Danny arrived here Sunday around 9pm and we let him grab a shower and it was straight out to the Cargo club. We met our co-workers there for our 'August Birthday Celebration' being that there are 7 of us August birthdays. It was lots of fun and we were out FAR too late dancing. One odd thing is that they mix Green Tea with all of their beverages there- and the drink of choice was Hennessy and Green Tea. When you get a table at a club here in Beijing they provide you with fruit platters- one after the other- and it is assembled rather ornately. Very classy. They had a fire show and a few professional dancers here at the club. A crazy fun night!
Monday was kind of a wash. We slept most of the day honestly- I took 2 naps! Around 3pm we ventured out for the traditional welcome meal of dumplings at Jill's favorite place. Then we gave Danny a short tour of our neighborhood and off to Carefour for provisions. We've found if we get there before 5pm we can avoid much of the mad rush. The nice part is every time we go to Carefour we discover some new delicious-nous and this time Danny found some yummy flat bread. Which we immediately ate when we got home. Then we watched Anthony Bourdain's No Reservation: China. He spent the first half of the show in Beijing and he ate at this place world famous for it's roast duck. It's suppose to be the best of the best-Li Quin Duck- a hidden gem of one of Beijing's Hutongs (old neighborhoods.) And we took note....then we took another nap....and snacked....and went to bed.
And thus began today- the first day of toursity stuff!
We started out with Beijing's classic- Tian'amen Sqaure! It is the largest outdoor public space in the world! And it is big! But- that's all that can really be said for it. Mao is buried there and you can see his body on display every day 8am-12pm. We got there around 11am and there were at least several THOUSAND people in line- so we're going to have to go back for that. Apparently Mao has a bit of a cult following- and during his time, youth were reported to faint if they heard him speak. That's really all that there is to say about Tian'amen although we did get to pose for pictures with several families. My blonde hair really calls the crowds and at EVERY stop we made today- even dinner- we got to pose for aleast one picture. There are many different approaches. Some people try to SNEAK pictures with us. Others call us and SHOVE their confused children in front of us. Some speak a bit of English and ask kindly if we will pose with their family or friends.
Then on to Forbidden City. Forbidden City is across the road from Tian'amen and AMAZING. It's hard to describe- but the beauty and 'WOW' factor can't really be captured well in pictures. And the reason is that the Forbidden City's WOW is it's size. Not in height- but the hundreds of buildings and amount of sprawling acres is takes up. Most buildings now are used for museums each showcasing something different from the Ming or Qing Dynasty(1406AD-1925AD.) It even has a moat! Even though it is huge, it is fricken' crowded. There are dragons everywhere- and lions- and various other animals with significance (turtle and crane?) carved or cast or placed everywhere. We spent a good 4 hours there and barely even scratched the surface of the grounds. The last area you visit is the garden and this was one of my favorite places. Despite the crowds it had a calm to it. One thing I will say honestly is that I am a little disappointed in how well the grounds aren't kept. When we were in India and went to the Taj Mahal it was SPARKLING clean. But here at the Forbidden City trash was thrown about and much of the grounds did not seem loved. Granted the grounds are HUGE and I can't imagine what the costs would be of maintaining it. But at some points I wished somebody had LOVED it a little more. It really is an impressive monument to power and to the emperor. He had his own bridge into every courtyard that only he could walk on. There is this one giant slab of carved stone on one of these bridges that was so large they had to move it to the City in winter and only by pouring water on the road and sliding it on the ice.
We then went to the Jingshan Park which backs up behind Forbidden City. It has an artificial hill and allows you a full view of the Forbidden City. We raced up the stairs like crazy people- it was a definite calf burner hike. The Hill was created from all the dirt that they excavated to form the moat the wraps around the entire Forbidden City and had to be dragged up there using animals and man power. At top is a pagoda temple with a giant Buddha. The wind blows and you can see a great panorama of the entire city except for the damn smog. It really limited the view. But the breeze was nice and what we could see was beautiful. We stayed awhile before marching back down the hill and on to see the animatronic dinosaur show. It was SUPER RANDOM- and hilariously awesome. We had not eaten since breakfast and hailed a cab to go to the Li Quin duck place- but our cab driver didn't know where that was. So we decided to go to FOOD STREET!!
Ah- Food Street. Well this is the place where you can come to eat any freaky-deaky, weird, gross food you may have ever been curious of. Scorpion? Check! Bee Larvae? Check! Sheep Penis? You betcha! Now- I'm a bit squeemish when it comes to food stuff- so I was not the adventurous one. But Jill and Danny were ready to dive right in. So, Jill started out with some wok-fried starfish. It smelled like seaweed and death to me. But she champed through it and ate the whole thing! Then Jill and I got H20 and sugar glazed fruit on a stick. Delicious! Then Jill called Danny out- so he bought fried and sauced snake. It didn't look too bad- so I got brave- and I tried some! It really had very little taste- but a pretty terrible texture. It was fatty and chewy and fell apart into little bits. Blech. Then they bought what they thought were Banana balls- but had mayo in them- and were sprinkled with dried fish pieces. This one I sat out for. And they quickly threw them away after some hilarious faces! Then Danny and Jill decided to split a centipede. Which they actually liked! Very crunchy!
Then back into a cab and off to Li Quin Duck Place. I broke my vegetarianism ::gasp:: and ate the WORLD FAMOUS duck. IT WAS AMAZING. Now Li Quin is tucked into an old Hutong. There are 3 ducks spray painted on a wall and an arrow- that is their sign. We went in and they tucked us into a small room. We ordered the dinner for 3-4 people and they quickly brought us our Duck. They cut it right in front of you. There is an art form to it. There are a precise number of cuts that will be made on each duck. You then wrap it in a pancake, sauce it up, add your own fixins (cucumbers and onions for me!) and chow down on it. DELICIOUS! And really helped settle my stomach after the snake! It came with LOTS of yummy vegetable sides. Eggplant & green peppers in sauce (my favorite!), salted cashews, butter sauced broccoli, shitakes & snap peas, and cellophane noodles. We met an American tour guide who graduated from VCU and does tour guide work. He speaks Chinese very well and taught us a good (dirty) phrase! We got his card and talked about a possible trip to Tibet! He had so much energy and is so well traveled that he knew everything about EVERYTHING! Even a funny curse written above a toilet in Li Quin's!
We wandered out of the Hutong and eventually found our way back to the metro. We just got home and I feel pleasantly exhausted. Also slightly bummed that we have to go to work tomorrow.
I'm going to try and throw some pictures on here- which I hope will be successful!
I LOVE LOVE LOVE you guys! And hope this tempts you to get your butts over here!!!!!!!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment