Nanning Typing

This is from the hotel in Nanning. There was Internet in the room, but I could only access a mail account.

Form there, I can't find anything. So I haven't written my diary since I entered Vietnam... which would be about right I think. It was running out of webspace that threw me. Couldn't decide where to post to, so stopped.

Anyway, this was at Nanning.



********** Nanning Typing *******************



It's a strange situation that I find myself typing here. I'm in Nanning, the main large city close to the border with Vietnam, and actually sitting in a room typing this into my mail account, because I can't actually sign into anything else. I can't use my usb key, I can't upload or access my website or blogs. But at least I'm here, with some kind of vaguely working computer in the room, the first ever in my room, just a week after I decided how productive I'd be with a laptop and asked the universe for one. Not quite my own laptop today, but it's a start towards one.



Next Day



Oh, I didn't get so far with typing then. The novelty of a computer in the room wore off pretty quickly when I realised that there's pretty much nothing it can do. I'm managing to do this typing into the mail account.

But while I'm here, I might as well say something about my time in Yangshou.



Overall, I loved it. It's funny isn't it. What feels like a million years ago now, I was sitting in UK, planning a trip to Bangkok, and that place seemed good because there was supposed to be the best cybercafe in China, and I did indeed end up there doing a load of typing, well, work generally, I pretty much built my site about religous studies.



It was a dark place and they overcharged a little, though it still worked at five hours for a pound, five times cheaper than England.



I left when I met Simon. I first became aware of him when I was sitting eating in Minority one morning and he had some semi-fight with a foreigner next door. He's about my age. Some guy was saying about how he never buys drinks, always scrounges and is trouble.



One day in the cybercafe, which turns out to be called Love Internet, he was theree arguing about price, and he asked me if I know how much it should cost.



I'd see him about around town and he'd say hello. One day he was passing and just joined me without asking, luckily just as I was leaving. He told me how to get a one year visa in Hong Kong and that I should go up to Kunming.



A few days later he caught my eye in the same place and said hello but I looked away. I'm really an expert at stonewalling people.



Anyway, while chatting, he mentioned that he was paying half of what I was in the cybercafe, and I was funny about using it after that, because I realised they were being arrogant there. I tried a few other places but there was too many technical problems. Also, the Chinese don't use printers, I've not seen one the whole of the time I've been here, and I've gone about as far as I can without print outs.



I met quite a few people there, or rather people tried to speak to me and I managed to get away from them. There was Walter, did I mention him. A Dutch guy who smoked all the owners cigerettes and was impossibly tall. He noticed my religious studies book and spoke about all these religious experiences he'd had.



A lot of Chinese wait down by the river and try to start conversations with foreigners to practice English. Having been in India so long I'm always suspicious. Once I was sitting at a table and a woman came and joined me saying just, 'Are you alone?', which really isn't an opener. So I got up and walked off. There are loads of people I stonewalled like that. I feel bad in a way now as they weren't touts as far as I can work out, they really were just people who wanted to practice their English.



There was this one boy who was unbelivably persistant. Each time I saw him coming I got up and walked off. Once, I was eating something and couldn't get away, so he did manage to get conversation out of me. He said he's staying at a school where I can have a job but it only pays board, not wages. I passed the school a while later and they were actually offering wages then. Anyway, this boy in the 'conversation' said that I seem really down and do I want to talk about it.



I spent a lot of time sitting in Riverside. I used to go there a few times a day. Once three women came up, they looked about eighteen and one had three long marks down her neck, like someone had love bitten her to make a pattern. Anyway, they said that they were haviing a party in the dorm and did I want to join them? I said that I was busy.


Even the woman from the hotel sat and joined me. Under the pretence of asking if I prefered orange juice room temperature or cold, she ended up with a dictionary. Her husband arrived and I think he was trying to get into Buddhism, but it was a slow conversation.



Everything was well and good. I invested some of the money which the solicitor sent, it's a part payment of the money mother had as cash. I bought just a couple of grand of bonds as I already have the shares.



I completely finished studying the Religious studies book and made a mind map for every chapter. I made a parcel up and sent them all back, as well as my shoes, so I'm travelling a bit lighter now.



I think it just became time to leave. I liked Minority. The man was honest and they were a nice family. I liked the food, but that hotel room became like a prison. There was a neighbour who had a cockrel which kept me awake. It was all so enclosed. I went over to Guilin and the same staff all remembered me and said hello, but the one in charge ignored me, this is the one who said that she wanted to come with me to live in, what I didn't know at the time, but she was asking if we could both stay at the Yangshou Culture House. This is Hostelworld's highest ranking place and she probably knew that most foreigners are on the way to stay there.



Anyway, I walked out and ended up booking flowers on line when I wanted to return.



They started being weird in Riverside. I used the computers for free there a little as I was off Love Internet, but they all used to laugh knowingly when I went there. One morning it got to me and I just walked out and never went back. It was a nice little place while it lasted though.



My God, is this all that happened in Yangshou?



Anyway, Minority owner wrote down my instructions/requirements for a ticket and I went to Guilin train station, but there was only the hardest class, so I went back without it. A few days later, I left, just resigned to having a hard seat.



So I left. I went back to Flowers, and the woman was friendler and checked me in, then I went to the centre and ate at a new place. It was nice. Opposite there was a big sign for 'King David Bowling' but it was all old and peeling paint and no longer there. I thought about how much trouble must have gone into making it, and what the business was like when it was running and all the happy memories that some Chinese people must have because they'd never been bowling, and now it's just some forgotten nothing, peeling paint and broken neon.

Some foreigners, British, were near me. They complained that the Guinis was out of date, but they were looking at the manufacture date. It didn't make any difference as they'd convinced themselves that it tasted funny. They sat and played cards for a while and then went away to a bar next door. As they left, the woman turned and pointed me out to her partner and 'that guy who kept staring at me funny'. So obviously the clientelle aren't good enough for them as isn't the beer.



The waitress joined me and tried to make conversation, prompting me to immeadiately call for the bill, though she didn't seem to mind, perhaps it's just me that's weird.



That evening, A phoned. All is well. Apparently the man who painted at A's goes to Geoffs place some times. He was there in the evening once and there's only a few people in. A said there's real money problems there. It's something that mother said to me more than once towards the end; he's not suited to running a pub. he's clannish with just a few regulars, doesn't introduce his family around etc. But whatever, he's nothing to do with me now.



I left the next day to the much dreaded first class. The attendant showed me to the wrong seat and I had to move, but then there was no space for my bag, so it was on my lap, but the guy next to me helped me.

I knew where I was going as I'd done a fair bit of research, and even looked at the satelitte photo at GoogleEarth, so I walked across into Chayang hotel. It looked OK, but they insisted on 100Y deposit, which is fair enough, but there was no receipt. I checked in anyway. I stayed and then walked off looking for the Vietnamese Consulate, but couldn't find the building. I was so tired that I went to bed.



I got strange phonecalls all night from a Chinese woman. Next day I walked up to the Nanning hotel and asked them for help and they wrote the address of the Vietnamese consulate down for me. It was far but a taxi was less than a pound. I went in, filled in the form and was done.



Next day I went and got my ticket to Hanoi. No idea which class or anything, but I have it and am leaving thisevening.



There's not so much in Nanning. I remember when I first came to China and stayed in Shanghai. People were coming and going and told me about all these places. I remember a Canadian who had been robbed here on the way to Vietnam, and so had gone back to Shanghai to replace his passport. I remember the Aussies who told me about Yangshou, and I ended up going.



But there wasn't so much here. I walked down to the shopping centre at Parkinson and relaxed, but that was about it. Yesterday I came here to look at the room as those funny phonecalls go on and on and on, and I still didn't feel good about the deposit I'd paid. There was a computer in the room, and I got Google docs on it, so checked in and went and got two days shopping, then got back and realised that it can hardly do anything. It's uses a proprietrry browserr and I can't turn session cookies or ActiveX controls on, so it's near useeless... but at least I can type this I supposee. It cuts out when it gets hot though. I paid for a half day and though what the hell, it's just opposite the station, and a computer in the room is still one hell of a novelty. I'm trying to download a different browser to see if I might make a hotel booking, but if now then I'll do it elsewhere before leaving.



LATER



I've got ten minutes before I check out; I can't decide if I should hang about a restaurant or book accomodation, the I ching thinks I should just go and see what I can find, unbooked. Actually, there's just five minutes.



I wanted to say two things that became clear to me in Yangshou. One, I'll likely not have a conversation again. I think I already said that somewhere.



But I think the other thing is that I don't really want to be with anyone. Very often walking around Yangshou or having a tea somewhere, being mindful and watching my thoughts or just thinking, I was often aware that it was better just me and I was glad there was no one there.



It's a bit like in Satipatanna sutra, where it's as important to be aware of the absense of desire as when desire is present.



I spent so much time avoiding people who wanted to talk to me, perhaps I realisedthatt I prefer it that way. I spent my whole life worried I'd never find someone, and still worrying while I avoid everyone... and perhaps I should wake up to the fact that I don't like being with people and be happy with that.

Right, I'll write another time. Look at the booking pages; and get to Hanoi!




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And this extra bit
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Diary 14 July 2007 Nha Trang -- Typed from Notebook



Perhaps the awful, empty feeling was always there, but it's whatI was masking with booze? So now I don't drink anymore, but I'm not like other people. Other people create all sorts of distractions, work and family and arguments and possessions and passions and hobbies -- and I can't know anyone for whatever reason, probably my ultrasensitivity and having to avoid everything -- and there's just this stretching emptiness -- here and stretching off into the future that I don't know if I can live with.



[but now typing this days later, I'm happy.]