onto china...

Welcome to the flip side. I’m not sure where to begin – but here it goes. Yesterday I traveled pretty much all day. What seemed like it would be a quick hop from Kyoto to Beijing was in fact an all day affair. Three different buses, three trains and 1 flight later I arrived in Beijing at the Wangfujing Hostel. How I actually found this place without any written directions is beyond me, but I did, and without getting too lost either. When I finally arrived at 11PM, I promptly went to bed.

This morning I wanted to hit the ground running and just started walking towards what seemed like The Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. The hostel is conveniently located about 20 minutes away from both – which as I’ve learned today, is just about next door in Beijing. Everything here is massive, including city blocks. Just to give you an idea, the municipality of Beijing is the size of Belgium. I’m shaking my head as I write this. It’s big. Anyway, on the way there, I stumbled across Wangfujing Snack Street, which is basically a couple little pedestrian only streets chalk full of food for shoppers and tourists alike. I unfortunately have no idea what real Chinese food should taste like yet, so eating here didn’t really bother me and I think it was reasonably authentic. I settled on two skewers of spicy grilled squid and passed on the grilled grasshoppers and scorpions. Breakfast of champions! I continued my journey towards the Forbidden City, electing to skip Tiananmen Square for now. As expected, there are a ton of cars lining each and every street. As a result, the sky here is extremely hazy, so much so that the moon seems orange through the haze at night. Anyway, as I entered The Forbidden City, I had a big grin on my face. This place is awesome in the true sense of the word. It’s really really impressive. I spent the next three to four hours wandering inside somewhat aimlessly, taking everything in. The Chinese certainly had a sense of grandeur when they built this place. Inside there are countless exhibition halls including a very cool exhibition of ornate clocks, mostly from Europe, that had been brought to China over the years. I finally left the complex around three o’clock looking for some more food. I had hoped to get some roast duck, but the place I had in mind is closed during the afternoon, and so instead I did what everyone else would do and had a lamb kebab and big plate of boiled intestines and a beer! Apparently I was quite the curiosity as each of the waiters came in turn to see the white guy eat his plate of boiled intestines. It wasn’t all that bad, though without the accompanying sauce, the tripe really didn’t have much flavor.

The plan now is to rest up a bit more and hit the town later this evening looking for some more crazy food and maybe to head back to Tiananmen to take in the scene after dark. Tomorrow I head to the Great Wall for a 10km hike – very much looking forward to that!