Before the trip

China.

Sounds like a long way from home. And yes, it is. It's 10.000 miles away, half a day time difference and 20+ hours by plane. It sounds like an adventure, like another jump into the unknown.

Unlike other countries, for which people tell you either not to go or ask you to think twice before you go and have major concerns and don't believe that you're having a good time there, mainly because they are influenced by the media (axis of evil and blah blah), I have met a few people only who were concerned about my trip to the far east. Most people were positive and some even jealous. I, for my part, have always wanted to travel Asia, especially Japan, Vietnam, China, Laos and a few other countries.

The interest arose again when I started teaching English to (mainly) Chinese students at the University of Hull. I wanted to know more about the country, the language, the culture. Thanks to my wonderful teaching assistant Jing, I learnt at least how to pronounce names right and many other things about her country and culture. She was telling me things about China and I often closed my eyes and imagined how it would be to be there.

What would it be like? Some say, the Chinese are the Asian Germans. Organised, punctual, structured, serious, robots, soldiers, work like machines and never laugh or smile. Doesn't sound nor good nor promising. Also the fact that it is a communist country and the internet is being monitored, the press censored and there is no freedom of speech, sounds frightening. But after my time in Saudi,  where I learnt what it is like to live in a totalitarian system, it sounds exciting to me. Also, do we really have democracy and all the freedoms we would like to have or think and believe we have in the West? Are we really happy and lucky to be born somewhere along the shores of the North Atlantic? Or do our politicians want us to believe that we live in an ideal world and all other countries and systems are evil?

Backpacking for months on end or motorbiking along the Silk Road like the GlobeBusters people do sounds and seems like a dream. Their ride from London to Beijing is epic. Would love to do that one day. I know that some Germans and Austrians have travelled through Asia by motorcycle, even before WWII, and I met a Greek guy outside the bar Refren in Ioannina a few weeks ago who has done Greece - China a few times on his machine. I'd love to do that too. Turkey, Iran, some -Stan countries and finally China. It won't be from Ace to Ace like the GlobeBusters tour, but more or less the same route.

I found a teaching job at a Canadian school in Guiyang, (Gui where? Gui what?) southwest China, and everything went quickly. Documents were sent to them, documents for my visa sent back, but then it was Chinese autumn break and the embassy was closed for a week. When it opened after a week, many people had the same idea as me, so I spent two hours queueing and waiting. The form I was given to fill in is a tricky one and you have to do it the way they want it. There are no useful instructions so you end up doing it either wrongly or not sufficiently. After a few tries, the form looked the way it was supposed to look, I got my approval and was asked to return four days later to pick up my visa. I thought that I'd have to wait two hours again and took a book with me, but to my surprise, there were no people and I finished within two minutes.

I also had to undergo three interviews. Two with an agency in New York and one after a very long time with a Chinese official. From the day the officials approved, everything went fast and soon I'd be sitting on a plane to the country of red lanterns and dragons. To the country of a 9.000 years civilisation, to the country of Mao Tse Tung, the Yangtze River, the Great Wall that's even visible from space and the Reich of 1.5 billion people, massive traffic jams, zillions of scooters and motorcycles, beautiful landscapes and delicious food.

I'm thrilled!

If you would like to read more by me, here are my novel and my diary from Ar'ar, in the northern Saudi desert. Both available on Amazon as soft and hard copy.