What were you doing on 20 Aug 2008?

Actually at 8 minutes past 8pm on that day?

Why that time you may be asking. It will reveal itself.

Since investing more time in Asia and in particular in China I have become even more aware of the importance of numbers to cultures.

To Cantonese speakers the number 4 sounds similar to the word for death or to die. So that is not so lucky as other numbers such as 8 which is I understand the number for good luck.

I have had it explained to me that the year 2008 is very lucky. Why because it has two eights in it. Yes the one at the end and the one in the middle lying on its side (00).

So if 2008 is double lucky then what about the 20th of August 2008? That can be written as 20 08 2008 - yeah that would be double double lucky. If you were to have that much luck you would probably be happy.

So on the 20/08/2008 I took particular notice of where I was at 8 minutes past 8 in the evening. You got why now?

20:08 on 20/08/2008

And guess where I was?

Outside a restaurant in Soho called Double Happiness Cafe!

We were hungry and looking for a place to eat.

It seemed like the place to go though it was full.

I wonder if everyone in there knew where they were at that time?

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog20 - Back to Hong Kong

Day 14 – Jinan – Hong Kong - 2 July 08

Had our last Chinese buffet breakfast and set off for the 40 minute ride to the airport in the hotel car. Jinan airport is a new looking large steel and glass structure. I did really like this sign on the doors into the airport.

I wonder what the inbound flights do?

The check in and boarding procedures went without a hitch, as did take off and the rest of the flight…unlike our inward journey.

We had a good view of the urban sprawl as we were coming in to land at Shenzhen.

Were going to catch the airport bus to Lo Wu and then catch the train back to Central but spied a coach service so decided to take that all the way to Kowloon Station, which is just a one stop on the MTR to Hong Kong Station, which is in turn very close to the ferry terminal. It was a stunningly clear day. Possibly the clearest we have seen since we moved to Hong Kong. The views from the ferry back to the city and to outlying islands were amazing.

In Mui Wo we jumped on our bikes and trundled up the valley to our little home on the mountainside. We had missed a lot of rain and a typhoon so had to undertake a bit of a clean up operation. Sweeping the twigs and leaves that had blown from the trees surrounding the house and washing or airing out clothing and leather jackets where the mould process had taken hold…this being a constant hazard during the wet and humid summer months of Hong Kong. And so, it was back to reality.

Stay tuned for the next enthralling tale of Louise and Merrin’s Asian adventures…

By the way here is our travel note that we used to expalin what we were up to...

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog19 - Qufu to Jinan

Day 13 – Qufu - Jinan - 1 July 08 (0km walk, 150km by bus)

Today it was time to say goodbye to our China walking guides…Paul “Earthwalker”, who has walked an amazing number of kilometres around the planet spreading the environmental message, Yuji, “Earthman” with a mission to continue Paul’s legacy and Konomi, the unsung heroine of the “Greening the Olympics” walk from Hong Kong to Beijing. At the start of the journey in September 2007 Konomi took it upon herself to learn to write Putonghua to communicate to the local Chinese along the way. She has done a superb job communicating in writing and now with an ever increasing amount of verbal communication. She is the quiet strength behind her man who remains unfazed when faced with challenges in the daily planning routine that is a large part of the journey. Our thanks go to all three companions and especially to Konomi for her strength of character and caring nature.

We taxied to the bus station and found out that the busses ran approx every half hour (unlike the trains which run once a day in spite of being told the day before that they run every half an hour). We had just missed the express so rather than wait 40mins we decided to catch the slower bus. All of about 1min into our journey the bus stopped for its first new passengers!!! The bus driver proceeded to get off the bus and sit at a table outside a local restaurant. The “new” passengers turned out to be the bus drivers 2IC and “conductor”. After about 5mins they all piled back on to the bus with plastic bags of food which Mr 2IC and Mr Conductor proceeded to share. At the next stop Mr 2IC and bus driver swapped so that Mr Bus Driver could eat his food.

Mr Bus Driver duly got back into the drivers seat and set off down the highway. We were fortunate that he was not a hooting tooting type…however his main vice was hoiking out the window. We were sitting right behind him in the front row so our view was often marred by the residue spit slowly drying in streams on the window. We were also horrified when at the end of the lunch session the driver proceeded to biff the plastic bag of lunch rubbish out the window in the middle of the highway. It is no wonder that as we walked through the countryside the piles of rubbish seemed ever increasing.

We eventually arrived in the middle of Jinan city at a large intercity bus station. It was easy enough to find someone at the bus station who spoke some English to help us understand how to get to where we wanted to go in the city. Two lovely ladies were very helpful in directing us to a taxi and informing the taxi driver where we wanted to go. Having bought a city map we were able to track the journey (in spite of the map only being in Chinese).

The taxi driver delivered us to the Crown Plaza…which was supposed to be next door to the hotel we were aiming for, however that hotel no longer existed. The Crown Plaza reception team were very keen to check us in but sadly our budget did not extend to their establishment on this occasion. The staff were however extremely helpful in recommending three alternatives within walking distance and we ended up staying at the first one on the list.

We set off on foot to explore the city and adjacent parks. Wandered through a street market just as they were setting up for the evenings trade and through the piazza where families were out enjoying kite flying in the early evening. At the edge of another park we stumbled upon a lady and man in their white coats doing outdoor massage for people heading home from work. We both enjoyed half hour neck/back massages for the princely sum of 10Yuan each…about NZD$4!!

After our massage we wandered off to find food and stumbled across a local outdoor food market alongside a small canal. First we discovered some wonderful garlic and vege dumplings thrown on a cast iron plate then transferred into a coal oven and baked. They were delicious and tasted like a cross between naan and chapattis.

We decided to order some vege food from one of the restaurants and found an empty table to eat at. There were three guys sitting eating and drinking copious quantities of beer at the next table. They invited us to join them so we moved on across and had a hilarious time eating, drinking and trying to communicate, us with no Putonghua and them with no English. We eventually managed to escape but not before they had refilled the half pint beer glasses, in Merrin’s case too many times and insisted on paying for our meal. We really do love to have these up close and personal experiences when we travel.

They are great moments to savour!

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog18 - Home of Confucius

Day 12 – Qufu; Home of Confucius - 30 June 08 (2km walk)

We all had a lazy morning trying to catch up on some sleep and to rest our weary bones. We went off to reception to try and get them to organise our flights out of Jinan. Yuji was phoned to come and interpret then we also managed to collar a person who was actually a Japanese guest who happened to speak fluent Putonghua. With his help we organised our e-tickets and decided we would catch the train to Jinan the next afternoon and stay one night there before flying out at lunch time the following day.



At 3pm we all set off on the final leg of our walk, through the old town to Confucius tomb…total distance 2km. It was great to have a leisurely wander through this ancient town. There are many modern shops but these are housed inside the old buildings so it really gave us a view of old China.



Outside the walls of the old town we walked the gauntlet of the souvenir sellers set up on both sides of the road to the cemetery. The cemetery is also walled off and is set in a forest that boasts some 20,000 trees – Cypresses, Chinese Junipers, Elms, Chinese Scholar Trees, etc. -- and occupies some 200 hectares of land. We had deliberately left our visit to late afternoon as we wanted to avoid the large tour groups of locals being lead around by megaphone wielding tour guides.



We made it to the tomb just before one such group and waited out their loud commentaries to then have some quiet time beside the large mound that is Confucius grave. Then we wandered through the forest which is dotted with tall concrete grave stones as this is the cemetery for all of Kong family, with over 100,000 Confucius descendants buried there. It really was a peaceful wander as most of the locals are driven around the roads in the cemetery park on electric cars and would not think of walking around the tracks between the graves. Did you know that the name for Confucius in Chinese is Kong Fu Zi? When we said Confucius to most Chinese they did not know who we meant though they certainly knew the name Kong Fu Zi.



We left the cemetery and had a superb dinner at a Korean restaurant. This was a welcome change from the Chinese food that we have been eating in local restaurants over the past 12 days. We have been sticking to a mainly vegetarian diet as the meat options look a little dodgy to say the least. Most restaurants have a selection of vegetables on display that we can go and choose from. Depending on the restaurant you either get exactly what you see i.e. sliced cucumber with no condiments or veges served with various condiments such as vinegar and copious amounts of garlic added. Our staple while travelling has been cucumber vinegar and garlic, small beans that you chew off the pods, and other bean sprout type dishes. These are served cold and are then accompanied with a variety of veges cooked in copious amounts of low grade oil.



After dinner we parted ways with Paul, Konomi and Yuji and went off to a performance in an outdoor stadium entitled “Confucius Dream”. This is a nightly performance in a purpose built out door theatre. The large cast perform a dance and acrobatic routine telling a story of how Confucius’ vision was of a world where all peoples live in harmony. It is a very visual performance with fantastic costumes set off by a great light show. We enjoyed it as did the other 100 or so attendees in the 1000+ seat auditorium.

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog17 - Road Walking

Day 10 – Road Walking to Zoucheng - 28 June 08 (24km walk)

The day dawned bright and clear. We started it with a great breakfast in the hotel. Packed our bags and had an uneventful taxi ride to the hotel in the next town of Zoucheng. The taxi drove along the road we would be walking. It seemed a long way! Arrived at a standard government hotel on a hill to the north of town, settled in to rest for an hour or so and then taxied back to the end point of yesterdays walk.

It was a long walk!!!


Road walking is not pleasant in any country but in China it can be a very noisy experience. Not only were the cars honking at each other but they of course wanted us to acknowledge them too, so would honk at us. There were some great sites though.


The walk became like a forced march with the pace set at 6km per hour with only two breaks of approx 10 minutes. We walked from 4.10pm to 8.40pm and straight into a restaurant for dinner. On our way into the town of Zoucheng (population about 190,000) near the river there were 100’s of people eating and at an open market. Great to see.

After dinner our only thoughts were to hail a taxi back to the hotel, jump in the shower (where we were careful not to burn ourselves in the “bathe of scald” as per the translated warning sign) and hop straight to bed to rest our weary bones.

Day 11 – Road Walking Zoucheng to Qufu- 29 June 08 (22km walk)

Paul and Konomi got up early to travel to Qufu to try and sort out a hotel. We stayed behind with Yuji to follow on once the technical details had been sorted. Arrived in Qufu at about 11am and settled into an okay hotel called “My Hotel”. Qufu is the home of Confucius so is quite a touristy town (population about 85,000). Our hotel was in a quiet area in the southern part of the city. Spent the morning resting up for this our last day of walking….which was going to be another long one.

The cloud cover of the morning had burnt off by the time we set off promising a long hot walk. After an uneventful taxi ride we arrived at the walking start point at exactly the same start time as the day before of 4.10pm. Thankfully the pace was not as much of a gallop as yesterdays.

The scenery was much the same as the day before. We were fortunate that one half of the road was closed to traffic for repairs for most of the journey, so we did not have to walk on the road edge thus creating even more horn honking from the traffic.


After 1.5 hours we had our first and only decent break. Stopped at a roadside stall for ice blocks and cold water; a quick method of cooling the body down.


Soon it was up and at it again. Paul picked up the pace and on we trudged. After 10 straight days of walking the effects on the body were definitely taking their toll, with sore hip and ankle joints for Louise and painful feet for Merrin. On the positive side a couple of kilos of lard from the hips and thighs has melted away with all this good fat burning exercise in the 29+deg temps.

We crossed the bridge to enter the city of Qufu and had a pleasant kilometre walk through a park and into a restaurant across the road from the hotel for dinner. After the dinner break we all had enough energy to walk an additional kilometre into the old walled part of the town.

Every day we seem to have at least one story of locals trying to earn more money than they should from us. Today’s story is around a Rikshaw ride that we decided to take from the walled city back to the hotel. Rather than squashing into a taxi yet again for 10Yuan, we decided to take a ride in three separate Rikshaws, each costing 5Yuan….or so we thought.


On arrival at the hotel the drivers changed their story and said it was 5Yuan each person! Needless to say a heated discussion ensued with all of us walking off having only paid 5Yuan per vehicle. Funnily enough the drivers did not seem too perturbed about the final payment!!!

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog16 - Plant a Tree in China

Day 9 – Plant a Tree in China - 27 June 08 (19km walk)

This morning our friend Andrew, the HanYuan Hotel Assistant Manager had organised local TV coverage and a tree planting in the hotel grounds. This was great publicity for Paul’s Greening the Olympics walk and for the hotel, which is very new. The interview took place in the hotel gardens. We all took part in planting a Gingko tree (which Andrew, who at very short notice had to find a tree, had donated from his own garden) and were all filmed doing so.

Then the hotel wanted some pictures of us taken at the front of the hotel so we all lined up with the hotel owner and all the department heads – chefs, bell boys, reception staff and housekeeping etc to smile for the camera in front of the hotel. It was great…everyone was happy.

Also check out Paul Coleman’s blog about the tree planting on 27 June at http://blog.myspace.com/earthwalker_paul_coleman

Said our goodbyes to Andrew (who has become a good friend) and headed to the next town to check into a new hotel before beginning today’s walk. Had organised two taxis so travelled in a bit more comfort! The traffic jam at the start of the bridges was even worse than the day before. On our side we were five vehicles wide taking up the whole width of the road all facing the on coming traffic leaving no space for it to pass. The Chinese solution to this problem is to turn off the car and sit and wait. As soon as someone moves all the engines burst into life again and everyone vies to move into any available gap and so the problem continues. There is absolutely no logic and certainly no-one wants to be the mug who gives way. He would probably still be waiting to get back into the traffic flow the next day as no-one would let him in! Finally as we made it on to the bridge the police were turning up to try to sort out the mess. During this time I had got talking to the local powerline boys. They invited me into their van, which had great air-conditioning. The others were amazed to see me wave at them from inside another vehicle. Rode across the canal bridges with them until they stopped to pick up their fellow workers who got a shock when I jumped out of the van.


We finally arrived at our new hotel for one night which was an older government hotel on the outskirts of Tengxian. After checking out the room price on the internet and having it confirmed by reception the price suddenly went up when we went to look at the rooms. The price we are paying is not much less than the HanYuan however this hotel is very tired and quite grubby really. Having said that the service is very good and the meal we had at the end of the day was also very good.

Today’s transport options worked very smoothly and did not create any more adventure for the day. Hailed a cab and showed him a picture of where we wanted to go and were delivered directly there. At the end of the walk a taxi driver pulled up behind us and delivered us straight back to the hotel. It was all too simple!!

The walk was long and hot. We are walking due north and apart from a slight deviation to the west to cross a bridge were able to follow roads alongside the fields (only sometimes having to walk through the fields) in a direct north/south line. We have walked out of the coal mining area so did not feel as grimy as yesterday. We passed many farming communities and the few times we stopped were able to converse with the locals. As always we draw a crowd. We passed mothers with toddlers in their bottomless daks (no need for nappies in the countryside), old ladies passing the time of day sitting on the street outside their homes and many, many people working in the fields.


Finally reached the journey end for the day – the junction with the main road, which we will be walking along for the last two days of the walking part of our intrepid Chinese adventure!

Grow well
Dr Merrin

EcoLog15 - Corn and Coal

Day 8 – Corn ‘n Coal - 26 June 08 (18km walk)

The driver that we had organised to pick us up the evening before did not turn up so we phoned our friendly taxi driver and he was there in a shot. Off we set on a longish journey complicated by a traffic jam at the bridge where drivers try to sneak through the wrong side of the bollards and everyone ends up sitting facing one another! Made it to our destination and off we walked…..and walked and walked. Through the communes down back lanes past and through fields of corn/maize. Every bit of the land is being used. The corn fields are edged by different crops sown right up to the road edges.

The land is very flat so as we walked along we could see either coal fired power stations or the coal mines to feed them. We walked closely past a coal mine through the village next to it. All the trucks transporting the coal are piled high with the low quality coal dug from under the village and corn fields. It has a sludgy look and is patted down on the trucks so that it does not fall off as they are bouncing along the roads.


All the fields had been double cropped. Before the corn wheat or barley was the main crop. Along the village lanes we came across farmers drying the wheat on the road. They lay the stems out on the road and force vehicles to drive over it to break it down eventually to just the grain. Old men and women sweep it into piles to grade as it is broken down by the traffic. Finally shovelling the grain into the air to get rid of the last of the husks and pouring it into bags.


As always getting back to the hotel was more of an adventure than the walking. Today after negotiations fell through with someone with a van we jumped on a bus to the nearest city. Here we were shown by the (friendly) lady conductor the bus going to Peixian and told it left at 6:40. There was one slight hitch…the bus did not leave until the next morning. Probably just as well because if there had been a bus it would have complicated things as we had left our Peixian taxi driver waiting for us at the start point of the days walk! We then found a local taxi to take us back to the start point. This guy was an absolute maniac. He spent most of the journey either on or over the yellow centre line leaning on his horn passing all and sundry at great speed. There appear to be very different road rules in China. It is every man for himself! Everyone wants to get there first and no-one will give in or give way. We made it back to our Peixian cabbie in one piece and set off on the final leg of the journey to the hotel.


Headed into a local restaurant opposite the hotel for a meal. Once again the best way to determine what you wanted to eat was to head into the kitchen.

Had a chance to catch up with Andrew that evening and he was very keen to hear our suggestions for improving the service at the hotel. Nice to be asked. He also told us that the local TV station was keen to interview Paul. We suggested that the hotel try and do a tree planting. So Andrew put his creative talents to work and also got the approval of the Hotel’s General Manager. What would happen tomorrow we thought as we began another wonderful night of rest.

Grow well
Dr Merrin