We’re celebrities!
Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008Beijing, China.
Today Steve and I had a very nice day. I went to bed pretty early last night since I was so exhausted after all of our late-night fun. We did go to see the Olympic Green all lit up with a guy from our hostel. That was an adventure all in itself since we our attempts to get close were thwarted at every turn! First the special Olympic Stadium metro line was blocked off so we couldn’t take the metro in. Then we tried to walk in through the big park in front, but that was eventually blocked as well. We followed a road to get closer and take some photos, and then tried to walk down another road. Eventually we got pretty close, but were still behind a fence so we didn’t take any photos of us doing silly things (like pretending to swim in front of the Water Cube or speed walking around the Bird’s Nest. But it was fun trying to figure out where to go and we were proud we got as close as we did.
But today we decided to sleep in and spend the afternoon at the Summer Palace. I was a little hesitant about visiting yet another palace place since I had been so overwhelmed by the Forbidden Palace. But the description in the book made it sound so nice and it is pretty far North of the city center so away from some of the busyness down here. Today was really pleasant weather-wise with it staying pretty cool out all day long. It was nice to have a break from the heat and humidity.
Our first run-in with fame in China was while we were sitting outside a McDonald’s drinking a coke. We shamefully bought the coke from McDonald’s because my throat really hurts and I just needed either something really cold or really hot to make it feel better and the only thing outside of the Summer Palace was a McDonald’s (with tons of tour buses parked in the parking lot!). We were just sitting outside on a little bench by the door talking and drinking our coke, and all the sudden I looked up and this man was taking our photo! It was so funny! I’m not sure if I smiled or just looked puzzled, but he seemed very pleased that we noticed him and happily waved when he was done. We’ve heard a lot about white people (especially blondies like Steve) being very popular in China, but so far in Beijing we haven’t really experienced it. Steve was stared and giggled out pretty often in Peru, but this was the first time anyone took our picture, at least that we were aware of.
When we finished our drink and went into the palace I was very surprised with how lovely and peaceful it was. The buildings were in the same style but they were mostly all falling a little into disrepair and it added to their charm. Most of the other classic styled buildings we’ve seen in Beijing have been repainted and refurbished so they look a little fake and just too clean. But these were nice and I had fun taking a few photos of some details in the architecture. There were trees everywhere which made it in even more drastic contrast from the Forbidden City. I could spend days there just relaxing and walking around and I can definitely see the appeal for it as a summer getaway. One of the big attractions was also a giant lake that took up about two thirds of the whole area. You could rent boats and paddle around and we even saw people fishing and catching crabs. We wandered around for hours just talking and enjoying the day. At one point I was posing on a pretty bridge with another bridge in the background. Steve had just finished taking my picture and was showing me the shots when a teenage or early 20s girl came up to me all bouncy and asked if I would be in a picture. At first I thought she wanted me to take her picture with her friends (we’d taken photos for people earlier in the day), but it turned out that her and her friends wanted to pose in a picture with me and Steve! It was hilarious! I couldn’t stop giggling the whole time! I wish I could see the photos! The best part was maybe that they took quite a few photos and people kept jumping into the photo from everywhere! It was a very large group of friends. We tried to talk to them a little afterwards, but all we could really think to say in Chinese was where we were from. The whole thing was just so funny! And to think that we were still in Beijing when it happened! I can’t wait to see how much attention we get when we travel to Pingyao tomorrow night and later on in our trip when we go to some pretty remote places. I wanted to give them my camera to take a photo for us, too, but it made me a little nervous to hand it over. They were very friendly, but they could have very easily been very friendly thieves. Sad that we have to think that way.
All-in-all we had a pretty good day. Tomorrow we plan to go to a museum and maybe walk around some more. Our train isn’t until 7 pm, so we have all day to kill. Hopefully we’ll also eat Peking duck. We keep putting it off (we were going to go tonight, but there was so much traffic that our bus ride was painfully slow and Steve is pretty exhausted from staying up late last night, so we just got off at our hostel and grabbed some food) . I really want to shop, but I’m trying to resist the urge since I’d have to carry it for a long time! I’ll shop just shop in Guilin and ship things back!
montarsig