Beijing, China

Beijing was a little different from the big, modern city that I expected. I guess Shanghai, China's business and financial center, is more like that. Beijing is the older, more cultural capital. Not so many large, modern buildings. A little bit older, a little bit dirtier. Still very bustling and full of people, bicycles and cars. Air quality was poor. Very poor. There was a constant haze over the city. Maybe it was my imagination but it seemed like when you went outside you could taste the air pollution.

We had a great time in Beijing. The first day we went to Tienanmen Square, evidently the largest city square in the world (whatever that means). There was a large monument there to the common worker, in contrast to the history of the square. Adjacent to the square was the Forbidden City, the ruling place for emperors. We were surprised by the sheer expanse of the city inside its walls. It seemed to go on and on and on. The kids thought so too, but not in a good way. Later our guide and driver took us to a little out of the way restaurant frequented by the locals. Very good. We decided that American Chinese food is closer to Chinese Chinese food than Japanese Chinese food. Got that? Later that day we went to the Summer Palace; the summer vacation home for emperors. This was one of our favorite places, nicely settled along a lake. Very scenic, very peaceful. Here we were able to walk along the longest corridor in the world (whatever that means).

The next day, Thanksgiving, we went to the Great Wall. Obviously everybody knows how big it is and can look up the dimensions. However you can't really appreciate its size without seeing it in person. At any one spot it isn't an overly large building, it's just that it goes to the horizon and beyond. Over 3,000 miles beyond. It was built hundreds of years ago on hilltops and rocky terrain. For its time, and ours, a truly impressive feat. We rode a gondola up to the top and walked along it for about an hour. To get down from the mountain we took an alpine slide. Now that's what I was talking about when I said there must be a more efficient way to get down from Mt. Fuji (see earlier post). After that we dined near the Wall. If this can be considered our Thanksgiving meal then I guess we ate what the locals eat. However for dinner after we got back from the Wall we ate at an international buffet. It would have been a very nice meal with a lot of different foods to taste and enjoy. But since we only had 30 minutes to eat before we went to a Chinese acrobatic show, it was a harried and frazzled experience. At the buffet we ate American, Italian, Chinese and Japanese. So if that was our Thanksgiving meal then it was an international affair.

The acrobatic show was fun to watch. It is amazing to see what the human body can do and odd ways it can bend.

On our last day we went to a Lama temple and the Temple of Heaven. The Lama temple is a temple for the Buddhist religion. The Temple of Heaven is a place to pray for bountiful harvests. After those we took a rickshaw ride. The ride kind of had a strange start as we went up and down some unattractive back alleys. Our drivers kept explaining where emperors lived or their sisters etc. We ended up going through old Peking and around a lake. Then we had lunch and went to the Silk Market which is actually somewhat like a mall but a little smaller and a lot more crowded. The best and worst part of shopping there is negotiating the price. At one store we bought two pairs of shoes, one for Cole and one for Robyn and the starting price was about $230 for both. That's crazy talk! We got them for about $26 total.

We did go to a silk manufacturing store (separate place) that was interesting. We bought a silk comforter there. Nice.

Our hotel was great. Our room had a nice sitting area, large flat screen TV and was equipped with a computer. The only problem was the bathroom as one whole wall was glass with a glass door. We called it the fishbowl because everybody could see in. Click here to see pictures of our trip.