Beijing Day 3

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First off today, we would like to thank those who have left us comments. Although we can't read them here in China (at least in Beijing), we appreciate your thoughts. We also want to let our family and friends know we are thinking of you all the time and hope everything is going well back home. More than anything though, we miss our little Polli pup and hope she is having tons of fun at camp.

Today we embarked on our 3^rd full day of sightseeing here in Beijing. I've read posts from people who were not thrilled with Beijing, but we have both enjoyed it a great deal. First off, as the capital city of China, it holds so much history that serves as the foundation for so much in China. As Americans, it is still hard to imagine a city or country with so many thousands of years of history still in one spot. The oldest civilization in the world is here and that isn't such a small thing to ponder. We are also taken with how much organization it must take to keep such great order in a city of so many people. Beijing is huge. Not just big, but enormous in land mass. We have been driven around for 3 days nonstop and have yet to see the same section of the city twice. Anna explained that they are constructing a 6^th traffic ring in Beijing which will have a circumference of over 400km.

Today, Shawn and I were both up before 4am. He fiddled with pictures while I read. I realize that my coveted reading habit will become something of a luxury a few days from now! After breakfast, we headed out for our first stop of the day, The Summer Palace. This is a palace built by and for emperors and empresses as an escape from the summer heat. It was destroyed and rebuilt twice, the last being in the early 20^th Century. It is an enormous park built around a land made lake and it truly is breathtaking. Thousands of other tourists joined us here today, so it was quite impossible to appreciate the serenity of the area, but the vistas were breathtaking. Skirting the lake front is a covered walkway which holds a place in the World Record Books as the longest continuous covered walkway in the world. Every surface within the walkway is covered with hand painted or sketched artwork commissioned by Emperors and Empresses throughout several dynasties. Anna was sprinting through the crowds, so I didn't have a chance to enjoy each and every art piece, but it was truly amazing. Also part of Summer Palace is the living quarters for the emperors, empresses, and concubines. There is a long and detailed story about the reign of the empress who commissioned Summer Palace to be built, and her relationship with her sons that was quite interesting. The pinnacle of the park was a huge boat that she ordered to be carved completely from marble. It is absolutely amazing the amount of detail that was derived from rock…especially in an age where carving and sculpting tools couldn't have been very sophisticated.

After leaving Summer Palace, we went to a tea house for a tea ceremony, where they educate on the local teas and, of course, end with a sales pitch. We fell for it, even though our next stop in Zhejiang is known especially for its tea. We walked out 1000 Yuan later (about $120) with a bunch of tea. We later argued about who was to blame for falling for the sales pitch. I think I lost.

Next was lunch, at another pre-arranged location. We decided that these places are like our Applebee's or Red Robin. The food was not nearly as good as yesterday, which was a fancier location, but it wasn't bad either. I would like to redeem my review of the duck from the other night when I said "duck is yuck"… We had something today that appeared similar to duck a l'orange and it was quite good and not nearly as greasy or heavy as the other night. I'm convinced that they must have given us the worst cuts of meat then.

After lunch, we headed out for the Llama Temple. We would have been happy to head straight to the Hutong tour, but we obliged our adorable little pixie of a guide and headed off in yet another direction. Upon arriving, it was obvious that the Llama temple was unlike any of the other temples so far in appearance and meaning. These temples hold Tibetan and Buddhist artifacts now and are an active prayer and study location for monks in Beijing, although Anna confirmed that no modern young people in Beijing study Buddhism today.

There was incense burning in large drums in front of each Buddha chamber as an offering to Buddha. We were not allowed to take pictures inside the chambers, but those Buddhas were very cool. Those who think Buddha is just the bald fat guy are wrong. We never even saw a "laughing Buddha" while there, but a room of artifacts contained thousands of Buddhas, each with a completely different meaning and time period. One hall contained the largest wooden Buddha in the world. I don't have the size stats handy, but huge would not even begin to cover how big it is. It is three stories tall and painted with gold. Truly amazing. I wish I were able to take pictures of it.

Next, we continued on to our final sightseeing destination, the Hutong Tour. A Hutong is an old style neighborhood in China. Many hutong are several hundred years old and still house several generations of families. Essentially, four rooms are built around a courtyard and then closed in within an alley system. Fang Shui is taken into account and each room is inhabited by one family member of a different ranking. We took a rickshaw through a maze of alley streets and continued on foot to a family's hutong, where we were seated in the family courtyard and given tea in Dixie cups. Anna translated for the husband as he explained the history of the hutong and his family. They had a cute pet bird that didn't seem to have any interest in flying away, and he brought out the family grasshopper to explain that centuries ago, they didn't have money to have hobbies outside the home and subsequently raised birds, plants, and grasshoppers to keep busy. Next, we walked further into the hutong alleys and were shown several cultural aspects to the decorations at the doors and how they represent a family's wealth or job. Even here, there was much construction and manual labor going on…and lots of cars all trying to get to the same place. Our favorite part of the hutong was the long lines of restaurants, bars, and shops that line the manmade river that runs through the hutong village and eventually snakes 1000km south into other port areas of China. Although rarely used for that purpose now, it was pretty to see a river running through such a rundown area, like an oasis for those that still live here.

Probably the funniest part of the day was when we decided to help Anna practice her English. We told her to go home and tell her friends that we taught her a popular phrase that Americans her age say: "That's off the hook, dog!". She said it over and over again all day with her Chinese accent. I wonder what her friends will think. She thought it was so funny.

Also a big hit, which you'll see in our pictures, was at the tea house where they showed us how they test to tell if the water is hot enough for brewing tea. They pour the water through a small clay boy and the water sprays out the front if the water is ready. He is called a pee pee boy. We loved him, but they didn't sell them. We begged and she gave us two (probably because she had already been suckers for her tea sales pitch).

We are back at the hotel now and heading for dinner. We are going the path of least resistance and eating at the hotel, but their dinner buffet looks good, so it's not really a cop out, just a protest against walking anymore.

So, tomorrow, we head out for the airport at 8:30am and continue on to Hangzhou. It's a 2 hour flight and I believe we arrive at about noon. Since we don't actually need our guide until Tuesday, we're not sure if she will be at our disposal the first 2 days. Being with Anna made us realize that this is not a country easily navigated by those with no Chinese speaking ability. Charades doesn't work as well here as some other parts of the world. If we were to do it over again, we would have taken a Rosetta Stone crash course or something just to be functional.

Again, sorry if the picture links are not working. If so, Click Here or on the right margin under Beijing Day Three for all of today's pictures. In the meantime, enjoy a few from today: