Blocked roads, fetid quilts and smelly feet

Although traveling on a sleeper bus can entail risks, the business continues to thrive for a number of reasons, mainly fiscal.

Ma Hui, 26, who traveled on sleeper buses from her home in the Ili Kazak autonomous prefecture, in the far west of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, to the capital Urumqi, around 20 times from 2004 to 2008, complained about the poor conditions. "The carriage always stinks of feet," she said. "At first, we could at least open the windows, but later the old buses were exchanged for fully enclosed air conditioned vehicles."

She said that safety concerns mean few female passengers ride the bus: the beds are so close to each other that one's hand is likely to stray onto someone else's bed if you move in your sleep. "The quilts smell, too. I didn't use them during the summer, but it's so cold in winter, especially if your bed is next to the window, when the outside temperature can fall as low as minus 30 C."