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Published: October 17th 2009
Not Bad For Our First Day...
For some reason, apostrophies are not showing up in this blog, so forgive the funky words that should have an apostrophe but dont. Case in point. Welcome to China - ha ha!! Also, this is the first blog with more than one page of photos, so make sure you click the "next" button above to view the rest of them! From now on there will probably be multiple pages of photos, so dont miss out...
Well, after posting our first blog at 4am this morning, we unsuccessfully tried to go back to sleep for a little while...didnt really happen. Finally gave up around 7am and got up to face the evil morning. Skyped our parents back home so they knew we were alive and well; then had a delicious breakfast here at the hostels cafe consisting of egg and veggie fried rice and a gigantic pot of REAL jasmine tea...heavenly goodness. All for the low low cost of about $2.75.
The forecast had called for sunshine, but we stepped outside to an overcast chilly day (it was a balmy 77 degrees and super sunny when we landed yesterday). There was a fierce wind
blowing all day straight out of the north (a gift from Russia, I suppose)...as the trees and messy hair in my photos will attest to!!! We made our way to Tianamen Square (no flag ceremony shutting it down this time) and joined about half a million (no joke) other tourists to gaze around. The Square itself I think is kinda overrated...its the worlds largest public square and its surrounded by museums and monuments, but at the end of the day...its a SQUARE. Nothing to write home about, really. Even though Im sitting here writing home about it. Sigh.
Moving right along...we made our way with the masses of people (no other blondes, of course!) through the north side of the square and into the Forbidden City...a sight that is definitely NOT overrated! The photos will speak for themselves, so I wont bother trying to describe the incredible architecture or the fact that every single inch of anything that could be decorated WAS decorated with beautiful paint or ceramic or sculpture...it was amazing. And HUGE!!! It is in fact the largest palace complex in the world and was home to 20 generations of emperors. Even 100 years ago, no one
but royalty was allowed through the gates, but today tourists (mostly Chinese, surprisingly) stream in there like a swarm of locusts.
On that note, we learned much of Chinese culture and etiquette today. Id read about all of this in guidebooks, but to experience it firsthand is another story! For starters, the spitting. Chinese people spit. Everywhere. Anywhere. Old men, young girls, in the middle of the street, the middle of the Forbidden City...you name it. Next is the queueing - or lack thereof. There is no such thing as "standing in line" over here. Tickets booths turn into rock concert mosh pits of pushing, shoving, yanking, and stumbling. And not just teenagers with bad attitudes. We got bowled over today by a tour group full of old women racing to get their bags through security - I mean literally SHOVED right out of the way about ten times in a row. Crazy. At first I was angry, but then I took a deep breath and got over it. When in China...
The staring will drive you nuts too. Im actually surprised at the lack of westerners here. Im sitting in a lounge full of them right now
at our hostel, but out and about in the city, its all orientals. I couldnt get stranger and longer stares if I had three eyeballs and a cactus growing out of my head. I might as well be a Martian.
And then there are the squat toilets. Our hostel thankfully has regular toilets like were all used to, but here...you basically pee in a hole in the ground. It looks like a mens urinal laying lengthwise on the ground. Theres a designated spot to put your feet, and you just squat and do your thing. Its pretty funky, but actually not as uncomfortable as it sounds. I figure Ill have thighs of steel by the time we get into New Zealand ha!!
Anyway. One of my famous ramblings about totally silly stuff. The sun finally came out about noontime and the temperature rose to a pleasant 65 degrees. Jeremy and I got separated for nearly an hour inside the Forbidden City, and I was about ready to have a heart attack when we finally found each other somehow in the throng of people. The place was packed...and it holds a lot of people. One of the coolest things
Ive seen anywhere, though, was the "Rock Garden" near the north end of the City. Crazy coral-and-rock formations in place of traditional gardens. Blended with the bright palace buildings and some truly gorgeous cypress trees, it was a very bizarre but beautiful sight!!
We exited the north end of the Forbidden City and realized only after exiting how far we were from our hostel (and nowhere near a subway station!). It was about the same distance to walk ALL the way back to our hostel, or keep heading north to a subway station through a couple parks, so we opted to head north, up Prosperity Hill, through Bei Hai Park, and around a very cool residential hutong district (hutongs are a long, slender style of house unique to the area - very pretty!)...the weather was gorgeous!! Although the wind really started whipping and I was very glad Id thrown a scarf into my bag...the temp was dropping and Im sure will be even colder this weekend...
We covered an amazing amount of ground in 7 hours, and we both feel fantastic despite the crazy time difference!! Overall Id say our impression of the city is...interesting!! In a good
way. I dont know what exactly I was expecting, but I must say the architecture is so vastly different from anything Ive ever seen (outside of Epcot)...the parks are beautiful, the people for the most part very friendly (once they get done staring). The city is bustling, energetic, fast-moving, and smells faintly of musty beef, if that makes any sense (thats the best description we could come up with!). You take your life in your hands trying to cross the street, what with buses, taxis, rickshaws, bikes, and who-knows-what-else hogging the road and driving on the sidewalks if they feel like it...but its all part of the fun!! Overall a surprisingly unique and different city, and a great start to our trip!
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Ina
non-member comment
Oh My God!!!
I am creating a facebook page-who wants to become a fan of your travel blog....I am so reading everything, so looking at the pictures and just soooo happy u are having such a great time!!!!! Pictures from China are awesome so far, so much red!!!!!!Keep us posted, and we miss u!!!!!!!