07.20.2008
BEIHAI PARK
BEIJING TRAIN STATION
On our last morning in Beijing we headed off to Beihai Park. Built in 1652, this park is one of the world’s earliest imperial gardens.
Practicing calligraphy with water is a common sight in China. Transient art so to speak.
Hubs took us for another wild boat ride. “Arghh! Ramming speed! Make way for the King of the Beihai seas!”
Dancers practicing in the park is quite common.
Seeing foreign babies sitting on a crane is quite uncommon.
lotus.
Here is a dancing and singing troop. They had special shirts and Olympic bracelets. I think they were promoting One World. One Dream.
At many tourist spots you can rent these ancient outfits and pose for a picture. I thought it was a wee bit too hot for long sleeved silk.
Here’s another large singing troop complete with uniform, a live band, songbooks and a conductor. They’re in the park every Sunday.
I don’t know what it’s called, but it looks pretty.
Water painting.
The first thing to go when making a new friend is to figure out who is older or younger. Is this big sister or little sister? Our conversation went like this:
He’s a year and a half.
She’s a year and a half.
He was born on 12/30.
She was born on 12/30!
He was born at 7:50am.
She was born at 10:30 in the morning.
OK – so we have big brother and little sister by 3 hours.
The most famous site at Beihai Park is this Nine-Dragon Screen. It’s 5 meter’s long and depicts dragons batting pearls in a turquoise water. There’s something similar in the Forbidden City, but this is the double sided original.
After enjoying the park, we went back to the apartment before heading off to the train station.
We absolutely loved our 13 days in Beijing. Come to think of it, we’ve never visited a city just before they hosted the Olympics. Who would have thought everything (including every expressway overpass) would be decorated.
Beijing is known as a city that changes quickly. Just today these changes began:
- the subway line to the airport started
- the new blue subway line opened
- an open top double decker tour bus line began
- odd/even driving days began (if your license plate number begins with an even number you could drive you car today – be careful…if you’re odd and you get caught – your car will be IMPOUNDED. Yes, the Chinese are serious.)
- And finally, at the train station, all people must show their residence card to get into the city. Only Beijingers and foreign guest are allowed into Beijing during the Olympic season.
That’s just one day!
The main Beijing Railway Station.
Olympic spirit is unleashed in all of Beijing! We couldn’t go anywhere without running into a FuWa.
Hmmm…I’ve got that airport feeling.
And here it is: Supreme Soft Sleeper. Well, there’s a TV with two channels. It only worked for an hour. The bed seems wider. Yes, that’s nice.
OK, another TV. Yes, that’s nice.
Oh, only two beds and a comfy chair. Hmmm…where’s the supreme?
OH MY WORD. We have our own bathroom. Supreme Soft Sleeper truly is supreme.
We also have a safe in case we need to store some diamonds or gold nuggets.
Raffe finds a comfortable space.
Schäfer’s favorite thing: a train ride!
What an amazing trip to Beijing.
We headed south to Suzhou, Zhou Zhuang, Zhen Jiang, and Nanjing. All of those photos will be coming soon to a gallery near you.
NOTE: Writing about each day of our Beijing vacation was fun, but I’m not sure I’ll do this again unless we have internet and I can blog each day live. But hey – FREE APARTMENT. No complaints.
