Beijing

Friday 10/14/2011 .... about 5 hours after Shanghai.

Curtis and I both wrote a blog about Beijing. So as to not double up too much, I decided not to post, but added in the JULIE TAKE.

Curtis: Beijing is another of China’s enormous cities; it is the capital after all. There are so many things to see and do here. There are a myriad of sites, sounds and tastes to take in like The Great Wall, The Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, The Summer Palace, The Temple of Heaven, The 2008 Olympic Stadium, beautiful parks, and various markets. You could easily spend several weeks here and not take it all in.

Temple of heaven

Great Wall, and our new friend

Great Wall

Guy that wanted his picture with me at the Forbidden City.

Curtis: After the whirlwind tour of Korea and Shanghai we decided to take it easy for a day or so when first arriving in Beijing. It was nice to relax, catch up on sleep, the blog and work.

Julie Take: We literally did not go anywhere, me more-so than Curtis. I don’t think I left the hostel for a full day or two! Sweet recovery.

Curtis: We stayed at Qianmen Hostel, just south of Tiananmen Square. It was a great little hostel with charm and character, in an amazingly convenient location. It was near the subway, in the middle of the city and close to many major sites. The WiFi was good and available in many of the rooms. (The WiFi needed to be reset a few times over the course of our 5-day stay but all that took was simply unplugging it for a minute). The hostel staff spoke English, as in most hostels in China, and was very helpful with directions on how to get where we wanted to go. They were also available to help book train tickets or flights if needed.

Julie Take: Hostel in Beijing, China...well it was the friendly hostel. The wall between the bedroom and the bathroom was glass, and basically you MUST be close to share a room here. Wifi works in the rooms close to the lobby. I learned that the universal sign for telephone is not universal? I still don’t know what China’s sign is, but this hostel person did not recognize ours. Everyone is sooo helpful though!

Curtis: The second night we decided to get out a bit and took a stroll around Tiananmen Square. You can’t get onto the Square at night but walking around it let’s you experience it’s massive size. It is the biggest public square in the world. It is situated immediately south of the entrance to The Forbidden City. It was a unique experience to stand in that place, thinking about the intense standoff that happened there nearly 15 years ago and the positive change that has happened in China since then. I’m hopeful that change will continue to grow and blossom into all the freedoms that the Chinese people desire.

Julie Take: It’s amazing being here. I wish you were all here experiencing it with me. Mostly for selfish reasons because I miss you, but it is so interesting to be here. Tianamen square was beautiful!! Ironically Curtis and I had a standoff of our own there. You really get to know yourself and your mate when you leave everything behind you and go to a place where you literally only have each other. I’m impressed by the people in the world that serve missions. Away from home out there in the big world. What a victory that is to leave your world behind and go and serve others! I admire you. In my church their are young people that go, and become a companion to someone they’ve never met, spend absolutely ALL their time with them and talk about something as intimate as God with random strangers. For Curtis and me, we are mostly talking to each other in our own language. My walk around the world has really let me see how big this world is, and how small somethings really are, and how important my friendship to Curtis is, and what’s MOST important to me.

Curtis: After our walk I spent the rest of the night searching online, trying to find out how to get to church the next day. After a lot of searching I couldn’t find any clear directions on how to get there but did find an address. Whether or not the address was accurate or still the correct location I did not know, but it was better than nothing. I also found the Branch President’s phone number and gave him a call the next morning. Thankfully, he answered and was able to email directions on how to get to the church via the subway.

POST DIRECTIONS

As it is with most Christian religions, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not allowed to proselyte in China and only foreign nationals are allowed to legally hold and attend church meetings. Once at church everything was the same as it would have been anywhere else, but going to church in China, knowing that the Chinese people do not have religious freedom was a sobering thought.

On the surface China seems relatively normal, but with no freedom of religion, no free press or speech, even a filtered Internet experience, you realize you’re a long way away from the freedoms you take for granted everyday in the USA.

Julie Take: That’s pretty much all I’ve got too. Who knew that freedom of religion, of internet, or TV/ news, selected education could be gone after a ten hour flight across some water. If someone here asks you about your religion, you have to say, “ You know I can’t talk about that with you.” When I was a teenager I went to every church you can possibly imagine for long periods of time. I have read so many of the different books and literature given to these sects, and asked questions to teachers and friends about what they believe and why they live how they do, then to later, truly become a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I can’t imagine if back then someone had said, “I’m sorry you know I can’t talk to you about those things.” I know for me I would have never stopped asking. I would have started a revolution. I hope that people in America never become lazy enough to let people take their freedoms away, NOT that China is Lazy, but I feel that may be the only reason we would lose our freedoms in America. As long as I live there you can be sure that I will be a fighter to keep what we have.

Sites We Visited:

- Curtis: The Forbidden City – We walked across Tiananmen Square to The Forbidden City. The FC is a huge complex. You walk across a big mote and through various large gates as you enter and exit the city. There are huge ornate building and palaces throughout. Ornate stone carvings and Chinese lion statues are all over the place. The garden has beautiful rock formations and old trees, some of which are 300-400 years old.

Julie Take: It was quite big, and I can say that I saw a small child with a slit in his pants. It took me a while to get this proof. Insert Proof

- Curtis: The Great Wall – I’ve always wanted to see The Great Wall in person. There are various sections that are relatively easy to get to from Beijing. The closer sections have largely been rebuilt in the last few decades and are generally over run with tourists and locals trying to sell you stuff. To get a more authentic Great Wall experience I highly recommend traveling an additional 1-2 hours to go to Jinshinling. There are less tourists and most of the wall you’ll be hiking on has not been rebuilt. The Great Wall is often situated up on the ridge-line of the mountains so it is a pretty long hike just to get to it. At Jinshinling and several other locations there is a cable car option that will take you right to The Great Wall, bypassing the time consuming process of hiking the entire way. When I first heard about a cable car option I was against it, but Julie realized the hike to the wall would be a huge time waste and that there wasn’t anything to see along the way, I changed my mind. We came to hike on The Great Wall of China and not to just waste half our day hiking to it. The wall was really interesting and must have been a massive engineering feat. Some sections were made of very steep steps to traverse steep mountainsides. Some parts were crumbling away with only half of the wall in tact to walk across. We walked through several guard towers of varying decay. It was a beautiful day and an exhilarating experience. (Definitely a check mark on The List). I was surprised out how low some parts of the wall actually were. I’m not sure if it was higher a long time ago and has either sunk down a bit or soil has built up around it, however several areas weren’t much higher than a few meters, easily breached by a basic ladder or rope. From what I’ve read the wall, although impressive, didn’t do a great job of actually keeping people out all the time. One of the most valuable parts of The Great Wall was the guard towers, found all along it. From the towers, guards could see a problem and notify each other by quickly lighting signal fires on each tower to notify others of the threat or danger.

Julie Take: I’m pretty sure I sang every Mulan song known to Mulan and quoted the movie. We later watched the movie back at the hostel. Insert Pictures

- Curtis: The Temple of Heaven – This beautiful pagoda style structure can be found in a large park just off the Subway line. The building itself was very stunning with many vibrant blue’s, red’s, gold’s and other colors. The surrounding gardens and trees were also beautiful. Lots of locals visit the park to play cards and other games. One I found particularly interesting looked a lot like hacky sack but was played with something that more resembled a large badminton shuttle bird with metal rings at the bottom to give it more weight. We watched for a minute and I wanted to give it a try but decided not to see if they’d let me join in. As we began to walk away Julie could tell that I wanted to give it a try and encouraged me to go give it a shot. I’m glad she did because I went back and in my universal language of charades was able to get the point across that I wanted to try. They humored me and let me join in. It’s been a while since I’ve played hacky sack or even juggled a soccer ball and I had sandals on and a day pack so I was a bit awkward at first and you could tell they thought I’d likely not get the hang of it. Then to their surprise I did start to get the hang of it and they all started laughing in amazement because I was able to keep up with them. It was a lot of fun. Travel is so much more enjoyable when you get involved in the local culture and life.

Julie Take: Insert pictures.

- Curtis: Olympic Park – The Summer 2008 Olympic games were held in Beijing. I almost came to China back then to experience the games first hand but decided instead to go to Africa during that time. When we got to the subway station where we could transfer to the only subway line that goes up to the Olympic Park grounds we discovered that the line was closed and we’d have to either walk the rest of the way or find a taxi to take us. As we came out of the subway we couldn’t see the stadium and from the looks of the subway map it would be a long walk. We were leaving Beijing that day so had our full packs on and were not up for a long hike with full packs. We tried to get a taxi but had no luck, and then a little motorized, enclosed rickshaw of sorts pulled up. It didn’t look very sturdy, nor did it look anywhere near big enough to handle our bags and us. The driver seemed to think otherwise so we decided to give it a shot and crammed ourselves in the back, holding our backpacks on our laps while the driver pushed the door closed. It was a really tight fit but we did fit. The drive to the Olympic Park grounds took just a few minutes but I wasn’t sure if that old rickety thing was gonna make it there or not. When we pulled up to the Olympic grounds everyone that saw us packed in there started laughing and taking pictures. (I wish I had picture myself, I bet it looked hilarious).

Julie Take: Basically we were touching the walls of the box. During the ride I felt swaying and mentioned to Curtis that if it tipped over to just got off of me and that I would climb out first. He looked at me oddly, and I guess it was a random thought, but honestly is seemed like a reasonable comment to me. The funny guy (driver?) said he would give us a ride back too. How nice. When we got out people were laughing and the driver started scolding them all and they stopped until they heard us busting up laughing too, and then it was all over!!

Curtis: We walked around the grounds a bit, saw the “birds nest” stadium and took some pictures with the locals. People in China always want to take pictures of or preferably with Julie. She is pretty much a celebrity here and sometimes they think I’m pretty cool too just by association. I think we should make an album and put it out here in China, we’d be huge!

Julie Take: Some cute girl came and said, “ I think you are very beautiful and you are very handsome, can you get of picture of me and her?” Ha ha.. Curtis is great! Also the sun was out today! It looked like a small moon hiding behind a sheet of smog. I looked right at it thinking it was the moon. I wondered what time it was, but then realized it was the sun. I’ve come to understand why people are wearing masks. It’s difficult to breath. I’ve smelled a lot of not so great things here, but what a beautiful park! We got to see more kites here.

- Curtis: The Summer Palace – This place was massive! Literally as big as a large amusement park. It is on the North West of the city, built on large hill or small mountain and a lake. The landscape is stunning, the architecture interesting, and the entire scene picturesque. This was the playground of China’s emperors. If I were they I would have ditched The Forbidden City and moved my permanent head quarters to this place. You could easily spend a full day exploring The Summer Palace. We just had a couple of hours and it was definitely worth it.
Side note: Try the roasted chestnuts from street vendors. They are all over the place. Often they'll give you one to taste straight outa the hot gravel. I really liked it and bought more but made the fatal error of letting them cool off before eating them and cold chestnuts don't taste so hot. Bleck!!!

Julie Take: Good idea, walking through the Summer palace! Bad idea, walking through the Summer Palace with your life on your back, 2 months after knee surgery. I think I was panting. It was worth it though. Also, they sell yams on the street. Carry a fork at all times, or smell them, and wish you had.

Curtis: Word to the Wise, Don’t get scammed: Places that have a lot of tourists also have a lot of scam artists and others who will try various ways to separate you from your money.

Exhibit A: The rickshaw driver that offered to take us to the subway station. After walking though Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City we were a ways away from the nearest subway station. We figured we’d just walk but a nice rickshaw driver offered to take us there. We knew to be wary of such and negotiated the price upfront, (ALWAYS negotiate the price up front with rickshaws, taxis, etc. and if they try to make you pay more or don’t take you where you wanted to go then just leave what you think is fare on the seat and walk away). The language barrier can always make negotiating a bit of a challenge that will either work in your favor or against you depending on how you go about it. We asked how much and he said 3. We clearly restated, “3 RMB?” several times and he kindly replied, “3 monies” and offered for us to get in for the ride. We got in, carefully keeping an eye on the traffic around us so as not to get hit while riding in the rickshaw. He took us about 20-30 meters and across a busy street and then said something to another rickshaw driver that was coming over. He then proceeded to tell us to get in with the other driver. I wasn’t sure what he was trying to pull, perhaps wanting us to pay him and then the other driver as well, so I said NO and told him to keep going. After another 20 meters he stopped the rickshaw and started adamantly saying, “3 monies, 3 monies”. I said, “Yes, we’ll pay you 3 RMB” and pointed in the direction of the subway. At that point he pulled a card out of his pocket that showed the pricing of 300 RMB for the ride. HAHAHA. I knew something was going to happen. At that moment we said no way, jumped out and started walking towards the subway. He got off the rickshaw bike and started following demanding the money. So that he would stop harassing us I turned and started to hand him a 5 RMB bill, which he refused. I was about to just drop it and walk away but he took it and left.

Julie Take: Basically he picked us up on the corner, and took us to the other side of the cross walk and demanded three money. I got out and walked away. Curtis makes me feel safe like that!

Curtis: People often try to take advantage of good-natured tourists. If they aren’t threatening you physically then don’t let them verbally extort money from you. Not only does it ruin your day but it also emboldens them to do it again to another tourist down the road.

Julie Take: Amen!

Curtis: This reminds me of another tactic used by street vendors or shops you may come across or just be passing by. They will put merchandise in your hand to make you feel more obligated to buy it and they will not allow you to give it back to them. If it ends up in your hand you’ll often have to put it back on their cart or shelf or even the ground to get them to take it back. If you don’t want something then don’t let them put it in your hand and don’t let them sell you something you really don’t want. The next time someone tries this to me I may just act like I thought they were giving me a gift, say thank you in their language and start to walk away just to see what happens.

Julie Take: Bu Yao, Xia Xia.. That’s all it takes. (No want, thank you..)

Curtis: Language barriers can be challenging but can also be a lot of fun. One night, while winding our way through some of the old alleyways of Beijing, we came to a street with many restaurants and shops. (Generally alleys in the USA are places to avoid but in Beijing they are full of life, culture, shops and restaurants so go explore them).

Julie Take: IF...., they look like alleys you should go into. Most do, but I always say bring your education everywhere you go..it’s safer that way.

Curtis: Julie wanted to find some dumplings. We went into a popular looking dumpling restaurant to get a bite to eat. It was the busiest place on the block and that is almost always a good sign. Upon entering we got in line to order and quickly realized that there wasn’t anything in English. The line moved fast and before we new it we were at the front trying to explain that we just wanted some dumplings. They clearly didn’t understand what we were getting at, even with some charades and picture pointing. Everyone, including the workers, Julie and I, and everyone in line started to laugh because we all recognized the funny predicament. A lady in line was able to speak a bit of English and came to our rescue. We ordered the dumplings and they offered for us to try the soup as well. They gave me a bowl and motioned for me to try it and give it back if I didn’t like it. It was a strange congealed; thick, unappetizing looking soup but everyone in the place was downing it like it was going outa style so I decided to try a spoon full. Just as I was scooping a spoon full of the sludge, Julie said, “I don’t think you wanna eat that”, I was already committed and slurped it down. I should have listened to Julie. It was most definitely an acquired taste that I hadn’t yet acquired and for a split second I thought, “Oh know, am I going to throw up right here, right now, into the huge vat of this soup they are making in front of me”. Thankfully I didn’t but it was a close one. I quickly gave the soup back and they smiled. I think they had had that experience before with other foreign visitors. Haha. The dumplings were really good though so we ended up on a positive note.

Word to the Wise: Eat where you see locals eating and avoid eating at places that are empty.

Pollution and General Cleanliness or the Lack Thereof: I like China in general and am really glad to be visiting here but China has a lot of pollution and sanitation issues that taint the overall experience. The major cities are thick with Smog and covered in a grimy film. People spit all over the place and kids just go to the bathroom wherever they feel like it. In fact babies and toddlers clothing comes with a fully open crotch slit and they usually don’t wear diapers. We’ve often seen kids doing their business whenever and wherever they please (Number 1 & Number 2, yup you read that right). We’ve seen parents holding up their kids and pointing them in a “safe” direction like a weapon to let them do their business, sometimes in the gutter or a planter and sometimes just anywhere. You really have to watch where you are walking in some areas or you will step in human waste. Avoid stepping in any wet looking spots or on anything that looks like you know what. Avoid walking around barefoot in any public place including trains and public transportation.

Julie Take: Right! After the Forbidden City sighting, we started noticing small children everywhere toileting the sidewalks. Stop it!!!!

Curtis: We decided to leave Beijing Wednesday and head for Xian via train. Upon checking out of the hostel we asked if they could call to check on Train tickets for us to Xian. They said it was likely all sold out and two tourists in the Hostel lobby chimed in saying they had to book Xian train tickets several days in advance. We asked them to call anyway just to check and when they got off the phone they said there were only standing class tickets left. There are no seats in standing class so you’d have to basically stand the whole 15 hours. One of the other travelers in the lobby said she did it. Kudos to her but we thought that would be too much of a grind for us. We decided to go check the train station for the next available sleeper class tickets we could get and decide what to do from there. We went to the train station and were lucky enough to actually get tickets for that very night in a soft sleeper cabin, which is what we wanted anyway. Thanks to Julie, and her Chinese skills. She has been good about learning key phrases that have really helped us. Soft sleepers have 4 beds to a cabin and a door to the cabin that can be locked. When we got on the train we realized we were in different cabins (we didn’t know that phrase). We were able to play charades and use the Pleco phone app to convince a lady in Julie’s cabin to switch with me and we were all set. Even more serendipitous, our other two cabin mates for the train ride happened to be the same couple from the Hostel lobby that said they had to book the train several days in advance. Their names are Andy and Rachel Povah.

Julie Take: It was funny. We were getting on the train and they motioned Curtis to go to a different car. When I got in my car I saw Andy and Rach’s friendly faces! I convinced Curtis to come ask the lady and son in the bottom bunk to move over, and he did it! We all got to room together, and what a HUGE help it was. We made fast friends, and got fantastic travel advice from them about transiting, and student I.D savings…etc

Curtis: Train travel can be very convenient in China. For long hauls I’d recommend the soft sleeper. It’s a bit pricier but the privacy, extra space, and ability to shut and lock the door to each 4-person cabin at night make it worthwhile if it fits your budget.
You also have the option of the Hard Sleeper, this cheaper option is an open layout of 6 beds to a section, go for the middle section if you take this route...the bottom sections are open seating until later in the evening when you can use it for sleeping...so if you are assigned to a bottom bunk you may have people coming and sitting along side you until it's time to sleep. There is not much privacy with this option as the entire train car is open with no doors so it's generally noisier, smellier, etc.
The other two options that you can do is a seat or standing...yes, it is possible to buy a standing only ticket for a long haul 15 hour train ride in China and some people and travelers do it...haha...crazy!

We enjoyed talking with and getting to know Andy and Rachel on the way to Xian. They’ve been traveling for 8 months now and will be for another 4. It was great to be able to tap into their experience and get some good insight.

In a nutshell, Beijing was great and a must see on any trip to China.

Goodbye Beijing..