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Published: November 12th 2008
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Near Forbidden City
Bryon by the canal that surrounds the Forbidden City My first blog entry. I have been in China for over 2 months , but I have been so very busy with school, teaching, students, reports, marking. And yes, exploring and travelling around our interesting area here around Dalian and further afield. ( $1 = 5.35 RMB or roughly just over 5 RMB . Two months ago, $1 was well over 6RMB)
This past weekend, I ventured off to Beijing. The one hour flight got me into Beijing airport at 8pm and I immediately took the train ( 25 RMB) to the subway where I hopped on for 2 RMB. Great deal. The only problem is that the subway is not walker friendly. I needed to tramp 100's of metres, it seemed, to go from one line to another. But it is fast and has frequent trains.
After I checked into my dive of a hotel,( 200 yuan) I went exploring and wandered the streets for several hours.
On Saturday, I was up early, on the subway and eating at Paul's restaurant before 9:00am. Paul's is a restaurant started by a Nova Scotian chap a number of years ago; very popular. After many Chinese meals I felt like
Famous Mao picture
Ken and I spend quite a bit of time trying to get through the crowds, but also taking photos from a number of angles of Chairman Mao's huge painting. I really more and more that I couldn't do the job this guard has to do- just stand and look... a change.
After being fortified with an omelette, home fries, hot biscuit and coffee ( 40 rmb or yuan), I headed to the Tibetan Buddhist Monastery, a large walled in compound with beautifully symmetrical buildings, pillars ,etc.There were hoards of people, all ages, buying and burning incense. The people weren't allowed to burn the incense inside the temples so they would pray, place 3 incense sticks on the altar and then leave. The monks were kept busy just collecting the incense and burning it in large vats and containers outside each temple.
From here I strolled along a lovely tree ( almost like willows) lined street with a variety of small shops, restaurants and tea shops until I came to Confucius Temple. As I entered, there were row upon row of huge tablets( 2 to 3 metres high) that signified the winners of the Confucian writing tests that were held yearly over the centuries. The winners were rewarded with jobs and houses. Very impressive to walk around these temples and buildings that were built to encourage learning and forward thinking.
From here I kept meandering until I came to the Drum Tower and the Bell Tower. Very
Tiannemen Square
Ken posing in the huge square.Nice positioning. Again we took numerous photos here. Many people , we could tell, were taking secretly taking photos of us as well. impressive structures! The Drum Tower has a series of monstrous drums and I was lucky enough to be there when 4 people did a short powerful performance on the drums.The view from the balcony was hazy as there seemed to be some pollution in the air. Only two hundred metres away is the Bell Tower. In both cases, I climbed up 60 uneven steep steps to get to the top. Here the gigantic bell ( as with the drums) was used to notify residents of the time- time to prepare to go to sleep ( 9 to 11pm) on to time to wake up - and I think that was either 5am or 6am. In the old days, no dallying about here, waiting for tea in bed!
Then I wipped out to the airport by subway and train to pick up my friend, Ken, who was arriving from Toronto at Terminal #3 . Huge new section of the airport built for the Olympics. Once I picked him up ( his flight was delayed by almost 2 hours- I had 3 books plus puzzles to amuse myself) we headed to our garden hotel ( lovely room set off to side
Walls of the Hutong
I am standing by a poster painted onto the wall on one of the lanes in the hutong. Many notices and instructional information litter the walls. This one is educational. of the closed- in garden area). It cost over 600 RMB; it was a lovely quiet place and we seemed to be their only guests.
The next morning after having a leisurely chat over coffee ( packaged sugared ,milk coffee) ( Ironically Ken had just given me 4 kg of good coffee which he had picked up from Maureen in Toronto), we headed out and attacked Tiannemen Square area. We strolled around the front of the Forbidden City where hoards of Chinese tourists, many of them quite old, and most of them in tour groups wearing their assigned red or yellow caps, were crowding to get into the Forbidden City. Massive crowds! Instead of touring the City, we struggled against the flow and finally ambled along the tunnels to get across the wide, wide avenue to get to Tiannemen Square. We spend hours just walking around , taking pictures of people and having our pictures taken and then strolling along the narrow but exciting lanes of the Hutong ( the area where many people live in crowded conditions. Only public outside toilets here.)
By the time we got back to the wee hotel, it was time for me
Eating in the Hutong
I couldn't resist taking this picture - a crowd all around anxious to get at the meat in the bubbling vat. We had already eaten. to pack up and head to the airport.
It was a great trip and a good start to Ken's trip to China.
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