Day 34: Visiting the Summer Palace, and Snafus at the Airport

So on Day 34, we got to sleep in late, because we weren't going to leave until we checked out around noon. So I got up around 9:30, worked on blog posts from the previous days, chatted with friends and worked on various other things. We packed up, making sure that we had everything and checked out.

But before I go on, I wanted to mention a couple stories from the Great Wall that I forgot to put in yesterday's post. When we were at the top of the Wall, we were going to take a selfie, but then a Chinese grandfather who was with his grandson offered to take it for us. He knew a little bit of English (enough to tell Dom to stand up rather than squat down), but when we said "Xīnnián kuàilè" (which is pronounced Xin-yen, quai-le), which means "Happy New Year", and "xie xie" (pronounced shea shea and means "thank you"), he thought we knew more Chinese that we actually did, and tried to hold a conversation with Dom in Chinese, to which he shyly said he didn't speak Chinese. We also ran into a British lady who said that she was there with several other people who stayed at the bottom, but she needed to go to the top since she came all the way here. We told her about our program, and she was impressed to hear it. Before we left, she told us that if we ran into a man in a puffy black jacket at the bottom (who was 70 that day, she had said before), that was her husband and to tell him that she had reached the top.

We commissioned a shuttle from the hotel to the subway station, having to transfer between three different subways to get to the Summer Palace area. I was also doing the Snapchat takeover for UC International (using Jessica's American phone because mine is a pain to use even in America, let alone here), and I was having lots of fun doing it. Once we got there, it was around 2 o clock, and we decided to get food since none of us had had breakfast other than granola bars or cookies.

We walked down the street to a restaurant, but realized that the line was too long (especially because the Summer Palace closed at 5). So we went to the convenience store next door and got some snacks to tide us over until we got to the airport. We ate what we wanted of them (with me not able to eat more than half of my small loaf of bread with my milk, since I had eaten some Oreos earlier) and saved the rest for later.

We got there, realizing that there were blue skies (a rare sight in Beijing) and got in line for tickets. Dom went to the ticket counter first, and paid for all of our tickets, and we quickly paid him back.

 Going in, at first it seemed really similar to the Forbidden City, in terms of architecture. But as we went on, it had a lot of differences as well. There were a lot of steps, but there were also a lot of unique little winding paths that took people to various places that were really intriguing. (And I was getting lots of great pictures for Snapchat! )

As we walked around, we found a bookstore, several gift shops, vendor stalls outside, and a couple jewelry shops as well. Dom got a map of the Summer Palace grounds (which, if you couldn't tell, used to be the summer home for the royal family) at the bookstore, I got a few gifts at different places, and Jessica got one of the same things that I got...a tiger's eye opal bracelet. There was also a huge frozen pond that dozens, if not hundreds of people were ice skating on.

There was a building at the top of the hill that we decided that we had to go see. It turned out it was extra money to get in, but we thought that it was really worth it. As we hiked up there, the view kept getting more and more spectacular, and the view at the top was breathtaking!

As we exited, we stopped at another gift shop, and then headed out. We asked the taxi drivers how much the ride to the airport would be. At first they said 300 quai, and eventually we haggled it down to 200, but we realized that the subway would only be about 7 quai, so we opted to take the subway. We walked back to the station, and bought a ticket for the station where we would transfer to the airport express. On the way there, a lady stood directly behind me, and according to the others, was obsessed with my hair, staring at it, and even touching it without my knowledge like it was a strange creature.

At the stop, we realized that you have to buy the airport express shuttle tickets directly at the airport, and they were more expensive, at 25 quai. But there was only one stop in between before the airport, and they had different types of seats for this train (and enough for everyone). We took a few more Snaps on the way.

Getting to the airport, Nick found out that our flight had had issues of some sort according to his email. We tried to check in, only to find that there were no tickets for some reason. Looking into it further, it turned out our flight had been moved by the company we had booked it through because it had been overbooked. We had been moved to a different airline, and the flight had left hours before... So we tried over the course of a couple hours to try to decide what to do.... Since Nick couldn't get a refund and we had already booked the hotel, Nick and Dom decided to bear the expense of the business class flight (which was double the price) in order to get the hotel ready for the next day. Jessica and I decided to catch the first flight in the morning which was a lot cheaper and stay overnight at the airport. Additionally, to add to my problems, none of the Snaps I was taking for UC International were uploading....

After Nick and Dom left, we found out that since they had to buy business class, they also got access to business class, which had a buffet dinner. We were still starving, but we had to make our way to the other terminal, which had our new airline. It turned out that ticket counter was closed for the night, but we were still able to get something to eat. We went to Pizza Hut and got a bit of food to tide us over (the fruit tea did put me in a slightly better mood though). After that, I went to the charging station to work on things (including Snapchat, which I thought I fixed, but I apparently didn't....probably because the wifi is iffy here) for a few hours while she rested. I came back over a bit before my time to sleep at her request, and stayed over until I decided to sleep too.

At the time of this posting, we're still at the airport.....

-Zoe

Day 33: Guided Tour around Beijing

 Day 33 started off bright and early, around 7:15. We had to get up and out the door for our guided tour, which was supposed to start at 8. Around 7:40, Jessica and I went downstairs to try to grab breakfast, only to find out that there was no breakfast. Apparently the dumplings yesterday had been  a special thing for the New Year.

At 8, there was no sign of the driver for our guided tour, so Dom went upstairs to try to call, getting no response. Nick tried to call, and immediately got a response. Apparently the guide and the driver were stuck in traffic, and were coming. About 10 minutes later, they came. The guide introduced himself as Wallace, and we chatted on the way to our first stop, the Jade Factory. Getting there, we got to see a worker carving a jade piece, and then she took us back into a little museum area where she explained the history of jade. After that, we were taken back into a showroom where they had lots of jade for sale and they taught us how to distinguish jade from glass. (Pro Tip for jade buyers: jade will not scratch without anything less than diamond, but glass scratches very easily, including against other glass.)  I was hesitant on buying stuff, but they guaranteed that their products were all real jade, and they had a buy one get one sale, so I gave in, getting two bracelets and two zodiac animal figures (one of each was for someone else). I also got a free keychain which said "love" in Chinese characters. But wearing my orange jade bracelet, I was very, very happy with my purchases.

Made entirely of one piece of jade!

After a bit of a drive, in which Wallace told us lots of interesting facts, such as how the dragon represented the emperor and the phoenix (which is my favorite animal) represented the empress, we were at one of the entrances to the Great Wall. He also explained the significance of some of the dragon statues. We found out that the one stepping on the world is the male (holding the world together) and the one stepping on a demon is the female (keeping the world safe).

The entrance we went in had lots of steps.....it was actually climbing a mountain (no joke). And it was freezing, and got more and more windy as we climbed the mountain, but the view was breathtaking, and now I can say that I've climbed one of the seven wonders of the world!

"If we do not reach the Great Wall, we are not heroes." Mao Zedong

As we climbed the mountain, there were more surprises. There was a snack shop in the middle, as well as toilets. When I went to get a drink of water, ice crystals kept forming on the top of my water bottle. And the more we climbed, the more steps it seemed like we had left....we thought we had one more tower left to climb up to....it was actually three. At some point, Wallace had left us to go back to the car and wait for us to make our way up and down the mountain, giving us until 12:10 to get back down to the other side of the mountain.

Marker near each of the lookout points along the wall

Jessica found that it was VERY windy on top of the Great Wall

UC sign on top of the Great Wall (since we're Bearcats abroad)

Once we reached the top of the mountain, we breathed a sigh of relief , and took lots of pictures. One of the things about the Great Wall, the steps are different heights, so it was hard to get my feet up there sometimes on the higher steps (and I was running out of breath quickly as I often do with heavy physical exertion). On the way down, it was falling down some of the bigger steps that was an issue, but not as big of a problem for me.

When we were almost down, Wallace called us to see where we were at (yes, there is service on the Great Wall of China) and we told him that we were nearly there.

We got back around noon (earlier than the time Wallace had set), we bought a commemorative medal to celebrate, engraving our name in it with an oversized nail,  and they took us on a two minute drive to an authentic Chinese restaurant. Wallace said he had only been there one other time before, but he started to order a few different dishes for us. Him and the driver also got different dishes, that they let us try as well. We ended up getting kung pao chicken, a pork and onion dish, and a fresh trout. We were pulled out of the dining area back into the kitchen to watch them get the fish out of the container with a net (the first one had a hole though) and once caught, she slammed the fish against the floor several times to knock it unconscious before weighing it. It weighed 3 kilos, so we were definitely getting a lot of fish. And it (and the other food) was all delicious.

After this, we were asking the driver to go by the Olympic Village, because it turns out that they hadn't planned to go by (even though it was on the tour route....). But the village area was really closed all of the time, so we just got to take pictures from the outside. We got to see the main stadium area, and a couple of the towers as well.

Science museum we drove by

Main Olympic Stadium and another tower

After we drove by, we went to a tea ceremony place, where the lady showed us the art of Chinese tea, letting us try five different teas, a jasmine tea, a ginseng tea, a older tea in a pellet called peor tea, a black tea, and a fruit tea. The last two (but especially the fruit tea) were very sweet without sugar. She gave us some of the history and uses for each type of tea. Ginseng is for health benefits, like improved memory and lower blood pressure and jasmine is to destress at the office, for example. She also showed this contraption that she called a "pee-pee boy" that would pee out water if you poured hot water on its head. She also said that if you bought something, you would get one free, which was strange....but we just rolled with it. Then she took us back into the showroom to buy some tea. After much contemplation, I decided to buy a variety pack of tea, and a teacup with a handpainted phoenix because I don't have anything from China with a phoenix on it yet.

Peacock tea set

After this, we went to the Silk Factory, which was similar to the Jade Factory, although they were more in depth with things. They talked about the life cycle of the silkworm and how the silk was extracted from the cocoon, showing one of the machines used for the extraction and weaving process. After that, there were workers actively stretching some silk in order to make it more and more toward the finished product. Then she showed us some silk inside a cotton sheet, as well as a silk bedspread. Afterwards we were free to wander around the shop. I thought about getting a silk dress or robe, but they were really expensive.

I ended up settling on three scarfs, one for me, and two for others. Mine was orange, and was one that Jessica had pointed out to me. I was very glad, because before that, I couldn't find the right one for myself. I got a silk handkerchief free (and found out that these places really love to give people free gifts....great marketing ploy, I guess).

They rushed us back to the hotel, and then they asked for additional money, which we thought was for tolls, but was actually a tip for them. After paying, we headed upstairs, chilled for a couple hours while I also finished my philosophy homework, and then played cards and watched videos for a couple hours with the boys. Afterwards, I headed back, trying to watch a video on the better wifi, but the website was messing up, so I gave up and worked on my blog before sleeping, knowing that I could sleep in the next day.

-Zoe