Friday, October 17, 2014

Asia – Day 8, 9 & 10 - October 15 - 17, 2015

Three Days in Beijing

Day 8 - We had been told over and over that to get into Beijing was going to take a long time.  Well the only thing that took a long time was for the local government to look at everyone’s passport.  When that process was done, at 8:00am, we were able to retrieve our passports and leave the ship.

We were met by our guide, Harrison and the driver for the three days.  Harrison spoke very good English and the driver did not speak English or understand it at all.

The first thing that impressed us was the amount of trees and plantings by the sides of the roads.  Also, the main road was very wide, 8 lanes and there were no cars. 

After 2 hours we reached the outskirts of Beijing and the traffic increased.   When we arrived in the center of the city the traffic was like any other city, jammed.

The first stop was the Forbidden City.  This is a beautifully preserved walled compound of buildings, courtyards and pathways, once considered the center of the universe and dates back to the 15th century.   It consists of 9,999 rooms (9 is a lucky number) spread over 250 acres.  It was an amazing place to start in Beijing.

Then we went to a wonderful, famous local restaurant on Embassy Row where we had Peking Duck.  We were told by our guide that this was the #1 food in Beijing that we had to try, so we did.  At the restaurant  the chef prepared by the table the duck by slicing off the skin for one serving, then another serving had skin with meat, then the final serving was duck with no skin.  He also served us the innards which only Barb tasted.  The duck was wonderful to both of us.  Peking Duck is a very white duck, roasted with the wood from the Pear tree and based with a sweet and sour soy sauce.

After lunch we then went to Tiananmen Square.  It is the largest square in the world.  After passing through security, we entered the square and walked around just a little part of it.  What an amazing sight.  One of the buildings on the Square houses Chairman Mao’s body, lying in state.  Viewing is only in the morning and one day we passed by in the morning and the lines were very long – our guide said a three hour wait to view the body.

Then we went to the Temple of Heaven.  It is said to be one of the most holy places in the whole country for more than 5 centuries.  It is set high on a hill in a huge park.  There were lots of local people in the park exercising and also a lot of them playing cards and a type of checkers game.

That was all of the time that had been set aside for tours so they took us to the Marriott City Wall to check in.  They upgraded us to the top floor and it was a great room.  It had a shower with two heads, one on the wall and one overhead.  I believe that this shower had the most water pressure that I have every experienced and what a shower when you turned on the overhead.

We unpacked and when to Executive Lounge to see what kind of food they had.  There is no question in our minds that this Marriott was the very best that we have ever stayed in.   The staff in the Lounge could not do enough to help and serve us.  And the food – they had three walls of food, both Chinese and American.  While in the lounge, we met an interesting businessman from Minnesota who spent about 10 months out of the year traveling and a lot of that time in China.  We had fun talking with him for almost two hours.  We ate dinner there both nights and that saved us a lot of money.

Day – 9 - The breakfast was just as elaborate as dinner as we found out the next morning.  Again, they had both Chinese and American food for breakfast.

We were picked up at 8:30am and the morning was set aside for the Great Wall.  But first we stopped at a Jade Factory that was on the way.  Barb got a bracelet and a ring that were beautiful.  Then it was back to the drive to the wall which took about 1 ½ hours and then we had to walk up a hill for a little ways until we saw the Wall – it literally took our breath away. 

Words cannot describe the Wall.  To see how tall it is, to see how steep it is and just to see the magnitude of it is beyond description.  Where we started from the wall the steepest was to the left and gentler to the right.  We decided that we may only be there once so we went for the steepest section and started our climb.  There is no question that it was strenuous, but the walk and then the views were well worth it.  While we didn’t go all the way to the top of the mountain we were on, we made it most of the way.  This one of the most amazing points of interest we have ever seen and also – we walked the Wall!!   We bought a couple of small Jade lions that will be placed in our house at the gift shop.

Next we went to very local restaurant to have a late lunch.  It is fun when you are the only foreigners in the place and for sure no English is spoken.  We told Harrison things that we liked and he ordered for us.  The food was wonderful, whatever it was we ate. 

Then we drove to a local part of town called a Hutong and had a one-hour tour of this village within the town on a Rickshaw that was powered by a person on bicycle.  It was fun as we drove in and out of the little streets.  At one of the stops, the guide we had from that area took us back into the area where we met a local family and saw where they an 7 other family members lived.  It was an interesting experience. 

On the way back to the hotel, we passed the Birds Nest, home of the Olympics and saw several of the other main buildings.  It appears that almost all of the buildings built for the Olympics are currently being used for the general public.

For dinner, we ate in the Executive Lounge and then took a taxi to a place called the Silk Market, which is one of the biggest clothing, purses, jewelry, electronic, junk markets in Beijing.  It was a building 6 stories high and it was fun to shop there.  The basic “store” was a 10 x 10 area and the clerks could not come out of their areas to approach you.  So it was nice walking down the aisle and not having someone grab at you.  They could however shout out at you to come on in and try on something. 

Barb found a couple of scarves and Ed bought 4 shirts.  It is really fun to bargain but you have to be prepared to walk away.  I think that they think you are very stupid if you do not bargain!!  For instance, the two short-sleeved shirts started out at 980 yen ($160.00) and I ended up getting them for $16.00 each!  Bargaining here is not a meet in the middle process.   You have to stand your ground and let them come down to you, or just give a little.  It is fun.

After the market, we could not get a cab to go back to the Marriott as they had inflated their prices drastically.  We found a motorized rickshaw who took us back for only double what we were charged to get there - the cab drivers wanted 4 times as much!  It was really a wild ride, cutting in and out, going the wrong way down streets with no lights in 8 lanes of traffic and really going fast.

We found out the next day that both the cab drivers and the rickshaw drivers were operating illegally and that the rickshaw drivers had a history of a lot of accidents.  It was quite a ride but we made it back to the hotel just fine.

We had drinks in lounge and then went to bed.

Day 10 - Once again we woke up to beautiful skies.  This was the third day that the pollution level was very low and the skies were very clear.  Our guide told us that it doesn’t happen very often so we were very lucky with the weather.  Last week, they had a pollution alert and even school kids had to stay home.

We first went to a Pearl factory were we learned about pearls and the different kinds and how to spot a fake.  Barb bought a small necklace and then we left to go to the Summer Palace. 

The Summer Palace is the largest royal garden in China.  It was once a summer retreat for emperors and it is 720 acres of which three-fourths is water.  Again, what an amazing place.  We walked down a ½ mile covered walk-way that had 8,000 paintings painted into the structure.  At the end, we took a dragon boat across the lake and the views were breathtaking.

After spending a couple of hours at the Summer Palace, we left to head downtown and another local Chinese Restaurant.  Again, we let our guide order for us and we had a great meal.  As they had been so great to be with, we bought a meal for the driver and our guide.  The total cost for all 4 of us for a wonderful, filling lunch was only the equivalent of $10.00 –amazing food prices in China.

Then it was into the car for the 2 ½ drive to the port where simply walked on the ship with virtually no one checking any document except our ships entry card.  We had expected to have all kinds of customs inspections both going into and out of Beijing, but it was harder to get in and out of San Juan then here.  Of course we had all of the proper documents and visas.

Just some random views of the two cities.  Our overall impressions of Shanghai and Beijing were that they were amazing cities.  The first and third largest cities in the world.  It is still very hard to comprehend how big they are.  For example, in Beijing they have 6 rings of expressways around the city.  The 5th ring was 229 miles around the city.  They are planning a 7th ring a farther out and it will be 800 miles around the city. They also do not have to go through any approval process or environmental process, the party decides and they do it.

The main road going through the city of Beijing is 28 miles long, 16 lanes across!

The currency is also hard to deal with a $16 = $100 yen.  So when you go to an ATM, and get 1,000.00 yen, you get a handful of money but it is only $163.23 in US dollars.  Quick, figure out how much is 386 Yen.  Thanks goodness for the currency app on the iPhone.

It was amazing to us the number of Chinese who were at these famous places.  95% of the people at the sights were Chinese and very few foreigners were here. 

Everything means something to the Chinese.  When they build something, things have to be just right.  The number 9 is a very important number and a lot of steps are 9 steps.

The local people have no idea of how many people died in the Tiananmen Square massacre. 

Food is very cheap and we enjoyed eating new things – yes, even Ed!

The people revere Chairman Mao and still worship him; but, they have hope that the new head of the government will end the massive corruption that is in the government.

They have a totally different view of the Korean War.  China and North Korea did not invade South Korea – South Korea invaded the North and China only helped as a friend.

There is a hatred for Japan as Japan ruthlessly invaded China and killed millions of its citizens.  In that regard, the US is a friend.  If someone hates your enemy, they are a friend to you.

The scale of everything in the two cities is that everything is over the top, bigger, brighter and flashier then we expected.

China has gone from black and white to full blown massive color in 3D – it is incredible to hear and see how they have rebuilt themselves over the past 20 years – an amazing accomplishment.

They truly feel that they are on the verge of controlling the world economically and that the United States is a “paper tiger” and they might just be right.

Shanghai had less traffic than we have in Bloomington, while Beijing has massive traffic.

There are more billionaires supposedly in Beijing than in any other city in the world.

There are very few birds in the cities because they have eaten them!!

They used to have a rule of only one child to a family but now if you are an only child, you may have two children.  Male children are preferred and almost all children are taken care of in their younger years by the grandparents.

China is an amazing place and we hope to come back to understand the people and the culture a little better.

Friday evening – we are back on the ship.

We boarded just ahead of the tour busses so we were in our rooms by 3:00pm, unpacked and working on this blog.  We had snacks while watching the people board and then took a nap – remember that naps are good!

We woke to an announcement that this ships departure was going to be delayed due to an illness on board.  We watched an ambulance arrive and take the passenger away.  We were told later that someone had suffered a heart attack.  We can’t imagine getting sick like that in a foreign country.

The show today was early and it was a singer who was very good at impressions so it was a good show. 

Then we had dinner and all three couples were at dinner for the first time and we all had fun talking about our last three days.  One couple is from England and the other is from Scotland and both couples have traveled a lot.

Next was the casino and we both did well and left the casino at midnight.  Tonight we set the clocks ahead one hour but tomorrow is a sea day so it will not bother us very much.

Sorry we still can’t put pictures on the blog – hopefully when we check in to the hotel in Tokyo.

Night after leaving Beijing for Korea.
Tiananmen Square.
Climbing the Great Wall
Barb's lunch
The Executive Lounge free food at the Marriott
The Summer Place
White marble house boat at the Summer Palacde

A Chinese lunch with our driver and guide


 
Wine tasting

Forbidden City

Peking Duck

Peking Duck lunch

The Temple of Heaven

Outside the Temple of Heaven

Our car, driver and guide

 

 

The Great Wall

 

A modern kitchen of a Chinese family

More Great Wall - what a climb
 
 

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