Qian Men Jian Guo Hotel Beijing

I find myself in a time warp here- everything passes by deceptively fast, that I still cannot believe its November. I have procrastinated on updating, in part because of the labor of explanations, and also, I feel my writing (or lack thereof) does not do the experience justice- instead I just veer off into intangible tangents. So time for some catch-up.<br><br>The other week my Grandparents' friend, Mr. Judge came to Beijing on business. I was eager to see my pre-China-departure mentor and ...

... Heaven is another one of those parks where Beijingers come to participate in exercise like dancing, tai chi, sword fighting etc. - similar to Summer Palace grounds.<br><br>By the time we had seen all three points of interest, it started to rain very lightly. So, we decided to head back to the hotel and get started with the packing as we are due to head to Xi'an tomorrow. We were also due to meet our friends, Victor and Carol for ...

... shopping, we took a cab to the airport and boarded our plane for the US! We flew from Beijing to San Fransisco which took about 12 hours. Jake was lucky enough to be sitting directly in front of a little boy that only knew how to use his "outside voice" and kept kicking Jake's seat. Jake basically got to sleep only when the little boy slept. We watched High School Musical 3 (cheesy but I'll admit I kind ...

... program is filled with bugs) to make it look like a "real" movie. I was in a group with John and two guys from Bucknell: Pat (from Thailand) and Geoff (from Long Island). I took on the role of movie editor and co-director, and John was basically the star of the movie. We decided to remake R. Kelly's "Trapped in the Closet," which is this weird 20+ part music video that R. Kelly made, in which all his lyrics are just really sentances that are explaining some weird ...

... bomb mark from the attack now know as the Marco Polo Bridge Incident that marked the beginning of the Japanese invasion of China prior to World War II. The bridge is guarded by 256 lions, each of which are unique in size and features. Legend has it that the lions move around at night, although we didn't go back the next day to check. When you want to go home - and we didn't stay long in the freezing temperatures ...

... it's hard to see them cooped up without feeling a few pangs in the chest cavity. Overall, the zoo was a great time and definitely worth the 20RMB/$3.00 entrance ticket. After several hours at the zoo, I rounded out the weekend by treating myself to my most favorite thing to do in China...more favorite even than eating great and cheap food and buying T-shirts with bad English...having my hair washed. Those that have read previous ...

... the night life, but after that ordeal we were able to consider our night complete, so we stopped by the internet café for a bit before coming back to the hotel in a cab. Even at 10pm, some families were still hanging out in and around their vehicles and carts, selling fruit on the dark streets. I had a good night, simple but so much fun. I really enjoy the people, obviously, and it helps that they seem to enjoy us too. I haven't seen much of the city yet to be ...