Big City Life

Let the travelling posts begin!

My first adventure led me to Beijing 北京, capital of China. I went there to visit Thomas, Philipp and Anna, three of my classmates from Germany. By lucky coincidence another guy from our class, Stefan, was also in Beijing at the time, visiting the city with his parents. I got a train on the 30th December, after having taken my last exam. This time around I luckily got a sleeping ticket. The beds on Chinese trains are surprisingly comfortable, especially when compared to dormitory beds. I should spend more time travelling. I arrived on the 31st December at 8 in the morning and was picked up by Thomas. The first thing we did was spend about half an hour trying to buy a public transportation card (think Oyster, just in Chinese) and then finally made it onto the metro. The first stop of course was the Renmin University campus, where I was to stay in Thomas' dorm room. In order to be allowed to do so, I had to become his fiancee for the duration of my trip. The receptionists of the dorm were insanely happy to see "such a beautiful couple", great fun to go undercover for a few days :D

The first sight we went to see with Philipp was the Summer Palace 颐和园, constructed during the Qing dynasty under emperor Qianlong (reg. 1735-1796). It covers a giant area and has the Kunming lake as its centre. The lake was frozen over (Beijing was pretty cold, always below zero) and you could rent little sledges to ride on it. We walked around the very impressive buildings for maybe 3 hours and then went back to the university. After all, it was New Year's Eve, and it was time to celebrate! We went to meet up with aforementioned Stefan and his parents and went to have dinner together. Afterwards we made our way to the Bird's Nest, the Olympic Stadium. The city government had announced that there would be fireworks at midnight so naturally we went to check it out. We got there at 23.30 and first had to walk around for quite some time to find a good spot. It was impossible to get very close to the stadium, as all access-ways had been closed. We finally found a nice spot on a little hill and waited. Sadly, midnight came around and...nothing. So we opened our champagne bottle and congratulated each other on maybe the strangest New Year's celebration of our lives. Afterwards we spent an hour trying to get a taxi. Quick note to Beijing: Get your transport sorted out! Either make your metro run past midnight, which honestly you should, you're a giant city after all; or Get More Taxis. Anyway, we took the taxi to the place where a Chinese friend of mine was celebrating New Year's to meet him. Sadly again, we were deceived. Turns out he was only there until midnight and we were left looking for a taxi again. Another hour in -10 degrees. Pretty much the best New Year's Eve ever. Still though, Hapy New Year to all of you!

The frozen lake! As you might be able to tell from this picture, the air was unusually clean during my time in Beijing. Not complaining.

Hall of Dispelling Clouds and Tower of Buddhist Incense.

At least it did look pretty.

On New Year's Day it was time to explore Beijing's centre. More specifically Tiananmen square 天安门广场, the Forbidden City 故宫 and Jingshan 景山 park. A journey through power centres of different periods. First stop, Tiananmen square, surrounded by friendly reminders of the government's power, whether it be in the form of giant buildings or policemen keeping close watch over the goings-on. And who could forget about the lovely portrait of Mao Zedong, watching over the square. All in all an impressive ensemble of buildings. Next stop, the Forbidden City, the seat of power throughout the Ming and Qing dynasties. It is a giant complex of buildings and it's easy to imagine emperors of old walking through it. There are the main halls located along the centre, to the left and to the right there is a labyrinth of small courtyards, filled with historical or art collections. We visited only a small part of these because we were running short on time, it's definitely worth a look though. Directly north of the Forbidden City lies Jingshan park, built for the emperor to enjoy leisurely walks. It is located on a hill from which you can overlook most of Beijing on clear days. Seeing the Forbidden City from above gives you an idea of its crazy scope. After a day filled with sight-seeing, we met with Anna to have dinner on Wangfujing 王府井, the most well known shopping street of Beijing. Delicious as ever, China! Sadly, the two hours of standing around in the cold on New Year's Eve had been too much for Thomas' immune system, he fell very sick and spent most of the rest of my time in Beijing in bed :(   Side note: He's better now luckily!

A monument to the heroes of the Chinese people.

"Long live the PRC! Long live the solidarity of the peoples of the world!"

Inside the Forbidden City

View from Jingshan.

Sorry random Chinese couple :/

The first Christian church I have seen in China.

The 2nd January saw the realization of a dream that I've had for a long time. I finally climbed the Great Wall! I'm sure most of you have heard of it so I won't bore you with historical details. All I can say is that it really is incredible. It stretches as far as the eye can see, built exactly on the ridge of a mountain range. It's unimaginable to me how it was possible to build this kind of structure in the middle of the mountains. Goes to show that humans can do wonders after all I guess. I went to the Wall with Philipp, Stefan and his parents. Took the public bus from Beijing and once there met two Chinese (really one Chinese and one Taiwanese) who decided to take a taxi with us. For clarification, the bus didn't go all the way to the wall, it stopped at a gas station nearby. You still had to drive about 15 minutes by car to get there. The taxi driver we had was absolutely amazing, the thickest Beijing accent I have ever heard. A great day all in all. In the evening the three Beijing-ers and me got together to have a little reunion feast. It was really great seeing all of them again, a little piece of home in the far far East.

Who would be crazy enough to come through these mountains in the first place?

Goes on and on.

One of the less restored parts of the Wall.

My last day in Beijing rolled around all too fast. This day had a wonderful surprise for me though. I found out that an old friend (by old I mean from summer camp times), Ella, was also in Beijing at the time. So we decided to meet up to visit the Temple of Heaven 天坛 together. Crazy how these things happen, we hadn't seen each other in two years and finally reunited in Beijing. The temple itself was beautiful, it's the only temple with blue roof tiles in China (or possibly one of very few), marking its connection to the heaven. After this visit it was already time for me to go back to Xi'an. Another night in the comfort of a moving bed. I arrived at 3.30 in the night and had to wait in front of my dorm room for an hour until Fede, one of my friends came downstairs to wake our night watch, who had drunk a little too much of his privately brewed liqueur. A sure sign I was safely back in the hands of my provincial Xi'an.

There it is, the temple :)

That concludes the first part of my travels, so much for today. Hopefully more tomorrow :)

Chinese Word of the Day: 地瓜 digua, sweet potato. It's delicious, they eat it covered in caramelized sugar.