High Speed Train to Shanghai

Post date: 20-Nov-2009 10:45:48

Beijing to Shanghai D31 high speed bullet train for 10 hours

First Class seats 25 and 26 in Carriage 3

Cost: $115 Canadian (800 RMB)

After our usual mad dash through the illogical drivers of Beijing, we joined the throngs of people waiting to board the "new Chinese fast train", as everyone calls it, from Beijing to Shanghai.

Colin and I saw 3 kids onbaord with a ripped slit in the bum of their pants for using the bathroom. When kids are outside, they just go to the bathroom anywhere on the streets. It saves from having to use diapers.

The train smelled bad at times but at least in first class we had a Western toilet instead of a squat toilet. In second class, the seats were smaller and it smelled either from the people or the squat toilets.

Our toilet

Train Rules

Us Killing Time for 10 Hours

We walked to the restaurant car just to see what it looked like. During our walk, I felt like I was the breast display lady giving free shows from all the stares I got on the way there. We were the only foreigners on the train and many people on the train live in some of the remoter mountain villages we passed, so it might have been the first time that some of them have seen foreigners.

Walking Through the Train Cars

I can only imagine the air quality on our train beause no one covers their mouths when they sneeze or cough and the amount of people who are horking and spitting and clearing their throats every 5 seconds are quite annoying. The second annoyance is the beeping cell phones because no one seems to know how to turn the beeps off on the keys and 3rd would be the slurping and open mouth chewing of food. Okay, I think that covers all my agitations of what I have observed from the culture of the people on our train.

Speed of our train

Shanghai Train Station

You can view our other 45 pictures from the train trip here: