Beijing Trip: Day 1

December 31st, 2008: We arrived in Beijing and were picked up at the airport by Abbie's family friends. There was Julia (the mother), Mark (the father), and Steve (the son). Julia's brother (Joe) and his wife (Shyanne) live in America and is very good friends with Abbie's parents. Julia has never met either Abbie or me before, but was so excited about having visitors that she paid for our hotel room and for a tour guide to take us around for two days. Anyways, that night, after being spoiled by Julia, we went to the hotel and then counted down till the New Year from there.

January 1st, 2008: Our first day of Beijing

Abbie and I started out our first day in Beijing layering our clothes as much as possible to protect us from the cold winter air. The idea of working in Beijing was ruled out when we were making plans for the year because we hate the cold and everyone warned us about the winter chill here. We were told by a fellow Knox graduate to dress for weather in Galesburg plus an extra layer. I put on two pairs of socks, shoes with a furry lining, long underwear, pants lined with fleece, a long sleeve shirt, a wrist warmer (I knitted it on the plane, and have yet to knit the other one), gloves, a long down-jacket, ear muffs, and a scarf. Then as I existed the building and felt the outside air hitting my face, I realized that I put too much on. I would actually argue that the cold weather in Suzhou is actually more uncomfortable than the cold weather in Beijing. This is due to the fact that buildings in Suzhou don't use strong heaters. The cold outside does not matter as much because you are walking around and moving, but when you get inside and sit down or go to sleep for the night, the cold bothers you more. So, basically, I would like to take this opportunity to shake my head at those who gave me a look when I said I was going to Beijing during the winter. *Shakes head*

After we finished with breakfast, we met Julia and her family downstairs. They drove us around Beijing and we saw the National Theatre, Tiananmen Square, and ChangAn Street. The National Theatre is huge, and is full of exhibitions containing theatre history from across the world, Chinese opera history, opera costumes, audio/visual displays of past shows, etc. Mark said that Chinese people joke around and say that the building looks like a big egg. I told him that it must have fallen from The Bird's Nest (which we got to see later on that day). At Tiananmen Square, we got see the outside of the Forbidden City, which was decorated with a big poster of Chairman Mao (of course). Considering that the Chinese soldiers were all around, it made me feel like I was in a historical documentary about China during the time of Chairman Mao.


After a huge lunch, we went to the Olympic Park and got to see the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube. It was truly amazing to see the Bird's Nest and to imagine all the athletes, coaches, politicians, celebrities, and all sorts of people full of hope, peace, and happiness walking in the same place I was walking. It was purely breathtaking. The whole time I was taking pictures there, I could just imagine my step dad showing off those pictures to all his work buddies. The one problem we had was locating the ticket counter for the Water Cube. They have it set up in the parking lot next to the Water Cube on the opposite side of the Bird's Nest. There were no signs showing us how to get the tickets, so we circled the whole building once looking for the ticket office before we finally found it. Hopefully if you go to Beijing and go to see the Water Cube, you will learn from our experience. The Water Cube is so much cooler in person than you can imagine. The light shines through it in such a beautiful way, that there is no way to capture its beauty in a picture. Inside is even more spectacular. When you are in the Water Cube and you are looking upwards at the ceiling, you feel like you are in Superman's fortress of solitude. The curves and the use of nature in the design reminded me partially of the Gaudi buildings in Barcelona, Spain.

We then ended the day by having dinner with Julia's family. We ate typical Beijing food. Beijing food is rather hard to describe because there isn't really a label for it like there is with Sichuan food (which is spicy) or Suzhou food (which is sweet). Beijing food is delicious but doesn't have one overwhelming characteristic, but perhaps that is because I haven't sampled enough quite yet. We had Fried Sauce Noodles, which was amazing. I really enjoyed it and can't wait to figure out how to cook it myself. After dinner (during which we both gained like 5 pounds) we went back to the hotel for some relaxation which was much needed after such an exciting day.