I knew that I was going to be off Facebook in China but had no idea that there woiuld be a problem with twitter and blogger as well, that's why I've been away for a while.

But now thanks to a friend, Tony, giving me access to a VPN (virtual private network) I can get around the firewall that they have set up over here.

Tibet was a good fun, accessibility wasn't fantastic but luckily I ended up with a really decent group of people who helped me out with getting into the monasteries that we went to in each place we stopped. Got to stop and take a look at Mount Everest as we were driving through the Himalayas which was an awesome sight, not as big as I expected though.

As we were driving through the Himalayas I was reading Paulo Coelho 'The Alchemist' thinking 'Was this book written for me to read right now?', amazing book that I think everyone should read before they do a journey like this.

Also got convinced to go and find work in Australia, it sounds like it would be a good way to spend a year or so.

When I say convinced, it was little more than a suggestion that I needed to hear and is something that I'll look into a bit more when I get back home.

The train journey to Shanghai was relatively accessible with the only time I needed to get out of my chair was getting into my room to break it down for the night, 2 days of relatively easy travel.

Since getting to Shanghai things have been going well. The weather isn't as warm as I'd like it to be (about 6 deg C) but it's a lot warmer than parts of Asia right now. I'm hoping that by the time it takes me to get to Beijing it will have warmed up considerably.

My host Sujata (a friend of Valerie from the CRP) has been so helpful since I got here, helping me make contacts and organise a fund raiser on Saturday at the Shanging Loft. All welcome.

I picked up my new footplate from the British High Commission yesterday after it was posted there, so just as this one looks as if it's about to fall off it gets replaced. Almost fate-like.

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Readers who submit articles must agree to our terms of use. The content is the sole responsibility of the contributor and is unmoderated. But we will react if anything that breaks the rules comes to our attention. If you wish to complain about this article, contact us here