The 'rush' to Suzhou
Today, we took a long distance bus from Wenling shi to Suzhou which took the whole day. Our journey started at 1pm sharp from the bus station and arrived at Suzhou at 8:30pm.
Shocked at the sitting configuration.
When we went up the coach, we were extremely shocked by its sitting configuration. Each passenger is allocated a space which consist of a inclined backrest and a long mattress. These are arranged in 3 rows with 12 beds per row stacked in 2 decks. 2 narrow asiles are present between the rows. The height and width of the coach is similar to those of regular coach. Imagine the limited room available for each person, sideways and heightwise.
When we were about to walk to the asile, we were instructed by the bus captain to remove our shoes and carry it to our spaces. Anyway, the asiles are so narrow that we had to squeeze our way between 2 rows to our allocated space.
And the coach stinks too
While squeezing through, I could smell a stanch of salted fish. I suspected that it was that of the socks of the locals. Yucks. The smell remained throughout the journey.
Hence, to alliviate the stanch, I opened the side window a little, hoping to bring fresh air in. As it is winter now and that the route which we traveled is mountainous, the air which came in was extremely cold. Apparently both are bad. In the end, I still had to bear with some smell and experience the cold.
Miserable ride.
While travelling, I tried to sleep, but was unable to because the speaker was directly above me, and they were blasting whatever very loudly. So I tried to sit up.
Bang! My head hit the ceiling! The headroom is insufficient even for me to sit up. So I tried to incline backwards.
But the angle was extremely comfortable as well! So I tried lying on the side. The space was so limited that shifting positions was a humoguous task. The space given was really miserable.
The rush.
When we arrived at toilet checkpoints, we were only given unspecified very limited time to do our business. We had just enough time (for guys) to discharge our waste, wash hand and run back to the coach. Even then, the door almost closed on us once. It was really a rush..
At one checkpoint, it was a small cookhouse when everyone was instructed to disembark for dinner. There, we each had to pay RMB20 per person. Then, each of us has to carry a metal tray and the staff will place our desired dish on small metal plates on our trays. At the end, we were given a metal bowl of rice. Only wooden chopsticks were supplied. Then we had to carry it to the dining area. The whole process reminds me of life in army.
Anyway, for the previous rushing experiences, I globbled down the food with the chopsticks. However, despite the fast eating, when I looked up after finishing my share, the whole dining area was almost empty! The other passengers were already boarding! Anyway, the dinner stop was the last stop before reaching Suzhou.
At last, we arrived.
It was about 8:30pm when we arrived at the outskit of the city. The coach just stopped by a round-about and the captain keep calling us to disembark faster. When we got down and collected our lagguages, the coach just zoomed off and continued its journey to Yangzhou. The coach was indeed a rush.
There, we hired a private car to ferry us to our hotel. Upon arrival, the hotel and its room appeared posh. Most likely 4-5 stars. Everything seems so comfortable, which is a sharp contrast from our journey here...
Shocked at the sitting configuration.
When we went up the coach, we were extremely shocked by its sitting configuration. Each passenger is allocated a space which consist of a inclined backrest and a long mattress. These are arranged in 3 rows with 12 beds per row stacked in 2 decks. 2 narrow asiles are present between the rows. The height and width of the coach is similar to those of regular coach. Imagine the limited room available for each person, sideways and heightwise.
When we were about to walk to the asile, we were instructed by the bus captain to remove our shoes and carry it to our spaces. Anyway, the asiles are so narrow that we had to squeeze our way between 2 rows to our allocated space.
And the coach stinks too
While squeezing through, I could smell a stanch of salted fish. I suspected that it was that of the socks of the locals. Yucks. The smell remained throughout the journey.
Hence, to alliviate the stanch, I opened the side window a little, hoping to bring fresh air in. As it is winter now and that the route which we traveled is mountainous, the air which came in was extremely cold. Apparently both are bad. In the end, I still had to bear with some smell and experience the cold.
Miserable ride.
While travelling, I tried to sleep, but was unable to because the speaker was directly above me, and they were blasting whatever very loudly. So I tried to sit up.
Bang! My head hit the ceiling! The headroom is insufficient even for me to sit up. So I tried to incline backwards.
But the angle was extremely comfortable as well! So I tried lying on the side. The space was so limited that shifting positions was a humoguous task. The space given was really miserable.
The rush.
When we arrived at toilet checkpoints, we were only given unspecified very limited time to do our business. We had just enough time (for guys) to discharge our waste, wash hand and run back to the coach. Even then, the door almost closed on us once. It was really a rush..
At one checkpoint, it was a small cookhouse when everyone was instructed to disembark for dinner. There, we each had to pay RMB20 per person. Then, each of us has to carry a metal tray and the staff will place our desired dish on small metal plates on our trays. At the end, we were given a metal bowl of rice. Only wooden chopsticks were supplied. Then we had to carry it to the dining area. The whole process reminds me of life in army.
Anyway, for the previous rushing experiences, I globbled down the food with the chopsticks. However, despite the fast eating, when I looked up after finishing my share, the whole dining area was almost empty! The other passengers were already boarding! Anyway, the dinner stop was the last stop before reaching Suzhou.
At last, we arrived.
It was about 8:30pm when we arrived at the outskit of the city. The coach just stopped by a round-about and the captain keep calling us to disembark faster. When we got down and collected our lagguages, the coach just zoomed off and continued its journey to Yangzhou. The coach was indeed a rush.
There, we hired a private car to ferry us to our hotel. Upon arrival, the hotel and its room appeared posh. Most likely 4-5 stars. Everything seems so comfortable, which is a sharp contrast from our journey here...
Heres a picture of a strip found on the bed...
posted by Justin Sng at 11:09 PM
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