China: The Last Day

It's finally here-my last day in Asia. Since the Intrepid tour officially finished this morning, I got to spend it with two of my trip mates, Hein (Belgium) and Lisa (Germany). We headed first to Jingshan Park, which was surprisingly large and lush! We even got to participate in one of the women's outdoor dance classes in the park which was pretty awesome! 

We hiked up to the main tower pictured above. There were all of these cool bonsai trees at the temple, and there was a great view over the Forbidden City. Unfortunately it was a bit smoggy, but the view did give some sense of the scope of the city itself.

After saying goodbye to my roommate Lisa, Hein and I headed out to the olympic park to see the Bird's Nest and Water Cube. It's crazy to think how many people were standing in the same park back in 2008... 

My next task was to find my hostel for the night. That turned out to be more of an adventure than originally planned :D But such is the world of traveling! After taking a bus to the general area of the hostel, I set about trying to find it armed with the address written in Chinese. Most people on the streets didn't speak any English, so there was a lot of showing the screen shot of the address and being pointed in the right direction. After multiple contradictory directions, I finally found one guy who was incredibly helpful. He pulled out his computer and gathered a couple of friends, who together plus this map they drew, gave me the first clear sense of where I was going. I did eventually find it :D

After checking into the Saga Youth hostel, I headed out on my second unexpectedly long adventure of the day-finding my friend Kyle. He's an Ole who received a scholarship to studying in Beijing for the year-what a great place to meet up with a friend for dinner :D Unfortunately we had agreed on a subway stop, but not a specific enough spot. With only a mere 21 million people, Beijing is not an easy place to find someone! Luckily, we managed to find each other after around half an hour of searching, and had a lovely dinner of hot pot. Such a great way to spend my last night abroad. :D

China: Day 8

Our last day with the tour started with a trip to the Forbidden City & Tiananmen Square. The city was home to the emperors between the Ming and Qing dynasties. It was built in 1406, and consists of 980 buildings and covers 180 acres! 

One of the most surprising aspects about this trip was how few non-Chinese tourists there were. As you can see in the crowds of one of the biggest tourist attractions in Beijing, it's almost all Chinese tourists. Perhaps it was a result of traveling in September, when many foreign children are in school. Plus, I expect most people think of China as a hard to get into, and heavily controlled by the government. Not to mention the fact that 1.3 billion people are Chinese, so that's got to help too! 

For dinner, we had Peking Duck, with yet another lazy susan for our big group. :D

Then, it was off to the kung fu show. It was such an amazing performance that told the story of one little boy growing up to be a kung fu master. 

China: Day 7

Today we went on an adventure to the great wall, which was absolutely incredible! Definitely one of the highlights of the whole trip. 

There are 4 sections currently which are open to the public. Two are quite close to Beijing (around 1 hour away), but these are also quite crowded with tourists. Intrepid took us to a location around 4 hours away. We arrived bright and early and had the wall section almost to ourselves, which was such a treat. 

Tour group lead by Ting Ting!

My lovely roommate, Lisa :D

Practicing our kung fu moves for tonights performance!

At night, I even decided to try one of the tourist traps after two Brazilian tourists offered to share their silk worms with me. Surprisingly, they weren't too bad. :D

China: Day 5

Inside the modern Xi'an are the old city walls. My trip roommate, Lisa, and I spent the morning walking the walls. There are city ordinances which limit the height of buildings within the wall, but not outside the wall which creates an interesting contrast. 

During the 1990's many Chinese women found themselves out of work. The government created a movement of outdoor and communal exercise classes for these women, and the idea stuck. Women take dance classes, play badminton/ping pong, and practice Tai Chi.

In the afternoon we headed out to the main attraction of Xi'an, "The Museum of Qin Terra-corra Warriors and Horses." Today, there are around 7,000 life-size terra cotta warriors and horses on display, but there are many thousands more which have yet to be dug out. The process started in 1974 after a farmer stumbled upon the site by accident.

You cannot help but be struck by the size of the pits already excavated. It's incredible.

Unfortunately, many of the warriors have been destroyed. Apparently, at some point during the 3rd century BC, Xiang Yu, the leader of a rebellion against China's First Emperor, Qin Shi Huang, succeeded in getting access to the outer chambers of the imperial tomb. He had the warriors smashed, and set fire to many of the rooms. Thus, the archeologists are in the process of having to piece together the remains of many of the warriors. 

One of the reasons why so many of the rooms have not been excavated is that the archeologists are still trying to refine their methods of excavating the soldiers. When they were originally constructed, the soldiers were brightly painted. However, most of the soldiers unearthed now have lost their paint. The scientists are trying to find the best ways to preserve these artifacts.

That night we went over to the Muslim Quarter for a bit of wandering and bargaining :D

China: Day 4

We took a quick walking tour of the city after arriving on our overnight train from Shanghai. We saw the old city walls, the bell tower (pictured), the drum tower, and the Muslim Quarter. 

Our main adventure of the day was visiting the Tomb of Emperor Jingdi. The tomb was filled with small clay warriors, chariots, animals, and tools. We are heading to more famous terra-cotta warriors (Qin Terra-cotta warriors and horses museum) tomorrow, and apparently these are significantly larger than the warriors present in this tomb. What was especially impressive about this one though is the techniques used to show off the warriors. The museum built glass walkways above the rooms, so it feels almost as if you are walking the hallways of the tomb. How incredible it would have been to see the warriors when they were first built-in all their color and elaborate clothing!

A model showing the layout of the tomb

Warriors and chariots

Warriors in the process of being excavated

Animals and pottery

For dinner, we went to a dumpling banquet! Each of the 16 courses was one dumpling, each with their own handcrafted styling and taste. 16 dumplings is a lot of dumplings...but they were delicious! Here are a few examples - duck, pork & sweet potato. 

China: Day 3

On our third day, we took a day trip to a small river town called Xi'tang. The town was constructed with canals flowing through it, which gives the town the feel of a Chinese Venice. In general though it was a bit too touristy and there wasn't a ton to do, but we were only there a couple of hours & it was relaxing. 

 

Plus we even found a random alpaca in one of the stores...