Home Inn (Xi'an Hanguangmen)

... marvelling at the consumerism and masses of quality clothes, shoes and electrical goods but more to keep warm in the malls as much as see what was on offer. Cars are king here and pedestrians have no rights even on crossings as turning cars will plow you down unless you allow them to pass in front of you. You can never assume a car or scooter will let you cross as they won’t. It is like no other place here that’s for sure. It seems like traffic lights are a suggestion often not a law.

... are also aesthetically pleasing colourwise. That would be my main complaint about the walls in Xian. Impressive they are, but the colour is a bit bland. What they lack in colour, they make up for it length. I thought they were only about 6 km. That's why I even attempted to walk them after already walking around the city for a few hours. They just seemed to go on and on. I thought I had become really unfit, or the heat had gotten to me or something because it was taking ...

... gave sermons here. The south peak of this mountain has been named one of, if not THE most dangerous Tourist Hiking Trail in the world. Logic tells you that there is a big difference between mountain climbing and mountain hiking. Mountain climbers have spent a lot of money and time being trained, they then gather experience, and also have all the necessary equipment to go where they choose to hang about for fun. Add ...

... constant formality will start to grate'. It hasn't yet, a week on... but that's because I've only come across it on the plane! I put my phone on 'flight mode' to listen to some music and the air hostess, very politely, asked me to switch it off. I told her it was on flight mode so it was ok but she didn't understand 'flight mode'... so I had to turn it off. I slept. I woke up. I was offered breakfast: a choice of omlette and something ...

... of the free beer tokens again, and met the same irish and english, and some italians and some chinese and some more english. Were in bed by the respectable time of 3am again.. well we had to be out of our rooms by 12 today. oh dear it's 12 now... brb just to return our keys. K keys are returned deposit is in hand. We're prob going to go and explore the Muslim quarter today as it's supposed to be awesome and are getting the train to Shanghai at 17.24. - Emma and Emma

For those of you that are avid readers of this blog (hi mom and dad), there were a few days in which an unfinished blog was posted. I had started that blog on our last day of Hong Kong and thought I would have a chance to finish that night, and I didn't. So that explains the several days of a random two sentence, unfinished blog. Sorry about that. I know you were hanging on the edge of your seats to find out about that conference. We made it to Xi ...

... and having a rest in a beautiful little park filled with bird cages. Then we went to the train station to catch a 7 hour train to Zhengzhou. Nanjing train station is really nice, with good views and nice facilities, so anyone with more time than we had could spend a bit of time there before their train! The train was very very very busy, and it made us very grateful to have reserved seats as there were people standing for the whole trip. There was no room ...

... they are probably fine with the way things are done; what they were doing was working just not as productively as I thought it could be. So, if I take all of those reactions I come up with something that I should've realized was the case the entire time: this is not America and the way things are done at home isn't the only way. I think that after visiting this city I can now appreciate that there will be difference ...

... the way up, but I admit I couldn't bring myself up to the very highest of the buildings; the height, the low railings and my slight-but-still-there fear of exposed heights sent me back down to the safer lower rooms. Now, the bulk of these buildings are actually inside the cliffs and therefore not much weight is borne upon the 'support struts', but see how you feel climbing up there. (Thankfully I wasn't the only one quickly scampering from the heights). There's not much to say ...