HK - China Trip (Part 5)

Beijing (con't)...

Day 9

This morning's seminar was a general report on the Beijing Olympic Games preparation. I think many were relieved to find that the speaker, who is the deputy director of international relations in the committee, could speak English well. During Q&A the pollution question came up. Seriously, I think Beijing's polluted air is really too much. It's like the haze season in Southeast Asia, except that it lasts throughout the year.

Just took this photo because the Malaysian flag is there! Yay!

In the afternoon we visited 清华大学 (Tsinghua University), which has aspirations of being one of the top universities in the world by its 100th anniversary. There we attended a talk by a "returned"-Chinese who was involved in big landscaping/architectural work. It was actually quite interesting but many fell asleep as the lecture hall + lecture effect was rather sleep-inducing. We had the opportunity to tour the campus after that.

清华学堂, as it was first known. It has roots in Sino-American relationship.

Next we went to 北京大学 (Peking University). They have a whole lake 未名湖 (Weiminghu, literally "Yet to be named Lake") and park to claim as part of their campus.Also, there are lots of Chinese architecture on campus grounds which I have been wanting to see for quite some time, as China nowadays seem more preoccupied with building "modern" buildings. So there is really a dearth of traditionally styled Chinese buildings. We had our dinner at the uni's cafeteria and we ate the same stuff as what the students there eat.

Not bad as a campus park eh? Heard from someone there are also small paths in the park where couples like to go at night and...

We had to go out at night of course, being the young people we are =P We went to 后海 (Houhai), a popular nightlife area in Beijing, which is like the Clarke Quay of Beijing. We walked around for awhile and then decided to rent one of the boats that we can steer on our own around the lake. There was an incident involving Olivia that made some of us panic and scream but I ended up laughing a lot inside. Oh well, insider's joke =P

The gate leading to the bar area.

We then split into 2 groups: the beer/alcohol drinking group and the Karaoke group. I obviously went for the latter. We went to Qiangui to sing. 钱柜 (Qiangui, literal translation: "Money drawer") is a karaoke chain enterprise and it is amazing. I have never seen another karaoke place like that in my life! Imagine an entrance and lobby a la a Hotel, a buffet spread and lots of people attending to you. It was lavish, yet the fee was inexpensive compared to Singapore and we got so much more than what we could have in Singapore. Really enjoyed it and I know where to go for karaoke when I ever go to China again (which I somehow think I will).

Day 10

Was really tired as I only slept for 1 hour, but I was still OK (a little grumpy though). Had a quick breakfast and went on the tour bus to visit a building near to the main Olympic building, nicknamed as 鸟巢 (Bird Nest). A lady there went through a briefing about the infrastructure built for the 2008 Olympic games as we walked around to see the models. After that we boarded the bus to another venue where we took photos of the 鸟巢 and other nearby weird-looking Olympic games facilities.

Scaled down model of the Bird Nest Stadium

Actual thing behind me. And this is how polluted the air in Beijing is.

We were having lunch at a place where they also produce jade products. We “had” to go through a “briefing” on jade manufacturing and products before we were escorted to a huge room full of jade products. The idea that ran through most of our minds was: Tourist Trap. Apparently the organizing committee didn’t know of such an arrangement and hurried to usher us into the restaurant place.

After that whole episode and lunch we returned to our buses. We went to 八达岭(Badaling) part of the Great Wall of China, which is one of the better preserved parts and was built in the Ming dynasty. The scenery here is definitely better, and the sky is much clearer too; I could finally see blue skies and white clouds.

The Great Wall is amazing. It’s really hard to imagine how people could’ve built such a project of such magnitude hundreds of years ago. However, like what I’ve heard about the 八达岭 section of the Great Wall, it is over-commercialized. There are so many peddlers and shops selling many souvenirs but many of them are out to charge very expensive prices to tourists which may be 5 times the price.

Part of the Great Wall

Quite steep at some places. Looks a bit exaggerated in this photo though.

There were two paths that tourists could take and I ended up taking the crowded one. The (look-out) “tower” points of the Wall smelt like toilets, presumably because people have been peeing on the walls there. Also, I saw many people, mostly old men, spitting. There were also some Chinese girls climbing the Wall in high heels @.@ I don’t get China sometimes. Anyway, there was merely a shop at highest accessible point and we then made our way down. But most importantly, I am now officially a 好汉! Woohoo! =P

The aforementioned 好汉 posing

Climbed up a tower to take this photo. There's a bottleneck at the lower left corner.

I did some shopping after coming down from the Wall. There was a lady who wanted to sell me a hand-painted T-shirt for RMB260 (!) and I was saying that as students, that was too much for me. She then suggested RMB200 but I refused. She then asked me what price I would want it to be, and I said RMB150. She refused, so I decided to leave, and then she decided to sell it for RMB150. But I still didn’t buy. Wasn’t really interested actually.

I saw a similar T-shirt down the road and the person there was going to sell it to me for RMB20! But then again, it looked more like a printed shirt rather than a painted one… Still, at another shop I managed to cut a RMB40 shirt down to RMB15, after Alena pointed out to me that some people were selling the same T-shirt at RMB15 on the Wall. Also bought some key-chains for my friends.

Had dinner and went back to the hotel afterwards. It was still early. Many people came to my room to use the internet and eventually there was snacks and chit chatting going on. Slept slightly earlier than usual.

Day 11

The Forbidden City was our first stop today. It is now actually referred to as 故宫 (Gugong "Palace") rather than 紫禁城 (Zijincheng "Forbidden City") by the Chinese. The old palace grounds were huge, and there were places that were out-of-bounds or were under reparation. There was also a special area where you needed to pay extra to get in but I didn't go there.

Moat surrounding the Forbidden City

Entrance

One of the many "halls" that we passed through as we walked from one end to the other end of the Forbidden City

At the royal garden

Had lunch at 全聚德 (Quanjude), where we had Peking roasted duck 北京烤鸭. The dish actually comprised of 4 things… the really sinfully oily roasted duck meat, a circular popiah-skin like thingy, a dark salty sauce and raw onion. We were taught how to eat it… first the meat is dipped into the sauce and placed on the popiah skin. Then some onion is placed on top of it and the popiah skin is rolled up such that only one side is exposed. It was sinfully delicious =)

My "angel" designed this dish for me! =)

After changing into our formal clothes we proceeded to the 人民大会堂 (Great Hall of the People). I guess we came a bit too early though… we waited for quite some time before going in. So we killed time by taking photos outside. Lol.

Outside Great Hall of the People

Inside the banquet hall

Once inside we prepared for the photo shoot. We stood on a curved, many tiered stage (like those when we stand on during choir performances), and they were going to take a photo of all of us. There were definitely around 250 of us (including the organisers, sponsors, government officials), so how were they going to take a photo? They used a rotating camera (never heard of it). When we all received the photo it was actually a long roll, kinda like 清明上河图.So anyway after all the speech by a government official and the photo taking session, we had our dinner in one of their banquet halls. The food wasn't magnificent but it was OK. There were performances by some of the participants, of which the Violin + Erhu was one of the most interesting ones.

We were free at night and it was Victor's birthday the next day so we went to sing Karaoke! Again! Woohoo! First time I sang mostly English songs though. I think I still prefer Chinese/Canto Karaoke =P

Jacky, Birthday Boy and Olive

Day 12

I got a bit sick this day onwards but was still OK. In the morning we had an event called CSP Forum and we had no idea what it was about. It was held at 中国青年政治学院 (Chinese Youth Academy of Politics?) and the organiser was 中华全国青年联合会 (National Chinese Youth Association?). They invited 4 relatively young people from the corporate sector to discuss about doing business in China etc. All of them pursued their education abroad and spoke good English. It was an interesting forum and it was nice to hear what they had to say about coming back to China etc.

Next up we went to the 天坛 (Temple of Heaven), also a famous symbol of China. There wasn't really much to do there though. Still, it's nice to see the intricate designs and there was also an exhibition space where the history of the temple and the related customs and processions are explained.

There were some interesting mathematical stuff concerning the architecture but I've forgotten

We then had a chance to visit the 胡同 (Hutong) of Beijing on trishaws. Vincent's trishaw rammed into a tree at a point. Anyway it was like a village except that the streets were really narrow and walls were built around every house. I can see why Beijing authorities do not mind destroying the houses for development because there's nothing very interesting or terribly historical in particular. That being said, a better alternative would be to shift the hutong elsewhere, but that of course would cost money. But I also see the logic of protecting the Hutong as it is really old and shows a glipse of Beijing's past, and it is a nice quaint oasis in the midst of a burgeoning city.

Pin-Chieh (Mily) and Carry behind me and Jacky's trishaw

We then left for the train station. The bus went in all the way til the platform! Now that's good treatment. Hehe. We had to sleep in the compartment that has 3-tiered beds, but I found the train OK.

Off to Shanghai!