China

From the moment I got off the plane (still barefoot, you can take a girl off the island but you can't take the island out of the girl) I had a Chinese translator/interpreter, in the form of my cousin, who was able to tell me the best places to go, read menus and order for me. This made things very easy and I was able to spend my time with him discussing eastern philosophy, practising yoga and qi gong (and realising how similar some of the exercises are) and generally discussing life, love and the universe (I swear we worked out the answer at 6am one morning ...).

It wasn't until the train to Nanning that I faced China by myself. My first mishap was getting my ticket stolen in the train station and having to buy a new one, but the day did not improve from there ...

The weekend before my intended train journey Typhoon Usagi approached and the boats were canceled and when we arrived at the train station at 1pm in time to get some lunch before getting on the train it said the train could be about 3 hours delayed. By the time I got back from lunch they eye saying the train wouldn't be there until 10pm so I left and came back at 10 ...

10pm was when the gates opened and I could wait on the platform. I was the only foreigner in the room so stood out like a sore thumb and when at 3am people started to leave and I tried to find out what was going on, all I got was people laughing at the fact that I couldn't understand. Eventually I found someone at the information that spoke English and found the train was due to arrive at 5am. It did arrive at 5 but it didn't leave till 7.

Once I was on the train it was fine. I fell straight asleep and the delay meant that I didn't need to stop the night in Nanning, but could get straight on the bus to Hanoi.

Internet information that I had found on the Nanning bus ticket office was slightly out of date as there are building works going on outside the station so it was lucky that I spotted an Australian with a Chinese friend that was able to take me there and order my ticket for me.

I will attempt to do China by myself one day. It is yet another example of travelling somewhere just to realise that thereis so much more that I haven't seen.