April 28 “It’s not where you are, it’s who you’re with”

Day 83

After yesterday’s hysterics, we sat at the breakfast table to discuss our plans for the day: The Yellow River Scenic Area in Zhengzhou in the day and then return to Kaifeng that evening since Zhengzhou has no youth hostels. 

Our hysterics last night foreshadowed the misfortunes that happened to us today. It all started with the bus ride there.

Waiting at the terminal for our bus to Zhengzhou 

10:30 A.M.
A station worker was kind enough to help us get tickets. Sh even lead us through the confusing bus terminal to the waiting area. She told us to wait at bus stop next to ours and that is how we missed the first bus.  When we noticed the bus was 15 minutes late, we knew something was wrong. After we investigated the area and interrogated people, we decided to exchange our tickets. We got the 12:00 instead of our original 11:00. Time lost: 1 hour.

1:30 P.M.

Once we arrived to Zhengzhou, we successfully got our ticket back to Kaifeng for 6:00 that evening.  We quickly got a packed lunch from KFC (again…) to eat on the long ride to the Yellow River Scenic Area. 

so good! TO take note.

KFC shrimp burger = 16.5 RMB

3:45 P.M.

After we found the damn bus stop and took the 60 minute bus to the Yellow Scenic Area, we unfortunately had one precious hour to explore the area before having to turn back.

The road from the bus station to the Yellow River

The Yellow River

Lots of fancy rocks.

If I had more time,  I would have loved to:

 climb that hill to reach the pagoda,

go down that giant slide,

 walked on the suspended bridge,

and ride the cable car. 

Oh well, maybe in another visit.

5:00 P.M.

Tanjin ugly crying

We boarded the bus that would take us back to the station by 6:oo to get the bus back to Kaifeng.  The estimated time of travel was useless as we missed the bus home. This was when things started to break me.

6:15 P.M. 

We stood in the chaotic/anxiety provoking Chinese line ups to see if we could get a refund for our tickets. We decided we would get a train home instead as trains are supposedly more frequent than buses. As we reached the counter, the lady scribbled something in Chinese on our bus tickets and redirected us to another booth to get a refund. A little confused with what was going on, a nicely dressed man offered to help us. I was torn between “let’s do this on our own” vs. “someone help us”.  After a bit of hesitation, we let the man help us by taking us to the other damn booth. I was feeling really paranoid so I wanted to do everything myself to make sure no one was scamming us/things got done right. I told the man that I wanted to practice my Chinese, in which he encouraged me. He helped translate the lady’s further instructions and so we went back in line to get a refund. So far so good. We lined up in a shorter line only to find out we had to line up in the huge ass “refund/exchange line.” The man said we could go to the front so we tried to but noticed Chinese people yelling (like that’s not usual). We kept our Canadian principles (we’re polite people) and decided to ditch, besides 18 RMB isn't much anyway. We thanked the man and ran off towards the train station.

Help is offered by two types of people: creepers and non-creepers.

 Yesterday, the lady who followed us was a creeper. Today, that man who helped was not a creeper. 

I guess it’s a vibe you get from the people… Also, creepers follow you while non-creepers leave you in peace.

7:00 P.M.

We found the train station and saw there was a huge ass line to buy tickets. We asked a lady in line if this was the right line just to confirm and she said yes, surprisingly in English too. She told us there was another place to get tickets.

Travel tip: Chinese people who travel in groups usually split up and stand in different line ups and the person who reaches the front first hollas at their peeps. They save time that way. Good advice indeed. 

Tanjin and Kristie’s line was shorter/moved faster and they called bearing unfortunate news. Apparently, the train tickets were sold out. *SIGH* The lady who gave us advice used her phone to check the train schedule after she heard about our situation. Although the schedule didn’t matter at this point anymore, it was still really nice of her to offer. So many helpful people. We met up with the other girls to find out we would be spending the night in Zhengzhou. On the up side, we had tickets back to Kaifng the next morning at 7:20. The best part: we don’t need train tickets anymore.

8:00 P.M.

Goal for the rest of the evening: have fun and don’t miss that f’n bus the next morning!

On the verge on breaking into hysterics, tears, and laughter, I became overly “unangel” like as the girls described me. We made rules for the night:

-     No talking to strangers (I broke that pretty fast as you’ll see in the next rule)

-     If someone stares at you for 10 seconds or just noticeably staring, we say hello

-     No crying

The beginning of our all nighter adventure in Zhengzhou started with a trip to the bakery called Fagiyo.

enjoying their bread

Croissants – 8 RMB

          Special drink of the day – 2 RMB

TanG got her watermelon

Dudes getting fake tattoos on the street. Only in China..

9:00 P.M.

As we were wandering the streets looking for a place to kill time, we found a night market.What a better way to forget our worries than shopping therapy. We found a store whre most of the items were 2 RMB. I ended up buying tacky jewels to decorate my phone case with later in the night.  Clothes wise… This place was like an outdoor version of the zoo market. It was harder to bargain here, but it didn’t matter all that much since things were already so cheap.

I finally got my bunny shirt

Asking price -29 RMB 
Selling price = 25 RMB

I liked the message on the shirt and the way want is spelled “wanr”. Beijingers add uncessary “r” sounds at the end of many of their words.

Asking price - 19

Selling price -15

A dress. I bought so many dresses from zoo markt but haven’t worn a single one… ugh, bad habit.

Asking price - 29

Selling price - 20

Stockings – to wear with the dresses/hide my bruises

2 for 15 RMB

11:00 P.M. (ya, we spent a good 2 hours shopping)

Catherine got hungry so we found a Chinese restaurant where she got noodles and w got to chill and play school girl games(mash, never had I ever, truth or dare) to keep us awake and entertained.