Our Last Day in China

So today was our last day in China. If you think we were going to go out with a big bang, it was yesterday. Today it was raining all day, so we slept in and pretty much took it easy. Our plan for today was to have Lydia, Max’s friend from Shanghai, show us the cool things about Shanghai, but most of those things require better weather than we were dealt.

This after noon we meandered through some of the really nice malls for a little while before catching a movie. We saw Knight and Day with Cameron Diaz and Tom Cruise. I can’t recommend seeing it, but it didn’t completely make me want to shoot myself. Plus I’m no movie critic and I didn’t have the best particular attitude going in. When the movie was over we went to the real part of Shanghai, the Bund.

The Bund is a stretch of Shanghai along the river where in the 1800’s western settlers came in and built some really pretty western architecture. The buildings today are used as headquarters for the biggest banks in the world. We saw it at night and light up this place is truly a beautiful sight. The buildings were really pretty and across the river of yachts was the Shanghai skyline. In the distance across the river was the 2nd tallest building in the world as well as some of its close competitors.

Now the only problem with the rain is that being taller than the average person in China makes their umbrella height, your head height. Now cram the thousands that were at the expo that day onto the four foot wide sidewalks on the way to the Bund and try walking down the street. It kind of makes you want to step into the street and let the bus filled with midgets just take you out of your misery. No worries though, cause no one did that, and we could release our frustration by yelling at them in English because our communication does have its benefits. If you can keep a smile on your face while yelling, they just think you have issues.

After the Bund we made our way back to the hotel and decided to call it a night. We were all still pretty tired from yesterday and have to be up early for our flight out tomorrow. So our flight back tomorrow is 15 hours in duration and 2 hours in time. I hope it just feels more like the 2 hour flight than the 15 hour one. Since we are leaving tomorrow, this is going to be my last blog. I am very grateful to have had you guys reading what I have to say about our trip. It has been a real treat for me to be able to write about our days here and I hope you enjoyed it at least a little as much as I have. Our trip was truly amazing. Everyday seemed to be something exceeding all expectations. Thank you so much again to the Zhang’s for hosting us, you guys were amazing and we all expect you both to make the trip to America to let us return the favor. Thanks again to parents for all that you have done to help make this trip happen. We love you guys and will be home soon. Also thanks girlfriends, for putting up with our 3 week break. We love you guys too and will be home soon. Now I may put up a diddle or two every now and again so feel free to keep checking out the blog. Thank you again for reading and we love you guys. See you soon.

Peace

Olympic Sprinters? Yeah They Have Potential

Yesturday was the last day of our jam packed 20 hour days. We woke up at 6:30 to be sure we were at the world expo with a good spot in line. They open the doors to the expo at 9 and by the time we got there, there were probably a few thousand people already waiting in line at the 1 of 8 gates we went to. Needless to say our good spot in line was really a mediocre spot, but there were still many thousand more people coming in behind us. On average the world expo has 300,000 people a day in attendance and has been open from April to December, which is kind of ridiculous for an event that I hadn’t even heard about until Max told me we were going.

So in order to beat the crowds we mapped out a plan. The typical wait for some of the main pavilions like Saudi Arabia and China are around 10 hours. So we decided to sprint from the main gate to the Saudi pavilion without concern for trampling old ladies or babies. Then because Max’s friend was meeting us with VIP passes to the China pavilion we were going to do that one at 1pm without having to wait in line at all. Then the rest of the day we could just chill and go to the smaller pavilions that didn’t have lines at all like Jordon, New Zealand, Algeria, places like that. Flawless right? We had the best plan to get the most out of our day. Well that was all well and dandy until even with trampling old ladies and babies we still had a 6 hour wait to see Saudi. So we missed our appointment with China and had to just spend the rest of the day avoiding lines.

The truth of the day though was not that Saudi was the coolest pavilion we saw. It may have had the longest wait by 5 hours and 50 minutes, but Gordon’s favorite was by far the New Zealand pavilion. Now the Saudi one had a really cool I-max show while we stand on a moving sidewalk, but the 6 hour wait was not quite worth the 10 minute walk up a spiral staircase.
With a little disappointment for having wasted the first half of our day, the rest of the day completely made up. After Saudi, Max went to meet his friends and Gordon, George, and I went off to do some little ones. Max and his friends wanted to see China, and we were going to do anything but wait in another line. So we split up to meet back at the entrance later that night before we were going to leave and see one of Gordon’s Dad’s students perform at a Jazz club near by. When we went off we actually walked all the way around the whole expo seeing just about every country represented. This was pretty awesome because in my opinion you get to see the best part of every pavilion without waiting in line, the architecture. Some of the pavilions had cool stuff inside, but the best part was the crazy designs of the buildings. The expo itself was massive, and the buildings were not giant sky scrapers, but they were really cool examples of some of the best modern architecture in the world. What happens is each country has about 2 years to build a cool building to show off their country however they can. The event used to be the worlds fair meant for trading goods, but now it’s just a way to publicize your culture and show off your countries swagger.

We walked around the rest of the day making sure we saw all the major world powers pavilions at least from the outside and made a stop at the USA pavilion. As we were walking by there was a black guy with a cello warming up on stage. My first thoughts were “oh shit this is going to be embarrassing, we are trying to show off as a world power to the Chinese by playing cello in front of them, who have Yo Yo Ma. What the hell are we thinking,” But as they guy went on and began to play some classical songs he went on to play some poppy American songs and then the real unique thing was when he started beat boxing. Yes, he was a beat boxing cellist who was trained classically. Then this guy with a bandanna and dred locks jumps on stage and starts reciting poetry. Being the only three Americans in the crowd we spoke up and showed our obnoxious American roots, asking where the guys were from. The cellist was from Kentucky, a student at Yale, and has been living in China for the past year studying abroad. The other guy who turned out to be a rapper was from New Jersey and has been living in Beijing since he graduated college and couldn’t find a job. We sat around for the show and it was actually really cool.

When the show was over though it was time to meet back up with Max and head out to Gordon’s Dad’s student’s concert. We showered quickly at the hotel and caught the subway to get to the show. We hadn’t taken the subway yet in Shanghai, but it cant be much different than any other subway. Well this particular experience was worth mentioning because our hotel is right next to the expo, so kind of on the edge of Shanghai. So when we went to get on the subway, there was no one already on the subway. We were the first people in line and our eyes light up as if we were going to get a seat on the subway. The doors open and we quickly walk on, only to be almost knocked off our feet by these little Pokémon looking kids that bumble rushed the subway like it was the end of the world and this was the last train to the moon. Seats were filled before we could blink and I’m sad to say that we although already halfway sitting, we lost the game of musical chairs. So when we got off at our stop there were many more people on the subway at that point and the line for the escalator was to the point that it would be faster to take the stairs. Now Max, Gordon, George, and Max’s friends that were with us, decided to just wait and take the escalator, but I saw those little punk kids getting ready to race up the stairs. I thought to myself, “These little Chinese boogers can’t really be as swift and fast as they proved at the opening of the doors.” So I tightened the dock siders and tapped into my Usane Bolt mentality for the race of the century. Now I’m gonna let you know right now the little shits got a head start so it wasn’t a very fair race and I feel a little betrayed by the system itself, but they did get the best of me that time. I cant say it was my best performance, but I was floating up the stairs as light on my feet as Muhammad Ali and with the escalator crowd cheering me on I felt a lot like Sylvester Stallone in Rocky when I reached the top. I think a rematch is in order, so dad lets go ahead and order the plane ticket back, just give me like a month or two of training and I’m going to stomp those little kids into those stairs right there.

When we made it to the club Gordon’s Dad’s student, Alec Haavak, had reserved us a VIP table upstairs. We all were starving so we ordered some food and nice wine. The club itself was really nice. It was dark with a crisp jazz ambiance filling the room. Downstairs was a bar and some tables with chairs and the upstairs had a small railing with a balcony looking over the stage. All around the balcony were these U-shaped red suade couches which normally require a 500RMB balance minimum. The show itself was awesome and the scene was really cool. Alec came out and played a first set from about 10:30 to 11:30 before he came up and sat with us to talk. He was really nice and it was cool to here him talk to Gordon about Mr. Bowen and big time jazz business.

We were really tired from walking around all day so when we finished the bottle of wine around 12, we decided to head out back to the hotel to call it a night. Completely pooped I pretty much crashed instantly when my head hit the pillow.

Marty

Wonder Which Food Will Kill You First?

The main course of today began in the city of Suzhou with lunch. The prequel though was our departure from Max’s house this morning. We woke up bright and early around 7 to shower eat breakfast and be on the road by 9. The trip to Suzhou was about 2 hours given traffic with another 1 ½ hours to get to Shanghai. Max’s dad had to rent a mini van thing to get us there because our entire luggage wouldn’t fit in even the biggest trunk of a car.

So after an intense game of luggage tetris with Gordon’s awkwardly enormous bag, we said our good byes to Mama Zhang. It was really sad to leave and it sucked that it was so rushed. She had to make it to work, and we had to make a lunch appointment with one of Mr. Zhang’s friends. We told her thank you in our best butchered Chinese and we were off on the road to Suzhou.

In Suzhou we met with one of Max’s dad’s friends from college to eat lunch on our way to Shanghai. The whole car ride we basically slept, but when we got out eating lunch the food was an immediate awakening. As if the meals we have been having weren’t memorable enough, this restaurant easily met the standard. When we got to the restaurant we were once again escorted through a really nice building with walls covered with bottles of wine, to our own private room in the back with the giant spinning glass table like the very first meal we had here. The food also was right up to par. Max’s dad’s college buddy realized we had been in China for a little while now and asked for some of our favorite dishes to provide as well as some new ones, believe it or not, more interesting than anything we’ve had yet. The two that really stand out were our first experience with duck tongue, and this really special fish from the Yangtze River. The fish we ate was the first thing here we have ever had where they bring out an individual entrée for each person. Typically a dish is put on the spinning table and passed around the table for each person to take their helping, but this fish was brought out on individual plates for each person. This was also the first dish Max ever asked us to finish. Now immediately realizing it was special for him to ask us to finish it, our curiosity got the best of us asking him why. He told us it was a delicacy and was really expensive. If we were to waste any part of it, it would be disrespectful to the host. This for Gordon was hell because he has had food poisoning from fish on multiple occasions in the past, so pig brains no problem, but fish, only for Max. Now after we were done eating our fish delicacy from the Yangtze, Max told us this fish in particular requires the chef to have a particular license to serve, which is why it’s so expensive. George immediately is reminded of something he had seen on the discovery channel about special fish you need a license to cook, and as were finishing the fish decides to tell us about how the Japanese fish he saw required a license to serve because it was a poisonous fish. Max with a huge grin on his face then tells us that George is wrong because the fish isn’t Japanese, its Chinese, and we just ate it. Oh yeah, and that one drop of that fishes blood would kill an elephant. But no need to worry, because if it were prepared wrong we would already be dead, and were not.

Grateful for lives, we got back in the car and made our way to Shanghai. The drive to Shanghai was just another hour and a half in a car and before we knew it we were in Shanghai. The rest of our day was just relaxing for a big day tomorrow. We walked around the city for a while and went out to find a hole in the wall place for dinner. We found this place that was okay and decided to have McDonald’s burgers for desert. The hormone filled pasteurized food with our standard helping of high fructose corn syrup really hit the spot and was a great compliment to our other poisonous meal today. A little giddy and excited for tomorrow we made our way back to the hotel and sat and had a nice cup of coffee before heading to bed.

Tomorrow we are planning on leaving for the world expo by 7:30 in order to try and beat the crowd to the Saudi Arabia tent. Were meeting one of Max’s friends from high school in China and she is hooking us up with VIP passes to the Chinese tent in the afternoon. We are also planning on going to one of Gordon’s Dad’s student’s concerts at the best Jazz bar in Shanghai after the expo. Anyways I’m going to get some rest for our big day. We still love all you guys at home. We all miss our lady friends and hope you miss us too. Families, this is our last stop so we will see you all soon. Hope all is well and the blog is not getting boring yet. Much love, peace.

Marty

Last Night with Our Chinese Family

Today was our last day in Nanjing. Last night Buddha was sad that we were leaving and cried all night long occasionally yelling really loud. When we woke up the rain had stopped and it was actually nice a cool today. We slept in and woke up ready to start our day around noon. George and Max had gotten up earlier to go eat breakfast, but Gordon and I slept in. For lunch we went to the same sushi bar we had been to earlier to eat off the conveyer belt again.

When we were done eating we walked around the city again for the last time. Stopping by some of the same shops we had been to before to pick up some last things. After we walked around for a little while, we decided to go play some pool in one of the pool halls max likes. The building that had the pool hall was enormous. We had to wait for the elevator to come down from the 21st floor before we could go up to the 14th to play pool. On the first floor in the lobby there was about 25 people roller skating like it was a roller rink. When we got up to the pool hall we got two tables and just switched back and forth playing each other. There were actually a lot of people there and they had snooker tables too, which is like Canadian pool, where the balls are smaller, the pockets are smaller, the tables are bigger, and there are different rules to the order of making the balls. After every time we finished a game one of the waitresses would run over to the table and re-rack it to start again. The tables were nice and we played all the way until it was dinner time.

For dinner, Max’s mom had picked out this really nice restaurant for us on the 7th floor of a really nice huge mall. The mall was really fancy and had a giant dinosaur skeleton at the entrance we used. It also had really top of the line stores like Burberry, Giorgio Armani, Louis Vuitton, and many others. Our restaurant was on the top floor and Mrs. Zhang already had our table waiting when we got there. We had a little private hut looking thing where we ate with Max’s Mom and Dad. The meal was really good. We ate the usual, pigeon, pigs feet, baby crabs, and duck. The restaurant was really nice, but the meal was really chill. We relaxed and enjoyed each others company for the last time.

After dinner we came back to Max’s house and began to pack our stuff. Tomorrow we leave for Shanghai and are staying for 3 days, but we fly out straight from Shanghai so we won’t be coming back to Nanjing anymore. The Zhang’s gave each of us these really nice traditional Chinese tea pots. We packed everything up and said goodnight. Tomorrow morning after breakfast is going to be the last good bye. There may or may not be tears, but we are extremely grateful for the dear hospitality the Zhang’s have shown us. It has been an amazing trip and they have been the best hosts in the world. They really have made us feel like part of the family and it’s a pretty special thing to get that from people you can’t even speak to. We’ve been insisting that they come to the US, just as much as Max insisted that we come to China, so I hope someday they are able to make it. I hope that they know that we love them and that we are so grateful for everything they have done for us. It’s going to be very tough to say good bye in the morning.

Marty

The Great Marty Gordon and George

Sorry, but I have actually gotten 1 day behind in writing these blogs. It was difficult to find time to write in Beijing, because each day lasted forever and was very exhausting. Were back in Nanjing for the last time and I’m going to try and catch up here.

Yesterday we went to The Great Wall of China. We woke up early to be sure and have enough time on the wall because it was also a 2 hour car ride from the hotel. Max’s dad arranged for us to have a driver and surprised Max with his favorite car, an Audi A8. So Max was pumped from the minute we saw our car and while Gordon George and I were just waking up, Max was picking his jaw off the ground to get in the car.

When we got to the Great Wall it was much more than you ever get to see in the pictures. The entrance and parking lot are like all tourist attractions, but the wall itself is more amazing than any post card can capture. When you first walk in, you go through a museum of the history of the wall before actually getting on it. At the entrance there is a giant plaque given by the New World Wonders, declaring the Great Wall to be one of the 7 wonders of the New World. You then walk out of the museum and all you can see is wall. The small portion that was open to walk on was probably 4 miles or so long, but only a tiny little part of the wall that actually is expanded throughout most of the country. The emperor who built most of the wall was Qin, the same guy that later built the terra cotta warriors. This crazy emperor used the work force of the entire country for many years to build the giant defense system. It was never finished even though the project was continued by the following emperors.

Unlucky for us, the one day that we get to see the Great Wall, it had rained the day before, so there was a very thick fog left over. We didn’t get the typical day at the Great Wall because normally it is scorching hot and clear skies where you can see the miles and miles of wall. The fog made it pretty bad for pictures, but it also made it great for walking. We honestly would probably not have walked the whole thing if it were really hot. But we had a nice cool fog that set a really cool atmosphere. Not being able to see 50 feet in front of you made it seem like a great day for the Mongols to attack. The fog made it really easy to imagine guarding your country thousands of years ago from horseback Mongolians trying to invade.

Now the wall itself was not what I expected. All the post card pictures you see with the aerial view of the wall bending around the top of the mountain is not really an aerial view at all. The wall is built with thousands or steps and extremely steep inclines so the aerial view you are seeing is just someone standing on the wall looking down at the rest of the wall. They are not on top of anything or standing on some ladder to get a better picture, they are just looking down the 45 degree slope that most of the wall is built on. So as you walk around the wall it’s not just a casual walk, it really is a hike. Most people don’t actually walk the whole thing, but watching the elderly women and children make the distance is good inspiration to keep going. When you first walk up the entrance you can go right or left. Initially we went to the left because there were less people that way. We walked that whole side until the blocked door prevented tourists from further exploration and we turned back to try the other side. Walking back we passed the entrance and took off on the more crowded side until we made it to the other blocked off end. At that end there was a staircase to the base of the wall and the walk back to the car was along the bottom of the wall. The whole scene was really cool, but the fog played a pretty big role on the overall atmosphere of the day. It would have been nice to see the typical views and get the typical pictures, but it was really cool to have the battle scene fog on the stage all day. The thing though that I’m never going to get used to is the fact that we can go to the Great Wall of China, where there are thousands of people from all over the world flying in everyday to see one of the 7 wonders of the new world, and people were getting just as excited to take pictures of us instead of the wall. It was amazing how many people took pictures with Gordon George and I, and especially seeing how happy it made them. So I don’t really know how I feel about it, but my most shocking and amazing thing about the great wall was really the great Marty Gordon and George.

After we left the great wall we got dropped off at the water cube and birds nest where the 2008 Beijing Olympics were held. The square they are in is really big and a lot of people still visit to see the stadiums. We walked around and took some pictures outside, but to take a tour of the inside is pretty boring because all you can see now is the empty seats. Sometimes they still use the building for big events like concerts and things, but only the best of the best get to perform there. The buildings themselves were much cooler and much bigger than they seemed on TV. The water cube is actually being renovated to be more open to the public. They are taking out like 70% of the seating and putting in a water park.

Leaving the birds nest and water cube we went back to the hotel and hung out for a minute, showering and getting ready for dinner. We didn’t have any big plan for dinner, so we were just going to walk around and find a nice place to eat. We ended up going back to this really nice area of Beijing, called the Village, where we found this nice little pub that actually served hamburgers. We had gotten there pretty late for dinner, but before the night crowd had begun to walk around so we had a nice, much needed, cheeseburger for the first time. By the time we were done eating it was about 10pm and had started to rain pretty hard. We decided that because the world cup final was coming on at 2:30 we could either go back to the hotel and go to bed, or stay there pretty much all night to watch the game. With the verdict of, it’s the world cup finals, were in china, and we don’t have to wake up early tomorrow, we decided to stay up and watch the game. Since we were there so early, we had the best table in the place to watch the game. When it got a little later the bar ended up packing out and it was completely filled with Netherlands fans. We met a few people from Yale, Brown, and Duke who were on a study abroad trip and they ended up watching the game with us. The game itself as you know if you watched, was pretty boring, but it was really cool to be watching in the bar with all those people from different parts of the world.

By the time we made it back to the hotel it was already sunny out. Luckily we didn’t have a whole lot planned for that day so we slept until we had to check out of the hotel. Before our flight out we decided to go back to Tian’ Anmen square to hang out and take pictures. We ended up chilling in the square just sitting around near the giant picture of Mao. The hundreds of guards walking around as well as the many more cameras gave us a great sense of security while we were hanging out.

When we left Tian’ anmen square we went back to the hotel and caught our flight back to Nanjing. When we got back to the house we just went straight to bed and are hanging out all day today.

Sorry there were a few days of absence with these blogs. I hope no one was worried, we have just been really busy, and finding even a few minutes to write is more rare than a solid poop. I had to throw that in there, cause what’s a good blog without the mention of poop. Anyways I hope every one is still reading and still enjoying. Be sure to keep checking out the pictures on www.flikr.com/photos/martyprevitte and we will see you at home in less than a week.

Marty

The Not So Forbidden City cont.

I’m sorry I had to cut the last part short, but the timing around here is tricky. Trying to balance sleep with exhaustion and seeing everything makes it difficult to write the blog at the same time everyday. Anyways most of our time yesterday was spent in the Forbidden City. We got there around 12 and didn’t leave until 5. It took that long to see everything, but we also wanted to take our time and not have to rush. On the way out the most random thing in the world happened. We are passing the biggest building again on the way out and decide to get a picture with the Hill flag that max had made and the next thing we know some girl walks by and says, “The Hill School?”, “Hill sucks go Lawrenceville.” Instinctively we start beating her in the Forbidden City and kick her down a giant flight of stairs as we quickly walk away like nothing happened. No but she really said that. Before Max could punch her in the face we peacefully explained to her how she was mistaken, as well as letting her know that “everybody knows…L’Ville blows.” As Max explained to her that we beat them in every sport including a 6-0 record in Ice Hockey, the most important sport, she quickly realized she was wrong and joined us for a picture with our Hill flag in defeat.

After spreading joy and knowledge all over the Forbidden City, we left and took the subway to meet up with one of Max’s friends from Carleton that we had met the night before, named Alex. Alex had planned a really nice dinner for us at the oldest place in all Beijing to eat the most famous dish from Beijing, the Beijing duck. The restaurant he had made reservations at is literally the nicest place in town and happened to be booked for that night, but because he knew people he was able to get a table arranged for us that isn’t normally used as a table. The dinner was amazing. We had appetizers of cucumbers and duck liver in a mustard sauce, while we drank coconut milk from a Chinese Island they said was the Chinese version of Hawaii. For the main course we had purple sweet potatoes, camel hump, duck heart, duck brain, and of course the real Peking duck. The sweet potatoes were not as sweet as normal, but were okay. The camel hump was delicious. It had a great sauce with chili peppers and orange slices that made it sweet and spicy. The meat itself was tough like jerky and was really thinly sliced. The duck heart was really good too and tasted like chicken, go figure, but was a different texture. It wasn’t like bloody or anything, it was actually kind of dry but had good flavor. The duck brain was pretty gross. I actually don’t want to talk about it. The Peking duck though was really really really good. The way you eat it was like fajita’s almost. The duck came out and was cooked, not like steaming, but was hot. Then you take a tortilla or lettuce leave and put the duck with a little piece of cucumber, celery, and cover it in the delicious plum sauce. The tortilla’s were really thin and were pretty small so you were really making like bite size wraps, but they were so good and the plum sauce was delicious. This restaurant was so cool though, that they bring out your duck after its roasted and show you before they cut it into the slices. They also give you a card with the exact number your duck was of their total existence, as well as a website where you can go to see how your duck was raised as well as what it ate and where it was from. I would tell you the number of the duck right now, but I have the card and no Max to read the Chinese number for me. Sadly to say my Chinese numbers stop at like 99.

So after we stuffed our faces with duck organs we met up with another one of Max and Alex’s friends from Carleton who happened to be doing an internship in Beijing this summer and his study abroad in the fall, named Cameron. We checked up on George who was still not feeling well and went out to chill at a tea bar and play a little poker. Needless to say the best man ended up winning poker and walking out with about 250 RMB which equals about $40. After the tea bar we went to a bar bar called Lush and ended up spending the money on drinks for the 5 of us while we hung out for the rest of the night.

Taking it easy, we left the bar pretty early and went back to the hotel where George was finally feeling better. Needing a good night’s sleep we got ready for a great date with a great wall.

Marty

The Not So Forbidden City

When yesterday began we had planned for all day to be completely devoted to the Forbidden City. We got up and took our time to go eat breakfast on the way, but I had forgotten my wallet in the room so we had to run back there to pick it up. By the time we had gotten back to the hotel and I had my wallet, Georges stomach was completely in knots. The food had taken all this time to hit him, but when it did, he wasn’t feeling up to walking around all day. So George stayed back in the hotel while Gordon, Max, and I went to the Forbidden City.

We hopped in a cab and quickly were on our way. This time the cab ride though went right through what looked to be the 5th Avenue of Beijing. As we approached the Forbidden City we saw a strip of the nicest foreign cars in the world. There were Lamborghini, Ferrari, Pagani, Rolls Royce, and a few other dealerships with their cars behind glass, less than a mile from the south entrance of the Forbidden City. Pretty soon after seeing the crazy cars, we were standing at the edge of the walls of the Forbidden City.

The City itself was another one of those whoa moments, where it really hits you that you’re half way around the world, seeing one of the coolest most historically significant places in the world. This attraction was beautiful, huge, and completely packed with tourists. Waiting in line to get a ticket to get in was over 30 minutes itself. Even at the terra cotta warriors there was no where near as many people as we saw yesterday at the Forbidden City. The wait though for the ticket was well worth it. As you walk in from the south entrance you are making the same ceremonial walk that every emperor of China for thousands of years walked. Only up until 1924 did the last emperor move out of the Forbidden City and it became a historical monument.

As we walked in the first two buildings we see are the biggest buildings in the whole palace. They are the largest wooden standing buildings in China, and are massive. Completely swamped in people at the base, it is still an amazing sight. Each tile of the roof is hand carved with a dragon on each, and the detail is incredible. The columns are a detailed red with gold designs and the tiles making the roof were gold. There are cast iron statues all around with the different animals that have different meanings. There were turtles that represent longevity, and beasts that represent protection, to name a few. The city itself is massive, but only a small portion of the overall city is open to the public. The Chinese were big fans of symmetry so the inner portion, which was open to the public, was a small proportional part that was open to us, and the outer ring that wasn’t open to us, can basically all be folded down a giant marble line that runs through the city. To understand the massive size of the city, it used to hold 9,999 ½ houses. The strange number is because they used to believe that the number 10,000 could only be used by the emperor, and because there were other people in the palace there could only be 9,999 ½ buildings. Some of the other cool facts are that the emperor was the only person in the whole city with balls. All of his male servants, dukes, soldiers, everyone, were unics; so that there was no chance of them sleeping with the empress and ruining the imperial blood line. And although the emperor was the only one with balls, there were over 3,000 women at his wish every day. He had his wife the empress, and 3,000 concubines, which when Max was explaining this to us, originally told us he had over 3,000 cucumbers.

Joking about the cucumbers for the rest of the day we walked around the magnificent palace until our legs dead tired. Then we stopped for a bit and walked some more. In the north end of the palace was the emperor’s garden. This garden was really cool with giant rocks, cool trees, and really pretty flowers. By the time we made it back to the garden though, it had started to rain again. This time we were able to by umbrellas and although pictures didn’t turn out as well, we stayed dry. In some of the side buildings there were a lot of the treasures that belonged to the emperors. A lot of the treasures from back in the day were looted during the Boxer Rebellion, but many were still there. There were really cool jasper and jade tea pots and even swords. It was really cool and there was a whole room devoted to broken pottery that had been shipped from special kilns all around the country. Some of the giant marble slabs that had crazy dragon carvings in them were also imported from different parts of China, and some of them were so big and shipped from so far away that they had to slide them across ice for 28 years before it made it to the palace.

Right now I have to cut this short again because we are going to the great wall today but I will be able to finish tonight and let you know more about it.

Sorry,
Marty