Two weeks after Singapore a few of us decided to do Beijing and Shanghai. Initially, I was hesitant because those two cities are basically the two most well-known cities in China! It did end up being a pretty rushed trip but I’m sure I wouldn’t have gotten to Shanghai if I hadn’t gone then.
Day 1: We left for the Shenzhen Airport (a pretty close airport in mainland China and the cheapest one to fly out of if you’re traveling within China) at 2:45 by train and made it through HK customs, then China customs and took a taxi for 45 minutes to the airport. Our flight was delayed by about an hour and we didn’t make it to Beijing until 10:30. We were greeted by chill, polluted air. Though the cool air was a welcome change from the humidity in Hong Kong, the pollution was unbelievable. If Singapore’s air was like a newly blossomed dogwood tree, Beijing’s air was like a rotting, termite infested tree that had just been struck by lightning. I’ve never experienced that kind of pollution – LA has nothing on China.
Our hotel ended up being an hour from the airport. Unbeknownst to us, there are TWO Novotel Hotels in Beijing – one is about 15 minutes away right next to Tiananmen Square, but the other is over an hour outside the city! It was a five-star country resort for $66 US/night. It was nice!
Day 2: Friday we arose and decided on goin’ to the Great Wall, to a section about 2 hours away from the Novotel. It was amazing. It’s an incredible feat of engineering and constructing. The sheer size of it is unfathomable. It looks just like it does in the books, only better because you’re actually there.
We spent a good 3.5 hours just hiking around and taking pictures and such. We actually tobogganed down from the Great Wall, down a winding, metal chute in little toboggans! That was fun!
After I bought a shirt and sweatshirt for about $9 US, we headed to Tiananmen. It’s a Great Square. There were a lot of soldiers patrolling around and pictures of Mao so I refrained from causing any trouble, like I usually do (not). We walked around for a while and then took our taxi back to the Novotel. Oh, I forgot to mention that we’d actually hired a taxi for that day and Saturday, which made getting around easier. He did not speak a word of English so we thanked God that Yichieh was with us. Everything would have taken three times as long if Yichieh had not been with us. He is a great friend (obviously not just because of that, but you know). Actually, almost nobody spoke any English so we were very dependent on him. I was able to use some of the Mandarin I’ve been learning but the Beijingese have an accent that is very difficult to understand, even for native speakers; Yichieh even had trouble sometimes. They talk very fast and don’t like to open their mouths very much or enunciate their words. It’s crazy how sometimes our taxi driver’s words just seemed to blend together into one big long word. That reminds me; I need to start studying for my final soon!
Day 3: On Saturday we ate a giant buffet at our hotel before checking out and loading into our taxi. The buffet was truly delicious and I didn’t eat for what felt like a day – it was at least a couple of hours anyway. Our first stop for the day was the Temple of Heaven, a huge religious and historical site with a lot of Buddhas and temples. If I did it over again, I think I would’ve skipped this stop. There was this one temple that had a perfectly circular wall surrounding it that conducted sound around its interior perimeter: in other words, if you and another person stood on opposite sides and spoke into the wall, you would be able to hear each other! That was probably the highlight of Temple of Heaven.
Next stop: Summer Palace. The Summer Palace was an historic summer vacationing home for emperors and other royalty, as the name implies. It is bordered on one side by a beautiful lake and, once you reach the top of the site, there are beautiful mountain views on the other side. I recommend taking about half-a-day to a day to take in and appreciate the whole Summer Palace.
Alright, here comes the main disappointment/embarrassment of the trip. After leaving the Summer Palace, our intention was to go to the Forbidden City. Bad news; it closes everyday at 4:30 and we didn’t get there until 5. We were overcome by sadness and deep sorrow. Okay, it wasn’t that bad, but we were really bummed out that we missed it. It was the Forbidden City, right in front of us and we couldn’t go in to see it. It was a major bummer.
After wiping each others tears, we went back to our taxi and were driven to the train station to prepare for our 12-hour overnight train ride to Shanghai. Before I continue, let me tell you that that train ride was one of the most relaxing experiences of my life. I wanted it to keep going; I could’ve ridden that for a day or two it was so calming. And sleeping on a train is especially soothing – it rocks you to sleep. The only bad part was that we had to wake up at 6:45 in the morning because it only took from 7-7 to get to Shanghai.
We had arrived in Shanghai and the “Mission” was about to begin…
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