Ian Rambles
We were all fairly wet when we arrived at the station for our train to Beijing - but soon dried out in the crush of travellers. I got talking to a couple of lads on the station - a very slow conversation with every word having to be found in our phrase book - but it still attracted the attention of people around us and soon I had a dozen sets of ears hanging on each word.

On the train we had all been allocated bottom bunks so we were spread along the train. This had the advantage of getting us talking - again a word at a time - with a chinese couple in the bunks above us. At one point Fi was writing her journal and I learnt the chinese for book - "shu" - and made an attempt at a joke by teaching them the English for "Shoe" - "shoe". I got out our "blue folder" to show them pictures of our house, dog, cats etc. and put it under my pillow for safe keeping as we slept.

In Beijing we found our way to our hostel - tucked away in some of the last remaining lanes and hutongs around the city centre. As I settled into our room I realised that the blue folder was still "safely" tucked under my pillow on the train. The hostel staff gave me a piece of paper with the appropriate chinese characters explaining my problem and, armed with this and "shu" being the word for book I set off back to the station.

Through my proffered note and much arm waving I ended up at an information desk on the lower concourse and a helpful young lady who took me, my note and my problem to the railway police. Several phone calls later and back at the information desk I was made to understand that "the book" was still on the train but would return at 5pm.

At 5pm Fi and I returned to the info desk - the girl behind the counter, after a worried moment and a phone call, led us through the station, through security checks and onto a platform where a train - our train of the morning was onec again leaving. Did we get the folder? Read Fi's journal to find out!!

I decided it was time for a haircut. By sign language and making buzzy clipper like noises the barber and I came to common understanding of what I was after. he insistd on washing my hair and giving me a scalp massage - a very pleasant sensation - then clipped my hair and beard with his electric clippers. He then proved himself a master of his art and with a comb and rapid snipping with his sharp barbers scissors he tidied up all the loose ends which lesser barbers would have left. Eighty yuan. About six pounds.

Fiona's Journal
It had taken Ian three visits to the railway station and one to a ticket office, somewhere else entirely, to get our tickets for this part of the journey.

We walked from our hostel to the station in the pouring rain and found it heaving, as usual, but with the added hazard of massed umbrellas. After clearing the bag scan we parked ourselves and our luggage alongside the stairs in the main concourse.

A group of young Chinese lads, keen to practice their limited English, got talking to Ian a slow conversation ensued - with Ian using our Mandarin phrasebook and the lads consulting one another about every reply. Much bonhomie was exchanged if not a lot of information!

This train was identical to the previous one but we had been allocated five consecutive bottom bunks this time rather than five out of a section of six. This turned out to be rather good in that it forced us to at least attempt some conversation with the very friendly Chinese people we were sharing a compartment with. Again, the information exchanged was minimal but it got us to open our mouths and attempt the Chinese pronunciation. Oddly, I started to hear some similarity to the Cornish accent in the unfinished endings to a lot of words and especially a certain “aargh” sound which crops up frequently.

We arrived in Beijing at 7.00am the next morning, after another enforced 10.00pm lights-out and another good nights sleep.

The train loos were beyond description, they would need mucking-out rather than cleaning, so I opted to hang on until I could reach a station toilet. However, the minute we stumbled sleepily onto the platform we were swept up by a porter with luggage trolley and escorted through the ticket barrier (where we had to pay for our porter's services) and through the baggage scan to the taxi rank beneath the station. Our porter then proceeded to secure us two taxis and direct them to our hostel, the address of which Ian has written down in his notebook but only in English, not in Chinese.

Our taxis got separated immediately by other traffic and then it transpired that neither of them really knew where The Far Eastern Hostel International was! My driver got somewhere near and then closed in on it by asking passers by and getting variably accurate guesses from them all. Ian's driver phoned the Beijing Taxi Helpline (perhaps set up to deal with the mass influx of foreign tourists for the Olympics??) and then getting an English speaking operator to get the address from Ian and transmit it to the driver in Chinese. What an excellent service!

The Far Eastern Hostel is a sort of annex to the Far Eastern Hotel and it turns out that we have been given hotel rooms for hostel prices because the hostel was overbooked. This is a plus and a minus in that we have the luxury of en suite bathroom with sit-down loo, and a king-size hotel bed instead of bunks, but it lacks the friendliness of a hostel.

We were just unpacking a few things when I heard Ian mutter under his breath, “Quadruple F***”,which sounded serious, especially as he said it so quietly. He had left the blue folder under his pillow on the train – that is THE BLUE FOLDER, the bible of this whole expedition with details of every accommodation address and booking reference, every train, plane and ferry booking and time schedule, every phone number and e-mail address we might ever need, not to mention full-colour photocopies of all our travel documents including passports and visas.

Ian went straight out again in search of a taxi to take him back to the station, armed with a piece of paper on which our hotel receptionist had kindly written out, in Chinese, the phrases he thought he would need and the hotel address. He returned two hours later, having been assured that his folder had been located but that he would have to come back at 5.00pm to get it.

After a couple of hours nap we all went out in search of lunch and discovered the real bonus of being tucked away in the tiny back streets that Taxis don't know. There is everything you could possibly want amongst the maze of little businesses and homes in these lanes. Cafes and restaurants galore, stalls of delicious things to eat on the street or take home, laundry services, a barber, little grocery stores selling sweets for George to get his retail therapy, print, fax and e-mail services, car and bike mending workshops and of course souvenir and gift shops but these are in the minority here.

We had a fantastic lunch, including the best Peking Duck I have ever eaten, and drinks all round for about £11.00 and, once again, we were the only non-locals in there. Ian had his hair cut and beard trimmed by the local barber a couple of days later and he did an excellent job. I bet he was the only non-Chinese person in there too.

Ian and I went back to the station at 5.00pm and did get our precious folder back - but not without a prolonged jog round the mysterious underbelly of the station, following the lost-property desk girl up and down stairs and along corridors until we eventually emerged onto a platform where our train was about to depart back to Xi'an. After running up the length of the train having breathless conversations with the guard in each carriage doorway, the doors slammed and the train started to pull away before she reached the last two. Our shoulders slumped in unison, all three of us, until we spotted a solitary guard still standing on the platform 100 yards ahead of us. He was clutching our blue folder!

Traffic in Beijing is even crazier than that in Xi'an and I have taken to joining a group of other people to cross a road and then looking firmly at my feet all the way to the other side. It's less terrifying that way.

For our last night in Beijing we were booked into the Red Wall Hotel, as part of the “Russian Experience” tour package that includes the Trans Manchurian and Trans Siberian railway journey.

We were sorry to move from our nice little neighbourhood where we were beginning to be recognised – well George was anyway! He has become a bit like our mascot in Asia; Thai and Chinese women particularly, seem to take an instant shine to him. Particularly when he is wearing his traditional Thai suit of embroidered shirt and baggy trousers or carrying his big rucksack, they rush to mother him and ruffle his hair and chuck hi under the chin. I'm not quite sure how keen George is on this attention but he continues to wear his Thai suit whenever he can and he certainly appreciates the occasional free lolly from the shops where he becomes a regular.

The Red Wall was very different and rather grand with cream-suited bell boys to take your luggage and call you a taxi and that was different and fun in its way but it could have been anywhere in the world really. They did sell us tickets to an acrobatics/circus show which was fantastic, and we would never have found it on our own. It is beyond my skills to convey any of the acts but they were astonishing, in terms of just what the human body is capable of, and only a small part of me wondered what life was really like for some of the very young performers.

Our Trans Manchurian train did not leave until 11.00pm so we had plenty of time to explore The Forbidden City, on our last day in Beijing. We had checked it out the previous afternoon and been rather put off by the plague of souvenir sellers and would-be tour guides. They mobbed us as we approached and were so persistent that Ian started to get very loud and bombastic and I ended up disliking them and him. However, forewarned is forearmed, and we stormed through without looking right or left this time and got in with minimal fuss.

Arthur took charge of the audio guide and relayed snippets of information periodically as we strolled about. It is tranquil and very beautiful in a rather formal, symmetrical sort of way but is also vast and all very much the same design and colour scheme repeated over and over again.

Arthur informed us that girls were taken into service with the Emperors family at the age of twelve. From that day they never left that compound of The Forbidden City that comprised the wife and family's hall, the concubines' hall and the courtyard that linked the two. What's more they were not allowed to speak for the rest of their lives. How did they not go stark staring mad? We probably covered less than a quarter of the total area but that was enough for us.

We ate a hearty mid-afternoon meal, to cover lunch and supper, and then just killed time in the hotel cafe until we felt we could reasonably head for the station and the next stage of our journey.

Arthur's Log:
We arrived in Beijing fairly early, a porter took us to the taxi station and via a few language problems we got to our hostel/hotel and just as we were unloading our stuff into our room dad said "ohhhh.... quadrople fuck" quietly. Dad had left the blue folder with all the info we need for this trip in it on the train, but thats his story.

We moved to "the Red Wall Hotel" in Central Beijing because it came with the tran siberian railway packige. A guy working at the hotel sold us some chinese acrobatics tickets and we killed time until then.

The acrobatics was amazing too. They were ftting a dozen people on one bike. They had 7 year olds doing continuous double backflips in the middle of 3 skipping ropes. They had a tower of 3 men standing on top of each other and another guy threw a small woman right over the top so she landed on the top in a hand stand.

We went to "the forbidden city" today, and even though it is really a palace it is more like a city. It is in a large square moat. In the chin dynasty everything revolved around it. Trade, worship, and sacrifices for Beijing was centered here.

There is a sacrifice house just outside the center of the palace. They would kill 2 full sized cattle a day and hang the gizzrds out for the crows for good luck.

The maids were recruited from the age of 12 and from that moment, offen until their death, they could not speak or leave the palace untill they were decomissioned (they would not leave unless a member the royal family said and of course they could not ask.) The royal maid could not even leave the inner court yard.

Concubines (Spare wives, that do what you say) were recruted from the age of 13. One emporer had a record 22 and is said to have died from over indulgence.