The young couple come into the carriage then. They do the stare for a few seconds. The one which is so different here, benign. They sit and proclaim "Hello" and look proud. I retort with my "Ni hoa" and we all laugh, suspecting we have exhausted our respective vocabularies. China is on the other side of the world. They explained it all at school. It is the opposite of where you are, no matter how big the spade you dig with, China is exactly where you are not.

Only, I am. China is now a metre away and offering me chewing gum. I take it and offer some of my own. A cultural bridge supported by Wrigley's gum. Their attention turns to my still open guide. I offer it and they spend five minutes giggling at the no doubt wild inaccuracies of the language pages. They look reluctant to leave as their destination approaches. I think I will like China. In the realms unreachable by the spade of any British school boy I am relaxed.

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