Last Few days in China

We didn't get to say a proper goodbye to Marty. On Saturday, we went to lunch with him and a few of his friends. They drove us to the train station, but traffic was horrible, and once again, people were trying to get back home so the train was crowded. We ran through the train station to get to our train on time, and the train literally started moving about 1 minute after we jumped on. We didn't have seats on this 3-hour train ride back to Beijing. It was standing room only, so we stood in between 2 cars for 3 hours. It wasn't that bad.


This article from a Chinese newspaper has a picture that adequately portrays what many of our transportation journeys were like: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-01/19/content_11883317.htm

Back in Beijing we saw a few more of the touristy places. But it was a quick city tour because it was snowing with a cold wind! This picture was taken in Tiananmen Square with the Forbidden City in the background. While in Tiananmen Square, we stood in line for 15 minutes to walk through a masoleum and view Chairman Mao's body. There's a lot of speculation about whether or not it really is his body. No one is allowed to take pictures or have any bags at all. Taylor read that every night his body is moved so it won't be damaged in case there was ever an earthquake.
I don't remember what this gate was exactly...maybe a gate to the old city. It's a cool piece of architecture.
On Sunday night, our last night in China, we went to Da Dong's restaurant to try out the famous Peking duck. We were really excited at first...until we actually started eating. We didn't have the best experience and are sure that it would have been better if we had a Chinese-speaking person with us. We paid for a whole duck but he only gave us about half the meat and left with the rest of the duck uncarved. We saw other tables around us receiving a wrapped and packed remainder of their ducks so we didn't know what was going on. Then we thought that maybe we had actually ordered the "half duck" on the menu. When the bill came, we were billed for the whole thing. Half of the platter we got was skin, which we didn't really eat, so there was hardly any meat at all. It was quite expensive so Taylor went to talk to the front staff. Luckily, but maybe not so luckily for them, there were 2 customers standing there that spoke English and translated for him. They told us that we had 2 choices- to get the rest of our duck and meat, which has to be specially requested; or our second choice for them to take away the remainder of the duck and boil it to make a soup. We got the soup, which we didn't even eat or like. Apparently, this is the more costly and preferred choice for most guests so it's automatically what you get unless you ask for Choice #1. Like I said, if we had a Chinese-speaking person with us, all of that could have been avoided.

Lesson Learned: If you ever go to Beijing to get the Peking Duck, take a Chinese-speaking person with you!

I absolutely do not like cats in any way, shape, or form without any exceptions...never have, never will. BUT, there were all these cats at the hostel we stayed at and I actually became quite fond of them. I thought this one warming itself in front of the heater was really funny. They were actually cute and seemed lovable (which means they probably weren't cats after all), but even then, my allergies kept me far from them.


Asia has lots of fun foods to try. How about some seaweed Pringles?
They were actually pretty tasty~