The Travels of Päivi and Santeri

Travelling around China by train is fast. You can cross the country in less than two days.

Our first Chinese hospitality exchange experience took us to Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province. It is not easy to find Chinese people among hosts and so we were very grateful to Lee and her roommate Barbara. They welcomed us wholeheartedly and took us to their family. Lee came to meet us at the train station when we arrived. That was actually the first time in one and a half years that somebody did so. Imagine how great it feels when you arrive tired from a 20-hour train trip and somebody is greeting you happily like an old, long awaited friend. These things we have really grown to appreciate when travelling a long time in countries where most of the time we don’t know anyone.

Nanjing has a surprisingly lively expat community considering that more internationally appealing Shanghai is just a few hours’ away. But Nanjing has a few advantages: living is cheaper and people are more patient with foreigners. The one and only reason why we stopped in Nanjing was doing hospitality exchange. People don’t usually come to the city that much for tourism as for a longer stay, for example to learn Chinese or to teach English. All of our hosts and other hospitality exchange people we met were teachers. That seems to be, actually, de facto for foreigners everywhere in China. Somehow expatriates are always polarised by the purpose of their stay. For example in Thailand it was sex tourism .

Global Nomads Päivi & Santeri celebrating their 3rd wedding anniversary on the road in China.

Travelling to Tibet by the new Qinghai-Tibet railway was awesome and easy. No notorious travel permits were needed. Tibet itself with its mountainous scenery and minority people reminded us of Bolivia, which we love, except that it was way more touristy. Still, at least the train trip was worthwhile.

Hohhot (Huhehaote in Chinese), is the capital of Inner Mongolia province located beyond the Great Wall in China. Many Chinese asked us why we were going there. According to them, there is nothing and the remote province is populated by "barbarians". Inner Mongolians call themselves Mongolians just like Outer Mongolians . Hohhot proved to be an interesting blend of modern China and Mongolian culture. You can feel the difference right away when you get out of the megalomaniac train station. Nearby streets are full of little eateries where people sit outside. In September the weather was already a bit chilly and people were keeping themselves warm by the fires, wearing jackets and wollen pullovers.

Ulaanbaatar’s city centre is Soviet-style. One part filled with dilapidated apartment buildings and the other with gers (or yurt, a kind of tent). After living seven months in a hotel in Cambodia and six months in Thailand , we thought it would be great to try something else for a while: hospitality exchange and Mongolia.

Travelling by bus from Cambodia to Vietnam and all the way through Vietnam from South to North.

Phnom Penh in Cambodia is a relatively hassle-free long-stay destination thanks to corruption especially for global nomads. We have had a pleasant chance to meet our friends in Cambodia this year. First Bill and Betty came over from the US on their six month tour around China and South-East Asia. Together we explored Phnom Penh and Angkor, and made a virtual tour to Angkor temples . Bill & Betty travel a lot spending around half a year abroad. We met in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where we both used to live. You can read about Bill’s and Betty’s travels at Bill’s blog . After the first of May came Helena who took care of Santeri when he was a baby. Helena is living in Kuala Lumpur where we celebrated last Christmas with her family. Helena used to live in China for some years, and according to her Phnom Penh is very much alike. She had been travelling in the neighbouring countries but this was her first visit to Cambodia.

This Enhanced Edition is a lonely planet parody that is better than the original. The printed book was for sale in Cambodia.