Ten years ago (2013) the Preen Team paid a visit to China. I made notes.

China

(By an expert who has just returned from a two-week holiday)

• The food is disgusting – off the scale revolting. Made me want to stop eating. Worst since Bosnia.
• Not everyone hawks and spits but when they do it is with a vigour and volume that is both impressive and nauseating.
• Not everyone is boot faced, many are friendly and smiley.
• No one speaks English. (Not too much of an exaggeration)
• Our guide in Inner Mongolia learnt English by listening to the BBC World Service.
• Chairman Mao looks sallow and diminished tucked up in his mausoleum on Tiananmen Square.
• I looked out my hotel window in a small town and at a glance saw 17 cranes making buildings. They don’t build one tower block they build ten in a group and set up a brick factory at the heart of each to aid production.
• The pace of change is eye-watering and given the resulting pollution that is both metaphorically and literally true.
• The Great Wall and the Terracotta Warriors are two of the greatest sights to be seen on the planet – right up there with Angkor Wat, Petra, Iguazu Falls, 59th St Bridge into Manhattan, Carnival in Rio – take your pick.
• And the tobogganing off the Great Wall was spectacular – ask Scarlett. (We liked it so much we climbed back up and did it again)
• The Chinese don’t understand what Westerners want and why we behave in certain ways – they don’t care. They don’t need us.
• No one except the Chinese can stop the Chinese from becoming the most dominant nation on earth.

• China
• Travel