I have traveled to many places in China (more than 80 cities) and will use this blog to represent some of my many experiences and circumstances while traveling in the worlds most populous nation. I originally posted 4 stories on my other blog (itoddmac.blogspot.com), then fully realized that my travels in China, and what I witnessed while on the road there would not fit in one travel blog; hey, I was a blog newbie. These 4 posts will be transferred into this blog; for other countries please enter the above blog address, if you are interested.
I have put photo's in my posts to help the reader visualize just what I was witnessing at the time that I took the photo; and wrote in my journal. Since I rely on both my memory and my journals, the experiences that are described are solely my own eye witness accounts and emotions. Each persons own travel is her/his own unique adventure, therefore someone else may feel that entering a certain city or a specific site in that city had an opposite appeal to mine.
A common thread throughout some posts will be my thoughts on the behavior of some of the citizens that I was surrounded by. I am not a fan of cigarette smoke so the disregard for others shown by some of the 330 million smokers that I came in contact with was frustrating. Most restaurants have large no smoking signs on the walls but the owners make sure that there are ashtrays on every table. A smoker (when confronted) may shrug his shoulders and point to the ashtray with a gesture of, what am I supposed to do, there is an ashtray? In so many of the smaller cities the car rules and the safety of the citizens in those cities comes a distant second. Not only do cars drive and park on sidewalks but the drivers of many cars use the horn as a warning, laying on that horn as they come right at you in a crosswalk. When the walk signal turns for a pedestrian to cross the road, the last thing you want to do is step off the curb if you hear a taxi driver honking that they are turning.
Some people will read a blog post without referring to this introduction post and may feel that I do not like China or it's citizens, this is not true. The pollution, the crowds, the bad behavior of some people (spitting, pushing, budding in line, smoking), those aspects are not only a sharp contrast to where I live but for me unacceptable for my every day existence.
When I reflect on my travels in China I often consider my tremendous experiences with visiting historic sites. Many times I took slow trains and long bus journey's where I obtained a bond with local people who were experiencing the same joy or hell as I was. I learned many things about the people and their culture while on the road in this largest Asian country. I recognized that the Chinese are a proud people; just one example is, many street vendors refuse a tip although they only make about 600 RMB ($100.00) per month. The Chinese are hard working people who will work 12 hours/ 7 days per week if necessary. We are very good at suffering short term in the west, perhaps we are the best, short term. The Chinese seem to be able to accept long term suffering and survive severe conditions over a full life span.
My posts will not be political but rather reflect from a tourist (me) perspective for the most part. I do want to say that I recognize some changes that could be made in China that would improve the life of the underprivileged, but that is their business. I was hoping that I could share my travel experiences through my blog with my Chinese friends but they are blocked from the Google US; they must use the Google Hong Kong server which is regulated. Baidu took most of the market share a few years ago after Google refused to adhere to strict regulations and pulled out from the mainland.
Finishing up here (I promise the posts will be short and sweet rather than lengthy and boring), I would like to give this last paragraph to my young Chinese friends who I love very much. As people will read, there have been incredible experiences had by me in China. Sometimes there was danger, at times confused chaos, but as I traveled around the country my young friends were never far from my mind. They always supported me when I was getting the chance to see their country extensively; perhaps they did not know that meeting them was a real highlight of my experience.
These experiences that I will describe in these posts would not be possible if it were not for my wonderful wife and daughter. I guess I could describe these two lights of my life with the word awesome.
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