why i am not keen on another china trip




my first and only trip to china was made in 1997. we visited beijing and chengdu in winter. we went there adequately prepared for the cold, for the sub-zero temperatures. we had long johns, gloves, scarfs and warm clothings. we even had plastic bags.

what i was not prepared for were the cheats. we were at the ming tombs and there were these locals hawking fruit. everyone of them seemed to be selling the same stuff. actually the fruit(pears) did not appeal to me at all but the insistence of the hawkers melted my resistance against buying from them. that was a costly mistake. i did not have small change, so i paid for my purchase with a 100 yuan note. the fruit was priced at 10 yuan. because of my inability to read chinese characters, i did not realise, until too late, that my change was in taiwanese currency. i got back only a fraction of the 90 yuan due.

another push factor was my poor understanding of the chinese language. you did not know when you were taken for a ride and you lost that edge when it came to striking a bargain. you did not dare to take a taxi. you had difficulty settling for a price when you wanted to buy something from a roadside stall. the china hawkers could also be downright rude.

another thing that put me off was the standard of hygiene in china. they might have 5-star hotels but their civility and hygiene standard could be way off the mark. we stayed at the holiday inn in beijing and at breakfast, there was this young man preparing fried eggs in full view of all diners. as he was doing that, he spat on the ground and using his shoe tried to clean off the sputum.