Fushiki to Beijing - Grounded: A Down to Earth Journey Around the World - page 48

and screams, while the screen flashes some Japanese characters that I assume say “Game over! Let's all try
harder not to occasion mass casualties!”
THE typhoon has passed. According to Rebecca's evaluation of multiple online weather radars, the next
couple of days ought to be clear sailing. We figure we'd better seize our chance to catch a ferry back to
mainland Asia.
The China Express Line runs a once-a-week ship out of Kobe. The passage takes two days and ends at a
spot on the Chinese coast about a hundred miles southeast of Beijing. Using the English-language page on
the company's website, we book ourselves into a private cabin, having learned our lesson about the perils
of shipboard group accommodations from our Estonian ferry's room of despair.
Who takes the ferry from Kobe to China? The practical reason to travel over water is usually that you're
bringing something heavy with you (e.g., a car—or multiple cars, as those Russian guys were doing on the
Fushiki-Vladivostok run). But this particular route may be the rare case where it's actually cheaper for a
luggageless passenger to go by ship instead of by plane. Airfare between Japan and Beijing is surprisingly
expensive. A family of five or six—and I'm seeing a lot of big families as I look around at the other pas-
sengers waiting in the ferry terminal—could save hundreds of dollars by opting for the slow boat to China.
Our ferry, called the Yanjing , is roughly the same size and vintage as the Russian ship we took from
Vladivostok. It's infinitely cheerier, though. The staff greet us with wide smiles as we board, and they've
festooned the main deck with red paper lanterns. The Russian ferry was all filthy, threadbare burgundy car-
pets, while the Yanjing is all brightly polished yellow linoleum.
After pulling away from the Kobe pier, the ship threads a path beneath massive suspension bridges and
between the lushly hilled islands in Japan's Inland Sea. At one point, a half-submerged military submarine
creeps up behind us. It approaches close enough that I can see the faces of the Japanese sailors standing on
its small parapet. I snap a few pictures before the sub speeds silently out of sight, leaving barely a ripple of
wake behind it.
We spend the afternoon watching freighters and tankers passing by us in the shipping channel. At pre-
cisely 6:00 p.m., a Chinese woman's gentle voice wafts from the public address system, speaking first in
Mandarin and then in a lilting, inflected English. “Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” she begins. “The
sun has set and the evening is coming. We hope a nice dinner will refresh you from the day's voyage.” Her
tone is so relaxing and her sentiments so soothing, it's like we've checked ourselves onto a floating sanat-
orium.
When we get to the dining room, there are about thirty other passengers already seated, eating the mushy
chicken and gloopy rice that's served cafeteria-style in steam trays. Of these passengers, four are western-
ers. Three sit together at a central table. The fourth—a gaunt, older man with a ponytail and sideburns—eats
alone in the far corner of the room, gazing out the window.
I'd love to be sitting at one of the tables full of Chinese people. They're all multigenerational families,
with adorable kids scurrying under the tables, and tiny infants getting bottle-fed by grandmas. But no one
seems to speak English, and to plop down among a family uninvited would be a bold move—probably
awkward, and possibly unwelcome. We resign ourselves to eating with the trio of whiteys.
They turn out to be friendly, standard-issue backpackers. The outdoorsy Aussie couple is on a three-week
vacation through Asia and is treating this scenic ferry ride as a relatively low-cost alternative to a cruise.
As for the third paleface, a nerdy young Brit, she's just wandering around, fresh out of university. Behind
her wire-rimmed glasses lurks a look of total aimlessness. Her budget ferry ticket grants her a space on one
of the dozens of padded tatami mats laid out neatly on the wooden floor of a lower deck. She tells us the