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When I first arrived in Changsha, a fast developing provincial capital of Hunan province, it was a little over two years ago. I stepped of a long flight with my fellow teacher named Josh, we unloaded our baggage into a dirty little airport in the middle of some rice fields somewhere outside of the city of Changsha, which we were pronouncing entirely incorrectly.  Our flight was delayed and there was no-one to pick us up from the airport, we had no contact information for the school other than through the internet, which the airport didn’t have, and even if we would have had a phone number we no idea how to use a Chinese pay phone. Our best plan was to sleep there, that was until we were kicked out into the street at 1 am.  Shoving us into the last taxi cab we tried desperately to communicate with our driver who I’m sure took us for a much longer ride than what was necessary to some yuppie hotel in the middle of Changsha.  Josh had luckily taken out some Chinese money before we left, and I was quickly finding out that credit/debit cards are unheard of in China unless you are at the icky Walmart.  After finally using internet at the hotel and getting a hold of our contact we arrived the next day at our school, were put into our rooms, and told we were to teach English in 3 days. 

Here I was, a fresh graduate of college, no experience teaching, no idea how the Chinese education works, or China for that matter, couldn’t speak a word of Chinese, I had no idea what the level of students I was teaching were, no book to work out of, hosting about 50 students for my first class, and my only instructions were to teach English.  Asking my students later about their first impressions of me I was described as shy and a little nervous.  

My first impressions of Changsha were that it was absolutely insane.  I saw families of 4 on one motorcycle racing down the road with a basket full of chickens somehow attached to the back at the same time.  I saw people crossing the road where they shouldn’t be.  I heard noises I had never heard before.  It was difficult to eat on my own, buy things on my own, talk on the phone, ask where I could go to the bathroom, or get on a bus to go anywhere.  All these things I had previously taken for granted, I was now feeling very lost.  Not only because I had never been to China before, but because I had not done much traveling before and was put in this situation for the first time. 

Arriving in Changsha for the second time was a completely different experience, and it has so far been nothing but rewarding. I didn’t realize the fact that this is a very unique city when I first started living here because it was the only Chinese city I knew.  Biking west through Jiangxi province last week though I started to notice things change.  Things that are defining characteristics of this Hunan region were coming into view, things that make this place unique, that people are proud of.  First as we headed south from Shanghai into Anhui and Jiangxi provinces rice became more available.  Instead of being able to order one bowl per person or not having rice at all in the northern regions of China we were starting to see huge wooden barrels full of rice, we simply scoop out what we need to go with our meals free of charge, something I had grown familiar with living in the South.  Next as we headed through Jiangxi the food started getting spicier. Hunan people are extremely proud of their spicy food, and will tell you so.  About 30 k from the border is where I saw my first signs of beetle nut.  I was talking with a man who was gnawing on the sticky brown nut between gum and cheek and I felt a sense of nostalgia for every bus driver, shop worker, and local of Changsha.  Remnants of the left over nut can be seen spat all over the streets and beside market stalls amongst the rouge peppers and ubiquitous plastic bags.  Like the carcass of a large insect left to shrivel and dry.  Jim and I looked at each-other with a smile, “oh yeah baby, Hunan.”

Walking through a market right on the Hunan-Jiangxi border I came across a number of sellers of dog meat, another specialty of Hunan province.  The animal was cut up much like any pig or cow that would be sold at market, you can buy it by the quarter, you can by the skull, you can by the paws.  I asked for a price “20 kuai per Jin, not too expensive.”  

Riding into Changsha was a much different than when I landed two years ago.  My impressions were much different.  After spending two months being in unfamiliar towns, villages, cities and lands it was comforting to be somewhere familiar.  I saw restaurants I had eaten in, streets I was familiar with.  And comparing it to where we were coming from perhaps most strikingly I saw order.  It was a completely different city than when I had arrived in 2005. Where I saw chaos 2 years ago I now saw order.  People honked their horns less, the roads were new and paved.  People didn’t stare at me quite as much, and there was development through new buildings, fast food chains, coffee shops, and traffic police.  I feel a sense of culture shock being in a city with so much convenience and development, whereas when I first arrived from America I felt the complete opposite. 

We met with old students of mine for dinner last night and will continue to meet with friends for the next few days.  It was spectacular.  We ate hot pot, roamed the “hot street” behind our school, and talked about both the past and the future.  After being on the road for so long and meeting zero people that I had previously known it is a great feeling to be able to find people you have history with. 

This afternoon we have an interview with a Changsha newspaper, tomorrow we will play a concert in the main square outside the library for friends and students. 

I know being comfortable here is only a false sense of security and soon I will have to get back out on the road with only my Chinese map, a compass, street signs, and local people to ask for directions.  But I’m willing to enjoy this sense of being home as long as I can.    

Like most mornings when you wake up and your sleeping bag is much warmer than the outside air (this particular morning it was only 45, but relatively cool all the same) staying in that sleeping bag is much more inviting than packing up your gear and heading on your way.  Nature generally does it’s part in helping you however, as it did this particular morning, so getting up no matter how difficult was at the same time relieving.

I emerged from my tent to an orange sun coming up over a freshly harvested rice patty.  We packed up our gear and made for the county highway we had been following the evening before. 

Just before we found our campsite the previous night we had come across a restaurant in the country-side, not far from where we had camped.  The red Chinese lanterns had called us in where we had a meal of beans, pork, and eggplant.  While eating we talked with various people, a few families, the workers, a pharmaceutical salesman, and a grade school teacher.  The teacher was named Mr. Zhan, he had a son who was 28, and a 3 month old grandson.  He taught in Mandarin instead of his local dialect.  He laughed at almost everything and loved to use hand gestures when talking. 

As we were mounting our bikes and preparing to leave that next morning he came walking down the road pushing a well used baby stroller with his grandson, and laughing loudly.  “Where did you guys sleep last night” he asked.  In our tents in that field we answered, it is relaxing, quiet, and free.  “Oh there was no need for that, you could have just stayed at my house” he replied.  He asked if we had yet eaten, a common question any time of the day in China.  We said no but were going to go look for a place.  He said we should go with him, ”dumplings, fried bread, steamed buns, it has everything!”  How could one resist.  We walked a short way and came across a number of stalls, he was quick to announce to his friends who we were and offer us breakfast.  Laughing the whole time and offering us more and more food we ate our fill, as usual for any group of people preparing to ride over 100 kilometers.  He offered to pay but we were faster than he.  He led us back out to the road pushing his grandson in front of him and wished us luck.  He did not have to work that day because it was Sunday, so he walked back home to rest. 

We rode our bikes down a road yesterday into a town, a pile of red dirt blocked our way so that we had to ride on the shoulder to get in.   Its name was Huang Feng, or Huang something Shan, I don’t quite remember, nor would anyone else.  If I had my map right now I could figure it out by either reading the characters, or asking a Chinese person how to pronounce them if I din’t recognize them, which would most likely be the case.  My mind is beginning to blend memories together, characters, unknown pen-strokes, words, names.  In fact I can’t remember the names of many of the places I have been over the last 51 days.  They just exist in a chain with no clearly defined links.  There are things that happened a long time ago, and things that happened a short time ago.   Certain things stand out, days when we rested, beautiful biking days, gifts we were given, run-ins with authority, meeting interesting people.  But the rest just blends.  

Last night in particular was one of those nights, just like most of the rest.  The middle of no-where China, a place where no other foreigner would ever dream of going, where I never knew existed, nor will particularly remember.  I love it, and I live for it on a trip like this.  It is why I am here.  A look into the everyday life of the putongde ren, the common person, real China.  You can taste it in the air, dusty, dirty, smokey.  You can see it in the people, wide eyed, curious, unsure.  You can see it in the city, regulated, communist with white tiled buildings, cement floors, low door frames, wacky advertisements, and homemade food stalls.  You can hear it, stupendously loud truck horns, cement mixers, jack hammers, undecipherable syllables being amplified through megaphones attached to bicycles.  You can feel it, people brushing against you, a man feeling the hair on your arm, the firmness of the plywood you are sleeping on.  You can taste it, the oil used in frying up the common man’s dishes, vegetables, meat, dumplings, and steamed buns.  This is China.

We biked down the one road going in and out of our town last night, turned at the intersection, and took a left.  We stopped in front of a sign for a luguan, or travelers hotel.  Pete went in with the laoban.  The three of us stood outside waiting, not for Pete to emerge, but for the inevitable masses to surround.  People had watched us enter the town, and were aware of our presence, now it was time to feel us out. 

Slowly and surly they approached, like a rat to a trap, timid, curious, and present.  One man stepped forward, “Where are you from” he asked.  “They don’t understand” said a woman in back.  “America” said drew.  Exclamation arose in the crowd that had now grown to about 15.  They can speak Chinese!  Confidence was rising, a flood of questions quickly followed. 

To steer the conversation to a level I am able to handle I usually run through all the meaningful things that I know people will ask me.  What we are doing and why, where we are from, where my bike is from, where we are going, how many people are in the group, where Nakia is from, where the Bahamas are, that the Bahamas is a real place, I then tell them I am not cold, tired, and will eat soon.  From there I try my hardest to pick up words, phrases, and ideas I can’t quite understand.

Last night was like most other nights in China.  People told us that we must be lost and asked why we were in their town.  Sometimes I tell people I am there because I have heard about it being a beautiful place so I came to look, other times I tell them the truth, I don’t know why I am there, I just ended up there.

Our luguan was two buildings next to each-other patched together like a maze, we had two rooms on the second floor.  We had to walk through an old photo studio with fake landscapes hanging on the wall to get in.  We had four beds, wooden slates with a wool quilt thrown on top, a door that kind of locked, a window that opened, a single light-bulb hanging from the center of the room, it was 6 kuai a person, less than one U.S. dollar.  It had a toilet that actually flushed, and cold water to wash with.  The chickens and ducks lived under the stairs.  Children followed us everywhere, screaming “hello”, and “how are you.” The perfect place.

We ate dinner at the same place we eat every night.  We got similar dishes to those we get every night.  We drank boiled water from the same thermoses that we do every-night.  

Pete Jim and myself went for a walk after dinner.  There were no street lights in this particular town, it saves electricity and is cheaper.  Everyone sleeps at night.  We walked down a road, a few hair salons remained open, a few families doors were open and you could see people playing mahjong, drinking beer, and playing with children. 

We stopped in front of an extremely small train station and were chatting lightly.  A man with a flashlight was walking towards the station with a flash light, he froze when he noticed us and heard our language then shone his light on us.  Jim said hello in a friendly voice, the man returned the greeting and asked if we from Xinjiang, a region in the far north west of China where the minority group of Uighur comes from.  No we said, we are American.  “That’s not possible” the man exclaimed.  After we had convinced him he quickly warmed to our presence.  He worked at the station and was on his way to work.  We chatted a while then parted ways.  

We return down the road we had come, and a family was standing outside their doorstep  and initiated conversation.  ” You are the foreigners who have ridden their Bicycles here from Beijing” they said.  “Yes” we replied, “you have heard of us.”  One man pointed at Pete, “you are 1.98 meters” he said.  Peter confirmed the statement.  Like a small town anywhere in the world word travels fast.  We talked a while and they invited us into their home to sit and talk.  We ended up returning to our luguan to rest however and to help Drew re-grease the bearings in his rear hub. 

We rode out of town this morning the same way we do every morning.  With long goodbyes, scribbling of addresses and names, and the snapping of pictures of quick friends. 

Slowly the landscape has changed, soon the language will also start to fade into incomprehensable syllables.  Hopefully by means of writing, video, and photography and I can pick out meaningful links in the chain of experiences to remember and share with others.  I have not yet grown weary of our trip.   Tomorrow may be similar to today, or it may be extraordinary, but either way I can’t wait to see how it develops.

Car, truck, truck, big truck, bicycle, bicycle, bicycle.  The perspective of a cyclists in China.  There are tons of bicycles in China, in fact more than any other country, which is how it got its nickname “The kingdom of bicycles” or in Chinese ”Zi Xing Che Wang Guo”  it seems however that this isn’t for any environmental reason as much as it is economic.

From moving massive construction cranes on huge flat-beds to people biking from their village to work the field we have seen it all in China.  We have biked through incredibly polluted areas laden with factories spewing smoke.  We have biked over rivers with banks covered in garbage, running black with pollution, and making their way out to the sea.  We have spent days riding into and out of huge metropolises like Beijing and Shanghai.  But we have also seen the families walking to their fields, the fields they use for self subsistence farming.

 It becomes easy to point a finger at the common enemy, China, with all it’s problems and harm-causing money-making industries that go into any industrializing country.  Too bad it is true, that China as a whole has now surpassed all other countries at leaving a deeper carbon footprint.  That the pollution is so thick in some areas that respiratory disease is the leading cause of death, and it has only been twenty years in most places where these factories have existed, what of the Children who will spend their entire lives living under these conditions?  

This trip has allowed me to have a more wholistic view of this country, beyond the smoke stacks, highways, and coal run power, beyond the government, oil hungry officials, and rising middle class tourists are hundereds of millions of people who have no choice but to get up everyday and bike to their fields to grow a few vegetables, or walk to work through pollution created by the factories producing goods for us Americans.  These people often have one light bulb hanging in the center of their house, one television, and consume relatively few pre-packaged products as compared to Americans.  They rise and sleep with the sun.  They are the forgotten China.  Not that they choose this way of life, but because they have no choice.  Which is important to consider as well.  If they had the choice to live like this would they choose it, probably not.  With this perspective pointing the finger soon becomes much more difficult. 

In America I try to consciously consume less than the average American, however it is still incredibly more than so many people I see in the country-side of China.  My plane ticket to come here for example created a much larger carbon foot print than that of many of the people I meet make in many months.

Many Chinese tell me of a common dream, that every person have a Car, like in America.  I believe this dream would quickly become a nightmare. Perhaps we can make a few people consider something they don’t often consider by talking with them about it, but unfortunately I feel more is necessary.

A man in the city of Huzhou in Zhezhiang province with the English name of Mike was telling me of no car days, where in the city people are not allowed to drive cars on certain days.  Beijing has had similar days as well, and has done test runs for the Olympics where factories and cars are not allowed to run.  My understanding however that these days are generally ignored.  I imagine such a day in the U.S. would have similar results.  Maybe the realization of a problem is a good first step anyway. 

The world is incredibly diverse, I have seen people drive their SUV down their driveway to get their mail and I have seen families with an old rusty bicycle as their only means of tranportation. Should we feel guilty for using what we have aqccured?  Not neccissarily, but we can at least be concious and make a choice to consume less.  For years messages of environmental protection have been drilled into our heads.  Use reusable bags and imagine the tons of plastic that could be saved each year, bike to the grocery store instead of driving and imagine the fuel we would save.  But what will it take to actually go through with these energy saving methods?  I am guilty as well.  Sometimes you conciously know what you are doing is wastefull yet you do it anyway.  What will it take to change?  In the U.S. there is a social stygma attatched to littering, probably because it is visible pollution that has an imidiate effect on our surroundings.  But driving a Hummer to work for some reason is seen as impressive. 

Clear facts pointing out how our world is being devastated is not working, perhaps however if the Jones’s talk behind our backs about how we leave our lights on when we go out people will be more likely to change.  Well we need more talkers!  Not behind any one’s back though, but in a respectable way, I feel to spread consciousness is really the best way.

Combining all perceptions that can be sensed there is one rising high above the rest as single most feared.  Agreed upon by both woman and mankind around the world nothing tests will, delivers pain, and breeds dread like this one sensation. Six a.m. somewhere in China the same tone, pitch, and pulsating rhythm that wakes the masses the world over fills our room. My radio shack travel alarm clock with case showing well use and buttons long rubbed off of their paint telling of their function succeeds again at rousting the dead.  However instead of dreading the stress of co-workers, sitting in traffic, paying bills, feeding the dog, and long term general monotony I have no idea what to stress about.  In fact I have no idea what the day will bring or where I will end up.  For some this in it and of itself might be reason to freak out or have an aneurysm. For some reason however I was created to embrace uncertainty, live for the moment, and thrive off the unknown. All that is known is that I have to follow little green, red, and brown lines outlined on my map looked at the night before. Forever heading south towards some unforeseen point. Entirely open to change and reevaluation a green road may become a red, or a red a green, but it is all the same to me, unknown. I can only speculate as to where there will be hills, traffic, food, and a place to sleep. In fact with no predictability rising from bed becomes much easier. I generally awake everyday with no dread, no remorse, and an unusual amount of energy. Ready to hit the road we pack, we eat, and we bike. 

Everyday we learn what does and doesn’t work, everyday we talk, change plans, and speculate. We have slowly become more efficient with our prep time and riding. Our group is unique in that we are very open with one another and we are very lucky that when something is bothering one of us we share it with the group.  As with any team we have our highs and lows, but so far have worked together and made changes where necessary. People in our group are also currently of different biking ability making working as a team very important. It is difficult to say if we are on track of our goal of distance traveled since it is so unclear what route we will entirely be taking. Generally we travel anywhere from 50 to 80 k per day, with a day of rest thrown in every so often.  Things that effect this are stopping at interesting places to take photographs, talking with people, playing music, and eating.  The type of road we travel on also highly effects how fast or slow we go.  We have encountered very mountainous terrain, rainy weather, very flat and fast land, curvy roads, muddy roads, and roads so full of drying grain that it is difficult to bike on. It has been brought to my attention that a more detailed status should be included in the site.  I will soon be adding a weekly blog with just details such as distances traveled, sites visited, terrain, and weather.  

I had no idea that the simple act of hanging around our hotel courtyard on the day of mid-autumn festival would create such an experience, but then I suppose you never really do see these experiences coming.  Mid autumn festival is a day in China where strictly speaking is on the 15th day of the 8th moon, or the autumn equinox.  If you are able to view the moon through the haze or not does not matter, what you do see is the entire country shutting down at the same time to celebrate the occasion.  Families get together and friends unite, like many cultures who have a celebration near harvest time.  The staple treat which everyone must consume are moon cakes, 3 inch circular discs which are similar to fruit cake in density and taste.  

Our hotel, or luguan, which is usually a family run smaller and cheaper accommodation was found down a quiet maze of back alley complexes.  Meshed together over the ages it is difficult to tell where one house ends and another starts, doors decorated in red fu characters for good luck and fortune lead you to our place. Most places open up behind these doors into an open courtyard with a few rooms attached.  At our particular luguan this mid autumn festival Jim was shooting the breeze with some old men in our courtyard who are part of the family which run it.  A graying woman cooked lunch while the men sat and talked.  I was in the area organizing some photos and when the food came out was invited to join the gang.  Jim, myself, three elderly men, and one woman all sat down to a feast of fish soup, chopped chicken (which was running around the courtyard just that morning) green veggies, sweet tomatoes, and of course, as any Chinese feast goes, baijiu.  Baijiu is the Chinese rice spirit which usually runs both too strong in a number of categories, most overwhelmingly being the taste.  As the meal progressed we seemed to be getting along very well and I really wish I could have understood the thick accent of the old man with the surname of Jia to at least know the subject he was talking about.  He was giving very serious lectures, or telling stories, or talking about us I’m not sure but all Jim and I could do was nod and say we agreed.  The woman was telling us that the yellow river valley was the cradle of human civilization and was asking us if this is what we were taught.  I told her I wasn’t sure and that there are many ancient civilizations in the world, although it is much older than the American civilization of where I come from.  Perhaps she was talking about existing civilizations, I am unsure.  

After an afternoon nap we decided to bike to the town square and play some music.  Squares in China are places people go to in the evening to dance, sing, play instruments, Rollerblade, meet friends, and just hang out.  It always seems to be a great commune of both traditional and modern culture.  Nakia, Drew, and Peter took out their instruments and instantly drew a crowd.  Reception to our music along the way seems to change depending on the situation but people last night were genuinely interested.  We sang a number of songs each with applause, Nakia particularly drew applause with her vocals.  After singing a few we told people about our trip and mission then asked if anyone else in the group could perform.  A tiny man, about 5 feet tall and missing most of his teeth jumped in from the back and demanded the attention of the crowd, people seemed to know him.  He belted out a couple of songs with hand motions, great eye contact, and a beautiful voice.  He could sing incredibly well and everyone seemed very entertained.  A woman soon starting singing Peking opera as well and they would go back and forth.  Jim stepped in with the Chinese song “The Moon Represents my Heart” and “Zai Nali”  With the help of the woman and the man the trio sounded great.  People seemed extremely receptive.  I meanwhile explained my bike to the many Chinese examining it, which seems to happen wherever we go.  ”Yes it is made in America, those are to hold water bottles, those are bags I put my things in, that is a pump to put air in my tires.”  People always ask how much it cost as well but I usually lie and tell them it is much cheaper than what I payed.  Sometimes it is an issue that I don’t want to run the risk of getting it stolen, but more often than not it is because after converting it’s price to RMB it sounds like a lot and I feel somewhat guilty I guess. 

The evening was rounded out with skewed meat called Chuar, today we start biking into the mountains.  Happy Mid-Autumn Festival, Zhong qiu jie kuai le!   

A man, faded army issue pants, wool coat, rope belt which wraps too far around his too thin waist, shovel, missing front tooth, standing in a dirt field with a blank stare at the foreigner riding by on a bicycle and gear costing much more than his yearly wage.  But he doesn’t know that, all he knows is that just over 30 years ago foreigners wern’t allowed into his country.  He knows that growing up during the cultural revolution he was told to eat his rice because there were American’s who were starving.  He knows that somehow things have changed but he isn’t sure of the scope.  Left in the dark and far behind not 100 miles to the north a place exists called Beijing which within the year will host an event on the world stage.  Not too far to the south exists a place called Shanghai, a place more foreign to him than to millions of Americans.  But he knows his son moved there, along with countless millions of others to the boom towns of post Deng Xioping’s economic freedom movement.  He knows that his son sends money home from his window washing job, he sends home the equivilent of 40 US dollars a month, much more than what he had ever been able to make growing corn, cabbage, and carrots.  It would not be too much to say that his son has a direct window to view the change occurring in this country at a hecticly and mind spinning pace.  He may get a chance to share this with his father once a year when he returns home on an over crowded train for the new year celebration.  His son sends home a lot of money, to this man my plane ticket to the country, my bicycle, my video camera, hard drive, and camping equipment dosn’t exist, it can’t exist, or one would starve.  Back in the United States I am poor, jobless, and missing out on building my 401k, paying off a mortgage on a house and car, and ruining the statistic of unemployment rates for my college.  Should I feel guilty for taking advantage of a situation, an unfair and unbalanced coincidence that I am able to travel, document, and see things that make our world ours.  I struggle with the thought that I make money in the U.S. then spend it on a lifestyle a fraction of the price for the same goods, while people here work day in and day out to make ends meet.  I have put myself in a unique situation.  No other generation in the history of human kind has been able to travel and see the world the way mine has.  I purposely have no children or current career that I had to tear myself away from.  The ability and freedom to explore has exponentially risen with the advent of better transportation and communication.  Would I then also feel guilty for not exploring these options?  I find a way to cope with this is by doing exactly what our group means to do, a way to share with friends, family, and anyone unable to take benefit from travel like myself.  We live in a highly globalized world which will only become more so.  Not only can this man working the fields in Hebei province China not understand me but I can most certainly not understand him.  But we can begin to build bridges for the future.  Not only for major corporations investing money in third world countries and the boom cities foregin to most residents in China, Americans, and a vast amount of their own inhabitants.  But we can try to understand the true people that make up the world we live in, along with exploring who we are ourselves in the process.  No we can not all quit our jobs and tour the world, it would then surly fall apart.  But we can step back ponder the man in the dirt field the same way he ponders us. 

Preparation continues here in Minnesota for the journey.  Things being taken care of include obtaining visas, purchasing (and making) gear, planning routes, bicycle training, language study,  and website development (mostly thanks to Jim)  The summer has been great here but I’m anxious for fall to roll around and head out on our trip.  I hope to keep this updated periodically before we leave then more frequently once we begin our trip.

Adam