At the border crossing, you have to go through VN immigration first, then China's. Everyone crowds to the front window and shoves their passport toward the officials. The officials always take their jolly old time looking at them. Some people had to take off their glasses. Finally, they call your name and give it back. I thought there might be problem because I never got a certain paper that you generally need to show at the airport, but no problem.
You ride a golf cart to go from the VNese side to the Chinese. At the Chinese immigration, I thought we were making great headway as the line was short and moving fast. Get up to the official, he immediately shoved it back to me and yelled something, pointing vinously. NO English of course. I found out that there was a card I needed to fill out first, so then, after doing that, I was back in a long line. Ha!! But after a bit, I finished and back in the golf cart and to the bus.
On the China side, we changed buses. Again, only a few people on the bus. The road to Nanning was a two land divided highway the whole way. The driver practically had the whole road to himself as no traffic and you could see the rolling hills landscape with no people. It was like I was in a dessserted country. The young woman who worked for the bus co. as a aide, was exceptionally nice. She tried to speak Eng and apologized by for her Eng but it was ok. The time is one hour different and the total bus ride took about 9 hours.
The young woman, JoAnn, called our hostel as I didn't have the address, only the phone number. She found out where it was so we didn't get off at the bus station but rode to the bus terminal. She then told me she would get us a good taxi and "he will not cheat you". Now, it was dark, so this was very helpful. It took her a while to get the taxi, and we were going to tip her but she refused, saying I had already been so kind to her. She even paid for the taxi, which was 10 yuan, about $1.50. I didn't want her to do this but then she ran off.
In the taxi, after a few minutes, I could tell the driver was having trouble. No meter too. Not a good sign. I showed him the phone fo the hostel and told him to call it. He finally did. It seems we were almost sitting right out side its front door. The hotel person came out to get us and we went inside and the driver never asked us for money.
The hostel itself was good but getting registered was difficult. I had reserved online for three nights. The front desk wanted me to pay in advance for all three nights, plus a deposit. I could have gone to the ATM which they said was down the street but I had already had one CC problem, and I didn't want another one right away here. So I didn't know what I was going to do. We had some Yuan but not enough. Another guest here form Amsterdam heard our plight and offered me 200 Yuan and I could pay him back after I went to the ATM on Monday. WOW!! Talk about a random act of kindness. I took it after talking to him a bit. So then we went to our room and slept through the night.
Sometime about 6 am, Thanh gets a call from VN from his girlfriend saying his father had a terrible accident and had a broken leg, maybe more. Thanh's phone seem to accept calls from VN but he couldn't call VN. Of course this was very upsetting to Thanh, who was going to travel with me but I knew he had to go back to Hanoi now. So, off we were to find the bus station. You would think it would be easy as we just came from there last night. But, No!! We did have a map and it wasn't far, but asking people they either didn't know, or just seem to point in a random direction. Finally, I thought we found it. Lots of buses outside and big ticket counters and lines inside. Nothing in English though. The problem was time was of the essence because according to the hostel, there were two buses that would leave for Hanoi at 7:30 am and 8:30 am. And inside the station I found a nice man who was willing to help us. He went to the counter and translated. But now we were told that the time would be about 6 pm. I told him no, and we got our money back. And the translator felt bad because he couldn't help more. It was then that we found out we were at the "Train" station, not Bus station. Then he directed us to the bus. We would have never found it alone or on time. Thanh bought his ticket 7:15 and the bus left at 7:30. I hope he can get some better news when he gets home.
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