Hell on Tracks

So... we survived the night train from Beijing to Xi'an... barely. Wow, what an experience that was!

We got the cheapest seats ... hard seats they call them. This involved kind of booths of 6 people - 3 on each side facing each other. We were lucky enough to be seated opposite a charming couple... we dubbed the husband BBB King (birthmark, burps and balls King) and his lovely wife, who we like to call Bertha, who constantly felt the need to jam a finger up her nose and roll her snot in her fingers... that's when she wasn't spitting sunflower seed shells all over our feet. By the way, when we say booth, please don't think we're talking about anything that would provide some kind of privacy or sound-proofing... we just mean rows of seats, 3 on each side of the train, facing each other. This seating arrangement is what allowed us to get to know BBB King so intimately - had we been facing the other way, we wouldn't have been able to stare at the birth mark on his face or see the delightful camel-toe his synthetic, checked, high-waisted pants were giving him... although facing the other direction wouldn't have prevented us from hearing him burp up a storm at 10 minute intervals, so maybe it wouldn't have been all bad.

We were the only foreigners on the train and as a consequence we got stared at A LOT. The guy sitting next to Bertha and BBB King spent at least 9 of the 10 hour train ride staring at us... we call him Starey McStare. He wasn't creepy, just curious, we think.

We had fun stepping over people sleeping in the aisles while walking to and from the shit-covered hole in the ground they call a toilet, and we particularly liked it when we couldn't wash our hands after touching the piss-covered toilet door handle because there was a man sleeping in the sink. Fact. (Thank god for sanitizer gel). We also enjoyed it when the people in the booth next to us set up their cell phones to play crackly Chinese music at full volume until about 4am. Who cares though really, it's not like we had a cusion under our asses or a head rest of any sorts that would allow for some kind of comfort that may permit sleep.

In addition to all these highlights, we also had the luxury of being able to oogle at the fat elderly gent in the booth next to us who spent 50% of the train ride shirtless... lucky us. Another fun bit was the stinky food cart that smashed into our knees every hour or so... really, it was 10 hours of joy. Tell you what, next time we book a train, we're not skimping on the $20 extra it costs for a cheap sleeper.

Experience had, lesson learnt.

Never again.