1. In my two years of living in China, I had not been to Beijing yet.
2. There was a flight deal from Shanghai to Tianjin (via Spring Airlines - China’s budget airline), and we could just take the train or bus from Tianjin to Beijing.
3. While in Tibet, our tour guide found us relatively cheap return flights, essentially saving us 2 days on a train, meaning I had “gained“ 2 additional days of traveling.
We had about 1.5 days back in Shanghai before heading out again and we spent it doing laundry and packing for the eventual flight back to the States. By now, we had moved out of the "Girls’ Apartment" and was living/storing luggage in the now-open spare room in the "Boys’ Apartment." Things move fast in China, and even faster when you’re at the Expo.
When the day of departing for the north came, Jing and I took public transportation to the Shanghai-Hongqiao Airport. We had timed it so that we could take the metro over, since line 2 had a terminal at the airport. Little did we know, or expect, for the distance from the metro terminal to the actual airport terminal to be such a hassle. We arrived to the area just fine and followed the signs to take us to our destination. We get in line for the shuttle bus; no worries since we had at least an hour before the plane took flight. I take a look at the sign for the shuttle bus and my heart drops.
"Departs every 20 minutes"
We had to make it onto THIS bus that was currently boarding otherwise we would probably miss our flight; we are at the end of what looks to be a long line. Somehow we make it on board (me trying to sneak our carry-on onto the bus and not the bus’ loading trunk to save time, but the bus ayi saw me and stopped me) and breathed a sigh of relief as the bus starts its journey.
"It should be about 5-10 minutes I think." That 5-10 minute bus ride ended up lasting close to 30 minutes.
"Terminal 1 and terminal 2 shouldn’t be too far away from each other. It wouldn’t make sense." Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 were not next to each other; we (slowly) drove through a construction site, (slowly) through what looked like the leftovers of an airplane field, (slowly) through a couple city streets, (slowly) through the area with hotels for airplane staff/stewards. Things in China don’t always have to make sense.
"We’re going to Beijing!" We hope we can still make it to Beijing!
With 30 minutes to departure we dash off the bus and quickly find the check-in counter for Spring Airlines. Past experiences of others in China have said that you can still make it onto the plane even with 15 minutes to departure, since, well ... because it is China. Jing and I think we’re in the clear until the check-in girl says, "It’s too late, you won’t make it."
Oh. heck. no. I am going to get on that flight and I am going to go see the Great Wall and the Forbidden City.
Two girls might be easy to push around, but my American forefathers fought for my right to the pursuit of happiness and dang it, I was going pursue happiness even if I was in a Communist country. As sad as it is for me to now say, it was time to play the role of The Foreigner. I grab our passports and push them to the check-in girl and in hurried English I say, "Please please please, let us get on the flight. We need to be on that flight." I told her that "someone" had told us that we just had to arrive 30 minutes prior to departure and it would be okay. I keep speaking in English and only occasionally switching on "bad Chinese" of simple phrases and butchered tones (i.e. wo yao qu Tianjin, hao bu hao? 我要去天津, 好不好? I want to go to Tianjin, ok?). She makes some hurried calls over the walkie-talkie and recommends we pay an extra 20RMB to get seats closer to the front of the plane since we are boarding so late. No time to argue and I quickly give her 20RMB. She hands tickets (yes!) and our passports back to us and tells us to run. When those on duty at the security check/x-ray saw which flight we were trying to catch they decided to just let us go (only in China). A Chinese lady at the end of the hall frantically waves to us and says "TIANJIN!"
She "checks in" our bag by simply asking if I had liquids or explosives in it and hanging a paper ID tag on it, no x-rays or opening it (again, only in China). We climb into a 面包车 miàn bāo chē, (literally translated as "bread car" because it’s supposed to resemble a loaf of bread on wheels but in the West is more commonly known as a ”van“) with a group of 3-4 Chinese men who were also on the same plane. We find our 20RMB seats and can’t believe this had all happened. After we eat our bento meal from 7-11 (yup, bringing our own food onto the plane) we try to nap but obnoxious passengers who speak too loud and make crude comments about everything kept us awake. But the main point is we made it to Tianjin, and after an hour or so bus ride, we made it to Beijing.
Day 1 of Beijing saw us on a trip over to the Badaling section 八达岭 bā dá lǐng of the Great Wall of China. There is a bus that takes you directly from Beijing to Badaling for about under 20RMB. All the tour groups (ugh) were heading to the right side of the Great Wall so we, and other small groups of foreigners, headed to the left side of the Great Wall. The Olympic signage for "One World One Dream" was still there and managed to appear in half of our photos. I was very excited to be on the Wall, even if it was commercialized with vendors selling panda hats, "I climbed the Great Wall" t-shirts and Mao memorabilia. Despite the blistering cold, I enjoyed occasionally pulling my hands out of my pockets to touch the stone walls. There were steep sections of the wall which were easy to climb up but a little more difficult to climb down. At one point, Jing and I took a "cracker break" and sat our bums on the cold steps eating Chinese crackers and admiring the view of tiny Chinese tour groups walking up the opposite hill like ants. We met and talked to other travelers from China, America, the Netherlands, and India to name a few. At the top of one of the towers a vendor tried very, very hard to sell to us small commemorative plaques declaring that we had climbed so and so meters on the Great Wall. No thank you, but he was pretty persistent until he figured out that we wouldn’t be moved. Finally, he asked for something else, a quick English lesson on how to say the English equivalent of, "不能错过 bù néng cuò guò." I write down, "You can’t miss this opportunity" in his notebook and he wrote some pronunciation hints next to it. We practiced it a few times together, answered the usual questions of, "You look Chinese but your English is so good" and "American? But your Chinese is so good!" and then we parted ways.
Giving free impromptu English lessons on top of the Great Wall? Check.
Oh, Great Wall - definitely a highlight of my life in China. Better late than never :)
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| One World One Dream |
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| Badaling section 八达岭 bā dá lǐng of the Great Wall of China - it's a long wall |
We take the bus back into the city; next destination: Beihai Park 北海公园 běi hǎi gōng yuán.
Beihai Park is a large imperial garden with the Bai Ta, White Dagoba, as one of its most notable things to see. It was nearing evening by the time we got to the Bai Ta so the entrance to it was closed already. We wandered around the grounds for awhile until it got to be too dark to really see much and headed out.
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| Bai Ta, White Dagoba |
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| Beihai Park 北海公园 |
Jing and I were going to meet up with a friend of hers who lives in Beijing for dinner nearby. We got a little lost and ended up at the rear entrance of the Forbidden City, though it did offer the opportunity for some interesting night photos.
The original plan was to find a particular Peking Duck restaurant, but after walking the same street for awhile it was discovered that the restaurant had closed down. Instead, we stumbled upon a snack street and since we were all super starving by now, it was quickly decided to eat there instead. The snack street had some of the usual suspects for Chines cuisine such as buns stuffed with shredded meat and noodles, but it also had some surprises for us. We had been eyeing the insect delicacies for awhile when Jing finally asked a cricket eating Chinese couple standing next to us, whether they tasted any good. They nicely handed her a fried cricket to try and Jing and her friend split it. They watched as Jing and her friend took their first bites and slowly and politely nodded their heads. The Chinese couple smiled and said that there was really nothing special about the cricket taste except to be able to say that you’ve eaten it, which in a way probably best described the taste of all the other fried insects on display. We kept wandering around and ended up at Wangfujing Lu 王府井 wángfǔjǐng, a well-known pedestrian street. I would say it’s Beijing’s version of Shanghai’s Nanjing Lu, except is felt more spacious. Day 2: We were determined to hit up as many sites as we could and had a whole plan laid out taking into consideration locations and positioning of the sun to ensure the best quality photos we could get. Early morning start, we took a city bus (conveniently located across the street from our hotel) to see the Olympic Park. Bird’s Nest and Water Cube and a lot of Fuwa’s (Beijing Olympic mascot). From there, we took the metro back into the city for the Forbidden City.
Due to our dislike of following behind large Chinese tour groups, Jing and I wagered we could avoid them by entering from the rear entrance of the Forbidden City since chances are the tour groups would be entering from the front entrance (Chinese tour groups = lemmings). We were also able to get "low season" ticket prices! But despite the "low season" there were still tons of people visiting. Did not spend too much time reading the descriptions of every building, pagoda or column, but do recall everything being called "so and so of Divine Harmony" or "so and so of Heavenly Tranquility." I thought the Forbidden City was supposed to be larger, but we were able to walk through the entire (open) area rather quickly. I wouldn’t say it was a ton of fun, but it’s a must-see for any Beijing trip. We walked out to the Tiananmen Square area and took some photos of Mao’s portrait.
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| Forbidden City |
Our next destination was Jing Shan Park 景山公园 jǐng shān gōng yuán, whose entrance was conveniently located (literally) across the street from the rear entrance of the Forbidden City. To save time we wanted to take a taxi from the front around to the back, however our transportation request was met with some unexpected resistance. Taxi drivers refused to take us saying, "It's unlucky to go because an emperor committed suicide there." Finally, when refused by the nth taxi driver to take us to Jing Shan Park, I say to him, "In that case, please take us to the back entrance of the Forbidden City." Sure enough, he took us and we just walked across the street to JingShan Park's entrance. Oh, China.
The specialness of Jing Shan Park is that you can view the Forbidden City from the top of the hill. As the sun set, many people had started gathering at the top to see the view. Jing and I shot a few pictures and after seeing our fill headed down the opposite side of the hill to wander around and see what else was at this park. We found the spot where the Emperor committed suicide; might have been a little more interesting to read the description if it wasn’t already pitch dark and thus a little spooky when we stumbled upon it. We ended our final full day of Beijing by FINALLY having Peking Duck ... it’s so delicious. Eating Peking Duck in Beijing is a definite must!
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| Peking Duck served on a duck plate - yummy |
The next morning, I headed back to Shanghai by myself (fast train from Beijing to Tianjin and then fly from Tianjin to Shanghai) while Jing was going to visit Tianjin and see another part of the Great Wall and then head back to Shanghai a day after me. I had several errands to run in case I was not able to get my flight changed (making the move back to the States means making sure all your affairs are in order - things to pack up/donate/throw out/buy, people to see, etc). Luckily, I came back to see the flight change confirmation in my emails which meant that I was now preparing for my move to the Hongqiao area of Shanghai to live for the next few weeks - but that’s another story.
Impressions of Beijing? I had so much fun and I really enjoyed the city and the vibe that I got from it. It didn’t feel as chaotic or crowded as Shanghai, and even felt a little slower paced. I loved seeing the sites and the people were friendly. Transportation (metro and bus) and stuff is also generally cheaper than Shanghai. The classic question of Beijing vs. Shanghai ...
Personally, I might be a Shanghai girl, but I’m just being biased.
