Tang Dynasty Dinner Show

I really am trying to finish the China posts and move on to real life, but some minor technological difficulties seem to be preventing that. I think I have the final kinks out of my internet troubles (thanks, Rick!) but you are all going to have to make do with pictures of our Dinner Theater rather than a video (someday you will see the video and thank me for sparing you now).

Anyhoo, We landed in Xi'an, which is remarkable like the central US. It was flat, a little more brown than green and the bus ride from the airport seemed to take forever!

Some of the sights on the street included more motorcycles than in Beijing. It has something to do with the additional taxes on motorcycles in Beijing (thieves tend to prefer motorcycles, this cut down on crime, supposedly).

We enjoyed watermelon with EVERY meal we had in China. In case I hadn't mentioned it, watermelons run about $20 each here on Okinawa, so it is a very rare treat. In China, this forbidden fruit was plentiful:In Xi'an each street seemed to sell it's own specialty. This street was filled with pet shops: But just like Beijing, the traffic was horrible. So bad that they had traffic cops in intersections WITH stoplights! Unfortunately, I was unable to get the picture of the police car with lights and sirens going that was hood to hood with oncoming traffic. The oncoming traffic refused to move out of the cops way!

After arriving at our hotel, we had just enough time to get our room keys, check out the room, then climb back on the bus to head to dinner. This is when the duck for lunch started to catch up with Lyle. He missed most of the dinner and all of the show :(

The food was incredible, and the dancers were very good. The musicians were everything you would expect from a Chinese dinner theater, specializing in instruments that are no longer played by anyone..... except at this theater. Again, you will thank me for not posting the video! Even Lyle could hear the final performance from where he was sitting!

Beijing, the final day

We started our final day in Beijing with only three stops planned - The Lama Temple, Lunch and the Airport. No shopping, so Lyle went out to haggle with the "One Dolla" guy for some final souveniers.

We boarded our bus and were on our way to the Lama Temple. We had seen this sign a few times, but I was finally able to get it on camera:


The Lama Temple:

The Shisa Dogs of China are very similar to the Shisa Dogs on Okinawa with one difference. On Okinawa the male and female are different only in how they hold their mouth, open versus closed (no comment necessary). In China the Male Shisa always had a decorated ball under his paw, while the Female was always holding down a cub. I think I prefer the Chinese Shisas!

After Lama Temple we were on our way to lunch. No trip to China would be complete without a meal of Peking Duck. We stopped at this restaurant with a duck outside.

While we started in on the dishes at our table, a waiter brought in the cart with the duck. Our tour guide said" You will want to get your cameras out for the demonstration on how to carve the Peking Duck" All of the men (and Sharjuan) got out their video cameras, stood for a better view and readied themselves for what we thought would be a wonderful display. We were all VERY disappointed when he just carved it as we would a turkey. No talented knife show, just a man carving a duck..... We all tried it and agreed that it wasn't spectacular, but it was good.

After lunch we were off to the airport, where I was able to get one last Beijing sign:

See you all in Xi'an

We interupt this vacation

for a special announcement (or 3)

Just so I don't fall incredibly behind on real life, I wanted to update the last week. We have all gone back to work (except Stephanie, who lives a life of leisure) so not much to post about except:

Chris got his braces removed

My remaining friends in North Dakota (all 2 of you) sent me a care package (including returning a shawl I forgot I lent you LOL)

We immediately had to try the new popcorn seasoning (the parmesan garlic is YUMMMMY)

And last, but definitely most important. Stephanie turns 12 today!

Birthday pictures will be coming soon!

Day Two, continued

Our drive to Badaling was very interesting. Our big bus, on a curvy road, covered with tourists, both walking and on buses. I don't think our horn stopped honking the entire drive up. The scariest point was our drop spot. Our bus went through the small tunnel pictured below. This is an actual road, not just a tourist drop, but the tunnel is only one car wide. The traffic through didn't care if people were also trying to use the tunnel, they just honked a couple times while driving through.

The wall was definitely the highlight of our trip. It was after all the main reason we wanted to go to China! Our guide gave us an hour and we were off. Chris chose out goal of the high tower to the East. We stopped for a quick photo, then got to hiking. It got gradually steeper as we neared the peak, eventually becoming uneven stairs. Once we reached the top reality set in for me. I don't like heights and we were WAYYY up there. Not only that I had to climb back down! Going down was harder than climbing up! On our way down a Chinese woman tapped Stephanie's shoulder and motioned to her kids and her camera. We had been warned that this may happen, so Stephanie just nodded and gave her best American Blond smile.

Once we reached our starting point we did a little shopping at the souvenier shops and found the best thing ever - Cold water and Ice Cream. We each picked a treat and sat down for a rest. Before we knew it, it was time to board the bus and head back to Beijing.

On our way back we stopped for lunch. Imagine our suprise to find these tiny cups

And this small bottle

We were informed it was the local moonshine and it was included in the lunch! All of the adults has a sample (or two)!

We did buy a bottle to bring home, not because it was particularly good (imagine watered down nail polish) but because it was only $2 and a GREAT conversation piece.

After lunch we headed to the Summer Palace. It was here we decided that if you have seen one palace, you have seen them all. The Summer Palace's claim to fame: it is home to the world's longest corridor (730 meters).

Another quick ride on the bus to see our final scheduled spot of the day. The Olympic Stadium - The Water Cube and the Bird's Nest.

Since there was no dinner planned for this evening, we all decided to check out Wafujing Street. For any of you that watch any of those Strange Food shows, you might recognize the name. For the locals it is just known as the Barbecue street. Here street vendors sell everything, and I mean EVERYTHING on a stick. The first "food" I saw when we walked up was a Starfish Skewer. Rick, I thought of you the whole time we were here! We each ate something strange, Lyle had Sea Snake, Chris tried Fried Silk Worm Larva, Stephanie had a frothy drink, and I had spicy noodles (I know, the girls wimped out, but we had nothing to prove!) We all enjoyed skewered chicken, steamed dumplings and for dessert - Fried Ice Cream!

Afterwards we all caught our own taxi's back to the hotel to get some Tums and Immodium AD! Tomorrow, final day in Beijing and off to Xi'an

Trip to the wall

I am going to try to get all of our second day in Beijing into one post. We started out our day driving out of Beijing. It was interesting to see the architecture. Corporate Buildings all had their own style, with each showing a different flair, but the apartments buildngs were all EXACTLY the same. Later we saw the same designs in Xi'an and in Shanghai! We made a brief stop at the Jade Factory, but since that was just a shopping stop, I don't have any pictures.

After the Jade factory we were on our way to the main reason we took this trip, The Great Wall. It was an hour long drive out to Badaling, our starting point for the wall. Our tour guide showed us the site of what was supposed to be a Disneyland type Amusement park. However, just before it was complete, construction stopped and it was never opened. There were various theories on why it wasn't completed, all of them focus around money. Soon after this site, we got our first glimpse of the wall.

After 3 hours of fighting with blogger and slide, I am giving up...for now. Stay tuned later for the rest of the story

Beijing Day One, Part 3 (aka the end of the day)

Our next sightseeing stop was The Forbidden City. If you have seen the movie, "The Last Emperor" then this site is already familiar to you. This was where the emperor lived and ruled. This site is huge, over 150 acres. Unfortunately, my camera battery died on our way in the gate. The following pictures are courtesy of Lyle
(via the digital camcorder) and Stephanie (who remembered her camera!)

Just a word of explanation, The Escape Tree is a tree that reached the second floor of the emperor's concubine. In case he (or someone else) needed to leave in a hurry, the tree was there and ready! The changing of the guards was a bit of a let down. We saw 4 guards marching toward the 4 guards on duty and got out the cameras. They were looking VERY offical, marching in formation toward the standing guards. But once they reached their post, they just started talking and milling around the guards they were relieving. Not what I was expecting at all.

We left the Forbidden City by way of the "gate of heavenly peace" This is the large red building with Chairman Mao's picture on it. This gate is where the Chairman stood and declared Communism was the future for China. Ironically this is also directly across the street from Tianamen Square

Tianamen square was a very solemn place. I think everyone in our group (children excluded) took a minute to absorb what actually happened here years ago. There were guards everywhere we looked. This was the first of many times on this trip, I was glad to have been born in America.

We all boarded the tour bus and were on our way to visit the Silk Factory. We learned about silk worms, how the silk is taken off the pods, and the different uses for the different type of pods (single or double wormed). I will spare you the few silk factory pictures I took, as they aren't very interesting compared to the video I took. Our factory guide explained that the silk worm larva is edible and a favorite snack. She asked if anyone wanted to try one, and Sharjuan volunteered, closely followed by Stephanie! That is right, my daughter that doesn't eat anything strange, VOLUNTEERED to eat a silk worm! Check it out:



Of course the silk worm was just an appetizer before dinner. We stopped to do some shopping at a local flea market for an hour (not nearly long enough) then went to a dinner show. Dinner was the first of many round table, lazy susan meals. The table starts with rice, tea and soup, but quickly grows to so many foods, you can't remember which you liked and which you haven't even tried. At this meal we were entertained by Chinese dancers:

I don't remember how the conversation started, but somewhere along dinner, Lyle made the statement that the dancers were busy cooking rice between each dance. And Chris said, with a dreaminess in his voice, "I need to get a girl like that"!

After dinner, it was back to our hotel. We each went to our rooms, exhausted after a long day, but looking forward to doing it again the next day!

Beijing, Day One, Part Two

After touring the Temple of Heaven it was another quick ride on the bus. Now we were headed to one of the Hutong Districts of Beijing.

The Hutong, or back alley, is one place we could see what life might have truly been like in old China. These small alleys are a maze of walls and buildings. We took a Rickshaw bike tour to one of the family homes in this district. Our ride was held up by a traffic jam. Two Chinese mail vans were competing for space on a VERY narrow road.

Each family unit living in the Hutong may have multiple relations living with them in their "family home" The homes are smaller walled areas, containing multiple rooms such as bedrooms, living quarters and a kitchen. These areas are so old that there is no plumbing and bathrooms are communal between multiple families. There is electricity running to the homes, but you can see in the pictures, it isn't neat and tidy.

We enjoyed a lunch inside the family home we were visiting. This family opens their home up everyday for tour groups and feeds them an authentic Chinese dinner. All for a fee of course. We ate a TON of food and even got to try making our own dumplings. Their kitchen area was small, yet they were able to feed all 16 in our tour group with plenty left over! We were left to wonder though. Were the ducklings in the cage pets, or next months dinner?

And just because I know someone will ask... The Tomatoes and Eggs were suprisingly good. Tasted very much like scrambled eggs with a bit too much catsup on them.

After lunch it was back to the bus which offered a couple more photos for you to enjoy:

See you all tomorrow for the final photos of Day one.