Lesson Thirteen: How to Enjoy All-You-Can-Everything

Let’s jump right in, woo! China did not make my list of top 3 countries (Right now held by Namibia, Vietnam, and Malaysia, respectively- though I have very high hopes for Japan), but it was definitely a blast. I traveled to Beijing with my friends Carla and Mark (adorable couple), Carla’s roommate Jaime and her friend Sara, plus Mark’s roommate Josh and their friend Matt. They’re all my friends, but there’s the specific rundown for those of you who feel I haven’t been giving you enough social information.

China was a challenge. It was a good challenge in my opinion, but I think others, a little spoiled by our easy time finding English speakers in all the previous countries, found it less positive and more frustrating. The most challenging aspect was the fact that NO ONE speaks English. This was not a problem in, say, Brazil, where Portuguese is relatively easy to pick up and you can get by with decent Spanish. In China, Mandarin and Cantonese aren’t exactly romance languages, and reading the characters is a feat even some Chinese people can’t do. The most English tragedy…okay. I got up to do stuff in the middle of that sentence and I have NO clue what it was going to say. “The most English tragedy is Romeo & Juliet?”…”The most English tragedy is running out of tea?”…I don’t know. If you can comment on what should have been the best sentence, I will give you a special gift when I get home. Give me until then to decide what it is. Probably a baked good, because god do I ever miss baking.

Back to China. Language barrier was tough. We figured out ways around this, like having the hotel concierge write where we wanted to go in Mandarin beforehand. This did not always work out, as cab drivers had the justSOfun habit of staring at the piece of paper like someone wrote “These people think your mom is a stripper,” on it, then sometimes nodding and saying, “(insert Chinese characters here),” or, even more graciously, simply going, “No,” and driving away. OH THE ENTERTAINMENT. So, having at least 7 people at all times, and therefore hailing two cabs, is no easy feat on the streets of Beijing. One cab drove up to us and then drove away laughing. Glad I could pay the fun forward and give a Chinese dude a good laugh with no effort required. Of course, there were friendly cab drivers, too. One talked to us the whole way to the Temple of Heaven- unfortunately, as he was speaking Mandarin, all we could do was laugh and nod confusedly.

But before Beijing, there was Hong Kong. The ship docked next to a mall, so when we disembarked, we disembarked into the couture kids’ section. This was a giant and rather upscale mall, including D&G Children, Chloe Junior, and all sorts of absurdly expensive baby clothing. There was other unusually upscale stuff too, my favorite of which was PIZZA HUT. This was the swankiest Pizza Hut I have ever seen. It looked like it should have sold $50 steaks and $14 plates of pommes frites, not greasy pan pizzas. The first day a few VB friends and I set out to explore. We really just spent the day walking around Hong Kong- our intent was to go to the art museum, but it was closed on Thursdays (random). Our ship was docked on mainland HK, Kowloon, but we took the ferry to Hong Kong Island, where all the action is. We wandered up Hollywood Rd., went on a very long people-mover, saw a deli with a “Oba-macaroni & cheese” special, elbowed our way through a market street, saw a really weird cut of fish wherein a piece was still throbbing, went in the HK equivalent of Pleasant Surprise (favorite sighting- a dish towel that says “Pandas are the Most Cuddly,” I almost got it for you Michelle but it was way too expensive for a dish towel, sorry), and lunched at a superdelicious create-your-own burger place.

It was hot in HK, and as we walked in our attempts to find the Victoria Peak Tram, we were sweating like crazy, Vietnam style. Sidenote: It felt SO. VERY. GOOD. To be in Beijing where it was about 40*. I never thought I would miss the cold, but I would rather be in the cold than in the sweat-through-your-shirts heat & humidity of good old rainy-season SE Asia. Anyway, with the help of a friendly cab driver, we found the tram and rode it up to the top of- you guessed it- Victoria Peak. The view was gorgeous. We watched the sun set over the HK skyline and took lots of touristy pictures and got gelato that was far too expensive. We took the ferry back to Kowloon just in time for the light show. That’s right, the light show. Every night, Hong Kong Island’s building light up in a frenzy of lasers, spots, and rainbow flashing seizure-givers in a SWEET light show set to music. It is really bizarre to see a city make itself into a light show, but also incredibly cool.

That night was pretty amusing. We went in search of a nice chill bar in which to get a beer and some snacks, and instead found the following: First, a German beerfest in the Marco Polo Hotel. That was almost over and very expensive, so we moved on to Ladies Night at Zaza, also expensive but the first (and only, for us) drink was free. The kicker with Zaza was that it was some James Bond/Bollinger champagne promotion party, so there was a Cantonese fashion show with girls prancing around in gold and making spy motions. It was really uninteresting, but we thought it was funny that we managed to go to a beerfest and a fashion show in a two-hour span. We hit up McD’s for a magical western chicken mcnugget or two and went to bed.

I have definitely reached my foreign-food quota. Japan doesn’t count because I ADORE sushi and anything even slightly noodle related, but China was a place where I caved and ate a fair amount of things like BK and TCBY and other such acronyms. I even ate KFC, which I don’t think I’ve eaten at home since age 9. Desperation smells like a “Zinger Burger” and hot wings.
Anyway, the second day in HK was Tai Chi, Tea and Dim Sum. Dim sum was yummy, Tai Chi almost made me fall asleep but was actually really cool and surprisingly energizing (despite that whole sleepy thing), and I spent way too much money on tea and tea-related items that are a shared Christmas present for us, Mommy. My favorite dim sum item was a tasty bbq pork thing that is best described as steamed wonderbread outside with pork sloppy joe inside. It was a delight. I got a really cool loose tea press at “The Best Tea House.” That’s actually its name. It was really a lovely place and a deserved moniker.

After my morning/afternoon of culture, I met up with Carla/Mark, Sara, Jaime (jay-mee, not hi-mee like a latino boy), Josh and Matt for our flight to Beijing. After taking advantage of the free wifi to book a hotel room, we got on the plane- I was last, as I was literally booking the hotel room as I walked down the jetway. All went well, there was a full and delicious meal on our 2-hour plane ride, and they played Wall-E, which you all know I adore. We got off and set about the business of finding our way to the Zhongan Hotel. Frugal students, we opted to take the shuttle bus for Y16 to Beijing station, then catch a cab to our hotel. However, once at Beijing station (bus ride involved hearing “My Heart Will Go On”, America’s everywhere), we could not find a cab who would take us to our hotel, the address of which was written in Mandarin on a piece of paper. It was 1am and very cold, and the concierge pointed us in the general direction of the hotel, so we started walking. On our way, we found an elderly Chinese gentleman on a bike who kindly showed us the way to our hotel (about eight blocks) and then requested Y100, about $18. We talked him down to Y30/$5 because paying $15 for someone to walk you somewhere is absurd. The last two blocks involved going down a tiny, dark, deserted alleyway with no lights and no hotels/buildings, just little shack places. Once we actually reached the Zhong’an, it was a cute little courtyard hotel tucked away in a real Chinese neighborhood, which, barring our first late-night foray, was not at all sketchy. As it was late, we just went right to bed, ready to wake up early for a sojourn to the Forbidden City.

Sojourn we did, although not that early. We booked our evening’s activity- an acrobatics show- and our next day’s tour to the great wall, then headed in search of brunch. We found it at Chengdu, a place with a chili pepper icon that so resembled Chipotle that we continued to call the restaurant Chipotle. I had amazing chicken with spicy sauce, dumplings galore, and fried rice for about $3. Good start. We walked to the Marriott and caught a cab to the Forbidden City. It was cool, but was made a lot more useful by the GPS-led audio guides we bought. If not for those, I think it would’ve been your average series of old buildings, but the guide told us all about what each building’s purpose was in the dynasty days, plus interesting architectural notes and factoids. We went through the buildings to the other side, checked out the giant portrait of good ol’ Mao-ey Z, then skipped across the street to Tiananmen Square. We just looked around and took in the history, also taking the requisite jumpshot- if there’s one thing I’ve learned here, it’s that SAS loves the jumpshot.

With a few hours left before our acrobat show, we went to the Temple of Heaven. We couldn’t go inside because of a ceremony, but we walked around the beautiful gardens and absorbed the fact that we were finally in a country where coats were welcome. It was nice to be in a place where it was COLD and autumnal. The park and temple were both really beautiful and nature-tastic.
The acrobatics show that night was FANTASMAGORICAL. Seriously. The finale involved 12 people on a bike. One bike, I tell you! There were so many ridiculous feats of human agility, it was like Cirque du Soleil on crack. It was really cool to see, but kind of funny because it was in a theater that was more than vaguely reminiscent of a high school where PHS Chorus performed. After that, we headed over to the main bar street, where we headed into a place where the singers asked us where we were from, then yelled , “Oh, America! Barack Obama,” to which we yelled a very vigorous “OBAMA!!!,” an act which earned us a free popcorn from the Italian girls seated next to us.

The next day was GREAT WALL DAY, and my 21st birthday! It was a super terrific day, as we went to the Ming Tombs (sorry to say, these were boring and entirely uneventful) and a Chinese doctor who said I needed to exercise more and told me I needed $160 pills (to help me exercise more?). Really those were the only crappy bits, the wall was amazing! It is crazy to know you are walking on 2400 years of history, that you are walking on something that has been around over 10x the entire history of the United States. The Great Wall is over 6,000 miles long. That is crazy. You could walk to California and back on that wall. We took copious amounts of pictures and pushed our way through a million Chinese people to get to the top, as this was not rude because the Chinese have no concept of personal space. I’m not being rude, it’s completely true. I definitely had a “How lucky am I?” moment staring at all the miles of wall before me.

That night, we celebrated my birthday at the Golden Jaguar, a magical all-you-can-eat-and-drink-yes-drink buffet. It was sweet- I had another ton of dumplings, roast duck, sushi, and all sorts of tasty confections.

We spent our last Beijing day in the Land of the Olympics! We took a dubious cab (because he didn’t know why we wanted to go there, he wasn’t a dubious guy, he was actually pretty cool) to the Olympic Village, then wandered around to the Bird’s Nest. It is huge and silver and nesty and irony and AWESOME. It is so cool to see close up, especially because I had major Olympics fever this summer. We saw the Watercube next door too, which looked like the Bubble at the Newport Athletic Club, but more architecturally sound and pretty. It really looked like a building made of iridescent pinky-blue bubbles, with water running down the glass windowpanes. There was a sweet building a block away called the Torch Building, the top of which looked- well, should have looked like a torch, but really looked like a combination of Elvis’s hair and a frozen yogurt. We hopped back in some cabs and headed to the airport for our flight to Shanghai.

Shanghai was pretty uneventful. I stayed in that night, as I was super tired and not in the mood to deal with another new place. The next day, Carrie, Sam and I went to get Japan Rail passes and ate a fabulous lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. I know, I know, I really should’ve eaten Chinese food, but that Thai pizza satisfied my SOUL. Shanghai looked cool, but I really just didn’t have the energy or wherewithal to really explore and discover an entire giant business-based city in less than 12 hours.

Now here’s the not-so-fun part: While we were in Hong Kong, a student was hit by a drunk driver and killed. His name was Kurt, and while I didn’t know him personally, everybody said he was a really nice, genuine and intelligent guy. We just had a memorial service for him tonight (November 20, obviously I’m a bit slow with the blog post), and it was great to hear about what a great person Kurt was, but heartbreaking, because such a young life was lost. I have a hard time dealing with the idea that he will never graduate or get a job or get married or have a family. I feel like the shipboard community dealt with it in a really gentle, respectful way, by celebrating Kurt’s life instead of solely mourning his death. Kurt’s death made me even more aware of just how lucky I am to be here on this trip, and here on this earth. I can’t imagine the pain his parents must feel knowing that the time they said goodbye to their kid in the Bahamas would be the last time they saw him alive. Please send up a prayer for Kurt’s family and friends, or, if you’re not the praying type, just send some good healing vibes and thoughts.

Okay. I know it’s hard to segue into anything happy from that, but I will do my best. I would definitely come back to China, but it’s honestly not at the top of my list, especially after going to Japan, where I am determined to live at some point. More on that next post, which I shall write directly and probably post at the same time as this one. On the next “Voyage of the Me-me”, our intrepid heroine deals with the idea of returning home and her feelings on the journey as a whole!