Our journey from Beijing to Jinan to Qingdao

So we had our first experience with China railway yestersday and it was one hell of a journey. As i said in the previous post we was on our way to Jinan and then travel to the coastal city of Qingdao. We got a soft seat to Jinan and it took about 4.5 hours, we had plenty of room on the train and as you can imagine the seats were soft.






About 45mins into the journey the man next to me, who i later found goes by the name of Charles, kept curiously looking at my laptop, he asked me what the specs where and that he was thinking of getting the same laptop for his girlfriend. He and I chatted all the way to Jinan, he spoke good english and was very intruiged in how we westerners work, live and how our cultures were different. He was amazed we were travelling for a few years without any means of work, he was even more amazed we had no plan on where we would stay or go once we arrived in Jinan. I asked him if there was much to do in Jinan and he laughed and just said 'its very dusty'.

When pulling into Jinan we could see it looked a bit of a dive, Charles walked with us out to the station entrance, we was still chatting and laughing, we was greeted with even more stares than when we arrived in Beijing, when we got out of the station we could see that Jinan was basically a Chinese version of Romford. Nothing was in English and we, quite quickly, decided we wanted to leave for Qingdao as soon as possible. The time was about 6pm so we knew we had to hurry up so we could find a place to stay once we arrived in Qingdao.


The ticket office was teaming with people, the entire wall was cover in Chinese characters for train numbers, destinations and times, we didnt have a clue what we needed to do to get a ticket. Luckily Charles didnt have work till tomorrow so he was still hanging with us. He offered to get our tickets for us, we accepted and 20 mins wait later he come back with 2 hard seat tickets costing 28 yuan each (approx £2.80), this was going to be our first experince with the hard seat on the Chinese trains and i was actually excited about the experience. Only problem was it didn't leave till midnight so we had 6 hours to kill in a place we didn't like the look of.

Charlse invited us to go and get something to eat with him, we thought why the hell not and off we went 30 mins bus ride later and a 10 min walk further we arrived at an all-you-can-eat restaurant. It was 38 yuan (£3.80) for all you could eat and drink, definitely a bargain!

We filled ourselves up with sweet potato cakes, asparagus, sausages, chicken, squid, langastine, watermelon, ribs, beef cutlets, salad, prawns and pretty much anything else that was there. We sat, chatted, drank and ate for about 3 hours. We exchanged emails and offered Charles a guided tour of London if he ever came over in the future. He walked us to the bus stop and we said our zaijian's (goodbye) and thanked him over and over for all his help and hospitality.

It was about 9.30pm now, we made our way back to the train station and sat in the waiting room till it was time to go. 11.45pm slowly dragged close and we started queing, we saw people starting to run to the train platform and we soon found out why......they wanted a seat.

Our carridge number was 14 and the stairs down to the platform led us to carridge 4. We had to run a good 100m with all our gear on (my main bag weighs just under 19kg). Whilst running past the other carridges we could see all the seats had already been filled up and people where standing down the isles of the carridges. By the time we got to number 14 we were some of the last few to get onto the train, well getting on is probably an exaggeration. There simply was not enough room, there is a small area inbetween the doors and the main carridges where the last people squeeze themselves onto the train. The area probably measures about 3m L by 1m W. Each one of these areas in every carridge had about 10 people in them. I was shocked, we physically couldnt get on. Our bags took up the space of about 2 people, let alone the size of me and Tom. The doors started to shut one by one and we was dashing up and down the carridges to try and see if there was space.

We was fucked, it was midnight, and we were stuck at Jinan station with nowhere to go.

Tom's bargaining, blagging, pursuading, however you put it, skills came into action. The station attendants didnt understand a word of english but somehow Tom managed to plea with one of the chaps and he smiled and waved his hand to say 'follow me'.

He took us onto the other side of the platform and told us to wait here. Another train pulled up and i saw the sign 'Qingdao' on the train, i felt a bit more at ease but didnt know if we was still going to get on the train. The train pulled up and out stepped what i think was the boss. We walked behind the station attendant who was talking to the boss. He reminded my of King Louie from the junglebook, he was shouting his head off and kept looking back to us shouting some words and then started laughing at us, his co workers walking beside him laughed at us as well, we just smiled and nodded. We came to the entrance of the sleeper carridge and we picked up one word in the sentence as he was speaking to us....'english', we nooded and said 'Yes London' a few more loud words come out his mouth and a few more laughs ensued and he then pointed at the door and said go'. I couldnt believe it, Tom managed to do it, he got us on the train, and even better we was in the sleeper quarters. We shook their hands and said xiexie (thankyou).



We was in the small area that i described earlier but luckily it was just me and Tom so we had room to stand. A few people working on he train came into our area and started to try and talk to us. The only words we could exchange where 'England' and 'London'. One chap showed us an Indian Rubee and said 'pound', we didnt understand at first but then it clicked, he was obviously collecting money from different countries. Tom to the rescue again luckily had a few 20,1 & 2 pence pieces. He gave them to him and he kindly offered to exchange them for some Yuan, we told him to keep it for free.



After the train started to move he led us to the sleeper quarters and let us stow our bags up on the railings. We each had a little fold out chair to sit on, the carridge was very dark as people where sleeping and it stunk of piss, we was sitting right next to the toilets but it wasn't a problem i still couldn't believe we managed to get on the train and was overwhlemed at how kind and friendly the Chinese people we met in the last few hours were.

After a hour into the journey the chap who Tom had given the english money to pointed at the empty sleepers in the carridge and made the hand gesture to get some sleep, i'm guessing he was repaying the favour with the coins. At first we declined, they had done too much for us already, they even went and got tom a cup of water because he was thirsty. Another hour into the journey and i was trying to sleep, i was sitting on a tiny chair and a window seal acting as a pillow, i felt the horrible feeling that i had when i was on the plane, extremely tired but simply unable to get into a position that would allow me to sleep, it didnt even have to be comfortable just something that would mean i would fall on the floor when i drifted off. The man came walking down again and offered the bed again, this time i was quick to jump up on the bed.

Im not sure how much sleep i got maybe 2 or 3 hours, i woke up and it was daylight and the noise of the train (they are very loud) stopped me from getting back to sleep.

We sat up and started to try and have a conversation with the people in the beds above and below us (they are stacked 3 high). Its funny how people cannot speak any words of the same language but still managed to have a conversation and share laughs.

We arrived in Qingdao around 5am and what a journey it was. We said our goodbyes to the people in the cabin and also the workers on the train who helped us out. Whilst walking down the platform we bumped into the big chief and he smiled and shook our hands, then of course started shouting and laughing at us.

We got out of the station and managed to find a a cheap hotel with the help of one of the many salesman littering the streets 24 hours a day.

Within 30 mins of arriving in Qingdao we had already been asked to have our picture taken with 2 people, im sure the more south we go, the more intruiged the Chinese people will become.....