China, Part One: Beijing

Okay, so I am finally starting on the chore known as blogging about China! I am gonna do it a city at a time, for my own good as well as yours! As a warning, I am doing this for my own memory later down the line (which, btw, is not TOO far down the line, since I am forgetting way too much already!), so this is gonna be long and detailed. Feel free to not read :) Also, it will probably be the exact same blog as Cindy’s, tho I am not reading hers until after I write it to avoid copying! Hehe. But yeah, our blogs are always the same anyway, so what else is new ;) Anyway, on to Beijing!

So, on the 21st Cindy and I left Narita for Beijing, woot! The flight there was uneventful. Sadly the movie choices, while there were a LOT of them, all sucked, so I decided to get in the Chinese mood and watch Mulan, yeeeea! I love that movie! Anyway, we landed at the Beijing Airport, which was nice! Better than the nastay Taipei Airport for sure! At the airport, we met our first tour guide, Lynn and our driver Du. They rock! They were my favorite tour guide and driver of the whole trip, so it was a nice way to start it off.

On the way to the hotel (we arrived at night, so that is all we did that day), Lynn showed her secretive Chinese side by trying to be subtle with questions and failing miserably! Within like two seconds of meeting us, she was like, “Are you a couple???” Hahaha. Then she like didn’t believe us when we said no! She was also confused why Cindy “looked Asian” and then told her that Cantonese was useless. Haha, I wish she would tell us how she really felt! Anyway, we got to our hotel (which was nice, woot!) and when she was checking us in, she was “sneaky” again and asked us, “Two rooms, RIGHT?” When we said no, she was like, “Hmmmm.” Cheeky Chinese monkey! Because of this downright cheeky behavior, Lynn’s nickname (we gave all of our tour guides nicknames behind their backs) became Cheeky Panda, as she is a cheeky monkey, but hello, she is Chinese so she is obviously a panda!

That night we wandered around our hotel area, which was not too exciting, but we DID find a conbini and a couple mini conbinis! AND I was amazed to find out that Beijing guys are hooooooooooooooot! Holie! Dude, seriously! HOT! I couldn’t believe it. Far far far far far hotter than Japanese guys, tho that isn’t very difficult! We went back to the hotel after walking around and checked out Chinese TV. Dude, like the first thing we saw was Rain in concert! A good omen if I have ever seen one! Rowr.

Day Two

Day two was our first official day in China/Beijing, and it was busy and fun! We started it off with our hotel’s AMAZING continental breakfast, which I totally want in my house here, because it was soooooooooooo good. After eating about 7,00 calories, we went to Tiananmen Square for like all of 30 seconds! Haha. We literally just walked through it (it is HUGE!) and that was it, but that is all there is to do there, unless you want to wait in a long line to go see Mao’s pickled corpse (I am not kidding!) on display. I actually wouldn’t mind seeing that in the future, it would be weird! Despite temptation, I did not try to protest for democracy while in the square, btw. Oh, also, a depressingly low amount of people actually know what happened in the Square, and those who do know don’t talk about it, so Lynn was like, “This is Tiananmen Square, it is the biggest square in the world! The end.” Haha. Oh, we did learn that it fits 500,000 people! Damn. BTW, I have now been to the largest and third largest (Mexico City) public squares in the world, so I guess I have to go to Russia now, despite no interest in the country!

So the main event of day two was the Forbidden City, which is where the Emperor used to live. It is HUGE and full of tons of old buildings and other things, as you can see from my pics. It was built in the early 1400s, which sounds really old, but when Lynn said, “That is naninani years before Columbus discovered America,” it really put it into context! It is crazy to think how old China is. Anyway, we didn’t go to every room in the Forbidden City, as it is enormous. Apparently if the Emperor were to stay in a different room every day of his life, it would take over 20 years! That is impossible for me to comprehend, but amazing! The Emperor literally got ANYTHING he asked for. His meals literally contained I believe 107 dishes EVERY time he ate! UM, that is ridiculous. Anyway, yeah, the City was too big, so we went on a highlight route to see what was important. Sadly we didn’t stop at the Starbucks that is in the Forbidden City (so evil, but I wanted a picture!), but I will survive, I suppose. It was really interesting to go through the City with Lynn, as she would tell us all kinds of things that we would have NO idea about if we were just walking by ourselves. We learned a lot about the customs back then (damn, they were strict!) and stuff like that, and it was really interesting. This is where we realized how much Lynn (and Chinese people in general!) love giving us pop quizzes! I swear they just do it to laugh about how little you know! Starting the night before, Lynn would ask us all kinds of RANDOM questions about China, populations, history, Beijing, etc. Our answers were ALWAYS, “Ummm…..” Hahaha. It’s like, dude, we know nothing about your country, why do you think we are paying you a bazillion dollars to teach us about it! Haha.

Oh, we didn’t even realize it, but the second day was the Winter Solstice, which was cool, as it had a lot of meaning back in the day! Lynn would tell us things that they would do on Winter Solstice, and it was cool to think that it was the actual day.

Parts of the Forbidden City (and pretty much all of Beijing and lots of other tourist places throughout China) were under construction for the bazillion tourists that will come with the 2008 Olympics. Fortunately they only do parts of the Forbidden City at a time so that tourists don’t get too pissed. Overall, the construction wasn’t bad at all. I was worried that it would ruin a lot of things we wanted to see, but I didn’t notice it that much. However, it is amazing to see how INCREDIBLY excited everyone is for the Olympics. Like, they are a year and a half away, but they already have Olympic merchandise stores all over the country, and people talk about them all the time! They have electronic countdowns to them all over Beijing, etc. I cant believe how excited they are! K, end tangent.

We were in the Forbidden City for a couple hours, then we had free time before lunch, so we were dumb and followed Lynn’s “suggestion” of going through the Hutong, which is the oldest part of Beijing. It is an area with alleys and “quadrants,” which is where the common people used to live wayyyyy back in the day. Quadrants are a fenced area with a few “houses” (more like rooms, I guess), and a courtyard in the middle. People used to live in the quadrants with their extended families, and many still do. It is extremely old and traditional, and they are worth a LOT of money now for what they are!!! Anyway, so we paid for a tour of the area, and a rickshaw rode us around. We got to go in a Hutong and talk to a man whose family has owned the Hutong for generations. They are worth about a half a million dollars (a LOT of money in China!!!), but I doubt many people actually sell them, as you know your family would hate you for it! Anyway, it was interesting, tho in retrospect we paid a lot of money for what it was! I am glad we did it, though, as we were able to see how people used to live back in the day (and still do, in some cases). Plus it is the only “extra” thing (of which there are MAAAAAAAAAAANY on Chinese tours!) that we ever said yes to to Lynn, and she totally thought we were the cheapest people ever! Hahaha.

After that we had our first tour meal. The tour provides most meals, and they are the hugest meals EVER! It is the Chinese custom to give you more food than you can eat (um, wasteful!) and despite our best efforts, we could NEVER finish an entire meal. Each meal had at least six dishes, it was insane.

Surprisingly Lynn gave us food and the morning’s tour before us ever paying for the tour, so after that we gave our credit card companies a big smile by charging the damn tour. Ugh. BTW, I totally wanna work for a Chinese online travel agency, as everyone there was like 23 years old and looked way cooler than us! It was like going to Chinese MTV headquarters or something!

After that we went to the Temple of Heaven, which is where the emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (ahahaha, just typing those makes me think of the MILLION times our tour guides told us about “the Ming and the Qing”) went to pray for a good harvest. The walk to the temple was cool, as we saw our first park in China, which is like where senior citizens LIVE, practically, as they are always there singing Chinese opera, playing card games, etc. I saw my first Chinese hackey sack, which was amusing. It is depressing, tho, too, as Chinese old people are more active and flexible than I am!

Anyway, the Temple of Heaven was pretty. There was this weird area where you could stand on opposide sides of the courtyard, but could talk to each other through sound being carried by the walls? It is hard to explain but it was cool!

That night we went to Wangfujing, a shopping area in Beijing. This is where I realized how HUGE Beijing is. Like, everything is big! The roads are soooooooooo wide (especially compared to Japan, but also compared to the States!), everything is spread apart, the people are TALL (tall people scare me now, it was freaky!)…everything is big!

Anyway, in Wangfujing I only ended up buying DVDs, as was the theme for the WHOLE trip, as we learned that clothes in China are either really cheap and low quality, or REALLY expensive name brand (like, REAL name brand) stuff that I don’t want and cant afford. BAH. Anyway, so yeah, I bought DVDs. Let me say that China is my heaven, as DVDs are sooooooooooooooooooo cheap! The legal ones are ridiculously cheap in order to try to compete with the illegal ones (tho it seems to be a losing battle). Legal ones are less than five bucks usually! Hell, yeah! So yeah, I got any movie I was semi-interested in, which was also the theme for the trip!

While wandering around the area we found a VERY kimoi “couple” that was this old white man and like a 19 year-old male Chinese prostitute! Ewwww! It was gross, and we stalked them for a little while just because we are losers with nothing better to do than watch hookers and old men! However, I totally wanted to hooker’s jacket…to bad he was like 5 pounds.

After call boy-stalking, we intended to go to a hot pot place but it was under construction, meh, so we ended up at this izakaya-type place that was MUY Chinese and MUY loud! It was definitely an interesting experience! We got there and had to fight for a table, then we got a menu with no pictures in all kanji. I could read some things, but it was still confusing, and there were like 300 options! Thankfully the couple at the same table (you share tables with other people) were helpful and the girl’s English was really good! She offered to help us and we were more than happy to take her up on her offer! She turned out to be the most hilarious lady EVER, as she was WAY high-class and awesome! We had been sitting there for like 10 minutes and the staff still hadn’t cleaned up the dirty dishes from the previous people, or wiped down the table. The lady started ordering for us and got this WAY mightier-than-thou look on her face while saying nicely, “And you still haven’t cleaned up this table, look how dirty it is! Take these dishes and clean the table, please!” I don’t speak Chinese, but it was SOOO clear what she was saying. The waitress was not amused and was like, “If they want a clean table, they should move over there!” and pointed to another table, and the lady totally ignored her and kept ordering! HAHAHAHA. She was the most awesome lady EVER, but you kinda had to be there to see her faces and tone of voice!

Anyway, the lady ordered us a lot of yummy dumplings and other things (she asked if we wanted a beer, and we hadn’t realized it was a drinking place and were like, “We’ll have water or tea,” and she gave us a weird look and was like, “Hmm, I will ask if they have water or tea!” Hahaha, whoops) and left, she was awesome! Like an English-speaking helpful ghost that disappears when she is done helping you! It turns out that the restaurant was a good choice, too, as we later learned that Chinese people traditionally eat dumplings on Winter Solstice, so we were good Chinese people. We ALSO witnessed some major Chinese drama, as this homeless guy kept coming in and being kicked out for annoying people. He finally got yelled at by a waitress and was apparently sick of it and PUNCHED HER IN THE CHEST?! The whole restaurant FROZE, then the lady got VERY mad and ran him out of the restaurant and threw stuff at him! Hahaha, welcome to China!

Day Three

Day three was a big day, as we went to the Great Wall! This of course gave me an excuse to eat an EXTRA big breakfast at the hotel before the inevitable climbing! On the way there we stopped at a jade factory. Every tour in China is full of many factory stops, where they tell you about what they make there (jade, silk rugs, pearls, blah blah) and then try to sell you stuff. A lot of stupid tourists buy the stuff, but Cindy and I were like, “I will take your free tea but I am not buying anything, suckah!” Haha. Anyway, we got to the Great Wall and were given 90 minutes to 2 hours to climb as much as we wanted. There are five spots open to tourists on the wall, and this is one of the more popular ones. I am glad we didn’t go to the one with a ropeway that carries people to the top! That is only for lazy Americans! Hehe.

Anyway, the Wall was AMAZING, of course. I seriously cant comprehend how they made it. It is over 6,700 km long! It stretches as far as the eye can see, and then some. Like any major structure (just ask Eduardo about the Brooklyn Bridge!), many people died making it, and many of the dead people were buried inside the wall itself. However, I think they have been dead long enough for me to say that it was worth it! It really is amazing to see what people are capable of when they put their mind to it. It made me want to go to Egypt to see the pyramids! It also really made me realize that we are making complete shit now. Like, what do we have to be proud of? Ooo, Taipei 101 sure is AMAZING, I am sure people in 2,000 years will be traveling to see that! Hahaha. But yeah.

Anyway, I cant really describe how incredible (K, I need more than three adjectives in my vocabulary) the Wall is; you just have to see it. Instead, I will complain about it! Haha.

Cindy and I got to the wall in our usual million layers that we wore in Beijing, along with Hokkairo (heating pack things that you can stick to your feet, back, etc., they are AWESOME). However, by the time we got to the top (well, the top of our section, not of the entire Wall), we were pretty much naked because we were SWEATY and NASTY! I have no idea how people in armor and whatever “wears” (haha, that will make sense later) they wore back then could have climbed that damn Wall, because it was freaking ridiculous! I would say it did it’s job, if I wanted to break into China I would take one look and turn right around! There were a lot of people at the bottom, but as you continued climbing more and more of the fat lazy people gave up and Cindy and I kept on fighting, yo! We got to the top and there was barely anyone up there, it was great! Well, if by great you mean completely sweaty, out of breath and too ugly to be seen in pictures! But it had a beautiful view! The Wall stretched all over the mountains. I am so glad I got to see it in my life, I think everyone needs to!

We went back down and I am glad we got up early to climb it, because there were SO many more tourists than when we went up! They were annoying! Including these three STUPID GIRLS who were wearing HEELS and had like high-fashion purses! I was stuck behind them and wanted to kick them down the damn wall! There was also a Chinese guy in a FULL SUIT climbing it?! WTF! Anyway, I was proud, as we made it to the top and back down in exactly 90 minutes!

For lunch we went to the Friendship store, which was apparently the only place tourists could shop when they first opened China to tourists (which is not that long ago, strange). That would suck, considering it was boring stuff to buy there! Anyway, I tried my first sip of Chinese rice wine there and it is SOOO STRONG, holy crap! I seriously took a teeny sip and I couldn’t handle any more. Damn!

After lunch we were sleepy from lots of food and actually exercising in the morning, so we were totally ADD when Lynn took us to the Ming Tombs. Fortunately that was okay, as the Ming Tombs are pretty damn boring. The Ming Tombs are the burial site of 13 emperors from the Ming Dynasty. Most of them aren’t open, but we went to one (of the two, kana?) open tombs. Anyway, it wasn’t very interesting, as it was completely re-done inside the tomb and stuff was moved around and it was modern and boring. Oh, might I add that Cindy and I are the worst tourists for tours EVER. We must seem SOOOOO not interested in what people are saying, because we just kinda nod and are like, “Mmhmm!” when the guides tell us stuff. I think they are used to tourists who are like, “Oh my GOOOOOOOOOOOD, tell me MORRRRRRRRRRE about the MING AND THE QING OH MY GOD OH MY GOD!” because they always looked disappointed in our headnods! Hahahaha. It is like, are we supposed to orgasm over the old emperors or something? Anyway, yeah, so we were completely out of it at the Ming Tombs UNTIL Lynn randomly mentioned that ALL of the artists who could make the Ming period famous white-and-blue porcelain were poisoned on the same day! She just mentioned it in passing, but we continued to ask her about it for like 20 minutes, as if we were Chinese Sherlock Holmes or something! Haha, we are such freaks.

After the Ming Tombs we volunteered to visit a couple factories, as we had time before dinner. At first I thought I would hate factories, because I don’t like being pressured to buy things, but it was actually really interesting, as you get to learn about how much work goes into making various things. We first went to a famous silk factory, where we found out how RIDICULOUSLY DIFFICULT it is to make a silk rug! First of all, high-class silk rugs (these are oriental rugs, in case you don’t know) cost a ton of money. Second of all, they take more than six months to make!!!! What the hell?! Lynn was like, “Do you know why only women can make rugs?” We imagined it had to do with small hands or something anatomical or something, but her answer was “Because only women are patient enough to make them!” Hahahaha! She was completely serious when saying that, too. Amusing. Anyway, I will never look at an oriental rug the same way again, because I had no idea how much work went into them. It is also sad that the cheap fake ones have ruined them in my mind, as I would NEVER pay that much for a rug that Americans would think I got for like 20 bucks out of the bed of someone’s truck! The one COOOOOOOOOOOOOOL thing about silk rugs, tho, is that when you move them, they FREAKING CHANGE COLOR! Seriously! You have to see it, it is the coolest thing ever! Anyway, it was worth the visit to the factory to learn that, plus to use their bathroom :)

After that we went to a furniture factory that was also good to visit, as just as much labor goes into carved furniture. There were some really cool pieces there, but I don’t understand what tourists do when they buy this stuff?! Like, do you move to China?! How can you ship that stuff back home???

Oh, I am gonna copy and paste a paragraph from Cindy’s blog. I broke my promise of not reading her blog, as she is sneaky and pretends to be smart, when she really looked up history on Wikipedia to put in her blog! I am too lazy for Wikipedia, so I am just copying her historical facts, haha. Anyway, here is an interesting cultural bit that I am too lazy to type into my own words:

“We found out from Lynn that it costs $10 to watch a movie in China. That is just ridiculous, considering the average annual salary in Beijing is just over $2000. Lynn said that she just downloads movies, which I would too considering the ridiculous prices they charge at movie theaters! Jeff and I never seemed too too giddy outwardly when Lynn guided us on the tour (not b/c we weren't interested, but b/c we weren't sure how to react other than by nodding and saying, "Wow" and "Interesting" every so often. How else should one respond while on a tour?) Anyway, we tried our best so hopefully our tour guides didn't think we were too ADD. Anyhoo, when it came to the topic of movies, we lit up. While in the car, we even made a list of movies we recommended for Lynn to download! Haha.”

After that, Mr. Du, our awesome driver, took us by the Olympic Stadium and the Aquatic Park that were being built for the games. I am glad we got to see them, as we can claim we were there when we see it on TV in 2008! They are both really cool-looking. The Aquatic Park is all bubbly and high-tech looking, and the Stadium is supposed to look like a bird’s nest?! It looks cool, but that is random. I asked Lynn why, and she apparently thought that was a silly question to ask and pretty much answered something like, “Why wouldn’t we make it a bird’s nest?” Haha. She may need to think of a new answer by 2008!

Oh, our bad student behavior came out at this point of the tour, as Cindy and I were distracted by an AWESOME ethnic park (which I want to go to when I go back for sure! It has an area for every minority in China!) and Lynn actually had to yell “Attention, please!” to us! Hahahaha.

That night I tried Peking Duck for the first time ever. It was good enough, but too greasy! I would rather just have normal duck. However, Cindy said it wasn’t that good of Peking Duck in the first place, so maybe I need to try it one more time. Anyway, whatever, I can claim I had Peking Duck in Beijing, hehe. After that we were forced to go to Beijing Opera, as it was included in the tour. Oh my god it was awful awful awful! So ugly and boring! No wonder young Chinese people don’t like it! It was only tourists there, and some of them were completely RETARDED Japanese people. They were the only ones that bought the translations on headphones and were apparently deaf as they had the volume WAY up and it was practically all I could hear! The second act was “catered for tourists” and was really really crappy martial arts. For some reason that was translated, too, despite the fact that not more than two words were said in it? The Japanese people CONTINUED listening to their headphones during that and I was about to shoot them because it was SO loud and unnecessary! Anyway, the opera sucked, but at least I can claim I am cultured.

That was our last night in Beijing. The next morning we had to get up early (ANOTHER theme for the tour, which was not fun!) to fly to Xi’an! And with another city comes another blog entry in the future. Good lord, this was sooooooooooooooooo long, I cant even believe it. I am sick of writing the damn thing, so I highly doubt anyone actually read it! Oh, well, I will have this when I forget all of my China trip due to Alzheimer’s! To be continued!

Beijing Pics

I finally got my pics of Beijing up. I am doing it city by city, as it is too overwhelming otherwise. You can check them out here. Hoping to get my first China blog done by tomorrow...let's praying for not much lesson planning tomorrow so I actually have time!

Please Please Me, 12 year-olds!

So for 1nensei classes this week we are warming up with a Beatles song. Let the record state that it is never my choice to sing in front of the kids, but oh well. Anyway, we were gonna do Eight Days a Week or Love Me Do, but couldn’t because of technical difficulties. My teacher ended up choosing Please Please Me, which I am beginning to think was NOT the best choice! Here is part of the chorus:

Come on, come on, come on, come on
Please please me oh yeah like I please you

There is also this line:

I do all the pleasing with you

Now I may be a big hentai with a dirty mind, but I do NOT like saying this to a bunch of 12 year-olds and them repeating it back to me! The Japanese translation has it translated as “Please cheer me up.” Now that very well could have been The Beatles’ intention with the lyrics, but I have a feeling the cheeky monkeys behind Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds had other things in mind when writing these lyrics. Either way it is very disturbing to be saying this to 1nensei!

My kids are f-ing crazy

Okay, my kids are officially fucked up, as I keep coming into classrooms to find they have the fucking sliding doors and windows open to let in fresh air?!!!!!! Dude, wtf! Just because it is sunny does NOT mean that it is WARM outside! Apparently they are putting far too much faith into the theory of global warming, ‘cause I dunno what the fuck they are thinking. Then they are like, “It’s cold!” Yeah, no shit it is cold, it’s fucking January and you have all the windows open! I don’t get it! I don’t think they have miraculously learned that they smell like gross teenagers, either, because winter is like the one time of year that they don’t stink up the whole school, haha. Does anyone else’s kids do this? Anyway, I hope they aren’t too into the windows being open, because I get in there and passive-aggressively slam them all shut right away, haha. Crazy-ass mofos.

A Tokyo/Saitama Weekend

So my goal for the week is to at least start blogging and posting pics of China, but I dunno if that will happen today. Anyway, I will blog about my weekend in the meantime, as it is much shorter and easier to talk about than two weeks of touring a huge country!

So on Friday I “secretly” left work 20 minutes early (tho it is difficult to do this secretly, as my bike is parked right in front of the staffroom windows, so I am sure I was seen) to catch the train to Tokyo to see Sweeney Todd with Ann. HOLIE, it was sooooooooooooooooo good! I would usually refuse to see a Sondheim musical in Japanese (or any foreign language), just because Sondheim plays with language and it is impossible to translate it accordingly. However, I loved it! The reason I went to it in the first place was because it was by a really famous director with a famous cast, so I figured it should be good. It went beyond my expectations fo sho! It had great directing, great acting, great sets, great costumes, great lighting....it was fucking awesome! Of course the show is muy fucked up (about a barber who kills his customers, then turns them into meat pies), but it was damn good. Plus the lady who played Mrs. Lovett ROCKED! It worked really well with a Japanese woman, as Japanese women are good at playing crazy-ass obaachans! Haha. She was cool! Anyway, the show was great, I am very glad we saw it, even if it was from the last row (stupid Japan is evil and never gives Jeff The Spoiled Theatre Queen good seats!).

After the show I had the worst train ride of my life (long story, but Jeff was sweaty and crammed against the door and NOT amused with Tokyo!) on my way to Saitama to meet up with Natsumi and Adam! Natsumi was my RA when I studied abroad at Senshu and I am horrible and haven’t seen her in like 300 years! Anyway, I met up with them for the weekend and it was fun! Friday night we did a bit of karaoke, which I hadn’t done in forever. Saturday morning Natsumi and I had McDonald’s breakfast, which is SO FUCKING GOOD. I hadn’t had it since March! You had better believe I got two value meals up in hea, yo! Mmmmmmm.

In the afternoon we went to Ochanomizu, which is by far like the most random area in Tokyo EVER! It is nothing but guitar and snowboarding shops? Weird! Anyway, we ended up at Natural Lawson in the end, which is always good. I love Natural Lawson, I want to live there!

We then met up with Andrew, another friend from study abroad who is in Japan for a couple weeks with his friend Mark. We went to happy hour for a while, where I tried absinthe for the first time (ooo, I sound like Ewan McGregor!). However, sadly it did nothing for me, sigh. Then we met up with Neil, yet another person from study abroad (talk about a reunion!) and went to another place to drink. Then we drank some more and trained it back to Saitama for THREE HOURS of karaoke! Dude, that is hardcore! That definitely made up for my lack of karaoke as of late! But I understand the need for karaoke, as Andrew hadn’t done it in like two years, kawaisou!

On Sunday I had to head back to Gunma, and fortunately I had to norikae in Omiya, i.e. the best eki in the world! I got a shitload of REAL baked bread and bagels and shit. Mmmmm.

Anyway, the weekend was muy fun! It was nice to see people again, and to get the hell outta Gunma for a while! Thanks, Nacchan and Adam!