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Published: June 27th 2012
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All set to go!
(From right to left:) Michelle, Stephanie, Megan, and I at the airport Tuesday morning! My goodness I am very far behind in my posts! I have had a little bit of trouble charging my computer lately, but I am all settled in with my Chinese sister, Beryl, now, so I should have a some time to quickly catch up! Hopefully our pictures will do much of the talking. . .
Just over one week ago my fellow Tempe Sister Cities delegates (Michelle, Stephanie, & Megan) and I said goodbye to our desert home and made our way to Beijing, China. Flying to San Francisco then to Beijing, we arrived to meet our amazing tour guide, Martin, and driver, Mr. Wong, twenty hours later.
Our first morning in Beijing we were up and about by 9:00 am, not willing to miss a moment of our time in China!!! We first headed to Tiananmen Square where we saw the Chinese government building (Martin explained it was much like the White House), the Monument to the People, and just across the street: The Forbidden City! From there we took a short ride through the more residential part of the city on rickshaws and visited the courtyard homes where traditionally-large Mongolian families could settle during the Mongol-ruling
years of the Yuan dynasty. We continued the afternoon with a visit to Prince Gong's mansion. Martin told us Prince Gong was a very corrupt advisor to the emperor who built his mansion in order to house and symbolize his excessive wealth. From varied shapes of windows revealing the precious metal held inside to many ramps, rather than stairs, representing his smooth single bound to power, and a structure shaped like his sister's hat, where he could symbolically sit on top of her head, Martin seemed quite right!
Our second day in Beijing was even busier! We headed off to visit a part of the Great Wall built during the Ming dynasty-- about an hour-long drive from the city first thing in the morning. It was raining a bit as we arrived, but the weather cleared just as we began to hike up. Martin gave us about an hour and a half to hike up and cleverly waited at a cafe at the bottom. This may sound silly, but none of us was expecting the Wall to be as steep or mountainous as it was!!! It was well worth it, though, and we made our way pretty far up,
And. . . We have lift off!
We flew to San Francisco, then changed flights for the 11 hours and twenty minutes to Beijing. though not quite to the top, in the time we had.
After our Great Wall visit we made our way to the Summer Palace. Here we walked through the expansive former-residence of Emporess Dowager Cixi, even taking a boat to view the great Buddhist temple on a hill and large bridge and lotus blossoms within the Palace! We carried on from here, stopping for a quick tour of a Chinese silk factory which demonstrated both how to collect the silk thread and the many ways it may be used. It was very exciting to see! Our next stop was rather quick: Olympic City. It was very crowded and we had to hurry to the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube so we could make it on time to dinner!
Our dinner was specially reserved for us at a very nice restaurant known world-wide for their Peking Duck. Of course we showed up smelling terrible from our morning hike and looking like we'd been running around all day! Nevertheless, the food did not change based on our appearance and it was all very good!
After dinner we were free for the evening, but returning to the hotel the
four of us decided we were not ready to rest so the four of us set off on our own to explore the areas nearby on our last night in Beijing. After a bit of wandering we came across a magnificent closed-street for pedestrians called "Qianmen Emperor's Avenue". It was beautiful and full of lights!! We picked up a little bit of tea-ice cream and weaved in and out of shops, realxing. As we made our way back to the hotel we came across a huge group of older ladies dancing on the street corner. (They dance everywhere in China!) Megan and Michelle joined in, following along. It was really funny to watch them struggle to keep up!!!
The next morning we packed all of our bags and brought them along as we made a brief stop at the Temple of Heaven. Martin explained that this was where the emperor would come at the winter and summer solistice to pray for good harvests. It was beautiful, and very impressive: The entire structure has held together for hundreds of years with only wood pieces, not a single nail!
As our visit at the Temple came to an end it
was time to say goodbye to Beijing. We bid our farewells to Mr. Wong, and Martin helped us prepare for our train ride, leaving us with a note to help insure we would all get off at the right station! It was sad and kind of scary to say goodbye to Martin as he had taken care of us so well in the past few days! Nonetheless, we hopped aboard our train to Zhenjiang ready to meet our new home and new family!!!
(Be sure to scroll down and go to the next page to see all of the pictures. After all, that's the best part, right??)
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Jessbass
Jessica Bass
Be sure to scroll down and go to the next page for more pictures!
I just noticed they are really easy to miss, and they're the best part!!! :)