Heidelberg China Trip 2011

Hello.

I’m back in the United States. After a 14 hour flight where we left at 6:55 AM, I finally got back to the States at 8:15 AM.

My parents picked me up from the airport and I slept from noon to 7 PM. Changing back to a different time zone is going to be insanely difficult.

I’m definitely having some reverse culture shock. I’m really sad that I’m back…hopefully I’ll adjust quickly. I’m glad to see my family and my cats and everything, but that feeling of wishing I was still there is definitely going to happen for a couple days.

Either way, I’m going to upload all my pictures to photobucket and facebook so that I can put them on here. So be on the look-out.

Here’s pics of our last hours in China:

Sad faces at 3 AM.

Well, I was extremely excited for the Great Wall. We woke up early and ate breakfast in the hotel at 7:30 AM this morning. The food wasn’t as bad as the day before…but I definitely miss peanut butter from home. We were supposed to leave at 8 AM, but the bus was having difficulties, so we left around 8:30 AM.

I was exhausted so I slept the whole way to the Great Wall. We went to a spot that was less touristy and less crowded, so it was an hour and a half away. I woke up just before we got off the bus. It wasn’t super hot out and the sun was hidden behind a lot of clouds. However, it wasn’t extremely foggy or smoggy, so I was excited because it’s a lot easier to see far down the Great Wall that way.

We decided to take the trolley up, while Dr. Mahon hiked it. I’m glad we did, because I am way too lazy and way too out of shape to climb ridiculous amounts of extremely old rock. The cable car trolley was about a half mile up the hill and stopped right before the wall.

The cable car.

Cable car.

First scenes of the Great Wall!

After taking some initial shots with the landmarker saying it was the Great Wall, we started to climb on it. I must have freaked out the whole entire time saying “WE ARE ON THE GREAT WALL!” because I think my life was honestly complete the moment I stepped on it.

Myself, Lisa, and Mary with the marker.

At one of the towers.

We spent a good hour just taking pictures of the wall, each other, and doing the “H-U” and “O-H-I-O” on the Great Wall. Lisa wanted a picture with a Cleveland Clinic shirt for her mom, so we did that too. The wall was amazing. It’s honestly impossible to put into words how weird and how amazing it feels to be walking on it and to know how far it stretches. We took a path that was mostly downwards because a toboggan chute was at that end and I’m sooo glad. The wall was enormous and really sloped, but most of the steps were really well preserved.

O-H-I-O with Lisa, me, Mary, and Alexa.

Lisa, me, Mary, and Alexa doing H-U, our own version.

Lisa in her Cleveland Clinic shirt.

Mary’s dad really wanted a piece of the wall, so we spent the two hours picking up and collecting good rocks on the wall. That wasn’t the best part though. They have a rare few vendors on the wall on this spot. I guess the areas that Dr. Sanders and Ms. Green had been before were just surrounded by vendors on each side so it was hard to enjoy.

I got a piece of the wall…maybe.

ANYWAYS, Lisa, Mary, and I were walking by a vendor and he yells “BEER! COLD BEER” and as I walked by I was like “whaaat, they sell beer on the wall?” and after I walked by, the greatest idea of my life just HIT ME. I needed to buy my FIRST ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGE ON THE GREAT WALL! So what did Mary and Lisa do? They chipped in and paid for my first beer and we drank it on the way down. So no offense, but I think my first drink is definitely better than most people’s stories.

Buying my first beer.

Hilarious. They had me pose for pictures.

Cheers with Dr. Mahon. She hiked all the way up and met us so she actually deserved it.

So we continued to walk the wall and I drank my beer on the way down, which made me laugh. Beer is gross so I definitely will not partake in anything like that when I come back to the United States.

I also came up with a great idea of getting out my iPod and turning on Mulan songs while we walked. I’ve been singing them in my head at EVERY tourist spot and it was great listening to it on the wall…it just seemed so fitting.

So beautiful.

Mary, me, and Lisa.

We finally reached the toboggan chute. You go on a giant metal slide and loop all the way from the top of the Great Wall to the bottom. I was in the lead, so I was trying to take pictures of Lisa and Mary. I got a really successful shot and a lot of other ones of just my ear. It was really weird to come down the wall that way, but it was fantastic.

Lisa and Mary.

An example of my photo fail.

Toboggan chute.

After the Great Wall, we stopped at a local restaurant to eat local countryside food. It was full of a ton of vegetables. We also presented Eugene, Echo, and Jim with cards and gifts to say thank you for all the help they’ve given us all month and especially the past three days in Beijing.

Countryside food.

Dr. Sanders giving Echo, Eugene, and Jim gifts for helping.

After lunch, we drove an hour to the Art District and had an hour and a half to walk around. There were tons of really cool exhibits…and lots of weird ones. The graffiti on the walls was really pretty, as was this exhibit of painted horses. Walking around was nice, but I definitely wished we could have spent a lot more time at the Great Wall.

Car art.

Awesome painted horses.

Love over money, even in China.

Amazing graffiti.

After the Art District, we headed back to the hotel to eat dinner. The food was okay, but it was not the best we’ve had. I grabbed something off a plate, took a bite, and then was informed that it was pig’s feet. The rice and fruit was really good so I loaded up on that. After dinner, everyone wanted to hit up McDonald’s in China for the last time. We all went and got fries and ice cream and walked back to the hotel.

Now I’m sitting in Mary and Lisa’s room stealing pictures from everyone’s cameras before we leave. We have to be ready to go in the lobby at 2:30 AM which is rough. The plane ride is going to be 13 hours and we get back to Detroit at 8:15 AM. I’m so sad. It’ll be nice to see everyone, but I really am going to be leaving part of me behind. Yeah, that’s corny, but I fell in love with this place.

Goodnight everyone!

Today, we woke up at 6:30 and headed to breakfast at 7 AM. The hallway was entirely dark so we got lost at first and went back to the room to wait a little while because we thought the place wasn’t open yet. Finally, we realized the hallways was just dark so we headed in. The food was kind of sketchy, but I still ate some rice and had some watermelon and bread in the morning.

After breakfast, we met in the lobby at 8:30 AM and left for Tian’amen Square. I REALLY wanted to go here and see the Forbidden City, but also the wall with Mao’s picture on it. I’ve seen it in so many pictures, but being there is a whole other experience.

We walked around the square for a little bit, which can hold up to 1,000,000 people. It was enormous. On one side of the square was the Congressional building and opposite of that was the Chinese History Museum. Apparently, the government chooses the top 96 most attractive men in the military to live in the Forbidden City and to raise the flags in Tian’amen Square every morning. At that same time, they bring out the preserved body of Mao Zedong each morning as well. The painting of him in Tianamen Square was also made to have eyes that follow you anywhere. It was very interesting to see it in person.

Congressonal building.

History museum.

Military man and the monument for all the people who died in creating the PR of China.

Tian’amen Square.

Dr. Wasserman, Alexa, Dr. Sanders, me, Dr. Mahon, Mary, Lisa, and Ms. Green.

His eyes follow you around wherever you go.

We walked under the street (it’s so busy that they do underground tunnels to cross) to enter the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City was for the emperor, the empress, his 3,000 concubines, and other staff members. In all 30,000 people lived in the city and weren’t allowed to leave. The emperor was the only one who was allowed to enter by the front gate, except the empress on the day they got married. Everyone else had certain entrances for their positions, like ministers or scholars.

Alexa, Mary, me, and Lisa right outside the Forbidden City.

Execution square.

The place was enormous. They believed in fengshue (spelling is really wrong), where you have water to the south and I believe mountains to the east. The emperor had a giant moat built of water and a giant mountain (which happened to be the park we were in days prior that the emperor hanged himself) behind the Forbidden City. There was an area for executions of all criminals right outside the entrance, an area for maids to live, and the three main areas: the offices, a residential area, and a Chinese garden area. The emperor had 2,999.5 rooms made, with the library cut into half a room, because he believed that the god was above him and his palace in the heavens had 3,000 rooms, so he did not want to outdo him. Also, the emperor slept in a different room each night because he had so many enemies that he constantly had to check about being poisoned or murdered in his sleep.

Man-made river in the Forbidden City.

Giant rocks in the Chinese garden where the emperor used to drink tea and play chess.

Alexa, Mary, me, and Lisa.

The pictures don’t do this place justice, it was enormous and extremely elaborate. We only spent two hours there and that barely touched the surface of the place.

We then went to lunch at a place right by Tian’amen Square. After lunch, we all walked to Starbucks because Alexa wanted cups in Starbucks from China. We then got on the bus where we headed back to the hotel to see if some people could switch rooms. The rooms some of the group was switching to was exactly the same as the ones prior, so we just decided not to switch.

So much food.

So we headed out again by bus to the Temple of Heaven. This temple area has no statues because the gods’ faces were unknown, so they did not want to upset the gods by making a face of them that wasn’t accurate. There was a kitchen for sacrificing animals like horses, lambs, and also they burned jade and incense so that the smells and the ashes would reach the gods and make them happy. The corridor where the food used to be carried is now called the “gambling corridor” where many retired people come to play cards and mahjong and gamble. All retired and elderly get into any national park type area for free, which is nice.

Gambling corridor.

Far away view of the Temple of Heaven.

Mary, Lisa, me, and Alexa.

Mary, Lisa, and I.

We then went to see the temple. It was round, with four pillars inside painted with gold to represent the four seasons. The temple had blue roofs, the only ones to have such, in order to honor nature. In the Forbidden City, anything the emperor lived in was yellow, a color of the imperialist power.

After the Temple of Heaven, we went to another shopping area for only about 30 minutes. Lisa and I wandered around the floor of extremely nice pearls, where apparently Bill Clinton, Jessica Alba, and other famous people had visited. The price of the pearls was insane, like 126,000 yuan, which is over $20,000 US I believe. We met a sales associate there named Rony. She thought we Lisa and I were twins, which was funny to me because we look nothing alike.

Outside of the shop, we met Dr. Mahon’s cousin who is from Mexico, but living and working in China. He speaks English, Spanish, and Chinese and was really intelligent and funny.

After the half hour, we got on the bus and drove to Pizza Hut for dinner. There was so much food on the table: salads, calamari, chicken pot pie, and like six different pizzas. We ate extremely fast because we had to catch the show “The Legend of the Kung Fu,” which was a Vegas-style show. Lisa was extremely excited because she wanted to see an acrobatic style show and that definitely was it. We weren’t allowed to take pictures during the performance unfortunately, so I have nothing to really show for that. Afterwards, we were allowed to take pictures with some of the actors, so we got a lot of the group together to take funny shots together.

The Legend of Kung Fu show.

Me, Mary, and Lisa with one of the performers in the show.

When we got back to the hotel, we stopped at DQ with Dr. Sanders, Dr. Mahon, Ms. Green, Lisa, Mary, Dr. Wasserman, and Dr. Mahon’s cousin. It was nice to just hang out and relax after such a long and busy day.

Tomorrow we go to the Great Wall and it’s the last full day we have in China. I really am sad to be going back, but I knew this day was coming. Hopefully you’ll still read the blog even though you know I’ve arrived back because I’m not sure if I can put these updates up in Beijing because the internet is so slow.

The picture uploads are almost impossible here, so you’ll just have to wait!

Well Wednesday was the day we left Tianjin for good to head to Beijing for three days of sight-seeing before we leave. We had to wake up early and be ready to go in the lobby by 6:30 AM. I was really glad that I had bought that extra suitcase the day prior, because I know that having to purchase one in Beijing would be a pain, but my bag would be overweight for sure.

We headed to Beijing on a bus for about 3 hours. All of the sudden, the bus pulled over and we were at a stop for about 20 minutes. Finally, after sitting around for that long, we finally asked why we were stopped. Apparently we were getting a tour guide and she was lost. After about fifteen minutes more of waiting, she finally arrived. I didn’t even know we were having a tour guide, so that was kind of cool to hear.

Mary and I decided to eat some pringles while we waited.

Our first stop was the Sacred Way, or an entrance near the Ming Tombs that the emperor would walk through. There were giant pillars with a dragon facing outward on the outside of the Sacred Way, which was meant to call the emperor back into the area if he was away. On the inside, they had the dragon pillar with the dragon facing inward, telling the emperor he must go out and see the people if he was inside.

The dragon pillar.

Myself, Mary, Lisa, and Alexa in front of the entrance to the Sacred Way.

Gorgeous weeping willow-type trees.

Mary and I terrified because we were about to have to use our first Chinese toilet. 

I actually cheated and found the western one…so it wasn’t my first experience. I cheated the system!

Mary succeeded though!

The Sacred Way.

Also, there were all kinds of animals/combinations of stone animals in fours all along this long giant path. The first two in each set were always kneeling and the other set of the same animal was always standing. Finally, there were different Chinese stone men at the end…I think 8 in all guarding the walkway. It was really, really pretty.

Myself, Lisa, and Mary with the kneeling camel.

Myself, Mary, Dr. Sanders, Lisa, Alexa, and Ms. Green.

Mary, Lisa, and I with a kneeling horse.

I tried to keep a straight face, but it was almost impossible.

Next, we went to this place to eat called the Friendship Store. It was definitely a tourist trap, but because Tianjin Normal was paying for everything through this tour company, we didn’t have to buy the food. However, we had over an hour after eating to wander around this overpriced shop for items that I found on Culture Street weeks ago.

After the Friendship Store, we headed to the Summer Palace to tour. It was the most beautiful and interesting places in the world. The emperor had one empress and 3,000 concubines under him. This woman who was 15^th in line ended up giving birth to the first son of the emperor, so she was moved up to the 2^nd in line of the concubines. The son ended up becoming emperor really young, so his mother, “The Dragon Lady” would tell him how to rule everything and would sit behind a yellow curtain while he did business and told him what to do.

So the Summer Palace was her main place to stay. However, she also kept many people in her family under house arrest for over ten years, like her nephew and I believe the empress, before the Dragon Lady poisoned her food. The Dragon Lady is featured in The Last Emperor, so when we get back, we are having a movie night at some point with Dr. Mahon, Dr. Sanders, and whoever else wants to come.

The Spring Pavilion.

The 2nd Marco Polo bridge.

The views were gorgeous.

Top of the summer palace with a temple at the top.

Guinness book of World Records longest corridor. It had over 14,000 paintings in it. 

We walked near this temple part of the Summer Palace. Our guide didn’t buy the all-inclusive ticket, so we had to pay ten yuan if we wanted to go to the top. Of course, I came to China so I wanted to see as much as I could. I was kind of annoyed we had to pay, and even more annoyed that she told us we only had 30 minutes to climb all the way up, look around, and go down.

While I was ordering all the tickets for the people in the group who wanted to go to the temple, I did the sign for 6 in Chinese to get the tickets for everyone. After  I did that, an older man who spoke French was trying to ask me if holding up four fingers was the proper way to ask for four tickets. So I taught him how to do the signs for six and eight in Chinese. I definitely felt AWESOME getting to teach someone something about China!

I was definitely am glad I paid for a ticket. The view was amazing and even though there were a million steps, it felt really great with the breeze on top of the mountain. We also could see the water and pretty much all of the summer palace from the top, which was breathtaking.

View from the top.

Mary, Alexa, Jim, myself, and Alexa.

Alexa, me, Mary, and Lisa in front of the Summer Palace temple entrance.

For dinner, we went to a restaurant to eat Beijing duck. It’s traditional Chinese food in Beijing so I was excited to try something new. We eat so much American food here, which makes me sad since we are in China and I’d really like to try tons of new things. Duck wasn’t the only thing on the menu, but many things were WAY too spicy for any of us. Mary and I attempted to eat this soup and it was so spicy that my eyes and nose were dripping. It really cleared the sinuses, but it was hilarious to experience.

Trying to eat the octopus…I failed.

After dinner, we headed to the hotel to check in. We had a giant tour bus and our hotel was in an alley way with a toll booth. The driver tried to somehow maneuver the bus into the lane of the toll booth and ended up HITTING IT! The whole booth tipped over and I thought it was severely damaged, but all the people did was push it back onto the curb. However, as I found out later, the driver was fined $4,000 yuan for hitting it, which is like $600. The tour guide and the bus driver were outside the hotel with the police figuring everything out from around 6 PM until midnight, which is really sad.

Our hotel is really gross. The floors are disgustingly dirty and there’s tons of mold in the bathroom. I can deal with it for three days no problem, but I felt bad for others. Dr. Sanders’ toilet seat was broken and wasn’t even attached. The people at the front desk didn’t believe her so she brought it downstairs to the lobby to show them. It was absolutely hilarious and I’m glad I got a picture.

Dr. Sanders with the toilet seats.

I found out later that Mary and Lisa’s shower didn’t work at all. So they had to sit in the tub and splash water on themselves to get clean. So they will be using our shower from here on out.

Anyways, after checking in, Mary, Lisa, Dr. Mahon, and I met in the lobby and decided to visit food street. This is a street that has been featured on Bizarre Foods, the television show, with scorpions, starfish, seahorses, monkey, tarantulas, snakes, millipedes, donkey, and locus. I was SO grossed out by the smells and especially by the fact that many of the insects were still alive before they deep-fried them, so you could see them twitching away on a stick before being cooked.

Scorpions, starfish, and seahorses.

Geckos…ew.

Spiders…disgusting.

I’m still getting the creepy crawlies talking about the street, but it was a lot of fun. We took the subway there and Eugene was terrified for us and didn’t think we would make it back alive. When we were leaving food street, there were all these taxis parked and instead of running the meter, they were bartering with us saying it would cost 100 yuan to 800 yuan to drive us back to the hotel. Therefore, we made the decision to buy a two yuan subway ticket and just walk back to the hotel like we did on the way there. It was extremely crowded this time, because it was so late at night and the subway was closing soon so people were packing on. I think it’s so much more fun with that many people because when you don’t think any more people can fit, they find a way.

We got back around 10:30 PM and I hung out in Mary and Lisa’s room until about midnight. I wanted to go to bed earlier but some other circumstances prevented that unfortunately.

Either way, the trip was great and I really loved seeing some of these old sites in Beijing.

I’m pretty sad about this post. It’s our last and final day in Tianjin and I am dreading leaving. I’ve had such an amazing time and I really love this city. I need to come back somehow, so I’m definitely going to look into that.

I woke up this morning at 7:30 AM (so much for sleeping in) and couldn’t get the internet to work. That is the main reason why these posts are so late at night for me (early for you). With no internet, I decided to get a head start on packing. I set out all my clothes and all my souvenirs in different piles. After packing up all my clothes and throwing out tons of random unnecessary things, I knew there was was no way my souvenirs would fit in my suitcase without it weighing too much. 

I ended up coming to Lisa and Mary’s room and used their internet for a little while. Lisa had ordered some things from the nearby mall that had just arrived so we headed there at about 11 AM to pick them up. Surprisingly, the whole order and purchase went really smoothly and we were back before 11:30 AM. When we got back, Jim was there to see if we had successfully gotten Lisa’s gifts. We talked to him for a little bit and then just hung out until lunch.

Simon had told us the night before that he was going to do lunch big, and he didn’t lie. We had SO much food that we couldn’t even fit it all on the table. Ms. Green brought a watermelon down to be cut up that was given to her as a gift from the technology woman in the classrooms during teaching. The watermelon was delicious, but it was enormous. We ate as much as we could but there was so much left over, I felt bad.

The huge watermelon that Ms. Green was given as a gift.

Simon really went to town ordering for us on the last lunch.

After lunch, Lisa, Mary, and I ended up napping until at 3 PM. We were all still exhausted from the Beijing trip so we definitely needed a nap. After the nap, Alexa, Mary, Lisa, and I all walked to Vanguards for one last time to pick up some food, rice wine for Lisa’s father, and a suitcase for my extra things. The suitcase was 99 yuan which is just about $15 US dollars, which was definitely not a big purchase. We grabbed some snacks for the Beijing trip and then started walking back. As we walked by the bakery that we have visited so many times, Ms. Green and Dr. Sanders were inside. They offered to take our things so we could grab a taxi to Culture Street and do last minute shopping.

Mary wanted to get a figurine from the shop there and I wanted to look at the painted leaves, but that was all we intended going for. We decided to visit our friend that spoke English in one of the small shops to say goodbye. Of course, he pulled out seats for us to sit down. He was so nice to us that we of course wanted to buy something. I got three small bracelets that I kind of had wanted to get anyways and Mary got a fan. As we were leaving, he gave us each a small little purse to put money or jewelry in “for good luck”. Mary and I then met up with Alexa and Lisa and decided to head back and get a picture with our friend.

Mary and I with our English friend.

After Culture Street, we got back at 6 PM, just in time for dinner at the Sheraton. We got back and changed quickly and then took taxis to dinner at the Sheraton, where we had our first American style meal. I got spaghetti, apple juice, and cheesecake and it was really good. It was a nice last meal in Tianjin, but still very bittersweet.

Mary and I are really excited about our dessert.

And here we are, back in the hotel. I’m procrastinating packing my final things, so I’m writing blog pots and trying to upload pictures to photobucket so I can post them on here.

I don’t know if I’ll get internet access while in Beijing. If not, then I’ll definitely finish my updates when I get back, but it’ll be when I return to the United States. I’m so glad I got to do this blog and go on this trip. It’s been a life-changing experience (yeah I know, what a typical thing to say) and it’s changed a few of my viewpoints on certain issues. I’ve met amazing people and made amazing friendships and I really value that.

We’ll see if I can post again! 

Well…the trip to Beijing was a lot of fun. I can’t really remember a lot of it because it wasn’t planned and I don’t know the names of the places. Hopefully I can find out from Dr. Mahon later.

We woke up early Sunday morning to head to Beijing. Simon was coming with us and then leaving Monday night to visit his girlfriend for her birthday. I was super excited because we were getting to ride the bullet train from Tianjin to Beijing which only takes 30 minutes, compared to the 2 hour drive it took us on a bus a month prior.

We took a taxi to the train station. We had to have Simon help us with our tickets because everything was in Chinese. Thank god he was there because we honestly would have been a little confused. We had to each show our passports and in order to get a ticket that allowed sitting down, we paid 69 yuan (barely over ten dollars).

The train station wasn’t crowded and was extremely organized. Then when we got in the train, the seats were extremely nice and air conditioned and quiet. I wish we had that in the United States everywhere because it was super convenient.

Super classy.

Lisa is super excited to go on the bullet train.

So is Mary…apparently I’m terrified.

Lisa, me, Alexa, and Mary all in one piece!

After getting off the train and arriving in Beijing, we got tickets for the subway. Of course, the whole common idea that subways are crowded is PRETTY accurate. Dr. Mahon had done it before (Simon hadn’t which was crazy to me) so when it looked like there was no room on the subway, she just shoved in and magically all 9 of us fit. I honestly loved every second of it, I thought it was hilarious and a lot of fun.

When then had to take a taxi to our hotel. When we arrived, it was honestly one of the nicest places I’ve ever seen. It was really weird to be staying in a hotel like that in China because I’m okay with our current living arrangements and rooms. Either way, the rooms and the hotel was fantastic.

Chillin’ at the Holiday Inn.

Checking in.

The only soft beds in China, I’m pretty sure.

We didn’t want to spend much money there, so Mary and I had made and packed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches the night before. We decided to just eat in our rooms before exploring Beijing, which was a quick and good idea to me. Simon, of course, didn’t make food or have any, so we invited him to our room to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He had never had one before! Apparently while in the United States, Simon has managed to avoid all delicious American food. So we decided right then and there that next year at Heidelberg, we would be teaching Simon all about food in America.

Ninja Simon.

After lunch, we grabbed some taxis and headed to a park. This park, called Jingshan Park, had a temple at the top where an emperor had hanged himself after he knew the empire was ending. Minus that lovely little depressing note, we all trekked up the stairs and got to the top. Let me tell you, I think I died a little after the hike up and I’m definitely more out of shape then I even knew. The view at the top was amazing. The Forbidden City was right across the street so we got to see it from an above view. It is HUGE. We are spending about 5 hours there at some point in the next three days in Beijing and I don’t think that even covers close to half of all the Forbidden City.

The park.

Dr. Mahon being the tour guide.

A view on the way up.

A view into the Forbidden City from the top of the man-made mountain.

You could pay to dress up as an emperor or emperess.

View of the city.

After the park, Dr. Mahon found the man that took her around in a pedicab with her husband and so we all got on the pedicabs and toured through the Houtongs, or old neighborhood spots in Beijing. We saw some really nice housing that costs 1 million yuan per square foot and Mao Zedong’s home that he stayed for a few years.

Lisa, Simon, and Alexa in a pedicab together because they were the tiniest.

Coolest ride ever!

One of the pedicab drivers was teaching us about the Houtongs.

Mary and I on the pedicab.

After the pedicabs, we were dropped off and we got on the subway and went to Silk Alley and the Pearl Market. Every vendor in there spoke English, so when you walked by you’d hear “lady come look.” We only spent an hour and a half in there, but there were 8 floors and tons of things to look at. There were pearls, iPods, cameras, knock-off North Face and polo brand shirts, silk scarves, ties, pajamas, literally everything you could think of. I’m glad we went because I got a lot of my final gifts.

The Silk Alley.

After the Silk Alley, we went to dinner thanks to Simon’s father. His father called him the week prior and gave him money to take our whole group. We ended up going to a really nice hotel near Simon’s father’s work which was somewhat of an American buffet. The food was absolutely amazing and it was a lot of fun. Simon brought two of his friends. They did not know any English so it was awkward but you could tell they were nice people. It was good that Simon also got to see his friends since he puts up with SO much from us and all our jokes about him.

The restaurant was really nice.

After a nice long dinner, Alexa and Dr. Wasserman headed back with Simon’s friend and the rest of us went to a really cool park with tons of small restaurants, shops, and bars called Houhai Park. It was dark when we got there and extremely crowded. The place seemed like a really fun hang out and I think we may go back during the day time. After about an hour and a half of just spending time wandering around, we headed back.

A somewhat blurry picture of Houhai.

Well, half of us. Simon, Dr. Sanders, Dr. Mahon and I stayed for the second taxi and it was literally impossible to get one. We walked for twenty minutes out of the Houhai area hoping that it would be less busy. But then all the taxis were full from the Houhai area so we couldn’t get one. Finally, Dr. Mahon and Dr. Sanders went together to try to get one and Simon and I tried. For some reason, that helped our chances enough that we got one right away. The whole way back Dr. Sanders and I pretended to be driving the taxi and swerving and guessing what lane we were going to be in. I think that must have been the exhaustion or the heat, but it was still fun.

Simon’s phone had died earlier in the day and he forgot a charger so we were all afraid that his friends were going to leave him after he took 45 extra minutes to get back. However, once we pulled into the hotel, there were both his friends. The one who took Dr. Wasserman and Alexa back earlier and the one who went with Lisa, Mary, and Ms. Green both waited. We were all really glad to see that and obviously it shows us how nice Simon and his friends are. We owe him a lot!

When I finally got back to the hotel room, Mary and Lisa were waiting to go down to the pool. After all that walking and heat, I was glad to jump in for a few minutes. It was FREEZING. We spent about ten minutes in there before freezing too much and decided to go in the sauna. Then of course, the sauna was too hot so we got out and dried off.

We then met Ms. Green at the spa area where Mary, Lisa, and I all got full body massages. That was the first time for me doing that and it was SO awkward. It was definitely an experience. Mary and I were in the same room, still wet with our bathing suits on, unable to really know what to do. So we both laid down (thank god fully clothed, ha) and the masseuses started to massage our backs. Honestly, I’m so ticklish that I was struggling not to bust out laughing with the awkwardness and the ticklishness that was happening. I thought it was only going to be my back but then all the sudden it was my legs and it was just too much. Then they had us flip over on our backs to get massaged. Since it was the firs time either of us got a massage, Mary and I didn’t know whether to talk to each other or close our eyes or what. 

In the end, it really was nice. I’m glad to say I did it, but it was definitely awkward. I’m way too ticklish to do that all the time, but it was fun. 

With the massage over, Mary, Lisa, and I went to the lobby where we ran into Dr. Mahon and Dr. Sanders. I was starting to get sick so I wanted to get something warm to drink. We ended up all ordering something and sitting in the lobby for about a half hour. The waiter even had shawls that he brought us because it was so cold. Finally, I was exhausted and wasn’t feeling too well so we all went up and went to bed. 

In the morning, we all woke up and met in the lobby for breakfast at 9 AM. Lisa ended up getting flu-like symptoms and feeling sick, so she definitely wasn’t up for going out.

An adorable Chinese baby in the hotel.

After a buffet breakfast, Mary stayed back with Lisa while we went to a Tibetan style Buddhist temple. We had to take the subway to get there and I have NEVER seen anything so packed before. I thought the day before was busy, but I honestly think I was squeezed so tightly that I wouldn’t have to rest my feet on the ground if I didn’t want to and I’d still be upright. 

Then we transferred lines and there was almost nobody on there. We all ended up even getting seats, which is basically unheard of.

Extremely empty, which is really unusual.

The temple was gorgeous, but it was so hot. We couldn’t take pictures inside of the temples to be respectful, but there were some amazing things. The craziest thing I have ever seen was in one of the temples. It was a GIANT wood carving of a buddhist figure that was carved from a single tree in like 1000 A.D. and brought from India. It was four stories tall and somehow was carved out of one tree and transported all the way from India without being ruined.

Tree line leading into the temple.

Opening of the temple.

Alexa and I in front of a statue in the temple area.

The sign said “Please no coins” but look how many are on the ground!

The temple was really old and really beautiful.

One of the many temples.

Simon meditating?

Ms. Green, me, Simon, Alexa, and Dr. Sanders.

After the temple, we walked around the Imperial Academy street for a little bit. We were going to visit the Confucius Temple but it was 30 yuan and we were running out of time. We decided just to head back on the subway, instead. The subway wasn’t really packed this time either, luckily because we were between rush hour.

Blurry, but you can see much busier.

Simon and I on the subway. He hates them…not really sure what to say about his facial expressions, though hahaha.

When we got back to the hotel, we all grabbed our stuff from the room and met in the lobby and got some food. After hanging out for a while, we headed back in taxis to the bullet train to head back to Tianjin.

Mary being a worrying motherly figure. Lisa dying.

Lisa wasn’t feeling well, so I said that I’d go with her since I can handle someone having to puke (thanks to my sister and her motion sickness!) and I made Simon sit in the front so if we needed to pull over, we could have him tell the driver in Chinese (perfect system if I do say so). We got to the train successfully.

Trying to get tickets was not as easy this time, as the lady didn’t want us all to pay separately. While we were getting tickets, we saw two girls who spoke English flipping out because they missed their train and needed to be somewhere. We also saw a man slamming a book into the window because he was angry about something. After all that, we boarded the train and headed home in a half hour…still crazy to me.

Leaving the bullet train station.

We got back about 6 PM and decided to go get Pizza Hut on Binjiang Street. Alexa and Lisa weren’t feeling well so they stayed back. We had a really good meal. Mary and I split a popcorn chicken pizza and got mango pineapple smoothies. We ordered Lisa a cheese pizza to go so she didn’t miss out because she was sick.

The pizza was really deelicious.

Mary, Simon, and I took a taxi back to the hotel after dinner. While in the taxi, Mary and I found out that all the taxi drivers talk about us a lot in Chinese. Also, we forced Simon into making sure that he hung out with us back in America. I really hope I get to hang out with a lot of the Chinese students, especially my students if they come.

The trip to Beijing was awesome. For being spontaneous, it flowed really well and I saw a lot of great things.

Pictures to come. 

Well, today we were supposed to go shopping with Jim and Alexa’s student Vicki at 10:30 AM.

Due to some issues at home and the late night last night, I only had slept like 2 or 3 hours so I felt awful. I decided to forgo the experience and just continue to sleep. I’m glad I did, as I woke up at about 1:30 PM after falling asleep at 10 AM. So this post is naturally going to be pretty short and not so interesting.

Everyone got back at 2 PM and we all hung out in Lisa and Mary’s room for a while. Jim told each of us to pick out one of his paintings that he would give us…which is WAY too generous. So now we are trying to think of a gift to make or give him to say thank you. Nothing will ever compare, but at least we are going to try to do something.

After Lisa had to go to Maggie’s house, the previous Chinese professor at Heidelberg, Mary and I decided to go to Culture Street.

I believe that was the fifth or sixth time we had been there. We definitely had our lists ready for who to shop for, but we still wanted to look and see if things jogged our mind for someone we were struggling to buy a gift for. Basically, Mary and I bought a lot of things that weren’t on our list that we liked, which was inevitable.

We went to a strip of shops we hadn’t been to before and a man who owned a shop started talking to us in English. He was nice and he wasn’t pushy, so we decided to take a look in his shop. He asked us what country we were from and he asked if we knew any Chinese. He also assumed we were just on vacation or something because he said “oh are you flying back in a week?” We explained to him how we had been teaching English for the past three weeks and were going back, and he was really impressed. When I asked what one of the items he was selling was, he didn’t know the english word for the term, but he did the motion for applying lipstick.

So then he asked if we could teach him how to say and spell the word lipstick and we did so gladly. As we were leaving, he gave us each a pair of chopsticks “for luck.” 

We walked around and picked up a ton of other things. I had a lot of fun bargaining today and got the prices down a lot. After three hours at Culture Street, Mary and I headed home. Lisa wasn’t back yet, so after hanging out for a little bit, I decided to do some laundry. I had to hand wash some of my clothes and hang them up, which is a lengthy process when you only have a couple things. But I really did need to wash them, so I didn’t really mind.

After laundry, Mary, Alexa, and I decided to walk to this cafe called “Cozy Cafe” that had western food. The owner is actually American I believe, so they had lots of options.

The food was really delicious. I got a strawberry milkshake, a Fanta, and chicken and beef fajitas. Mary got fajitas and a mango milkshake, while Alexa got chili and a baked potato. The waitresses and waiters even knew English which was an interesting change from what were used to. 

So here I am, after dinner, exhausted and ready for our Beijing trip.

I won’t be updating tomorrow night or possibly Monday night because we are taking the bullet train to Beijing and spend a day and a half just wandering and doing who knows what. The whole trip is spontaneous and not planned sooo it’s what we make of it. I’m really excited, but I’m not bringing a laptop so I won’t be able to blog. I’ll be taking tons and tons of pictures, more then probably necessary. So look out for that on Monday or Tuesday night.

This is our official start to our last week in China. I could stay here forever!

So finally, the day of graduation was upon me. I don’t think I could prepare for this because it’s really a weird thing to meet and befriend so many people, just to know that in three weeks, it’s likely you will never meet them again.

Graduation involved every class sitting in Room 511 to perform presentations of any kind to celebrate the past three weeks and the confidence and english improvement of each student that participated. 

Lisa and Ms. Green’s class went next first with a performance of sign language by her 5 students who did not go to Cambridge. They also did a skit about Thanksgiving from friends which was adorable. 

The class doing sign language.

Again.

Doing a skit from “Friends”.

Next, Dr. Mahon’s group went by doing presentations. One of the students did a presentation on her hometown and province, which was very interesting. She had tons of pictures of sculptures and events that went on in the city each year. The next student showed things about Peking Opera facial make-up, which was  very interesting. She talked about what the different colors meant and what the different masks and ways to paint your face were for.

The girl who did the presentation on her hometown.

A presentation about facial make-up in operas.

We then thought we were running out of time, so we had to cut Dr. Mahon’s presentations short and hopefully do them at the end if we had time.

Mary’s class went next, with Sophia giving a speech about the past 19 days and how much she learned and they meant to her. It was so touching and really did make me sad. Amber, one of her students, said that she had put together a powerpoint presentation, so Mary allowed her to include it.

Sophia giving a thoughtful speech.

The powerpoint was tons of funny pictures about things that happened in and out of class. At the very end, different students stood up with gifts and gave something to each of us. They gave Lisa, Alexa, and I a bracelet made out of a traditional Chinese grass. It’s beautiful and it’s such a great reminder of all the times I’ve had here. 

The presentation about our visit.

A slide joking about how Dr. Sanders and all of the rest of us always saying “English! English!” when students tried using Chinese.

That presentation was followed by Davis and Mary doing a duet from Disney’s Brother Bear called On My Way by Phil Collins. I’ll see if I can upload the video in another post because it was so cute and so perfect for the occasion. 

Next, Mary’s entire class shared all their wishes with the rest of the class. They definitely almost brought the tears.

Davis sharing his wishes with everyone. I only have video of Mary and Davis singing and I’ll try to upload that when I get back and the connections better.

Finally, my class was ready to present. We had a combination of featuring different talents from our class and things we performed for fun. We first showed Lulu’s coffee commercial that he made. It was so funny and it was a great way to kick things off. 

Getting Lulu’s coffee commercial ready.

Next, Jim showcased some of his art that he has done, which was so impressive, I can’t even tell you. He showed some 3D housing designs, some Chinese paintings, and some watercolor on a powerpoint for everyone to see. People were very impressed and I was so glad he got a chance to stand up confidently and share his talents. 

Jim, showing some of his drawings.

Henry and Jack were next, performing a song that Henry had written the music for and Jack had written the lyrics. They performed the entire song in Chinese, then again in English, and finally again in Chinese. It was really, really touching.

Henry and Jack.

We then started the class participation, where our entire class spread out along the front of the class and did the macarena. It was absolutely hysterical, because it’s funny watching a bunch of people doing a dance they’ve only learned prior, but also because we forced others in the audience to participate.

A blurry picture of us dancing.

Finally, we wrapped up our segment of the graduation with the song”Can you feel the love tonight?” in the Lion King. Our whole class sang, as did many of the other classes. Some of the University of Wisconsin girls studying here had just gotten out of class and came in to see the performance because they heard us singing. It was a really special way for our class to end our time together.

The class and I singing “Can you feel the love tonight?”

It ended up that we had extra time because we were waiting for the Dean to pass out certificates. Therefore, we invited Dr. Mahon’s students back up, where Element gave us a run-down of many Chinese teas. Then Vicki, another student, gave an abbreviated version of her 40 slide presentation on the Forbidden City.

Element presenting on tea.

Vicki’s presentation.

Dr. Mahon’s class wrapped up with Pansy, a student, singing Chinese opera, which was very good to the rest of the class.

Pansy singing opera.

We still managed to have extra time, so Dr. Wasserman had our class get up and we performed and taught the shark song to the class. We also did most of the macarena and got almost everyone to participate. 

Baby shark performance, very embarrassing.

Finally, the Dean arrived and we presented him with a gift of stamps of actor Gregory Peck, because Dr. Sanders said that the actor reminded her of the Dean. He then helped pass out certificates to each class.

I managed not to cry once during any of the presentations or goodbyes. It was really sad saying goodbye to my class, but I know they have bright futures and are going to go very far in life. I have all of their emails and I hope I can stay in touch with as many of them as possible.

Some of the students gave me gifts to say goodbye. Lulu and Sharon had given me coin purses the day before. Others had written us all letters, which were so sad. Nancy, from Lisa’s class, gave me a jade necklace and a postcard on it, which was sooo nice. Jessica from my class gave me some panda chines. Stephen, also from my class, gave me a Chinese good luck hanging thing. A lot of them made very impressive homemade cards that mean more than anything!

This experience teaching has been so amazing. It’s left such an impact on me and I definitely feel that I’ve learned a lot about Chinese culture and about diversity. I was nervous having to teach students, especially because they were older than me, but I learned that age and ethnicity are still just minor details in the grand scheme of things. We all were very alike, even though we lived in different countries, and I’m so glad that I could have this experience.

After graduation and the goodbyes, we had a closing ceremony dinner in the hotel. I sat with Simon, Lisa, Mary, Alexa, Jim and Ellen were invited (from my class), Ms. Li, and Eugene. The food was amazing as always and I love sitting and talking with everyone.

Because of impending rain and a little bit of flu like symptoms on some of our parts (I’m healthy so far…knock on wood) we decided to push Culture Street to tomorrow. Therefore, we just headed upstairs to take a nap for about two and a half hours, which was much needed for the sick ones in the group.

After dinner in the hotel, we all got ready and met with Simon and Jim and went out for the night which was sooo much fun. We went to the Sitong Bar, which is a bar with a lot of foreign people apparently. We just sat at a table and hung out for a couple hours. Lisa made tons of friends with people who barely spoke English outside around us. We were definitely completely safe, which I wasn’t sure about, but definitely we were all good with Simon and Jim being our “body guards”.

Before going out. Our favorite asian!

Alexa, Mary, me, and Lisa waiting to get a taxi.

Mary, Lisa, and Simon.

Simon and I. He loves us, even if he pretends we’re annoying.

The Sitong Bar.

Outside the restaurant, we ran into two men in their late 20s. One of them was Italian and he started talking to Lisa. While he was talking to Lisa, Mary and I started tallk to the other guy who was from Ohio! So obviously, we were all super excited we ran into someone from Ohio. Apparently he wast here for a year and a half for business. He was an engineer and had another 8 months left in China and he was from Newark, Ohio. Very cool.

After that, we went to late night karaoke and just hung out for like an hour or two and sang some songs. We finally called it a night, of course in the pouring rain, and took a pedicab-style thing back. 

Lisa and I. 

The whole day was lots of fun. It was a majorly busy day but really great.

I’m working on trying to upload pictures…it’s going a little slow. So I figured I would just upload this post that I had written and fix it later.

Last night, Dr. Mahon came in the room at about 10 PM and asked us if we wanted to go to an antiques market in the morning 5 AM. A part of me said “NO WAY!”, but the tourist side of me said “DEFINITELY!” so I decided to go.

After waking up at like 4:50 AM, Mary, Lisa, Dr. Mahon and I headed out to find a taxi and go to this apparent antique market that was allegedly famous in Tianjin. We first get to the gate to leave the hotel and it’s locked, so we had to wake up the guard so he could unlock it so we could get out. I guess it’s for safety, but that was interesting that they lock us in each night.

The locked gate.

When we got to the market, we were actually surprised that there were so many people out to sell their goods. It’s obviously very difficult to find out if antiques are really or fake, so I’d never pay a lot of money for anything there. However, there’s tons of little things that are not mass produced that you can pick up, which I really liked. 

Just 1/4th of the little shops or goods that are around.

It was a little dirty though. The older generations still tend to spit and do the “snot rocket” technique, which is digusting. The younger generations have really learned to stop doing that though. So we had to dodge a couple of gross bodily fluids on our adventure, but it was still a ton of fun. I may go back on Saturday with Dr. Mahon because more of the little shops were open and I want to look at some old coins that are really cool. 

We went to the market until about 7:30 AM and then we got back in time to shower and get ready for school. We were definitely glad that today was only a planning day for the graduation ceremony tomorrow. 

When we got to class, we decided to read a play on the Pony Express that we were going to perform for the graduation but don’t have time to do. It was very cute watching them do the play. We had more people than parts, so a lot of people had to double up and read at the same time which is always funny.

Alice, Sharon, Jessica, and Hortensia reading the play.

Lulu and his girlfriend Crystal reading the same part, hilarious.

Sophia reading the narrator part.

Chen reading the other narrator part.

Jane, playing the mother of all the boys wanting to be in the Pony Express.

After the play, we started to plan and practice the order of our performers and get them all on a flash drive for easy transitions during the performance. Lulu is going to show a commercial he made at Tianjin Normal last year which is really cool. Jim is going to show us some of the 3D rooms that he’s designed and his watercolor paintings.

Henry is going to showcase a song he has written. Lanseer wanted to dance, so we were going to have her dance, but she couldn’t think of a song. So out of nowhere, I thought of the macarena so our whole class is going to perform that, which is going to be a fun time. Our closing song for the whole graduation is going to be “Can you feel the love tonight?” which is my ABSOLUTE favorite song from my favorite movie the Lion King.

Henry and Jack performing the song Henry wrote.

Before we left, I wanted to take a picture with each of my students. Here’s just a few of them.

Jim and I.

Chen and I.

Kay and I.

Lulu, Crystal, and I.

After class, Dr. Sanders and Dr. Mahon hosted a pizza party for their students since we haven’t seen them very much recently. We went through pizza SO quickly. It was also Gloria’s birthday this week, one of Dr. Sanders’ and Mary’s students, so they had ordered it earlier for the pizza party. 

Gorgeous cake for Gloria.

Simon stole my camera and was trying to take a super up close picture, so I made this gorgeous face.

Dr. Sanders and Mary’s class.

Dr. Mahon’s class.

Simon, failing to light the candles.

Glorida, making a wish before blowing out some of the candles. Lisa’s looking lovely in the background.

Singing Happy Birthday to Gloria. She’s adorable.

Dr. Sanders cutting the cake for like 45 people.

Chloe and Sophia.

Ms. Green, Simon, and one of Mary’s students. She had a crush on Simon and her friends made her get a picture with Simon, hahah.

With the pizza party over and done with, we all headed up to the room to get naps to make up for the sleep we lost this morning. After a nice two hour nap, we met in the lobby at 5:30 PM to head to the Dumpling Factory (the restaurant we took our students to). Unfortunately, Mary felt a little sick all day today so she headed back to the hotel before the meal even came. So now I’m playing mother and doctor to Mary and Lisa just in case they both feel sick.

I’m also going to hand write each of my students a note, so I hopefully won’t be up all night doing that. Either way, it’s worth it to me.

So long blog followers until later tomorrow.