Mar 2009

After shopping up a storm under the Shanghai sky, it was time to move on for some Beijing Bling. We took a very flash overnight train (more flash than most of the hostels and guesthouses we've stayed in of late) from Shanghai to Beijing. Boarding a train in China is rather like boarding a plane: xray your stuff, get herded into a waiting lounge and then wait until the train police open the gates to the platform, at which point the idea is to run like hell to the train or get out of the way while the rest of China runs like hell to the train (a seemingly pointless persuit seeing as everyone has an allocated seat or bed).

On arriving in Beijing we were greeted with the capital's concession to Olympic security: xray machines in metro stations. It seems to be perfectly acceptable to carry pocket knives and kitchen knives on the train, but deodorant spray cans are serious contraband and we found ourselves unpacking Glenn's bag in order to surrender our security threat. We checked into our guesthouse in a traditional Chinese Hutong and then set out to check out Tian'anmen Square and the Forbidden City. Again, the security presence is well felt and we queued for quite some time before security deemed us safe to trod on Tian'anmen Square. The place was an absolute madhouse with Chinese tourists keen to have their photo taken under Mao's picture and, grand as it was, Tian'anmen Square felt rather sterile and not the kind of place for weekend picnics and kite flying.

Mao overlooks Tian'anmen Square

Possibly our biggest Chinese highlight thus far has been our visit to the Great Wall of China. We were determined not to simply take a bus out to the closest section, see it, touch it and leave. Instead we took a three hour bus trip out to the Jinshanling section and hiked 10km to the Simatai section. It was excellent. Knee-knackering but excellent. Many parts of the wall were crumbled and some sections were virtually vertical. We saw probably 20 other hikers on our section of the wall and we were accompanied periodically by several ageing Chinese hawkers selling anything from water to t-shirts to beer. The air was clear and the wall was visible for miles, though unfortunately the Chinese government are at present building an expressway very close to the wall which is sure to destroy the mystery and tranquility of that section of the wall. On reaching Simatai, we took a zip-line (Bec: A Chinese zipline? Hell no!! I've seen Chinese safety standards!! Glenn: It's either that or walk another 40 minutes to the bottom. Bec: Alright, but you're going first.) across a ravine to a restaurant in the nearby village. In all, an excellent experience.

On the Great Wall

The old-world Great Wall under the new-world flight path

'Look mum, no hands!!' Bec defies death on a Chinese zip-line

The next day we took our painful selves (OK, Bec's painful self) to the Olympic Stadium and the Water Cube. Again, cue Chinese security. The Stadium is certainly an engineering masterpiece and we were able to have a run around inside the Stadium.

The Birdsnest

And so the shopping continued. Bec bought two more pairs of boots and a jacket (and was decidedly smug with herself and her bargaining abilities) and Glenn continued with the bike-bit-buying mission, this time being asked to supply cheap goods rather than buy them.

The joy of travelling in Beijing so soon post-Olympics is that Beijing is immaculate. The metro is super clean and self-explanatory, public toilets are everywhere, English menus abound and all the major attractions are still gleaming from their pre-Olympic make-overs.

Beijing bling

The traffic is mental, though we found it to be more manageable than Shanghai. China's road rules seem to be more 'guidelines' than rules and bike and scooter riders are a law unto themselves. The whole thing seems to work though and we've not witnessed any accidents as yet (this is probably attributed to a law which dictates that foreigners cannot drive in China).

Beijing bike parking

A store selling police equipment. Maybe a set for the Triton or the Barina?

Our food experience continued in Beijing with a plate of traditional roast duck and our first introduction to a Chinese hotpot (huge and hot, obviously). Beijing's night food market is an impressive display of star fish, grasshoppers, seahorses and over-priced noodles all for the eating.

Duck carving

Star fish and sea horses feature on the market menu

And again, time to move on......

After two nights in transit (overnight train in upright seats from Ljubljana to Zurich, overnight flight from Zurich to Shanghai) we arrived in Shanghai very stinky and almost comatose from lack of sleep and serious head colds.

We took the MAGLEV (one of the fastest trains in the world which operates by magnetic levitation) from the airport to the outskirts of the city at a very tidy 431km/hour. The cars on the parallel freeway looked like they were going backwards and the whole trip took only eight minutes. After a bit of confusion at the metro station over trains not running, we eventually made it to our hostel and got into beds we didn't get out of again for two days.

The Maglev's speedo at 430km/hour

We'd been really looking forward to getting back to Asia. We love the food, the smells and generally just the feel of Asian countries and we weren't disappointed when we finally woke up to look out our window and find a woman cooking noodles on a street stall. We woke up to the smell of her cooking every morning for six days.

Mmmmm, street stir-fry

On eventually leaving our hostel, we wandered along the Bund (Shanghai's riverside) and watched the hundreds of barges and cruise boats go by and then strolled through the neon madness that is Shanghai's Nanjing Road. We fobbed off countless entrepeneurs keen to sell us knock-off watches and skate shoes, determined to do our own bargaining in Shanghai's clothing markets.

Ad boats on the Bund

Neon on Nanjing

Our shopping mission started out with a research trip to a few big-name department stores to find that the prices were all very western and that the best bargains would be found in local markets. Glenn made an absolute killing at the Shanghai Motorcycle Market where he bought gloves, knee guards, elbow guards and body armor for well below retail cost in Australia. Bec wasn't quite so successful in her boot-buying mission coming away with only three pairs. We sent our first carton of Chinese acquisitions home three days after arriving in China.

Shanghai Motorcycle Market

Shanghai seems to have a bit of a reputation for being Beijing's poor cousin in terms of tourist attractions. This may be true, but we still enjoyed the very kitch (and again very neon) Bund Tourist Tunnel and an eye-popping performance by a group of Chinese acrobats.

More neon inside the Bund Tourist Tunnel

The food in Shanghai was excellent, though we seem to have lost some of our ability to eat with chopsticks. We often eat from street stalls so that we can point and order, rather than play the food lottery in restaurants with no English menus. Not all plans are foolproof, however. We went to a restaurant next door to the hostel which had a vague kind of English menu. We pointed at beef and chicken and then said 'noodles'. The waitress looked confused for a minute before holding her hands far apart to indicate something long. Yep, excellent, noodles thanks. Not so. What actually arrived was a big eel, chopped into bits (with the exception of its head which sat proudly staring at us through seared eyes atop the plate) and stirfried to death in oyster sauce and it took us about half an hour to pick the bones out of it with our chopsticks. Entertainment ++ for the locals. Naturally we were wondering how much our eel speciality was going to cost us.The whole meal cost us 55 yuan ($12) for three mains and a beer so we were thinking that we got the food poisoning fish (the fish sit in tubs of water out the front of the restaurants, this particular eel shared its water with a bunch of cane toads about to become Braised Bullfrog) rather than the super-expensive tourist fish and set about drinking copious quantities of preventative beer in keeping with the theory that alcohol on the skin kills bacteria, thus alcohol in the stomach will do likewise. We were naturally very grateful that we got a plate of eel and not a plate of stirfried snake or braised bullfrog.

Toads, fish and squid await their stir-frying in plastic tubs in front of restaurants

After a week in Shanghai, it was time to head for Beijing...........

The overnight train to Zagreb was uneventful, though not particularly restful. We hadn’t really intended on spending any time in Zagreb but found enough things to keep us occupied for a day or two, including the King of Carnival exhibition at the Ethnographic Museum and a stroll through some of Zagreb’s many parks. We seemed also to spend a lot of time looking for things that don’t actually exist, or are so well hidden they may as well not exist (namely Zagreb’s Sports museum). Temperatures were warmer, but not warm enough for us to need to put things in the fridge rather than hang them from the window grates outside.

The train trip from Zagreb to Ljubljana in Slovenia was very scenic and the border crossing uneventful asides from Bec being assigned a new pronunciation of her name; Rebechecha Yentra (apparently double hard c’s and j’s defy Slovenian language capabilities). Ljubljana is a gorgeous city with a relaxed vibe. The city market provides good food and good views, as does the town square and we spent quite a few hours eating Burek (cheese or meat rolled in filo pastry and formed into a pizza shape) and people watching below the main monument.

Pretty Ljubljana town

A local woman sells her wares in Ljubljana

Burek-fast, Slovenian style

Never able to pass up a funicular, we rode it to the castle on the hill above Ljubljana. Possibly the best description of the castle could be found in the castle’s visitors book as ‘This castle is not very castle-like’.

'This castle is not very castle-like'

We like to listen to languages (without having to participate ineptly in conversations) and the local puppet theatre had a show on so we went and watched Supramiska (SuperMouse, or so we thought) with about 50 sub-seven year-olds and their parents. Initially we felt a bit dodgy on account of being childless but we soon got over it and enjoyed the very basic 45 minute performance of which we understood absolutely nothing. The following day as we walked past the theatre we saw a sign out the front that translated Supramiska to mean Skip Mouse, not Super Mouse. Turns out we watched a show about a dumpster rat.

Dumpster mouse

It was impossible for Glenn to be in Ljubljana and not try the horseburger.

Horseburgers

Lake Bled is about an hour away from Ljubljana by bus and we took a day trip there and circumnavigated the 6km around the partially frozen lake. Virtually a ghost town in winter, it’s easy to see how it’s a tourist magnet in summer.

Lake Bled

From Ljubljana we took an overnight train to Zurich for our onward flight to Shanghai........

From Mostar, we took a very beautiful train journey full of tunnels and switchbacks north to Sarajevo. After arriving at Sarajevo’s train station, we legged it to the tram line to get into town. Sarajevan tram scams are well documented and we’d have been a bit miffed if we weren’t exposed to one while we were there. We weren’t disappointed, though. No one at the tram stop seemed too keen on selling us a ticket and neither did the tram driver who waved us onto the tram and motioned for us to sit down as we tried to hand him money. Lo and behold, at the next stop a pair of ‘conductors’ get on the tram and demand our tickets. Unable to produce tickets, we were promptly turfed off the tram and ordered to pay 26 Bosnian convertible mark each ($26AUD). While the ‘conductors’ faked attempts to ring the police over our refusal to pay, our British friend from Mostar used his most persuasive and baffling English in the hope that they’d give up. Undeterred, the ‘conductors’ continued to pretend to call the police, at which point we decided that the best course of action was to take them with us to a police station, wait for an available police officer, wait for an English translator and hopefully waste enough of their time that they’d give up. None too keen on going to the police station or producing their ‘conductors’ identification, our ‘conductors’ backed off and we walked off. According to our hostel owner, what usually happens is that a bunch of tourists will get on a tram and the driver will refuse their money or motion for them to sit down. The driver will then ring his mates, the ‘conductors’, who then get on the tram at the next stop and inspect tickets. The driver then takes a cut out of any ‘fine’ that might be paid.

Though feeling slightly annoyed at then having to carry our bags all the way into town, we were pacified somewhat to find we’d been chucked off the tram in front of the Sarajevo Holiday Inn (home to the world’s journalists during the war) which we wouldn’t have noticed had we been on the tram.

Home to the world's journo's during the war

Sarajevo is a lovely city full of market stalls selling all manner of things from cotton to copper, lovely parks and rehabilitated buildings. War damage is still apparent in Sarajevo, though less so than Mostar. The city dwellers are very modern and the parks are full of men playing chess on giant chess boards on the ground.

Outdoor chess, snow and all

Possibly the biggest danger we faced in Sarajevo was death by falling icicle. Temperatures were consistently sub-zero and dumps of snow and huge chunks of ice were falling with massive thuds from the roofs of buildings.

Icicles cling to roof gutterings

Again, several new cemeteries have arisen throughout town and it’s desperately sad to read the headstones of so many young people.

Flowers punctuate the somber white expanses of Sarajevo's cemeteries, while cranes in the background continue the clean up effort

Sarajevo has some interesting museums, among them a dedication to the 1984 Winter Olympics and a museum of BiH history located at the spot from which Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, subsequently sparking the start of World War 1.

Site of the death of Franz Ferdinand

Bosnian food suits us well and cevapcici (little spicy sausages served with pita bread, onion and yoghurt) became a favourite very quickly. Likewise, the beer didn’t disappoint.

Leaving Bosnia and Herzegovina, we took the overnight train to Zagreb in Croatia.

After being delayed in Dubrovnik a day or two on account of all the snow, we finally managed to set off for Mostar, in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Going to BiH (as abbreviated by the locals) is one part of the trip we’d both really been looking forward to, Glenn to see the bridge in Mostar and Bec to just get a general feel for the country itself. Given that pretty much all we know of BiH is war-related, we were pretty keen to see what else it had to offer.

We arrived by bus into Mostar mid-morning and, together with a British guy we met on the bus, took ourselves on a walking tour of the town. War damage is everywhere. Bullet-scarred and burned out buildings are the norm rather than the exception and although many of the shopfronts have been repaired, the upper floors the buildings remain largely derelict. Churches and office blocks loom abandoned.

A church and an office block await rehabilitation

War damaged buildings and houses are common

We were warned by well-meaning locals not to stray off well-worn paths for fear of landmines and many of the crumbling buildings sport warning signs. The locals capitalise on the sheer number of spent bullets and shell cartridges by turning them into elaborate pens and vases and selling them to tourists.

Mostar market stalls

Several new cemeteries can be found around town and it is very, very sad to read the headstones of so many young people all with the same date of death. (A bit by Bec: Initially I found it to be very overwhelming and very confronting, almost to the point of dizziness. I found it very difficult to look at all the destroyed and damaged buildings and not let my mind imagine the type of horror experienced by the townspeople. I found myself looking at women my age in the street and thinking that at 15 years old, when I was fighting with my mum about going to the Bundaberg show , these women were most likely experiencing sheer and absolute terror like we’ll never know. I’d also look at people in the street and wonder how many loved-ones they’d lost through the fighting and wonder how they can now go about their daily lives.)

The people of Mostar appear to be getting on with their daily lives and the reconstruction effort is continual. The Mostar bridge (destroyed during the war) was reconstructed and reopened in 2004 and dotted around town are signs that read ‘Don’t Forget’. Mostar has a beautiful and vibrant old town and is a magnet for summer tourists. We spent three days wandering the streets of the old town and exploring (carefully, on well-trodden paths) the area.

Mostar's bridge

Signs like this one urge people not to forget and are found throughout the old town

Business as usual