Last Full Weekend in Beijing!

It's hard to believe how time has flown by here in China this summer. Currently, I'm blogging from one of the coolest places I've ever been to: Malaysia (think mix of down-town New York, the history of Europe, and the nature and palm trees from Hawaii/some Caribbean Island). But more on that later.

Last weekend (July 15th through 17th), was my last full weekend in Beijing because this weekend I am in Malaysia, next weekend I will be in Thailand, and the weekend after that I come home. So, we decided we needed to see everything in Beijing that we had put off, which was basically four things.

First, we all decided that, since we were in Beijing, we needed to see a traditional Chinese Acrobats show. It was an evening show that last a little over an hour and was amazing! The performers definitely know how to impress and audience and keep them entertained. Here is a highlight of some of the acts:

There was a very cool act where the performer stacked a bunch of chairs on top of one another and then did handstands on the top of them. We thought it was impressive when the guy was using four chairs:

But, he kept going and eventually got up to eight chairs!

Other cool acts that they did were one where the performers juggled balls with their feet:

and one where a bunch of people balanced on a bicycle:

Another place we had wanted to visit in Beijing for a while was the 798 Art District (a modern art district). We weren't allowed to take pictures inside any of the studios, but the outside exhibits were still very cool to see. My favorite was a bunch of objects made out of bricks, including an iron, a can of tuna, and a car!

Another place that we had been wanting to see in Beijing since the beginning of the summer was the White Pagoda Temple, which is by the Forbidden City.

It was a giant park and, on top of a hill (of course!), was a giant temple to Buddha. On the way to see the temple, there was an area where people wrote their prayers on wooden squares and then hung them all over the place, which was very pretty.

Once we got to the top, we quickly snapped some pictures and left because it was beginning to rain, and being on top of the tallest hill in the city during a thunder-storm did not seem like the best idea! Fortunately, we did have enough time to see the view of the Forbidden City from the temple and look inside the temple, which was very simple. There were also a bunch of incense sticks laying out, but none of them were lit, which I didn't completely understand. Finally, the outside of the temple was covered in these little carvings of Buddha. Most of the statues, however, were worn down in some places because it seemed like everyone who was walking by had to touch every Buddha!

The last item on our list of things to see in Beijing was the Night Market, which we went to on Monday night (July 18th). The Night Market, which is located in the middle of the city, is a VERY popular and packed tourist destination, mainly because of the strange street food you can buy from the vendors, including (prepare yourself) starfish, scorpions (which were still moving on the stick....grossed me out!!!), seahorses, spiders, lizards, and more. If you want to be grossed out, pictures are below:

We decided that the only people who would be dumb enough to eat those things are probably the Frat-Boy type who need to prove their manly-hood, or something. I ended up going for the safer, normal food: some pork dumplings and grapes on a stick that were dipped in a caramel-like coating - delicious!

That's the last of the main things that we saw in Beijing during our last weekend. I'll update soon with information about my trip to Malaysia (probably a couple of posts!). All you need to know now is: I've officially picked out the house I will be living in when I move here! It's so amazing!

Update on the last few weekends

Sorry I haven't posted in a while! I've been busy at work, exploring Beijing, and planning our week in Malaysia/Thailand! So, here's what we've been up to the last couple of weekends:

On July 2nd, we explored around town during the day and didn't find a whole lot of things. That evening, however, we decided to go back to the Olympic Stadium because the last time we went, we lest before we could see everything lit up. The Stadium definitely had a different feeling during the night and it was very pretty!

The funniest part of the evening was when PJ and I were trying to get a picture of the Water Cuba lit up with a bunch of different colors, like you see on all the official Beijing Olympic pictures (see below). However, the Water Cube changes colors throughout the night and it seemed to repeat every 30 minutes or so. So we were waiting for the Water Cube to change colors to the one we wanted and then some Chinese people came up to us asking for our picture (not an uncommon occurrence). As soon as they came up to us, the Water Cube changed colors and we were trying to tell the people that we had been waiting for 15 minutes and had to get a picture! I don't think they entirely understood, but we got a couple of pictures and the Chinese tourist got a picture with us, so all ended well!

The next day (Sunday, July 3rd), a couple of us went to the Beijing Zoo. After wandering around to find the zoo (which you wouldn't think would be that hard, but it was...), we finally found it and the first area we went to was the pandas! It wasn't a huge surprise, but all but one of the pandas were sleeping....and the other was eating bamboo. They were still very cool to see.

They also had an area with red pandas, which are a lot smaller than the Giant Pandas (shocker, I know), but still cute.

After seeing the pandas, we explored the rest of the zoo. Although the panda area of the zoo was large enough for the animals and well kempt, the rest of the zoo was almost the complete opposite. Many of the animals were in really small cages that were dirty and filled with litter. We figured it was like this because of the limited amount of space in Beijing and because the entrance ticket was only 15 RMB = less than $2.50 (seeing the pandas was extra).

Last Saturday (July 9th), I went to a couple of small places a few metro stops away: the 5-Pagoda Temple and the Purple Bamboo Garden. The 5-Pagoda Temple (Zhenjue Temple) was a smaller, Buddhist Temple built in an Indian style, as opposed to the traditional Chinese style. It was a very quite place to walk around and explore because it's not a traditional "tourist destination" in Beijing.

Around the temple, there was also a museum of stone carvings, which included a lot of large statues and old tomb-stones, including a bunch from Jesuits, which was slightly surprising.

After seeing the Temple, we wandered around the Purple Bamboo Park, which was a short walk away. 

The park was very pretty and, once again, was not a tourist place; there were just a bunch of locals walking around, taking pictures, practicing tae kwon do, and more.

Finally, on Sunday (July 10th), one of PJ's friends who is currently working in Tianjin (30 minute train ride away) was visiting for the weekend so we went around with him for the day. I also found a place at the Pearl Market to buy cheap, but very good quality, knock-off Coach bags, so you can believe I'll be bringing a few of those home with me!

You know you live in Beijing when...

After about six weeks here in Beijing, there are a lot of things that are completely different from in the US. Here's a list I've come up with about the important differences between Beijing and Michigan.

Transportation

-People ride on the back of bikes.

-Cars don't know what brakes and turn signals are. If you don't look both ways at least 10 times before you cross the street (even if you have a green light at a cross-walk), there is a good chance you may die. And I'm not exaggerating, although I haven't yet seen an accident.

-The metro system is a God-sent. You can go anywhere in the city for 2 RMB (30 cents)

-Almost every restaurant delivers. Including McDonald's and KFC. And people say Americans are lazy!

-I've seen almost everything being transported on the back of a bike, including water, fruit, flowers, entire families (I saw one bike with the two parents, two kids, and a dog), and more.

Eating
-Fancier restaurants all serve food in a family style manner. All the food is placed on a rotating glass stand on top of the table and then you just take whatever you want with your chopsticks.

-Pig's ear is disgusting. Don't try it. (and for the record, I thought it was gross before I was told what it was)

-Almost all snacks/cookies come in a wide variety of flavors. Take oreos for example: forget vanilla filling. Try mango&orange, green tea ice cream, blueberry& raspberry, and more! The same goes for Chips Ahoy. Orange Chips Ahoy cookies are my favorite so far!

-There are a ton of different types of juices here, including coconut juice, watermelon juice (yum!), plum juice, and more!

Entertainment
-Movies can be bought for $2, and books for $1 to $2, depending on the length of the book.

-Clubs here play a lot of Spanish and European music, which I was not expecting!

-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 doesn't come out in China until August!!! Oh the horror! Because it comes out in Hong Kong on July 14th (like the rest of the world...), we think it has to do with some Chinese law.

Clothing and Shopping

-The women here in China will go to any length to ensure that they are pale because tan skin is a sign of a poor farmer. This includes: wearing socks with sandals, always carrying a parasol (even if it's cloudy out), wearing what look like leg warmers, but for the arms, and (in some extra cases) wearing face visors to prevent the face from becoming tan. On of the graduate students in my lab couldn't understand why Americans like to tan, and trying to explain it to her was nearly impossible!

-Chinese clothes are tiny! I went to a clothing store the other day and all the pants were skinny and size 4 or less.

-The knock off brands here are hilarious! For example: AmericEagle (instead of American Eagle). I have also seen advertisements for the new "zPad" (Forget iPad!)

Miscellaneous
-I have yet to find a public bathroom that has toilet paper and hand soap.

-Chinese will just randomly come up to us to take a picture with us. It's actually quite hilarious to see which one of us can get the most pictures/the most bizarre pictures in a day.

-Store owners always hand things to customers with two hands (include change). Supposedly, as a sign of respect, you should take things with both hands....hopefully I haven't insulted too many people by just grabbing my change with one hand...

-Bargaining is a most in China (except at places like grocery stores and department stores). More often than not, you can get things for 10% to 20% of what the seller originally asks for.


And finally, here's an update on our travel arrangements:
Our flight are officially booked for Malaysia and Thailand! We will be in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from July 23rd till the morning of July 27, and then Bangkok, Thailand from July 27 till August 1! Then it will be back to Beijing for a week before I head back to the US...It's amazing to think how little time we have left, but I can't wait for our trip!

We tried to book train tickets to go to Shanghai for a weekend, but we couldn't get tickets! In case you haven't heard, a new, high-speed train was just opened on July 1st that can travel between Beijing and Shanghai in a little less than 5 hours (compared to the 13 hour ride the old train would take). Well, since the train ride is as short as a flight (if not shorter, and there's no risk of a delayed flight) and about half the price, it seems everyone is just taking the train. In addition, the over-night, slow trains are being phased out. So, the overall story is: it was impossible for us to get tickets to go to Shanghai this weekend and now we're not sure if we'll be able to go!