Slag, Coal Dust, and CabbagesSlag, Coal Dust, and Cabbages

Curious and friendly passengers in smoke-filled, hard class sleeping cars; Communist Party VIPs, coal miners, and peanut farmers. Gritty steel mills, vast open pit coal mines, and railway repair shops. A mayor's banquet where the toasts never end, and the only nightclub in remote Reshui, Inner Mongolia. Thom encounters these and much more as he travels far from Beijing through China's Workers' Paradise , with like-minded companions in search of the country's last steam locomotives. On 13 journeys between 1995 and 2007, his quest carries him 29,385 miles on nearly a hundred trains of all classes and cleanliness. Along the way, he and his mates tread closed areas and other sites where Westerners are unwelcome, resulting in hours of police interrogation. Thom's experiences are interwoven with the history of Manchuria, Mao Zedong's era, and the nation's recent rapid growth. Join him in this different, intimate look at China which tourists never see.