Cambodia – Phnom Penh

As we started planning our winter trip south – a tradition when we live in China – we knew we wanted to return to Thailand but also thought we could add a few places to our itinerary. At first we were looking at Vietnam and Cambodia but once we found out that we would have to get rather expensive tourist visas for Vietnam, we decided to skip it. After looking at our Great Mekong guidebook, it looked like Cambodia would be a good place for biking – but more on that on future posts.

We flew into Phnom Penh and arrived before midnight. Milad had managed to fall asleep just as the plane was landing. Already on the plane, I had filled out three sets of papers for customs but once we got into the airport, we were told we had to fill in another paper to get our tourist visa. Peiman was carrying Milad and I was frantically filling out the papers. One official came over and said he could get someone to help us faster so we wouldn’t have to line up. I was grateful but it turned out this was a scam to rip us off. First the said they would accept Chinese Yuan but at a ridiculous exchange rate – 10 to 1 instead of 5 to 1. When I realized that, I quickly went to take out American dollars from the ATM and paid with that. The visa was to cost $30 so I gave them $200 and was given $100 back. I thought they were being generous and we went to line up at the immigration line. While lined up, I looked at the four visas and noticed that the price for the two adult ones was indeed $30 but the two children ones were free; therefore I had overpaid by $40. We were all annoyed but too tired to go back and do anything and decided to let it go.

Once we got our bags (for which we were grateful when we saw some people at the lost luggage line), we went outside and were pleasantly surprised to find a taxi driver standing with my name. (I have never had this happen to me and had always wished to see my name written down and being picked up – sounds silly but it’s true). The ride through the city revealed a lot of garbage and rundown housing. My daughter was not impressed. We finally arrived at our hotel and the taxi driver asked for $15. We thought that was a bit much and since he had no change for $100 and I only had $11 from before, we gave him that. He left and the hotel personnel translating said he would come back for the other $1 the next day – so the real price turned out to be $12. He deserved to lose that dollar for trying to overcharge – he never came back.

By the time we went to bed it was 2am (3am China time) and well we didn’t get enough sleep but things looked brighter in the morning. We stayed in a very lovely large family suite with two rooms with large beds, lovely furniture and large bathroom. We went off to search for more ATMs, sunglasses, bus tickets and a swimsuit for Roya (she forgot hers at home!). We found all but the swimsuit. The funny thing about getting money from the bank was that our Chinese bank cards worked much better than our Canadian one – allowing for more money to be taken out and working in more machines (at first we tried but failed with our Canadian card at a few machines, even causing one to go temporarily out of service).

Milad trying on sunglasses in the market.

Money in Cambodia is an interesting thing: there is basically a dual currency system, with US$ and Cambodian Riel. The conversion rate between the two is 1:4000 or 4100 in some stores. So you can pay with either or a combination of both. When your change is less than $1 you are give the rest in Riel. $2.50 is often given as 10 000 Riel.

Khmer restaurant for lunch near our hotel.

Inside the restaurant.

After our mostly successful outing, we went back to our hotel as Milad needed to rest, having caught a nasty cold just before our trip and not having had enough sleep. We ate at a Khmer restaurant near our hotel (Green Oasis Villa where we had a lovely stay) and went back to our room. After some attempt at making the kids rest, I decided to go to the Royal Palace nearby by myself and the rest were happy to stay at the hotel in our room or by the pool below.

I had a nice time visiting the palace – as the reviews said, it was not as grand or large (or crowded) at the one in Bangkok but it was still lovely. Here are some pictures:

After some selfies, I noticed a Chinese couple asking a guard to take their picture so I decided to do the same 🙂

The next two pics are the outside of the Silver Pagoda, whose floor is all made of silver (though mostly covered by carpet).

At the little exhibition centre outside the building area, I took a picture with the lovely statue and then took a picture of the lying down Buddha, the musicians playing some traditional Cambodian instruments and their audience.

Back outside, I thought this man sleeping in a hammock in his tuk tuk was great. Then I made my way back to hotel, snapping a few more pix.

When I got back to the hotel, I leaved that Milad had managed to badly snub his big toe whose nail he partly broke – my poor accident-prone boy! We all went down the pool area, Peiman playing the travel guitar he had made and I take a dip in the pool.

This is the view from our hotel window – interesting contrast between the peaceful inside and dusty, poor outside. But we really loved our hotel – Green Oasis Villa – with its large two room and two large bed family suite plus well-made furniture and large bathroom.

And then it was time to head out to the bus station: we may not come back to this city again, not being super impressed by it, but we did enjoy our stay at this well-located and well-priced hotel, with great service, esp. from Vishna.

Timing

As I was returning from Shanghai after a successful day in which I managed to: FINALLY get my ECNU student card (there had been a complicated problem with my registration) and passport with residence permit, as well as conduct one research interview, I was reflecting about “timing”. When I first moved back to Nanjing, I was eager to get my research going as quickly as possible (to capture my participating children’s transitions to life in China). Yet settling down took so much longer and required so much more effort than I thought it would – it basically took up my entire first three weeks. Then I spent the next few weeks following up with participants who have moved from Canada as well as looking for new sites and participants. It was all very exhausting work, with few results. I faced a lot of closed doors (or more accurately, closed school gates). But I didn’t mind that so much as I figured that the “right” research site(s) would eventually turn up and each closed gate was one step closer to that.

Yet I had my share of anxiety, such as when an email to an administrator at a promising research site received no response for two weeks. Two weeks seemed like an eternity. Now I am starting to see the wisdom in waiting patiently for things (not my strong suit). A wise friend once told me that when we ask for something, there can be three responses: “yes”, “no” and “not yet”. I don’t have a problem with the first two but the third is hard for me. I always try to change the “not yet” to “yes” but sometimes I end up changing it to “no” in the process! That’s because sometimes the timing of something is not right and not respecting that can lead to problems.

So now, I am very wary of “not yet” answers. I hear them, and I accept them. And I try to await patiently for the time when they either become “yes” or “no”. I am also reflecting a lot on the form of “not yet” answers, which are typically quite subtle. I am not very good at interpreting subtle things. But instead of just accepting that this is “how I am” I have decided to become a better reader of subtle clues, to listen carefully both to what is said and what is implied, something that will come in very handy in China, where things are often answered in very subtle ways.

So next time, you are told “not yet”, just say, “Ok. I understand.” and wait patiently for when the timing is actually right. You will be surprised by how smoothly things develop when the timing is actually right.

Reflections on Friendship

Those of you who know me know that I am sometimes critical. That is in large part a result of my upbringing and affects many aspects of my life. Something that I have not consciously realized is how I am also critical of friendships. Recently, I have been working on various personal issues and gaining new understands of myself and my relationships (past and present). At the same time, I have also had opportunities to visit with various groups of old friends (partly because I will be moving back to China soon). I have enjoyed these visits and did not feel the vague disappointment I have sometimes felt in the past when, after visiting with a group of friends, I felt like, “We didn’t talk about anything substantive.”

Don’t get me wrong. I still value deep, one-on-one discussions over other interactions but I am starting to appreciate other friendship relationships FOR WHAT THEY ARE. Basically, as with many other things, it is a matter of changing expectations. Instead of wanting things to be the way “I want”, I am starting to allow them to be what they are. And surprisingly (or not really), I am able to find new enjoyment in those friendships. In a way each friendship is special and brings something unique and that is what I am starting to see rather than looking at what is missing. The way you connect with someone is like two puzzle pieces – they fit together in a very specific way that are unique to that friendship.

Related to this is a feeling of gratitude for all the wonderful people I have in my life. Granted we are all very busy and sometimes long time passes before I am able to connect with some friends. But the wonderful thing is that, even after long absences, those friendships are still meaningful and the feelings remain unchanged. Of course there have also been some friendships that have been lost and that is always difficult. But I have accepted that and remain open to the possibility of potentially reviving those in the future. But since the possibility of that is not in my hands, I have let go of any expectations in that regard – in a way, it is interesting just to see how things will develop over time and what life will bring with it. And if a friendship is only meant to last for a short time, so be it. The duration of a friendship is not what defines it. Sometimes even a brief friendship can have a profound impact. People come into our lives for a reason and a purpose and when that reason and purpose are fulfilled, we may have to say goodbye to that friendship, grateful that we had a chance to experience it.

Bottom line, whether from the past or the present, I am very appreciative of all the people who have been there for me, cried with me, laughed with me, challenged me and made me a stronger, wiser and hopefully better person. Thank you, dear friends, one and all.

It’s a New Day – how do you want to live it?

Today is Naw Ruz, the New Year (or literally New Day) for Baha’is and Persians. For Baha’is the New Year comes after nineteen days (one Baha’i month) of fasting. The purpose of the fast is spiritual cleansing and renewal before the New Year. Except for a few years when I was pregnant or nursing, I have fasted every year since I became a Baha’i at the age of 20. Each year the fast is a unique experience – this year, it was one of those special fasts for me – probably because I had begun my “cleansing” months earlier as I dealt with personal challenges, both present and past. It was during the fast that the work I did to deal with these found a kind of resolution. But it wasn’t until last night, when I had yet another sleepless night that has become commonplace over the past few months (though the past week or so, my sleep had been much better), that I realized what I wanted to focus on in the coming year.

During this time of personal change, I have been trying to understand my automatic negative thoughts (ANTS) that caused me to have strong reactions to seemingly commonplace events. These are thoughts that I was not aware of, that had been with me for decades. Relatedly, I had also started trusting my heart and my intuition more. I have always had a very open and trusting heart but I often made decisions purely with logic and thinking; this was often effective but seeing things with my heart and intuition adds another important layer to my understanding of situations.

What’s more, I’ve been thinking a lot about friendship and those connections we feel to others. Have you ever started speaking to someone on a plane, at a lecture or elsewhere and found yourself connecting to that person, only to leave them when the plane landed or lecture ended, never to speak to them again? Or perhaps you got their contact info but never contacted them? I think it has happened to all of us. But what if that person was meant to be your friend, had something to teach you and/or you them and you missed that chance? I don’t want to miss those opportunities anymore and want to honour what my intuition tells me in those situations. So I have decided to make a more conscious effort to invest in new and existing friendships, to express the love I feel for others, and to accept friendship, in whatever form it may take, and offer it. May friendship and love cross your paths and may you follow where they lead you.

Personal Transformation and Change

For the last three months I have been going through a huge personal transformation. The source has been revisiting traumatic events from my past (childhood and youth) through writing and sharing with those closest to me. I have been making discoveries about how these events have impacted my life in ways that I literally had no idea about on a weekly and sometimes even daily basis. It has been incredible how once the door was opened, realizations started coming one after another. Part of the reason that I think I was able to go through this right now is that I have been able to build a support network of friends, family, a counsellor and a support group that have all been there for me in incredible ways. It all just kind of came together and now each of these feeds off the others and my insights continue to grow. That is not to say that it has been an easy time – in fact, it has been very challenging and difficult but I have able to keep going, have needed to keep going because these things need to be dealt with and it feels like the right time now (though understandably I have not been able to dedicate as much time as I would like to academic and other obligations). Another result has been that this is affecting my relationships with others since when one person in a relationship changes, the nature of their relationship changes as well. I hope my change has been beneficial to others as well. One day I would like to share these stories with a wider audience so that perhaps they could help others who have been through similar experiences but this is not the time for that yet.

One big change has been that by uncovering and processing pain from past, I have started to have moments of joy. It’s not that I have not had such moments in the past but I have realized that I have been living with a constant burden weighing down on me and not even realizing that it is there or what its nature is. Now there are brief moments when the burden is lifted and I feel amazing freedom, joy and am able to fully enjoy the present moment.

For those who know me know that I am a planner. I typically live in the future; hardly even in the present. I think that planning urge comes partly from fear of the unknown and fear that terrible things like those that happened in my past could strike at any time and so I must plan in order to avoid them. Of course, planning has its benefits (esp. for my research, work and life path) but it has to be kept in check so that I can actually live my life, rather than just planning it, which is truly the source of connecting to the world and to ourselves.

Another realization has been learning to love myself. I am always very critical of myself and by extension of others. But I am starting to become more gentle with myself and more loving, which is also leading to being more loving and understanding with others. It also has the benefit of being able to give myself what I need rather than expecting and demanding that others fill my needs. It feels incredible to realize that I can fulfill many of my own needs.

One of the reasons that I wanted to share this, however vaguely, with my community is that people I know often think I have it all together and all figured out. Well things could not be farther from the truth. I am just like everyone else and I know we all struggle with different aspects of our lives. Also, I hope that by reading, you may be inspired to gain the courage to go through your own transformation and to confront things you may not have dealt with in the past when it was not possible to deal with them but that maybe you can deal with them now or whenever you feel the time is right. When that time comes, I hope you feel the courage to open the door and begin your own healing journeys.

I will try to share bits and pieces of insights as time goes by and the realizations continue. There is still a long way to go on my journey and I am both excited and scared but I know I have the courage within to keep going. A special thank you to my amazing support network – you know who you are but you have no idea what incredible gifts and blessings your friendship and support have brought to my life. I will be eternally grateful for you coming into my life.

Perseverance

Perseverance has been a theme in my life this fall, as I began the second year of my PhD studies. As I embarked on my self-imposed, crazy deadlines in order to finish my comps and proposal (successfully defended 🙂 Nov. 26 on the five year anniversary of our move to China) and submit my ethics application by the end of November so that I could (hopefully) begin data collection in Jan/Feb (to be able to be in classes at least 5 months before moving to China for the next phase), I felt overwhelmed many times. One example: 16 consent forms to write and then translate into Chinese – yikes!

Two things kept me going. One was to take a deep breath and just do it, one tiny step at a time, to try not to think about the amount ahead of me. The second was the amazing help I got from friends: friends who helped me translate and those who gave me feedback on things I was struggling with, like my research questions – without you, I would not be where I am – thank you, you know who you are! There was also the encouragement. We all go through times when we lose all form of self-confidence! That’s when a friend can do wonders reminding you of what you already knew – that you are capable, that you can do it! And then a few days it’s your turn to help her. It works great that way 🙂

Roya doing “tawaza” (sp?)

As is often the case, when we struggle with something our children do so as well. So my daughter, Roya, who has been doing karate since August 2012 (along with her brother) with relative ease, reached the point where was trying to pass a belt to reach intermediate level. Suddenly things became a challenge and her first instinct was to think about quitting. We met with her teachers at Intention Martial Arts and had a LONG talk about perseverance and how when things get hard is the time to really learn perseverance. From the beginning, I’ve been impressed with how the teachers at this dojo focus on teaching virtues along with the physical aspects. The talk really made an impact on Roya, who restarted with renewed energy and dedication. At the end of the three months when it was time for her belt test, she and a friend were both awarded two belts higher because of the amazing progress they had made. It was a very proud moment and a reminder that we accomplish amazing things when we choose to persevere.

Roya at her belt test

My final reminder about perseverance came from Joyce, a Japanese-Canadian lady who had been interned as a child during World War II. We had taken our Rits-UBC exchange students on a field trip to the Nikkei Museum so they could learn about Japanese internment for our class about social exclusion in Canada. Joyce’s most difficult time was when she was a teenager, after the end of internment but before her family was allowed to return to the West Coast, when they lived on the prairies. She had to spend long days toiling on sugar beet farms to help her family make ends meet. She said this was when she learned perseverance. She felt that this made her the person she became even though she would not wish it on anyone. When her own children were teenagers they decided to pick berries as a summer job. Joyce told them if they decided to do it, they would have to persevere and do it until the end of summer. After a few days they were ready to quit but they didn’t. Joyce was proud that her children had learned perseverance. I couldn’t agree more – teaching my children perseverance is also my goal and it is great when others are able to help with this process. Perseverance is an important lesson for all of us and one that we will continue to learn as we face harder and harder challenges in life.

15 minutes a day

One of my learnings this year for me seems to be about developing consistent good habits for myself and my children. Earlier, around the time of Baha’i fast (March), I realized that I need to commit to a certain time to do my obligatory prayer if I am to remember to do it (yes, after so many years as a Baha’i I still struggle with this). It happened kind of naturally really as we are allowed to eat after sunset so I was ACUTELY aware of when sunset was. As I waited for that time of day, I realized I had not prayed yet and doing this several days, I made the conscious choice to make it part of my daily routine. This worked well because on days when I work, I get home at 5:30 and need a little time to myself before facing the family – the perfect time to pray. I also combined the prayer time with the time for my daily exercise routine. This works well for me because I am very mental and not really “in my body” most of the time but exercising made me much more present, which then helped me be present in my prayers. This routine worked really well during fast but slipped a bit afterwards then improved again. It is a work in progress but I am doing much better than I ever had before.

Another learning came a few weeks ago, thanks to our friend Matt, who is also Roya’s piano teacher. Let me just say that I think he is an amazing teacher – he is so patient and in tune with what Roya needs in terms of instruction and so flexible – I wish we had started her on piano with him much earlier! We will miss his lessons very much but are really grateful for his foundation….Back to what I learned from Matt – he and Roya started a daily practice chart where she would write how long she practiced every day. The great thing is, Matt told her at first that she should practice no more than 10 minutes a day – he was trying to develop the habit and chose such a short time so as to not encounter resistance. Well, it is now week 2 and she herself chose to move up the time on the weekends to 15 min. She feels a great sense of accomplishment when she does her time and checks it off. So I decided to do the same for the kids’ English reading – ie. have them read 15 min. with me every day. I had tried before to read “a little every day” but without a firm goal/plan, it was far from consistent. Plus when you tell them it will only be 15 minutes, it does not seem as daunting as “Come read with me (endlessly!)”

So after all this, I decided that I myself need to adopt this for my Chinese study. It has been almost a year since I stopped formal Chinese classes and I know my (intermediate) level is just not good enough (I mean esp. for my research which I want to do in China). This term was less busy than I’ve had in a long time and I started doing some Chinese on my own but again, not consistently. So today I began my 15 minutes of Chinese a day. If I want to do more, I can but it is a base I hope I can keep up with.

So if you want to work on something, why don’t you try doing it for 15 minutes a day?

Three Weeks of Craziness

It has been almost three weeks since we came back from our Thailand vacation and life has been crazy ever since. The first challenge of course was trying to adjust to the cold weather after the amazingly warm and beautiful Thailand – no small feat. Well, if that were not enough, we were greeted by mouse droppings all over the house and spend two whole days (after sleeping at the airport the night before) cleaning EVERYTHING. A note to all who live on the first floor and may get such a surprise – close your doors before you go so the mouse can only invade the main living area.

That first day Peiman actually saw the mouse in the kitchen and barricaded the kitchen door and the sewer hole through which it came but it managed to escape anyway. The next day a “mouse guy” came and looked everywhere and put out “traps” (extremely sticky cardboard with bread on it that only managed to trap my slipper two times). Well, there has been no sign of it since, though our overhead storage space we don’t use has two new holes in it. All that remains is Milad’s nightly plea of “Don’t let the rat get me!”

On a positive note, the thing that saved us before and after our trip has been our new washing machine that we are “testing” for a Chinese company that wants to sell it abroad. Well, let me tell you, we are the perfect washing machine testing family! Before we left, we had to wash all the summer clothes we were bringing on our trip because even though we had washed them all before putting them away in the fall, they still got a bit of a funny moldy smell to them. Then when we came back, we again washed all our clothes plus all the bed sheets (which we had washed before the trip but which were visited by the rat while we were gone). And, though we seldom use the dryer (yes, it actually has a dryer!), it is really great to dry bed sheets in the machine because it is hard to find enough hanging space for them in the winter.

Two days after being back in Nanjing, I received my rejection letter from U Penn. Well I have to say, I was hardly surprised by this. The whole process of applying to U Penn was one difficulty after another. They were very picky about how to send them transcripts, then they weren’t receiving them. Finally, at the last minute, I managed to get UBC to email them a copy which they accepted in the interim. All this is a very long and complicated story that I won’t bore you with but let’s just say that every step of the application process was fraught with difficulty. During that whole time, I kept thinking that this is just not meant to be and that it won’t happen because all the doors kept closing – unlike with UBC where the whole process was so smooth and easy. But I decided to test my theory and so I kept on doing all I could to make sure my application went through.

Then, a week before our trip, I received an email that I had been shortlisted by U Penn – one of about 10% of their PhD applicants. I was very happy but then realized how insane it would be for me to fly (all expenses paid by them) to U Penn for ONE DAY of meetings and conversations. And this was to happen smack in the middle of our Thailand trip – five days lost for a one day interview. Not to mention the crazy jetlag. Well though I was a bit disappointed it didn’t take long to decide to tell them I would like to skype with them instead, which they had said was not a problem. After that I heard nothing for a while and then just as we were about to go to the one place where we did not have internet, I got an email that they wanted to do a skype interview. I told them I wasn’t sure if I could skype at the time or not but got a Thai phone so I could receive free calls in case there was no internet.

It them turned out that they had internet but I had to use it in the middle of the outdoor restaurant which could be noisy. In the end, I did have my skype interview and there was no problem with the technical part but the interview was the strangest one I had ever had. Honestly, it felt like the person interviewing me had not even looked at my application! She was asking me about my research but had no comment about it. When I asked her point blank later on how she saw her work and mine matching, she paused and asked me to describe my research idea all over again. Then after a little more discussion about their program she said she had to go. That was it. That is when I knew I was not going to be accepted to U Penn. Honestly, I think she called out of obligation but that they had already selected those they were going to accept during the weekend interview.

It was at that time that I finally realized I was completely wrong for their program. Their age demographic is 21-30, no doubt most or all childless, with many coming in straight from a BA. Well that is not me at all. Not to mention that none of the professors are working in China or even Asia and though we see eye to eye on methodology I guess that is just not enough. So the rejection letter was no surprise and I was just grateful that I had enough sense to not ruin my Thailand vacation chasing after the wrong dream.

A week after coming back to Nanjing was my first day at work. The night before I did not sleep well and felt myself getting sick. That morning, like every morning, I checked my email to see if there was word from UBC. I was now super excited to be going there and felt strongly that I would be accepted but there was always that small fear of rejection. That morning, as I was about to check my email, I felt like I would actually be receiving something and there it was – an acceptance email along with a generous scholarship for my study. I was ecstatic! I went to work all happy and spent the whole day teaching in the freezing cold and feeling worse and worse. By the time I was taking the bus home, I had the chills and I knew something was very wrong because the bus was being heated (the only heated part of my whole day). Well, I went home, crawled into bed and stayed there for 6 days with a constant fever of about 39 degrees. I don’t remember the last time I got the flu like that. By the sixth day I was getting a bit worried so I called a foreign doctor that was a friend of a friend and he told me I should be fine as long as the fever went down by day eight or nine. Then, just as it had started, the fever went down. Now I still have a cough that is worse at night when my chest hurts when I cough but I feel I am on my way to a full recovery.

Knowing that we are actually leaving Nanjing in four months has put everything in perspective – not just for us, but for our friends as well. We have several groups of them who are studying Baha’i materials with us and participating in the community building process, and we want to help them as much as we can before we leave. So with the thought of accelerating their study and activities, we have been talking to them about where we would like them to be and how we can best help prepare them for their service. Well, their response has been amazing. Of course they (like we) are sad that we are leaving but the pace of all our activities has doubled or tripled. Not only that but friends who had stopped studying with us are restarting their study. It seems our departure is just the push they needed to get back on track. So now, we are very excited about all the work we will be able to accomplish before we go and have confidence that the work will continue after we are gone. I have to say, there are some truly amazing human beings in Nanjing that I have so much admiration and respect for, people who want to make a difference in their community and who have a vision of how they can help their friends and colleagues lead a more fulfilling life. We will miss them so much but they will always live on in our hearts (and we will definitely be visiting them when we move back to China even if we are not in Nanjing).

So that brings my three weeks of craziness story to an end (though I am sure it is not the end at all but just the beginning :))!!!

Train Travel in China

Travelling in China by train has proven to be very challenging. The main challenge is trying to buy tickets but the travel itself has at times been taxing as well.

Map of China

Our first difficult experience was travelling from Guilin to Nanning. We arrived about 15 minutes before the train was to depart (we had to take a bus from Yangshuo, eat lunch and then walk to the train station). The waiting room was completely packed with people standing (and a few sitting) but they wouldn’t let anyone go on the platform since the train had not arrived yet.

A “hard seat” (second class) wagon on our way to Nanning – the people standing have no seats.

The train ended up being late by maybe 20 minutes and people were even waiting outside the big waiting room. When the train finally came, people pushed and shoved their way out of the waiting room onto the platform but then we all had to drag our bags up two flights of stairs, cross to another platform and go down two flights again. Then there were huge lines in front of each car and they would only let people in on one side of each car so even though our seats were close to the front end, we had to go up from the back and then spent five to ten minutes trying to shove past people without seats to get to our seats, in which people were already sitting. I told them that those were our seats and they got up but the train was very crowded and there were many people standing without seats.

The group of youth trying to all take a picture of our kids.

We made friends with two young girls who were travelling as part of a travelling trip. (As an aside, there were over 20 young people from about 12 years old to maybe 16 travelling with one 21 year old tour guide to different cities for a week or so – something that would never be possible in Canada.) Near the end of our 6 hour trip, the young people finally got the courage to ask to take pictures of our kids; then they all stood around with their cell phones trying to get them to look, which of course they didn’t. Finally, after about 15 minutes of this, I told the kids to look up once so everyone could take their picture and then put their phones away and that more or less worked.

“Soft seat” (first class) wagon with empty seats on the way to Beihai.

After that experience, especially for my mother’s sake, we decided to try to buy soft (first class) seats for the rest of our trip. The first was to Beihai. I always thought the benefit of soft seats was a little more sitting room but actually it is that standing only people are not allowed in soft seat areas. So when we travelled to Beihai, there were even empty seats and we travelled very comfortably.

low bunk ceiling making sitting for tall people uncomfortable

However, some trains don’t have soft seats. The least comfortable was the train from Kunming to Dali, where you had to sit on the bottom of a hard sleeper waggon. Each bottom bunk was to seat four people. When we arrived, there were already four adults and two children there and we had bought five tickets (even one for Milad) so we would be comfortable for the long 6 hour trip. It turned out one person was supposed to be in another room and he moved and one of the children moved too (they were a multi-generational family spread over three rooms). Then we sat okay except for Peiman. He was too tall and couldn’t sit up straight in the seat due to the other bunk on top. He tried to lie down on the top bunk but he was told by the conductor that he couldn’t because he only bought a hard seat. Then he went for a walk but couldn’t see anything because the windows in the aisle are at sitting height, not standing height. The kids also couldn’t go on the top bunk as it was not “safe”. There seemed to be one conductor who was going around just telling people to get down from the top bunk. Yet we were told it is even worse travelling by bus in Western China as the roads are very bad and if it rains, you may even get stuck due to a mud slide.

As for buying tickets, that has been even more challenging. Our first problem arose when we tried to buy a ticket from Nanning to Kunming in Beihai. They simply had no sleeper tickets at all for a whole week in advance. The reason is that when you try to buy tickets in a city other than the city of departure, they don’t release many tickets for sale. I had originally planned to buy our tickets when we were in Nanning, before going to Beihai but when we were leaving, we weren’t sure how long we wanted to stay in each place as we had decided we wanted to spend less time in Nanning and not go to Detian Falls so we thought we would either spend more time in Beihai or Kunming but we wanted to see Beihai first before deciding so I completely forgot about buying the tickets. Because of the change in itinerary, we also did not plan to spend any more time in Nanning before going to Kunming so there was little chance to buy a sleeper ticket once we arrived in the afternoon. So the last night in Beihai when we had no tickets to Kunming, my mother asked us to try to buy plane tickets. Being on a budget, paying three times the price (or more) for plane tickets was not appealing. However, I felt bad for having planned so well but then being stuck in Nanning. I went online and there were tickets on sale for the day we would arrive in Nanning and at a reasonable price but one website showed “low availability” and the other actually said “two seats left”. Then there were no seats. A little later in the evening, it had “low availability” again so I decided to call and try to get tickets. I called and was told there were only 4 seats left and we were 5. Peiman quickly said he would take the train (seat only on an overnight train) and we could fly and meet him later so I tried to get the tickets but because the company could only order adult and child tickets separately, and there was a big discussion of how I would pay for them (since it was less than 24 hours, I couldn’t use a foreign credit card but only cash but the lady wasn’t sure where in Beihai or Nanning I could pick them up), by the time I bought the adult ones there were no more for the kids. The lady actually thought I could still use the adult ones and when I said they would have to be cancelled, she wasn’t sure if I had to pay a penalty for it! In the end her colleague said she could cancel it for free and after about an hour on the phone, I had nothing to show for it.

After that we went to bed but just before and several times in the morning, I checked the website again to see if there would again be tickets available (having lived in China, I knew that “no tickets” doesn’t actually mean “no tickets”, just no tickets “for now”) but nothing. Since our train wasn’t until ten to twelve, I decided to finish writing my Northern Guangxi blog entry. Finally done and ready to check out, I decided to check one last time the website and low and behold suddenly there were tickets available on the same flight and not even “low availability”. Quickly I called and this time got a competent operator who booked all five tickets in less than ten minutes – success!!! My mother was truly happy when I told her that we had plane tickets and we could enjoy our time going to Nanning. When we got to Nanning, I still wanted to see if there were any sleepers and also buy our next ticket to Dali. Well, good thing we got our plane tickets as there were no more sleepers that evening and the next day only the terribly timed train leaving at 4pm and arriving at 5am had hard sleepers. The plane tickets were also a blessing because as we headed to the airport in a shuttle Roya started complaining of stomach pain and by the time we were flying (after arriving at the airport four hours early to pick up our tickets and then the flight being delayed for one hour), she had a fever. She spent the next day mostly in bed, though unfortunately we also had to change hotels as the one we had before didn’t have room for an extra night (since we were not travelling overnight).

In our comfy soft sleeper (four beds, all ours, with a compartment door) on the way to Chengdu

Having had such an experience, we were intent on buying our train tickets as early as possible. Unfortunately, the train buying system was not in our favour. First I went to buy sleeper tickets from Lijiang back to Kunming but was told you can only buy those 6 days in advance (possibly because we were buying them in Kunming not Lijiang?) Then the next day it was the 2nd so I thought I could buy the overnight tickets from Kunming to Chengdu for the 12th (10 days early) only to be told that I could buy them the next day for 10 days early so not sure when it is counted from. In Nanjing you can buy them from 3pm 10 days before but here they said the next day in the morning I could buy them. We were leaving just after 10am to Dali so 45 min before I lined up for the tickets. Well, all seemed to be going well until I said I wanted to buy 4 tickets – three adult and one child. The lady first tried to convince me that the child could sleep with us but I said we have two kids and needed a bed for them to share. Finally she told me that according to the “rules” I could only buy 3 tickets and if I wanted more I had to go to special window number 2. Well, I first said that if my husband came, could he buy another ticket. She said yes so I called him to come over (he was waiting outside with everyone) but then I realized if we don’t buy the tickets together, we may not have our beds together and she confirmed this when I told her and told me again to go to window 2. Well, I told her how I had already come twice to buy tickets and couldn’t and how now I had a train to catch and couldn’t line up again so she got her supervisor who overrode something on her computer and she was able to sell me the tickets. I felt triumphant but very stressed.

When arriving in Dali, I immediately went to buy tickets to Lijiang. However, even though it wasfor several days later, I was told there were only standing tickets. This was likely because a) most people take the train from Kunming to Lijiang directly and get first dibs at tickets (longer distance tickets are always more available than short distance ones) and b) tour companies or scalpers buy out large sums of tickets. Since the trip was only about 2 hours, I bought the standing tickets and we went to our hotel (which was quite a distance away in the old town). However, as I said in the blog entry about Yunnan, we later decided against going to Lijiang, one because of the cold weather (and we were told it would be even colder in Lijiang because of the higher altitude) and another because the kids were getting very tired of travelling and were also having much fun with their new little friends in town. So once we decided we had to go back and refund our tickets. As I lined up, a scalper offered to buy my tickets off me for 100 yuan (without even knowing how much I had paid). I told her I paid over 100 (I forget how much) and wouldn’t sell to her (also I don’t like scalpers). Well once it was finally my turn I was told that there was a refund penalty and I only got back 98 yuan haha. After that, I also tried to buy tickets back to Kunming but these were sold out as well so we ended up buying bus tickets. Buses are not a very popular mode of travel in China, no doubt because of the inconvenience of not having an easily accessible toilet, being able to walk around, etc. So there was no problem buying bus tickets and we got ones in the very front with a great view.

Overnight train to Xian: my mother laughing as she tries to eat very watery congee (rice porridge) with chopsticks – not sure how exactly one is supposed to do that. In addition her train breakfast included plain steamed bun, hard boiled egg and some pickled vegetables – I opted for some fruit I had brought with me.

It was also in Dali that Peiman and I decided that he and the kids would go back to Nanjing instead of continuing on to the rest of the trip so he could get back in his workshop and they could have a break from travelling. Then came the ordeal of trying to find flights back for them. I first looked at flights from Kunming (which would also mean returning Peiman’s and Roya’s sleeper tickets) but they were too expensive. The flights from Chengdu, our next stop, were cheaper but still a bit much. The cheapest were from Chongqing (the largest city in China with the greater city having roughly the same population as Canada!), a two hour train ride away from Chengdu. I bought these and then hoped and prayed that I could get them train tickets to Chongqing.

We shared our soft sleeper with this mother and daughter (and grandma). Unfortunately, the little girl got a fever and diarrhea soon after boarding and was sick all night – I was very impressed with how the young mother handled such a challenging situation. By morning, she was feeling better 🙂

We had already asked a friend we were visiting in Chengdu to buy my mom and I sleeper tickets to Xian, our next stop, which he had done without any problems. However, I didn’t want to bother him again so, now back in Kunming, I went to a train ticket place to buy them myself. Unfortunately, I was told that high speed train tickets could only be purchased at the railway station. So I took a taxi there and lined up at the “special window” – the famed window 2 where I was told to go the last time I was buying tickets in Kunming. Of course, by the time it was my turn, they were sold out. My next move was to ask our friend to buy them but he was not able to buy the either. This shows another problem with ticket selling in China – sometimes, tickets will not be available, not because there aren’t any but because they have not been “released” yet and if you ask later, you will be able to buy them. So as soon as we arrived in Chengdu (back to the sweltering heat!), we lined up at the computers where you can buy self-serve tickets. Unfortunately, when it was finally our turn, we discovered we could not use the machines because high speed train tickets now requires the use of id (to prevent scalpers from buying them up) but the machine could only read Chinese id cards, not foreign passports. So I went to line up directly at the “special” window which I now knew the existence of from my problems in Kunming. And lo and behold, I was able to buy the tickets no problem!!!

I then tried to buy tickets for my mom and I from Xian to Beijing, the last leg of our trip. The lady, however, misunderstood me and sold me tickets from Chengdu to Beijing, which I luckily noticed as I was leaving and was able to return without a penalty. The tickets I wanted were of course not available. So I called on my last resource, a friend of a friend from Nanjing who lives in Xian, to ask him to get us two sleeper tickets to Beijing. Well, this friend told me that these tickets could only be bought four days in advance. This was very confusing as it had always been ten so I got very nervous. After a few days I learned that the government had actually changed the amount of days from ten to four at just that time (now it is different again). When we got to Xian, this friend told us that we were very lucky because he was only able to get these tickets through a Chinese friend of his who works for the railway and was able to get them with a special additional fee. He said that had he tried the regular way, we would not have been able to get any as the train trip between these two cities was very booked up all the time. In fact, we got on a special train that goes directly with no stops. Finally, in Beijing, as I was there for an extended time, not only for sightseeing with my mom but for an important international conference afterwards, I had no problem getting a ticket back to Nanjing.

And so ends my account of buying train tickets in China. May I just say that I was able to accomplish this travelling feat ONLY because I can now more or less converse in Chinese AND I have some friends who really helped me out. I honestly don’t know how a person who doesn’t speak Chinese and doesn’t understand at least a little that there are many strange rules when buying train tix in China nor has any friends here, could ever possibly travel by train in China!

P.S. As of this fall, it is apparently possible to buy high speed train tickets online though there is only a Chinese version of the site. Slowly it will probably be possible to buy other types of train tickets as well. And maybe one day the site will also be available in English. But then people will miss out on a lot of crazy adventures!!!

Yunnan Province: Kunming and Dali

Map of Yunnan Province

So, I actually wrote this post half a year ago but never had the time/energy to insert the pix and post. These days we are thinking a lot about Yunnan Province because we want to move there, either after completing the coursework for my PhD (if I get accepted into one) or for the fall. However, as always happens, when you decide something, God has a way to throwing you a lot of curve balls. Ours come in the form of having a lot of new opportunities happening for us here in Nanjing, such as Peiman’s workshop and guitar work and contacts/possible buyers and me, quite a good job, opportunities for service and also contacts, such as finding a migrant children’s centre right in our neighbourhood where I would like to volunteer and/or get friends, etc. involved in volunteering at. So, stay (and endure more painful winters, a very dark and cold apartment, being underpaid) or go?!

Now, for the post of our summer trip to Yunnan:

Lining up at the airport with all our gear.

Since we were not able to get train tickets for the relatively short trip from Nanning to Kunming (more on this topic on my train tickets post which I will hopefully post soon), we had to fly to Kunming.

We spent close to two weeks in Yunnan Province, first in the capital, Kunming, then in the town of Dali and then again in Kunming. Arriving in Kunming was a bit of a weather shock as the weather was cool. That is because this part of Yunnan is very high above sea level, Kunming maybe 1700 m and Dali 1900. Mornings are always cool and then it warms up. In Kunming, it felt cool and comfortable and we enjoyed the respite from the heat.

Daguanlou Park

We found Kunming to be clean, with many green spaces and parks and very pleasant. Unfortunately Roya had a fever when we arrived so we didn’t see too much during our first visit although the second day we went to Green Lake and then to Daguanlou Park. By chance we also found a great store for kids’ running shoes so we bought both children badly needed footware, which came in very handy in Dali where it was at times quite cold and wet and we also did two days of hiking.

Lotus view in Daguanlou ParkKids sitting on a metal statue at the park.

Kids sitting on a metal statue at the park.

Our crowded compartment.

On the way to Dali on the train, we wanted to be comfortable so we got seats for all of us (kids half price) but ended up not in “seats” but in a compartment with quite uncomfortable seating. For one thing, the top bunk (for night sleeping I guess) was too low so Peiman could not sit up straight. However, when he went on the bunk to lie down to be more comfortable, the conductor came by to tell him he couldn’t do that because he had not paid for that bunk.

Mom laughing at Peiman’s funny face as he shows how he can’t sit up straight in compartment.

He tried it a few more times but each time was told to go down. Later on, a few girls came by who had no seats (in China, if seats are sold out, you can buy a standing ticket for the SAME PRICE which is crazy) and asked to sit across from us. Since the family seated there also had the rest of their family in another compartment and some of them spent more time there than here, they told the girls they could sit there. We enjoyed talking to the girls (two about to start university and one thirteen year old) and the kids played with them.

Three girls from Chuxiong who were visiting family in Lijiang.

At the beginning of our historical village visit.

Dali was a pleasant and peaceful place surrounded by beautiful unspoilt nature. Most of our stay was overcast with some showers and one day especially was raining all day and cold (maybe 15 degrees). That day we went to see a village by the lake and ended up walking for far too long and through large muddy areas between fields.

Peaceful garden in the middle of nowhere.

By the end everyone was exhausted and cold. We found a nice peaceful garden but then couldn’t find any transport back to the highway.

Very interesting vegetation in the garden – yellow bamboo trunks and a cool yellow cactus.

Peiman standing by the deserted lakefront.

Thinking that we could find more life and transportation by the lake (Erhai Lake, a large lake spanning many villages and also Dali), we walked all the way there only to find nothing but an ugly landscape. That left us with no other choice but to walk ALL THE WAY BACK toward the highway.

On buggy on the way back to highway.

Almost all the way back, we finally found some horse-drawn buggies, one of which took us to the highway to catch our bus back to town. (That was the last time that we went to a “historical village” with the kids since after that whenever we said those words they associated it with this place and insisted they never wanted to go to a “historical village” ever again!)

Getting a tour of Dali with our friends’ two youngest kids.

Unfortunately that day we also had to go return our “standing” train tickets as we had decided not to go to Lijiang since we didn’t want to move the kids so often and decided to just stay longer in Dali and then in Kunming. After buying our bus tickets back to Kunming for several days later we ate a quick dinner and went to see our new friends in Dali.

Roya and their youngest boy were the same age and really had fun together. Here they are walking near the Dali Erhai lakefront (much nicer than the one by the village!)

These friends are an amazing family that live in the old city and have been there for eleven years. The wife is from Chile and the husband Iranian. They have six children ranging in age from seven to mid-twenties. Their two youngest kids and our kids had a great time playing together while Peiman had much to discuss with the husband about everything from work to wood to agriculture to how to market and sell the families’ smoothies, feta cheese, jam and other products they produce.

Group massage 🙂

I also enjoyed speaking with the mother, who homeschools/ed all her children while running their household which also includes her parents in law – a busy lady indeed! Another blessing was being able to borrow some warmer clothes from the family while we stayed, which really came in handy. Another day, we also met visitors from England, Kunming and Macau and had a really nice lunch with everyone!

Kids playing dress-up marching band.

Marching dress up band version 2 (they came down at least 5 or 6 times in different dresses and with different instruments.)

Family picture with Milad as the “monkey king”

Our favourite sightseeing activity in Dali was hiking the large mountain range, Cangshan, on two different days. The best thing was that you could take a chairlift on one side or gondola on the other most of the way up and then hike on a fairly level stone path to various valleys and small waterfalls, weaving in and out of the different mountains. The walking was not demanding but it did go through beautiful scenery so that the second time we were able to cross most of the range in several hours. The kids had fun picking little weeds/plants and planning their future! Somehow they got into talking about where and how they wanted to live when they grew up and had hours of fun talking about it. Milad started it. He wanted to live in Kunming (later changed to Malaysia), with his wife, two kids (older daughter and younger son) and me and Peiman. He first said we would be on the first floor and they on the second but when I asked he said we could be on the second 🙂 He also planned to cook with Peiman, have a workshop with him and work on the computer. Roya said she didn’t want to marry so she could do what she wanted (interesting). She also was scared to give birth so she planned to adopt three kids. At first she said she would live on a mountain but when I asked her how she would live there, she changed to living on Vancouver Island, and planned that we would all visit her every summer.

Milad later decided to teach ABCs as a job and Roya didn’t talk about work but from the past I knew she wanted to be a dance and math teacher. The kids often like playing teacher as teachers play an important role in their lives. Another funny thing on this hike was the large amount of large ladybugs on the chairlift. As you went up, they would just fly up and land on you. It was quite amusing trying to capture them on photos.

Resting with grandma 🙂

Beautiful waterfall on the mountain in Dali.

Milad on the chairlift with a ladybug on his hat.

Milad posing with a girl dressed in traditional Dai Minority clothes in Dali.

Back in Kunming, we spent one day going to a new “safari” zoo, a huge place out of Kunming many parts of which had animals roaming freely. It was quite a nice change from the typical zoo and we enjoyed getting up and close to some of the animals.

A beautiful bird in one of the bird cages.

View from gondola over Dianchi Lake and interesting architecture.

We also went on the local mountain, Xishan. It was really beautiful. We went part way up by gondola over the large Dian Chi Lake and then up over the cliff face. Then we hiked around, seeing various pavilions and even a mini stone forest (for free unlike the overpriced one south of Kunming that we didn’t go to).

View of Dianchi Lake and Xishan Mtn. from gondola.

In the end we had to go back before the gondolas stopped running but determined to see the summit, I went up the last climb alone in about 10 exhausting minutes. The view and sense of accomplishment was worth it and then we went back down.

Cliff face of mtn.

We also had a nice time with a special friend from Russia, who I had met in Hong Kong the previous family reunion. She took us to the bird and flower market and also to visit another friend. I really enjoyed talking to her and discussing the work possibilities for myself if we were to move to Kunming which we will now begin actively planning. Although Kunming, like all other big cities in China, is polluted, it is much better than Nanjing and the weather is also much more pleasant. Especially nice are the mild winters and the lack of humidity and mold which plagues us every summer in Nanjing.

At one of the viewpoints on the mountain.

Otherwise the city has many nice areas that would be nice to live in, seemingly more jobs than I previously thought, and just a nice feeling we like. It was good to visit and find out how much we would like to move there.