Off to Beijing!

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We're on the last leg of our journey now, we've finally landed in Beijing; it's a bittersweet realization.
This morning, we took a short trip to the city wall around Xi'an that once protected it from invading tribes and warring territories. Several of us rode tandem bikes around the eight mile wall, and a few of us got to see a really wonderful, short performance by local citizens about a war and the community's celebration after coming out victorious. After the wall, we walked around the city square and did a bit more shopping and eating before the hour drive to the airport.
This evening, we got to Beijing, unloaded our belongings at the Rainbow Hotel, and had dinner at the Yinchun Rice Congee Cafe. So far, our experience with congee has been a mostly unpalatable, soupy, bland porridge served with breakfast, so we weren't too excited about the meal. However, tonight, we had a much thicker, far more flavorful congee accompanied by a large dinner of both old favorites and new, strange dishes.
Probably the most unexpected dish on the table was the pork and walnut gelatin blocks, and it's just what it sounds like, too; a lightly flavored gelatin block with walnuts, pork meat, and pork fat sunk to the bottom of each piece. What was strange about it was that it wasn't that bad. I actually enjoyed the flavor, the walnuts in China are almost always perfect and the pork is typically fabulous, but the texture was what threw me off. Stranger still, it wasn't the very firm gelatin, but the small chunks of pork fat, that made me cringe upon biting into them. I suppose it was because the rest of the block was all of a similar firmness, but the sudden creaminess and melt-in-your-mouth texture of the fat just wasn't a pleasant experience next to the firm gelatin, fresh walnut, and tender pork that made up the rest of the piece. Still, I felt the gelatin mold offered a much more palatable alternative to the bitter melon and egg yolk roll, although the table was split on which one was better.
Tomorrow, we will go to Tian-men square, the Forbidden City, and the Imperial Palace Museum, undeterred by the gigantic, neon plush flower our local tour guide insists on leading us about with.

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