Slow Boat to China

By Chris Rea

So, the book is essentially my day-to-day activities of traveling from Tokyo, Japan to Shanghai China, and then the course of 4 months through China, including the Great Wall of China, the terracotta warriors at Xi'an, the granite cliffs along the Li River from Guilin to Yangshou, and finally leaving China via the modern city of Shenzhen to Hong Kong. As a side, the 1991 Rugby World Cup is going on in Europe, where I have included newspaper clippings and only two years after the Tiananmen Massacre. I have published my accounts on my Wordpress account in 2019.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris AU
• Release date: Mar 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9798369492451

Book preview

SLOW BOAT

TO CHINA

CHRIS REA

Copyright © 2023 by Chris Rea.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 03/15/2024

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Endnotes

Before the proliferation of the World Wide Web , Google Maps , and personal global positioning systems (GPS), two young men from Brisbane , Australia , who had been living in Japan , working as English language instructors for a couple of years, decided to expand their knowledge and horizons by embarking on a journey of discovery to a vastly different Asian location in the nearby communist country known as the People’s Republic of China (PRC ). Incidentally, they both had visited Mainland China , albeit briefly, the previous year, and that had ignited a desire to spend some time in that exotic locale to try to get an understanding of what life was like in the PRC , only two years after 六件天安門事件 (the Tiananmen Square Incident ).

On 24 September 1991, Peter and I – from Brisbane , Australia – embarked on a voyage of a lifetime from the port city of Yokohama (near Tokyo ) to Shanghai in Mainland China . Here is my account as transcribed from my journal below.

CHAPTER 1

24 September 1991: ‘The Departure’

After arriving home from a rugby trip to Hokkaido the day before, Peter and I awoke early to begin packing – first a trip to the bank to organise our finances and then returning to finishing loading our bikes. With me having put everything on the bike at various stages, this was the first time I had put the whole lot together. (I had actually visualised how I would do this in my head many times, including the night we climbed Mt Fuji – 17 September). Of course, my days helping Dad load the car for Straddie (North Stradbroke Island , Queensland , Australia ) in my youth proved an invaluable experience.

Around one o’clock, we had everything ready to go as we headed out on our first ride from Miyuki ’s apartment in Tokyo to Yokohama , thirty-four kilometres away. We arrived at Kannai Station at 3:00 p.m. to rendezvous with some well-wishers. From here, we walked to the international ferry terminal (ten minutes), buying numerous amounts of Pocari Sweat and Aquarius (sachets) for the China adventure.

N.B. We realised that in China , drinking water would be a concern, and we knew, from the experience the year before, that hot water would be provided at our accommodation. Therefore, we rationalised that we would mix up the powder of these sachets of popular sports drinks we had become accustomed to, living in Japan , with the provided hot water to consume while riding around China.

横浜港大さん橋国際客船ターミナル

The boat was slow loading, so we had time to check our gear – which we wouldn’t see for three days (of the voyage) as they put them in the hold under the boat – and to say farewell to the special people who had come to see us off, namely Sayaka , Miyuki , and her younger sister Minori .

Our ferry boat, the Jian Zhen , departed the wharf around 7:00 p.m., first sailing under the infamous Yokohama Bay Bridge , along Tokyo Bay , as we steered our course to the Pacific Ocean . The months of planning the two-man trip to China were over; we were on our ‘slow boat to China’ (although the old Straddie barge wouldn’t have been able to catch her – we were travelling along at approximately twenty-four knots).

It was six months earlier that the idea had been hatched at our school in Ginza , named Ginza Beikaiwa (lit. ‘Ginza American Conversation’). As for myself, I was particularly eager to quench my thirst that had been whetted by visiting a ‘real’ Asian country when I ended up in 广州 (Guangzhou or Canton) on a short trip to 香港 (Hong Kong ) the year before. There was something about 中国 (Zhong Guo ), the ‘Middle Kingdom’, that I didn’t get in Japan or on trips to Korea or Taiwan – that feeling of going back in time.

N.B. There is currently only one ferry service between Japan and China , and that is the weekly service from Osaka to Shanghai and back. This service is operated by Shanghai Ferry Co. and takes approximately two days. Interestingly, the ferry is called the 新羹真 (Xin Jian Zhen ) or New Jian Zhen (Japanese Shin Gan Jin). [Check out The Shanghai Ferry.]

25 September

Waking up at around 6:00 a.m. to the gentle rocking of our boat at sea, we confirmed that our journey had really begun and that it wasn’t just wishful thinking. We had done it! Finally, we were free from the grip of a sometimes-ruthless country (i.e. Japan ).

Outside, it was rather overcast, with strong gusts of around forty knots, causing many of our fellow passengers to empty their stomachs over the side of the vessel. Also, the threat of a typhoon from the south was becoming a real possibility, and that made everyone somewhat apprehensive.

Amongst our fellow travellers were Roger and Martin , also from Australia , although further south from Adelaide and Melbourne , respectively. We initially met them shortly after boarding the night before. We discovered that they knew a mutual friend of ours, Trevor , from my university in Australia, whom Peter had gone to high school with and who was living in Tokyo . He had informed them of ‘our’ journey without mentioning ‘theirs’ to us.

There was a German fellow named Gus who was travelling solo to Australia via Shanghai and Hong Kong . He was married, unmarried, divorced, separated, or unfaithful (we could never seem to work it out as his English wasn’t very good). Apparently, he was waiting for a huge hereditary payout that ran into millions of dollars that would enable him to live in Australia without ever having to work.

Then there was Roberto , an Italian American whose turn of phrase and choice of words were beautifully complemented by his travelling companion, Marty , the latter being a surrealist from England on his way home to finish his studies at Cambridge via Shanghai and India . We were never quite sure about those two, with their artsy vocabulary and feminine gestures.

It was not a particularly exciting day on the waterfront, so we spent large parts of the day conversing with our companions. As evening approached, the lightning increased, as did the rain. If it hadn’t been for the skills of the captain to chart a course further to the East, we could have been staring down the tempest. We had bid sayonara to the Land of the Rising Sun as the lights of Kyushu disappeared from view.

26 September

Today we were introduced to some of our Japanese travellers on the boat as we began to