People walk differently in different places

We just got back from a trip (well, a few days ago) and it was so much fun.  We were pedestrians and we rode buses, planes, and trains, and we even took a boat.  People were all traveling and walking differently and speaking different languages with different accents.

First we went to Beijing China (a 12 hour flight).  R went a few days earlier than S and she flew to Toronto and then over Canada to Beijing, with a 13 hour flight.  S flew to Seattle and then to Beijing on a 12 hour flight.  She didn't stand up the entire flight and swollen ankles were the result, nothing painful though.

R explored the city on the first day with our friend and visited the the zoo, Temple of Heaven, and the planning museum the next day (without S).  The planning museum was really cool, they have a model of the entire city with the tallest building being about one foot tall.  You can see the traffic flow and the building layouts.  They built a lot of new buildings for the olympics and you can see how they shaped them like dragons and how they used the building locations to direct people toward the stadium and other away from less touristy areas.  At the zoo the animals were kept in cages without any greenery to ensure good visibility, it was a little depressing seeing the animals in such unfriendly cages, but was a fun experience.

With some of our fans on the Great Wall

The first day we were both there, we visited the great wall and that's when we became celebrities, well at least we felt like we were, many people wanted to take pictures with us, we had them take the pictures with our camera too.  The train ride to and from the Great Wall was about an hour and there were farms along the way, right next to the train tracks! That night we had Peking Duck, which was good, but S's favorite dish from that night was a tofu salad made with green onions, cilantro and something salty (probably just MSG sprinkled over the top, but I don't want to think about it).  R's favorite dish that night was a pork dish with a sweet-ish sauce, served with green onions and cucumbers on tofu sheets (you were supposed to wrap the pork and vegetables in the sheets, we didn't like them much so we used the tortilla-like ones they gave us for the duck with the pork too). Good thing we had Veronica there to order for us, we would have been lost!

S decided she needed to join some people while they napped
in the Forbidden City

The next day we ventured out alone again to Tiananmen Square.  We took pictures with strangers again. We asked a Chinese guy who was about 22 to take our picture for us and once he was finished he asked to have a picture with us.  He got between us and we all stood there kinda awkwardly until his aunt yelled 'WAIT' (or something like that in Chinese) and went up to us and put his arms around us...he looked like a pimp. Then we went to the Forbidden City (or Palace Museum), which is right next to the square, this is where the emperors lived with their concubines, empress, and servants.  It was fun to hear about the different emperors, but we don't know enough about Chinese history to have known a lot of the implications the automatic guide would say stuff like 'in the Qing dynasty the emperors stayed here for their summer court' and we have no idea what kind of significance that has so we didn't pay too much attention. There were some interesting stories though, about the emperor who didn't make any of his own decisions and instead the empress had a throne set up behind him with a yellow curtain between and when people came to ask him for something she would tell him what to say.  There was also a story of an emperor who had to marry his cousin to try to bring the family closer, but she was really ugly (with a hunchback and thin hair) so they were married but pretended to be strangers so she lived a really lonely life and 'died of loneliness' but after he died and she got to appoint the next emperor (maybe she killed him to get power...who knows). One of the most interesting parts about these parks were that people would spend the entire day in there because there is not much green space in the city. There were people with picnics and napping on the benches (of course we took pictures of the nappers). But the best part is that there are always people selling ice cream in the street, there is no shortage of that!

Our favorite proverb, and I'm pretty sure R is wearing that hat wrong
(for the record, no, I'm not wearing it wrong, there is never a wrong
way to wear one of those hats!)

Then we crossed the street to a park that overlooks the Forbidden City and climbed some stairs where we found the best Chinese proverb (as you can see in the picture).  At the top of the overlook you can see the entire city and the Forbidden City.  We met our friend and one of her friends there and then went to dinner.  We met a bunch of Veronica's Chinese friends (only some of whom spoke English) for dinner and we spent the evening giggling and gossiping in the corner while they caught up.  They all commented to her about how nice it was to not have to entertain her American friends.  We ate lots of lotus root and fish balls that night (well, R didn't touch the fish balls) and may have eaten some unidentified meats, but they all tasted good.

On the pedal boat at Summer Palace, S felt so powerful steering.

The next day we went shopping and bought cheap shoes that warn us to 'keep away from intense meat', maybe referring to our meal the last night? Then we saw the Chinese acrobats, impressive and a little nerve wracking, they did a bicycle act where there were about 15 people on one bike while a girl pedaled around in a circle and one with 6 motorcyclists in a sphere, that one was stressful.  That night dinner was in a small restaurant near where our friend lives with lots of good chinese food, but none that stood out as the best.  R and our friend picked out all of the peanuts while S ate the whole cloves of garlic in most of the dishes. We went to the Olympic Stadium and saw some mega-segways (I don't really remember what day this happened so I'm just sticking it in here hoping no one notices).  The next day we went to the Summer Palace where we rented a pedal boat and pedaled around the lake while eating lobster cheese chips (gross) and seaweed pringles (S liked them, R and Veronica said eww) and some other good Chinese snack food.  That night we made hot pot at the apartment.  We bought lotus root, fish balls, cilantro, 3 different kinds of mushrooms, spinach,  and other vegetables for the dish, then we made our own peanut sauce (well, ok Veronica's boyfriend made it) and ate hot pot.  Basically you boil water with some oil and spices in it at the table and put stuff in as you want to eat it.  I think S ate all of the lotus root, and R kept going back for the broccoli.  Then we had McDonald's deliver McFlurries to us (YES, they deliver by bike 24 hours a day, what?!) and had to run to the train to get to the airport on time for our 1am flight out.

There will be more to come about England soon!
S and R