Jinpin Hotel Guiyang

... br>The best bit about yesterday has to be that Tom went out looking for dinner whilst i grabbed a shower, and when he came back, he had chips and sausage! We have eaten nothing but noodles and rice with spicy food stuffs for 10 days to finally have something mildly english, was amazing. Even if the chips were under-cooked, and the sausage over-cooked. Oh well.

We're off to Kunming today on a train, heading south to Laos.

Hi - 17/8 Arrival at Kaili
We are in China!
We had spent 30 hours of 3 flights - all good, specially Air Uzbekistan, then a bus to Guanyang - a big city, 1.2 million people: a modern place, 20-30 stories buildigs, wide road, full of new cars and well-dressed people. The streets look so clean, quite. Lotteries on streets!
We took the bus to Kaili - 2.5 hours, new road (you pay for passing it).
Kaili is a Miao city - looks ...

So, last night we had the fourth gig which was a chilled out place...but not as many people or not as much energy as the other gigs...which have been awesome!!! there's some photos up from the Chongqing gig on soundsmakers.com - check them out!!
It will be nice to not have a gig today I think! just chill out all day, go out for lunch with the owner of the club we were at last night and maybe some other people, and then catch the train (a sleeper ...

... too high for me. You'll recognise his finger lower left corners! He was terrified of dropping the camera.

Unfortunately, a few of the photos are fuzzy - that's because most mornings here are quite hazy, always clearing up around mid day.

Later, as we were cruising through a most spectacular mountain range we decided to pull over into a wee rest stop and boil the billy for a coffee. Wow, all those imposing mountains were so huge and we so tiny, it was ...

... on the scenic and cultural attractions of Xijiang, instead of just a beautiful face. A Xiang-yi sees it differently. "Every villager is an ambassador of Xijiang," she said. "Besides, you can find girls much more beautiful than I everywhere in the village." A Xiang-yi said she has more important tasks to concentrate on for now - with the May Day holiday approaching, she has to get ready and train dozens of staff members for a tea-tasting fair. "It will be three hectic days," she said.

... to see there, a waste of time. Buy some fruit and sweets for supper in the train, and we are left at Guiyang train station, among milions of chinese people. The train has no closed cabins, and we must sleep in the beds in the middle of the corridor, more than 80 persons per wagon. This will really be an experience. Tomorrow we arrive in Guilin, after more than 17 hours in the train. I wonder if it is worth saving the hotel to suffer all this.

Before the 1950's, very little was known about leprosy in China. Leprosy was believed to be highly infectious and so very much feared. If a leper was to show his or her face in public, he or she was generally burnt alive. Cases such as these happened throughout China, including the Wumeng mountain region of Guizhou. As Chinese civilization developed, leprosy patients where eventually sequestered to leprosy "colonies" or "villages" where they could live, marry and ...

... back into the cultural and economic center it was in the early 1900's. Ma created a women's committee that meets weekly to fellowship together and confront community issues. As 90 percent of the women in this area are illiterate, Ma also provides classes as the farming schedule allows. Together the women study basic Chinese characters, hygiene and health practices, farming technology, and simple veterinary medicine. In 2004, Ma and the ...

... of the crops in the gentle breeze. As it was, there was a clamber along the recently reconstructed village wall and a more sedentary wander through the Sunday market where it seemed as though every villager from miles around had come to sell their speciality, be it farm tools or seed, to dogs, cattle and fresh vegetables. Anything being eaten - except for the cured tofu - was fresh. The row of stalls through the middle of the market square selling food were no different ...

... racks, and a bit of courteous shuffling by the inhabitants ended us up with two seats together. It was quite good actually - hard seat carriages are quite friendly and interesting places. We worked out that the lady opposite us was on her way, along with about a dozen other people around her, to the beach for a holiday, so they were all very jovial, and delighted to have some foreigners to poke and prod ...