"Finally" in China: the long road

Before I arrived in China, I was more looking forward to the first part of the trip. Qingdao sounded more appealing to me for some reason, perhaps it was the sea; that is it a smaller city so I assumed it would be less busy, less crowded. I believed that the pollution would be less, being by the coast. Beijing, I thought would be hard work. Having only arrived in Beijing this evening, I haven't experienced enough to compare it to Qingdao, but the little I saw from the car between the train station and the hotel was enough to make me feel like I have, only now, finally arrived in China. And for the first time on this trip, I am actually really excited! There is a lot of history here and I can barely wait to soak it all in.

Not to say that I did not like Qingdao. Well, I suppose I did not actively like it, but I did not dislike it either. We did, all in all, have a nice time. The heat and the crowd took it's toll in the end. The thing I was looking forward to most about Qingdao was Laoshan, a scenic area in the mountains about an hours' drive outside Qingdao. We hired a taxi to take us there yesterday but when we got there, the throngs on local holidaymakers, heat, the expected difficulties of walking with Til (would not have been possible with a pram), finding a place to change him or for lunch, an incident between our taxi driver and the lady behind the ticket counter had us leaving the area without going up the mountains. We ended up going up the TV tower in Qingdao instead, which we (probably Til the most) enjoyed. Caroline and I rather willingly fell into what can only be described as a tourist trap and bought a Chinese painting each. It was supposed to be an "offer" price because we (Caroline) won a lucky draw. The price we were offered were small fractions of the "original price" but that had to have all been just for our benefit. We realised that we could have got paintings elsewhere for less than what we paint. But a Chinese painting was one of the few things on my shopping list. With Til, we both knew that the likelihood of us being able to really go out in search of a good painting at a reasonable local price was slim, and for that price we were quoted, we would only get a painting one tenth of the size in Sweden, so we went for it. Now to just get it home in tack!

At the TV tower, Caroline got stopped by some locals who wanted their picture taken with her. This was not the first time this happened to her. I started making jokes about how I was travelling with a secret celebrity, until I got stopped by people wanting to have their photo taken with me too! Well, I say people, I mean one person. It was amusing, and baffling. We asked our local contact later on why people did that, and he was just as baffled as we were. Or maybe he did not want to say because it mind offend us.

The train ride today from Qingdao to Beijing was less amusing though. We stopped at Jinan, which is the city where Til is from, to collect his passport. Caroline had submitted the application before I arrived. An at least half an hour waiting time was cut short to a total of no more than ten minutes because the guide talked the people behind the counter to let just jump queue. Good for us on this occasion, but I'll save my comments of the queueing culture, or lack thereof, for another time.

The entire journey, from pick-up to drop-off including the stop at Jinan and waiting time for a connection train, took 12 hours. It was not easy for any of us, but I suspect in a toss off on which one of us it was hardest on, I'd come in third.

Because Caroline had to worry about Til and the pram and her hand luggage, I took care of our suitcases. So, two cases of about 23, 24 kgs each. Plus my camera gear. The thing you need to know about taking the train in China though is that there are many check points to go through. Bags and people go through a scanner before as we enter the train station and tickets and IDs are checked. The latter meant that neither guide nor driver could help us beyond the entrance of the station. It's a bit annoying but most of the train stations seem so busy anyway, I am not sure I want to know what it would be like if all sorts of people were wandering around taking shortcuts and getting coffee like I have been known to do in Malmö. Anyway, before we are allowed on the platform, tickets and IDs are checked again. Most stations did not have lifts to take you and your bags or pram to and from platforms. One did not even have escalators. Add to that thousands of people, and remember the non queueing culture? Queues seem to be an alien concept and any space of more than a foot between you and the person in front of you is equivalent to a flashing neon sign arrow saying "welcome" and you'll begin to realise what a fun (not!) experience it was! I was close to flipping out at some point. But that was my part.

But then we had Til, who is at that age where he wants to run and explore and touch everything. And, he hasn't quite yet learnt where the boundaries are with other people. This could be because of his age, but it probably also has something to do with having grown up in an orphanage. Whatever the reason, it's difficult to allow him to run free and explore, not knowing whether he would take a stranger's water bottle or run into them head first at full speed, or climb on their lap. So Caroline has had to keep him on a fairly tight reign, which he has of course not enjoyed. So he's not been happy. And what to toddlers do when they are unhappy?

So his being unhappy has in turn been hard on Caroline (I am assuming it must have been) because she had to try to cajole him and calm him, and keep him happy. And to try to stop him from doing things he shouldn't doing. And all this without them really being able to understand one another. Although he is already starting to understand quite a bit of Swedish. He seems to know exactly what we are saying sometimes and even repeats random words in Swedish. And there is a lot of communication that do not need words. But some things do have to be explained and he doesn't always understand. Especially not when it comes to having to wait. And it happens of course that he can't get Caroline to understand what he wanted. My instinct would have been to try to talk to him, to ask him to explain things to him in Mandarin but in these circumstances it would not help Caroline in bonding and in establishing in her role as a parent. It's a complicated spiderweb of factors to consider.

Well, at least our train journeys in China are over.* We'll be staying put in Beijing until we leave the country. Thank God for that! Tomorrow, it's the Forbidden City and Tiannamen Square for me. I have issues about the Tiannamen Square because my introduction to it was, well, when it hit the news in the late eighties and THAT picture which was on the cover of everything at that time is branded forever in my memory. I was tempted to skip that bit of the tour and just visit the Forbidden City, but I decided that it would be good to have seen it and I achieve nothing by "boycotting" a square. Caroline and Til will be taking it easy in the morning to get some much needed R&R time, and to get used to a new routine in a new hotel. And on the day after, it's the Great Wall for all of us! I can't wait.


*There are many more stories to tell about our train journeys though. Maybe I'll get to that another time.

#China #triptochina #adoption #trainsinchina