I have four day weekends here, as a rule.  I have yet to really, truly, and fully take advantage of this opportunity up here.  Part of it is that I’ve been to a number of places, part is the dearth of travel companions here compared to Shenzhen.  Last weekend, with the clock ticking on my time in China, I took the power upon myself to get out of Beijing.  It was a welcome break and it was no great stretch to take the bullet train two hours south to Shijiazhuang, the dusty capitol city of Hebei province.  Though surrounding prosperous Beijing, Hebei as a whole is still very countryside.  This point was hammered home as I sat out waiting for a bus near a pile of garbage.  One going the other way passed, where a girl on board saw me, began pointing, and then attracted the attention of everyone else on the bus.  Oh China, I’ll miss you.

The first stop was Yujiacun, a stone village a couple hours west of Shijiazhuang.  It is set amongst dusty rolling hills near the province’s border.  The town is a few winding streets paved in stone and nothing much else, and has existed as such for over 500 years.  Here I was given a tour guide by the local office staffed by an old man, one of many in the town who speak in a local dialect that is near undecipherable for me.  The lady who served as the guide took me from site to site, explaining in Chinese.  I think I caught about half of what she said.  Which isn’t too bad overall.  That night I slept in one of the stone houses set up for guests, and was given a demonstration of how they make the noodles before eating some great nongcun food and having a beer.

It was wonderful to leave Beijing for a period of time.  The city gets a bit oppressive…I wonder if this has anything to do with its political obligations.  While Yujiacun was a nice break, it was also a bit too quiet.  The next day I rode the local buses around until I got to the foot of Cangyanshan, a mountain which may be best known as a filming location for “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”.  The climb was pretty easy, the worst of which was about 200 feet of stairs.  While going up these I had the pleasure of listening to Chinese tourists complaining about how tired the stairs made them.  I think they need to get out more.

Whilst taking photos a girl who was part of a university class group on an excursion came up and started speaking to me in English, asking if she could tag along with me and get some English practice in.  Listening to her, I did what I usually do in said situations.  Let it go for about 10-15 minutes of English practice before turning the tables back into speaking Chinese, a method which works wonderfully well.  The students were all sophomores and were excited to chat in English, though some were nervous.  On the way back down, while the class took a group picture, I was treated to two renditions sung by them of revolutionary songs including one with the line “No Chairman Mao, no new China.”

The weather being lovely and the day young, after getting down the whole group decided to do what I termed a ‘real hike’, following a trail that was not a set of concrete stairs up a ridgeline on the other side of the valley.  Upon reaching the top we were rewarded with lovely views.  The landscape, as a whole, was almost like mesas, which I’d never actually seen in China before.  Absolutely stunning.  Throughout the hike the language pendulum began to swing back to English as my fatigue increased.  Later the kids shared snack food with me and offered me a ride back to Shijiazhuang on their charter bus.

Back in the city, the two kids most responsible for adopting me saw me off to the train station.  The hour was growing late and I was beginning to fear I may be trapped overnight in Shijiazhuang, at the loss of money for a hotel.  Reaching the ticket lines, my fears were realized seeing the mass of people waiting to purchase tickets.  No way would I make the train, I thought.  Then a man, middle-aged and short, red-faced, speaking loudly, all signs of the country, come up to me and asked if I needed Beijing tickets on the dongche, or bullet train.  Why yes, I do.  So to the front he went and cut in line, buying me my ticket at a small fee.  Countless times I have been annoyed with such people; however, without his help, I would not have made it back home.  Somehow, in this instance, it worked.

Great escape from Beijing!