Thursday, April 22
I flew from Fukuoka, Japan to Beijing through Dailan. In Dailan I simply had to get off the plane, have my passport checked and stamped and then board the plane again. The best part about that little layover was meeting a Japanese woman and her daughter while waiting to board. Her husband is living in China for work and she and the daughter had been visiting family in Japan. We ended up exchanging email addresses.
The other good thing about stopping in Dailan was my bathroom experience. First of all let me say, bathrooms in China, in general, weren't that great! There's a toilet paper dispenser at the entrance and you get some to take into the stall with you. I kept forgetting, luckily I had tissues in my purse! Anyway, I found a sort of public service announcement on the back of the door in the airport bathroom. What do you think?
Good advice, right?
When I arrived in Beijing Christy was waiting for me at the airport with a driver from her school. He drove us home and we ordered dinner. My first meal in Beijing...PIZZA!
Went to bed pretty early that night as I planned to wake up and leave when C left around 7:15 Friday morning.
Friday, April 23
I snuck through the side entrance of the Crown Royal hotel which happened to be right by C's place. It's a huge hotel with lots of foreigners so C told me I could walk in the side door, through the lobby to the front and just ask the concierge to get me a cab. They all spoke English so I could tell them where I wanted to go and they'd talk to the cab driver for me! It was about a 45 minute to 1 hour cab ride to the main part of Beijing.
First stop...Tienanmen Square.
This was just after I went through the security checkpoint where they scanned everyone's bags before letting them onto the square, which is pretty big! There were so many people too. My favorite was the tour groups, all of a sudden I'd see a big group of people all wearing red caps. Quite a sight! I walked around a bit and was approached by people trying to sell stuff. I had to go down under the street to cross over to the Imperial City which holds the Forbidden City.
This is the north gate of Tienanmen, which literally means "Gate of Heavenly Peace." At the other end of the square you can go through a rather long line to see Mao's body. I didn't really think that was necessary! There were so many people outside of this gate. Lots of picture taking, even had some random guy walk up next to me, stick his cell phone in my face and take my picture...twice, same guy! I just smiled for him. Needless to say I stood out with my blond hair.
Once you walk through this gate you can see the entrance to the Forbidden City. I was preparing to figure out how to get in when a Chinese guy approached me and asked if I needed a tour guide. At first I declined, but quickly changed my mind after considering the fact that I don't speak Chinese and know next to nothing about the place. He was a cool guy and offered me a 1 1/2 hour tour for 150 RMB ($23). I thought that was decent. While he was buying our tickets to enter a fellow solo traveler asked if I'd like my pic taken.
I returned the favor and asked him if he'd like to join my tour. He was from Australia and had been to see his brother in Macao and then to China and was leaving that day to go back to his brother's. We get our tickets and head inside, going through another security checkpoint.
This is Josh and me just inside the Forbidden City.
My tour guide, "Herry." He was so informative and spoke excellent English! I just knew he must've studied abroad at some point, but when I asked he told me that he'd never been outside of China!
Along the top of the buildings there were lines of animals. According to "Herry" the number of animals correlated to how important the building was.
A room covered in silk. The Forbidden City is where the Imperial family lived and regular people weren't allowed inside. The emperor could have more than one wife and this is where they spent their honeymoon. All around the room is this Chinese character:
It means "double happiness." The top line across is like shoulders touching and the line across near the middle is like holding hands. I thought this was a cool character. As far as I know there isn't one like it in Japanese. A lot of the characters are the same or similar so I could understand a little of what was written on signs in China!
One last bit of trivia about the Forbidden City. See how the floor is raised at the entrance? It's like that in order to keep evil out.
However, do you notice this door way doesn't have the step? Supposedly it's because the Last Emperor, who was just shy of 3 years old when named emperor, received a bicycle as a gift from Britain at some point and they had the steps removed from a couple of doors so he could ride his bike through the Forbidden City!
After the Forbidden City tour, "Herry" was ready to say goodbye and I asked him if he'd be interested in letting me hire him for the day and lucky for me he was ok with that. Just outside of the Forbidden City is a teahouse which "Herry" sometimes visits. So we went together and enjoyed watching a Chinese tea ceremony and drinking tea.
The tea leaves were rolled into balls. This was ginseng tea.
All together we tried 5 different kinds. This was the final one, a chrysanthemum flower wrapped in green tea (I think that's what they said). After dropping the tea wrapped flower into the water, it bloomed after a few minutes!
"Claire" and me. She was an entertaining tea ceremony presenter as well as quite a salesperson. I ended up buying tea for my mom and myself.
I still have a lot to write about my first day out in Beijing, but it'll have to wait because I'm fighting to keep my eyes open. I should be back tomorrow though! Until then...
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