Iris and I slept in a little this morning, while Margarida got up bright and early to do her 10-kilometer all-day hike along the Great Wall. We wished her luck, but it definitely was not a trip for us.
After breakfast Iris and I took the subway to the Summer Palace, which was built in the late 1800s. Empress Dowager Cixi used funds originally intended for military use to build this Summer Palace, where the royal family could escape the heat of central Peking (Beijing) for the summer.
Just a side note: For those of you who didn’t know, Peking was the original name for Beijing, but now it is known as Beijing. In Mandarin it means “Northern City.”
The Summer Palace was a nice, relaxing daytrip, especially since we were still exhausted from the Great Wall the day before. When we first got there, we paid for our entrance ticket and walked around some of the beautiful buildings. However, we quickly got bored, since this architecture looked the same as what we saw in the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven.
When we emerged from a series of buildings we saw a beautiful lake! It was enormous, and apparently the grounds of the Summer Palace are majority water. The buildings and temples are built around this lake, with an island in the middle which has more Chinese architecture on it.
Iris and I decided to rent a paddle boat and go out on the lake. We figured we could paddle around the perimeter of the lake and give ourselves a nice overview tour of the Summer Palace. The line took forever, but it was worth it in the end. The weather on the lake was sunny and warm, and a nice breeze made the entire experience absolutely perfect.
At one point, we saw an empty water bottle floating in the lake. At first I was a little disappointed to see trash in such a beautiful place, but Iris said it would be cool if there was a message inside.
And that’s when we had an idea! Iris took out a piece of paper from her purse, and I finished the water from my bottle. She wrote a note explaining who we were and where we were from. We told them we were exchange students in Macau, and that we would love to hear from whoever found the message. Iris put down her e-mail address, and with that we closed the bottle and sent it out to sea!
We paddled only across one of the sides of the lake, and by the time we paddled back we were twenty minutes over our time limit. Quickly, we went to stand in line to return our ticket and get our deposit back, but the line took forever. Then, when we were finally close to the end of the line, a man behind us told us we didn’t have to wait to collect our deposit. Thanks, sir, for telling us this NOW and making us waste our precious time here in a stupid line we didn’t even have to be in to begin with.
After collecting our deposit back, we grabbed some ice cream and sat in the sunshine. It was really enjoyable, but I was irritated with all the people staring at us. I should be used to it by now, since it’s completely normal in Macau, but here people stared unabashedly at us and didn’t even try to hide it (especially when we were taking jumping pictures, since they would laugh and mock us). At the Summer Palace we had about two groups ask to take pictures with us, but we noticed many more sneaking photos of us from a distance, including one of the employees at the paddle boat ticket booth! It’s really amusing to be stared at like a celebrity, but after two and a half months you get tired of it. For once, I just wanted to blend in and be another tourist.
(This guy wants a picture of me? Well, I’ll take his picture too!)
Iris and I went inside and paid 10 Yuan (USD $1.46) each to dress up like Empress Cixi and take pictures of each other. It was really fun, but it didn’t help at all with the staring from the tourists, Asian and Western alike.
Afterward we went to the Tower of Buddhist Incense, the main temple and the largest structure at the Summer Palace. It was quite a climb to get up there, but it offered a spectacular view of the lake. At that point I realized that China isn’t very handicap-friendly, since there are no elevators or ramps to get to most of these tourist spots in Beijing. I have a joke with my dad that the Asians need to be introduced to the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990).
Before leaving the palace we stopped by the Grand Stage to watch some martial arts performance. It’s an old style of performance, just like what we saw at the Peking Opera a few nights prior. The actors are locked in a battle, for whatever reason outlined in the plot, and they clash using choreographed martial arts stunts.
We left the Summer Palace and went back to the subway station to go back to our hostel. Now that we had the subway system figured out pretty well, it was a cheaper (and much less frustrating) way to get around Beijing. Forget taxis, the best way to get around Beijing is by subway! You can even take the Airport Express Line to and from the airport, which we did when we left on Tuesday.
Back at our hostel, we met Margarida and had dinner in the lobby. Margarida was exhausted from her hike, which lasted the entire day, and we were pretty wiped as well. She called it an early night, but Iris and I still had just enough energy to go hunt down a local market Margarida had found the day before (while Iris and I were at the Great Wall).
It was amazing! They had the lowest prices possibly imaginable, so bargaining wasn’t really necessary. I found so much for so little money, and I found lots of souvenirs for all my friends and family back home. And trust me, it feels good to have that part of my entire experience here in China out of the way. I was so worried about finding a large number of souvenirs at low prices to take back home with me, but that’s all taken care of. So don’t worry, all, I’m not coming back empty-handed! : )
One man, who kept trying to get our attention in the shop we were browsing in, finally caught us and started using his tiny massage device on our faces. The little device had different heads that were intended for different parts of the head, like the face, the scalp, and the neck. We didn't even want it, but he was entertaining us. When we thanked him and began walking away, he grabbed our arms and started throwing prices at us. We told him it was a nice little device, but we didn't really have a need for it. He kept throwing us lower and lower prices, and even though I tried to walk away, he was persistent and kept a firm hold on my arm.
He kept throwing us lower prices, shoving the calculator in my face and asking me to name my price. At that point Iris and I were laughing so hard we couldn't even speak, and all I could manage to choke out was, "But I don't want it!" The entire store was looking at our scene, obviously very amused by the Chinese man tormenting the young Western girls. I don't blame them. The entire situation was extremely hilarious.
At last Iris agreed to his final price: 38 Yuan for one, and he'd throw in a second one for free. In the end, Iris and I paid less than USD $3.00 each for some useless massage device we didn't want, just to get rid of him. We couldn't help but laugh some more, since he had essentially bargained with himself to give us a dirt cheap price.
One of my most memorable moments of Beijing was the street musician playing the erhu at the market. An erhu is a Chinese stringed instrument, and this man played it beautifully. Iris and I gave him a couple Yuan, since I really appreciated how much he was into the music. Another street musician was following people around, with a woman shoving a tin can in people's faces asking for money, which wasn't cool with me. But this guy had just set up a stool and began playing for the fun of it.
After taking the subway back to our hostel, we crashed for the night. We’d decided to sleep in a little bit the next morning for our last full day in Beijing.
Coming up next: “Beijing: Day Six!”
Kati
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