Keep these points in mind while reading this report. China:
-is an eastern hemisphere country
-is a third world country
-is a communist country
-has been cut off to outsiders
-doesn’t get a lot of American tourists
-especially the smaller towns
-has taught its citizens Americans are evil imperialists
Day 1: Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Up at 3AM. Fly to Denver than San Francisco. Air China leaves at 2PM. Fly 12 hours and 40 minutes crossing the International Date Line.
Day 2: Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006
Arrive in Beijing at 7PM. While taxiing in on the runway it dawns on me, “I’m in China!”
Day 3: Thursday, November 23rd, 2006
Up at 2AM. So much for avoiding jet lag. Eventually go for a run before 6 and as I’m pounding down the payment it dawns on me, “I’m running in Beijing!”
These morning runs while traveling are a common opportunity to observe locals starting their days; this one has a distinctive feel. The sidewalks and streets of Beijing are quickly filling with bicycles and buses while street vendors sell breakfast and newspapers.
View from hotel.
Driving through Beijing.
First stop of the penetratingly cold day is the infamous Tiananmen Square.
This largest square in the world is full of Chinese tourists; Westerners are rare. This phenomenon is repeated at other tourist sites for the remainder of the trip.
Behind the square is the sprawling Forbidden City, once the secret complex of the emperor. The vast open expanses and multitude of buildings is mesmerizing.
Another drive through this sprawling city.
The lifestyle of past emperors is exhibited at the Summer Palace in which a huge hand dug lake is ringed by temples, concubine quarters and the palace.
Day 4: Friday, November 24th, 2006
Slept all the way to 4AM. Another run, another experience of observations.
Of the most famous of world landmarks.
Peering through the polluted air, it cascades across the mountains.
Total hat hair.
The section of the 3,000 mile Great Wall has a 700 meter climb with 1,800 steps.
Near the apex looking around. Told you about that pollution.
Should have kept the hat on.
Another drive and seeing Olympic venues being built.
After lunch, ancient character in the historic Beijing neighborhood of Hutong.
A rickshaw ride reveals narrow alleyways front shops and homes.
The day culminates with a Peking duck dinner at the famous Quinjude Roast Duck Restaurant.
Day 5: Saturday, November 25th, 2006
Driving.
The Temple of Heaven was once used by Chinese rulers to worship the emperor of heaven.
Driving through Beijing.
Beijing Railway Station is a monstrous edifice jostling with throngs of Chinese.
The platform and train is right out of an Eastern block turn of the century movie/book.
The car’s layout is three berths high- lowest for sitting or sleep and others for sleeping. The few Americans congregate and are all put off by the arrangement and grittines, but the group’s joviality quickly makes it a fun trip. Stories are swapped generating laughs, food and drinks are consumed and the ladies stress over using an Eastern style toilet on a swaying train. All the while a guard ominously overlooks and the Chinese passengers sleep.
The views for hours.
Emerging from the station neon greets us illuminating Ji’nan.
Day 6: Sunday, November 26th, 2006
Another run finds an overpass sheltering bamboo rings of steamed buns and sizzling griddles.
Further on puddled alleyways have more breakfast fare and crates of produce. In one such alley I observe every U.S. Health Code being violated.
The famous springs of this town.
Fantastic meal.
The base for the next two nights is Tai’an. A drive through town brings us to a stroll through a park. My new friends, Rodolfo and Monika, invite me to accompany them to see downtown.
A real treat is visiting a supermarket gawking at the wares. I get a couple small packages of crackers, banana, and 2 pieces of bakery for what equals about eighty cents.
At this supermarket we are amazed by the sheer volume of employees. One aisle counts 15 alone. Three to four at every check out. Communism- give everyone a job!
Day 7: Monday, November 27th, 2006
Up at 4AM. After reading and although the hotel is on the outskirts of town, with nothing else to do I go for a run and find things to see nevertheless. I have 3 things to call attention to myself on these runs. 1) American 2) Jogging 3) Wearing a yellow Pearl Izumi jacket.
A neighborhood of cardboard homes.
Examples like this were fun.
Head to Mt. Tai, the ancient mountaintop place of worship at over 5,000 feet.
It is a surprising treat finding small villages and temples interspersed among the peaks.
These are linked together by steep stone stairs and paths made more hazardous by a coating of ice. The photo opportunities are limitless.
It was bloody freezing.
Back in Tai'an. Chicken foot.
And time to amble about.
Wandering on I find a weathered old lady selling roasted yams from a large drum.
Ambling up a street full of sidewalk vendors I enjoy this steaming sweet starch while taking in the concrete slabs strewn with indigenous produce. My bakery fixation finds no boundaries in a couple more detours off the streets.
To see local consumerism the multi-story Silver Plaza has clothes, electronics and kitchenware.
A repeat visit to the supermarket for more bananas, snacks, bakery and local candy.
Get a real visual treat at the Free Market.
A plentitude of nuts, spices, meats, produce, fish and…bakery.
This area is the most I engage with the Chinese as they offer samples and smiles.
Day 8: Tuesday, November 28th, 2006
Getting out of town.
Qufu
Confuscious Temple. This is a complex of pagodas and long buildings where his disciples were taught.
Ancient Cyprus trees and brick walkways add to the stimulating architecture.
Walk into town and brave the jostle of countless vendors, mopeds and bicycles vying for space on muddy streets.
Moving over to Dongman Dajie, aliens might as well have landed with the gawking. Old people stare bluntly, kids smiled and then laughed as I offered hellos.
Ever see al fresco dining on muddy streets?
Confusion Mansion as we learn more of this famous scholar.
Confuscious sites culminate with his grave site surrounded by the tombs of 10,000 leaders.
Train to Shanghai with my new friends.
Day 9: Wednesday, November 29th, 2006
Welcome to Shanghai!
Room was ready yet. Time to hoof it and explore!
Street after street yields immense hustle and bustle. Open storefronts exhibit bicycle repair, vats of boiling noodles, produce and clothing. I marvel that a couple hours of walking was only seeing a thumbprint of a thumbprint of a thumbprint of one of 17 districts in Shanghai. This walk also includes 5 bakeries and one of the best food finds of the trip- a steamed bun encapsulating a wonderfully seasoned mixture of pork. All these transactions were a struggle but I made it through it. And what do people the world over do when you can’t understand them? Talk louder!!
Then I luck upon a street market best described as fourth world. Next to containers of live fish men chop them up on the ground. An old lady stands ready at a sewing machine.
Get back to the hotel for an appreciated shower and fresh clothes and off to downtown Shanghai.
Shanghai Museum
Needing only 30 minutes to see all of the museum’s 4 floors of galleries I head outside to walk downtown. Standing at the museum stairs contemplating the drizzle and taking in the skyline, three young Chinese adults approach me asking where I was from. They explain they assumed America from my The North Face jacket. After some chit chat including where in the US I am from (they knew Wisconsin is near ‘those 5 big lakes’) and what I was doing there the conversation turns to economics and government. I do my best to be an ambassador of the magic of capitalism and democracy. Their curiosity was apparent and I wondered what they have been taught and what knowledge they are seeking.
Pudong
The Bund & Nanjing Road
I found Shanghai to be the most western on the outing, especially downtown and the Central Business District. This was reflected in more stylish attire, some signs in English, great looking skyscrapers and consumerism. And McDs, Starbucks and KFC helped! This was also the first time to see some other Westerners.
Day 10: Thursday, November 30th, 2006
The ubiquitous run included a bakery stop and a fried patty from a street vendor that costs about 10 cents.
Today’s journey was 2 hours west of Shanghai. In Suzhou.
Meandered through the Master of Nets Garden.
After lunch we learned how silk is manufactured at Suzhou Silk Factory No. 1.
Got to see why this town is called the Venice of the orient with a boat ride in the canals.
The wide grand canal was boring, but the narrow canals branching off from it showcased character with stone embankments perching old structures.
Day 11: Friday, December 1st
Up at 6 and soon on the obligatory run. A brightly lit cafeteria drew me in for a glutinous patty filled with bean paste. Two bakeries and an hour later I found a jumbled market sheltered by a dilapidated tin roof.
As I wondered around the stalls I was conscious of each vendor staring at me.
I noted circular slabs of stone for cleaving meat, their pocked surfaces showing many whacks. Chunks of meat and fish were laying everywhere, no refrigeration in site. It wasn’t until leaving that I noticed everyone was looking at me. Now I know what it feels like to be a rock star.
Old Town.
A labyrinth of crooked alleys exhibited women washing clothes with clotheslines strung overhead with dripping garments (don’t look up). Homemakers were preparing meals, an old man sharpened a cleaver and another wrenched a bike.
Past this was the Old Town Bazaar. A commercial shopping area packed with Chinese tourists who were snapping as many pictures as I was.
It's a GOP thing.
I moved out of the bazaar to seedier shopping and the omnipresent hawkers.
A couple of marts were busy multi-story monoliths with narrow aisles packed with merchandise.
My new friends Rodolfo, Monika, Larry, Joyce headed to lunch Originally from Brazil, Rodolfo & Monika were resolute at dining at Brasil Steak House discovered in my tourist book photocopies. We trekked 2 hours across town seeing the business districts, culture of museums and opera houses and finally the high end accoutrements with marquees such as Ferrari, Versace and Gucci.
Our walk was rewarded with a spectacular feast of barbecue carved right off the spit at our table. Roast beef, bacon wrapped chicken, lamb, chicken hearts, sirloin, tongue, duck, more beef and even bananas. Cost? 55 Yuan. Or seven bucks.
A weary Larry and Joyce grab a taxi back to the hotel while us remaining three deciphered the subway system to get to Nanjing Road.
This stretch of pedestrian only street is a wide sea of countless shops and signage. This street culminates at The Bund.
At The Bund (waterfront) looking across at Pudong.
For 2 Yuan we crossed the Huangpu River to Pudong as night fell.
This area has become representative of Shanghai’s growing economy with attractive modern skyscrapers arising one after another. One such is Jin Mao tower. From its Hyatt’s 54th floor lobby we could see visibility was poor so skipped the observation deck. We walked past the Pearl Tower landmark to the Bund Tourist Tunnel to get back across, or rather under, the river.
By this time The Bund and Nanjing was lit up in neon glory. Think Times Square many blocks long.
Another subway ride brought us as close to the hotel as possible and into a shopping mall. A taxi ride and the end of another visually packed day.
Day 12: Saturday, December 2nd, 2006
A day of travel.
-Up at 5:30AM.
-A walk to a convenience store to satisfy a curiosity of foreign snacks and candy.
-Bus at 7:20.
-The Maglev bullet trains whisked passengers to the airport at 231 km/h.
-2 hour flight from Shanghai to Beijing.
-11 hour 10 minute flight from Beijing to San Francisco
-San Fran to Denver
-Denver to Milwaukee arriving at 11PM CST
-Shoveling 11 inches of snow at 1AM in 10 degrees.
For those of you keeping tally that is 5 airports, 4 planes and 17 hours 25 minutes of flying and being up for 34 hours and 20 minutes with less than 2 hours of light sleep.
Commentary
In Conclusion: “China?”, with a scrunch of the face is the reaction I get from most about this trip, before and after. I am certainly glad I went. Every corner yielded something intriguing. Asking for a favorite site, while all the destinations were compelling in their own ways, it would have to be the everyday things- street markets, a bundled up kid, a wooden cart piled high, the graceful architecture of a pagoda or the pride of a farmer in his produce.
Communism: Communism has failed every time it is tried. Condemned behind this atrocious ideology for 6 decades we can hope one day the Chinese can learn the wonders of democracy and free enterprise. Only by tossing aside the stifling controlled society can the rewards of self-reliance and initiative be fully realized.
Communism can stifle but not vanquish the human spirit of a quest for betterment. Patriotism is held in one’s heart, not forced by a central government.
Those into politics or social commentary know that those defined as poor in the U.S. are far better off than the balance of the world’s poor. The worst I’ve seen in the south, NYC or LA live much better than the squalor I saw in China. Very sad.
Pollution: It was horrible. I thought the haze constantly covering Beijing was bad until getting out of that city where visibility is a quarter mile, half at best. It was days before seeing a patch of blue sky.
Food: It was only with my own forays into food finds that I found tastes and textures unique to each region.
