Kunming days
Trip Start
Apr 04, 2004
1
2
34
Trip End
Jun 07, 2004
Kunming,
China
Friday, April 9, 2004
Continued from ; Camelia
Thursday 8th April.
I am obliged to report to the PSB - The Police, in other words. Who happily extend my visa. It is their job to provide this service for foreigners, not an immigration office like in other places. Naturally I would not dream of asking their advice on how Joe Foreigner will make a non-standard crossing into the Tibet Autonomous region. The Chinese government are paranoid about spies and sympathisers. But my tentative plan is to fly in to Lhasa from a place called Zhongdian. Not from Chengdu as is preferred by the general masses for that would mean back-tracking. I would rather not fly at all because it will break my unbroken record so far of travelling all the way from Stockholm overland. But there are no permitted land crossings in this region for foreigners wanting to enter Tibet.
Wally and I regularly occupy the smoking section of the hostel. Which consists of two armchairs and a large house plant. With the assistance of concentration-enhancing tobacco I make some very intricate repairs to my shoes using a tube of Chinese superglue.
Life continues on for a while in Kunming. I like the city very much. In particular Green Lake park dotted with its small pavilions reached via ornate bridges. Where an older generation of people play musical instruments and sing. Popular is a kind of guitar with only two strings and a carved horses-head. Others spend all day playing cards or Ma-Jong. The younger population walk to and from the university there or sit under trees with their books. Some with hairstyles attempting fashion statements. There's a pizza place in the vicinity by the name of Theresa's that's astonishingly good. Sometimes I'll drink tea at a French cafe or stroll along the river that cuts through the city. To avoid some of the inevitable congestion in the late afternoon.
Waking up in the dorm, I see that yesterday's three Israelis have been replaced by three different Israelis. And I'm not kidding but the original three Israelis reappeared again one morning from the same beds. Either they are magicians or I am smoking too much of Wally's tobacco.
Kunming is not short of lively drinking establishments either. There is the City café with it's outside seating providing a good daytime people-watching zone. There is also the much larger Camel bar in which we play a rowdy and highly amusing card game that involves two main tests of ability. That of memory power and that of the capacity to skull vast quantities of grog. As participants are later seen dropping their trousers on public balconies, it's clear that both requirements reduce in supply the longer the games goes on. Lastly there is the Speak-easy bar where they have a designated chill out room popular with a certain type of smoker. Slack-jawed with eyes hanging out. Elsewhere in the cavernous basement venue are pool tables and the general feel of a dimly lit nightclub. Low and behold, who should I meet in there but Randy Andy. Last seen in Chengdu. He has a local girl with him and she's quite lovely. Barman, please !
Next ; Same shit, different town
