a2b - Accor Beijing, mishap in Iran

I took a glance at the Accor Beijing website and noticed that the background colour has been changed. Instead of a deep blue it is now a more cheerful bright yellow which makes it easier to read.

There are only two more one-line entries on the Express Bank, for the 12th and the 13th May. On the 12th they cycled 91 kilometres in a desert area. The comment of the day is that the internet is becoming less reliable. On the 13th they cycled to Qom where they had theological discussions with unnamed teachers. They camped for the night “晚上找宿营地时被摩托车混混抢了国旗和帐篷杆，很郁闷” - “when he was robbed at the national flag and a tent, it is depressing. … …” [translation by Google-analytics] which I think means that someone stole something from one of the tents, or maybe stole the tent as well.

According to their original plan Iran should have been cleared in less than 3 weeks, they have been there since 29th April, more than 2 weeks ago, and are less than halfway across the country. Pakistan will take as long again and India probably much longer. Unless they have a few tricks up their sleeves for regaining some time and distance the idea of arriving in Beijing on the 8.8.08 is becoming unrealistic.

a2b – Accor Beijing, robbery in Turkey

A few more entries have appeared on the AB blog covering a few more days in Turkey. The first three entries, covering 7th, 8th and 9th April, don’t add much to what we already know [not a lot, I know, as placenames and distances are missed]; the one phrase that catches my eye is at the end of the entry for 7th, ‘Ya Li Xiaolong with Kanjia is so, must travel home’- but I haven’t a clue what it means. Suffice to say that they were very impressed by the beauty of Esme. If these entries were brief then the one following, covering 10th to the 23rd April, is very thin indeed, however we are then treated to two items by Li Xiaoya [or Marissa as she now calls herself], one for the 12th and one for the 23rd.

The following translations are the combined efforts of Google-analytics, a native Chinese speaker and a native English speaker. There is no written guarantee regarding accuracy -

“12^th April - 23 kilometers to the east of Erzincan city, sunny, a rainbow appeared on the snow-capped mountain
In order to arrive earlier,we were separated into two groups with 4 people in each, a few days ago. Our team rode for a while and then went by bus so as to catch up with the other. Yesterday, after meeting at Erzincan we decided to camp once we rode out of Erzincan to get a rest. Erzincan is a city surrounded by many snow-capped mountains. Even when you are in a street in the city centre you can see the mountain rise above your head.

Due to the light reflections from the snow I felt that the sunshine here was too dazzling. It was much more like the sunshine in summer than in spring. I daren’t remove my scarf because I was afraid even my mother wouldn’t recognise me after staying here for a couple of days, he-he.

Along the way from Erzincan the landscape was very beautiful. The rolling snow-capped mountains, the azure blue sky, green grass, and the shimmering water. Everything was quiet and peaceful and seemed isolated from the noise. A thing most wonderful was that there was a littlt rain on our way suddenly and then we saw a rainbow on the snowcapped mountain in front of us. After a while, the rainbow disappeared quietly. However, I still captured the moment of its disappearance because I was staring all the time and any of its little tricks could not escape from my eyes.

In the evening,when we finished camp, all the others were busy lighting a fire for cooking. I was writing my diary while watching at the sunset from the tent.

In the evening, the sun became a light yellow colour. Because of the thick clouds we were not be able to see the face of the sun for a lot of the time. Sometimes the sun ran away from the clouds and we could see the light very clearly. I thought there were fantastic colours in the angle formed by the horizon and the line of sight. I felt that I was at the end of the sea and sky. I seemed to be a vagrant.

The dinner was wonderful. Coprinus, noodles, eggs, and added some seasonings. With Chinese style music, it was so cool. Liu jia couldn’t help himself singing loudly.

What a day! After 3000 kilometres, finally we had the feeling that we were on the journey.

with regards

Marissa (this is my new English name)”

“23^rd April - 70km away from Erzurum,weather is sunny. Experienced robbery.

This is the second bad experience which has happened on our way. Every time Liu Jia, Yang Jianying and I have been involved. We have had bad luck.

The first time happened in Greece, near the border. That day we rode until it got dark and we hadn’t found any water along the way so we decided to fetch some water from the gas station by the roadeside. Liu Jia and Yang Jianying went together, but the guys in the station ran out with a gun and shouted at them viciously, “No camping! No water!”. Those two were calm at that moment as maybe they thought they would not be hurt because they were not malicious, but when Liu Jia told me about it I was almost scared to death.

Today was more depressing, since the two groups before us were ok. Only when we three passed, the robbery happened. At that moment, we were just on an uphill and were moving slowly. Liu Jia walked in front, followed by Yang Jianying and I was the last one. I saw there were two people on the roadside in the front and Liujia stopped when he passed them. At the begining, I thought that must have met some local people who were curious about us but after a while I felt there was something wrong. One of the locals stood in the way in front of Liu Jia. As a result I rode quickly in order to arrive there to see what was happening. When I rushed to the front and looked back,I saw that Liu Jia was still stopped there. If Yang Jianying and I went away then Liu Jia would be left there alone, so we decided to stop and sit on the saddle ready to leave at any time. At that moment we discovered that the man beside Liu held a stick and the other man held a dagger. I finally realised why Liu Jia hadn’t moved. Originally I thought that we three were enough to deal with the two teenage children and we did not need to take notice of their threats, but I didn’t know what to do once I saw the dagger. So I just stayed there quietly and thought if they came close to me, I would just ride away. I was really not afraid then,I just didn’t know what was the best way to solve the problem. They kept shouting ‘Money’ to us and Liu Jia. Yang Jianying just said ‘We are students. No money’. I was so stupid at that moment that I forgot to seek help from any passing trucks, or maybe there were no trucks passing, I can’t remember clearly. After a stalemate, Liu gave them some coins and they turned to Yang Jianying. Yang said nothing but gave them some coins also. When it was my turn at last, I just said ‘No money’, they didn’t say much and let us go.

After the incident we understood the situation more clearly. They were only some teenage children and they wouldn’t dare to do anything if we had ignored them, but we didn’t know that at the time. If that had been adult robbers and we had been hurt the journey couldn’t have been continued and the money [10,000 - 20,000 yuan] we had already spent would go to the wind. Just as Liu said, the worst situaition would have been like a TV film and we could have been robbed and hurt. Someone may say that what we did was weak, that we lost face and we condoned crime, but in our situation safety is the most important thing.

In addition I think the Turkish government should give more consideration to the education issue. We saw many places along the way which were just the same. A number of school-age children became gang members or would clean shoes for others. Along the way from Kasan, near Greece, to Erzurum, near Iran, every place was the same. Not only in the town but also the large city. Children are the future of a country. There is indeed no reason to not to provide the children opportunities to go to school. Especially when Turkey is unlike China to face a serious population problem. I just want to say that a child without entering the school really can’t do anything substantive but I also want to say the facts which I saw with my eyes. I know there are many such children in China also and there are many people who are doing something for them and I am sure there are much more people that are able to do something for them. Whatever the Chinese, the Turkish, the American, please help these children! Whether it is the individual, the country or the world, ignorance is really the biggest sorrow.”

These two entries give some insight into what is happening, a flavour of how things are progressing and throw some light on the possible meaning of other more terse entries. For example there have been several instances of bus and car rides mentioned but never any details about how far, or where from or to, or who has been hitching lifts, often there is no explanation at all. It would appear that some of the riders are faring better than others and the group now regularly divides into two, the stronger ones and those who are not so strong. I’m not sure how this benefits the tour as a whole, possibly allowing the stronger riders to detour and do some sight seeing while the slower group takes the shortest route, but this is just speculation. Inevitably they are still seeing the world and interpreting it with Chinese eyes and minds and are constantly at risk of being overwhelmed by sights and occurrences which would normally be outside their sphere of experience [much the same as anyone in a strange world would].

In addition to the blog entries there are a few more one-line entries on the Express Bank. The distances mentioned are not very long, 46 km. on 2008.5.8 and 35 km. on 2008.5.9 [they are now in Iran] which is a little worrying as they need to be clearing 100 kms per day to be in Beijing for 08.08.08. The most important messages are on the 10^th and 11^th when we learn that Mo Hanyi returns to Tehran by car/taxi[?] and brings back the Pakistan visas and Yang Jianying and Li Xiaoya will fly to Delhi - and rejoin the others for Nepal and beyond?

a2b – Crotos on the Golden Road To Samarkand

We travel not for trafficking alone:
By hotter winds our fiery hearts are fanned:
For lust of knowing what should not be known
We take the Golden Road to Samarkand.

This is a section of the tour I’ve been looking forward to. Not that I have any personal knowledge of the place or that I would particularly want to cycle there, but it is a region with an interesting history, a lot of romantic/fairy-tale associations and I wanted to see how easy it was for the riders to communicate via the internet in this tightly controlled country. In the middle ages it was the seat of one of the great empires of Central Asia, founded by تیمور/Timur the Lame/Tamburlaine/Tamerlane/Timurlane/Emir Timur or Amir Temur as Joachim Lent calls him. Whichever way you prefer to spell his name he was a fairly successful Emperor - ruthless and unimaginably cruel, but that’s emperors for you. His speciality was to build pyramids of skulls and after conquering the city of Ispahan, Iran, he built one of 70,000. His main ambition, to restore the empire of Ghengis Khan was never achieved. More recently the country was under the grip of the Soviet Union and since the dissolution of the USSR has been in the hands of another bunch of thugs and control freaks. For several years the USA and the UK maintained relations with the present dictatorship; the excuse for propping it up was that this relationship/alliance was part of the strategy of the War Against Terror - see the review of ‘Murder in Samarkand‘, or better still read the book. Since Uzbekistan changed its mind and decided that the new Russian Federation was a better horse to back, kicking out all USA military presence, the UK government has done an about-face and denounced the Uzbek government as a brutal dictatorship.

One of the more interesting observations Lent makes is about the reaction of the people to the tourers. They are pleased to meet so many from such a mixture of foreign places, and even more impressed when they learn they have cycled from Greece. The reaction on learning they are travelling to China is more muted. He doesn’t explain why but this may be more likely to be because of the relationship the Uzbeks have with the Uygurs [the people of Xinjiang] and the mutual distrust between the Uygurs and the Han Chinese than anything to do with events in March this year.

Click here for Joachim Lent’s blog and links to other related posts can be found on the Crotos - BatiCCycle page.

A step nearer . .

So the Olympic flame has arrived on the top of Mt. Everest/Qomolangma/ Zhūmùlǎngmǎ Fēng/珠穆朗玛峰/jo-mo glang-ma ri/Sagarmatha/सगरमाथा or whatever you want to call it - a mountain by any other name is just as steep.

Here is a page on QQ news, translated by Google-analytics, with a few more photos of the event.

No protests were reported.

a2b - Accor Beijing - change of mind?

There are no more entries on the AB blog so I’ve had another try at fitting together the one-line entries from their ‘Express Bank’.

On the 4th May they paid a visit to the Pakistan Embassy to deliver applications and did 44 kilometres of cycling. They don’t say what the applications are for or where the cycled to or from; we just have to guess. The following days entry is even more brief and in the space of 11 words manages to list mountaineering, camping, another 53 kilometres of cycling and mentions that tomorrow they will go to the seaside, and on the next day, as predicted, they cycle 112 kilometres and arrive at the seaside. One final sentence “Pakistan visa application has been approved” explains the earlier application and tells us their itinerary has changed again. Now instead of flying from Iran to India they will continue cycling as originally intended. Whether or not they will follow the original planned route, displayed at the head of their website, or do something else remains to be seen.

I can only guess where they are located but possibly they still have 8 or 9 thousand kilometres of cycling to cover in 3 months.

Links to related posts can be found on the Accor Beijing page.

The Storm of the Chinese Tea Stain In A Tea-cup

After I posted the item about the tea stain remover I did a search, using the slogan, to see if I could find who might have instigated this heinous campaign. The results were disappointing with only this site and QQ News returned with the full slogan, all other hits were irrelevant. Out of curiosity I repeated the exercise today and was presented with 117 hits, each containing the slogan. Here are a few of them

http://rnews.baidu.com/n?cmd=8&page=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.people.com.cn%2FGB%2F40606%2F7197050.html&pn=1&clk=rrel&cls=housenews&where=toppage
http://cache.tianya.cn/publicforum/content/sport/1/128149.shtml
http://fuxing.bbs.cctv.com/viewthread.php?tid=11778270
http://4979787.blog.hexun.com/18887151_d.html
http://jiansuo.cns.com.cn:6666/search.wct?channelid=5940
http://www.0086.ie/html/50/n-3750.html
http://bbs.tiexue.net/post_2762555_1.html
http://military.club.china.com/data/thread/1011/2007/93/96/6_1.html
http://duping.net/XHC/list.php?bbs=11
http://315.cctv.com/20080505/103467.shtml

The first on the list is Baidu, listing another 2 further pages of sites, I didn’t investigate these and assumed they will be duplicates of those already found. Most of the others are on Chinese websites and simply reproduce the QQ news item, but others add a few comments. Here are a few selected from the thread of a forum, arguing over the possible meaning of the ad and all of them completely missing the point. Bear in mind these are Google translations so the English is not very good.

Absolutely Yiyushuangguan mean. 现实生活中，china这个词常用么？ In real life, china used the word Mody » 如果一个装饰性的瓷器还说得过去，而喝茶的杯子谁管它叫china? 我听说过have a cup of tea，却没听说过have a china of tea. If a decorative porcelain also justifiable, and the tea cups Who Guanta Jiao china «I’ve heard about have a cup of tea, no one heard of have a china of tea. tea这个东西，本身就很容易联系到中国。 tea this thing in itself can easily link to China. 欧美人喝茶的比例毕竟是少数，如果做广告，更应该说，洗咖啡垢，可乐垢。 Europe and the United States, after all, the proportion of people drinking tea is one of the few, if advertising, should also be said that the scale washing coffee, cola scale. 偏偏选了一个茶垢，真是别有用心。 Unfortunately the election of a tea scale, is an ulterior motive.

再看排版，后面感觉就是Made in China。 Look at publishing, is the feeling behind the Made in China. 是在打击中国制造的东西有污圬。 In the fight against Chinese-made things have sewage masonry. 不知道这个广告是什么时候放上去的，如果是毒玩具毒狗粮那段时间反中国制造的高潮时期，那它100%有反华的意思在里面。 The ads do not know what the time-boost, if the drug is toxic Gouliang toys made in China at that time the anti-climax period, it is 100 percent anti-China mean inside. 更可恶的是，这里字母全都是大写，所以也没办法区别是不是一个专用名词。 More heinous is that here are all in capital letters, so it can not distinguish is not a special term.

The English do not quite understand people not to speak, Procter & Gamble this ad is a shame, for advertising, his advertisements have two customs justice, CHINA can refer to China, was criticized when sophistry can be said that the porcelain, but if they are That the porcelain, the use of cleaner bit too narrow, because the cleaning agents can not just wash porcelain, can also wash the glass. Shing and tea in general is in the cup, porcelain flush toilets is done, but by who heard that Flush toilet to drink tea,
所以正常情况下, 他的这个广告词应该说”除去任何杯中的茶垢”,而不是”除去瓷器中的茶垢”他难以自圆其说的.他这个广告直意是”中国茶可以造成污垢”, 暗讽中国的东西都是污垢. Therefore, under normal circumstances, his words should be said that this ad “cup of tea to remove any scale”, not “get rid of porcelain tea scale,” he difficult to justify. He This ad is intended straight, “Chinese tea can cause dirt” , An Feng of China things are dirt.

. . . . and so it goes on page after page

Another starts with the heading “Westerners also declared war on the Chinese people! ！ !“, the article is pasted below it, and ends “ Brothers, how do we fight again » ？ » ？ » ？ » ？ »”

If the students who reported this to QQ had not been so touchy . . if QQ had used a bit of common sense or employed a competent translator to check the ad out . . if the ‘news’ item had not been published . . . . probably no one would have batted an eyelid.

Am I right in thinking we have an expression which might sum this up, something about a lot of rain in a cup? Or creating a large mound of humous from the labours of a small black animal?

Ireland Joins The Anti-China Rage

On QQ news is an item of complaint about a bus stop advertisement, found in Ireland. The ad is for a detergent and the slogan makes use of the expression ‘all the tea in China’ – a common idiomatic expression meaning ‘much’ or ‘a lot’ - and reads, “Gets Out Stains Made By All The Teas In China”. I cannot read or make a reliable translation of the QQ item but, using the online Google translator, I gather that some Chinese students living in Tallaght, Ireland [Tallaght, for anyone who doesn’t know, is a suburb of Dublin], have seen the ads and have felt ‘very uncomfortable with them’. There is a hint in the translation that one student suspected that this incident is ‘another disgrace’.

Can I just make sure that I’ve got this right -

• The advertisement is racist as it singles out Chinese tea.
• This has some connection with violence in Tib@t.
• An Irish detergent company is joining in the international conspiracy to slight and slander China.
• The whole business is a joke disgrace.

Click here for the original page; the original wording and an unedited Google translation is below. -

中新网5月5日电 爱尔兰《新岛周报》近日收到一名热心华人投稿，这名华人在爱尔兰Tallagh和市中心多个公交车站发现一则广告，这是一则清洁剂广告，广告主体是一只绿 色的茶杯，在杯子上印着Gets out stains made by all the teas in China(从中国出产的茶都能挑出毛病)。对于该语句的翻译也许有多个版本，但是许多留学生和华侨看到这行字时都非常不舒服，甚至有学生怀疑这是又一起 辱华事件。

由于3月底4月初以来，中国西藏打砸抢烧暴力事件和西方媒体不实报道使得全球华人一致发出抗议的声音，也让许多华人对各类与中国有关的东西都十分敏感，一些华人同胞在看到该广告牌后都觉得“不舒服”。

May 5, Ireland, “the new Island Weekly” recently received an enthusiastic Chinese Contributor, this Chinese city centre in Ireland Tallagh several bus stops and found an ad, this is a cleansing agent advertising, advertising Green is one of the main cup in the cup on Yinzhao Gets out stains made by all the teas in China (from the tea produced in China are singled out problems). For the translation of the statement may have multiple versions, but many students and overseas Chinese saw the lines are very uncomfortable when, or even a student is suspected that this incident, another disgrace.

Since the end of March early April, China’s Tibet burning of violence and vandalism Western media reports is not the same issue of Chinese people around the world make the voice of protest, many Chinese with the Chinese on all kinds of things are very sensitive, a number of Chinese compatriots on the After seeing the advertisements that are “uncomfortable.”

a2b - Crotos - Bukhara

One day’s worth of travelling into Uzbekistan and, although Lent may not be a 100% happy bunny [he still has a sore stomach], his mood lifts noticeably. The border crossing takes only 2 hours, whereas the previous one took all night. Even the temperature has dropped to a mear 33 degrees C.

“In Bukhara, archeology has revealed the mutual influences of eastern (Chinese) and western (Greek) influences in the local crafts (pottery) and of course the trading goods passing through this oasis since the second millennium BC. In a cultural sense at least, we are now half way between Greece and China.”

More to come in a few days time.

Links to related posts can be found on the Crotos BaltiCCycle page.

a2b – Crotos in Turkmenistan, Part 2

If the first days in Turkmenistan were hot the later days, shown by the temperatures recorded on JL’s blog and his comments, were even hotter. Mountainous, hilly or even bumpy terrain is a thing of the past, at least for now. Instead the riders are faced with heat, sand and thirst. To combat the problems the tour sets off as early in the morning as possible, covers as much distance as possible and at midday finds a suitable teahouse where they can eat, drink and rest during the worst of the day. On reaching Mary, the modern replacement for Merw, they join actual route of the old Silk Road at last.

On the 29^th April he heads off route to visit the ruins of Merw. There he find an extensive area of ruins explored on a 10km guided cycle tour.

Pressing on from Merw the next obstacle was a 180 km. stretch of desert. This took two days to cross and involved a lot of guesswork, many water bottles [and good luck] moving from one supply point to another.

One phenomenon of Turkmenistan is the exchange rate; for US$50 you become a millionaire and have more notes to carry than will fit into a wallet. The answer is to stuff the saddlebag or pannier with them.

Lent’s main problem and complaint is the food, which is not prepared particularly well and usually in very unhygienic conditions and on the last day manages to give himself a stomach ache so he has no regrets when reaching the border.

When getting to the Uzbek border after Turkmenabat, it is saying good bye to a weird country, plastered with gilded statues of nation-builder president [i]Niyazov, his Ruhnama quotations on all roadsides (of course I couldn’t read them but their display did nothing to raise my interest in the Turkmen language) oversized images of his successor, backward technology, rapidly devaluating already nearly worthless money coming in huge bundles and hopefully to excessive heat and poor food… “

Links to related posts can be found on the Crotos BaltiCCycle page.

a2b - Accor Beijing in Turkey and Iran

Nothing has been written on the AB blog since mid-April. The only communications have been brief one-liner messages published on the Accor Beijing Express Bank - 雅京行快报 – possibly these brief messages are uploaded from a mobile phone. However, rather than wait for the next blog publications I decided to have a go at piecing together their journey from these missifs.

On the 20th April the group arrived at Ergincan and found themselves amongst snow-capped mountains. The following day they travel another 100 km and, at the end of the day, share camp with two German drivers. The 23rd was a slightly easier day with only 63 km covered, arriving in Erzurum, where they stayed for one day. After 101 km on the 25th they arrived in a small villages where they were met by some school teachers who invited them for dinner,. Hospitality was extended the next day to an invitation to join a game of football - score 3-3. The following day is a little longer than they expected but they eventually arrive on the Turkey-Iran border, under police escort.

The following days are glossed over and the only coherent message I could find was -

Car to Tehran yesterday morning and afternoon paid a courtesy call on the Chinese embassy, consular office warm reception given to the Palestinian Embassy and the note. 计划周六离开。 Plans to leave Saturday.

So it would appear they have arrived in Tehran and, by now, departed for India. But what the note for the Palestinian Embassy could be is anyone’s guess. Could it be a mistake by the Google translator?