The Great Wall & Other Great Moments

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Geo: 39.9165, 116.391

Hello!  Today was so crammed-packed full of fun and interestingness I don't know where to start!! It was a wonderful day!  We woke-up around 5:30am, showered in our spa-like giant bathroom (I'll have to get a picture before we leave here) and we were starving from skipping dinner last night.  The hotel offers a "western-style mixed with eastern-style" buffet breakfast every morning which is included for all of us on the tour.  The selection ranged from dim sum, corn on the cob, and steamed greens to scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, jelly.  You know I had the eggs, bacon & eggs toast - and even though the eggs have a fishy taste - they maybe were cooked in the same grease or skillet as something else - breakfast was good and we were happy. 

After breakfast we had a one hour tour meeting in a conference room here in the hotel.  Our tour manager, "Jason" (his "American" name for the tour), gave us headsets, debriefing on the overall schedule, etc.  It was interesting to meet the other 11 individuals which flew-in from New York last night ~ seven pilots and various wives/sisters with them from Sarasota, Florida.  They had a harrowing time apparently ~ their Air China flight was delayed 3 hours and then upon debarkation four of them setoff temperature alarms and one was quarantined.  One funny guy, Mark, said every time they waived the temperature wand at him he would panic a bit and his temperature would rise. HA  The guy that was quarantined was immediately stripped of his passport and two other people had to take off all of their clothes. They were all held-up over an hour until they were finally let go.  It was hilarious to hear the stories but thank goodness nothing like that happened to our group flying-in yesterday.  We laughed and laughed at them today.  The original group from LA has 17 people that are all our age - or younger - much younger.  We were surprised.  The new group is a large group mainly in their 70s.  There are some real characters with us which I'll have to explain later if I have time.  Hilarious!

Today (and tonight) we went to the Olympic Village.  China built this village for the 2008 Olympics - they completely tore-down apartment complexes and etc - by leaving big, white paper notices on the buildings to the residences with their move-out dates  - no other notice was given.  Each residence was compensated "X" amount of money by the Communist government - no negotations.  It was not enough money for them to buy the same style of apartment in the same area or close to town so many had to move farther out of Beijing.  This is not something our tour guide reports as the people being upset about, simply as a fact of life.  The people in Beijing are very, very proud of the Olympic village which is approximately 15 to 16,000 acres of landscaped, manicured, lawns and amazing buildings all built in <5 years.  We saw the famous Birds Nest, the Water Cube where Phelps won 8 gold medals in 2008, the Olympic Village, the five buildings creating the dragon, etc.  It was neat but even neater last night around 7pm when we drove back by and saw everything lit-up for night.  Awesome!

We also went to a Jade factory today.  Kamie found a Jade lion-like thing for only $480,000 US DOLLARS.  No thanks honey.  You cannot buy Jade for yourself, it is bad luck.  You must have it purchased for you as a gift. Needless to say, Kamie did not get a gift today.  Also, we learned Jade is available in 7 different colors and is a very important status symbol to the Chinese.  When you marry into a family, you usually get a piece of family Jade.  Some of the larger carved Jade items had small glasses of water sitting by them in the cases ~ this is also superstitituous ~ it is to bring out all the glory and fortune from the Jade.  We learned today that most Chinese are atheists, a small amount practice Buddhism, and they are all very, very superstititious - they take fung shei and the Chinese horoscope/calender very seriously.  Numbers, especially, are important.  6 is good luck. 8 is good fortune.  4 is death.  You can pay hundreds of dollars for a cell phone number with 6 and 8s in it.  Our guide paid $450, 12 years ago for his cell phone number which has some 6s and 8s in it.  If you want a cell phone number with lots of 4s - probably free he said! Ha! Strange things but interesting.

So, we went to the Great Wall of China today!! It was awesome!  Due to recent Siberian winds, we had blue skies, no fog, and a cold but sunny day to walk two parts of the wall.  Going-up was sorta steep but easy.  Coming down was sooooo scarey ~ especially if you have short legs like me ~ grab the railing and slowly make it down.  One girl in our group scooted down on her butt.  Another guy - Kamie calls him "Newman" (from Seinfeld) - well... he's here alone, probably late 40s, Kamie says he must be a 50-year-old virgin - he knows everything and nothing at all.  This guy crawled up on his hands and feet... and then couldn't get down in time to meet our bus... and we couldn't find him.  We left him there and went to a late lunch but the tour guide stayed and waited for him and they took a taxi to our lunch place.  This guy looks like Newman from Seinfeld so everytime he does something bonkers, Kamie pierces his lips and says "Newman."  LOL  

A young couple from Atlanta in our group walked up the great wall and he gave his video camera to another group member (secretly) - and he proposed today!!  She said yes!! It was so sweet!  He said he had the ring in his carry-on bag all day yesterday on our plane, sweating bullets.  We all toasted them at dinner and our tour guide played them a love song on the bus.  HA  It was pretty amazing and really sweet.  They both seem real nice and she is just lovely, too! 

Today while walking the wall I got a few "HI! HI! HI!" from some younger people - wanting to practice their English and say Hello to a blonde person.  The tour manager warned they might want to take pictures with me but I did not make a lot of eye contact and was not approached for that ~ just lots of looks.  The Great Wall is important to the Chinese, especially the older Chinese from Mao's dynasty who repeat Moa's saying ~ "You are not a hero until you have climbed the great wall."   Today, Kamie & I became heroes.

So, thanks to waiting on Newman, we had a late lunch.  We sit at spinny tables, they bring out and ask if you want warm beer or warm 7-up.  I took the beer today.  Good choice.  You have lots of dishes around you ~ a tea cup, soup dish, chopsticks, beer cup, a small saucer for your food, and even a fork for us Americans.  They bring out dish after dish and place on the spinny table and everyone moves the table around and takes a little of what they might like.  I was able to eat some sticky rice (plain white rice) with a bit of Soy Sauce (very strong over here), some sweet-and-sour like Chicken, and that is all I liked today.  I tasted a tiny bit of this and that.  Kamie ate everything.  Cleaned his plate and tried every dish.  The man is a garbage disposel.  I am not.  I am trying things but not many things get tried twice.  

After lunch we took about a 45 minute walk through the sacred gardens.  This was peaceful and at times a bit humorous with all of us taking pictures in front of the marble "guardians" ~ carved animals that protect the gardens and the former emperors.  We then went to the Ming Tombs.  This was an interesting site but to put it very bluntly ~ it is a large cemetery where a former emperor is buried with lots of buildings and other items built to honor the former emperor.  The emperors are buried with jade, silks, and many other valubles.  Their cocubines are also poisoned and buried near them.  The burial grounds are elaborate and what they contain is mindboggling.  This specific emperors' tomb is actually completely encased in marble - the floors of the site were marble but they were getting so damaged by tourists they recently covered most of the marble with laminate flooring to protect the marble. This site was interesting and again, full of Chinese superstition lessons.

It was 5:30pm before we left our last site.  It was freezing cold today - literally - and we were sooooo cold - even on the bus.  I was wearing a turtleneck, gloves, scarf and my warm gloves but could not get warm.  Beijing is a very dry cold ~ very, very dry.  It is hard to explain.  We have been told to wear two sets of pants tomorrow because tomorrow we will be outside almost all day. 

For dinner tonight, we had a great experience ~ a Peking Duck dinner at a fine restaurant in China.  There were nine of us that had paid and signed-up for this option on the tour.  It was so much fun!  We had unlimited wine, beer, and "firewater" which we all said "Gom-bay" before drinking more and more ~ maybe that is why it was so fun?  I am not a fan of duck but Kamie is and he had wanted to sign-up for this meal.  They treated us like royalty in a special area of the restaurant.  Tonight we had another array of utensils and platters and even a warm wet cloth at our seat to wash our hands before eating.  The food and service was all very different but interesting. I did try the duck pancake and the regular duck.  It was okay.  Kamie loved it all again.  I'm so glad he is eating good on this trip.  They also had roasted pork (just okay), garlic bamboo shoots, ham fried rice, some sort of slimey-seeming beef, sweet and sour tilapia with the head on, soup, apple fried dumplings, custard, and watermelon.  I ate a tiny bit of this or that.  The apple dumpling was good, the custard pie was okay, the watermelon was perfect.  Ha  The atmosphere at dinner tonight was fun and joyful!  Kamie was sitting by a lady who told him that both her parents had been held captive in Hungary at a concentration camp ~ very interesting stories.  Newman got drunk on the firewater and talked too much.

The ride back to the hotel tonight was beautiful again ~ Beijing has a goal to "light-up the city" so they have all of their pedestrian walkways and highways and roads lit-up with LED lights.  Very interesting and pretty much what you would think of when you think of China ~ lots of flashing, neon lights everywhere.  It is an overload of the senses.  The driving however, is crazy-crazy.  We were almost in so many wrecks ~ many!  We saw several wrecks.  We saw a car blazing smoke.  The guy gets out, checks it out, gets back in and keeps trying to drive it even though it looked like it was going to blow-up any minute.  There are sooo many rickshaws, bikes, pedestrians and other tiny odd semi-automobiles in the mix with the cars and buses that it is no wonder that over 80,000 die per year on their roads ~ there are no set lanes, stop signs are optional, etc.  Two cars almost collide then they just sit and honk and whoever honks loudest and longest gets to not move apparently.  Also, there are so many drivers that there is a lottery for a license plate - you usually will get issed a license plate where you can only drive on Tuesdays, Thursdays & Sundays or Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays.  Very interesting rules here trying to keep the traffic down.  MOST cars are Volvos or Volkswagons.  In the last 10 or 15 years or so the Chinese have been given access to American public television.  They thought all along we were just as poor as them and now they have seen what we have and they want that.  They are very materialistic and will spend all their paycheck on something "name brand" versus something practical.  They want American cars, too. Starting in 2015, the Chinese government has made a deal with Ford to bring over the American mustang.  Cost for a Chinese citizen to buy one ~ $90,000 US dollars.  My friend Kari may want to sell hers to a Chinese citizen and buy two more in US.  HA  Actually, some of that money is tarrifs the government has imposed.  If you want a Mazda 8 (remember lucky number 8) or a Ford Mustang or another import car not readily available in China, you will PAY PAY PAY.  We have yet to learn from our tour guide how some citizens are making the money to pay when so many others are simply struggling.  More to learn, for sure.

We got back to our hotel room after 9pm tonight.  We walked to a neighborhood store for water.  There was smelly trash strewn all over the streets.  It was disgusting.  We have not seen anything like that in the tourists areas.

Overall, this tour is intense and tomorrow is no exception but it is fun, interesting, and the atmosphere is great!  I will try to post some pictures but the Internet is very slow.  Loves to you all!

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Comments

[kari]

I have enjoyed all your stories and pics.....lets just say we could buy 3 Mustangs at that rate.... kinda cool mine is named Jade..good luck charm. Hope u continureto have fun and safe travels. We love dim sum.. might want to skip the chi
cken feet though

[i.d.k.]

Kari ~ I knew you would find that price astonishing and yes, Jade is a good name for your car! Glad you are enjoying my tales from the East. Kamie is eating dumplings every chance but I'm hesitant. There were some chicken feet somewhere o
ne day and even Kamie passed... thank goodness!

[Kelli]

Sounds like you are having a great time!