http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Asia , China , Beijing , Haidian district en-us Sun, 03 Jan 2010 03:24:58 +0000 Sun, 03 Jan 2010 03:24:58 +0000 What other city in the world can you tour a royal palace eat grasshoppers on a stick and have your own following of paparazzi...all on the same day Ah Beijing. The longer we're here the more this crazy city grows on us As usual we've crammed so much into the past two days it's hard to know where to begin Yesterday was actually a pretty chill day for us. Sherpa's grueling hike left u http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-446339.html A Journey of a Thousand Li Begins from Under Onersquos Feet. LAOZI THE TAO AND ITS VIRTUE C. SIXTH CENTURY B.C.ldquoDo not sneeze cough or form any bodily gesture that may alert the swine http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-442366.html If You Wonrsquot Go into the Tigerrsquos Lair How Can You Catch The Cubs HAN DYNASTY PROVERB 202 B.C. A.D. 220 ldquoNOTHING VENTURED NOTHING GAINED.rdquoAs I wait for my connecting flight beneath the towering canopy of Dubai International Airport I welcome you to my Beijing blog ldquoHe Who Daresrdquo. Accompanied by an overpriced bottle of imported beer and http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-442365.html We arrived at the train station ready for a shower after our wading experience leaving Xirsquoan. All that stood in our way was a taxi ride to the hotel on the northwest side of Beijing. We followed the signs to the longest taxi line I have seen. And of course people were crowding in a large group at the end of the line and then merging into two side by side lines. I was pushy. I learne http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-431572.html Staci and I were planning on going to the vegetarian restaurant last night but as we were headed out the door a fellow teacher came our way and invited us out to dinner with a few others. It's so nice to be here with a big group as it allows us to make friends and experience being in a foreign place with likeminded adventurers.We had a bit over an hour to spare before take off so the two of u http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-428505.html I wish we had pictures but we went to Starbucks today and it was every bit as delicious as I was hoping for. Yes I had a tall mocha frappuccino something that you can say in English anywhere in the world and be understood. For the twenty minutes that we sat inside sipping our drinks I almost forgot we were in a different country. In fact the people closest to us were two men that kept alte http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-428127.html FINALLY a day off from the crazy program. It was amazing. We loaded onto our two Peking University tour buses at 730am and took off for a 2ish hour drive to the Great Wall see Martin's post yesterday. I don't have words for it other than incredible. Our legs are dead. It was a pretty intense climb but we took our time and took many breaks to take pictures and just enjoy the scenery around us. http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-427323.html Coming to live in China has required us to once again embrace many of the same things we did exactly one year ago today. Staci and I celebrated our first anniversary of marriage yesterday Sunday. Since we are 15 hours ahead the exact moment in time was today but regardless the feat is quite special nonetheless. China has required us to take a deeper look into trust communication love humor http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-427086.html We woke up to the sounds of thunder lightning and fierce rain pounding on the roof. Dreadful. I didn't bring the best dress shoes to wear in the rain and of course don't have a coat. Luckily we have one hideous poncho what poncho ISN'T hideous Martin's nonwaterproof jacket but hey it works and 1 umbrella. We bundled up and headed to school stopping at the bookstore on campus on our way to http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-426450.html Short entry as it's already 730pm and we still have to study and lesson plan Ahhh We started getting evaluated today in our teaching classes which will help determine our placements through the city of Shenzhen say it with me now ShenJen. We also get to fill out a sheet of preferences district age group who we might want to be near a few other things and they'll try to work with us t http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-426141.html Staci It's official. We're the boring old married couple. We just walked back from dinner and passed other program participants drinking beer and smoking cigars without a care in the world. Us We got dinner at the same place we ate the first night we each got a plate of noodles stir fried wbeef and vegetables I didn't eat the meat and a glass of beer. The total expenditure 28 yuan or about http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-425524.html Staci It's been a whirlwind of a few days. After all the sad goodbyes security lines one issue happened right away we started to go through security and then realized that I Staci had somehow left my new raincoat behind. Thinking that I must have left it at our seats I got out of the line talked to a TSA employee and was allowed back out to look but it was gone resulting in a minor freak http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-425290.html Today was interesting I went to the Lama temple which is a place where 70 monks pray and live. I saw possible the most incredible thing of my entire life. There was a statue of Buddha that stood 80 feet tall and was carved from a single piece of Wood. It was an incredible site. Such amazing detail and I really canrsquot describe it in words. I wish I would have been able to take picture http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-418468.html Le Summer Palace Le Palaid d'EtLe palais d't est situ dans le district de Haiding dans la banlieue nordouest de Pkin. Bas sur le lac de Kunming et la colline de la Longvit. C'est le jardin royal le mieux prserv et le plus grand de Chine il fait partie des quatre jardins les plus connus de Chine avec le Village de Montagne de Vacances d't Chengde et les Jardins Liu et Zhuozheng http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-417150.html As planned we went to Summer Palace this morning and we walk a lot to visit different sites in this park. It is also quite hot today so we use lots of H2O. We went to McDonald this morning for a change and it is quite tasty after almost 1 week with Beijing's style food. Around 400 PM we left Summer Palace to go to Temple of Azure Clouds httpen.wikipedia.orgwikiTempleofAzureCloudsDuring http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-413103.html I thought about a usb drive will it work. I have an ipod with all my music from my desktop but its for my iphone and its already been synced with my desktop but im going to sync it to my laptop and i want to keep my songs which i know i cant.Try copying all the files onto a USB drive and put it onto your laptop and then onto your laptop's iTunes. Another thing that you could do is hook up bo http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-396625.html youtube only accepts video.. but you can easily create video with your songpicture with movie maker... This will help you....use windows movie maker included in your windows machine... it can help you make beautiful slideshow or video clipe.g. mixing your songs with picturesvideolyricetc.... then save it as video file such as wmv file format... finally upload.or .. Just get those clips http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-396082.html Today I got the opportunity to participate in a Vietnamese student sport competition in Beijing. It was unbelievable I definitely did not know what to expect when the day started but it was more than I ever imagined. The competition was held at the Beijing Language and Culture University BLCU. At the event there were so many Vietnamese students from all sorts of schools in Beijing. I could n http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-388892.html After Chinese class my friends and I decided to go on an adventure to the Summer Palace. The weather was absolutely gorgeous with very sunny and blue skies. The trip was quite a learning experience as we all had to communicate in so many different languages. It was very international group as there were people who spoke Korean Thai Filipino Tagalog English Japanese and course our common la http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-381645.html So far during my time at Tsinghua University and China I have learned to celebrate the small victories that come with adapting to a new environment and culture. Before I left the States I made a personal goal to keep an open mind about anything that may come my way. While in China I keep hearing people describe those who come to the country as having an adventuous spiritthat it takes a unique http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Haidian-district/blog-377016.html