Wang Gui Hotel(Daliushu) Beijing

... front of the hotel after enjoying my breakfast buffet and having checked out. We drove to the Summer Palace, another one listed on the Unesco World Heritage List. The Palace suffered 2 major attacks during the Anglo-French allied invasion in 1860 and a part of it was burned down and rebuilt later in 1886 and 1902. The whole complex is very large, four times the size of Versailles!

Before leaving Beijing we visited a traditional tea house where I was able to taste some ...

... how long, just remember that my grandfather said, reed marshes of age older than my grandfather's grandfather even longer . Although it has now been razed to the ground, without the quiet that only the factory noise, but it was weak in Body bones, golden leaves, there it was like Gone with the Wind, such as fog-wei Xu, gave me left a note difficult to forget Yi. The spring of each year, a new ...

We travelled to Beijing by overnight train for 24h. Comfy sleeping we have to say :-) In the Youth Hostel we stayed we met some nice people like Chris from Berlin and Kirsten from Edinburgh. Beijing is really interesting with tons of stuff to see and do. It is really ...

The Chinese Communist Party has used much of Chinese culture in order to establish legitimacy and unite the country. One of Mao Zedong's most famous quotes was, "Bu dao Changcheng, fei haohan!" Translation: If you haven't been to the Great Wall, you're not a great man!" I am now a great man. Woot! Louise (a friend/CAPS student) and her sister (who's visiting from the States) allowed me to accompany them on ...

I shot up out of bed to turn off the alarm blaring in my ear. It was 5:58 AM and I was to meet my driver at 6:30. Today, I was going to climb the Great Wall of China. Darkness, misting weather, and a feral cat met me as I left the apartment building. Exhausted, I navigated my way through the streets of Beijing. Arriving at the pre-arranged meeting place, I got nervous as 6:30 came and went. Several taxi drivers tried to convince me to varying degrees of ...

... wealth gap between black and white is nothing less than embarrassing. But things are slowly getting better. (20 min). Suddenly 10 hands (out of 25 students) briskly shot up into the air. A student tried to convince me that the reason why black people are poorer is that their brains are smaller. I told him he is wrong, and this was an example of racism (another vocab word). Another student told me her mom's theory that black people are lazy and that is why ...

... und immer wieder neue Türmchen und Abschnitte entdecken. Soweit, dass keine Touries mehr zu sehen waren haben wir es dann doch nicht geschafft - immerhin muss man die Strecke ja auch wieder retour laufen ;-) Die Planung nach der frischen Bergluft die Ming-Gräber zu besuchen, wurde leider durch unseren Taxifahrer missverstanden. Er brachte uns zum Botanischen Garten - im fast-noch-Winter!!! Weis auch nicht, was der sich wohl dabei dachte ...

... always nice to have a whipping boy to whale on, so Ken was IT. Ken went walking again, and a miracle occurred! He found the Raffles man!! I could have kissed both of them, but they were too wet. Problem seemed to be that the police hadn't let some of the car and driver's in to the Portside, but told them we would be sent out. Unfortunately, we were told the opposite. It was a long way to where the car was parked. Ken and Man grabbed ...

... stained everything. You would figure that someone that works in laundry knows not to mix colors and whites. Of course, in China they don't care if they screw you. I took out 50 from my pocket and motioned to let her know that I would take my clothes and leave. She got very animated, as did her husband and pointed at the receipt with 140 written on it. Then the little naked girl got up from the corners,walked up to me with a plastic cup in her hand and started hitting ...

Well after a long journey we finally made it although it was raining we made the best of it and explored locally. The weather is still off cast but humid and we will do some more exploring tomorrow. Photo's will follow shortly when I have figured it out. Love and best wishes, Gill