Hello China!

I'm excited about China. India I was nervous about, I might have even had (definitely did have) a little blub to Toby  about how nervous I was about my trip and India in the taxi to Tobe when I left him at Yalumba brunch, but China has a mystical history and an interesting present. I land in Kunming, in the South-West of China, at 5:15am. Fortunately, signs are in Chinese and English with little pictures, and I make my way to the taxi rank. I'm prepped, I hand over my phone with the hotel address because I know that would I say wouldn't be read or said correctly. Oh wait. It's English writing, and none of the taxi men can read them. I accidentally scroll down the page while he looks at the address. BAM. There it is!! In Chinese symbols. THANK YOU HOSTEL WORLD!! ‘O-k. We go’ says the taxi driver. I chuck my bag in the boot and off we go. First impressions; China is grey, the people are helpful but I am definitely going to struggle. Lanes are acknowledged, as are road signs. And attraction signs are in brown, like at home. Roads are wide and there's a grid system like in America. It's clean. Really, really clean. I can't see any graffiti or litter anywhere. But most of all, I'm grateful for the lower temperature, lower humidity and even the rain. 

My taxi man is smiley. He tries out his English on me: ‘Hello. Hi. Sir. Madam. How are you? I am fine. I love you. I love you too’. Well, didn't that escalate quickly! I giggled when he started, after his declaration of love I'm belly laughing. He laughs too. In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have laughed so much. He spent the rest of the journey saying ‘I love you too’ over and over. 

In-between his declarations of love he called the hostel three times to make sure they were open and to find out where exactly it was. On the way to the hostel we drove over a cross roads where there had been a collision between a taxi and a moped. There were no other cars on the road and it was grey and rainy so I don't understand how the accident happened. 

The driver stopped at a row of shops with a square alcove of other shops. In Chinese, he explained that the hostel was in there somewhere. I strapped my bag back on my back and head towards the alcove. The taxi driver remained. I spotted my hostel in an alley off the square and gave my driver a thumbs up. He smiled, laughed, returned the thumbs up and drove off. 

The Hump Hostel was on the third floor. I climbed the stairs, lazily and slowly, and walked into the large lounge and terrace area. Red with gold edged Chinese lanterns hung in the dark, copious amounts of photo frames adorned the walls- it was too dark to see what the frames held and fat rain drops splattered on the ping pong table and terrace table tops. I took at a seat at the reception desk and waited for someone to come. Behind the check in desk was an A4 piece of paper with the writing ‘if check in before 7am and after 11pm call 0xxx xxxxxxx’. I hadn't called this number. When I had made my reservation though, I had specified arrival time 6am. 

Behind me, the couple from the Kolkata departure lounge and Kunming airport, arrive. ‘You made good time!’ I knew it! I bloody knew they were heading to the same place. We exchanged pleasantries. Twenty minutes later I was in my hostel bed. 

I woke up at 1pm to the sound of a Chinese girl I was sharing with on her mobile. Such a loud voice! Anyway, she's stuffing her face with impressive chop stick skills whilst chatting to a friend. I go for a shower. My room has a shared bathroom. Whilst I'm showering it starts. The hawking. Either there's a few people in the bathroom or this single person is bringing up an entire lungs worth of phlegm. I hum to distract myself from the sound and by the time my shower is finished, they've gone. 

I order shredded pork noodles from the hostel restaurant, an iced coffee and take a seat on the sofas under shelter on the terrace. The rest of the day is spent reading, enjoying wearing my hoody and watching the rain fall. 

Around 7:30am, the couple from the morning, Nick and Jen get back to the hostel from a days wandering. Happy hour starts at 8am. 600ml bottles of Tsingtao for 10¥. Nick and Jen have both spent six weeks in India and now spending a month in China making their way to a family wedding in Malaysia. After happy hour finishes we go try to find street food. Nick is carrying this small notebook of little phrases and manages to order pork skewers, beef skewers, pork buns and veg buns. As we sit in the little covered alcove behind the grill, we people watch. A lady just in front of me chews on chicken feet. She sits with her legs spread wide and every and now then she spits out what she's chewing on to the floor. There's a little pile of chewed chicken feet growing between her feet. Her friend talks while she chews and spits and thinks nothing of it. Jade, if you did that I would be absolutely mortified. Dad, you would have left.  

We wander around the night markets and I have no idea how, but by 10:30pm I'm shattered and go to sleep.