Not a lot been happening, currently stuck in a small town after some confusion about the difference between the Chinese for morning and afternoon. Wish I had stayed in bed 4 hours longer instead of yomping down to the bus station in the pitch black. Only 1 week till I come home! Can’t believe it.
Went to the weirdest (or at least most inappropriate) the other night. Had a Buddhist theme and Tibetan karaoke, the videos for which all showed the Tibetan’s ‘joy’ at being ‘liberated’ by the Chinese. Had enough of Communism for a while, what with blocked websites, oppressed monks, staggering inequality etc. The town I’m currently in is called Luding, and is the site of a famous battle during the Long March (basically a forced retreat of the Communists during their fight with the Guomindang). Apparently about 30 Communists overwhelmed about 1000000000 Guomindang soldiers. Remarkable. I suppose that at that time at least the Communists hadn’t become corrupt.

Back to the weird club, where me and a Pole, an American and an Aussie settled down for a quiet drink. Unfortunately the local army who were out on the lash had other ideas and made us join them. After some harassment the four of us decided to tell everyone that we were two couples. Unfortunately this led to one of the army guys wanting to fight me for the Polish girl, something I was less than enthusiastic about as he kept showing me the gun he was carrying. He was joking about the fight, but was drunk enough and nasty enough that we decided a hasty retreat was called for.

We’ve dropped out of the mountains now, it’s nice being able to run upstairs without feeling like I’m going to collapse. Unfortunately I’m currently trying to travel along a road which is under construction. Got delayed for 3 hours yesterday, but I met a Swiss guy who said they had been stuck for 24 hours before now. Did my first hitchhike in China after the taxi I was in decided that it wouldn’t wait in the queue any longer. Surprisingly easy, first car I looked at stopped for me, guess this is the advantage of having a face that sticks out a mile (in the best possible way),