The headache, that mad me feel like I was being punched in the head, has gone. (Thanks for nursing me through it, Wilko). I shower, pack and head back to the transport centre to get the bus to Leshan. Unlike the bus to the mountain top, seats are allocated on this bus and I sit in the wrong seat, but the girl’s who seat I sat in is lovely about it and helps me find my actual seat. 

The bus takes about an hour. Leshan is set up for tourists too and has a tourist information point right outside the bus station. The attendant tells me, in pigeon English, that I can leave my pack at the bus station at the left luggage counter and I need to take the number 13 bus to the end of the route for 1¥. A taxi man hounds me for business and she tells him to go away. 

I go into the bus station and buy my onward ticket for Chengdu at 4pm, check in my back for 5¥ and go find the bus stop for route 13. 

As I climb on the bus the bus driver says ‘he-lo’ and holds up 1 finger and points to the slot to put my money into. I say ‘Buddha?’ And he nods. Leshan is nice. Lots of shops and loads of construction going up along the river line. I enjoy getting the bus in unknown towns, even though you take this round about, and ultimately longer routes, you see more of the area and the people. The bus turned right and went over the river and turned right to drive parallel to the river to pass through a grand archway. I stood up to get off seeing the ‘Giant Buddha Scenic Area’ sign. The bus driver shouts back ‘no. No’ and I take my seat again. The people that weren't already staring at me definitely were now. Two stops along he tells me it's time to get off and points out the ticket office to me. 

Once inside the complex there are more steps. I'm learning that China loves steps and their translations are brilliant. There are signs which show no littering, but the English translation reads ‘no parabolic’. The information placards in the grounds do have English on them but it reads the way my German homework used to with basic grammar being wrong, as if they've used Google translate, because I never ever did that, Mum. I reach the gateway and see the Buddha statue forehead in front and temples (temples for praying, not temples on your head) to the left. I join the queue for Buddha. ‘90minutes from this point’. 90 minutes?! Well I'm here now and it's only 11:30am so I have time. There's a massive TV screen showing a repeating documentary on the statue and the complex has wifi. For the first time I'm happy that Tobes and Adrian are on similar and the same, respectively, time zones. Although, a national monument of an ancient statue and temples having wifi seemed so weird to me. 

While queuing a group of elderly people push infront of me, but they only get to just in front of me because the group of boys in front won't let them through. I glance to my left and a very old man is standing next to me and staring at me. He gives me the same looks that the villagers in Hampi did. I think he  was standing the closest he ever had been to a westerner. He was no taller than 5ft, wearing traditional navy blue pumps, navy cut off trousers, a grey tunic and blue cotton cap. He had a wispy grey beard and only had a few teeth. Wrinkles covered his face, but the wrinkles by his eyes made his face look like he was smiling all the time. I smile and nod, he smiles back, raises his hand and waves to me. This interaction carried on for an hour, him and I letting the other go first at each bend and turn in the queue. When you leave the rails there are steep, deep steps where everyone has go in single file and I got ahead of him. By the time I reached the bottom and was standing infront of the statue I was so over it. But I made sure the little old man made it down the stairs safely, he did, and I watched him pray. The 90 minutes queuing, spitting, pushing, shouting, avoiding selfie sticks that were millimetres from your face. I was so over it. I watched boats cruise by, passengers wearing life jackets having loads of space to stand on board and take in the statue. I wish I had taken the boat. The statue is enormous and very impressive. I think though, because it was built the same way that Petra is built- from the top down, and not as old I was a little underwhelmed. To be honest, if I had taken the boat and gone into it without feeling fed up I'd have probably love it. 

I spent 15 minutes looking at the statue, moving out of the way of even more bloody selfie sticks and started to the climb the stairs back to the top. Once I made it back to the top there were no signs towards the exit. It's 2:30pm by now I'm aware that I need to be back for the 4pm bus. Where is the exit?! There are signs to all the ridiculous named temples, but none to the exit. 

I walk back to the entrance I came in from and follow it out, walk to the bus station and wait at the bus stop. I climb aboard and I'm given the same reaction ‘he-lo!’ The bus is full so I stand, I am very much taller than the other people on this bus and children stare at me. As the bus thins out the driver calls over for me to sit on the special assistance seats at the front of the bus and I catch him glancing at me in the rear view mirror every now and then. My stop comes and he waves goodbye and let's me cross the road infront of the bus. Leshan, you're people are nice. In the bus stop waiting area is a grey poodle. He looks just like Elvis, but grey, and the girl lets me play with him. 

My bus departs exactly at 4pm and I take my allocated seat this time. Over head they're playing a Marvel film in English, with Chinese subtitles. This will definitely pass the time. Oh wait no, the driver puts it on mute. No film for me. So I read instead while all the other locals sleep. They can sleep anywhere!

A old couple sit across the aisle from me. They're deaf and I watch them wondering if sign language is a universal language?? Half way through the journey the old man wakes up. He does this enormous sniff where you can hear the snot hit the back of the throat, next a hawk throat clear. I temporarily paralyse. He is not going to spit that out on the coach is he? He can't. Can he? There are no windows. He has to swallow it. I glance to my right to see he has taken out a tissue, he slowly spits the contents of his mouth out into the tissue. He takes the corners of the tissue, makes them meet and twists them, and places the tissue into the netting of the back of the seat in front. I do a minisick, Kim. He does this another time and I put on my music, loud and close my eyes for the rest of the journey. Oh China! That is not ok. 

The bus arrives in Chengdu to grey rain, and we clear out. I take my bag and hear the taxi men hollering for business. To my right is taxi men, to my left, men on little electric scooters. I take the left option. I show my address in Chinese to the man. He puts my pack on the floor in between his legs and I climb on behind him. The scooter makes no sound and we whizz through Chengdu. Ten minutes later we arrive at the hostel, Flip Flop Hostel. 

It's lovely! My dorm is great- there are actually people in it! Two girls and a guy. One of the girls, Julie, studies at Hong Kong university and speaks fluent English and puts her VPN on my phone. The other girl doesn't speak to me at all. The boy gives me presents; dried meat from his town, a screen cleaner and a key holder. He asks Julie to translate questions; do I know where David Beckham lives? Erm, nope. Can't say I do. 

I sit in the hostel lounge, drinking Tsingtao, eating noodles and sleep.