不到长城非好汉

So, each day, for about the last 10 days, I woke up and told myself: I am going to sit down and blog today. And each day, it just never happened.

We went to a whole bunch of places, which I’ll spend a little time detailing now:

- Lama Temple/ Confucius Temple: Despite the tourism, I still had the feeling that it was a really solemn and sacred place. A lot of people light incense and bow down in front of Buddha sculptures and such. We went the day before the national Chinese “Gao Kao” exam (which essentially and solely determines the college you can go to, if you are a high school Chinese student) so there were a lot of students there that day...

- Hutong: Beijing’s historical old family homes. To be completely honest, it was really strange, I didn’t feel that it was that historical. I saw the old style architecture and stone roads, but to me, it seemed a bit contrived. Especially because we were contributing to that, riding through the streets in a touristy pack of like, 12 rickshaws. Hah. But, anyways, there was also an eccentric old guy there (now referred to as “crazy cricket man” by many of our group) who showed us his prized fighting crickets who won thousands of yuan. I’m not going to lie, he was pretty riveting. Especially if you could understand Chinese. Haha.

- The Great Wall: Okay, listen, this thing is a LOT harder to climb than it looks. Maybe it’s because we went to one of the slightly less renovated sites (a.k.a. not Ba Da Ling) but some of the steps were like, higher than my knees. But, it’s okay, because in the words of Chairman Mao himself, I am now a great man. (不到长城非好汉。)

- Ming Tombs: Meh.

- Olympic Stadium: This place had a really futuristic feeling to it. We went there and it was like, really mystical (word choice?) because they were playing some ethereally subtle music in the background, people were strolling around casually, little kids were playing, and the buildings were like huge and modern looking. It was like straight out of a brochure for an (idealistic) future.

- Quan Ju De (全聚德): The birthplace of Peking duck. I, along with Chistine, Jerry, and Justin, had the opportunity to experience this dining delight. It was (almost shamefully) expensive – 1300 yuan – but also ridiculously good! – and very classy (I wonder who all the other Chinese people there were??!). Peking duck is roasted until the skin is very crispy. Then, it is sliced up into thin pieces. You then put it in the wrap along with sauce and slivered green onions. And then consume it ALL because it's so good.

- Beijing Zoo: So, I heard from a lot of people that the zoo isn’t exactly the most humane place on earth and that the living conditions of the animals is pretty bad. But, when I went, I was actually pleasantly surprised that almost all of the animals seemed to be okay, no outrageously small cages or anything like that. The one thing that was BIZARRE though was this exhibit which had lemurs in it … and chickens … and a baby monkey. I am quite certain that none of those animals have ANYTHING to do with each other in the wild.

- Xian: I was so glad I went on this trip. (For people in the program next year, I highly recommend going.) China’s ancient capital is awesome! We went to the Terra Cotta Soldier Museum (兵马俑) where Emperor Qin, the first emperor of (unified) China, erected thousands of soldiers to protect himself in the afterlife. It’s interesting, this huge army was only found again in 1974 by a farmer digging a water well. He was actually there, basking in the fame and glory and eating a bowl of noodles (no really, he literally was.) Hahaha. We also went to the Wild Goose Pagoda, but in my personal opinion, the fountain outside of it was better. This fountain, as big as Tiananmen Square, has a show once a day at 12 noon. Of course we were there. Of course we were tourists and jumped in. Haha.

To sum this entry up, I LOVE CHINA!