Beijing, Days 2 & 3

We returned to Nanjing by train last night and arrived here early this morning. Beijing was awesome. We started the second day by going to the Great Wall. I know that it's just a wall. But this wall was built hundreds of years ago on some rough terrain and spans thousands of miles. You really can't appreciate the scope of the thing unless you are there standing on top of it and looking at it the rest of it twist through the vast mountain range. After the Great Wall we went into the heart of Beijing and looked around at some shops. I was surprised to see so many upscale retail stores around, but I guess there is now a market for that in China. Next we walked along a strip of street food vendors on Wangfujing Street. There were some normal food items and then some not so normal food items. Some of the things I successfully ate: sheep's testicle, water beetle, silk worm, grasshopper, scorpion, starfish, shark, snake and dog. Then to wash it all down I had a plate of my favorite Cantonese style noodles. We wanted to have a night on the town after that, but once we got back to the hotel room we were all too tired to go out. The next morning we checked out of the hotel and went to the new United States Embassy. That was an awesome experience. It's one thing for Americans to go visit an embassy when traveling abroad, but it's quite another thing to have a question and answer session with a panel of experts who work at the embassy. Since Dr. Onate knows a lot of people in the foreign service he was able to arrange for us to talk to a few of the employees at the embassy. There were a couple people from the political department, an economics officer, a military advisor and the Deputy Chief of Mission. It is unheard of for peons like us to get face time with the DCM, especially since he is actually the acting ambassador to China because President Obama has yet to appoint someone to the top position. After the embassy we went to the Summer Palace. There were a lot of cool buildings and temples in the surrounding area. It was a really nice day out and we all walked around there for a couple of hours. To end our trip to Beijing we went to the famous Silk Street Market. It's a gigantic shopping center that has row after row of tiny shops where people literally grab onto you in hopes of getting your business. They have pretty much any bootlegged stuff you could ever want. You pay as much as you are willing to and the best hagglers can come away with some great stuff without spending much money at all. I didn't need or want anything there, but I did haggle for things just to see how low I could get the price. I won the unofficial sock buying contest that we had. The benchmark was 10 pairs of socks for 35 yuan. I ended up talking to guy down to 20 yuan for 10 pairs. That ends up working out to a little over $2 US. Once we all had our fill of knockoff stuff from Silk Street we went back to Beijing Railway Station and got on the night train to Nanjing. It was a great trip all around and although we fit tons of activities into 3 days it was not nearly long enough. If I ever come back to China I'll definitely go back to Beijing for a while.

Beijing, Day 1

Yesterday we took the overnight train from Nanjing to Beijing. Each compartment had 4 beds and was pretty small, but still comfortable for the amount of time we had to spend there. Usually it only takes about 8 hours to get to Beijing from Nanjing, but the train had to stop a few times during the middle of the night due to mechanical issues. We arrived at our hotel a little after 9 AM and immediately started our exploration of the city. Our first stop was the Temple of Heaven. You might notice that I have attached a link to the place we visited. This is because I am way to tired from today to go over all the details of the places we saw, so I have decided to let you look at the information on your own. Just click on the highlighted words and enjoy. The temple was really cool and, as most things in China have done, blew me away due to its age. Most dynasties in this country have lasted longer than the entire existence of the United States. After the temple we went to the infamous Tiananmen Square. This was way bigger than you can grasp from just looking at pictures. It is also arguably the most politically volatile area in China, which you can see from the linked Wikipedia description. I won't go into details about that because I don't want my blog to get blocked, but I will say that there are more security cameras and military personel in that single area than I have seen in all of China so far. I was disappointed to find that Mao Zedong's Mausoleum was closed for the day because I was really hoping to see his body on display. I didn't know this before, but his body is still being preserved and put on display there even though he has been dead for almost 33 years. That is something a lot of people were grossed out by, but for some reason I think it'd be awesome to say I saw the body of Mao Zedong. After Tiananmen Square we went to the Forbidden City. The entrance to the Forbidden City is the picture I posted at the top of this blog entry. It is where the last (I think) government sponsored portrait of Chairman Mao is on display. The Forbidden City is huge and took about an hour to walk from the south entrance to the north entrance. After the Forbidden City we went to an amazing restaurant and had Beijing duck, which is world famous. It lived up to the hype and was the best duck I've ever had. Tomorrow we are going to the Great Wall, which I'm looking forward to. I'll try to fill you in on that after we get back if there is enough time. I am falling asleep while writing this so I'll talk to you all later!

I Should Have Learned Spanish

I just finished taking my Chinese midterm and I must say that it did not go as well as it should have. The grammar section was first and by far the most difficult since I ain't not good at learnin' no grammars 'n such. The second part of the exam was listening. That is my specialty, so I did really well on that section, or at least I think I did. Tests have a way of deceiving you. Sometimes when you think you do an amazing job you get the test back and wonder why there is a big red "C" written across the top when you felt that it should be an "A" instead. The last part of the exam was the speaking section. I stumbled through that due to my lack of vocabulary, but the teacher was very helpful and patient. My teacher told me my pronunciation is great, which was surprising. She then politely told me that my reading skills aren't that good and that I should try harder to learn the Chinese characters so my speaking ability isn't wasted. I must say that I have never studied (crammed) this much for a test before. If I studied that hard all the time for every class I've ever taken I could have graduated college with straight A's by now. Unfortunately, that would also mean I would have had no fun for the past few years. I think finding the middle ground in this situation is the appropriate thing to do. I'll keep looking.

In other news, our group is traveling to Beijing this weekend. I'm really excited! We have a lot planned. I'll have to fill you in on the trip when we get back. After that I'll only have about a month left to spend here in China. Time flies. By the way, if there are any requests for gifts that you guys want I'll be happy to get them for you. Just make sure it isn't too expensive (you can reimburse me if it is) and that it can be taken back home easily in my luggage.

Gym Culture

About a month ago, before I got sick, me and a couple other guys decided we needed to start working out to offset our mass consumption of Chinese food. We stuck to our regimen of lifting weights at least 3 times a week pretty well and I was feeling good. Then the food poisoning hit. I was out of commission for a couple weeks, but now that I've recovered we have all been regularly going to the gym at Nanjing University. It is one of the premier universities in China, yet the gym leaves something to be desired. It's like we're using old equipment from the Soviet Union that even those guys didn't wanna touch. Now, I'm not writing this blog to rag on the quality of gyms in China. I am by no means a 'roid ragin' athlete that refuses to work out somewhere if it doesn't have the adequate equipment (just look at my puny arms). All I aim to do is point out the differences in gym culture between the US and China. So, for your convenience I have compiled a nice list of things that are acceptable in gyms in China, but not in the US and vice versa. Here goes:

1. In China one of the top five universities has probably one of the worst gyms in the entire country; In America the top five universities probably have individual gyms for every student.
2. In China it is common for people to come and workout in full business attire or blue jeans and a polo shirt; In America it is common for people to come and workout in nothing nicer than sweatpants and a stained "10k Race for the Cure" t-shirt that they got 10 years ago.
3. In China it is acceptable for males to take their shirts off mid workout and parade around in front of the mirrors flexing as if they are the next Mr. Universe; In America it is acceptable for males to take their shirts off mid workout and parade around in front of the mirrors flexing as if they are the next Mr. Universe only when they actually have the muscles worthy of such narcissism.
4. In China it costs you about 40 cents per day to use the gym; In America it costs you about 5 dollars per day to use the gym, but you most likely opted for paying the monthly membership fee of $200 after being talked to by that good looking 20-something year old who works there and said that you can have a body like his/hers in no time.
5. In China it is common for the girlfriends of the guys working out to sit quietly in the side of the room and read a book as they wait for their boyfriend to finish lifting weights; In America it is common for the girlfriends of the guys working out to run on the treadmill, ride the bike, and use the rowing machine all before the guy finishes his 3 sets of bicep curls/looking at himself in the mirror.
6. In China it is common for the gym attendants to be old men about half your size and to compliment you on how big and strong you are; In America it is common for the gym attendants to be young college students twice your size and to laugh at you as struggle to bench press 1/3 the weight of their personal best.
7. In China it is typical for the gym to have a broken refrigerator that is always half-stocked with various juices, sweetened teas, and water bottles; In America it is typical for the gym to have an entire food/drink station packed with protein shakes, protein bars, smoothies, fruit, vegetables, vitamin water, and gatorade.

Those are the most blatant differences between the gym facilities of China and those of America. They are all based on my personal experience with gyms and the way I perceive the differences in American and Chinese culture. I kind of like this compare/contrast list format. I might have to do a few more of these. What do you think?