Guoxi Hotel Beijing

... and headed south past the drum tower and the bell tower. As we walked, it was clear we had entered a touristy part of town, as every few steps we were approached by someone offering &#8220;rickshaw? You want rickshaw?&#8221; The rickshaws, bicycle-drawn carriages, were all covered in identical purple velvet with gold fringe. A fleet of rickshaws? So it seemed!<br><br>This particular area of Beijing is still filled with the characteristic &#8220;hutongs ...

... a try, but I was not that adventurous.<br><br>Dinner was interesting. We had some of the old favorites of peanuts and cucumbers, but we also had sweet and sour fish. This was interesting by cause it was served on a platter with the head sticking up on one end and the tail sticking up on the other. It may have looked different, but it tasted good.<br><br>After dinner, we took another walk around the city ...

... up with new thick jackets (which we don't need), at more than we wanted to pay. But we had a hilarious time doing it, and Scott's ego got suitable inflated "Mister you funny", "Mister your wife beautiful". Etc. Clasic though was when a very young girl was measuring Scott for jeans and she demonstrated their fit to me - with one finger prodding him, said "your husband BUM HERE!, your husband leg ...

... in and suited up, we didn't really need to power up our camera was until 5:30. Once the preshow started, we shot until around 7:20 and then changed our batteries just to be sure we would get through the next 5 hours. Everything went stellar! The whole crew was amazed at the show as we had never rehearsed with the fireworks. If you saw the ceremonies, you would have seen the giant scroll that opens and closes. This was all LCD panels and LED lights. Genius ...

... Jingshan Park. Anyway I caught a taxi at the back of Jingshan Park and headed for Downtown Backpackers Accommodation. At the hostel, I booked a Jinshanling and Simatai Great Wall hiking tour for only 280 RMB. Then I realized they also had a tour to Beijing Opera and Shaolin Kung Fu Show. It was a pity that Beijing Opera was not available on the night, but I was able to book a ticket for Shaolin Kung Fu Show. I thought I should have had stayed in that hostel. Anyway, because ...

... called, "I am the Dog of the Working Class." This very intense political piece is a commentary on the rise of capitalism in a formerly socialist state... That is my interpretation of his performance piece, which consists of him standing in the exact center of the sideway bent over in a squat and, how to put this politely, creating feces, um, how about going to the bathroom, or making number 2...you with me here. Yes, my friends...in the ...

... while also tasting like dough, really strange. Not all that bad, but the chewiness was just too much for me. His mom also told me about her neighbor who has a daughter I can tutor, so now I'll be tutoring her 3 hours a week. I make 100kuai an hour, so I should be making around 600kuai a week, which will be nice. That will cover food and some going out money. If I stick with trying to eat cheap I may even be able to save some money....we'll see though.... Sorry I haven't ...

... history museum, which contained some things from about 300,000 BC. Apparently a lot of evidence of early man has been discovered in Mongolia, as well as a bunch of dinosaur bones. After the museum we went to a show of traditional mongoliuan dance and music, which was very cool. Then for dinner, our guide had made reservations for us at the Mongolian BBQ, but this time we got a meal of lamb that is cooked on hot stones for 5 hours (thus the need to call ...

... is for oneself to take. People pay for the bill by bamboo sticks. Each one is ten fen, and if there are two sticks through meat, that is twenty fen. Generally speaking, there is only one piece of vegetable on a stick, or there is only a piece of meat, even the mushroom is only a little bit. We always felt that we had little for one mouth, so we had to have much to fill with our stomach. Like me, a northern girl, it was no problem to enjoy seventy or eighty sticks of food. There was ...