Friday 24 April 2015

Chengdu 150415


Chengdu. My hate & love relationship with Chengdu. I stayed the longest so far throughout my trip here for 12 nights, mostly because I had to wait to get the permit for my next trip destination Lhasa, Tibet. What I dislike about Chengdu; Cold, Expensive, Big City, Money, Getting Colder – the coldest I’ve been too, figuring how to go to Tibet – more and more money, the city is too big – so you have to use public transport to go around – more money and China certainly made a big hole from my budget. What I like about Chengdu; people I met (travelers, locals, students, a Malaysian guy), the cheap local food, the Xingjian lamb stick, the food cooked by a Malaysian fellow, the spice of the food, meeting lots & new people and finally the good weather on the final days of my stay. I would say I had a first bad week followed by a good one.

The first thing I did when I arrived in Chengdu was to find a taxicab and showed him the address of my host. It took a while for the taxi driver to figure out where it was – this shows how big the city was; even the taxi drivers didn’t know all the roads in Chengdu city. Chengdu is the capital of the Sichuan province and it was twice bigger than Kunming. My host lives somewhere in the southwest of Chengdu. Chengdu was structured in circular way with ring roads. Rieneke from the Netherlands has only been in Chengdu for about a month as she is taking Chinese language studies at the southwest university. I also met up with Michael that evening – he approached me on couch surfing for meet up. He was from Sarawak, Malaysia and has been working in Chengdu for a year and half as a kindergarten teacher. He has plans to do a reversal trip from Chengdu to Malaysia by land, once he is done with Chengdu – that’s why he wanted to meet up at first. Michael kinda introduced me Chengdu and the way we should travel around here. The second elevated ring road has a frequent bus that just goes around and from there we can go to outer part of the city. And then we can use the bus on ground level or metro subway to go inner towards the center where everything was. He also showed me the cheap street foods and ‘Hui’ (Muslims in China) food of Chengdu.

On the first week of my stay, I didn't do much sightseeing and I only go outdoors for food and to figure out about Tibet. The weather on the first week was really cold. And it was the first cold weather I encountered for years – so it took me quite some time to adjust and waking up to the cold mornings were hard. Rieneke was busy with classes on weekdays and she was mostly available at night. I went to my first few couch surfing meeting with her. I met a lot of random people whether they were traveling or on a break from traveling (working), locals, and other couch surfers with their hosts from. It was awkward for me at first but once we started talking – we just couldn’t stop. I also introduced Rieneke with Michael and we went for our first hotpot together, which was very spicy experience. Michael introduced us to his colleague Lana from Ukraine and his American friend Hubert. They made dinner at one of the nights - cooking meals from their home country. And it was good and fulfilling one.

Figuring out the Tibet trip was like a roller coaster. I searched it online before but it was just too expensive because foreigners must have permits to enter Tibet. And in order to get permits – we must go with a tour. From the Internet it showed that the cost was about USD1000 for seven days trip until the border of China – Nepal. I decided to figure it out once I’m. I went to Lazybones hostel, which was recommended by Michael, and somehow from the packages that they offer – it seemed to be out of my budget. It is cheaper if you have a big group go with but I don't have that. So, they told me to email the Mix hostel if there any groups that I can join with. The respond was good as there were a couple going there soon – and I can join them but I need to decide as quick as possible whether to join them or not, so they can do my permit with the limited time. I went to Mix Hostel, which was located at the north side of Chengdu to get more details. If I joined the couple, the cost for each of us will be 3000 Yuan excluding accommodation and food. I also need to get the 2day train ticket from Chengdu to Lhasa. I guess that was the cheapest price for the last minute limited time that I had left. The train ticket to Lhasa is sold out according to organizer of the trip at mix hostel but somehow they can get it black market (what is that suppose to mean). I was 50 – 50 on going, because it will make big hole out of my budget but on the other hand, I really wanted to make my way through Nepal by land and this was the only route to do so. While figuring out and deciding whether to take the Tibet route or not, I met a lot of exciting travellers at Mix hostel. There were three bicycle travelers and by coincident they met up at Mix Hostel – an Aussie guy cycling from Europe to Australia, another Aussie guy cycling the opposite way and a French guy who is cycling towards Mongolia. I’ve even met up with a traveler who has been traveling for 14 years.

My 2nd week was so much better because the sun was out. I’ve also decided to take the Tibet route but I was unprepared for the weather in the hills of Tibet. Luckily, I met a local, Amy at a couch surfing meeting and we talked about my Tibet route. According to her it’s freezing cold at Tibet. She helped me out to get cheap winter clothes from an NGO and 2nd hand hiking shoes.  Thank you for that Amy. I’ve also moved to stay with Michael on the 2nd week. I’m the first person he ever hosted on couch surfing. Michael loves food. Somehow he managed to get me cooking my favorite ‘Ayam Masak Merah’. I never really cooked for people before and my last cooking was about two years ago – and Michael really wanted to learn a Malay dish. All in all it turned out good and I’m glad that they enjoyed it. With the days that I had left before the Tibet trip, I went to explore the Chengdu city – like Kuanzhai alley, Jinli Street, Tianfu Square and some monastery. And during the night I would spend my time with Michael, Lana & sometimes Hubert – we even went for a typical Chinese Karaoke TV on one of the nights. That somas up my time in Chengdu and I was time to move on for the Tibet trip by taking the 42 hours train ride to Lhasa!

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