Incomparable travel across China

The traveling experience in China is incomparable, food writer Fuchsia Dunlop writes in The Independent, reflecting the country's social changes.

When she first started traveling in China, in the early 1990s, the country's complicated dual currency system and transport system made it virtually impossible to buy a train ticket.

"And if one couldn't secure a 'hard-sleeper' ticket, one might have to face 72 hours in an unnumbered 'hard-seat' carriage, where you would spend all night struggling for a few inches of room in a seething crowd of people," Dunlop said.