Overnight Train from Xi'an to Chengdu

Saturday, June 21, 2008--Xi'an (Continued)

I went to another noodle house in my neighborhood tonight. It was cleaner and a little fancier looking than the one where I ate last night. Unfortunately, the noodles were not as good. I don't think they were freshly made. And they were thin, round noodles rather than flat, wide ones. The meal was fine, though. There were 3 slices of meat (beef?) among the noodles along with spices. I added some soy sauce and some hot pepper oil to give more flavor to the soup. The meal cost slightly more than the one where I ate last night, too.

I am a little worried about leaving here. It seems from TV that it is raining almost everywhere in China except here. I hope it isn't raining in Chengdu when I get there Monday.

I finished reading The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve tonight. It really kept my attention with its story about Norwegian immigrants to a small island off the coasts of Maine and New Hampshire and a double murder that took place there in the late 1800s. I gave the book 3 1/2 stars out of 4.

Sunday, June 22, 2008--Xi'an (Leaving on Overnight Train)

Well, it is raining here today, too. I guess it is now raining everywhere in China. It has been steady--not light, but not heavy, either. There was a brief pause around noon when I checked out of the hotel and walked to the cyber cafe, but it was starting again when I arrived here. I am hoping that it will have stopped again by the time I leave. I will pick up my luggage around 15:00 and head for the train station for my 17:20 train that will go through the mountains to Chengdu on an 18-hour trip.

While staying in the room this morning, I wrote a brief story. I think it may be a good one. I wrote it about a friend of mine in Copenhagen and something that happened when she visited the U.S. in 1986 and later after she returned home. I might contact one of the women's magazines in Denmark to see if it would interest them, since, in addition to the story, there is a recipe included. I just did it for fun. I am not trying to find a way to make money.

I am frustrated here at the cyber cafe. I got an e-mail from Wes saying he had made arrangements for us to meet next May in Vancouver for a vacation together. I went online to check the schedules adjustments I would need to make and ran into problems. First, the United Airlines website would not load. That may be purposeful on the part of the Chinese government. If so, curses to them! But then I went to the Star Alliance website, and some programmer has messed up their schedule planner. It only allows people to search for flights in 2000 and 2001! Then it says no flights can be found due to the date being prior to today. I even went to the trouble of downloading their schedule to this computer only to find it has the same problem!!! Then I tried to write to the Star Alliance to tell them the problem they have, and the amount of space they allow for a complaint is so limited I couldn't even word what the problem was precisely. Curses on them, too, for not being on top of things and not seeming to care!!! What makes it worse is that I never know if I will find a cyber cafe in any given city. My guidebook only shows one in Chengdu, so I hope it is still in business and not closed down like the one that was listed here was when I went to it.

Oops, it must be raining hard outside. A man just closed the window. Why else would he do so? Yuck!