Exhausted from a day of extreme tourism! After an orientation meeting reminding us about i-to-i's aims of meaningful travel and reassuring us that our money does go somewhere (I love how even the company director anticipates that every volunteer is going to be sceptical about its economic efficiency) and another yummy Chinese lunch (already getting a bit bored of rice though), we had the bright idea of walking to the centre of Xi'An. We were advised to get the bu...

I write this from the computer in the Xi'An volunteer apartment, which I can monopolise as no other volunteers are currently here. After thirteen hours of flights I have finally arrived! I spent the first ten and a half hour flight from Heathrow to Shanghai seated next to a gruff Glaswegian man who withstood the stress of flying with a double gin and tonic clutched constantly in his hand whilst I watched 'The Blind Side' and pretended to learn something from my T...