Man Utd 2 Chelsea 1

It's a sad scoreline but there's still everything to play for. Two red replica tops spotted in school to just the one glorious blue one, so far. But I'm doing everything I can to turn this around over the course of the season. I've already got an entire class of Juniors whose favourite player is Shevchenko. Now we just need to turn their raw enthusiasm into replica merchandise.

(Oh, and this just in... a familiar story, I'm afraid: Newcastle nil Liverpool nil.)

Was it something I said?

Sadly the good people of the People's Republic can no longer read my blog. Perhaps it was that very subversive piece on mooncakes or the savage irony of those noticeboard photos, I just don't know. But the blog is now completely off limits to anyone in China - including me. Hopefully you can still read this even if I can't. Otherwise, as they say, watch this space. Literally.

True too.

Hope so...

A question of taste

The Rough Guide to China describes Huanglong Xi as "a charming riverside village [of] understated Qing dynasty streets - all narrow, flagstoned and sided in rickety wooden shops". Some 40 kilometres south of Chengdu, the original village dates back to the Seventeenth Century but, to be honest, I'm more ancient than most things in the Huanglong Xi of today.

There's conservation, there's renovation and there's reconstruction. This charming village is very much in the latter camp. It also has its own logo which can't be a good sign. Through the 'traditional' gateway which was nearer four months old than four centuries, you are channeled along the main drag, a traditionally flagstoned tourist superhighway lined either side by souvenir shops brimming with the latest traditional tat.

Immaculately decorated rickshaws with immaculately dressed runners charging very untraditional prices parked themselves at the top of the street. We passed them to find more streets from yesteryear. Oliver, our guide for the day, excitedly pointed out the Qing Dynasty bank and the Qing Dynasty gambling den with their papier mache props and bicycle lock padlocks to stop you getting too close.

Elements of the village are actually genuine; every gnarled twist of the nine hundred year old banyan tree which is propped up by huge carved dragons ('Huanglong' means 'Yellow Dragon', by the way) was thoroughly real. The Chinese Opera stage had a sign claiming it to be 'remarkably preserved' though I wouldn't bet my life on it; the buildings in the temple kind of looked old but they just didn't feel right. It felt like a film set - which is actually was for, among many other movies, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

To the water next. To be honest it's a pretty pointless trip up the grey green river passed a couple of fishermen, a boarded up temple and some holiday homes but it's a relaxing way to while away an hour before lunch.

Oh yeah, lunch. Deep breath now: crispy deep fried prawns, rice topped with sugar and strips of pork, bowls of tofu, stewed eggplant in spicy sauce with garlic, a kind of egg and tomato omelette, a haunch of boiled pork with crispy crackling, spicy bream in a hot sauce, chicken with red and green peppers and peanuts, salty shredded potato, 'Twice-Cooked Pork" (everyone's favourite, this one: pork that's been roasted and then fried mixed with a rich sauce and a variety of fried vegetables), stewed seaweed soup and garlic cabbage. All washed down with a crisp cool beer and finished off with an inexhaustable supply of cleansing, refreshing green tea.

Tasty.

No smoking

It’s a myth that everyone smokes in China. Sure, it’s not like England where smoking is akin to being a Communist in fifties America. It’s okay to have a tab in the staff room at school, or to smoke in the corridor (although even that is unusual to be honest). Before I came, I had the impression that all teachers smoked in class too but I can now confirm that to be absolute bollocks.

It’s the same as being told before I came out here (Alan H, are you reading?) that I’d have to do ‘night soil’ – put the contents of your toilet bucket outside for collection and use as fertiliser. No, after more than two months, I’ve not had to do that. (Wait, though, for the inevitable blog entry on Chinese-style toilets in general: the sights and smells, the squatting, the very communal experience of it all…)

Buses are smoke-free. Planes, of course. Shops and offices generally too. Women, on the whole, don’t smoke – and if they do the word on the street is that they’re ‘on the game’. Strange, then, that Chinese men find it normal (expect, even) for western girls to smoke: you can see how their minds work.

In restaurants it’s okay to light up but, there too, you find it’s a small minority who choose to do so. It’s okay in taxis as well. In fact, drivers will often offer you one. Travel books tell you that smoking is so much a part of the culture that you’ll actually offend people by refusing the offer of a cigarette. More rubbish, I’m afraid.

On 23 January 2007 it’ll be two years for me without one. Happily, I don’t think living in China is going to change a thing on that front.

True.

The Wild West (Part Three)

For all the planning that goes into uprooting to China or even just getting away for a few days, it’s the unplanned and unexpected things that turn out to be special. The trip to the lakes on the second day came from a chance meeting in the hostel and, looking back, I'd not have missed it for the world.

So it went with the third day too. We had climbed Paoma Shan in the morning and found ourselves at a loose end in a bar after lunch (by the way, Tibetan butter tea is probably the best drink in the world; it’s like the most comforting hot milk before you go to bed that you’ve ever had – but with the comfort factor multiplied by a hundred).

We went for a wander to the bottom end of Kangding in the vague search for a temple. “The bottom end” is probably a fitting description of south Kangding although there are plenty of apartment blocks being built there; somebody somewhere knows a good investment when they see one.

Passing a group of saffron robed monks loading a truck, we headed up a bank and turned a corner to find a small hut where Buddhist nuns were turning vast prayer wheels and chanting rhythmically. A little further on was the entrance to the monastery itself.

Wow. A grassed courtyard is surrounded on three sides by the monks’ accommodation. Straight ahead is the business end of the monastery: rows and rows of coloured prayer flags draw your eyes toward the shrine. Huge white banners shrouded the entrance from view and the whole building was crowned by a colourful, carved roof with characteristic upward pointing eaves. Behind the curtain and in a dimly lit cloud of incense a single monk oversaw worshippers from high on the left hand side. Everything was a festival of colour: reds and golds. And dead ahead was a huge benevolent-looking Buddha figure gently welcoming you inside.

Now, I’ve not got a religious bone in my body but, as with great cathedrals, anyone can appreciate the theatricality – the sheer drama and beauty – of a place like this.

Coming out, we passed ‘The Knapsack Inn’, a hostel similar to the ‘Black Tent’ where we were staying. We thought we’d check it out and have a relaxing cup of tea in the hope of maintaining that Buddha vibe a little longer.

Just inside the gate in the yard, a Chinese couple were crouched around a ‘range’ style wood-burning stove. They invited us to sit down and have a drink. So we did. And even without talking everything just felt right. Smiles can say so much.

Monks wandered by, going to or from the temple. More smiles. Two or three more people came and sat down: one, a Canadian guy called Philippe, seemed to speak the most authentic sounding Chinese I’ve heard from a westerner and made me want to learn it even more. Chat, chat, chat; baked potatoes appeared from the stove; a spicy Sichuan sauce came from the kitchen. An American fellah, a couple of Japanese, a Brit, a Canadian and a few Kangding locals all meeting for the first ever and, no doubt, last ever time in the middle of nowhere under a beaming sun and it was perfect.

That evening, we couldn't find a place to eat. While looking though, Bick had seen a catholic church sitting incongruously on the high street and wanted a closer look. With no door at ground level we ventured up some metal steps to the side and came to what looked like a church hall – or, more specifically, a church hall cum soup kitchen. But the head man welcomed us in anyway and we found ourselves in a Sichuan ‘hotpot’ restaurant. To describe it as ‘no frills’ would be to exaggerate its sophistication but we were in now. And we were hungry.

It transpired to be the best ‘hotpot’ experience I’ve had while here. Basically you sit at a table with a gas ring in the middle in which a huge pot of boiling, spicy stock is placed. Then you drop in all kinds of wonderful things – meat, vegetables, fish – till they’re cooked through and wickedly spicy. It’s a bit of a connoisseur thing in Chengdu; here it was ‘all you could eat’ for twenty nine Yuan (just under two quid).

We ate and ate and ate. And drank. Finally we had found a place in China that used a decent sized glass for drinking beer (normally it’s served in shot glasses, would you believe? The Chinese don’t have a high tolerance for alcohol.) Then, with a glance here, a “Hallo” there, a tentative “Cheers!” or “Ganbei!” we gradually got to join the blokes at the next table. They, with hardly a word of English and we, with hardly a word of Chinese, decided a good time was common ground enough to meet on and we ended our holiday, as we began, with an accident – this time a happy one.

The Wild West (Part Two)

An eight hour trip became one of about nine and a half but that didn’t really matter anymore. And, in any case, the journey was so spectacular that we’d have happily stayed on the bus even longer.

We sped on through colossal gorges, wild gashes slashed through rock and greenery. Everything was green. Green was the only colour. But it was in a whole spectrum of shades and tones that made it seem that here were all the colours you’d ever need.

Valleys were stitched together with elegant bridges leaping across craggy voids. The narrow road switched back and back on itself again creeping higher and higher. We looked down on monumental dams plugging still lakes and furious rivers tumbling to their destinations, rope bridges spun between their banks.

It was night when we pulled into Kangding. Rain. Pouring rain in the dark. Tired and a little disoriented we found the hostel and negotiated a price to make us feel we’d not been ripped off. We slept well.

A foaming river tears through the middle of Kangding and a procession of lamps shaped like Buddhist prayer wheels usher it from one end to the other. Lonely Planet sums the place up well: “there is a tangible sense that you’ve reached the end of the Chinese world and the beginning of the Tibetan”.

Three mountains tower above the town, one inscribed with a huge Buddhist mural on its bare rock face and each one strewn with faded prayer flags. A chill, fresh breeze reminds you you’re well away from the city now.

Sipping Nescafé first thing the next morning, our day took an interesting twist. Four Chinese tourists at the hostel said they were taking a minibus to Mugecuo Hu, one of the highest lakes in northern Sichuan, and would we like to share the cost by joining them? The decision didn’t take much making.

All squeezed together in a rackety old microbus, we headed north up the Yala Valley to Mugecuo Hu whose name literally means ‘Wild Men’s Lake’. Lonely Planet (again) warns travellers not to stray too far from the paths as it is also home to “wolves and other wild beasts”…

We arrived at a Glastonbury-like muddy field with cars skidding in the mush and middle-aged ladies negotiating puddles in high heels. Even the toilets with their open pits and holes in the floor were festivalesque.

But, after a chain of further (mini)bus rides, we escaped the crowds and reached the lake. Pure white clouds swaddled the dark peaks surrounding the lake and swooped down in the wind to the water’s surface. All along the far bank there was a wooden walkway punctuated by pavilions where you could buy yak meat on skewers. Blue skies gave way to rain but that simply made the view more spectacular still.

The next day, we took on Paoma Shan – one of the mountains (well, it’s a great big hill) that surround Kangding for views that my photography skills probably fail to do justice to. The route begins with a wander through a lamasery where rows of prayer wheels beg to be turned to have their prayers within them spread on the wind. Through a tiny wooden doorway (curiously, with broken glass set in concrete along its lintel) we found erratic stone steps leading steeply up the hillside. Faded prayer flags marked the route as we rose higher above the town and measured ourselves against the truly impressive Gongga Shan mountain (7556m) alongside.

It took about an hour to ascend, quite literally, through the clouds. Mountains were all you could see in every direction. The air was fresh and the sky was blue (a revelation to any resident of Chengdu). But peace, quiet and contemplation? Forget it: building work is going on to transform the summit into some kind of Tibetan theme park.

We decided to get close to Tibetan culture in an altogether better way and came down for a good old fashioned Kangding night out…

The Wild West (Part One)

I’ve been meaning to mention Chinese driving for a while. It’s mad. It’s like there are no rules, you just get from A to B as quickly as possible and to hell with everyone else. Yet, despite this apparent chaos, you see remarkably few accidents.

There is a system at work; it’s just the opposite of what we’re used to in the UK. There, the assumption is that you – the driver – take responsibility to drive as carefully as possible and not make any mistakes that could affect other drivers. Here, the assumption seems to be that you expect the other guy to be a maniac and so you concentrate on avoiding him. You expect to see cars coming towards you on the wrong side of the road. Or to be overtaken on the nearside (the term 'undertaken' is grimly appropriate). Or for that car jesuslookout! to pull out in front of you with no warning whatsoever.

It’s why Chinese traffic is so bloody noisy; it’s not that people are enraged and pressing their horns in frustration or anger, rather they are simply letting other drivers know that they’re coming – to warn them of their presence (which, I believe, is what horns were fitted to cars for in the first place).

But sometimes it does go wrong.

We took a bus westwards this week to visit Kangding way up in the mountains at a height of around 2600 metres above sea level. That’s over two and a half kilometres upwards. And the only roads are gloriously narrow and windy ones which meander along towering valley sides. If you’re a truck driver though, the fact that you’re 500 metres above a treacherous ravine is no reason to slow down or to drive on the correct side of the road. A... B. Quickly!

The blue truck carved into the red one. The whole of the left side of the cabin – the driver’s side – was crushed. I guess only the huge weight of these massive dumpers kept them on the road at all and stopped them tumbling down the cliff face. When we finally passed the accident both drivers had been extracted; God knows if the blue driver survived but a good hour after we’d stopped we saw an ambulance threading its way through the backed up traffic.