Got the Herb, Doc?

One of my Chinese souvenirs bought in Pingyao, Shanxi province, is an urn-like red box decorated with Dr.agons and floral ornaments. You can imagine Marcin’s disapproving look when I communicated to him I was going to carry my urn all around Asia in my backpack. I know this is utterly illogical, but as long as

Cormorants Under the Blue Sky of Yunnan

The last Chinese province on our itinerary waiting to be explored after Hong Kong and Macau was Yunnan. There was a brief thought of my other half to skip it and head off to Vietnam, but that would be clearly a deadly sin we would never forgive ourselves. For some travellers, Yunnan with its 25

Letter to Mars, Incorporated

18 October 2011 Mars, Incorporated 6885 Elm Street McLean Virginia USA Dear Sirs, I am writing to kindly inform your company of an online promotional campaign of your M&M’s brand my husband and I have been running for the last three months.

Hong Kong and Macau: Two Independent Women, But Different Personalities

Lonely Planet guidebook compares Hong Kong to a sexy energetic woman who is exotic and unpredictable, but at the same time makes you feel at home and brings in the securities of the Western world. Following this way of comparison, Macau is a Mediterranean type, cherishing a more relaxed lifestyle with seafood, a glass of

The Hell of Adventure

‘If you fail to plan, you plan to fail’. A person using a toilet in one of the hostels in Chengdu inscribed this saying on a toilet wall. But there was also somebody else who dared to disagree. He, or rather She, I think, crossed out the second part of the sentence and wrote instead:

With the Flow of Li River and Tourism Industry

Li River with its outworldish karst landscape inspired generations of poets, painters and musicians. Cameroon’s Avatar wouldn’t be the same but for the limestone rock formations emerging straight from the river level like gigantic mushrooms. No wonder this region is one of top attractions in the itinerary of all organised tours around China. And this

Minorities in the Rice

They say it’s better to be in the minority. Afterall, the minority in the world has power, money and is educated. The mainstream is boring and predictable whereas subcultures or minority groups are colourful and vibrant. The minorities also get the publicity either good or bad, but certainly they are good for tourism. There is

Shaking Off the Red Dust

‘Travelling is hard work. Danger is not exciting, it’s just proof of your incompetence. Besides, the biggest danger anyone can face is a life behind the Iron Curtain.’ Ma Jian’s ‘Red Dust: A Path Through China’, an autobiographical novel published for the first time in the UK in 2001, is a Chinese version of Kerouac’s