Our trip to Hua Shan spring 2009

Trip to Hua Shan,

First of all I am really sorry that I am not able to add photos ,as recently this site is blocked in China and I am using thevproxy site to open it which means can't add any photos.
I am so sad though,btrreaders can understand I am not so pathetic..
back to the story:


We had another short holiday this weekend and decided to go to the Mount Hua, which is located 200 Km on the East part of Xian.
As we used to for our trips we got up around 7ish and get the cab to the train station and surprisingly saw a huge queue in front of us.
Well I admit that mountain is pretty famous in these area ,and as we all(who live in China) know ,in any public holiday every where is jammed and crowed by Pack of locals who are going somewhere.

Chinese citizen who are employed ,in 99% of jobs which they are dealing with ,just have 5 days off per year.

Anyhow back to our trip it was 8ish we started our trip and it took 2 hours to reach to Hua Town. Bus dropped us on the bottom and we saw the gate and plenty of mini busses ready to take people up .

Most of mountains you have to get a cab or mini bus to reach to part of mountain which you can climb.
In fact some mountains are pretty famous and crowed or in peak seasons have so many visitors ,like mount Hua ,which you don’t need to be worried for vehicle as there are plenty.
Some mountains like Mogan Shan near Hangzhou in Zhejiang province, is harsh top get down or climb as rarely mini- buses or taxis give you a lift.
It took around half an hour we reached to the main entrance .and there were 2 different area which you had 2 choices of using a cable car or climb on foot. As majorities get cable we decided for one way till we know about more about distance and areas. I am so happy we did .

Apparently it could take 3 hours and really hard to climb up. We reached to the final station of cable car and our real journey started. By that time we arrived there was almost 12 and we climbed a bit and reach to the North peak which is almost 1800 M .This mountain as Huan Shan( Yellow Mountain) has different peaks and different directions to summit area, after we reached to the North part went back and passed y the only freaking Hostel there.

We were wondering if we could stay over night there ,but it would cost each of us 340 RMB per night and I said screw it .It is not going to happen, so let’s climb the whole freaking day and go back and sleep at night on the bottom which is much cheaper. Moreover we were totally prepared this time with food and snacks and drink as in mountain if triple price for any thing.

So we chose anther direction to the West peak which took another hour and meanwhile we ate .The main problem was ,crowd .Chinese love taking freaking photos for hours and we had to wait for the whole ,entire family over 10 people to get their memorable photos ,then continue climbing. No complain …

Another difference between this mountain and others as I have been to more than 6 mountains in China was chain climbing .
Well you may not believe but some parts were unreachable and we had to hold the rusty chain and climb peacefully, well it is not fun though in 2000 Meters believe me or not.

We were lucky and ecstatic that could find some other paths to avoid the crowd and have a bit fun climbing and enjoy the beauty of nature.

It was almost 3.30 P.M we decided not to discover the whole mountain range and let climb down and calculated it has been 4 freaking hours climbing up non stop so lets e pathetic and go back..

The way back we decided save more money and even don’t use the cable car so you can imagine how it was. With chain stuff we had to deal half of the way down. but I was so happy it was the way down not up, as it is easier, if you can control not look down.
I have aqua-phobia but I love mountain climbing. So determined not to look down other wise feel giddy and the rest of story would be unfinished.

Anyhow in 2 hours we were down and I hardly could feel my legs and they were completely numbed.
And by that time we saw the bus ready back to Xian ,so decided to back home and sleep in our lovely bed and no point stay a night there.
Anyhow It was great trip though.

Old street in XIan and Great Masque

Xian Old street and Muslim area.

Another place which worth visiting is Muslim area and old street in Xian which is located inside the city wall.

The day me and Wijbren were walking of the city wall and had our lunch in one of local places and visited old art street ,we noticed that in another side ,which approximately is 20 minutes walk in distance form city wall you can see Drum tower and Bell Tower.





These 2 towers basically were built the exact time that city Wall was built due to keeping the ceremonies there and moreover keeping an eye for enemies attack who Want to subdue the

city.
Nowadays there are nothing especially left from those era and these 2 towers are completely isolated and forgotten, but still they are nice to see and be there.
Another day we decided to go there and take some photos.

We went out to explore the small streets of the old town. I wandered around the small streets of the old town through the markets and small temples that dot the area. Eventually we ended up at the Great Mosque, which is not what you expect to find in the center of China.






Great Masque was built in Tang Dynasty and renovate later on. When you get in the masque you realized unlike the masque in Middle East or Arabic countries this one the construction and architectural style in totally Chinese, include 4 courtyards and arch shape chambers, which makes it completely different. In fact this masque had 3 different corridors you pass on and then a great big square which I assume is for praying on Fridays.

This Masque was built to show great honor to Islam in China during the Tang Dynasty when a lot of Merchants came to China from Middle East to trade and married with Han National in China.

But Xi'an once the capital and end (or start depending on perspective) of the Silk Road has a large Muslim population that has remained to this day. The most interesting thing about the Mosque is it really looked like a Chinese Temple, even the Minuret was disguised as a Pagoda.

Xian museum and Small Pagoda

We ( me and Wijbren ) have been to Xian around 3 months already. During the May holiday and mostly in our weekends we arrange to have a tour around the city, as Xian is one of the oldest capitals in china.

On day we decided to go and visit Small goose pagoda. In fact there are 2 Pagodas in Xian ,Big and Small one. It is around 2 kilometers far from center of city.

This pagoda as other Pagodas is a symbol of peace and dignity in Xian .In fact it was built on 15 storeys in Tang Dynasty but due to an earthquake in 1556 ,2 floors were collapsed .It has a brick ,pentagon shape structure.
It was hard to climb up as too many people at the same time are trying to reach to the top and you have pass though a narrow dark tunnel, but the eye-birds view was totally amazing.






Inside the Pagoda the area which is around 5000 meters,as you can see so many silk shops, painting, calligraphy and Chinese paper cutting .

Moreover there are few places you can sit by side of bamboo trees and have your tea ,in fact there is no tea houses there,which I wish there were some.

Actually Wijbren was trying to find something for his Mum there, and I was looking and chatting and basically mumbling Some Chinese words to the shopekeeper inorder to get some discounts.



A lot of Chinese have this habit to boost you and in fact praise you and say “oh! Your Chinese is so good”. Well it is part of their culture, as they usually ask you we you are from and what you do in China and so on…


On the West part of building you can visit the Xian Archeological Museum which has 2 floors and has 2 exhibition halls which shows the history of the city and how it built and shows the city wall and other surrounding areas which grew during the time and the basement( first floor)shows the treasure and underground treasures.

I ALWAYS HATE BEING SO LONG IN Museums and in fact always be curious to get in and see what is inside.

In fact that day was like a short ,nice tour .It is good sometimes being far from other responsibilities and hang around and see somehistorical,cultural places and have a nice picnic.

My sixth Birthday in China

My Sixth Birthday in China:

My Birthday is on 23 of March and this year, as I was thinking before and planning few months ago .
I could be at home(Iran),which my plan ttally chage due to my new postion and new job and travelling to a new city.
The point is every year I passed my Birthday somewhere in China ,just 3 years I was in Hangzhou and every year there was totally different as I had new colleagues coming and going and I had different plans for my birthday ,like dancing being in pub or choosing my special restaurant..

Celebrating Birthdays in a tradition between every nation .But I can say it is completely personally as some people even from the same country have different attitude toward it, celebrate it or not.
I know some people say well we are too old for this shit now and some want on purpose to forget it as they think they are getting old or somebody might ask their ages.
.
In fact I personally think your age is the age you feel inside and not necessary your Birth certificate age. They are so many I have seen in middle age ,really healthy, do sports regularly and have healthy diet ,a great partner who cheer them up and lovely life and feel great every year that pass.
In fact that effects your body metabolism and your mind like a therapy.
Having a person understand you and make your life more bright is a special Birthday gift In fact.

I do believe specially for women having a perfect lover, partner who care enough makes them much happier and younger every year than`pass by.

To me, Birthday is an important issue and always will be .
I would like to have it as I want to remember the day I was born and enjoy it with my beloved ones, as my family ,close friends and my partner from now on.

Anyway this year in Xian I had 2 birthday as we celebrate one week early to be in a fancy, exclusive restaurant and in the next week on my real birth day we had a nice lunch in Korean restaurant and I received a beautiful ring and Wijbren officially proposed for marriage.

Our trip to Tai Bai Shan,winter 2009

There are two mountain ranges around Xian which both of them are around 2 hours by bus far from Xian , the same distance in 2 different directions.

We decided in one of our short holidays or better to say our long weekends (3 days off) go there.
We found out there is a main bus station beside train station located in the center of city and by taxi takes 15 minutes to get there.

We( me and wijbren) were so panic and wanted to be punctual in matter of not losing the bus ,so we woke up early and arrived there 7:30 ,as one of the locals suggested. Well as things works like that in China, we had to wait there for another hour till bus arrive to the station and enough passengers then get ready to go.

Well ,somehow we managed to start our trip 8.30ish and it took approximately 2 hours we arrived to the bottom of the mountain. All the way we passed from farm fields and fruit trees. Actually around Xian is pretty green.
The way coming to Xian we were sitting on the train and had plenty of chances to look around and from 3 hours before then arriving to Xian districts we saw so many fields, paddies and cultivated areas.

As I have been to so many mountains in China I knew how it works and I told Wijbren don’t worry we have to climb from bottom to top, as there are stairs always to climb up.

In China mountains are not just like Iran’s mountains which definitely need equipments and tools to climb up .In fact at least after 500 meter high ,if you are not a regular climber or not having proper equipments and boot not good enough you won’t be able to climb.
But surprisingly we discovered that it is 45 Km zigzag way.

Which means at least one day completely walking ,more than 12 hours. Sound terrifying. Well they has some taxis waiting for costumers as hunting fish .I tried to ignore them and deal with entrance get and pay the entrance fee ,but finally we had to get taxi up to be able to reach to the top .

I have been to Mogshan Mountain, Tian mu Mountain and Yellow mountain. In China and all the way we could climb on foot or use cable car and as a record I should mention this Mountain was different.

Anyway ,By taxi it took 4 hours to reach up and some people get car sick the mid-way cause is so high and all the way is spiral and rocky and pretty shit in winter.

As this mountain is called Tai Bai Shan, which means” white snowy mountain” ,you can imagine from 1500 meter up we could still see snow on the way up and it was April already.
The way top we stopped few laces and we took some nice photos and on the last station taxi waited for us for 2 hours and we managed to climb a bit on 3700 meters height which was nice though ,but some part was unfortunately really slippery ,due to un melted snow and icy in fact and too dangerous to walk even one by one step.


Any how we had some snacks and asked the taxi drop us some where we could get some food. In fact in this mountain there is no restaurant or any other places to get even water, so you should be equipped completely.

We had a plan to stay there overnight ,so we asked for a room form the only restaurant ,hostel place ,better call it local lodge. But it was just few smelly small rooms and a shitty noodle restaurant in 2000 meter high.
They wanted to charge us a 150 Kuai per night ,so we decided we go back in the after noon and get a room on the bottom and the next day we could go for hot spring and climb a bit around.

Actually there were some places before the gate you could climb a bit and see some temples on the top of 500 meter.
And in the afternoon we got the only bus which, usually gets back to Xian around 3ish in the afternoon.

One day tour on City Wall in Xian 2009

As sometimes my memories and mind live in present while I am writing I need to come to present time and I apologize to the readers see my blog swinging between present and past.

As we are living in Xian I had a great desire in one of our weekend walk on the wall. Can you imagine ,it never end .It took us 4 hours walking and still long way to go.

There are some booth and cashier centers on the wall which help the tourist to rent bikes by giving them a 100 kuai deposits.

There are plenty of chance in China and a lot of East Asian countries to do exercises more than West. Especially in China still most of people use bike for daily tasks and the size of a lot of cities let you do that. The lane on the roads are built for bikes and each Road has 4 lane plus one lane for buses and one lane for bikes.


Meanwhile that you are strolling in a nice ,overcast day on the wall and enjoy the scenery , you can imagine that how long it had been taken to build that wall a few years with hands and pretty primitive tools to make such a strong wall with almost 20 meters.

The University That I teach currently has a big square in the center which is a gathering place for elderly that every morning show up there to do some Tai chi or Kong fu.
If it is your first trip to China you will be surprised or might be annoyed due to siren and noises and music for dances in the early morning. But beside that you can feel how much people pay attention of exercises here. Anyhow back to the wall..

There are 4 gates on the city wall and that was built on Tang dynasty
.In fact the point of building Great wall in Beijing and City wall in Xian was protecting the city from enemies attack ,as on those era the arsenal were pretty primitive so couldn’t easily break the wall .


The only way attack the city was pass through the gate which was really harsh .the are 48 ramparts on the wall which are built 200 meters far from each other on each side of 4 gates.

That day was a great time when I was standing in front of one of those old mortars to take a historical photo.

There are plenty of places around each gate of city wall that you can eat and get some traditional local snacks ,like dumplings, noodles, and that part of wall we stopped and dropped by, was in the center of old part of city and we could go to see some calligraphy and art exhibitions close by and surprisingly I noticed few Western café around with beautiful decoration .

Those places were build in Spanish and Greman style and had 2 floor and nice balcony which is facing the wall and city on the other corner. Those places quite nice to sit and chill out after walking for long distance n the wall and a mixture of traditional and modern architecture in fact.

My trip to tibet second part

Tibet trip the second part:
When I got my tour to the South to Himalaya I was so proud of being able to find 3 other people to be with me .It cost us around 2000 for jeep and guide .In fact we had to get another local permission to enter to other areas in Tibet. The permission from travel agency it is just for Lhasa and Namdoc lake, in fact.

It takes totally 6 days to go down and came back to Lhasa. We visited few small country sides and some other districts

.one of the small towns is called Gyantse which is not effected by Chinese culture that much, there is a monastery which is famous to see.

The first day we were going down the guy stopped in one of toll booths and within 2 hours got the permission for restricted areas this city is almost around 4000 above the sea level and there is another holy Lake which is called Yamdork lake which is located in Shannag region. It has 130 Km length and the second highest lake in the world around4400 meter above the sea level and the largest freshwater lake in the world.

There are a lot of pilgrims go there to show their dignity and appreciation to this lake and in fact it is the holy guardian of Buddhism in Tibet. The water is like a crystal and so clean and surrounded by mountains which is like an ice cream around the clear sapphire.

They way to lake is so zigzag and it is far from the main road in fact. It takes almost one hour from the main road to get there and you see in most of roads in Tibet people hang color paper and even most of the local cars and buses stop in some high roads in order to do their pray to the road and burn the papers or tear them down and spread them into air to avoid bad spirits and wish a good trip for travelers.
And in our 3 day after passing Gyatse and Yamdork lake we went to Shigatse another county village which has a nice view Tashilumpo monastery. At the foot of Mt. Everest is located the highest temple in the world, Rongbuk Monastery. At the altitude of about 5000 m. (16,404 ft.) and 25 km.

(15.5 mi.) in the distance, it is also the best point to appreciate the scenery of Mt. Everest. Rongbuk Glacier around this area is also the largest among all the glaciers here.In fact if you don’t madness of climbing or enough money or any other reasons youc an stay on the bease camp and climb around and see the great view of Mount EVEREST AND IT TAKES 2 HOURS WALKING IN FACT TILL REACH THE NEPAL BORDER.I