3 comments about China by Rail.

1. For a travel guide, I rate this book 5 stars. A book on China Rail, it's not! There's 1 chapter on the history of Railways in China but no photos of trains. I was looking for a book on "China Rail" and found this.

   Well laid out with Rail Maps showing different sections of the country and then the chapters following give the "travel guide" for that section. The usual "where to go, what to do and see" stuff.

   A more appropriate title should have been "Traveling China by Rail" It's misleading for someone looking for a railroad book.




2. Pretty shallow book. Not good for railfan or travellers. For travellers, one can find much better information some where else. For railfans, it is more disappointing. I don't recommend this book.



3. This was an excellent little book that I used on my first trip to China, it is compact and full of useful information about buying tickets and the idiosyncracies of rail travel in China. It doesn't contain as much tourist information as the bigger guide books but does give the traveller all the information that is needed get to get anywhere in China by rail. I used this book to travel by rail from HongKong to Guilin, Kunming, Dali,Chengdu, Xian and Beijing. Obviously the new rail route to Tibet had not been built when this edition was published so a revised edition would be a useful guide

No comments about Berlitz Beijing Pocket Guide (Berlitz Pocket Guides).

5 comments about Lonely Planet Beijing (Beijing (Lonely Planet), 3rd ed).

1. I found the 2000 version of this guide to be indispensable on a recent trip.

   Beijing is a city with an incredible amount of things to do and thanks to this guide I was able to get around with ease. The information on attractions was accurate and detailed. For instance it tells you exactly which window sells Forbidden City admission tickets, the exact corner where you can catch a bus to the Badaling Great Wall etc... In addition it had some great recommendations such as the Lao She Tea House.

   The maps in this guide were not very detailed but were adequate as long as you stuck to the major streets and attractions. One thing the maps have going for them is that major street and places of interest are labeled with Chinese characters, making communication with Taxi drivers a lot easier.

   The description of the airport shuttle bus routes is confusing - it could have been so much easier had they drawn the bus route on the map.

   The restaurant recommendations are lame and inaccurate and a couple of the hotels that it mentions were already out of business.

   Despite some shortcoming, I would rate it as one of the better LP guides that I have used.




2. As a fan of LP I was very dissapointed in this book. It seems like the person who wrote this book has been living in China for a while and is not particularly interested in seeing the sites around town. There were plenty of places to eat, stay and party, but not a lot about the amazing things to see in Beijing.
   For examply it had good instructions on how to get to the summer palace, but no info on what you were looking at once you were there, compared to Egypt guide (for example) where you could happily wander around a temple and happily feel that you don't need a tour guide to tell you anything, the Beijing guide had a paragraph or two saying this building and that building are nice.
   Also very dissapointing was the history section, As the capital city of a coutry with so much history, old and new, I think that it deserved more than 3 pages.



3. Many of the things that I tried to do in Beijing failed because the book was inaccurate. Because there has been a lot of construction and renovation in the city since this book was published in January 2001, Lonely Planet's Beijing is already out of date.



4. I returned from Beijing last week after spending about 2 weeks in the city. I had and used the Lonely Planet Beijing guidebook extensively. It was at least partially wrong about almost everything. Museums, resteraunts, and other things it recommended were closed. Every phone number was wrong. The guidebook lacked useful information about how to get places, how to orient self, and hours of an establishment. Also, the guidebook was judgmental. I think it is the worst guidebook I've ever used.



5. In general, I consider Lonely Planet (LP) as one of the best publishers which excels in thick, detailed guide books that describes in "text" the best attributes of a city or country. LP is not a book with pretty tourist stock photos. If you want pretty pictures, I recommend the Insight Guides which have at least 1 per page. After looking at a half dozen Beijing (BJ) city guides, this book excels again in describing Zhongguancun, where others fail.

   Zhongguancun, (Zgc) is like a Chinese Silicon Valley, or computer business development area near Beijing and Qinghua Universities (p149-50) in the older 3rd edition. Zgc is an important hi-tech area for tycoons, business, and consumers alike to find computers and software localized for China. It is located in the Haidian District, NW Beijing, near Haidian Rd and Zgc Rd following the 4th Ring Rd, far outside the Metro ring. Zgc is just south of the Old Summer Palace area. This area is probably best accessible by bicycle, taxi, light rail, and bus. It is about 4 miles (6km) NW of the northwestern-most metro ring station at Xizhimen. Zgc is listed in the index.

   In the Insight Guide (p198), I saw a Zizhimen light rail stop about 1 mile away from Zgc.

   LP/BJ 3rd ed (0-86442-547-3), also has a two maps to get a good view of Zgc and the downtown districts, Map 3 for overall Beijing and 10 for the Haidian district. Map 10 also shows the Zgc bus stop with nearby hotels, restaurants, internet cafe, brewery, and universities. This edition has 11 maps.

   However in LP/BJ 4th ed (1-86450-144-8), Zgc is still listed (p53). Zgc is lost in the maps with only 7 maps, ersatz replaced with 20 pages of pretty stock tourist pictures. I believe LP's editors have stepped in the wrong direction here. Lets hope that they get it right before the 08 Olympics. I read this in the local library.

   I noticed that LP/BJ 5th ed (1740592816), with a new author is scheduled to be released this month, 10/02.

2 comments about Let's Go Map Guide Hong Kong (2nd Ed) (Let's Go Map Guide Hong Kong).

1. The actual map is incomplete and presented in awkward segments, so it's not really useful as a map.



2. If you are planning to live in Hong Kong for the next three years do not count on this map guide to help you get around. It shows only very limited, touristy portions of the SAR. I deem it a total waste of money.

No comments about The Red Sea and the Arabian Gulf (Seas and Oceans (Austin, Tex.).).

1 comments about Silk Route by Rail (World Rail Guides).

1. This book provides you with the essential resources for planning a trip along the silk route (via Moscow though, which is not orginally on the silk route !) and comes with tips, hotel address (some phone numbers are outdated though) and city plans. I have used it for planning my own trip.

No comments about Many Paths: Searching for old Tibet in new China.

5 comments about Sky Burial: An Eyewitness Account of China's Brutal Crackdown in Tibet.

1. i recomend this book to everyone and if you are a tibetan you must read it. this is one of the best books i have read on tibet and it gives you a very vivid picture of the october 1,1987 uprising in Lahsa and the events that followed. it inspired me and it reminded me as a tibetan that there are thousands of tibetans right now as we go about our daily lives, that are imprisoned and being tortured mercilessly in a dark, damp cell in some corner of tibet. it reminded me that i have a responsibility as a tibetan towards the freedom of tibet. i constantly sobbed throughout the book as i learned more and more how the chinese relentlessy killed tibetans and tortured them with cattle prods, riffle butts, electric batons and all kinds of horrifying instruments. the book also includes numerous interviews with tibetan refugees who have escaped the tyranny of the red star. Blake Kerr later travels to Dharamsala and meets the Dalai Lama. the book is very well written and i enjoyed reading it and the scant humur used in it. go read it...



2. Add this book to Tears of Blood By Mary Craig and In Exile From the Land of Snows by John Avedon and Whispered Prayers by Steven Harrison. It is important to understand the brutal nature of China and what buying the "Made in China" label supports in both the government and those who control manufacturing and trade. Read, understand and act. This and other books will break your heart that the U.S. wants to become a business partner with the horror that is the government of China.



3. I'm from Brazil, and here we have only few notices about the situation in Tibet. It's not easy to me to read in english, but it's the only way to be aware of the terrible situation on Tibet. Sky Burial is one of these books that bring us some conscience and desire to make something to help those people and that country. Since I read this excellent book , I don't buy chinese goods anymore and I do the possible to talk about the tibetans reality with my family and my friends. We, all the people of the world must help Tibet from the chinese hands, before it's to late.



4. This book brought me to tears. As an activist for the Tibetan cause, I thought I knew how bad things were there, then I read this book. It is fantastically written and includes photographs of China's atrocities in Tibet.

   This book is the journey of a man. We watch him go from being a simple tourist and climber to being a doctor and a witness while being present at one of Tibet's largest recorded protests.

   Anyone who cares about human rights should read this book




5. I shared the same feeling when I read the bood, but when I went to Tibet by chance, I found so many lies in book. Tibet is a nice place, and most local people there regard Tibet as a China's province. Those people want Tibet's independence are just a small population, and creating all kinds of lies to get sympathies from all over the world.

No comments about Buried Treasures of Chinese Turkestan (Oxford in Asia Paperbacks).

No comments about Narrative of a Mission to Bokhara, in the Years 1843 - 1845: To Ascertain the Fate of Colonel Stoddart and Captain Conolly.