Riding the Iron Rooster

Fülszöveg

If you want to understand China, take the train: as the Chinese do, as the author of The Great Railway Bazaar did - in every province of the People's Republic, from the searing hot Gobi desert to the Western Xinjiang of the ice-bound cities of the Siberian border; along the South China Sea and to the edge of Tibet. The result is a beguiling - and revealing - book of travels in old and new China. Vowing to arrive in China without jet-lag, Paul Theroux joined a tour that made its way by rail from London to Mongolia, stopping in Paris, Warsaw and in the Soviet Union. Reaching China by this unconventional overland route proved nothing short of hilarious and never less than eye-opening about who goes to China and why. Then, to Inner Mongolia and Peking and Shanghai, Mr Theroux rode trains and discovered that in some ways China is changing radically, and in others it is still as ancient as its ruins and just as bound by tradition. A perfect example was the Iron Rooster - an aged rattling... Tovább

Fülszöveg

If you want to understand China, take the train: as the Chinese do, as the author of The Great Railway Bazaar did - in every province of the People's Republic, from the searing hot Gobi desert to the Western Xinjiang of the ice-bound cities of the Siberian border; along the South China Sea and to the edge of Tibet. The result is a beguiling - and revealing - book of travels in old and new China. Vowing to arrive in China without jet-lag, Paul Theroux joined a tour that made its way by rail from London to Mongolia, stopping in Paris, Warsaw and in the Soviet Union. Reaching China by this unconventional overland route proved nothing short of hilarious and never less than eye-opening about who goes to China and why. Then, to Inner Mongolia and Peking and Shanghai, Mr Theroux rode trains and discovered that in some ways China is changing radically, and in others it is still as ancient as its ruins and just as bound by tradition. A perfect example was the Iron Rooster - an aged rattling train that continues to shudder along a four-day route between Peking and distant Urumchi in China's far west. While the country produces Kentucky Fried Chicken and atom bombs, most trains still go everywhere, and the trains are crammed with Chinese tourists, who, now that travel restrictions have been lifted and the economy has improved, are on the movehustling, smuggling, purveying, studying, sightseeing, eager to learn about the West, anxious to try new things. Riding the Iron Rooster is a book of encounters, full of people and their talk - for the Chinese are candid and friendly and nowadays outspoken about Chairman Mao and the Cultural Revolution, about rising prices and student unrest, about their work and their worries and the possibility of a better life elsewhere. The trains go everywhere and Mr Theroux rode them for a year, to the end of a line in the grassland of Quinghai province, where wild Yaks browse outside the line. At that point Mr Theroux detrained and made his way into Tibet where, in the rarefied air of the holy city Lhasa, he made some disturbing discoveries. Vissza