beijing with joon

Here we are at Tianamen Square. Behind us is the building with Mao's huge photo portrait on it. Look at that smog!!!

We went to a snack street where they have all kinds of strange things to eat, mostly on a stick (Beijingers seem very fond of food on sticks). They had scorpion, testicle, octopus, all kinds of weird stuff. Needless to say, I didn't try any adventurous foods because they're all animals, but here is a shot of Joon eating scorpion. He liked it.

The other day we visited the Great Wall. It was a lot of up and down steep wall. As you can see from the photo, it's in a beautiful setting- gorgeous mountainside and smog-free. We hiked 20 towers, about 3 hours of walking. It was a lot of fun but we were really tired at the end.

At the end of the portion of the wall that we climbed, there was a zipline that took you to the bottom of the hill (where there is a Hostelling International, by the way; always in the best locations!). Here's Joon zipping down.

We're staying in the Hutong district. I'm pretty sure hutong means alley in English. Beijing used to be all hutongs but a lot of them have been destroyed to make room for the super modern skyscrapers. The hutongs are cool because they give you an idea of old Beijing. Lots of small shops, homes, courtyards, and markets.

Joon goes home tomorrow and I follow the next day. It's been great to be in Beijing with him. It helps a lot to have another person you trust to try to figure out what is going on, especially when you have no clue about the language. A lot of people in Beijing do not speak English at all, and sadly I have neglected my roots and don't speak a word of Mandarin. Well, I can say hello and thank you...

I am completely ready to go home. I miss everyone and everything about San Francisco. I can't wait to be in familiar surroundings, speaking my native language and knowing the customs. Feeling like an insider, basically. My only fear is that after a week I'll start to miss the adventure of world travel. It has been a great trip, and I feel so lucky to have had the chance to see so many different countries and meet so many wonderful people.
Well, the next time you hear from me, I'll be stateside. Until then...

Beijing is pretty

Hi! I just arrived to Beijing yesterday. Here are a couple pictures I took when i first got here. They are all from the street/alley where my hostel is. I'm staying in the Dong Chen district, which is an historical Hutong (alley) district.
Up there are some candied fruits.
Here's the outside of a restaurant under construction on the inside.

A Chinese rickshaw thing?
Really cute public phones.
Here's the Sprite that accompanied my only Beijing meal so far. It was pizza, which to me seemed like a safe bet. They put it in the oven, all the bacteria gets cooked to death... right? Well, I was wrong apparently because I got a pretty bad case of food poisoning. I was up all night throwing up and doing other unpleasant things. It was doubly bad because I opted to watch movies on the plane instead of sleep a full 8 hours (I couldn't resist- it's been forever since I saw a movie or tv in English! Plus, you don't really sleep on the plane anyway) so I was super exhausted anyway, just from the travel. Today i stayed in bed until 3pm and slowly walked to the store to find Gatorade and crackers.
I'm feeling a bit better now and hopefully I'll be ready to hit the town tomorrow. On the ride to the hostel from the airport, I was surprised at how clean all the streets are. The air is also wayyy cleaner than the air in Kathmandu. There are lots of blossoms blooming and it just looks like a really nice city.
Well, I will write again in a couple days. Hope everyone is doing well at home.