The alarm was set for 7 a.m., and I had also booked a wake-up-call from the reception just to be sure. It was time to go home, I could hardly believe that I was supposed to be at work the next morning. Not that I had needed waking, due to travel nerves I hadn’t slept much that night. I took the airport bus, it was very convenient since there was a bus stop just around the corner in Nathan Road. It took about half an hour and cost 33 HKD. The airport seemed easy to get around in, as well as effective. My plane left at 1115. You had to take a train to get to your gate. And then I was on the plane, and my vacation was over. The trip to Amsterdam was supposed to take 12 hours and 10 minutes, but on this day it went about an hour faster. Thank god for small mercies. Then waiting at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam, and another 1 ½ hours to Oslo. The plane landed at 9 p.m. local time (there is a 6 or 7 hour time difference). To my surprise my parents picked me up at the airport and drove me home, which was really nice. On the way I had to stop by my friend Mari’s house to get my house keys, and then straight home to bed. Phew!

On the long journey back home I had plenty of time to think, and try and sum up my experiences from the eventful three weeks I had just had. This is what I came up with:

My favourite sights/moments:

• Bicycle trip in the beautiful limestone landscape around Yangshuo
• Boat trip on Shennong Stream 
• The view from Moon Hill
• The Muslim Quarter in Xi’an
• Riding the double decker-bus to Victoria Peak in Hong Kong
• Visiting the pandas
• Chinese food in general, Sichuan food in particular
• The old men with their birds 
• The old pilgrims in their mao-suits on Emeishan mountain

Negative aspects:

• The pollution
• Modern Chinese architecture
• The garbage
• Communal toilets
• Hate instant noodles for ever and ever 

Well done:

• Met one cockroach and survived (that would be me, not the cockroach) 
• Have become the master of the squat toilet. I have (more or less) successfully mastered a variety of terrible squat toilets (even the moving ones on the trains), and further developed my ”not-breeding-through-the-nose-tactics”
• I have let my travel companions see me at my worst – dirty, smelly, scruffy, with little or no makeup and an unbecoming ponytail– and charitably let them live to tell the tale
• Managed to carry my backpack not only when arriving in China, but also when leaving China (good job considering all the shopping I have done)

Not well done:

• Not lost weight as hoped because of diarrhoea or starvation (due to inability to eat with chopsticks)
• Only managed to learn and use two Chinese words: “ni hao” (= hello) and “xie xie” (= thank you)

Next travel destination: 

• With Intrepid to VIETNAM 2001!