Speaking the Language ...
After more than a decade of experience in China, I got seriously annoyed with myself for still only speaking rudimentary Chinese. For a westerner, the language is just impossible to pick up by simply being in the country. So I studied Chinese at Lanzhou University (a beginner’s semester, during the Sars-spring of 2003) and Yunnan Normal University in Kunming (for two years in 2006 and 2007), in China’s northwest and southwest respectively.
Just have to travel ...
My urge to travel must be innate. Some of my earliest memories are of weekend train rides when I was four. These rides were great, and getting off the train felt bad. I always wanted to continue to the unknown places the train was going to.I bought my first week long valid national rail pass as soon as I qualified at the age of fifteen, and my first one month European rail pass when I qualified at eighteen.
I picked up a masters degree in Dutch literature – I am from Holland. But during my studies I travelled ever longer and ever further.
About Pieter Neele
Soon after graduating I landed in China for the first time as a backpacker. This is now twenty years ago.
I have kept returning ever since, fascinated both by China’s
fast paced development as well as its people and culture that
remain unchanged in many ways. A few more trips as an
independent traveler provided me with enough of a resumé to
become a tour leader in 1993. By now I have guided almost a
hundred group tours, most of them in China, Tibet and Indochina,
and most of them for
Baobab
Reizen, a long established and reputable Dutch tour
operator.
Exploring China's West ...
Using Kunming as a base, I now explore the western provinces of Yunnan, Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai. I advise tour operators and I continue to guide tours.