Sūzhōu

Unlike the various other water villages, Sūzhōu is a city with a metro and a train station nearly the size of Scarborough. Armed with the Lonely Planet and the GPS on my mobile, we try to explore the city and visit some of the sights. The problems however start at the train station. Which exit is the right one? No idea. We start with the wrong one and walk for about ten minutes until we realise our mistake. Then we look at the GPS and ask for directions and find more of less the right way. 
More than half an hour later we arrive at a temple, which we aren't sure of its name. Finding its entrance is a tricky business too. You have to go along the yellow wall you see in one of the photos and turn left at the end of it and then left again and walk a bit until you see the entrance. Directly opposite is a small shop with many beautiful photographs advertising canal cruises on something that looks like gondolas. Everything is picturesque and romantic. Since the bit of info is in Chinese, we try to communicate with the man and the woman and find out as much as possible. What we understand is, that we will start our journey at point A and finish it at point B. Both points are directly opposite to each other. As we haven't got a clue where we are, we can't tell how far it is to either points. Never mind. We want to do it. We pay the temple an extensive visit and go back to that little shop. The woman signals us to follow her and she guides us through some backstreets and alleys to a travel agency. There she hands the money we had given her to somebody and disappears. There are some more tourists waiting and some more arrive later. Ten to fifteen minutes later a minivan arrives and we get all in. A bumpy and adventurous ride across part of the city later and we find ourselves in front of another agency. There the Chinese tourists are asked to go inside and we are asked to follow somebody to a car park full of coaches. 
We board a coach and when it's full the journey starts. We drive and drive and drive and don't seem to arrive. There is a lady holding the microphone and saying something all the time and we are wondering what the hell we have paid for. OK, we are stupid foreigners and didn't understand what we paid for, but what about all those Chinese on the bus? 
More than half an hour later, we arrive at another car park and everybody gets off. There's no gondola waiting for us, but one of those long flat river boats. We get on and find some places at the back. As soon as we set off a woman takes the microphone and starts talking. God knows what she's talking about. And boy, she can talk! We float down the river and pass some boring scenery and make a u-turn somewhere where it gets interesting. Three quarters of an hour later (we were close to cutting our veins), we arrive at the point we started from. But before we arrive and are allowed to get off, a man walks by and sells CDs, DVDs, card games and some other silly souvenirs. We are surprised to see how many people actually buy that stuff. 
I learnt later that this cruise is very common in China and the locals like it. It's a nightmare for westerners! Shoot yourself if you happen to make the same mistake.
As soon as we are off the boat we try to find the way to that interesting area we saw through the windows. It's a long but beautiful walk down there. We pass some walls with graffiti and calligraphy, we walk on some paths among beautiful flowers, bushes and trees and enjoy the view over the river. Then we walk over a bridge and find a market area with many food stalls, small shops and a Starbucks. To our surprise there is no McDonald's or any other western fast food chain.
Our walk continues through that area and out of it, because we want to see some gardens and other places we wanted to see at the first place but for some reason never passed them. We have to go across town and because it's a long walk and it's getting late, we take a taxi. We show the driver on the Lonely Planet where we would like to go and he seems a bit irritated at first but confident later on. He drives us to an area which doesn't look anything like the description in the Lonely Planet, but according to my GPS we are right. What is it? Instead of the gardens we wanted to see, we are in the middle of a touristy shopping area. Small shops and food places everywhere. (The photos towards the end). There we sit somewhere and buy something to eat and a look down at the canal makes us curse those people from the agency across the temple wall. Why? We see the gondolas those people had in the photos advertising some romantic cruises in the canals of the city. 
Then we took the long way back to the train station, entered it from the side we should have exited, walk for a long time until we find our gate and have to go down some flights. There we take place in the waiting area and some people stare at us. It's the second time today. The first time was at a square we wanted to pause for a little. We sat on a small wall to enjoy our drinks and the entire square turned their heads to look at us. Some even came and asked for a photo. Then an old man approached us and said something angrily and pointed at my drink. No idea what he wanted, but I answered in a tone as angrily as his. Then he left us and we walked away.
A few minutes later we are on our bullet train and 35 minutes later we arrive in Shanghai. 
As we are hungry, we go to a muslim restaurant in the area we live in. The food is delicious, but hygiene standards are ... if I say poor, I'm exaggerating. Let's say they are non existent. Some cats walk through the restaurant and go into the kitchen and whatever else is behind the door that separates the restaurant from the kitchen. Oh, and we saw a cockroach going up the wall.

We want to be Twin Towers when we're grown up.

The first thing you see when exiting the train station. Doesn't look very nice.

It gets better if you take the right direction.

Some backstreet, but there are no boys...

Not quite the Berlin Wall, but it might give Trump an idea. There's a temple behind the yellow wall.

Inside the temple area.

Buddha

A gigantic tea pot.

Wanna grill something?

Some deities on display when you walk in circles around the tower.

This is the circuit with the deities.

Vistas from the circuit.

In there is a room where people meet to sing. At least they sang when we were there. The door was unfortunately closed, so we couldn't glimpse inside.

Same tower, different angle.

On the way to what we thought would be a cruise on a gondola along the canals.

That's the vistas from the agency that would take us to the cruise with the gondolas. Yeah, right!

We are family, I got all my sisters with me....

Fully loaded.

That white car is parked in the middle of the road.

Local fruit and vegetables.

Sleeping beauty.

This is not a gondola!!!

We are on such a river boat.

Calligraphy 

Graffiti. 

On a bridge at the edge of that interesting market area we saw from the boat.

Gate to the fourth dimension.

What is she wearing???

Another sleeping beauty.

They are everywhere....

This is where the boats make a u-turn.

Il Ponte dei Sospiri? Nah!

hmm...

That's what we wanted to cruise down the river with.

Oh, those lucky people!

This must have been part of the gardens we wanted to visit, but it was closed when we arrived.

No mention of this market area in the Lonely Planet.

Can she really see through that thing? And look at the gloves...

Ponte Vecchio? Nah, I don't think so.

Canale Grande? Nah!

Ponte di Rialto? Nah!

So cute!

Night at the train station square.

Waiting for our bullet train to come.

Back in Shanghai.

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. 

Train stations

My wonderful teaching assistant Jing from the University of Hull, once met a girl from Scarborough in Yorkshire, U.K., who was telling Jing how big Scarborough is and blah blah. Jing, coming from China, has of course a different sense for dimensions. To Jing her hometown Shenyang is a village, even though it has a population of 6.3 million (census 2010, source: Wikipedia). I have to admit that I found it strange hearing Jing calling Shenyang a village, but I can understand her now. Guiyang is slightly smaller and it feels like a small town. I have been to places of about a million people and those were the equivalent to our villages.
To cut a long story short, Jing told that Scarborough girl that the train station of Shenyang (she used the words 'my village') is bigger than Scarborough, and made the poor girl go quiet. I couldn't stop laughing when Jing told me this story, but now I realise that she wasn't exaggerating.
China is a massive country with a population, distances and dimensions that go beyond our imagination. You can't understand it, unless you come to China and experience it yourself. Neighbouring cities may be close by bullet train or airplane, but not by car. Cities of one or two million people are considered villages, cities of five or seven or even more million are called second tier cities and the rest are proper cities.
Of course Jing was right by saying that the train station of 'her village' is bigger than Scarborough. I had to think of her words on several occasions while travelling around the country by train. The photos underneath were taken at the central station of Shanghai. You see thousands of people lining up in front of the building, going around like in a maze, waiting to go through controls. Access to the train stations (not all of them), have only travellers. You can buy your tickets online or offline and in both cases you have to pay the ticket office a visit (that's where you collect the tickets you have bought online). That's either in a different building or in some cases in the train station building, but everything is written in Chinese and hardly anyone speaks English. Good luck with that!
Then you walk to the actual train station building and you queue up, go through controls like at airports, have to have your luggage scanned, need to show your ID and ticket (both are checked at one of the numerous desks as soon as you enter the building), and there's a body check too. Men will love the body check, because it's done by (often good looking) women in uniforms, who grab and touch you all over your body if you're a westerner and if they are in a good mood. I for my part always smile at them and feel disappointed if they don't grab my behind. I bet for them it's the highlight of their lifetime to touch a westerner all over his body.
Once inside and through the controls, you have to find your way round. There are screens with all the info in English and in Chinese. Announcements are usually made in Chinese only. And then you have to walk. Be prepared for a long walk. Be also prepared to go upstairs or downstairs by normal old fashioned stairs and not some brand new flashy escalators, simply because they either don't exist or are out of service or go the wrong direction.
While you walk around trying to find your platform, you will pass food stalls, restaurants, various shops, coffee and tea places, etc. You will have the feeling of being in an airport, rather than a train station. Half an hour later (no kidding!!!), when you will reach your gate, you will be tired but happy and would love to sit down and relax for a bit. Unfortunately, most of the time all seats will be taken, so you'll have to stand. Like at an airport, you wait at a gate, not at the platform. An announcement is made and all people queue up in order to go through a ticket control. What looks like an insanity and makes you think that it might take ages, it actually doesn't. It is a very quick process. Once through the ticket controls, you go to the platform and have to follow some signs. What signs? Well, there is a carriage number on your ticket and those numbers can be found on signs on the platforms. Since the trains are really long with many carriages, you go to the designated area and wait for the train to arrive if it isn't there already. The train departs not even three minutes later.
If you're lucky enough to have a seat number, you simply go to your seat, if you're unlucky, you have to stand somewhere for the duration of your journey or hope to find a free seat.
There are various train categories and classes. Second class on bullet trains is cheap, but the seats are not really comfortable. First class seats are better, have more legroom, are more comfortable, have sockets to plug in your devices, but are more expensive (in some cases not that much more, but in other cases a lot more). Bear in mind that first class in China has nothing to do with first class in the western world. There's no extra service and it's not quiet. It's loud and it's packed. Vendors go through and sell food and drinks, people who have no seat reservation enter in search of a seat and stand in the corridor, passengers talk with each other and shout into their mobile phones or play loud music or watch films without the use of headphones, children play computer games, etc. It's definitely not worth the money. It's an experience, though. If you want a first class service, you will have to travel business class and pay a small fortune for it. At least there you get a warm meal for free.
If you need to go to the toilet, be prepared for a long walk. There are western style and Chinese toilets on the trains. The first ones are the ones we know, the latter are a hole in the ground. At least there is toilet paper and if you're fortunate enough they will be clean and tidy.
There's also a hot drinking water dispenser where the Chinese fill up their flasks and bottles and a sink where you can wash your hands. Those facilities are usually opposite the toilets.
The bullet trains are likely to be the only place in China where smoking is strictly forbidden, which makes it hard for the chain smoking Chinese. That's why you see them queueing up in front of the doors before the train arrives at a station and jumping out when the train comes to a halt. Since the stops are extremely short with under three minutes, they smoke as fast as they can in that given time.

Queueing up to enter the train station building. The entrance is somewhere where the red umbrellas are.

Walking towards the gate. Still half an hour walk in front of us.

Queueing up at the gate for the ticket controls and being allowed onto the platform.

The tall white guy is my colleague and programme leader Andrew from Scarborough (hihihihihi)

Can you spot the ticket controls at the far end? No? Neither do I.

We have almost made it.

The platform.  Only one escalator.

Our bullet train. Now we have to find the entrance to our carriage.

Second class. Two seats on the left, three on the right.

Waiting to get off the train.

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.