padam

So! My journey began at about 12.30 on the 12th of July when my father dropped me off at Swansea Station. Around 1 KT, one of the other girls on the trip, arrived at the station too, and we waited for the damn bus driver to get back from his little lunch outing. ____ He was half an hour late (jerk ball). It was so much better having someone else on the bus journey, because it wasnt just me staring out of the window the whole time XD Also, KT had banana chips which were surprisingly yummy and the conversation was good.

On the way to Heathrow terminal 4 we went to Bridgend, Cardiff, Newport, Bristol and Reading. We also went to several other terminals in the airport. At reading our bus driver (jerk) switched places with another guy (Cant remember his name, but he was extremely funky. He had a white beard and moustache and a tangerine turban). Oh lawd, this guy was hilarious. He kept apologizing for the delay and then told us a little story about how he was waiting for the bus to come and fell asleep in the car XD Gotta love those inappropriate bus drivers. He also told us that he would let us know when it was wakey wakey time, which was adorable.

Eventually we got to the terminal! Wooooot! We met up with the other girls, who were conveniently all together by the baggage weighing bit. We sorted customs and all that jazz out, bought some snacks and headed for the gate. At this point I was kind of in a daze. I hadnt actually realistically thought Id ever be getting on a plane, so I was sort of Huhhh?! We sat on a couple of benches outside the gate, and we could see our plane. Inevitably, we eventually got the call to say that it was time to board out plane to Shanghai. Eeeeep. One of the other people on the trip, KS is the girl friend of my best budd, so I knew I'd likely be hanging out with her a lot. KS was awesome, and swapped seats with me so I could have the window seat.

I almost had a heart attack when the time for take-off came around. I didnt anticipate how fast planes actually accelerate to before they start flying. Of course this makes sense now, but at the time I was like 0_0 I thought I was proper going to pass out.
Things I dont like about flying -

Take-off. That bit where you tilt upwards? Yeah, not for me, dudes.
Sideways leaning. Oh my word. Makes me want to die.
Smallness of space. I want a couch to myself or something.

It is incredibly beautiful, though. The lights of London on that first flight were really breathtaking, and after my initial panicking, they really calmed me down. Also amazing? Stockholm from the sky, at night. Oh my god, it was the most amazing thing Ive ever seen. So incredibly beautiful. We had our first meal around this time. It was ok! I had sweet and sour chicken with rice (not good), a little bowl of pasta with olives and tomato (so-so), strawberry mouse (reaaaal good), fresh bread and butter. Yum. On this flight we also ate - a cheese and pickle sandwich. This was icky due to the fact that is was incredibly cold. I didnt eat it. Our second meal was salmon and noodles (so god damn good, I cant even describe. Lol), a kitkat, bread and butter and fruit salad. It was tasty I still cant get over that salmon. Haha.

After twelve long hours, we finally touched down in Pudong International Airport, Shanghai. It's really quite gorgeous. It was strange, though, because we had no idea how to talk to anyone. Nobody spoke a word of English. I especially am not used to this, because Ive never been out of the UK, but I think it surprised all of us. For the most part, we explored the shops a little, bought some snacks and then parked outselves on a couple of rows of seats, chatted for a bit and waited for our plane to Harbin.

Now, this plane was MUCH smaller than the first, and was also packed with people. The next two and a half hours were some of the worst of my life. Im not joking - literally the whole journey was turbulence. The air stewards with their drinks tray could not get half way up the aisle without having to go back and try again five minutes later. It sucked, sucked, sucked, sucked, sucked. The only relief came when we finally touched down in Harbin. We then got a text from Alex, our group leader, saying that there was a storm on, and that the airport had told him we might be landing randomly, and hed probably have to come find us elsewhere. 0_0 Thank the lord that we didnt know this on the plane. I could tell by peoples faces that the plane journey was much more than usually turbulent. It would have given me a heart attack XD

After our plane got in we waited for our bags and then we FINALLY, after 28 hours, got to stop travelling (almost). We had to get a lift back to the uni, but this was a piece of cake really, given that we knew we were almost there. The journey there was strange - it was our first time outdoors in China too! It was night at the time, almost midnight, and everything was incredibly quiet and peaceful. There was a faint sort of farmyard/cabbagey smell in the air that was reasonably pleasant.

Eventually, much to our amazement, we got to the uni! Yaaaaayyy. We got given our keys. Me and KS decided to room together, had a shower and crashed out.

Getting to our home!

So, me and KS and the rest of the girls (All of us from Swansea were girls apart from our team leader, AL), after being extremely tired discovered our rooms. Each room has two single beds with a pillow each (these beds are reasonably, though our pillows seem to be half filled with straw), two desks, a wardrobe, a tv and some cabinets. Also, a little fridge. This fridge is incredibly awesome because it means we can have cold, cold drinks (hallelujah) and ice-cream and such.

The first day we got here, we did a couple of little things. We (KS and I) got up reasonably early, considering wed been travelling for a full day before, and decided to explore a little, and buy some food. We walked through an outdoor market that specialises in food (It is nicknamed The Parasols). There are all sorts of stalls in this place, in a giant sort of L shape, and in the middle are tables. Theres some sort of roof over the top so you dont get soaked in the rain. We had our first meal here. We attempted to ask for noodle soup. Hahaha. This was not as easy as it seemed at first to be XD

Its amazing to realise that youre in a country where VERY, VERY few people speak English. Maybe one in every 200 signs will have some form of English on it. That may even be a generous estimate. Its extremely alien to me, having never been abroad, but I know that the other members of the group, all of whom are well travelled (two girls are natives of Germany, KS is half Russian, KS's parents are Vietnamese and S is originally from Nepal) are also noticing the extreme lack of English.

Anyhow, noodle soup. We were starving come mid day, so we went along to the Parasols (thats what AL calls it, I have no idea what the place is called in Chinese, but Ill try to figure this out). We went up to the stall holder who seemed to be selling noodles, and we tried, in English, to ask for noodle soup. No luck, and we encountered some blank looks. We then proceeded to try hand signals, and sounding out the words. No luck! The stall holders are extremely nice, and they laughed with us at the lack of communication. We finally pointed at a man who was already eating the stuff, and the lady ordered us up two bowls of noodles. Within 3 or 4 minutes these were made from scratch and cooked. They came in a delicious broth that was a little spicy, and as a topping they had red cured pork which was really tasty and slices of mushroom. Mmmmm! I must try this meal again. For a maaaassive bowl it was RMB 7, which translates to about 70pence. Lurvely.

We also went to the supermarket, and being general tourists bought some junk!

Some interesting things about Chinese supermarkets (at least in Harbin).

Before you enter the supermarket, they make you put your bag into a denim pouch with a zip on it. Once this is done a lady at a desk near the entrance puts a tag through the zip (the same as the round ones you get in clothes in clothes shops to keep people from shop lifting) and this tag can only be removed by going out through the checkouts and having one of the ladies there undo it.

There are cigarette counters at the front of the shop, the same as you get in Tesco or Asda in the UK. Cigarettes are extremely cheap (on average about RMB 15, 1.50 for 20), but to purchase them you pick your brand. You then get a yellow slip of paper which you take to the till with you when you buy your other goods. You pay for the cigarettes there, and then have to go back to the counter with your new receipt in order to collect em. Its sort of amusing, but adorable too.

They sell live animals. When we went in they had turtles (these were black, and had long slim snouts) and large carp-like fish. Also, large silkworm pupae that they roast and eat, but that are still squirming in the store. Blerghh. Haha. I need to get a picture of these. They sell them in the Parasols too, on sticks. I may have to try them before I leave. XD

That night we had our first meal together as a group, too, and we made our first friend. H got a room mate. Her name is M, and shes Japanese, and rather good at Chinese as well. Well, we were all hungry and went to a little Korean place that was across the road from the uni.

What we ate We had four sharing platters. One had battered prawns. The batter had pepper and other seasoning in, I think, and the prawns were fried with dried red chillies (hhhooooot) and green peppers. Very tasty! We also had battered pork (I think) that was cut into strips and in a sort of tangy red sauce. It had stir fried courgettes and other veggies too, and it was much lighter than the battered prawn dish. We also had a platter which had strips of several meats ham, pork, prawns, squid and veggies spinach, cucumber, black fungus and mushrooms with fried onions/other veg. This was mixed with a sort of hot mustard type sauce at the table, and the waitress used chopsticks to mix up all of the elements for us.

The last dish was battered squid rings. On the side of the plate was a sort of coleslaw covered with a lot of Ketchup! XD We were surprised by this, but it was really tasty. As for condiments, there were three little dishes that they gave us straight away. One was a yellow vegetable which was pickled radish, apparently. It was quite sweet and crunchy really tasty. Another was chunks of chopped onion, and the last was a sort of inky black sauce which looked sort of like lava bread, but was much runnier. Apparently this tasted like salt and a little vinegary, but I didnt have any. When they brought out the other dishes we had a sort of runny dipping sauce with chilly, soy and garlic. We all got a bowl of sticky rice at the beginning of the meal, and then piled whatever we wanted to eat on top of this. It was soooo good, but Im not used to eating rice so I couldnt finish. Pouring the dipping sauce onto the rice was incredibly tasty and made it a bit less plain. Delicious! It was a cute little place, reminded me of the sort of diners we get back home, minus the plastic tablecloths. There were nine of us, and we paid about RMB 18.5 each, which translates to about 1.80. Pretty darn awesome.

When we came out of the place, we realised that there was a night market along our street! So cute! It had hundreds of little stalls, mostly things like clothing, toys, decorative things like hair accessories, purses, etc. The goods are cheap, but I think theyre less cheap than they could be. I bought a couple of little things here for people back home.

After exploring this, we went to bed! And that was our first day.

^ Sweet ham and peanut butter pastry. Odd.


^ These are amazing. I almost lived off of them.

^ This feast was home made. It was bloody delicious. The dishes closest to the camera - potato 'salad' and stir fried aubergine were amazing. Mmmm.

^ Tofu noodles, roasted peanuts and beer!

Dried shrimp rice, made by my Japanese mommy, M!

^ And AL throws this chicken in to the tigers. They enjoy it, but I got quite sad.