Canals, catfish, cockroaches and Chiang Mai

Yesterday we went for a tour of Bangkok's Khlongs (canals) which saw us on a traditional longtail boat with a boat driver who thought we were in a James Bond film, and hundreds of catfish which splashed the boat (and us, with cold, smelly canal water) to let us know they wanted to be fed...eau de canal was the smell of the day!

After the boat ride, we stopped at Wat Po to see the golden Buddha. I saw the worlds largest Buddha a few weeks ago so although this was impressive, I was more interested in intricate pattern of the mother of pearl inlay on the Buddha's feet than the statue itself. Please see photo which illustrates better than my poor discriptions.

The evening brought an overnight train to Chiang Mai, where I am now. The train was different to Chinese trains and each bed had a little privacy curtain to block light out and the beds were more comfortable. Unfortunately, our cabin was riddled with cockroaches and the swift motion of a flip flop connecting with a roach was often heard. Add this to the 'Doors of Death', which sealed each cabin unexpectedly and often on someone's hand/foot/shoulder/head and you have some unhappy travellers. I did not mind the cockroaches so much as they do not bite you or harm you in any way, and the one I saw last night by my feet was still around this morning which gave me confidence that I had not eaten him during my sleep.

My speech was quite ropey on Sunday as I was getting used to talking again but today it has been back to normal, so I'm very happy that I did the extra practice last week. I think maybe I need to stop being such a perfectionist and putting pressure on myself to be fluent in every situation as its not going to happen! (And there is even less chance with the pressure I put myself under).

All in all, a good result and I am excited to cross into Laos tomorrow for some tubing on the river. Happy days.

Bangkok redeems itself... or does it?!

The week of 100 contacts has kept me very busy. The last few days have seen me wandering around various neighbourhoods on self guided walks trying to give Bangkok a chance to redeem itself from its poor start. I found an interesting street full of woodwork shops where I saw a door carved with a huge Chelsea football club emblem (Uncle Howard and Jack: it was tacky but brilliant at the same time!) and another street where every shop sold gold replica buddhas.

I finally found something nice to say about Bangkok: the food here is both tasty and cheap. In fact, I have developed a craving for rice, a food I always considered to be a boring waste of valuable stomach space.

I squeezed in time for a haircut and despite the stylist not speaking English, he did himself proud. My mime of 'It's very humid here and I don't have a hairdryer so please cut in a style which can dry naturally' must have worked! International hand gestures win again!

I went to Siam Toastmasters in downtown Bangkok yesterday and although I did not speak publicly, I did introduce myself to everyone and make small talk, something which historically has been very hard for me. My final tally for contacts will be known tomorrow, but I am sure it is more than 700. The goals for this week were set because I needed to keep speaking as much as possible and although I have put around an extra 10 hours of work in, I have been experiencing slightly more tension than normal. When I meet with my tour group tomorrow, I will be talking non stop to get the diaphragm moving again. They will all be sick of me by the end of day 1, let alone day 28! Despite slight hitches, I am quite pleased with how things are going speaking wise and am proud that I have managed to keep going under challenging circumstances.

I'm sorry there are no photos for this blog or my last blog but I dont really feel safe taking my camera around. You aren't missing much anyway! T-minus 2 days until I leave!

The week of 100 contacts

So far, Bangkok has not impressed me. A man with long fingernails tried to grope me in the street (I dont know which was worse: the attempted groping or the long fingernails), and there are cats everywhere. My hostel room is a windowless, airless cell just off the Khaosan Road. It is not agreeable.

To take my mind off the hideousness, I set myself some weekly McGuire goals, namely:

1. 100 contacts per day
2. Attend toastmasters at least twice
3. Do an extra hour of work on my speech every day

Seeing as Bangkok is so below par, it has been even easier to do my McGuire work because I do not feel like I am missing out on anything else. The only redeeming features of Bangkok as I see it are:

1. I am leaving on Saturday
2. There are lots of Marks and Spencers food to go shops here
3. My tour joining hotel has a swimming pool.

Enough said!

Today I went to the first of my Toastmasters meetings, at St John's University Club. When I got there, they explained that today wasnt a normal meeting as the area director was there to speak. I was slightly disappointed but I decided to stay as I felt that by watching him, I could maybe learn something.

During the break, the President came over and said they had changed the format of the meeting (because the area director was putting everyone to sleep). She asked if I would I mind doing Table Topics after all? I said yes and I was happy to get the chance to speak.

After the break, the President said, "It is time for table topics. Please welcome our guest, Hannah, to the stage!"... What was lost in translation was that she had asked me if I wanted to be the Table Topics Master and host the session. It was stressful, but I did it and it was a definite learning curve.

In future, I would prepare more and think about what I was saying (it was on a par with my speaking performance in Beijing- my aim was to speak using basic technique of pause, breathe, speak, release and I was not bothered about anything else), so next time I will formulate and visualise.

Another step forward, another Toastmasters tomorrow!

Hello Hong Kong!

On Wednesday I crossed the border from China into Hong Kong. Everyone else I am travelling with was super excited about using facebook for the first time in a month and instantly logged on when we reached the hotel. I was more concerned about finding a Marks and Spencers to buy chocolate viennese sandwich fingers (also known as the best biscuits ever). Happily, I found out that there are 8 M&S branches in Hong Kong, catering for the ex-pat community and therefore I ran to the nearest store to indulge my stomach.

Once I had satisfied my biscuit craving, I went to the evening light show 'A Symphony of Lights' which happens every night in Hong Kong Harbour. The skyscrapers light up to music and the show holds the World Record for the largest sound and light show in the world.

I really like Hong Kong; the juxtaposition between the old and new architecture is interesting and there is plenty to do. Before I left, I researched lots of walking tours for most cities I visit so that I can see real neighbourhoods and cover ground in the most efficient way (typical me!), and I had 3 walking tours for Hong Kong that took me to places including the zoo, botanical gardens and to the Chinese herbal remedy district, where I saw dried flying lizard rat things attached to wooden poles and also dried shark skin...it was a good day!

Yesterday, I visited Lantau Island which was like what I imagine the Thunderbirds Island to be like, if it actually existed. The weather was beautiful, palm fronds lined the roads, water buffalo roamed freely and the buildings were all cool retro 70's creations. The only thing missing was Lady Penelope. On the island I visited Tai O fishing village, a stilt village home to the Tanka people, who are frightened to live on the land, and I saw the worlds' largest Buddha statue, which was ENORMOUS!

Today I snuck back into my old hotel to use their free internet to write this blog and to upload my Mexico and China photos to flikr, to keep them safe. Once this has been done, I'll send the link so you can all have a browse at my journey so far. Other than that there is nothing new to report; I am excited but nervous to go to Thailand tomorrow and am looking forward to investigating the many Toastmasters meetings and hopefully winning a 'best speaker' ribbon.

Hong Kong is my half way point for travelling; I have now been away for 3 months and have 3 months left until I come home. Every day, my decision to see the world makes more and more sense to me. I am having an absolutely fantastic time and am so happy to see such wonderful things every day and meet so many new people. I'm on time, on budget, working hard on McGuire and am ready for the second half of my adventure! Roll on Khaosan Road craziness!

Countryside and Cormorants‏

Since my Terracotta Warriors update, I have been enjoying the Chinese countryside. Some of you may remember the HSBC advert from a few years ago which featured Cormorant Fishing (American friends: look on youtube). This ad was filmed in Yangshuo, which is where I am now. It is so pretty here; a tiny town nestled amongst great limestone karsts, which are dramatically lit up at night. Yesterday I went for a cycle ride through the Chinese countryside, which was both stunning and ridiculously hot, and I climbed a mountain called 'Moon Hill', which has a giant half moon shape cut out from the middle of the mountain. I will attach a photo of this to my blog next week. My bike was retro lime green with a jingling bell and I did consider asking the lady if I could package it up and have it sent home, because I loved it so much, but she didnt speak English and my Chinese is somewhat limited so I aborted this plan and was happy just to enjoy the bike for a few hours!

In the evening, I went Cormorant Fishing and I wasn't sure what to expect. I went with 3 other people, and for the first 30 minutes, we sat on the boat next to the dock in complete darkness, with the staff frantically trying to start the engine/get the lights working. Health and safety isn't great in China so I was slightly worried and looking around for my exit route if something should occur, when they brought another boat alongside and asked us to change boats. Once on our way, we travelled upstream for about 10 minutes before we drew alongside traditional fishermen with tiny wooden bamboo boats with a flock of Cormorants on the bow of the boat. The fishermen started throwing the cormorants into the water (with quite strenuous force), and they merrily bobbed amongst the waves whilst looking for fish. They have a loop tied around their neck so they do not swallow the fish, and when they catch something, the fisherman hooks them back onto the boat and forces them to give the fish up. That said, they are allowed to eat every seventh fish they catch.

After we had watched this for a while, we docked on a tiny beach and were allowed to hold the birds. This is where the problem began. I did not really want to hold a bird but everyone else I was with did, and therefore peer pressure meant that I felt unable to refuse. The fisherman handed me the bird but I wasnt ready and it was not only cold but slimy too, so I started screaming because I was frightened, which started my bird and the other birds off. It ended with a cacophony of birds screaming and me screaming and eventually the fisherman did take the bird away. But not before laughing his socks off!

I also visited the Three Gorges Dam on a boat tour, which was really pretty. On the morning of the second day, we took a tiny boat up a tributary to the Li River and the scenery felt like we were in Avatar. Our boat struggled to work at various points during the voyage so whilst we waited for the captain to jump over the back of the boat to fix the engine, we had a sing off with another boat full of Chinese tourists to pass the time!

During the boat tour, we also saw a 'relocated town' which is where the people whose homes were destroyed during the building of the dam moved to. It was a very soulless and depressing place and I was happy to get back onto the boat for a game of 'Mafia'. Evenings were spent laying on the deck looking at the stars and chatting about life... it was exactly what I imagined travelling would be.

Terracotta Warriors‏

I know I only really update my blog or email everyone once per week but this was a special occasion! This week I saw the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an, and they were breathtaking. Prior to seeing them, I wasnt sure what to expect, (maybe a field with some crumbling figures in?!), but they absolutely blew my mind.

The day was sweltering hot; about 40 degrees and very humid. Upon entering the first vault, we were met with a huge aircraft style hangar, with row upon row of terracotta warriors. In total, there are 8000 warriors spread over 3 vaults, and the warriors are interspersed with chariots, horses and other items to protect the emporer in his afterlife. Vault 2 contained the most senior members of the army, and Vault 3 has yet to be excavated, so it was interesting to see how the Warriors were found- buried in tunnels covered with wooden beams.

Our guide was extremely knowledgeable, and told us about how the warriors were built over 70 years, and they took 700 craftspeople to build them. The emporer died before the army was completed, so he ordered his inner circle to bury alive(!) everyone who worked on the warriors once they had been completed, to prevent them revealing the secret of where the warriors were located. The warriors were found in 1974, by 4 peasants sinking a well in a paddy field. I think this aspect of the story interested me most- if the peasants had sunk the well just 0.5 metres in any other direction, the warriors would not have been found... It also made me consider what other treasures may lie under the ground across the world.

Simply amazing. A true 'travelling' moment. I have attached two photos but will attach more to my blog from Hong Kong.

I'm about to board a boat to visit the Three Gorges Dam now so will send another update on Monday, hopefully with lots of picturesque photos of Chinese countryside! I hope that everyone considers this break from normal blogging service to be worthwhile!

Great Wall Toboggan and Shanghai‏

This week I have done lots of 'big name' sightseeing, including the Great Wall, Temple of Heaven and Summer Palace. The Great Wall was steeper than I anticipated it to be and was very busy. We visited a section which is located about 2 hours outside of Beijing, which also has a cool toboggan slide to get from the wall back down to the car park, which was really fun! The toboggan goes really fast and probably should not have been open as it was a rainy day, which added to the speed immensely!

On Wednesday, I visited the 'Temple of Heaven', a large site for the Chinese to worship heaven. There is a convoluted worshipping process involving slaying and skinning a cow and the use of a ceremonial oven. A large park surrounds the Temple, and I followed my ears to find a patch of grass covered with people dancing to traditional Chinese music. Whilst happily snapping photos of dancing couples, an elderly Chinese gentleman motioned for me to dance with him. I am keen to promote good Anglo-Chinese relations, and therefore I happily accepted. He was an excellent leader and soon we were dancing to the same rhythm. The problem came when he tried to spin me around, as I am a good head taller than most Chinese people, but we made do and it was certainly an experience I feel lucky to have had.

No visit to Beijing would be complete without a trip to the Silk Market, which sells literally anything and everything. I love a good bargain and the vendors will ask an outrageous price for something. You haggle it down, and usually end up paying about 10% of their original price because, for you, they 'do very good price, lady, very good price!' I found that this was another interesting way to do McGuire contacts, and I notched up high numbers very quickly indeed as everyone is so keen to talk to you (and sell you useless rubbish!).

Thursday brought an overnight train to Shanghai, which is where I am writing this from. The train was clean and comfortable, and each cabin slept 6 people. There was plentiful hot water for the pot noodle eaters amongst us, and it was a pleasure to wake up and do my McGuire warm up with the Chinese countryside passing by.

Shanghai is a wonderful city; architecture is incredibly modern, yet intertwines well with historical buildings on the Bund, the main tourist area. On Friday night I went to 'Amazing Friday' Toastmasters and spoke at Table Topics again. I felt that this week went better because the goal for Beijing Toastmasters was simply to speak, and to be honest, I was so nervous that I had no idea what I was saying or how. This week, I was much more aware of what I said and I used strong, eloquent technique. I still did not win the weekly 'best speaker' vote, but I am proud of myself and if I keep going to these meetings whenever I can, one day I might win a ribbon!

I have now been in China for one week and below are some observations about Chinese life that I have noticed so far:

* Boyfriends carry their girlfriends' handbags for them, irrespective of size, shape or colour
* A 'green man' symbol at traffic lights does not mean it is safe to walk or that cars will stop for you. Cars only stop if they hit you, or if they are a taxi driver looking for a fare
* One day, a red wrapper Magnum might be a milk chocolate covered ice-cream. The next day, the same red wrapper Magnum might be white chocolate covered ice-cream. Just eat it.
* Every hostel and hotel I have stayed in so far has had a plentiful supply of new toothbrushes and I have used a new one every day.
* The Chinese love taking photos of Westerners! I have been asked by so many people to be photographed with them that at first I thought they had mistaken me for someone famous...but then I realised they just really like Western people. It's very sweet.


Next up is the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an, so expect an update from me soon!

In search of little puffs of heaven‏

This week has mainly been spent adjusting to China time, relaxing and getting ready to start the next phase of my adventure. To this end, my days have mainly been filled with working on my speech, finding shops that sell Magnum icecreams (at 45p for a double caramel Magnum, it would be rude not to!) and trying to correctly order steamed pork buns (a.k.a. 'little puffs of heaven' as they shall henceforth be known for the purposes of this blog). A few times I have inadvertently ordered pickled onions because the pictures look suspiciously similar, which has been very disappointing. Food here is a conundrum to me because I cannot read the chinese characters on menus and even the pictures on supermarket food confuse me. For breakfast on Wednesday, I ate yoghurt with crackers because on the box the crackers looked like cereal and when I was preparing it, I didn't notice until after I had added the yoghurt. I still ate it though!

My sightseeing has included the Olympic site and 'Birds Nest', the Imperial Palace and Tiananmen Square, where I ensured I said hello to the big guy. I am saving the big sites such as the Great Wall, Temple of Heaven, Forbidden City and Summer Palace until next week as I thought it might be nice to see them with the group. Beijing is exactly like I thought it would be: grand imperial buildings interspersed with 'hutongs'- local neighbourhoods full of character. The people have surprised me; they are so friendly and helpful and will do whatever they can to assist you in any way, even if they do not speak English. One subway worker actually ran after me brandishing an English subway map because she knew I would find it difficult to navigate with the Chinese version.

Yesterday I visited numerous Hutongs to get a feel for 'real Beijing' and to see how normal people live. I came across a park with some old men playing Mahjong at one of the tables, which is a special game in our family as our dear Grandad taught my cousins and I how to play many years ago and we love breaking out the board at Christmas and other celebration times. On the way back to the hotel, I visited Donghuaman night market, which is a huge market selling really interesting food to locals and adventurous tourists, such as fried scorpions and centipedes, icecream on bread (I didn't really get this one) and fried birds nests, among other things. I also saw grilled snake skin and grilled octopus, the latter of which smelt absolutely vile and the smell was still on my clothes when I got back, so I'm doing a boil wash right now!

One issue which plagues me constantly is that I have become lost numerous times. This is very unlike me, as I have a sense of direction like a homing pigeon, but it has led to some rather unexpected events. On Wednesday, I was very lost and a nice passerby offered to walk with me to the subway so I could find my way back to the hotel. During our walk, he explained that he was practising his English because he was speaking at a 'Toastmasters' club the following day. Never one to pass up a speaking opportunity, I asked if I could go with him to Toastmasters and participate in the 'Table Topics' section (for those who are unfamiliar: you are asked to speak for a certain period of time on a completely random topic). I thought this would be a good idea because I have not done any public speaking since Newcastle in April and obviously that was a long time ago in terms of my speaking practice. Thursday night rolled around and I was quite nervous but also excited to do this. I ended up speaking for 3 minutes in front of a room full of strangers, pretending that I held the Guinness World Record for the longest hair. I received positive feedback, including: 'very natural speaker', 'engaging' and 'funny' so obviously my backhander bribes worked!

In other news, I have been feeling slightly under the weather this week with swollen glands and a cold, and I have almost exhausted my supply of Lemsip. When I entered China, there were thermo body scanners at immigration that everyone must walk through to detect if you have any kind of illness. I wasn't unwell enough for them to stop me, which I was obviously happy about because I couldn't face being sent back to Vancouver airport for another long wait. Yesterday however, my Mexican roommate Katherine emailed me to say that she had been diagnosed with Swine Flu since returning home to England on Sunday so I'm really hoping that this isn't anything more than a common cold... If I start to oink and grow a curly tail, I'll let you all know. Maybe eating lots of little puffs of heaven will cure me?!

Mexico Madness!

On Friday night, I went to 'Luche Libre' at Mexico City Arena, which I cannot say enough about! There were 6 fights in total, 2 female and 4 male, and the women were so much more vicious than the men. They were tearing each other apart! I have two specific highlights I would like to share; one fighter was a tiny man dressed as a blue bear (I'm unsure of the politically correct way to say this but he was a very small man, dwarf, midget etc), and his tag team partner would lift him up onto the ropes so he could jump down onto the opponents. Sheer brilliance. Then, the 'main event' was 'Mistico', supposedly the best fighter in Mexico right now. He got beaten up quite badly during the first round but really showed his prowess during the second and third round by doing some crazy wrestling moves that made the crowd go wild! My voice was hoarse after screaming and cheering so much! I am so grateful that I got the chance to see this as it is entrenched in Mexican culture and I would highly recommend that anybody visiting Mexico should make the effort to go. They confiscated our cameras before we went inside, so sadly the only memories I have are in my mind.

I arrived in Beijing last night after a mammoth journey that involved me crying 3 times...I think it was the tiredness more than anything else because I made the genius decision to not sleep on Saturday night and go straight to the airport in Mexico City for my Sunday morning flight, which I swiftly regretted! Anyway, I arrived in Vancouver to change planes, to find that my flight was delayed by 8 hours due to typhoon weather in China. Thankfully, I had my clicker and used the time to do some McGuire contacts which made the delay go quite quickly and I had lots of conversations with random strangers.

Before arriving in Beijing I had heard that no one speaks English but I wasnt sure how true this was. I got off the airport shuttle at my designated stop, and had written the name and address of my hostel on a sheet of paper in Chinese characters, but 5 taxi drivers later, I was slightly worried that no one understood my handwriting either. Starting to panic, as it was 2am by this time, I met two lovely Chinese boys who could speak English, and they did everything they could to help me. Once they knew where the hotel was, they translated to a taxi driver who took me to a dirt road not lit with any lights, and the hostel was at the end of it. As I walked down this dark road with all my belongings strapped to my back, I reflected on how I am completely at the mercy of the kindness of strangers, and every time, people surprise me with their generosity. I will forever be thankful to those two boys who didn't have to help me but did, and I know I'll never forget their faces as I was driving away in the taxi and they shouted 'WELCOME TO BEIJING!'