My 2016 China trip

August 30,2017 I will try and write this blog during my travels to China and Taiwan this September.

China October 2014

Chapter 1

Departure and arrival

This is the fifth year I have done annual pilgrimage to China. I do this as I find my learning Mandarin improves in one week is more than what I learn on my own in Canada or the US during the whole year. By now I have developed a group of people with whom I interact while I'm in Beijing in Beijing. This group is, of course, headed up by Bing Zhao. Bing is the manager of the small inn I stay at while I am in Beijing. Bing is in his early 40s. He was married to a very pretty lady who contracted Lupus disease and they are now separated. His wife lives in Chong Ching which is about 1000 miles south of Beijing. His only son Mikey, lives with his mother there.

Picures of this trip can be seen at:

https://picasaweb.google.com/107923363810248771461/China2014?authkey=Gv1sRgCIvtz-60z5vwMg

When I first started staying with Bing five years ago he was running a 10 room inn which was located in a charming hutong. Hutongs are old parts of Beijing that survived the modern era. There are several Hutongs in Beiing and luckily efforts are now being made preserve as many as possible although the pressure is immense to house the population of Beijing of 19 million people. Many more people can live in a high-rise that in the one story buildings which one finds in the hutongs. The word actually comes from the Mongolian for a place where there is water. The hutongs were built around places where there was water either underground or near a river.

Over the years, Bing has grown his business from an inn of 10 rooms to the one he now manages which has 55 rooms. He still manages this as an inn as the rooms are small and cater mainly to backpackers and to students. I am given the biggest which is not much bigger than 12X12 feet which is OK for the short time I am in Beijing.

I have been asked several times why I do this and I have now figured that this is my annual camping trip. While others may go to the woods and live with mosquitoes I find it more fun to go to Beijing and live with Chinese people. Besides, mosquitoes do not speak Mandarin... I have been studying Mandarin off and on for 5 years working with a Beijing based teacher called Hao Jie. She has schooled me over the years using Skype to communicate.

This year for the first time I left China directly from Canada. I flew with Air Canada from Montréal and then connected to the Vancouver to Beijing flight. It is this a five hour flight from Montréal and a 10 hour flight from Vancouver making a total playing time of 15 hours. Interestingly Air Canada does not provide any free food on the flight from Montréal but does provide a snack and two meals on the flight from Vancouver to Beijing. On the flight from Montréal they were selling sandwiches at $10 a piece. Luckily I had had breakfast at home and had a few snack bars with me. The connection in Vancouver was smooth and both flight left and arrived on time.

Time.

At 2 o'clock in the afternoon of October 16th, I arrived in Beijing.. The arrival procedures in Beijing are quite efficient and smooth. It only takes around five minutes to clear immigration checks the passport and one's visa. If one compares this to the two hours it takes sometimes to clear immigration in Washington Dulles Airport, one sees how efficient the Chinese system is. After clearing customs, one goes down one story to get on a small train ( built by Bombardier of Canada) which is a five minute ride into the the baggage claims building. It took about 20 minutes for my bag to arrive. Once I had it, I then went smoothly through the customs area with no stop. I arrived in the arrival hall where there must of been 300 people waiting. It was almost like walking a gauntlet as there were people on both sides with little cards with names of people there will looking for. I immediately identified Song Ping who is the wife of one of Bing's gang whose name is Chun Lei. She and a friend had been sent to pick me up.

After taking the elevator down to the parking lot we then headed in towards the city. It became clear to me Song Ping was not a very experienced driver but she was cautious. After a 35 minute drive, she pulled over to the side as she was clearly lost and had no idea where she was going anymore. She then started up her GPS which indicated that she should turn right whereupon she turned left. Obviously she had never used the GPS before either.

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However after two hours of driving (instead of 40 minutes) we did arrive at the inn. Song Ping was very apologetic about having lost her away. This is the reason I prefer to take a taxi from the airport than having people pick me up. But is part of the Chinese hospitality and therefore they do it. The same applies when I leave but at least then they do not have to get out of their car.

I was met at the inn by Bing who immediately invited me out for dinner that night. As it was 4 o'clock in the afternoon and I had been up for almost 24 hours I declined saying that I would prefer to get some rest and have dinner later on alone. Interestingly, I have been dealing with these people for these last few years and they are not offended by my decisions to be social or not to be social. I then went to my room slept for a few hours got up and walked around town for a few hours, had a small bite to eat and then went back to bed.

The next day was Saturday and it in the morning the sky was blue and temperature was about 72°. So I took my little knapsack and headed out into the street for the beginning of many walks around this town. I have found over the years, that this is the best way to interact with people in stores, on the street and in any other public areas. The Chinese are very friendly and always willing to help to talk to you. They are particularly surprised when a foreigner can actually speak to them in their own language. Very few people can actually convese in English which is fine with me as I am there to better my own Mandarin.

It was such a beautiful day that I realized that there are in Beijing very few days like this during the year. It is either very hot or very cold or very smoggy on most days. I spent most of the day walking through the area and getting to know the various little stores one finds along the streets. I find myself playing a game of trying to figure out what each store actually does as this is not necessarily obvious from looking at it. In some stores I actually need to go inside the store to look around to find out what there are actually selling. I went into my favorite little dollar store next door to the inn to buy a few basic things like a plug extender and a brush and other little things that I would be needing.

In the evening I met up with Bing and Chun Lei and his wife Song Ping. Dinner was at the inn. Bing has converted what was his bar into a hot-pot restaurant. Hotpot refers to the Mongolian type of food which is cooked in a large container on a heat source The containers have two separate basins one is with very hot spicy liquid and the other is hot and not so spicy liquid. This is similar to the Swiss fondue except that the Chinese put in anything and everything from fish, to meat, to vegetables. Each person dumps stuff into the pot leaves it there for a while and then fishes it into their own small bowl using their chopsticks . There are a number of such restaurants in Canada and the US which are part of a Chinese chain. The idea of converting Bing's bar may result in more traffic and use of a rather large space which last year saw no traffic at all. So far I have seen some customers there.

Sunday I was told we were going to go to a special place for dinner in downtown Beijing called Bei Jia. It consists of about 10 houses the royal family used to use. These have been converted into individual restaurants with water features and all lit up in colors in the evening. We actually ate outside in the garden served by waiters and waitresses all dressed in period clothing. It was a lovely setting. I took some nice pictures of the place and of other places during my stay which can be seen at:

https://plus.google.com/photos/ AlexanderNicolasKeyserlingk/albums/6079488904894212225?gpinv=AMIXal8_eLRk6vsdjMLRdD-5dguJzbN9T-NhPKSyWXWVeONRNA0Y9aaQK6sUUHZFeQErqszTOZKljfi0-hMk00eIDkIyrxhOtU5Sm_Uv_5c6x4azl7frTG8&cfem=1https://plus.google.com/photos/ AlexanderNicolasKeyserlingk/albums/6079488904894212225?gpinv=AMIXal8_eLRk6vsdjMLRdD-5dguJzbN9T-NhPKSyWXWVeONRNA0Y9aaQK6sUUHZFeQErqszTOZKljfi0-hMk00eIDkIyrxhOtU5Sm_Uv_5c6x4azl7frTG8&cfem=1

You will also see that I have made a collection of the strange modes of transport one sees in Beijing streets. Most of them are very Chinese but work well.

I also found during my walkabouts an exposition of great pictures of China which were shown on boards along the main pedestrian walk way in central Beijing. I took pictures of the boards and later, cropped many of them and added them to my collection above. These are parts of China I have not seen but hope one day to see as it seems that there are many beautiful areas in this huge country.

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In the afternoon of Sunday, Bing confided in me that the was in financial difficulty. Apparently, his partners required him to buy them out and he has taken on loans from his father which he needs to repay. After spending a few hours looking at his financial situation I decided that I would help him as the amount he required was not large. I believe that is a good loan and that Bing will repay the money. I set up a transfer from my account at the bank credit union to his account here in Beijing. The transfer took several days to come through but it did eventually get paid into his bank account. I then set up a bank account of my own in the biggest Chinese bank into which Bing is to deposit his repayments over the next year. I intend to use these funds when I next return t Beijing, perhaps next year with my wife Monique.

The next days were spent doing the rounds in Beijing which I am starting to know better. It is a huge city but there is frankly not a lot to see. With a population of 19 million most of the city is high rises. There are some museums, Tiananmen square and the great wall which I had visited on earlier trips. I do make a point of always going to Tiananmen square for its historical importance and also to see the masses of people who are always there. This is like the Mecca for the Chinese.

I spent a day with my Mandarin Teacher Chao, Hao Jie with whom I have worked for the last 5 years. We have a tradition of going together to the Pearl Market to pick up presents for people back home. She loves to bargain and it usually takes a half day to make the purchases. I usually end up paying about 10% of the original prices as prices are set high only for tourists. After she had got the best price for my pearls, the sales girls gave her a present of a pearl necklace!

The weather of the few days I was in Beijing was terrible. The pollution level reached 400 on a scale of 500 which is deemed dangerous. I cannot understand how people live in such horrible conditions but then they cannot all just up and leave. However, the rate of cancer in China is reported increasing. My own teacher who lives with her husband, 5 year son and her parents is continuously taking one or the other to the hospital or to the doctor because of coughing and other respiratory situations. The authorities are doing a lot to try and reduce pollution by replacing coal buring power stations, requiring cars to use electricity but with the inversion of air which happens because Beijing, like Los Angeles is backed up to a range of mountains, there is not a lot which can be done, particularly in the autumn and spring months when temperatures tend to vary a lot.

On this trip I had my first misadventure in Beijing. For the first, (and last) time I accepted to be transported by a bike pedaling rickshaw driver. I was tired and wanted to get to Tianamen quickly so I agreed on the price before getting on (5 Yuan= US$1) and off we went. He headed down small alleys and after 5 minutes said that the square was just down a small corridor and that I should walk. I gave him a 5 yaun note and he refused it saying he wanted 5 US$. I said no way and he got rather aggressive, pushing me and demanding the money. I stood my ground and told him that we had agreed on the price. After staring him down with some trepidation and saying I would report him to the jin cha -police( he was a big chap) he relented and I headed in the other direction towards a corner where there quite a few people. When I later reported my experience to Bing and co, I was told one should never use these people who have a reputation of doing such things. I had not known this and I now know. Luckily, I rarely go out with much money and only carry one credit card with me in the street so there was not too much which I could have lost, but still such events make one nervous. They, of course, could happen in any big city but I had never run into such a situation in all my China travels.

After a week in Beijing, I decided I wanted to get away and decided I would visit Harbin which is a city 800 miles north of Beijing, almost on the Russian boarder. I have taken up the habit of doing a side trip each year to a different part of the country, usually traveling by train. So I booked myself in first class seat to and from Harbin. The trip takes about 6.5 hours to cover the 800 miles from Beijing. It stops in about 10 places for minutes and travels normally at around 220 kms per hour (170 mph). China has built out about 10,000 miles of high speed train tracks in the last years. These are tracks which are dedicated for high speed trains and they cover a huge part of the country. The distances are great and these high speed trains have reduced travel times to such an extent that it is often as quick and far easier to travel by train than by plane. The costs of such travel is very reasonable for foreigners. The return Beijing to Harbin ticket costs US 145.00! Not bad for an eight hour train ride in first class. The seats are comfortable and the views are great. It allows me to get a sense of the country

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which is not available when flying around. My train left Beijing at 10 am and arrived in Harbin at 6 pm. In addition to having built out the high speed rail system, China has also built new rail stations throughout the country to accommodate the new high speed trains. These stations are usually fairly far out of the cities and many look more like airport stations than train stations with huge domed ceilings and multiple passenger boarding gates. The one in Harbin is pictured in my collection and one can see it is built for the future as there are not that many high speed trains nowadays.

The ride up to Harbin goes through very flat land all the way. It is the breadbasket of China and from the train one sees endless wheat fields stretching to the horizon. There are small groups of small houses every few miles and these are the farmers of these fields. At this time of year, the fields are barren as the crops have been harvested so it is not a particularly pretty sight.

Interestingly, when I left Beijing, the smog was as bad as I have ever seen it. But, rather than improve as we traveled quickly north, the smog hung on for 600 miles until we got to Harbin. It was probably more fog in the countryside, but still it meant that visibility in the whole northern part of China was reduced because of this layer of fog on the ground.

Harbin used to be mostly inhabited by Russians. The Russians obtained permission to use it as their base while building the trans-Siberian railroad from St Petersburg to Vladivostok. By cutting through Northern China, the rail line was much shorter than going to the Pacific coast and heading south. This town was built by Russians and the older part of the city still has a number of European building from that time. The main relic of the Russian period is the Basilica of St Sofia which is a magnificent Russian Orthodox Church in downtown Harbin. It is well maintained but now used as a museum with a collection of several hundred pictures of old Harbin with its Russian imprint of stores, streets and building with names in Cyrillic. The new part of the city looks like any Chinese town with skyscrapers and large department stores. What is really missing is an old part of the city but in fact this town was built only in the last 20 or so years and now has a population of 10.6 million people. It is not a pretty city as the land is almost totally flat in all directions. Interestingly, the best sausage one can buy is in Harbin. The original recipe was brought by a man from the Baltics and sausages tasting very much like German sausages are a delicacy in this city still today.

I had booked myself into the local Sofitel managed hotel which is a huge building. I checked in and was shown to my room which in fact was a small suite. I really appreciate the luxury of such hotels after spending a week in my little room in the inn in Beijing. The bed alone was almost as big as my Beijing room. The bathroom was also as big as my Beijing room so I was a happy camper. I chose that hotel as it has a swimming pool. I went swimming every day while in Harbin and there was never another person in the Olympic size pool. It was good to get some other exercise than just walking around Beijing.

The next day I started my walkabouts around town and ran into a real problem. Harbin is really off the beaten path of tourism with only an ice construction festival in February. Thus people are not used to people like me who do not speak perfect Mandarin. I found I had real difficulty getting myself understood by the locals which I did not experience ever in Beijing. On the second day, I had planned to visit the Harbin Siberian tiger park. The park has the largest number of tigers (250) and is used for breeding. Estimates have it that there are only 500 such tigers and half are held here. I knew the park was far out of town so I wrote down the name of the park in Pinyin and hailed a taxi. I told the driver where I wanted to go and he did not understand. I showed him my pinyin piece of paper but he still did know where to go. He then called his dispatcher on his radio and asked him where the Dong Bei Hu Yuan was. No help there either. I then told the driver to go back to my hotel and I asked the concierge to tell the driver to take me to the tiger park. “ Oh, you mean the dong bei hu yuan.” Yes, that is what is written on the paper. We eventually got to the park and it started to snow. October 20^th! I told the driver to wait for me as I would be going back to town after my visit. I had to wait 30 minutes as one boards a minibus to make the tour of the facility a bit like a safari in Africa. There were masses of tigers roaming in open spaces and caged throughout this huge facility. The animals were beautiful and looked well fed and healthy. An hour or so later, I got back into my taxi and headed back to town which took almost 45 minutes. I gave the driver a fairly good tip above the meter price but he wanted more. He did not get more.

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On Monday Morning I boarded my train back to Beijing arriving in the late afternoon right on schedule. I returned to Bing's inn for my last days in China. One evening at a dinner with about 20 persons a young Swede joined us with his Chinese fiancee. I had met him last year. He has been in China for 5 years working at various computer companies. I had thought he was fluent in Chinese Mandarin but at this dinner he was struggling to follow the conversation. At one point, I asked him why it was that this group of Chinese (40 or so years old) never spoke of

politics. He told me that politics is just not a subject of conversation in any group as they are convinced that they cannot change anything and that as long as the government lets them get on with their lives and make money, they had no interest in the subject. I had thought that the lack of political discussion was partly because I was there but in fact there is really no time spent on the matter.

I spent the last days in Beijing doing a little more tourism but the weather was so terrible that I did not spend too much time outside. I was looking forward to getting home and on Thursday I at 5pm on October 30^th boarded my flight to Vancouver.

I arrived in Vancouver around noon on the same day I left as we crossed back over the date line. As Monique was due into Vancouver the same day on a flight from Montreal, I rented our car and awaited her arrival. She came in on time and we headed to my sister's house which is in the area of the University of BC. We had a pleasant evening with Sis and her husband and had an early evening after a long day.

The next morning, we picked up my grandchild, Emmett who is now studying at UBC. We set off to Horseshoe Bay to pick up the ferry heading out to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. I have always found Vancouver island to be a very special place where civilization and development never spoiled. Especially the west coast of the Island has always attracted me. For this reason, I had rented two cabins in Uclulet. When we arrived in Nanaimo we drove to a prearranged place near the harbor to meet my friends Julie and Dunstan Chicanot. They had agreed to join us for the week-end. They transferred their things into our SUV and we all drove off across the island. This drive is through dense original forests of pine and cedar with some of the trees reaching 10 feet in diameter. We arrived at our cabins in the woods and set up with Monique and I in one cabin and Emmett, Julie and Dunstan in the other. Their cabin was bigger but ours was exceptionally beautiful. It was made of cedars so big that it only took 4 cedars on top of each other to make the side walls. The interior was very cozy with a fireplace and a balcony. We had our meals in the larger cabin where meals were put together with food brought by Julie for the first day and thereafter from Tofino which is a town at the top of area. We spent time walking in the woods and on the beaches of this rugged area. There are times of huge storms in this area which are spectacular but we were lucky to have wonderful weather.

On Monday morning after 3 days on the Island we headed back to Nanaimo. We left Julie and Dunstan at their car an re-boarded the ferry back to the mainland. Back in Horseshoe Bay, we left Emmett so he could get a bus back to Vancouver while we headed north towards Whistler. On the way, we stopped for a cup of coffee at the house of Sis daughter, Marion who live in Squamish. We arrived in Whistler that afternoon. Whistler is a very large ski area developed by the same people who redeveloped Mont Tremblant north of Montreal. Whistler is in fact several times as large as Mont Tremblant but at the time of our visit it was almost like being in an abandoned town as the ski season had not yet started. In fact, we were in a large hotel but there were only 3 guests in the whole hotel. We did get to meet a niece of Monique's ( Catherine Aird) who lives in Whistler with her husband who is a lawyer. On our second day in Whistler, we drove further north to Pemberton and several miles north of there where the road goes over a huge pass. The mountains were starting to turn white as snow was falling at altitude and skiing was to start in a couple of weeks. Monique had never seen the rockies and the drive gave a few very good views of the mountains.

After a few days we headed back towards Vancouver. We stopped off for lunch with Sis's son, Ted and his wife. We lunched at the Horseshoe Bay yacht club which is close to their house.

The next day, we had arranged to have lunch with a college friend of mine from Brebeuf ,Guy Dalcourt and his

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wife who live in Vancouver. It was a fun meeting of someone I had not seen in 10 years. Guy in fact has lived outside Quebec for most of his life and is now semi-retired. He keeps busy being a wine consultant at a large wine store in Vancouver. Nice hobby.

That evening, Sis had invited some 25 people for dinner at her house for us to be able to introduce Monique to the Vancouver crowd. It was a very pleasant evening with good conversations and the chance to catch up with a lot of family and friends whom I had not seen in many years. Monique has now met most of my relatives, except for the American Branch and that will take place over the next years. However, to meet all the family will probably be a lifetime occupation as I estimate that there are some 2000 living relatives...

The next morning we flew home. It was good to get back to our house after 3 weeks on the road.

The trip did my Mandarin a lot of good and I expect I will do it again next year, perhaps this time with Monique. We shall see.

I hope you enjoyed this little travelogue. I enjoyed the travel.

Fort Lauderdale,

December 9, 2014