Day 13: May 5th - Standing Tickets

I now think standing tickets are awesome. The train ride was really fun, and we wouldn't have met nearly as many people if we were sitting. By standing, the foreigner effect was at full power, because everyone could see us. There wasn't a set of eyes in our car that weren't gawking at us at one time or another. It all started with a lady coming through selling shoe soles and socks. Trains in China are always full of people going up and down the aisle selling random shit. She saw us, and immediately tried to push these things on us. Chris was bored, so he started acting like he was interested, and because he loves to haggle, kept trying to get a better price. He offered 5, then 6, and she wouldn't budge, but she wouldn't leave either, because she had a sale lined up. Chris did it all so vocally, that most of the car was standing up and watching the transaction. We even had someone jump in and translate for us. When all was said and done (and pictures taken), Chris had gotten two packs for 10 yuan, which is funny, because it was equivalent to her selling them for the original offer of 5 yuan. She would've been better off selling them for 6. Oh well, it was a great laugh, and Chris actually wore them for the train ride. After all, we were standing.

I think it was mainly that act that really popularized us, since after that, many of them saw we were nice, and fun, so they tried chatting with us, even if they didn't speak English. We met a really nice guy from Beijing, who Jessica got a cell phone number from, so when we go to Beijing, we'll be able to coordinate with him. We also met someone from the Chinese Army, who spoke decent enough English, and there were a few other guys who didn't know any English, but were awesome anyway. People lent us seats when they felt like standing, or went for a smoke, and were so friendly and hospitable, it was incredible. This was a genuine experience I don't think I would've gotten in Canada. In Canada, if you get up to go to the bathroom, and come back to someone else in your seat, it's rude, and you'll probably kick them out. In China, it's a war to give the guy his own seat back. “No really, YOU sit down” until eventually no one sits in the seat at all, or someone else grabs the seat. The army guy also pulled a stool out from nowhere, so we actually get to sit down.

Once we arrived in Nanjing, we booted it to the ticket office, and Jessica managed to get us 4 standing tickets on the train to Wuxi. This one was a lot more mellow, since at this time, it was about 2 or 3 AM, and everyone was asleep. We eventually managed to squeeze into some seats, and fall asleep until we got to our station, and made a quiet re-entrance to Wuxi, finally getting home just before sunrise. It was unusual to see the streets so quiet, but what's interesting about China is that everyone seems to follow the same basic schedule, so after a certain time, there's almost no one on the streets at all.