Summer Palace

Yesterday, I walked out of my hotel and to the top of the street and, for the first time, went a different direction. On my way to the Gulou subway stop, I passed by both the drum tower and the bell tower. They are both huge and are separated by a small courtyard. In the area, there are also a bunch of rickshaws and drivers awaiting passengers. Where all the drivers wait, there are all these things that on first glance appear to be playground equipment as they are all colored bright blues, oranges, and reds. However, on further inspection, I realized they are actually various exercise machines, and this is what the drivers do while they wait. I saw them all over yesterday, and I will take a picture and post it soon. In the same general area, there were also two tables of elder Chinese women playing mahjjong. (For those of you who don't know, this is a game played commonly by Jewish and Chinese women, including my mom and her friends, that uses ivory tiles engraved with Chinese characters.) I almost took out my phone to call you mom, but that would not have been cost-effective. I wanted to take a picture, but I thought that would be rude.

Andi and I were meeting at a subway station, and we had some issues finding each other. (Since everything is in Chinese almost exclusively on all the public transit, we generally just count how many stops ahead of time, and Andi counted wrong.) We found each other and opted to take a taxi rather than risk getting lost on the bus.

We arrived at Summer Palace, which is a gorgeous 1.2 square kilometer (I think that's what it said) property covered in small buildings, a large lake, bridges, gates, and gardens; everything has names like "Longevity Hill" and "Harmonious Gardens". Our first priority was to find the restaurant as neither of us had eaten and it was about 2:30pm. On our way there (it was relatively far away), we walked slowly and just took in everything we saw. It is all gorgeous, and I will post pictures shortly. By the time we got to the restaurant, it was closed, so we grabbed some snacks and continued wandering. The palace closes at 5pm, so we didn't have very much time. One of the most fascinating things to me was all of the different plants and birds over here that don't exist in the states, as well as all of the architecture and decoration. Our last stop before departing the palace was to climb up to the Tower of Buddhist Incense. This offered an amazing panoramic view of the palace as well as parts of Beijing. This consisted of climbing a lot of steps, which our feet were not so happy about after walking around all afternoon (we were both wearing flip-flops). The top of the tower contains the Buddha with One Thousand Hands and Eyes (some of you can picture this from art history class). It is a huge bronze statue and was just amazing to see in person, though this is the one thing they didn't allow us to photograph.

After departing the palace, we managed to figure out how to take a bus, and I took Andi to see the Drum and Bell towers. We stopped at a small market to buy some postcards, and the woman in the store was really friendly. We discussed which postcards to buy, where we were from, what we're doing here, and when we're going home all in Chinese. I was very proud of myself! Right before we left, she handed me some tissues to wipe my face as I was sweating profusely; it had been about 80 degrees and humid all day.

After stopping by my room briefly to rest our feet and enjoy the AC, we went to find a specific noodle restaurant nearby that one of my guidebooks (thanks for that Sue!) recommends. We got a little lost, but in doing so got to see the Qianhai lake (five minutes from my hotel) that is very scenic, and I hope to return to many times. The restaurant called 'Jingweimian Dawang' or 'Beijing Noodle King' has a gorgeous facade, and when we walked in, they banged a gong to signal our arrival. We ordered way too much food even though we were starving, and we couldn't even each finish a 20oz beer cause we were so tired. A note about Chinese meals: they are taken either with beer or nothing to drink, generally speaking. Andi went home after dinner, and I eventually managed to find my way home, though I was exhausted and covered in pollution, i.e. most exposed parts of my skin had somewhat of a black tint, and ready to shower. Unfortunately, the water heater for my shower got unplugged and now the outlet is broken, so not only did I have no curtain and no pressure, I had no heat. An unfortunate end to a great day, but I'm going to try to somehow explain that to the front desk workers and hopefully switch rooms because my TV also doesn't work, and my window doesn't close (this wasn't a problem until we had a huge thunderstorm last night).