Country Archive
Help rebuild the Great Wall of China: Volunteer adventures in the natural world
Date: 12/31/2007
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Take the Slow Train Through Ancient China
Date: 09/05/2007I’m traveling through the Sichuan countryside (in southwest China) on the Jia Yang railway. This is one of the few remaining passenger steam trains still operating on a narrow gauge (30-inch wide) track.
Read OnNo Seat for the Squeamish at the Chinese Table
Date: 08/27/2007Being the only foreigner amongst the 300,000 city dwellers of Deyang, people in the street stare at me. Girls yell "hallo, hallo." Men in bars come over and fill my glass with beer which I have to swig down clean.
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Fairytale mountains and outlandish characters in the backwaters of Yangshuo
Date: 03/31/2007
The man at the food stall in the night market wasn't taking kindly to the tourists gathering around his stall. I had arrived first, folding out my camera tripod…then other passing tourists drifted over to see what it was all about. More cameras came out, accompanied by much gawking and gasping at the array of meats-snakes, rats, rabbits, dogs, snails, and birds we didn't recognize. The man, momentarily distracted by something he had been chopping, looked up-and he looked angry. "Hello," he hollered, "bye"-and he waved us off with a violent fling of his hand.
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Leathery turtle, fried camel, and a Buddha larger than the Statue of Liberty-China's culinary and cultural delights
Date: 07/31/2006
We were greeted at the entrance to our Beijing hotel by two immaculately dressed girls, who escorted us to the reception desk in the marble-floored lobby. At the far end, a female soloist, elegant in black, was performing Chopin on a concert grand. Check-in completed, we made our way to the elevator, where an attendant in a floor-length robe bowed as he held the door open for us. Ah, five-star living…
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