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Beijing |  Next Day |
Nimen hao!
Hello from Beijing! That’s the capital of China! How did I get here, you might ask? Well, I happened to overhear some folks getting ready to take a trip, and I thought to myself, what better way to see the Dragonlands and visit my first World Wonder, the Great Wall of China?! So I found a proper new hat, snuck into a backpack, and hid there for a long, long, long flight. Did I mention it was a long flight? At least it wasn’t as scary as my first trans-Pacific flight way back when I first came to America!
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China is 15 hours ahead of California, so we landed at five in the morning! As we dragged our jetlagged selves off the plane, our guide from China Discovery Tours appeared and introduced himself as Shine, like Sunshine! I liked his name, though he was a sleepy, sarcastic fellow, who gave us liver and tripe porridge for breakfast and didn’t tell us what it was until we’d taken a few bites. I didn’t feel much like finishing breakfast.
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Apart from this, I learned three things about Beijing right off the bat. Firstly, due to its factories, five million cars, and complete lack of emission regulations, it is a Black-Sneeze City, which means that when you blow your nose, you leave a black mark on your tissue. Secondly, I learned that it is quite customary for people to hawk phlegm onto the sidewalk whenever the inspiration strikes. Thirdly, I learned that the Chinese diaper is a hole in the back of a baby’s pants that lets them squat and do their business on the sidewalk. In short, I had to watch my feet at every step! It’s not the cleanest city, but I wasn’t going to let lung cookies or baby doodies get in the way of adventure!
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Our first stop was the Summer Palace. Built in the mid 18th century by the Qianlong Emperor, it was ransacked and burned twice by French and British troops and by the Boxers during their rebellion. The Empress Dowager Cixi had it rebuilt in 1902, and she used it as a resort for herself and a prison for her nephew. That wasn’t very nice of her…
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The landscaping techniques here were extraordinary! Shine asked us whether we thought a distant pagoda was part of the property or not. I thought that with the wealth of the emperors, it would have been, but I was wrong! The landscape was designed in just such a way as to make the bordering hills seem like part of the palace grounds! This is called jièjǐng, or “borrowing from the surroundings,” which I thought was pretty neat. I didn’t have long to marvel, or even to take a dip in the lake, because the tour moved like the wind! We skipped climbing the famous Longevity Hill to stand in line for a Dragon Boat across the lake to the exit. It was a pretty cool boat, but it felt like we’d just breezed through this UNESCO World Heritage site like it was a city block. This made me quite sad. I needed some flowers.
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I found some at the Bird’s Nest Stadium, built for the 2008 Olympic Games! It looked like an upside-down beaver lodge, which restored some of my cheer! The plaza was massive and full of people selling kites and fake gold medals. When asked whether the stadium was still used for any kind of sporting events, Shine said it was built for one event and is now a monument for tourists. What good is it to built so big a place and never use it again? The stadium in Salt Lake City (2002 Winter Games) is still used for both kinds of football. That puzzled me, but at least the Water Cube (a.k.a. the Beijing National Aquatics Center) still appears to be fully functional. There was some event going on inside, but I didn’t have time to investigate, because Shine had a schedule to keep.
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Shine had to take us to Dr. Tea; that was why we had to rush so much. At first, I thought the former A-Team member had gotten his degree, but no, this was an actual tea house. Here, a nice lady taught us how to properly enjoy oolong tea by slurping and pu’er tea by chewing. However, she warned us not to slurp and chew too much outside a tea house, as it would look ridiculous. Then, as may well have been expected, came the aggressive salesmanship. I usually try to avoid tours in general, but I especially avoid them if they’re going to send me into tourist traps! I very nearly enacted Deadly Art Number Four on the sales lady, but she was so nice lady, I couldn’t bring myself to do it! Instead, I watched the other members of the group get suckered into buying $40 packets of tea! Dr. Tea was clearly a weight loss specialist; the group’s pockets weighed a lot less going out than they did going in!
With a smile on his face, a song in his heart, and a fat commission in his pocket, Shine dropped us off at our hotel, the Jade Palace, which was quite nice, though I was surprised to learn that no one in this 5-star hotel spoke any English. Why would I be surprised, you ask? Every 5-star hotel I’ve visited has had at least someone on staff who could communicate with international guests. Nonetheless, were I to start over, I would put much more time and effort into learning Chinese. In the mean time, this beaver is tired! I’d say it’s about time to jump in bed and flop down like California’s economy.
Wan An!
More 2011 Adventures |
Beijing | Next Day |