Off The Rails

by Chris Hatherly

  That gave me another sixteen days and 600 kilometres of riding, and while I was looking forward to seeing Nat again, I was beginning to feel nervous as well. While riding, we were getting twelve hours’ sleep per night and the days were flying by. At our slow pace, 600 kilometres could take twelve days (I had this all counted out) and twelve days with twelve hours’ sleep per day would simply whiz by. Then – a couple of days in Beijing, a day and a night on the train to Hong Kong, and an overnight flight to Sydney – I’d be back home to Nat. Sixteen days! The numbers meant everything, because they took my mind off their meaning. I was dying to be with Nat again, but scared about what would happen to our relationship as we got to know each other again. I thought down to the heart of the matter and realised my most basic fear. After a year apart, a year when I hadn’t been there, would she still love me?

  Late the next day the dirt road ended and the countryside underwent a drastic change. For over two months – ever since climbing up and out of Russia – we’d been cycling at over 900 metres above sea level, across the vast Mongolian plateau. Now we’d finally reached its edge and were about to start a long descent to Beijing and the Yellow Sea. Directly below us, although still six to 800 metres above sea level, was Hebei Province and the promise of a different China.

  The bitumen reappeared and we raced down a long, winding hill. At the bottom, we emerged into what seemed like a new world. Mud-brick houses clustered together in little villages. Here and there were fields that had been harvested and ploughed in a flurry of activity before winter set in. Winter! There was a startling thing in itself. We’d woken that very morning to find our water bottles frozen solid. The sparse grass on the plain had been dead and brown and the few trees stripped to their bare branches. Now, sixty kilometres further along the road and a few hundred metres down a hill, we seemed to have overtaken the seasons. All around were hills and mountains. There were a few streams and along their banks, more trees than I’d seen in over two months of travelling. They had leaves, too. Brown and red autumn leaves to be sure, but leaves all the same. There were tinges of green in the grass, and the air was noticeably warmer. Somehow, on the way down that hill, we had caught up with the edge of winter and crossed back into autumn. Like migrating birds, we had cycled south and reversed the seasons. Winter was still following along just behind, though, and we’d have to race to stay ahead of it.

  We camped the night in a grove of young trees then set off again in the still freezing air of the morning. Our illegal lifestyle had been pretty easy up until now, lots of open flat space and, as in Mongolia, very few people to hide from. Now, however, the countryside was becoming more populated. Already, a day after beginning our descent from the plateau, there were towns and villages everywhere. The traffic had picked up and we spent most of the day riding among a chaotic stream of trucks, bikes and cars. It was going to be a lot harder to find good, tucked-away places to camp, and if the police presence picked up at the same rate as the population, then we might really find ourselves running the gauntlet of the law.

  I caught up with Tim a little after midday on the outskirts of a small town; he was surrounded by a group of workers from a nearby factory. The workers had come out, jostling for a look and ignoring their supervisor who was obviously unhappy about the distraction. I held Tim’s bike while he went off with a few men to fill the water bottles. When he returned, we both hopped on to do a couple of demonstration laps around the carpark before getting back underway.

  Before we could leave, though, we heard a car pull up on the gravel nearby. A door clicked open and a set of heavy footsteps crunched along the ground, heading our way. The men around us ceased their happy chatter and some of them melted silently away. I looked up, confused. The usual, happy grin had disappeared from Tim’s face. I turned to see what was going on. There, making his way through the crowd and straight towards us, was a policeman.

  End of the Road

  Houqi – Beijing

  Late Autumn 2000

  ———

  Tim

  ‘Let’s go!’ shouted the policeman. He had a slight build but stood square shouldered. His face was striking, with skin tightly moulded over strong cheekbones. Initially, I chose to believe that he was just interested in us. I wasn’t convinced that riding a bike was a crime that warranted arrest.

  With a joyous smile we waved goodbye to the onlookers, who were now standing at a safe distance, and followed the police car. We didn’t know it until later, but we had entered a town that was closed to foreigners. In light of this, I found it ironic that the police made us follow them right into the commercial centre; our cycling route would have bypassed the town altogether.

  We rode abreast down the main street, attracting more attention than usual. The pavement was cluttered with stalls selling everything under the sun. Rickshaw riders pedalled alongside us, yelling out a greeting, and bystanders called out for us to stop. I stuck my thumb up and smiled.

  ‘This feels fantastic, hey Chris? Like we are part of a procession or something. Closest we will get to a ticket-tek parade!’ I yelled, excited. But I could tell that he was a little more concerned about the whole event.

  The parade ended as we turned under a great archway and came to a halt before a fleet of police cars and motorbikes. The rush of interested pedestrians came flocking in behind us like a thundering mob. Thirty or forty pushed into the carpark just to see the foreigners and their bicycles. The arresting officer yelled something that sent them fleeing in panic. He seemed embarrassed that we were such a point of fascination.

  Although we were at the centre of the commotion, I felt utterly removed from it. The police, the locals, the hieroglyphics plastered over the shopfronts, and whatever else lay ahead was just so beyond my comprehension that I felt unconcerned.

  After retrieving our passports, we followed the officers into a four-storey building. Chris was barely visible beneath a thick film of dust. His usually green jacket was bordering on brown and his face seemed to be blowing away in the breeze. I noticed a couple of dried horse crap ‘biscuits’ poking out of the pockets – we’d run out of diesel and he’d been collecting them for our cooking fire. Most striking however was his footwear. He wore, like I did, a pair of red Gore-tex mitts as socks. The sleeve for the thumb flapped loosely over the side. In fact, almost nothing remained of the shoes except the worn soles and the laces that bound his feet to them. As a general rule Chris was the clean one. I could only imagine how I must have looked.

  My anticipation of a dirty, dark, windowless interrogation room was crushed as we were ushered into an office on the third floor. We were seated on lavish armchairs facing a large painting on the far wall.

  Out the window I noticed a crowd of officials huddled around our bicycles. I wondered how long it would take before our policeman friend would cave in and ask questions about the bike and our journey.

  For some time we sat in silence while the officer flicked through our passports. Then another man rushed in. He had marginally better English than the arresting officer. ‘Hello. Okay, I will ask you some questions. Where you from?’

  ‘Australia.’

  There was extensive discussion before they arrived at a conclusion. ‘So, you are foreigners?’

  ‘Um, well, we are not Chinese,’ I mumbled.

  This seemed to satisfy them. ‘When did you arrive in this town?’

  ‘We arrived about five minutes before the policeman met us.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Just now.’

  ‘And where did you stay last night?’

  ‘Well, we don’t know. We stayed in a tent. There were a few trees nearby, probably about sixty kilometres from here,’ I said, but the translator was having trouble understanding. Finally, Chris was reduced to miming the idea of sleeping in a tent. When that led nowhere, the translator decided on a new course of action. ‘Can you give me your map?’

  I reached into my pocket and retrieved a screwed up photocopy of a map that we had m
ade in Ulaan Baatar.

  ‘So where did you go?’ he asked, pointing at the map.

  ‘We came from Erienhot, then we came down here,’ I said, dragging my finger down the only road south from there. ‘But where are we now? What is this place called?’ We hadn’t been able to read any signs, and our map only had place names in English.

  ‘Houqi,’ he replied. ‘So when were you in Erienhot hotel?’

  ‘No, we were not in a hotel. We were in a tent,’ I replied.

  The translator skipped to the last question on his list. ‘Do you have permit to travel?’

  ‘Permit? We have visas.’

  ‘This town is closed to foreigners, and this road to Beijing from Erienhot is also closed to foreigners. You can only go on train.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Yes. So do you know you have broken Chinese law?’ He smiled smugly, closed his folder and stood to leave. ‘Have a good journey,’ he said, with a smile as he walked out.

  ‘Good luck!’ I called after him.

  The policeman was replaced by a woman who came rushing in with wet, freshly washed hair and a contagious smile. She couldn’t mask her excitement. I immediately felt comfortable with her in the room, like it was the beginning of a party; she had such a bouncy energy about her.

  ‘Hello, my name is Xiao Wei. I am the English teacher from the local school. They have asked me to come and help with some questions that they couldn’t ask before.’

  In between questions, we began a casual conversation about our journey and Australia. We also asked her some questions about China and found out how to pronounce ‘Australia’ in Chinese.

  At some point we were asked to show the film footage we had shot in China. The arresting officer squinted at the tiny LCD screen, looking for who knew what in scenes of a donkey and cart, a few trees, our bikes and a sunset.

  Xiao Wei was eventually asked to translate the basic problem. ‘So, you understand that our town here is closed to foreigners. And you rode right through our town,’ she said, trying hard not to laugh. ‘You broke Chinese law and for this you must be punished.’

  ‘But we didn’t know.’

  ‘I know, you are very brave, you boys. It’s quite cold to be cycling at this time of year.’

  ‘Do you meet many foreigners here?’ I asked.

  She blushed and laughed a little. ‘It is a closed town, but yes there was another Australian on bicycle one time, and she was here too in this office. By the way, if you want I can take you on an escorted tour of our town,’ she replied, eagerly.

  ‘Oh, that would be great!’

  We moved to another office, and while the officer flicked through some fat law books, Xiao Wei handed us a booklet. ‘Look, you can read what others wrote so you can write also,’ she said.

  It was a booklet with statements from all the other poor foreign cyclists who had wandered into the forbidden zone and been arrested. There were two parties in all – an Australian woman and a group consisting of an Australian, a Japanese and a Canadian. I read the statements with interest and flicked over to see their fingerprints and copies of their passports.

  Then I looked at Xiao Wei and smiled. ‘So you do meet a lot of foreigners here!’

  After writing our own statements, we had to dip our fingers in red ink for fingerprinting. ‘It’s just like finger painting!’ I said to Xiao Wei, who blushed and put her hand over her mouth to hide her smile. Then it was Chris’s turn.

  My spirits were high. I was wondering when the formalities would be over so we could give the officer and Xiao Wei a ride on the bikes. But I overdid my confidence. ‘Can I film Chris signing the statement?’ I asked. Xiao Wei blushed again, as if it were an inappropriate question, but translated my request to the arresting officer.

  The atmosphere changed immediately. He slammed his fist on the table. I was acutely aware of his glare and a supremely stubble-free face. Xiao Wei tried to fall in line with the seriousness of the situation but failed. She just couldn’t suppress her giggle and curiosity. I realised my mistake and tried to look appropriately intimidated.

  The officer said something to Xiao Wei.

  ‘Did you see the Olympics?’ she translated.

  ‘No, we were in the Gobi and missed the whole thing, actually.’

  She translated my response for the benefit of the policeman and then handballed his response back to us. ‘He said maybe then you do not love your country.’

  When we were done with paperwork, it was dark outside and I was getting hungry. All that was left, it seemed, was saying sorry and goodbye. Xiao Wei read out the final details of our crime: ‘This says that you have broken the Chinese law Section forty-six for riding through a closed town and for riding in China. For this you must pay … five hundred Yuan. If you agree with this then please sign here. If you disagree you can take the matter to court.’

  ‘Shiiit! Five hundred Yuan!’ Chris shouted. That was about US$62! On a budget of about four Australian dollars a day, this was mind boggling. In fact, we only had US$150 cash left in total for Beijing and the train to Hong Kong.

  ‘Five hundred Yuan!’ I repeated.

  ‘Yes, and this is only for one person, so together that will be one thousand Yuan.’

  I turned to Chris who had already become a quivering mess. ‘But we just don’t have that kind of money!’ he pleaded.

  ‘So you want that I ask to lower the price? I think also that it is too much,’ Xiao Wei said. She put her arm around the straight-backed officer and whispered into his ear in soft, seductive tones.

  After a lot of haggling, and a point at which I thought she was about to sit on the man’s lap and start kissing him, we agreed on an awful 600 Yuan. It still amounted to US$75, but at least it was less.

  As we stormed out of the building, my joviality felt well and truly squashed. In the carpark the police wanted a ride on the bikes. Of course, now that we had paid the fine, the officer in charge seemed more amenable, although he hinted that his motorbike was by far the superior machine.

  We were taken to a dumpy hotel room opposite the police station and placed under house arrest. Tomorrow, we were to be sent to Beijing on the train, and no more riding would be permitted. The next train out of Houqi didn’t leave until the following evening. Only then would we be given back our passports.

  All was not lost, though. As our friend waved goodbye for the night, she promised to take us on a tour and, if possible, would organise for us to talk to her students.

  When we were finally alone, we flopped exhausted onto hard narrow beds and flicked on the crappy television. The opening ceremony of the Paralympics in Sydney was on. Despite our money woes I found some pleasure in having a shower and lying down on a real bed to vegetate, something I hadn’t done for a long time.

  ‘At least it’s a nice prison cell,’ Chris mumbled, dejectedly.

  ‘Yeah, and let’s just make sure we make the most of our ‘tour’ tomorrow. It was a bloody expensive ticket!’ I said.

  It seemed incredible that we were only 400 kilometres from Beijing, yet getting there by bike still seemed uncertain! I reflected that there had been many times when we could have or should have given up: the desert, the snow, the BAM railway: just getting the trip off the ground had seemed improbable. Then again maybe that was just the nature of adventure: uncertainty is relentless and it’s never easy. It kept us on our toes. There was never a moment to take for granted; the whole journey could be thwarted at any given time. Perhaps that was why the sunset at the end of a day’s ride always felt like the equivalent of gulping down ice-cream after a meal of vegetables. The constant challenge made moments of reward exquisite.

  I awoke early in the morning feeling hungry. The police didn’t turn up until midday, by which time Chris and I had resorted to soaking semolina with hot water from the tap; it was like eating spoonfuls of warm, lumpy sand.

  After a real meal in a nearby restaurant, closely guarded by our police escort, Xiao Wei took us on a tour of the
town. I jumped at the offer, but Chris was keen to have some time alone. For me, the real purpose of the tour wasn’t sightseeing but buying food supplies. Although we were supposed to take the train to Beijing, Chris and I had no intention of doing so. Somehow I had to convince our escort that we needed five loaves of bread, four tins of fish, two and a half kilograms of biscuits, eight packets of noodles and some breakfast cereal just for the train ride. Both women were dubious, but asked no questions. What’s more, with a guide and interpreter I was certain not to get ripped off.

  When the time to leave Houqi came, I felt disappointed and a little sad. There hadn’t been time to talk to the English students, but every moment spent with Xiao Wei had been a joy. Despite Chinese regulations, she had offered us the warmth that had characterised our Russian experience. In her presence, I swelled with optimism.

  Consequently, I wasn’t terribly upset when the police realised that they had forgotten to bring our passports. Much to their embarrassment we missed the train. The next service wasn’t scheduled for another twenty-four hours.

  As we trundled back to our cell, I talked with Xiao Wei, who seemed just as relieved. I was more than happy to spend more time with her, especially if it meant visiting the school.

  ‘So maybe you can come to school tomorrow,’ she said, with a contagious smile.

  The next morning our escort failed to show again. As time passed I began to worry. I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to talk to the students.

  By midday, starving and fuming mad, I decided to break out. I crossed the courtyard and strode into the police station. On the stairs I ran into the policewoman who had been assigned the task of escort. When she saw me, she looked as if to say, ‘Not you again!’ Five minutes later Xiao Wei came running into the building. Then we all walked back to the hotel.

  After packing our bikes, we set off through the congested traffic. Behind us the policewoman struggled to keep up on her own bike. I turned to see her chubby face reddening as she panted heavily. In front of us two officers on motorbikes led the way with Xiao Wei. It was a windy day and dust clouds rushed through the town, scattering litter. I had attached the video camera to my bike with hose clamps and discreetly pressed the record button. Part way down the main street I stopped to adjust the angle of the camera. When I looked up again Chris and the motorbikes were nowhere to be seen, and the policewoman had fallen hopelessly behind. Before a crowd could gather, I took off.