Day Three

We are off to Tiananmen Square. A huge area in the middle of the city. Apparently capable of holding a million people.

I was fascinated by the crowd control barriers in this photo. I see them all over the place in China.

I have to wonder why we are not using these on the tarmac back home, instead of the silly PIGS that flap around in the breeze. 

(Sorry but non Air New Zealand staff may not understand a word of that. Just smile and nod)

The top end of Tienanmen Square leads right up to the entrance of The Forbidden City.

 Many of the trees in the city are literally hundreds of years old.

You will see many of them leaning precariously, needing to be propped up. The stay is not real timber, and are concreted into place.

This is a man-made river that runs around most of the Forbidden City.

Lunch was at a famous dumpling restaurant.

Nice.

 Sarah took great interest  in the lady at the next table. She was dining alone, but still bought all of these dishes. She then started packing them into takeaway containers. I guess that's lunch sorted for the next few days!

We had the afternoon off, and took a wander to a mall a block away from our hotel.

Sarah took this one. She couldn't get over the classy way that women sit in this country.

Clearly they have not been reading the magazine articles about Meagan Markle learning not to cross her legs. Zoom in on the one chomping on the corncob, if you have a strong stomach.

Lets not forget the Apple Store. One of my pilgrimages wherever we go.

The evening finished with a dinner. This is the only one that is part of the tour package, and is at a local restaurant whose specialty is Peking Duck.

Sarah doesn't eat anything that has become a Disney character, so it was all on me.

Interesting.

Remember, the tour includes every breackfast and lunch, and one dinner. This was the one.

Souvenirs

I think it's time to explain something about tours.

Almost without exception, every tour you go on WILL include the opportunity for shopping. Souvenir shopping.
Whether it's getting suits made in Bangkok or pottery in Vietnam, the tour guide will always include in the day's itinerary an opportunity to buy some quality local products. These are not always mentioned in the printed itinerary, but is a great opportunity to educate yourself about the local crafts.

There is an important distinction to be made here. There will be local street markets where you can buy 'similar' products for less than these factory shops are offering, and the markets are often open to bartering, something less likely in the shops the guide will take you to.
Here comes the BUT...

Too often, the products you will find in the street markets are of similar quality to what you will find in a good $2 shop back home! An occasional gem, but mostly crap! To be fair, though, for many people, that's exactly what they want. Spend a couple of bucks on a novelty present for the friends and colleagues without breaking the bank. But if you want something for yourself, or as a special present, the market often doesn't cut it.
When we were in India, we were taken to a silk house that has been in the business of weaving tapestries, scarves and other beautiful items for generations. Sarah bought a handful of scarves there. Mostly for herself, but a beautiful quality as a very special present, when required.
We later ventured out from our hotel and explored a local market. We found silk scarves for probably 60% of the cost of the first ones. But when you have handled silk, you can really feel the quality. The more expensive ones are SO much better quality. You will almost never find that quality in any street market.

So embrace the opportunity to see these factory shops the guide will take you to, with no obligation to buy. It's so much fun to see what is available in these exotic countries.
Don't be fooled, though. Some items are scary expensive. Out of reach for many, but amazing nonetheless.
Some of the most memorable, and expensive, things we have bought overseas were from these tucked-away factory shops that we didn't even know we were going to. Maybe the surprise of finding something we weren't looking for, adds to the appeal.

In the factory after the Great Wall, there were some amazing pieces of jade. Some are carved from horrendously massive blocks. Crazy huge. Many many kilos in weight. Tonnes. The largest Jade items I have EVER seen.
We didn't buy anything there, but it's always good to visit these places.

We discovered that there is actually Jade and Jadeite, or more specifically, Nephrite and Jadeite. Jadeite is harder and more expensive. Should I mention that some experts say there is no Jadeite in New Zealand? Just Nephrite and something called Bowenite. So there is Jadeite, Nephrite and Bowenite, all completely different chemically, and all called Jade. It depends who you talk to, I guess.
Other experts will tell you that for centuries, whenever the Chinese find a green stone, they call it Jade.
Not confusing at all, then...

Day Two

This was the day to visit the Great Wall...

Oh crap!

This is probably one of the most famous things about China, and the only one visible from space.

Not much to be said, really...

As you can see, some of these steps, are ridiculously high.

Somebody needs to add some half-steps at one end of each step in the steep bits.

We went further up than we had expected, but we certainly didn't tackle this nose-bleed section.

Once you have a bit of altitude, there is an impressive view.

There are two Great Wall locations that are popular from Beijing.

The other one is always much busier. They have what Ricky calls the free Chinese massage.

Clearly, we came to the quiet one. Thank goodness.

On the way back, we stopped and looked around a huge jade factory/shop.

Then off to an underground Mosoleum, once more in a massive park area.

According to my silly watch, I did 11,585 steps and 12 flights of stairs today.

It felt like it.

The extracurricular activity that we asked Ricky to arrange for us tonight was to go see a performance by the Shaolin Monks. Lots of high kicks and somersaults, loosely wound around a story of their history.

In Beijing, they have an Uber-esque company called Didi. It's probably all over the country.

Ricky is a frequent flyer with those guys, picking up or dropping off clients at the Airport. He had built up so many points, that he had lots of free trips up his sleeve. Despite these concerts being out of hours for him and the driver, Ricky used his own points to 'uber' us to and from both concerts. FOC! The driver got the night off, but Ricky took us and waited outside to bring us back to the hotel. Did I mention he's a nice guy?

Day One Evening

Ricky offered to get us tickets to a couple of shows while we were there, so why not.

This first night, we chose to go to see an acrobatic show.
The venues for these places are .... interesting. The patrons, enthusiastic.

I will add a couple of videos when I figure out how.

After lunch

Next door to the lunch restaurant was a silk factory shop.
They showed us the life-cycle of the little grubs that make all the magic.
Unlike most caterpillar/pupae/butterfly progressions, this one stops at the pupa, because the cacoon is the thing people want. It is made of a rediculously long, thin strand of silk, wrapped into a ball around the bug.
They explained to us the different uses for the silk, from both single cocoons and doubles.
For some reason, it is quite common for two bugs to cuddle up before they start spinning their cocoons, creating a double.
It seems that they soak the cocoons in some secret sauce, to loosen the strands.
With the single cocoons, they can unravel it into a continuous single strand of up to one km!! These are what you will find in woven silk fabric.
It appears that the 'twin' cocoons cannot be unravelled, so the twin silk has a different use. Imagine one of those fake spiderwebs you buy for halloween. They come in a small wad, and can be stretched wider and widerto make a bigger and bigger web.
These cocoons are just like that. They get stretched out wider and wider.
these make up the filling for a duvet. One 'web' gets stretched out to the required size, and then another one gets laid over it. Depending on the weight of the duvet to be made, the number of webs increase. So the difference between a double and a super-king is how far the webs have been stretched.

Sarah bought one. No surprises.


Then we went to the Temple of Heaven, where the Emperors would go to worship.

Like most temples or palaces, the grounds they sit on are simply huge. There is no shortage of land to create a tranquil environment, even in the middle of a busy city like Beijing.

We did notice some bazarro little cars around town. So many little vehicles to pop into and out of nooks and crannies with the busy traffic.

Last event for the day was a Tea ceremony. Ricky took us to a beautiful tea shop, where a lady walked us through the various teas, and how to make them.

Sarah wants to add to her teapot collection, so we had a look at those, and bought some tea.

They gacve us a halarious little gadget that tells you when the water is hot enough to make tea.

Its a little ceramic guy, and you pour the water over his head. If the water is not hot enough, nothing happens. If the water is hot, he pees in your eye. "No Pee No Tea"

Tea He....

Leaving the Summer Palace

All the dirt from the lake went to make the hill to put these buildings on.

We can take a dragonboat to the other end of the lake, where we will meet our driver

This is our ride

Did I mention lunch is included in the tour?

Day One

According to the itinerary, day one is Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City.

It also said that on Mondays, The Forbidden City is closed for maintenance. Guess what today is?
No problem. Sarah was ready with suggestions of a restructured itinerary, but Ricky was way ahead of us. He had already decided to swap days one and three, and asked if we were ok with that.

So Day one was now going to be the Summer Palace. Built by an Emporer for his mum.

This is the entrance to The Summer Palace. Ticket sales to the right

In the middle of this Palace is a man-made lake.
Where there is a lake, there is somebody who will take your money to let you get on a boat

A huge long covered walkway for mum's exercise. 728m long, the longest corridor in the world, allegedly.

Unsurprisingly, it is called the Long Corridor.



She was bored, so...

The Emporer instructed the designers to decorate the passageway.

They had a week to do it, on pain of death.

No pressure, then...

There are more than 14,000 individual artworks in the corridor, by hundreds of artists, depicting scenes from stories and fables.

Apparently the paintings are on the left, right and overhead, so that mum would exercise her neck while admiring the work as she worked.


Apparently mum was now happy, so there were no designers or artists beheaded in the making of this structure.

Wendy Wu Tours

So here's the deal:
Sarah found this tour that covers all the bucket list hotspots in China.
The Great Wall, Tiananmen Square, Summer Palace and The Forbidden City are all within reach of Beijing. In fact, all of them except for the wall are virtually walking distance from each other.
The only one left was the Terracotta Warriors, which are outside Xi'an.
The tour starts in Beijing and spends 3 days working through the list. You then fly to Xi'an for the Warriors.
The tour includes 3 nights at a hotel in Beijing, a flight to Xi'an, and one night in a hotel there.
All hotels include breakfast.
We also get a guide and vehicle for the three days in Beijing, escorted to BJS airport, picked up from Xi'an airport and taken to the hotel. Finally, we get a guide and vehicle to the Warriors.
The deal we signed up for has us meeting our first guide in Beijing at the hotel after breakfast, and leaving our second guide at the hotel in Xi'an. We were to make our own way from Beijing airport to hotel, and from Xi'an hotel to airport. Just so we're clear.

When selecting the package, we had a choice of 3 standards of hotel. For a few reasons, we chose the top one.

So in Beijing, we are staying at The Regent. Nice hotel.

After breakfast on our first day, we met our guide, Ricky, in the foyer. Or is that Lobby? Not sure which one is posher... We had spoken to Ricky on the phone the evening before, so knew when and where to find him.

Now we have done the odd tour before. We have certainly seen them descend upon our terminal in Christchurch. Everybody will have their own opinion of which nationalities are going to be pushy, which will be demanding, and which will be impossible.

We were expecting Ricky to escort us out to the bus parked out the front, to join the others from the other two hotels. Odd, nobody else from the Regent were looking for Ricky.

But no. He took us to a VW sedan, with a driver. Seriously? Before we had pulled out onto the street, we asked Ricky about the bus. "If you'd rather a bus group, I can arrange it". Smart Arse.

No, we're good. Surprised. Ecstatic. We're good.

Clearly, Sarah's PhD didn't pick up the fact that this is a private tour. A very nice surprise.

Ricky is a young guy, mid to late 20s. Very good English. Very chatty, very friendly. Nice guy.

So day one began well. Comfortable car, water bottles supplied (temperatures are expected in the high 20s), private tour of Beijing.

The Neighbourhood

Once dropping our bags, we took a little recce around the hotel.

 No this is not our hotel It's a rather grand little number just across the road.





















These were all within a single block. Aston was in our hotel building, while the others were just around the corner, one after the other. We don't want the rich and powerful walking too far to make a decision.

Obviously, Capitalism is alive and well in China!

And just down the road is the police station.


Can you imagine one of these little numbers in hot pursuit of a recidivist Ferrari or a McLaren driver?

Wherever you look, you will see a famouse Chinese Fast Food Chain is nearby

Beijing

I tell you what, getting into China is a bit tricky for a big fella!
And not for any reasons you've just thought of.

Just like getting into the States (keeping up with the Trumps?), they take your fingerprints.

UNLIKE getting into the States, they don't tell you to flatten each enormous digit onto the reader one at a time.

Put all four fingers of your left hand on the screen.
Stay inside the lines
Put all four fingers of your left hand on the screen.
Stay inside the lines
Put all four fingers of your left hand on the screen.
Stay inside the lines

I'm probably a slow learner, but I eventually figured out that my wide hand (but is it though?) wasn't going to fit inside the window they give you. I have no idea how sasquatchian sportsmen from just about any country would get through this IQ test.

Then I figured it out. The goal is to get all four fingerprints visible on the screen. So I turned my hand 45° and voilà! Just like how they measure a television screen, the diagonal corners are further apart than the sides.
Phew!!!

Anyway...

These big airports really are impressive. And modern.

We were debating how to get to our hotel. All other transfers had been pre-arranged, except for this one. We didn't know till about -24hrs which way we were coming, so decided to wing it.

Those who know Sarah will understand how difficult that thread was to leave dangling.

Against her better judgement, she agreed to let me take her on the train. The only alternative seemed to be a taxi, and we knew that English would not be the default.

So off we go to the station. About 100m from the main terminal concourse. I had screenshots on my phone of the transfer stations.

As we all know, Google is a dead duck in this country, but Apple Maps was alive and well. Go figure!

I had decided to gamble that we would have access to enough wifi spots during this trip, so got a password at the airport to set up my train route before we left the terminal, and our link to the internet behind. I didn't want the hassle of getting a local sim, but we'll see.

The train ride was uneventful. Just like in Bangkok, the ticket from the airport only gets you to where you change to a city train, regardless of what you're told at the airport ticket desk. 50 yuan for airport to city, then only 6 yuan for the last two sectors. Once we emerged at street level, it took a moment to get our bearings. After getting directions via sign language, we established that the train station exit is  actually in the basement of our hotel building. Too easy!!

In Transit

Hong Kong Airport really is a big place. You need to take the train to the gates! This is not like the train in SIN terminal, which just runs a couple of hundred yards. This is a serious distance. I don't even know if walking is an option.

 HOW many gates, did you say?

Is it just me or does this belong in Japan?


OK, so it's just me...



















HKG may be a 24hr operation, but not at check-in.

 I imagine its a rare sight to see no activity here.

We turned up at 0400 for the 0730 departure for Beijing. Standard stuff, 3 hrs out. Sarah's rules.

Counters should be kicking into life by 0430, right? After all, we all know what these airports are like getting through customs and to the gate.

Apparently not! Needless to say, Sarah was getting antsy. If we had known, that could have been another hour's sleep.

At 0515 they eventually opened the counters, but not like back home. There were more than 15 counters. Hit 'em heavy and hit 'em hard, apparently.



We were checked in and through customs by about six. Amazeballs! Crisis averted.

Planning

There are a few must-sees in China:
The Great Wall, Tiananmen Square, Terracotta Warriors, stuff like that.

Sarah decided that these places deserved a place on her bucket list. Conversation over.

As with everywhere else we have been, Sarah does a 'PHD' on the destination, looks into everything. Every angle. Every detail. No stone too small, no detail too trivial.

There are so many reasons not to go to China. Language. Food, Hygene. Polution.
We almost didn't go. Sarah read something about 'fake food', and worried that it would be an issue.
She read about pollution and worried that it would affect my asthma.

We spoke to one of the Chinese girls at work about these concerns.

• She said that there would be no food issues, fake or otherwise, if we stuck to the kind of restaurants found in major hotels.
• She also said that pollution would be much lower in summer, when we have been planning to go, rather than in winter.

Sarah decided that, based on Jing's advice, we would go after all. It would be Jing's fault if things went badly. So no pressure then.

Maid in China

Well. It's certainly been a while.
To be fair, I got a little worried that I was turning into one of those Facebook addicts that I mock so mercilessly.
You know the type, those who change their status every time they poop.
So I stopped the blog. What could I possibly say, that would hold people's attention.

Anyway... Enough of the self-flagellation. It's time.