Book description
When she learnt that the Chinese had built enough new roads to circle
the equator sixteen times, Polly Evans decided to go and witness for
herself the way this vast nation was hurtling into the technological
age. But on arriving in China she found the building work wasn't quite finished.
Squeezed up against Buddhist monks, squawking chickens and on one
happy occasion a soldier named Hero, Polly clattered along pot-holed
tracks from the snow-capped mountains of Shangri-La to the
bear-infested jungles of the south. She braved encounters with a
sadistic masseur, a ridiculously flexible kung-fu teacher, and a
terrified child who screamed at the sight of her.
In quieter moments, Polly contemplated China's long and colourful
history - the seven-foot-tall eunuch commander who sailed the globe in
search of treasure; the empress that chopped off her rivals' hands and
feet and boiled them to make soup - and pondered the bizarre traits of
the modern mandarins. And, as she travelled, she attempted to solve
the ultimate gastronomic conundrum: just how does one eat a soft-fried
egg with chopsticks?
POLLY EVANS is very cowardly and not at all fond of danger. She
does, however, have an unfortunate tendency to seek out discomfort and
sometimes even downright pain. It was this ugly trait that led her
five years ago to throw in her comfortable office job - complete with
its twizzly chair and free use of the coffee machine - and to take off
on a leg-battering bicycle tour of Spain.
The result of her endeavours was one very sore set of limbs and her
first book, It's Not About the Tapas, which was short-listed
for the WHSmith People's Choice Travel Writing award. She indulged in
further escapades the following year, this time swapping pedal-power
for a motorbike to travel around New Zealand and to write her second
book, Kiwis Might Fly. Polly's third book, Fried Eggs with
Chopsticks, tells the story of her sometimes-desperate battle to
tour China by public transport while On a Hoof and a Prayer
sees her learning to ride horses in Argentina.
Polly is also an award-winning journalist. When she's not on the
road, Polly lives in London.
