My brother’s arrival in China was a well-anticipated one. I had planned out our trip already a few months ago and now was ready to greet him at the airport! After 17 hours of travelling, there was my big brother with his typical smile and eagerness to start exploring. We took the maglev that took us to the centre of Shanghai at a whopping 430 km/h. Getting off, Ken was confronted by China’s realness and contradictions: there she was, a beautiful Chinese fashionista puking in the trash can. Welcome to China big brother!

We got a bullet-train to Changsha, 2000 km west of Shanghai – an 8 hour train ride. We swapped our second class tickets to first class seats so my brother could at least enjoy a decent nap in a chair his size.

We then got two tickets to Fenghuang on the 9AM bus. As we were early, I introduced Ken to some classic Chinese breakfast: baozi – steamed bread with meat and/or veggies. Ken was very popular by the way. Everywhere we went, I could hear people shout ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’. ‘So tall he is’, ‘what a big laowai’! We were frequently greeted with big smiles, nihao’s and broken ‘hellows’. After almost half a year in China, I’ve gotten very used to this and even a bit annoyed but Ken enjoyed the attention and played with it. He learned some Chinese words so he could impress the Chinese even more.

Our bus trip took about 8 hours and as we were driving from the highway onto the sandy roads, I remember thinking; ‘hey, this is going cute smoothly’. And so, I jinxed our smoothly running bus ride. The woman in front started throwing up, the man in the back joined in as well. What is it with Chinese people and bus rides?

Fenghuang is very pretty. A river cuts the village in two pieces and on the riverbanks, the housed are supported by wooden beams. People run around in their traditional clothes (Miao and Tujia), men are building dams and in the background mountain tops and pagodas dot the scenery. I was pretty impressed by the ‘authenticity’ of it all, which in China is very hard to come by. But as we went further into the little town, we could see that capitalism even reached this faraway little village: bars, coffee shops, western food stalls and souvenirs in every colour and shape.

How traditional and authentic Fenghuang might seem on the outside and in daylight, by night the village turns into a laser&light spectacle. Disco music pounding through the bars, the ‘old houses’ were lit up in every colour of the neon rainbow and from one pagoda, way up high in the mountains, shone a flashy green laser light. Disneyland, China style.

The next day, we continued our journey to Zhangjiajie, about 250 km from Fenghuang. Here lies the Wulingyuan Nature reserve, known for its peaks and rock formations, green valleys, waterfalls and caves. These types of formations can only be found in Zhangjiajie and are what inspired the creators of ‘Avatar’. Despite the distance and high entry price, definitely worth the visit. We arrived in Zhangjiajie around 8PM and had some tasty street food: wontons, BBQ, noodles, rice and beer. What more do you need?

Up next: Zhangjiajie park!

Magali