kept me in conversation till the end. We saw the sun set and found a place to stay, I got up early to watch the sun rise over the mountain from a terrace with a swinging chair it was a great viewing point. On the way down to the river I climbed down a ladder it was a long vertical ladder and very high. I thought it would be no problem for me having done so much ladder work whilst cleaning windows, however I still found it a little daunting and took it rather slowly without looking down. At the bottom there is a huge rock in the middle of the river, legend has it that this is the point at which the tiger is said to have leaped from to clear the river. I had to haggle with an old man to climb onto the huge stone and paid two Chinese Yuan(about 17p) once on the giant stone I could really feel it moving from side to side with the power of the current. One of the photos you can see is of a dog in a small hut I found this particularly amusing because when anyone walked past it ran out barking and this scared the living daylights out of the German woman I was with. We managed to hitch a lift with a Chinese family back to Lijiang on the way we stopped on the road and I couldn't understand why, when I got out of the vehicle some of the Chinese pointed at the road, there had been a small avalanche and rocks were still falling onto the road. The bottom line was we had to make a run for it, I was a bit scared to be fair as the rocks were quite big and falling very fast, when we got the other side the driver bolted his car across, one big rock hit the car made a loud bang and left a dent in the side of it luckily nothing hit his windscreen or us as we ran. We stopped at a village for some food, the family seemed to want a sort of fish hot pot so that's what we had as there was no communication we had to go into the kitchen and choose the fish. The one I chose literally jumped right out the tank and into the cooks hands which made me jump, then I watched him immediately chop its head off. In all the places I have been so far (and that includes India) this was the spiciest meal I have ever had I was literally dribbling out my nose, and the state of the table afterwards was just discussing fish bones, fish heads and tissues all over the place although this was quite normal for the Chinese I had to take a photo. When I got back to Mama Naxi's there was allsorts of commotion, apparently a Japanese guy had touched up Mama Naxi and a fight broke out between Mr Naxi and the Japanese man. It really was the funniest fight though, one would kick the other almost in turns before me and another guy split it up. In the end they called the police but the drunken Japanese nutcase still ended up staying in my dorm.

I moved on to Dali where I had a hair cut for the first time in China, I triedto explain how I preferred it styled but in the end I just let them do what they wanted. I have since found that showing a photo of yourself with shorter hair is a good idea. Dali is where I spent Halloween and met some crazy people. Got a great picture of a Chinese girl dressed up as a witch, when I asked her for a bottle opener she just put her head on the table and opened her mouth ('the human bottle opener'). It was great to see the locals cutting up pumpkins for candles.

Next stop was Yangshuo it was a very touristy place I stayed in a very remote place in the country to begin with, and found myself surrounded by chickens and other livestock. This was a very tranquil place after crowded Lijiang, the scenery here was incredible, covered in kast hills poking up over the entire region and colorful rice terraces neighboring my accommodation. I took a bike ride around the area visiting some of the farms and realised the farmers were still using cattle to plow the fields, I stopped and sat with a fisherman, he gave me his rod and I managed to pull in a small fish even though we could not speak a word to each other .There were two bright red glowing dragon flies I tried to photograph. This countryside was truly something out of a book the color diversity amongst the kast hills is spectacular! I trekked to the top of moon hill, famous for its big hollow arch at the top, there were many people rock climbing which made good entertainment for me whilst resting near the top - it looked very dangerous. For some reason the small track leading to the peak was forbidden but I had been informed by a fellow traveler that it was safe so I decided to attempt it anyway. At the top there were some great views of all the hills poking out the ground and a old Arial pole I managed to climb,I had to use the timer on my camera again and missed my head from the shot. I loved cycling around the country side listening to my ipod absorbing the natural sceneries and observing the mysterious local farming traditions I got lost in the fields on many occasion.

After I had had enough of the countryside I hitchhiked my way into the town on the back of a truck through the kast hills. Gary had specifically told me to stay at monkey Jane's hostel which would be full of backpackers and famous for beer pong. I arrived there and immediately started having great fun I did a few jobs for monkey Jane and was soon getting free accommodation and food.A few of us arranged a sightseeing trip on the Li River by bamboo raft, we even persuaded monkey Jane herself to come as our guide. We got some great pictures and on the back of a twenty Yuan note is a slice of the scenery itself I managed to get a good photoswith the exact scene on the note. I met a Slovenian guy called Simon on this trip he had been traveling for a few years in South America he had some great stories to tell. We decided to try some local Chinese cuisine and ventured out looking to try some p**** cat. Jane told us she wouldn't get us any to eat at the hostel because there is an old Chinese superstition that if you eat cat something of yours will run away! Not being superstitious we went out searching. In the end there was nowhere that sold any, we did meet a guy who immediately made some phone calls to try and get us one but we decided it was too expensive, the funny thing was we think he rang his brother who had a pet cat and would have been willing to cook it for us to make some money. With no luck we gave up and had a burger. The next day Gary turned up and we explained the need to taste some kitty cat he was also game, so off we went again this time to the market. I couldn't believe this palace the first thing that hit me was the smell it was truly revolting. At the back was the counters that sold dog this was particularly horrendous sight not just because they were hung up and cut open because there were may live dogs in cages watching the whole procedure of there associates being slaughtered , disemboweled, then having there hair blowtorched before being hung up to be sold. I got a great photo displaying this. Eventually we saw a cage of cats and on hung up having been freshly blowtorched, we negotiated a price and for half a cat we paid 40 Yuan between us we aboutthree pounds fifty we even got half a head for that. We paid a restaurant to prepare it with some rice and garlic, that cost another 3 pounds, we photographed the whole buying and cooking procedure so please check out the photos only if you can handle them there pretty gruesome!!The bottom line was it was delicious really the nicest meat I have ever tried truly tasty. Our next step is to try dogI hope dog is not as good because I like dogs as pets 'not as meals', thing is when we see a cat on the street now we don't say'oh how cute' we say 'that looks delicious'.

Monkey Jane offered us some promotion work in Guilin the City north of Yangshuo it would be a few days and we would have are accommodation paid for, food plus a small amount of money. The Danish girls turned I had previously been traveling with turned up at monkey Jane's so we all decided to go. It was a tourism expedition and the tourism board was promoting the Yangshuo area. There was a huge exhibition center and many products being promoted, we just had to stand around and have pictures taken of us all day holding various musical instruments. Most people took photos of us just because we were western, however we did have many journalists film and photograph us, god knows where our pictures will end up!!

We had some great meals here with all the governors of Yangshuo they really made us drink though, after every joke or meal course or just randomly we all had to do shots of Bijo it's the Chinese version of rice wine truly horrendous about 50 percent I remember those few Chinese words that meant we were going to drink that and 'gambe'that means finish your whole glass. Gary managed this better than me I nearly threw up on many occasions.The only means of communication was through Janewho also came as a translator, she is the crazy skin head in the photos. They paid for all are drinks and hired a KTV room for us we managed to get the governmental people drunk as well that was amusing. KTV is all over Asia its where people go for karaoke however I'm a horrendous singer so not to great for me. For the last meal they ordered dog it wasn't as good as cat a lot tougher and no where near as tasty. When we got back we played some more beer pong then watch Jane's parents serve a live snake to some other backpackers they cut the head off with scissors and then washed the beating heart down with a shot of snake blood, I was holding the moving headless snake for some time, was going to release it but I don't think it would get very far without a head. Here we decided to fly to the Philippians to meat Simon after Singapore. We booked our coach to Hong Kong as our flight to Taiwan leaves in a few days.

China and traveling on my own was an amazing experience, whilst here I read two books, one which was aboutrecent and future Chinese economics called'The writing on the wall' by will Hutton, which I found very interesting because although china now seems now very open and much more westernized than people perceived Hutton really explains that behind the scenes this really isn't the case, and that the country is still in a straight jacket thanks to the communist party, no one can freely access facebook and I often couldn't even useinternet without a Chinese ID Card. The other book I read recommended by my brother was Jung Chang's Wild Swans it is also the best book I have ever read and really did offer me great insight into China and there desolate history. I met a backpacker the other day who loved Chinese history and had studied it she told me she had no intention of going because she heard there people were unfriendly, I found this incredible as I found quite the opposite, not only did I feel the safest there I have in any country yet, they were in my experience the most willing and friendly people I have encountered yet!.

See photo's China

And I forgot to add, note the bums of the girls in red they were all like this no lie…. Maybe that chili pays off

Next stop Taiwan…..