Guilin, Guangxi -26th – 31st October

We arrived in Guilin train station and took the local bus to town to find our hotel. The bus cost the equivalent of 22p each and the hotel told us it would take just over an hour. They said for us to count the stops and get off at the 21st. Sounded simple enough, but Glen was watching the Rugby commentary on his phone and I was people watching and we ended up saying “20! the next stop is where we get off” but the next stop was the little bus station, the end of its journey! Oops we’d mis-counted! So we got a taxi back across two bridges and arrived at our hotel ten minutes later for the equivalent of £1.20!

In reception we were greeted by ‘Tony’ the manager, he was a lovely man who had an equally lovely well fed grey cat. As Glen paid and asked the usual questions when we arrive “how much is your beer?” and “how cold is it?” Doing his cold impression “brrrr” I noticed a chalk board offering ‘Head, neck and ‘essentials’ massage’ I was about to ask the price (wink) when Glen put his backpack back on and we went off to our room.

Sweet Osmanthus is the city flower of Guilin and Guilin actually means Forest of Sweet Osmanthus trees. The very fragrant flowers are used as an additive for tea and other beverages in the far east.

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I’ve been obsessed with road sweepers because they use amazing natural brushes made of twigs to sweep rather than plastic ones.

This woman was brushing up the tiny flowers outside of the Serenity Palace, hopefully not to sell for use in someone’s tea!

We saw the Sweet Osmanthus trees everywhere, or rather we noticed the tiny flowers covering the streets as we walked around.

Walking by a large building one day, I saw two small pale pink socks, stretched to an inch of their life over a metal coat hanger just outside of a window. I looked in the window and could see it was a hospital ward. The washing looked strange hanging out at street level in the middle of town. I assumed the patient had swilled them out in the sink and had put them out to dry. Now I think of it it could have been someone in the next bed putting them out because they stank lol!

Just as well I didn’t take a photo as we saw many of the patients a few days later at the little steamer cafe next door!
The thing was that the queue at the street cafe next to our hotel was always long and so we thought it must be good food if all the locals eat there.

There were two women eating there with children cuddled on their laps that didn’t seem to be feeling well but we didn’t think anything of it. As we walked away we saw people In the queue with freshly bandaged hands etc. It seemed we had inadvertently tried the hospital food! Well what you would eat if you were to find yourself in the hospital or visiting someone in the hospital opposite our hotel! It was good food though. You pointed to what vegetables and meat you wanted from a cabinet and they steamed it, along with everyone else’s. When it was ready you ate it straight from the steamer…… steam kills all germs right!?

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We’ve ‘invested’ in some Tupperware, I was happy to pay the 8y (88p) price tag (sticker) but Glen says we should have bartered it down. I was two busy looking at what else they had for sale. I spotted this fold-away toilet seat stand which would be great for the squat toilets when you are tired! Mind you it would be difficult to carry the darn thing up the steep steps to the top of Karsts we’ve been mastering, which is exactly the time you feel tired and in need of a sit not a squat toilet! 

I mentioned about having to take the toilet paper in from the main wash basin area in one toilet here (and how we had to ask for toilet paper in the class room at Primary school) well I used a toilet that had a machine where you had to pay for the paper! Now you may have noticed these QR codes in our photos, especially on the food stalls. Well most people, especially the youngsters, pay with their phones in a jiffy. They are much quicker than the ‘contactless’ way we can pay back in the UK.

Anyway, one toilet had a giant toilet roll holder with one of these QR codes on it so people in the know were coming in and paying for their toilet paper in a flash. Now you might think it’s not good for those without a phone but believe me EVERYONE has a phone, street cleaners, very small children taking photos of a group of adults with a phone! Now I think of it why did they ask the child to take the photo and not have the little chap in the family shot!? Anyway I was so impressed at the time I forgot to feel cross about it! 

I was going to say something else then… oh yes, so I was hanging around in the toilets after I had been, in fact I went out got my phone and went back in again to take the photos! Yes people were looking at me, and yes it did feel a bit inappropriate (again) but I’m doing this for all of you (especially Jane!) so please don’t judge me. Chuckle.

I was not only taking photos of the toilet roll dispenser but the signs on the toilet doors actually had English words underneath, as you can see they call the western type toilets ‘potty toilets’

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What I was talking about was our new Tupperware container. When I washed it the water didn’t stick to it, it was totally dry if you know what I mean. It put me in mind of the technology I once saw Prince Charles being shown on TV. He was having a ‘walk about’ in a factory where they were throwing dirty water on to a windscreen and it just wouldn’t stick. Fascinating, do you remember? Glen thinks I dreamt it! I don’t think it caught on because otherwise they wouldn’t have people squeegeeing the windows of the bullet trains when they stopped on the platforms. Because surely over here they would embrace any new technology.

The weather here started out wet and dull and we had our coats on as well as various layers to keep warm and dry. However the last few days it’s been 25 and 26 degrees! Madness! It’s like the U.K. weather. So we were walking along by the rivers, there are loads going in all directions here, and we noticed all this washing hanging out all the way down the road.

I wondered if it was a ‘Launderette’ (Dhobi Ghat, where the Dhobi Wallers live and work, like we saw in India) but Glen said it could just be all of the people in the flats behind having done their big heavy items (There were dozens of duvets) as it’s such a lovely hot day. Well if that’s the case they have a whole different meaning to “having a duvet day” here. Smile.

Later that day I went up to the roof of our hotel to get my washing in and there was a local lady (I assumed it was Tony’s wife) hanging out a duvet!! Maybe it’s an auspicious day for washing duvets. I googled it up and nothing was mentioned about today being auspicious for washing duvets! It must just have been a coincidence.

According to Chinese calendar, from February 05, 2019 to January 24, 2020 is Year of the Pig. You can use the Chinese Farmer’s Almanac calendar (Tung Shing or Tung Shu) to find out things suggested to do or not to do for each day, and holidays and solar terms in each month.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.yourchineseastrology.com/calendar/2019/

It did mention something about ‘clash horse’ / ‘evil south however. I have no idea what that means but here is a tenuous connection (see photo below)

Suffice to say we did not eat there!

It was so hot walking around in our t-shirts but the locals still had their coats on. This lady had made her duvet into trousers! Surely she should have been washing them that day! Chuckle

They have soooo many safety signs here re falling etc

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I was careful of slippery lol! I hated walking up the steep steps! As safety conscious as they appear to be, they don’t worry about draping wires over the pavements when they are re-charging their electric bikes. (Most are thicker than this example)

Look closely and you can see a thin wire crossing the pavement.

Here are some photos from our walks (climbs!) up a few Karsts.

KFC’s slogan in the UK is ‘Finger licking good’ as you know, but they were wearing plastic gloves when they were eating it over here. We went in to buy a Dorian fruit ice cream (I know! I know! But it wasn’t that bad actually) and we saw how they were eating the chicken. The menu isn’t like ours in the UK of course! and it doesn’t even smell the same as you walk in.

There have been lots of KFCs in China. This KFC in Pingyao tastefully blended in to the local architecture I thought.

You’d think we would have been free of politics and the hum drum of British problems as we are thousands of miles away in China, but no! One evening an old man approached us on the street and asked where we were from. When we said “England” he asked “why aren’t you listening to Mr Johnson?” (sounds so official and grown up, as apposed to Boris!) anyway he said “you should get on and leave, listen to the Queen! She wants to leave” Glen started to explain how it works and why the man would think the Queen wants to leave Europe but that she is just following the will of government etc. I thought this is getting a bit heavy (and boring!) so I just said “they should just all come over to China, it’s lovely here lol!“ And the old man laughed and we walked off in opposite directions.

We watched a couple of local fishermen along the river making their living.

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Guilin had some lovely city walks through the parks and along the rivers.

Every night at 8.30 the ‘Waterfall Hotel’ put on a show as water cascaded down the front of the building, accompanied by music, for fifteen minutes.