hi everybody!!
as most of you know our experience in asia is soon coming to an end. we have a few months left and we're trying to squeeze as much as we can in the remaining time that weve got here. weve recently taken a trip to mainland china and returned this week. i previoulsy summed up out trip with the following statement; ive walked the paths of emperors, and climbed the heights of the great wall, twice. 'ting bu dong' is a great phrase to know when faced with a train full of chatty chinese dudes. people in china spit loogies, waitresses in beijing arent friendly, babies wear crotchless pants, and tour guides love wasting your time at factories.
but here are some pictures and a little more detail about what weve seen and done in the most heavily populated country that hosted the 2008 olympics and may someday own the united states...enjoy:)
Day 1
after arriving at the airport in Beijing, we were greeted by our tour guide that would drive us around Beijing for the next 3 days and give us an overview of the 6000 year history behind china and its wonders. Peter is a 29 year old, english speaking chinese tour guide who hastily walked us through our itinerary only to waste our time at stupid factories in order to earn a comission off of anything we might purchase. after dropping us off at our hotel to get settled for the night, Peter left us all alone with little information about what we could do for the remainder of the evening. needless to say we were on our own in a foreign country yet again and know idea where to go. so we started walking. we saw some bulidings, saw some shops, got lost in a hutong (a hutong is a traditional neighborhood in beijing where 10 families share one square courtyard containing so many single-level houses and one bathroom for all to share) where recieved many cold stares and "you dont belong here" looks. finally hitting a main strip of numerous restaraunts, we decided to pick one at random. we ordered rice, vegetables, pork and some part of chicken (as to what part of the chicken; she thinks it was kidney, i dont know what the hell it was, but it didnt feel good biting into it). after feasting on unknown meats and dealing with rude waitresses and an impatient serving staff we headed back to our hotel to retire for the night.
H1N1 ninjas
plague
our hotel in beijing
erin loungin in the room
i want to know who tipped them off as to what we were up to...
our chicken(?) dinner
Day 2
day 2 consisted of a history lesson regarding the many dynasties of china and the relevancy of the forbidden palace within those dynasties. our first stop was the forbidden city. an enormous palace in beijing that was, for thousands of years, only inhabited by emperors and those close to him. its pretty much what you think it is, a lot of ancient architecture and hundreds of rooms and buildings (some open to the public, others are not). after exiting the palace you come out across the street from tiananmen square. not knowing at the time, and only as recently as a few days ago researching and finding out the importance of this area, this area is not only where the government buildings, the tomb of the founder of todays china, and the president of china are located, but it is also the setting for one of the most infamous protests in world history. the tiananmen square incident in 1989 went down in world history, portraying some of the most famous images (tank man) of the century. because the chinese comunist government has complete control over how people think and what they believe, Peter never mentioned a thing about the history behind where we were (because the government denies the incident altogether and any mention of it can result in arrest). so after briefly checking out the area and snapping a few photos, again we were off. this is when peter decided to waste our time and take us on an exciting adventure to...a silk factory. why do we care how silk is made? i didnt. and i still dont. but he forced us to stay there for about an hour or more so he could earn commission off of the 2 dollar scarf erin bought, weasel. WTF. after ending the tour peter found some stuff for us to do that night after he dropped us off at our hotel. we went to a couple tradtional chinese theatre shows. we saw some acrobats and a pretty cool kung fu show where i bought some nunchuks. after the show we hailed a taxi and retired back to the hotel for the night.
peking duck
chef slicing up our duck
kung fu show
acrobat show
erin drinking chinese beer at the show
tallest building in beijing
crazy architecture
stretching silk to make a blanket, i think.
silk being made
silk worms
at the temple of heaven
erin and peter
erin:taiwanese pose
talking to a wall
listening to a wall
temple of heaven
old people dancing, notice the woman that looks like Mario
monument to farmer uprising; tiananmen square
erin at tiananmen square
temple of heaven
tiananmen square; looking at forbidden city
us!
tiananmen square
forbidden palace buildings
tiananmen square
forbidden city
inside the city
emperors office
forbidden building
emperors quarters
corridor
temple inside forbidden city
temple atop coral reef brought from the oceans
outside forbidden palace
the emperor forced the trees to bind so he could have a love tree
gate to forbidden city
as most of you know our experience in asia is soon coming to an end. we have a few months left and we're trying to squeeze as much as we can in the remaining time that weve got here. weve recently taken a trip to mainland china and returned this week. i previoulsy summed up out trip with the following statement; ive walked the paths of emperors, and climbed the heights of the great wall, twice. 'ting bu dong' is a great phrase to know when faced with a train full of chatty chinese dudes. people in china spit loogies, waitresses in beijing arent friendly, babies wear crotchless pants, and tour guides love wasting your time at factories.
but here are some pictures and a little more detail about what weve seen and done in the most heavily populated country that hosted the 2008 olympics and may someday own the united states...enjoy:)
Day 1
after arriving at the airport in Beijing, we were greeted by our tour guide that would drive us around Beijing for the next 3 days and give us an overview of the 6000 year history behind china and its wonders. Peter is a 29 year old, english speaking chinese tour guide who hastily walked us through our itinerary only to waste our time at stupid factories in order to earn a comission off of anything we might purchase. after dropping us off at our hotel to get settled for the night, Peter left us all alone with little information about what we could do for the remainder of the evening. needless to say we were on our own in a foreign country yet again and know idea where to go. so we started walking. we saw some bulidings, saw some shops, got lost in a hutong (a hutong is a traditional neighborhood in beijing where 10 families share one square courtyard containing so many single-level houses and one bathroom for all to share) where recieved many cold stares and "you dont belong here" looks. finally hitting a main strip of numerous restaraunts, we decided to pick one at random. we ordered rice, vegetables, pork and some part of chicken (as to what part of the chicken; she thinks it was kidney, i dont know what the hell it was, but it didnt feel good biting into it). after feasting on unknown meats and dealing with rude waitresses and an impatient serving staff we headed back to our hotel to retire for the night.
H1N1 ninjas
plague
our hotel in beijing
erin loungin in the room
i want to know who tipped them off as to what we were up to...
our chicken(?) dinnerDay 2
day 2 consisted of a history lesson regarding the many dynasties of china and the relevancy of the forbidden palace within those dynasties. our first stop was the forbidden city. an enormous palace in beijing that was, for thousands of years, only inhabited by emperors and those close to him. its pretty much what you think it is, a lot of ancient architecture and hundreds of rooms and buildings (some open to the public, others are not). after exiting the palace you come out across the street from tiananmen square. not knowing at the time, and only as recently as a few days ago researching and finding out the importance of this area, this area is not only where the government buildings, the tomb of the founder of todays china, and the president of china are located, but it is also the setting for one of the most infamous protests in world history. the tiananmen square incident in 1989 went down in world history, portraying some of the most famous images (tank man) of the century. because the chinese comunist government has complete control over how people think and what they believe, Peter never mentioned a thing about the history behind where we were (because the government denies the incident altogether and any mention of it can result in arrest). so after briefly checking out the area and snapping a few photos, again we were off. this is when peter decided to waste our time and take us on an exciting adventure to...a silk factory. why do we care how silk is made? i didnt. and i still dont. but he forced us to stay there for about an hour or more so he could earn commission off of the 2 dollar scarf erin bought, weasel. WTF. after ending the tour peter found some stuff for us to do that night after he dropped us off at our hotel. we went to a couple tradtional chinese theatre shows. we saw some acrobats and a pretty cool kung fu show where i bought some nunchuks. after the show we hailed a taxi and retired back to the hotel for the night.
peking duck
chef slicing up our duck
kung fu show
acrobat show
erin drinking chinese beer at the show
tallest building in beijing
crazy architecture
stretching silk to make a blanket, i think.
silk being made
silk worms
at the temple of heaven
erin and peter
erin:taiwanese pose
talking to a wall
listening to a wall
temple of heaven
old people dancing, notice the woman that looks like Mario
monument to farmer uprising; tiananmen square
erin at tiananmen square
temple of heaven
tiananmen square; looking at forbidden city
us!
tiananmen square
forbidden palace buildings
tiananmen square
forbidden city
inside the city
emperors office
forbidden building
emperors quarters
corridor
temple inside forbidden city
temple atop coral reef brought from the oceans
outside forbidden palace
the emperor forced the trees to bind so he could have a love tree
gate to forbidden city
No comments:
Post a Comment