Pingliang

Dear all,

We were scheduled to leave Xi'an at 12:30pm on August 22nd and so had some time to spend in the area round the hotel. I spent a good part of it here:

That's Cathy reading in the photo.

It was a beautiful cafe with all kinds of chairs, lamps and books inside and was also very large. They played some good music with the exception of a lounge jazz version of Pink Floyd's "Time". The speakers were meagre but they sounded excellent due to the large acoustic space. The coffee cost five times more than a beer but was fresh and of an acceptable quality.

I read my book, "The Magic Mountain" by Thomas Mann. Set at the turn of the century, it's about two young men, a naval engineering student and an army officer, who end up taking a long stay an a sanatorium in the Alps. They leave their customary and privileged lives of work, friends and family behind and instead spent time in a much more rarified atmosphere where recourse to their usual habits and ways quickly becomes unfeasible. Instead, they live a simple life, albeit an uncomfortable one where death is ever present.

At 12:30 we boarded the truck (not bus) and set off. We were introduced to some truck rules - no firearms, illegal drugs, prostitution or violence, and disinfect your hands every time you board. It takes three vetoes to skip a track on the truck's sound system, we shouldn't refer to the inboard safe as a safe but instead by its codeword, ***, there are six seats on the roof but we can only use them off tarmac where there are low cables or bridges.

Here we are (or at least the people I was facing when I took my camera out):

That's Kelvin in the blue shirt, then Cathy, Martin and Jenny. Martin's from Australia, Jenny's from Surrey, they met on a trip decades ago and now live together in Australia.

The two photos above are typical scenes of our travel. Works for me.

I stocked up on snacks before we departed. I found 'Lonely God' crackers, among other things:

We reached Pingliang five hours later, well fed and not at all tired from our journey (that comes later). On our arrival at the hotel we found two other trucks:

By pure chance, our itineraries had three groups (Beijing to Istanbul, Beijing to Kathmandu and Istanbul to Beijing) in the same place at the same time. The truck crews had organised a Karaoke night for all of us which we were looking forward to. But first came dinner:

Yes, Tim, school counsellor, scifi novelist and my roommate for the next couple of nights was an adventurous eater. He bought a bag of chicken feet and handed them round. I thought that they would be a secret Chinese delicacy, specially cooked to turn even the skin and nail into tasty morsels but no, it was a normal chicken foot. There was a tiny amount of meat on it.

The rest of the food - a selection of fish flavoured pork, braised lamb, greens, smoked tofu and noodles - was better. As usual, it came to around £2 per person.

After dinner we proceeded to the beer garden where the passengers and crew from the other trucks had gathered and beer only seemed to be sold in three litre jugs. Fortunately this beer was 3% so you would have to drink at quite a rate to become ill.

I wanted to meet some of the Beijing bound - we would only be in the same place this one night - but they were at the other end of our table, so I chatted with Kelvin, Nina and others instead. Due to the logistics of large group and large jug beer drinking we never made it to the karaoke. Inevitably there was always a half full 3L jug which we didn't want to leave.

I headed back at midnight. My roommate Tim came back I don't know when. I jumped out of bed to open the door for him and was expecting all kinds of faff but he just pushed his backpack off his bed, fell onto it and was asleep directly (no snoring).

That night I dreamt I had a monkey curled on on my lap. It was very friendly and docile - I liked him but I was well aware that it was a wild monkey and could turn on me at any moment. I still didn't want to move away from the monkey though.

The next morning we two of the three trucks were scheduled to visit Mount Kongtong. As we were given a brief introduction to the mountain I recalled that it was one of the reasons I'd wanted to participate in this trip. Kongtong is one of the twelve sacred peaks of Taoism and as such is home to a great many Taoist temples. There aren't many of these in the world - they are mainly in China and even here their numbers of greatly decreased since the "cultural revolution". I've always had a great interest in Taoism since its primary scriptures don't depend on a belief in supernatural Gods or forces. Instead, it describes a coherent philosophy of living in accordance with the natural way of things, without pride, humility, virtue or sin. Understanding is reached by reflection and contemplation, not by language, argument and logic. Being kind to ones neighbour is seen as acting in accordance with "The Way", but not an act deserving of reward.

I'd read the two primary texts - the Chuang Tzu and the Tao Ti Ching - but hadn't retread them recently. I knew that Mount Kongtong was mentioned in the former but didn't know what was said, and I knew something of the Taoist immortals and objects of worship but had forgotten most. This bothered me. But we had no internet connection in our Ping Liang hotel so I would simply have to go and see.

We drove to the base of the mountain then took a minibus halfway up. The way was good fun - quick, steep and picturesque - better than most theme park rides.

The climb of the mountain consisted of many steps. Our Chinese guide, Myles (he travels with us) warned us that it was hard, warned us to take our time and provided us a rough overview of the relative locations of the temples, bridges and peaks in the vicinity, then we began.

That's Claire, one of our drivers.

The way was easy. All of us from both the groups, young and old, were at the peak in under two hours. It was cloudy going up but the views were stunning nonetheless. The temple at the top is the peak:

It was overcast / smoggy making it difficult to see a horizon initially but it cleared up a bit later.

After milling about a bit at the temple of heaven Kelvin, Nina and I decided to go further. There was an ascent to heaven, an archway to heaven and bridge to heaven but sadly no stairway to heaven. We inspected the map for a while. I noted that there were two paths we could go by but in the long run it didn't matter which road we were on. Sadly no one reacted.

We decided to cross the bridge to heaven. We set off at a good pace but then we noticed the rest the group was following us. Claire said, "I hope you know where you're going." Strangely enough we did.

We reached the bridge without much climbing. We were already in the heavens.

Nina is an atheist but her mother is Catholic and her grandmother is Buddhist. She lit incense, knelt and prayed at the Buddhist altar. She suggested I do the same, but I lit incense and left it at that.

On our descent we passed through many Taoist temples. The Immortals depicted were those who have transcended their bonds to materiality to such an extent that they could fly between heaven and earth on clouds:

At present I don't really understand the symbolism of the above. I will read more on my return. In any case I would like to see Chinese directors make a film about the Immortals fighting the forces of base materiality - like Power Rangers except with more spiritual depth. That would be good.

I took pictures of the murals whenever there wasn't a Taoist Priest around to tell me not to take pictures. I've discovered that my respect for religions does not extend to not taking pictures of their fascinating murals. I did not however take any pictures of Taoist Priests. I did ask once but was shooed away.

I think these guys are lauded Chinese generals. Perhaps success in battle is praiseworthy in Taoism but that doesn't seem quite right to me.

I carefully inspected each temple we passed through; as a result I began to lag behind. Fortunately this time I was with friends who were patiently waiting for me (I hope):

The sun had come out, and so the descent was more beautiful, more relaxing and quicker than the ascent. I wanted to take my time though, I didn't know when I might see these views again. We did take time to simply sit and look in relative silence for a while.

On our return to Ping Liang, a short drive, we had some time to ourselves before dinner. Kelvin, Nina and I went looking for a pay-as-you-go 3G SIM card, green tea leaves, rice spirit and a hat. Kelvin found the rice spirit, we did without the rest. Some of us are suffering from Internet withdrawal symptoms, which include spending an hour in a mobile phone shop figuring out the complexities of Chinese mobile plans using your poor Mandarin and ultimately giving up (Kelvin) and wandering round with phones out periodically checking for the incredibly unlikely wifi hotspot that we can freeload off (the rest of us except me because my phone is still in Beijing).

While Kelvin chatted in the mobile phone shop Nina and I sat in the beer garden where we'd spent the previous evening and drank tea. She's the second person I've met who has decided to travel post breakup. Her response to the breakup that she instigated was to go to North Korea, then Beijing to Kathmandu, then volunteer in Mongolia for one year. If that doesn't clear her head and give her a fresh start I don't know what will.

Personally, I didn't go travelling immediately post breakup because I wanted some time alone, some peace and quiet, to rethink what I wanted to do with my life. As it happened I was incredibly busy for those nine months with setting up a new house, making new friends and dating, and I'm still not entirely sure what the best course of action is. However I've heard that the desert is quiet and we will be spending a lot of time there, albeit mostly on the move. Where is the best place to go for quiet, I wonder?

Kelvin returned. It was now about 5pm so we decided to move from tea to beer. We wandered over to the other side of the beer garden where as luck had it we found Cathy, Bob and Margaret drinking beer and eating meat on sticks. I beat my personal record for a price of a pint (25p here) and ordered lamb and fish on sticks for an equally measly sum:

The fish was the best thing I've ever tasted on a stick. Charcoal grilled with a spice paste applied with a paintbrush then coated with a dry spice mix.

Kelvin, Nina and I had collectively decided to get to Karaoke that night - the next place where we were to meet was Tibetan Xiahe who are not known for their Karaoke. We would set out immediately after dinner and encourage our groups to join us.

Kelvin and I joined Nina and the rest of the Kathmanduers for dinner. I was pleasantly tipsy and was enjoying myself, so was quite happy to take on the challenge of eating a chicken's head. I don't have the photo of this attempt but doubtless it will surface at some point.

Next to Kelvin is Mike from San Francisco and Shane from somewhere in Australia.

We had an audience during our meal:

A lone white person gets many stares, some hellos and occasional requests for photos, but a group of white people, especially when they're travelling in a big orange truck, results in wide eyes and jaws slack with amazement. The concept of a foreign tourist is still new to most people and cities.

As we left the restaurant it began to rain quite heavily. We all hurried back to the hotel. I believe some ventured out for further beers but had to make their way back through ankle deep flooding and sewage. It was quite a storm.

The Kathmanduers departed early the next morning and we were left to forage for buns. I ate alone in a small bun and soup place among many curious Chinese who wished to talk to me but couldn't. My own silent communication was quite successful however. I managed to say "I would like to sit here and eat whatever is in that steamer with chopsticks. I apologise that I do not have any smaller notes" without speaking a word.

Stephen