What were the most memorable parts of our trips to China?

Well I have to say the most memorable part of our trips to China have been getting out and meeting the locals.

Grabbing a hotel card (with details in Chinese and English - just in case you get lost), a local map, and a camera and getting out amongst the daily life. Don't take too much stuff with you - you don't want to make yourself a 'target' - just what you can easily manage. Don't forget your sense of adventure and your sense of direction.

It helps to have a few words of Chinese or a good phrase book. In the provincial cities we visited we found that English was variably spoken in the hotel (ie a few staff had very good English, some had passable English and the lower level staff very little) but usually vary rarely spoken outside the hotel - so knowing a few words of Chinese gets you a long way.

Getting out and about gives you a glimpse of day to day life in China and you can make some really interesting discoveries.

For instance in Chengdu, Chongqing and Fuling I found some great local shops in the pedestrian subways that went for miles - the same products as in the Dept store next to our hotel but half the price.

You get to interact with the locals. Sometimes they will just stop and stare or they may walk past and giggle or they might stop and try and strike up a conversation with you (particularly if they have studied some English and want to practice).

Sometimes they will stand back en masse but then something will give and you are inundated with people. For instance in Chongqing there are young people handing out advertising on business card size pieces of card - these people are everywhere, trusting the cards into the hands of locals. On our first trip and first street promenade we were given a wide berth, until one young boy trust a card at me and said 'hello' and responded with a 'ni hao' and then it was on for young and old - every street card provider wanted to give us theirs and say 'hello' or 'ni hao' - my husband and I got a stack each over 3 inches high - all absolutely useless to us (they were for local phone companies and travel agents as far as I could tell). But it did give us a priceless memory.

When walking with my daughter in Chengdu we saw some very interesting street life - people selling little tortoises (I tell myself they were pets but I think they were for eating), origami insects made out of bamboo leaves and my daughter's favourite - the man standing on his head on the street corner. She spoke about him for weeks afterwards - what was he doing, why was he doing it, is he still there? I marvelled at the fact that he narrowly missed having someone spit in his face (not that they intended to but there is still a large amount of expectorating that occurs in the street).

In Fuling I just got out and wandered around the streets - particularly around the orphanage (which will move in 2008) and recorded street life with my camera - the lady selling eggs, the fruit seller, the market stalls, the laundry hanging from a tree. Just anything to capture the memories for when my daughter is older and the orphanage is no longer on that site.

In Chongqing, we were also exposed to some of the less fortunate members of society - people begging in the street. But it was not the 'in your face' aggressive type of begging - for the most part the people look abjectly 'ashamed' of their situation. It was very confronting stuff - destitute women, severely disfigured lepers, amputees. It was very difficult to walk past them and not want to give them some money - but unfortunately they were generally positioned in areas that would have put me at 'risk' if I had pulled out my wallet and started passing money around. They are images that stay with me - definitely not the usual travel memories but they do give an insight into the plight of people in a country with no social security.

It is very easy to want to stay within the safe air conditioned confines of your hotel, where the staff (for the most part speak English) and only venture out with your guide. But miss out on a lot of the experience of really being in China - the sights, the smells and the sounds. But being a little adventurous will yield you with memories you aren't going to find in a guide book.