Kevin Thom - Hamilton, Toronto, Ontario Photographer

I did a little walking around Beijing today. During the day, the smog is astounding. China has made some truly impressive efforts to reduce pollution and energy consumption, and the message is constantly hammered home by the media: use less energy and water, live in harmony with the environment, use public transit. However, the fact remains that there are just too many people here, and despite the fact that each person uses far less than we do in North America, the cumulative effect of so many crammed into such a small space is catastrophic to air quality. Anyway, as it pertains to me, it’s hard to take photos during the day, because everything more than 50 feet from you is shrouded in a hazy white veil.

Tonight after a delicious and artfully prepared meal at a restaurant down the street (sorry, I wasn’t expecting it to be so good, so no photos), I went out to see what I could shoot. I decided to hop on the subway and try to get myself over to the Olympic park to have some fun with all those celebrity buildings, like the National Stadium. I’m truly amazed at the changes to the subway system in the last two years. When I was here in 2007, I had to battle a crowd to get to this little cage containing a woman selling paper tickets. You then had to battle a crowd to get to a guy who would punch a hole in the ticket and let you down the stairs to the trains. There were four very limited subway lines open, covering a small part of the city. That’s all changed. Now, you buy your re-usable plastic subway tickets from a bank of bilingual touch-screen terminals, and pass through automated gates to get to the trains. There are nine lines now, with 147 stations all over the city. The cost has also changed. Instead of three to five Yuan (about 50-80 cents) that it cost in 2007, it’s now 2 Yuan (about 36 cents) to ride anywhere this massive system goes. According to Wikipedia, the system is still under massive expansion, with plans to double its current size by 2012. This is why I’m baffled that Toronto can’t build proper public transit to Pearson airport. It’s all about priorities.

So, I rode the subway for quite a long time, transferring a couple of times to get to Olympic park. It took about an hour to get there because it’s pretty far, and I kept missing my connecting trains. By the time I arrived at the Olympic park station, it was about 9:35pm. I was surprised to discover that the Olympic park closes at 9:30pm, so I was just in time to see the security guards let the last people out, and slam the gate shut. Also, it started raining.

I chalked it up to experience, and comforted myself in that I’d at least figured out where the airport express subway line started, and headed back to the hostel. When I came out of the subway, the rain had pretty much stopped. The reflections of the buildings in the wet pavement made me feel like doing some long exposures. Earlier in the night, I’d been shooting this old church that was sandwiched between a giant hotel and a mega-ultra-modern department store in the busy Wangfujing shopping area. It looked amazing reflected in the wet pavement.

Just as I was getting into shooting this, and finding some interesting angles, someone abruptly turned out all the lights on the building. It took a moment for me to realize how awesome this was. I truly believe that to get great night shots, you have to shoot what seems impossible to shoot. There are so many photographers who can easily recognize the photographic potential of brightly lit night scenes, and will get out the tripod to take some very ordinary shots. However, I want to make it my mission to capture those rarest of photons, because the fewer there are, the more potential they have to make night photos that really shine. After the lights went out, those remarkable photons were reflecting off of the moving clouds, creating a surreal backdrop. The sparse light from the shops across the street provided ample fill for the building itself, even though the scene at the time looked almost totally dark.

I only have one more night left here in China before I head over to Thailand. In some ways, this trip has seemed to have flown by so fast. In other ways, I feel like I’ve been here a lifetime. In either case, I’ve done my best to make it memorable.

Our adventure to the grasslands of Xilamuren was a lot of fun. Not a lot of tourists go there after the beginning of October, because the grass turns yellow, and it gets kind of cold. But, being the hardy Canadians that we are, we decided it would be no problem. Plus, we are here now, not in July, so it’s not like there is any other choice, right?

Our mini bus picked us up at the hotel at 8:30am. It was a rickety old thing, and the driver seemed a bit nervous that it wouldn’t make the trip in one piece. He phoned ahead, and we did a bus and driver swap with some Spanish tourists who were returning from the grasslands. Both the new bus and the driver seemed more comfortable. The tourists advised us to ask for a heater when we got to the grasslands.

The drive to the grasslands is spectacular, over a couple of hours of winding roads through desolate mountains, ascending to a plateau of wide grassy fields and crisp blue skies. The smog and pollution that blankets most of China doesn’t exist here. The fresh air was very welcome indeed. There was a pleasant absence of most everything except for the golden grass on the wide plains. Once in a while, we’d see someone galloping on a horse, but that was pretty much it. At once, it was easy to imagine Genghis Khan rallying the Mongol warriors on horseback to take over all of Asia and part of Europe back in the 13th century, but also difficult to imagine how such a desolate land could produce enough of those warriors to hold such a massive territory.

There were some interesting moments during the drive. At one point, there was a toll booth ahead, charging 10 Yuan to pass through on the highway. Our driver had a mischievous grin as he pulled off the road into a tiny village made of dirt. That village was conveniently located around the toll booth, so by giving the locals about 2 yuan to pass through their rocky dirt roads and coming out on the other side of the booth, we avoided paying the full toll. This extremely rough shortcut made it obvious that the toll money the locals collected was not being spent on road maintenance. Also, I’m certain the driver caused more than 8 Yuan of damage to his suspension during that little trip. But, it clearly gave him great joy to “stick it to the man,” so that has to be worth something.

We ended up staying at the home of a Mongol family. When we arrived, there were some Chinese tourists there. No one spoke any English, but they were eager to communicate. Dad can read a bit, so one of the guys wrote down his questions in Chinese, and we had fun struggling to answer them in our limited vocabulary. It never ceases to amaze me how you can make friends despite the barriers of language.

Our new friends were not staying overnight, so they left after a couple of hours. We spent the rest of the day just wandering around the property, taking in the fresh air and the bright sun. The wind was blowing constantly and strongly. It was so strong that often it was hard to hold the camera steady because the wind pushed on the lens hood like a sail.

We enjoyed traditional Mongolian meals, which were about 90% carbs, including moon cakes, shredded potato, noodles, etc. That pretty much trashed my caveman diet, but I was in no position to refuse, because our hosts were so warm and friendly, and there really wasn’t anything else to eat anyway.

Dad and I slept in a “yurt,” which is a circular tent traditionally used by the nomadic Mongol tribes. Our host family kindly set up that little heater for us. It was fueled by coal, and started by lighting up a wad of dried cow and sheep dung. I’ll tell you now that the smell of that was not entirely pleasant, but in the middle of the night, the heat was well worth it.

Anyway, I enjoyed the stay there very much. I felt like such a city slicker, amazed at the farm animals that wandered around us at will. I’m sure they must have rolled their eyes every time I snapped a picture of one of the shaggy little horses, their eyes squinted shut against the blowing wind and grit.

The next morning, we said goodbye to our Mongolian family and headed back to Hohhot. Because we had many hours to kill before our evening flight to Beijing, we left our luggage at the train station and took a cab to the brand new Mongolian museum. This super-modern structure had just opened, and was offering free admission to the first 3000 guests every day. The exhibits were well presented and informative, and as with all Chinese museum exhibits, had a political bent that glorified the achievements and benefits of the Communist revolution.

At night, we took a cab to the Hohhot airport, which is brand new and very nice, and flew to Beijing. We’ll be riding out the rest of our stay in China here in the capital, after which I head to Thailand, and Dad goes home to Canada.

It was great to arrive at our hostel in Hohhot (pronounced Huhehaote in Chinese), the capital of Inner Mongolia. After several days of dusty travel, I was pleased to discover that the shower here is not only the best I’ve experienced in China, but probably the best I’ve ever experienced, period! It is strong enough to be a sandblaster, which is exactly what I needed to blast the sand off me.

We needed to take care of some particulars, including booking the rest of our trip. We secured flights to Beijing leaving on Friday night, and booked an overnight tour of the grasslands starting tomorrow morning. I booked our hostel in Beijing too, near the Forbidden City.

All of that being done, we could enjoy a walk around the city. Hohhot is a modern and relatively affluent place. Because it’s kind of in the middle of nowhere, it’s quieter here too, with less pollution. It was a pleasure to walk through a large park in the middle of the city.

Dinner tonight was Mongolian hot pot, which is served all over China, and in many places in Canada too. It seemed only fitting to have Mongolian hot pot while in Mongolia. The idea is that you get these different kinds of boiling hot soup at your table, and you dunk in various meats and vegetables until they’re cooked. Delicious.

Dad and I find ourselves on a sleeper train once again. Our bunkmates are a middle-aged couple whom we imagine are on a little illicit “office getaway.” Who knows, it’s probably a lot less interesting than that.

The last day in Xi’an was relaxing and fun. We checked out of the hostel, which was the best yet. For anyone staying in Xi’an, I can highly recommend the Xiangzimen Youth Hostel near the South Gate of the city. The atmosphere is great because it’s located in restored older building with lots of charm. The thing that makes hostels work though is the staff, and the girls that work the desk at the Xiangzimen were always friendly, helpful and cheerful. They assisted us in figuring out train travel, booking our next hostel, and recommended a restaurant that we ate at two nights in a row.

Because we had a number of hours to kill before our overnight train to Lanzhou, we decided to rent bikes and ride around the top of the city wall. It was fun to zip along the top of these ancient walls on a bike. Because it was a Monday afternoon, there were few people up there. The wall forms a square around the city about 3km along each side. It’s made of grey stone bricks, many of which bear engravings in very old script. Could they be original bricks from when the wall was first built around 900 years ago? The ride was extremely educational. The walls are about 5 stories high, which gives a great vantage point from which to see the city from all sides. We could see how old areas are being flattened to make way for new development. Just outside the walls, numerous 50-storey apartment buildings were crowding the sky, with many more under construction. Some people lament the loss of these traditional neighbourhoods, but I can’t see China’s burgeoning “me generation” being satisfied living in the conditions that their parents and grandparents endured, with no indoor plumbing, makeshift electrical and telephone wiring, and plague-inducing hygiene. My bike was a aging contraption with flat tires and barely-functional brakes. It made the crappletrap rattletastic I rented a couple of years ago feel like a Rolls Royce. By the end of the ride, I felt fairly pummeled on multiple surfaces, but it was still worth it.

After dinner, we headed to the train station to board our overnight train to Lanzhou. I was determined not to spend the night in Lanzhou, because from all accounts, there’s nothing there to redeem it from its grubby industrial status. I’ve spent only a few days in grubby industrial cities, and that was enough for me. The train left Xi’an after 10:30pm and arrived in Lanzhou bright and early at 6:30am. Lanzhou taxi drivers seem quite reluctant to make the trip between the train station and the south bus station, which are about 20 minutes apart. We ended up being crammed into a cab with a couple of strangers, our luggage hanging precariously out of the trunk. When we got to the bus station, we got dinged for a bill that was about three times higher than a normal cab fare in any other Chinese city. So, the lesson here is, just because something is uncomfortable and weird doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s better or cheaper.

Dad and I were using Lanzhou as a transit point to get to Linxia, and then ultimately to the remote town of Xiahe. Xiahe is the home of a large Tibetan monastery, and the destination of many Tibetan pilgrims who go there to make a circuit around the monastery and to spin the 300 prayer wheels. Because of the heavy Tibetan population, the Chinese government places some restrictions on traveling there. I had done some research online, so I was prepared. My discussion with the ticket lady at the bus station went something like this:

Me: I want to buy two tickets to Linxia.

Ticket lady: What country do you come from?

Me: We’re Canadian.

Ticket lady: Ahah! You need to have a photocopy of your passport to go to Linxia. (waves a sample photocopy of a passport)

Me: I’ve got one! (producing a photocopy of our passports)

Ticket lady (inspecting the photocopy, disappointed, then lights up): Ahah! You need to have a photocopy of your Chinese visa too!

Me: Here it is! (producing the photocopy of our visas)

Ticket lady (inspecting the photocopy of the visas): Ahah! But you need TWO copies of each!

Me: Here are the other copies! (producing the other copies of the passports and visas)

Ticket lady (begrudgingly): That will be RMB 59.

Thank you, Internet. Again, you have proven yourself most useful.

With that, we found our way to our red bus, bound for Linxia. The bus was of the normal long distance Chinese kind, which is to say, it is filled with Chinese people who shout into their cell phones, snort and hawk up phlegm from their throats, cough on the back of your neck, and smoke like chimneys, despite the prominent “no smoking” signs posted everywhere. Over the sound of all of this, there is either blaring Chinese pop music or movies played on the overhead LCD screens. The bus driver uses the horn in every possible way, and makes me want to invest in a Chinese bus horn concern, because I’m sure they wear out a horn at least once a week. On the highway, the horn can either mean, “I’m going to ram you if you don’t get out of my way,” or “I’m in incoming traffic passing you so look out.” While cruising slowly through villages looking for passengers, the horn means, “Hey, we’re going to Linxia, isn’t that exciting? Get on the bus!” In any case, it means the horn is blaring for approximately 96% of the trip. If you can endure all of this, there is stunning scenery outside.

The bus wound its way through the mountains, climbing higher and higher. We passed terraced farms built into the sides of the mountains, and cave dwellings dug out of the earth, which I’m almost sure are not used anymore. The land is extremely tough, scrubby, rocky and dry. The plots of land are often nearly vertical patches of tilled dirt, accessible only by thin, winding mule trails. Yet, the farmers here manage to scratch out a living somehow, growing corn, lettuce and cauliflower against all odds. Seeing these dirt farms redefined the term, “a tough row to hoe” for me.

A couple of hours later, we arrived in Linxia. We were dumped off the bus in an area that resembled a hillbilly’s backyard filled with old and dying buses. It wasn’t a bus station as we knew it. After inquiring about the bus to Xiahe, we were again bundled into a taxi, and driven a couple of blocks, where the taxi driver ejected us and our luggage onto the side of a dusty road between a couple of carts selling fruit. Apparently this was the bus stop. Sure enough, about 20 minutes later, a blue bus trundled down the street with its door open, and a lady shouting, “Xiahe! Xiahe!” to the street.

We passed a lot of interesting sites on the way to Xiahe. There is a heavy Muslim population in the area, so there were many mosques, some of which were Chinese style pagodas with minarets on top. There were butchers with piles of sheep heads on the sidewalk in front. There were sheets of bright yellow corn kernels drying on the front steps of peoples’ homes while birds pecked at them. There were crowds of Muslim men in white caps congregating on the street for no apparent reason. Between towns, the bus crawled up valley roads, with a wild river below, and mountains forested by green pines and deciduous trees with fluttering golden leaves. As we went along, mosques gradually gave way to white Tibetan temples with golden tops. I don’t have photos of these things because the bus was moving too fast and vibrating too vigorously to catch them.

Finally we were in Xiahe, about 2900m above sea level. We walked the entire dusty 1km length of it to find our hostel, which initially seemed fine, but turned out not to have any electricity or running water. We thought this was a bit too much to endure, so we headed next door to the “International Hotel,” whose great claim to fame was their 24-hour availability of hot water. They also had no electricity, and we were told there wouldn’t be any until 7pm. There was some construction happening nearby, and that had knocked out power for most of the town. We also had no key to our room, because one of the staff had taken the key with her and left town until later that night.

We decided to spend some time walking around the monastery, following the pilgrims as they spun the ornate prayer wheels. The beautiful blue sky and forested hills were offset by chugging diesel tractor motors spewing choking fumes, and acrid piles of burning garbage. China never fails to provide a wealth of stunning contrasts.

I seem to be prone to altitude sickness, and my head was throbbing in no time. So after a quick but tasty meal in a very grimy local restaurant, I was ready for bed. Unfortunately, the hotel wasn’t. There was no heat because the radiators are heated by the so-called 24-hour hot water. I’m not sure when this 24 hours exists, but I now believe it’s sparsely dispersed throughout the year in five minute increments. The room was bone-chillingly cold. Combined with what I believe to be the one-watt lighting, it was a very gloomy evening indeed. I wore my jeans, socks, t-shirt, sweater and jacket to bed, and piled a sheet, two comforters, and a blanket on top of me. The freezing subsided, and I dreamed mostly about escaping from places, and helping other people escape from places.

This morning, we made an early break from Xiahe, catching the 7:30am bus back to Linxia, and then another bus back to Lanzhou. I was thrilled to be able to get train tickets to Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia, leaving in the afternoon. So that’s the train we’re on now. By the time I can post this, we’ll be in Hohhot.

The thing that has struck me on this trip compared to my trip here two years ago is that there are a lot more young people out, looking good and having fun. The difference is striking. Youth are filling the streets, restaurants, stores. The cities are happening places, even on Sunday nights. Music throbs from every corner. People are drumming, dancing, bands play in the streets. Kids are spending what I can only imagine is boatloads of money. Except they don’t need boats, because all of that consumption is being directed towards products made right here in China: clothes, shoes, accessories, cars, jewelery, etc. Can you spell “future economic superpower?” I can: “C-H-I-N-A.”

Anyway, I’m not going to write a lot tonight. I’ll just let the photos from today’s walks around Xi’an do the talking.