China

Though the older girls attempted to outdo us with their guest blog ripe with intense narrative and pictures, we will persevere with limited internet access but the knowledge that wit can overcome all.

WE ARE IN CHINA!!

It was a long train journey … Two days from Irkutsk (middle of Russia) to Ulaanbaatar, two days in Ulaanbaatar, and two more days to Beijing.

Here are some highlights, and keep reading to the end for a well-researched lesson entitled, “What to do when you are bored on a train.”

Trans-Siberian Railway, Carriage #10.
First night: Amanda and Tori get on, get settled, and figure how out how to work everything. Score one for us. As we are just settling down, angry Russian lady gets on. She does not like us. She keeps repeating something in Russian and gesturing and scowling. We do not understand. (Something we have noticed: Everyone seems to think that by repeating something in a foreign language, we will miraculously understand them. Usually they say it louder, too.) Our inability to understand troll-lady’s commands irritates her. We decided not to poke the bear and left the compartment.
Next, a girl wearing D&G jeans enters the train. Her parents follow. Each carries a girnormous suitcase and they congregate outside our compartment door. How can they all be in our four person compartment? Mystery solved. Only the daughter is traveling. She simply has a lot of stuff. For a 12 hour journey.
We weren’t very excited about sharing with the cell-phone-addict suitcase girl and troll-lady, but they got off at 6am the next day in Ulan Ude. With all the rest of the Russians. A nice British/Irish couple got on, and the carriage quickly turned into the foreigner car. Translation: VODKA TRAIN.
Russian customs: We sit at the Russian border post for 5 hours waiting to go through customs and immigration. Tori and Amanda are slightly concerned as everyone else has these “visa registration receipts” that we have never heard of. Luckily, the officials don’t seem to care (kind of like how they didn’t care that Maggie lost her migration card).
6 hours later we leave Russia to repeat the same process on the Mongolia side. Our favorite part was the intense bag search and stowaway investigation.

Ulaanbaatar: AMAZING! Our Mongolian Mom (the woman who owned the guesthouse we stayed out) took great care of us. She cooked us wonderful meals, took us on an amazing tour of the countryside, where she showed us the famed national park, awesome gers, and let/made us try mare’s milk (Mongolian traditional beer made from mare’s milk—not as bad as we thought it would be, but not something we’d choose to drink again), sheep’s kidney (good experience), and unidentified sheep’s insides. We passed on the stomach and its blood contents. Mmmmmm.

Trans-Mongolian Train #4, Carriage 9:
No Russians to be found on this train, just Tori and Amanda in their own, beautifully empty compartment. It was an awesome ride. Chinese customs/immigration were great! It only took ab hour! Then another hour to change the train’s bogies (Chinese trains ride on the left side of the rails, Russian/Monogolian on the right). Then we set at the station for three hours. Because schedules are very, very important to the Chinese. (You know, someone might be trying to catch that train in Erlian, China at 1am!). Highlight: How the carriage attendants cleaned our entire compartment three hours before we reached Beijing. First he took the sheets, then the seat covers, then the tablecloth. We thought he was done. Then he took the rug out from under our feet and mopped the floor. It is all still very unclear.

Then we got to Beijing! And our hostel met us at the train station! Always a plus. WE LOVE CHINA. SO COOL.
We wandered around all day and went to dinner at an AMAZING vegetarian buffet. We ate alongside Buddhist monks, other tourists, and locals, and it was delicious. Mmmmmm. We love Chinese food. And Chinese shopping. And Chinese cleanliness. And China.
Tomorrow, Tori’s friend, Peter, from acapella is showing us around Beijing!

WHAT TO DO ON A TRAIN WHEN YOU GET BORED:

Drink vodka. Try to keep up with the Irishmen in the next compartment. Try to keep up with the Irishmen in the next compartment as they polish off five bottles of Chingis Khan vodka, Mongolia’s finest.
Sleep.
Lean your head really, really far out the window, have your friend lean their head out the other window. Take pictures.
Antagonize the Australian man-child by refusing his advances and not laughing at his jokes.
See if you can fit in the luggage compartment above the seats (hint: you CAN!)
Wander the entire length of the train. See half naked people lounging in their open-doored compartments. Dance up and down the compartments where all the doors are closed. Skip, too.
Sing Anastasia. Then switch to Mulan. You’ll know when the time is right.
Laugh, hysterically, for long periods of time. About nothing, mostly.


More to come later! We’re headed to Xi’an in a few days to see the Terracotta warriors.

As an aside, we understand many of you enjoy our blog and anxiously await entries. We enjoy blogging. We enjoy comments even more!