Tag Archives: train

Thanks, Harbin…

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That’s our train headed back to the Jing…

The three-week educational working visit to Harbin’s come to an end today. It’s been three weeks of Chinglish. During this trip, my iPhone’s ran into about 25 cases of new Chinglish in Harbin. I’m up to about 2,200 cases of the concoct language, and while it’s far from perfect, I did like one of the most recent Chinglishes I found this morning — that the restaurant lies on the second floor, complete with the MAIE RESTROOM. Now just how do you pronounce the latter?

My thanks to the trio that made it possible: two lessons plus a title of International Teacher of English at the newly-formed and grassroots Chenguang School, and two more visits to more established locations, including the Hulan campus of the well-known Harbin Normal University (哈爾濱師範大學) and the Yuan Dong campus of the Harbin Institute of Technology (哈爾濱理工大學). About 80 joined me for the first one; the second one was sheer magic with 200 people.

The trip back to Beijing’s going to be quite a ride — nine hours through the more Siberanesque parts of China before moving onto warmer, but also foggier, climates near Beijing. Seriously, we’ve had some Harbin Air that’s on close parallels to Beijing Air.

I’ll miss staying next to the freeways here, in a bit of secluded silence, but I’ll also look forward to the Yizhuang Starbucks back in Beijing. Here’s hoping that when I come back to Harbin sometime in the future that Starbucks Harbin can wow me with a bit of Habrinesque Bi Luo Chun…

Chinese High Speed Rail: A Public Beta I’d Go For

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The fact that I arrived back in Beijing in late August 2000 to a China where the fastest trains were just 160 km/h (for Guangzhou, up to 200 km/h) and nationwide ticketing was not available, to the fact that the fastest Chinese trains run, as of this post, at speeds just over 350 km/h, is just purely amazing. I travelled on a 350 km/h G train sitting the wrong way, and didn’t barf: it’s a sign at just how stable the Chinese HSR network is.

But the whole network is just about a few yeras old. It’s still in a bit of a public beta, and it can crash — as the Wenzhou crash showed us — and when that happened it was pretty tragic. Nearly 50 lives lost, and brutal manhandling by the railway authorities, who preferred to bury people alive than to save any lives. It’s a system so paralyzed by bad press, and so demented at the wrong time, that despatch ordered drivers to “go invisible” and cared less about faster trains rear-ending “invisible” trains.

Yet despite this, I’m setting the record straight:

  • China needs high speed rail, imported or homemade (there need for freight transport is too big, and this nation will keep on growing);
  • China needs high speed rail because the air system is a mess (delays hours on end are just part of airport life — even if you have a private lounge it is still very annoying);
  • China needs high speed rail because of Petrus and Iceland (Petrus is Swiss-German for the weather gods, and Iceland reminds us to the awful volcanic ash plumes shutting down western European air space in spring 2010).

I’m also retweaking my train travel preference as such:

  • I’m not dumping the plane this time. A sensible A-to-B system won’t exclude any means of transport. For travel within 1,000 km, as well as trips from Beijing to Shanghai or the northeast, these will form the sole exceptions.
  • I’m only doing HSR on “safe” routes. There are a few unsafe routes, such as Ningbo-Fuzhou or Shijiazhuang-Taiyuan, but most are generally regarded as either safe or relatively safe.
  • I’m only doing trips for non-personal trips. Basically, the trains have to get me to my involvements. I’ve a busy schedule in Beijing so travels won’t be daily, but it’ll still be a frequent thing.

Finally, there will be no set mileages for 2011 or any subsequent years. The present mileage is around 15,034 km for this year, which has already exceeded that of last year by just over a thousand kilometres. There will also be no preference for HSR-only reference over that for regular rail.

I’m looking forward to taking Chinese trains again, which will include D trains on well-established lines. As the Swiss say, smart people travel in trains. Long live the thing that gets you places on time without making you turn off your mobile phone!

Regarding the Chinese Rails: What David is NOT Thinking of…

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The Wenzhou crash has turned the whole Chinese rail world on its head, with a hitherto flawless HSR system catastrophically ruined. I’ve had to flip over my once solid stance that Chinese HSR is safe, and that it has not claimed the life of a single rider.

But my recent posts saying I’m strictly restricting travel on the trains has led a fair number to think that this is a full ban. So to make the situation easier for folks to understand, I’m posting a list of myths that are — well, just that, myths. In other words, what you see below is NOT true on my end. If you must, take this post as a classic post of fake news and fake viewpoints… (and realities where applicable…)

  • “I will never take Chinese (high speed) trains again.”
    (Reality: I’m limiting all travel to essential travel only, and will severely limit, but not ban, high speed trains. I have the option to fully dump HSR, but only when necessary.)
  • “For my own personal travel, all D trains will be banned.”
    (Reality: Three D trains, namely the Guangzhou–Zhuhai, Guangzhou–Shenzhen and Qinhuangdao–Shenyang lines, are OK but subject to restrictions.)
  • “The new Beijing–Shanghai HSR has been banned for my personal travel.”
    (Reality: It hasn’t been banned except for in inclement weather.)
  • “(Despite my previous support,) I am against Chinese railways and Chinese high speed rail.”
    (Reality: I am against their mismanagement. The trains are innocent. Crooked liars and bad managers are what stinks in the system.)
  • “I have flipped 180 degrees from pro-rail to anti-rail.”
    (Reality: More about being more critical than being anti-rail.)
  • “The rail ministry used to fund or support me (in one way or other) but after the crash, I’ve dumped them.”
    (Reality: I have stayed 100% outside the Chinese rail ministry system. I have never been a ploy or a puppet for them. Indeed, as I posted on Sina Weibo, I’m proud of my independent existence outside the rail ministerial system.)
  • “I used to (or still do) work for the rail ministry.”
    (Reality: How can they accept non-PRC citizens as “working staff”? I’m a PhD student; also, like I said, I’m 100% outside the rail system here in China.)
  • “I’ve set up my own travel ban through to 31 December 2012.”
    (Reality: Restrictions are not the same bans as blanket bans.)
  • “I’m scared of Chinese high speed rail; it’s not safe.”
    (Reality: the Beijing-Tianjin HSR has one of the most solid records ever, with zero crashes. I’m only “scared”, or critical, rather, of lines built too quickly or with shoddy standards, eg the Shijiazhuang–Taiyuan or Nanjing–Hangzhou HSR lines.)
  • “The government has forced me to do this, as in, implement bans; or the government has banned me from HSR trains.”
    (Reality: This is a 100% David Feng “concotion”, if you will, on his own, free, independent will.)