I love to travel and the first thing I
normally do after confirming my flights and where I’ll be staying, I picture
myself in that place I’ve never been. I have vivid images mostly from the
media, books I’ve read, what I’ve seen on TV and what I’m told. In June I told
one of my classmates from China that I would be going to visit but the trip I
was making is mostly for the graduation of a relative who was there on
scholarship. She was excited for me, this took away the little worrying I
had in me of going to a place I never thought I’d visit anytime soon. I told
her I was looking forward to the shopping mostly, and she encouraged me to take an
empty suitcase because it was ‘crazy cheap'. She warned me of the Beijing
atmospheric pollution but I told her I’d be there for a few days then get a
train to Shenyang where my cousin goes to University.
The flight was long, maybe it was because
we stopped in Malaysia for a few hours. I was so relieved when we landed in
Beijing after the long flight. I headed to a family friends where I stayed for
a few nights before heading to Shenyang. Beijing was beautiful, but I expected
the streets to be cramped with people and I’d be struggling to move, to my
surprise it was nothing like I imagined. I did a little shopping there, the
kind where you can bargain for a pair of shoes from 100 dollars to 10. I was
shocked and even felt sorry for the seller, but the friend I was with insisted, "trust me that’s the whole point, if you don’t want to bargain there’s always
the fancy malls we could go to", she said. But I was on a budget and this is
what I needed, this kind of shopping therapy. I bought myself a lot of shoes,
bags and clothes, things I’d probably spend so much on in Australia, stuff I’d
never be able to afford here all at once, but I got all at once for a bargain, the jaw dropping kind, it was insane. The nightlife
was amazing, the alcohol was cheaper than water, no kidding! The clubs were big
and getting around the city was easy especially since the cab drivers were always
ready outside calling out for you with their cheap fares they’d negotiate with you before even entering the car.
Another thing I was in awe of there were the
huge train stations, I felt like I was at an airport and kept thinking maybe
it’s both a train station and an airport. It took 5 hours from Beijing to Shenyang
on the bullet train, went by really fast but I also hardly sleep when I’m
travelling. I was told it was a smaller city, but on reaching and just by the
look of the train station and driving through the city to my cousins apartment
I thought, “well if this is small, then I don’t know what Kampala is”, honestly
the few days I was there and hearing about the population, it might as well be
the whole of my Uganda. My cousin and his friends obviously speak Chinese but
it was at this point I realised I’d never been to a country or in a place where
almost no one spoke English, yes I believe even in the deepest rural village in Uganda you’ll come across a herdsman or farmer that speaks broken English but you’ll feel
safe in knowing you cannot get lost if left alone. Here I was, always thought of myself as
independent but I relied on my cousin and his friends for everything, for
directions, buying food, you name it, except getting money from the atm
machine, it’s all I could do.
Also I was very shocked on the little
personal space I had, while walking I could feel people touch my hair, they
were so fascinated by not just my skin but my hair too, like I was the first black girl they were seeing, some even
went as far as asking for a picture, and here I was thinking this town had a
lot of international students and they should be used by now. All in all, it
was an awesome trip that made me wish I spoke Chinese, being in another world,
their world, made me realise; the world’s way bigger than what I’m shown on TV
or the magazines.
