The great loop of China - April 2018 - Page 3

Before leaving Beijing, I took a walk to breakfast, through a Hutong. I found a Cafe Bene which I think is a Korean brand. I had a really good coffee there but it was somewhat ruined by a large group of French tourists who came in and were all dying. They needed to go to the hospital! One woman actually passed out and hit her head on the table, and jolted herself back to life. If I die of a disease while here, blame these French people! I burnt my throat drinking my coffee as fast as I could so I could leave, I wished I got a take away.

If a taxi isnt terrifying enough, you can go in a 3 wheeled electric motorbike taxi. Most of the time they dont tip over.

Here is the street scene outside of Cafe Bene. The trees here will form a complete canopy over the street soon, lots of streets in Beijing are like this.

The Beijing West station is quite far from the centre of the city, and even further from the central business district, this isnt the station itself but it was obvious its a highly developed area.

Here is a small part of the station, I could not get it all in the photo, to do so would mean trying to cross the road, there were fences to prevent that.

The inside of the station is quite modern, but not as modern as the more modern stations which have more modern amenities.

Once you get nearer your platform, you go into a crowded waiting room, and do whatever you can to prevent a line from forming!

The trains. I do like trains. I especially like ones that go really fast.

The inside of the train. These are very long trains, there are 3 classes, I am in the cheapest class of course, I travel among the people. There are also 2 dining cars, although one is exclusively for first class. Carts full of food and drink come past constantly. The trains are fast and very very quiet, I was also surprised at the lack of lung particles being coughed up constantly, most people went to sleep and were silent.

Zhengzhou East station. It reminded me of Shin-Osaka.

Here is a view of Zhengzhou new city, its quite far from where I am now which is the old city, hence the title of todays chapter.

I was a bit early to head to my hotel to check in so I looked for food. Duck necks were on offer, I didnt feel like crunching on vertebrae, so I went to....a bakery! I thought I had ordered cheese on toast, it got heated up for me, and looked good, then I bit into it and it was sweet. It is indeed cheese on toast, but with blueberry filling. Surprisingly nice!

Finding my hotel was not hard. It stands out above everything and has a UFO on the top. I already described checking in, it seems to be a great hotel and I think I am paying about $55 a night. It was just about the only hotel I could find to book in Zhengzhou.

Now we get the pics of my room, its actually an apartment, absolutely enormous.

It has a full kitchen and full sized fridge. The stove and oven is hidden under that blanket thing, I dont think it has ever been used.

I also get a view in 2 directions. Now this is going to look like I am staying in the middle of a bomb site, but the newer buildings are on the other side of the hotel which is the main shopping pedestrian street and enormous mall area.

Since I am on a corner I also get a different view out of my bathroom, which is also huge. After taking this photo I went downstairs to buy some drinks to put in my huge fridge and the police were on my floor with the staff trying to get into someones room! They motioned for me just to keep going, I did.

The mall area outside of my hotel has shops, a lot like what I remember from the crossing into Shenzhen from Hong Kong. To try and get young people to loiter, they have erected the worlds ultimate selfie station.

It is hard to tell in this photo, but this entire roof is a 3d screen. Things jump out at you. I never really saw anything like it before.

This is the central railway station. It does have high speed services, but I couldnt get one to Xian (my next destination). I recently realised the station that I am leaving from on Monday is not connected to the subway. It is however connected to the high speed line from the central station, so I checked if I could get a ticket between two high speed stations in Zhengzhou, and I could! On Monday I will take a 6 minute train ride.
I realise the above sounded very confusing, because it is.

This is the inside of what I thought would be a modern shopping centre. There are multiple levels of this.

This huge building is also what I think is just wholesale junk clothes markets. There were signs suggesting levels 9 and 10 were restaurants but I couldnt get up there, the place seemed shut.

I cant really convey the intersections in still photos, look at all those little things parked in the middle of the road..... there are no traffic lights!

This is also a wholesale clothing market. It was also shut. I then realised there was a whole other world under me, and that crossing the street in the traffic above ground was only for fools and long haired lost Australians.

There are lots of alleyways filled with food carts and little food stands such as this, 3 identical ma la tang shops in a row. They didnt really have anywhere to sit though, so I moved on.

This is back right by my hotel, the cold comfort of neon and stores that are open and trying to attract regular customers.

I descended into the underground, and wandered around a very long maze of little stores and people mingling about doing what they could to avoid what was going on above ground. I couldnt find any food down here which I thought was weird.

Then I realised theres mored than one level underground. Basement level 2 has a food 'street'.

I found ma la tang sushi train style, just like the ultra expensive fusion place by my house in Melbourne that charges $38 per person. Here in Zhengzhou, all you can eat is $3. There was no English, and there was some confusion as there are 6 soup choices. The way this all works is you get a bowl of soup on your own personal hot plate, you take things off the train and cook them yourself.
The boss came out from the kitchen and spoke really fast Chinese to me, I told him I can try and understand if he speaks slowly. He told me I am the first American customer he ever had.

This is Erqi square monument, it was constructed to memorialize a labour strike in 1927. I assume many people died. Nothing much of significance happens in China unless many people die. Now its the centre of the city, and about 100 metres from my hotel.

On the way back I decided to stop and lose all my money throwing neon hoops at plush toys.

The wet modern entrance area to the Shaolin temple, home of the kung fu panda movie, and apparently home of all kung fu and related activities.

Despite the rain, so many people! They seemed to be having an amazing time splashing about. Seemingly like they had waited their whole lives to be here. The entrance fee was exorbitant, over $20 Australian dollars! I did notice that the parking lots in the area where the monks live were filled with Range Rovers, Audi's and a Rolls Royce!

You can buy the fighting baby figures everywhere in Asia, not just in China, I guess they originate from here?

Not everything is sparkling and new, I wandered off the path to this abandoned area with no other people. I went closer to climb over the back of this but I was concerned it might collapse.

If you dont take the shuttle buses that run along a parallel road, you can get a decent walk here up a tree lined road. This is pre massive downpour, later this was a river.

I entered one of the temple areas. Most of it looked new, but apparently the trees are sacred and ancient, most people seemed very interested in the trees.

The temples here were stacked together with lots of trees, hard to get a clear shot, I couldnt tell if they were old or new, some of the things inside looked old but they kept it so dark you couldnt really tell what you were looking at. There were plenty of oohs and ahhs from the locals.

Incense burning was a popular fun activity. I think you are supposed to light it here and carry it somewhere else. This idea was not going too well for many people in the rain. It was also damn slippery, I saw 3 people slip over trying to walk down stairs in the rain carrying their incense stick in one hand and photographing it with the other.

That all looks new to me!

This is the final temple, where you get to fight Lord Raiden.

I found another secluded area, with steps leading to it, which meant I had it to myself to look at the statue, and soak up some mud.

I bought a coat, despite buying the coat from an unofficial vendor inside the park, it was less than $1. It did the job. When I left later on, despite being among the first to leave, there were already 3 metric tonnes of discarded coats.

This was the best part of the experience for me, the pagoda forest. I think the photos were actually improved because of the rain and fog.

I enjoyed the pagodas enough to take two photos of them.

This is the area where you can see the live show. I did not get to see it. There were waaaaaay too many people for the 11:30 show and the next wasnt until 2pm, this was right around the time of the torrential downpour. I suspect this is the main attraction, it has lasers. I have also seen news stories about amazing feats of lifting weights attached to monks scrotums and breaking planks on a guys erect penis! Really, apparently they do that here in the show!
It was raining way too much to wait in a line for 3 hours to find out.

Instead I beat a path to the exit, a number of small Chinese children seemed to want to fight me. Only me. Like fighting invading westerners was part of their training? Also, I did not see a single monk all day in the orange robes. I did see a bunch of kids guarding the living quarters in red tracksuits, I presume they are pre-monk.

A plastic coated family. Note the bootie things on their feet, you can buy them too. Everyone slipping over had bought those booties. I have no idea how to spell bootie.

Through this heavily guarded compound is where the monks live and train.

After sitting on a shuttle bus until it filled, I was relieved when it arrived back at Dengfeng new bus station - yes this is the new station. Here I was able to buy a return ticket to Zhengzhou departing almost immediately! I was thrilled with this.

I had just enough time to take a photo of a street in Dengfeng out the front of the bus station. Some parts we went through on the bus looked really nice with gardens and monuments, this was not one of those places.

After arriving back in Zhengzhou, I decided to go through the tunnels back to my hotel rather than cross the damp streets. This is what I saw, miles of this. Progress was slow! Luckily I only had to go a few hundred metres, but maps on the wall suggest the tunnels of people with cardboard boxes of polyester baby clothes are extensive. There are also two underground levels of this! The worst fire in modern history could happen here.

On the old side, a clothing market has been set up in the puddles in the mall immediately next to the street food stalls.

This is still the old side, but things are looking up, these are all restaurants. Nearly everything was a hot pot of some kind, generally only suitable for groups of people, often featuring bullfrog.

Here you can see a whole heap of street food stalls. Everything comes served on a stick, obviously there is nowhere to sit and relax. The sticks make a huge mess.

I found the only place suitable for solo diners as mentioned above, it just happens to be the same as I had last night, which just happens to be delicious.

Then I found a different eating area with more street food inside a shed which I had assumed was a construction site, as you will see, it kind of is! This place was buzzing with excitement, the tiles were deathly slippery, a mixture of oil, mud and water.

You want crab? Its been there all day waiting for you. She looks thrilled.

And here we have the border between eating area and demolition site. See how the food stalls back directly onto a mini rubbish dump? Tier 88.

It seems it is pineapple season, heres another pineapple rice stall, but there were people dancing around selling pineapples in the street too.

Various meats on sticks for your dining pleasure. Maybe dog! Who knows?

Most Chinese cities seem to enjoy decorating their public spaces like this.

Here we have the busy Erqi square and tower, looking back towards the old side of town from a road overpass, with all the neon from the pedestrian street. The hotel on the left with the big LED design on it and flying saucer on the roof is where I am staying.

A bit more view of the chaotic street scenes. I stood here for a while just watching.

Now we move into new mall territory. This one is not quite as new as the next.

This is the newest mall around, its very fancy, I think MixC is an international brand, having also outlets in at least Taiwan and Korea.

Inside they have an are of fake blossoms for your selfie-ing pleasure.

The inside of this place is very nice, much like a brand new mall in Australia like Chadstone, only in China they cant get as much real estate so build higher instead. This one is 9 levels.

The basement has an excellent Ole international supermarket, and more pineapples. I love Ole. Ole please come to Australia!

There is also a xiao mi store, I also love xiao mi, their toothbrushes never wear out. I was able to check out some of their products other than their phones, before now I had only seen pictures online.

And for my last photo this evening, here is a shaved wolf. He seemed happy enough to be shaved, proudly parading himself for photos with everyone. I have not really seen many dogs here, in Beijing everyone had a silly little white dog, or a colored poodle. I suspect they do here also but there is not a lot of residential buildings where I am staying.

This is a crop to get some zoom so might be a bit pixelated, but what the hell is that huge roof over the top of a suburb? I couldnt get close enough to see, it looks like it could cover a football stadium.

Share bikes are also popular here, popular enough for piles to form, stay tuned for more piles.

The main brand of everything here is Dennis, they own malls, department stores, supermarkets, bus lines. They need a new name.

If you have been to China / Japan / Korea / Taiwan before then you are probably familiar with the daily pep talk from the manager. Here in ZZ that extends to the food delivery scooter drivers, who stand to attention to hear stories about the cultural revolution and how they apply to getting someones boiled duck neck soup delivered to them while it is still hot. Yes, I am just going to say ZZ from now on.

SO. MANY. PUBLIC. TOILETS.

Apparently ZZ used to be known as the tree lined city. Then they decided to widen the streets and most trees were lost. There are still some streets left like this one that are completely enclosed by trees. With the wind and blossoms and trees and spring, I today found out I suffer from hayfever. I was having sneezing fits outside but as soon as I went indoors it stopped.

Outdoor shopping mall musical theatre.

I beat all these Chinese people at ping pong.

Somehow, they are managing a 4 bin recycling system in this park, impossible!

This was just one of many parks today, the quietest of those that I visited, still nice though.

This is a new apartment complex, there are probably 10 or so 'streets' of identical buildings. The bottom of every one of these streets is 3 levels of shopping mall, quite modern and nice inside.

Basically no one at all rides their own bike anymore. I suspect all bike shops are out of business. One day the same thing will happen with cars, the autonomous car cloud will take over, and all car dealers will go broke immediately.

3 electric long nose school buses. So much of everything is electric, you have to be really careful crossing roads and footpaths because you cant hear them coming.

Now I am at a new area, a giant circle of new. Its so large I took a photo of the map, because I wont be able to capture it all in a photo.

Before attacking the circle, I stopped for coffee at Holly's coffee. The barista decided to use my coffee to train all the staff in how to make coffee. They made it together 3 times before they were satisfied which was really weird. All the staff watched with great interest. Admittedly it was a truly fantastic coffee.

Part of the circle of new. This photo did not come out well, please scroll past.

That is the convention centre, I think, or an art gallery.

The selfie spot has a frame, I failed to get my big head, the frame and the building in the shot together. My head is blocking most of the view.

Here is the back of the convention centre. How is that 4 bin system working out?

The outer ring of the giant circle is one huge endless shopping mall. If it were raining in ZZ I could get all my steps just running around it non stop.

For my mother mainly, heres the inside of the mall. Sparkling clean.

Now I headed north along a tree lined street, where a new pipe was being installed. A great place to park your share bike.

Look at all the cables! And the open box where all the cables are terminated. Amazing.

A Chinese building site. They do not mess around. You could easily build 10 apartment towers here, and they probably are.

Then I arrived at an outlet mall. I needed a drink and it had a huge Vanguard supermarket on the top floor, so in I went.

Inside the outlet mall was pretty much identical to what we call DFO or Harbourside in Australia.

The outlet mall security staff was not thrilled with all the share bikes left laying about.

Another giant Dennis department store, far from anything else. This one is 14 levels high, the top 2 levels are all restaurants.

Now I found another park with some kind of fair happening. I had to investigate.

It seems to be a farming and food technology cult recruitment drive. Like Amway, a pyramid scheme. The top sellers are winning awards. From what I can work out they sell miracle potions made from organic food that cure cancer and eliminate unwanted ghosts.

The gardens were nice though, they inspired me to sign up as a seller, anyone want to buy purple carrot pills?

This is the Henan province museum, where you can see pottery and dinosaur bones. I had no time for this.

Instead of going to the museum I helped this guy recycle some cardboard. This guy is killing the recycling market in Australia / the western world.

Meanwhile nearby at yet another mall, the local youth gangsta squad was busy warning everyone about the evils of getting involved with women.

Inside, there was a fashion parade for babies. They had the full walk / twirl / pose routine worked out. I was the only middle aged man standing there with a camera, in camo shorts, looking angry.

Upstairs you can join a craft class. I glued various revolutionary characters to a picture frame.

To celebrate my long walk, I visited a Karaoke bar and belted out a few Chinese classics.

Then I found a huge guitar store, it was actually really well stocked, but super expensive.

My journey then took me past the local drain, quite picturesque, didnt smell.

And then I arrived at a huge busy park. This was an amazing place.

First I enjoyed the muslim dancing demonstration.

Then I appreciated the Chinese opera with full orchestra. Todays opera was an epic describing the journey down from heaven of the temptress who lured the greedy traders to their death by convincing them that if they were to set themselves on fire they would turn into solid gold.

All parks have a lake and paddle boats you could hire. This one had a cool go kart track too which I didnt photograph.

The gardens were quite spectacular, look at all those people in the background enjoying themselves.

I guess I should do at least one temple photo for the day. This one was quite nice set aside in a quiet part of the park.

And then as I returned to my hotel, with my feet not even sore despite my long walk on concrete, I was attacked by this creature, who was advertising the opening of a new jewelry store. I won the fight with a finishing move of a roundhouse to its furry head.

First of all, I wandered around this whole labyrinth of a fire trap, it was just shutting, which is unusual as most things stay open late, again I suspect this place doesnt really rely on the individual shopper.

There was a crappy looking food court in a mystery hidden basement accessible only via emergency exit stairs. Tonight I did not want to peak to early and have food regrets later, as tonight is my last chance for a meal in ZZ.

To placate my hunger I decided to purchase some ancient mixed lollies, I think I was the first person to ever buy any.

It must be shift change time for the furry.

Pineapples everywhere.

This is my head, crossing the road on a pedestrian overpass, and becoming entangled in a huge mess of wires. They were no more than 5 feet above the walkway, everyone would have to duck under them. I just cut through them all with my machete.

And there she is, isnt she beautiful? DAVID PLAZA! Why is it a she if its named David? The English language is stupid.

Out the front they have placed a butterfly house. It was shut. I suspect the butterflies all flew off because there is no double door airlock thing to keep them in there.

I had to study the floor plan in detail because there were so many restaurant floor choices.

There is no doubt, China wins the world championship of casual eating venues for solo travellers. I could have eaten in any one of 50 places.

I settled on this very very delicious beef noodle soup with all the condiments. Top quality, tomato and chilli base, I added lots of chilli and vinegar, great noodles, peanuts and pickled vegetables, no regrets!

Then I headed to the basement, there had to be 100 casual eating places down here. Lots of them dessert focused but also dinner places with benches and stools to sit at. I could come back here for months and not exhaust all the options

Next up, the supermarket, notice it not only has a huge bakery, but behind it tables and chairs. They will cook you dinner in here, noodle bars, sushi bars, ma la tang, pizza that actually looked really good. It was very depressing....because in Australia we have Coles and Woolworths, where you can buy washing detergent and bread pre prepared in Ireland before being 'finished' in Australia.

Where as China has a fruit salad bar, old women were busy cutting it up fresh to order, I selected from one of the pre cut options. I always enjoy fruit salad in Asia.

Now this is a crap photo, but its here because of the technology. Inside the door of this coke fridge is a semi translucent full motion screen showing ads. You can see the drinks in the fridge, through the screen. Occasionally the image on the screen was a kind of augmented reality for the drinks behind the screen, other times like now, it shows coke being poured into a glass of ice.