okay, i have tried to upload my photos. It seems i am destined not to put them up on here. Apartently chiense internet cafes dont let you use a usb. The manager at the hostel im at said i could use his but it was telling me that it was going to take 40 mintues to upload 3 photos! So i have offically given up. But other than that down point it's been good here so far.

im now going to bore you with a list of the stuff i've done. Mainly because i ahve such a bad memory that ill forget what i did when i get back so i can look on here and suddenly remeber everything that happened.

So we went to see the chiense opera first. Which really wasn't an opera at all, well not what you think of as one. We got there late which i suppose really didn't help, but there wasn't much singing. It ended up as sort of a amatuer kung fu panto. It was bascially the story of the monkey king and how he defeted everyone. So he had fights with all these different characters, bascially making the crowd laugh at them behind their back, it was very odd.

It kinda picked up when we ewnt to the great wall, mutianyu. We decided to get the cable car up, well basically because its ridicualsly steep!! nd we walked along abu\it and we got to one part which was pretty monsterous. It was a very steep section of steps (if i could get photos on i would show you!!!) you had to stop at least 6 times on the way up. And everyones thighs were hurting for days afterwards!! It think that was the start of everyone being totally nackard everyday. We went to see a kung fu show in the everning, which was crazy, people were breaking poles over thier heads, balancing on sticks on their stomach, dancing up material hangin from the eiling. One guy lay on three swords (demostrated as very sharp as it cut a brick in 2), then had a small bed of nails on his stomach onto which a guy lay. This second guy then had a concrete slab placed on his stomach and broken with a sledge hammer!

We all visited the forbidden city the next day, which sort of killed us all of leg wise. And it was really nice(although all the temples were pretty much decorated the same) bu there was so many people around! the best bits were the smaller houses and temples on the outshirts of the city with little allyways, just because there were less people! It also puts me of going to the summer palace. And its now the start of the week long chinese national holiday. The swedes in our group went to the summer palace yesterday (the first day of the holiday) and they said there were just people everywhere and it was noisy that you couldn't even talk to one another! i also went to the lama temple where they train the dahali lama, which houses a 60 ft buddha made out of one single piece of sandlewood.

We also experienced beijing clubbing scene for one night. One of the girls katie had her birthday on the 30th, so we went out to a club called mix. Nothing majorly different although they seem to buy botttles of a spiri then bottle of a mixer and do all thier own drinks. And as far as i could make out from the taste was that they mixed their spirits with iced tea, which was kinda unsusal i thought.

but by far my favourtie thing so far has to be the outdoor night food market. This is where you can get the werid and wonderful food wise! I stayed on the safer end of the food. I had sweet rice in half a pineapple, fruit covered in hard sugar syrup, mssive fried shrip, mini lobster (which we found out had no meat in and was just shell!), coconut milk drank stright from the coconut, fried squid and my most adventerous seahorse. Which bascially was just crispy skin. But you could have cockroach, hearts, snake, scorpians (which were still alive!!), fried flowers, oysters. Masses of things!! I also had a normal blueberry flavoured drink except they had dropped a bit of dry ice in the bottom so it bubbled and white smoke came out of the top. And everyone was trying to get you to by things, shouting at you tyring to get you to come over to their stall, it was a great atmosphere! If i'm brave enough then i may go back and try some of the more obscure stuff.

Its hard to try to explain what its like being over her. Becuase you stand out so much here. Everyone stares at you, but no ones rude. They just point, quite a few people giggle at you. I've had several photos with various chinese people who just wanted a photo with me and their friends. And loads of people want to try and speak to you, i went to beihai park yesterday and i was sitting eating a icecream and a kid of about 2 said hi and how are you to me! and we were sitting in a coffee bar and a kid of 12 came in a nd had a conversion with us, and she understood english very well! Someone came up to Ghino on the train and sat next to her and said "excuse me, can we have a conversation".

It's also weird all the prices of things over here! When i went to beihai park i must of paid about 6 different entrance fees, along with my tube fare and it only came to 4 pounds! The subway itself is 2 yuan from to any stop, thats 16p! My breakfast this morning cost me 32p and i couldn't even finish it! It's crazy. I think the most expensive night i had was when i went to the club and it cost me 32 pound for the night, including a meal and entrance fee to the club and drinks! and the norweigns and swedes smoke here and they can get a packet of 20 cigrattes for 7 yuan which is 56p. I went out with the last of my group for a meal last night, (they have now all left me!). There were 7 of us; 5 meals, 8 lots of rice, 8 beers, 2 cokes. All for 1.50 each! Its crazy!

Thanks for all your messages. I don't know the best way to answer everyone so ill just write it all here...

there were quite a few yaks in mongolia, not as mucha s it hoguht there wuood be, theres also a few camels. But there mostly goats evrywhere! Because no one actually owns the land in mongolia they let all their livestock roam free and just brand them or paint them to distigush the difference. So there are massive herds of goats and sheep nad cowes all mixed up together. And they let all their horses roam free too.

All my laundary is appartly being done, the first time its all being washed! but im haveing to chase it up, i dont seem to have it back yet!! The thermal underwear (thermal being its "special" quality) is good, it's not that cold anywhere anymore, but they do well as doubling up as tights. They seem to stay clean for quite a while, which was good for the train!

H said he was down on the island this weekend. When the plaster come off Liz have you still got loads of physio to do and stuff like that? I can't wait till i actually get any of my photos on here, so ill send you one as soon as i can.

And Ruth, make sure you tell me what the uni is like! What course is it your looking at doing?!?

Im meeting my group in a few days then im off the Xi'an, so ill see if i can write a blog whereever i am next.

xxx