By 7 a.m., the train is alive. Old men climb from their berths, stretch and yawn. Young women shuffle to the steel sinks at the end of the car to brush their teeth. The televisions mounted to the walls of each cabin are soon turned on – at full volume – playing a low-budget Chinese historical epic. Before long, the grumpy attendants are back pushing carts down the aisle, selling fruit, toothbrushes and fried chicken in vacuum-sealed packages.
Sleep is futile. Outside my window is southern China’s Guanxi province. As staccato images of rocky outcroppings, rice paddies and half-built brick homes flash by, I roll out of bed and mix myself a robust cup of instant coffee I’d brought with me.
Rule No. 1 of Chinese train travel: Bring coffee.
“A train isn’t a vehicle,” Paul Theroux wrote in Riding the Iron Rooster, his 1988 book about train travel in China. “A train is part of the country. It’s a place.”
He wasn’t kidding. In China, people don’t ride a train – they live it. The minute a train pulls from the station, sunflower seeds are chewed, card games played and tea endlessly gulped. Passengers sleep away the hours as if on vacation, chat with strangers or gaze out the window at the passing world. Riding the rails isn’t just a way to travel China; it’s a way to experience it. And it’s becoming much easier and more comfortable to do so.
Until the late 1980s, China relied on steam-powered relics to transport citizens and goods around its vast territory. Today, it is home to the largest high-speed rail network in the work, with 6,900 kilometres of track. Last year alone, China spent $82.4-billion on rail construction, and it plans to add 16,000 kilometres of capacity by 2020. It already has 2,000 kilometres of routes that can run at top speeds of 350 kilometres an hour, with much more to come. The country hopes not only to connect prosperous coastal cities to the remote west, but also envisions lines beginning in China and stretching across Asia, the Middle East and Europe.
To put China’s growing rail network to the test, I recently set out on a 10-day journey by train from Beijing to the southern tip of China, and back again.
Despite Beijing traffic’s best effort to stop me, I make the 28-hour Beijing-to-Guilin train minutes before our 8:58 a.m. departure. I’m soon resting on the middle berth of a second-class compartment, called a “hard sleeper.” The beds are almost as comfortable as in first class – a “soft sleeper” – but each cabin has six berths and no door, which makes for a lively trip.
A gritty city in Hebei province rolls by as I read Theroux’s book and pick at a supply of ham, cheese, crackers and fruit I’ve brought with me in order to put off consuming the gruel generally served in Chinese dining cars. (Rule No. 2: Bring snacks.)
I’m soon distracted by an old lady snoring on the berth across from me. On Chinese trains, noise is constant. There’s elevator music, crackling loudspeaker announcements, people babbling on cellphones and folks clearing their throats and horking. Reminding myself that it’s all part of the experience, I put on my iPod, dig into my book and let the hours drift away.
