北京 （Beijing）

Some of you know that I missed my connecting flight when I left Kunming, the Beijing-Seattle leg. I had to wait 2 days for the next one!

In the meantime, I got to see a few Beijing sights unexpectedly.

Enjoy！

Beijing 2009

Tibet (བོད་/西藏）

I have not yet posted my Tibet album here.

First, let me share this cute photo my tourmate Annie took when we were at the Deji Orphanage in Lhasa.

 

Awww, sweet girls!

Now, here's the album.

Tibet 2009

Tea

Our "school outing" yesterday was interesting... Went to another city, visiting some city building and a school. It started out with a lot of waiting around, not knowing the schedule, and watching a video that would have been quite informative if I understood it...

But the highlight was definitely the tea ritual where we got to be served by students.

This particular tea was poured into a little tall cup, which was then covered by a wider-mouthed.



The part where she flipped it over was really dramatic!


You can see that none of the tea has spilled out... it's all suctioned inside.



After releasing the tea to drink:

Good World, Good View, Good Food

The buildings that house our office:



The VIEW from the office:


...yep, row after row of big apartment buildings. That's where everyone lives. I don't think I've seen a house yet in this city.

Typical Sunday Lunch:

Getting lost is kinda fun

Today I didn't exactly get LOST, but I took the correct bus and got off at the correct stop to meet my friend at the Kunming Botanical Gardens... and when I called her, I wasn't where she thought I should be. I eventually figured my way to the entrance and was not scared at all. It's a good thing, because this may keep happening as I navigate my way around the city.

So here are a couple of photos from the picnic and egg hunt I went to today.







And a really interesting flower:

I caused an accident today.

I live in a nicer area of Kunming.

Went walking today and ended up in what I'll call the "urban countryside"--much different from the fancy skyscraper and storefront district that my apartment is near. I saw zero foreigners in this area, where I became "lost" for a good 10 minutes of fast walking, meandering through alleys looking for a way out.

So I guess I was quite a sight for them, too. Out of the corner of my eye I caught a motorcyclist watching me...and then he crashed into another motorbike in front of him. I could laugh on the inside because they were going quite slow and no one was hurt. So now I can say that I've turned heads! Ha.

Kunming's "Wild Animal Zoo"

Went to the coolest zoo today, and my previously-working-fine batteries AND my new set all turned out to be used up, so no photos... Boo.

Located way up on a hill on who knows how many acres, this zoo was more like a hiking area--we were thankful for the tram; otherwise we would have walked for miles and miles! We walked quite a bit on the extensive boardwalk system as it was.

There were great close-up experience (need I say photo opps--sigh!) with bears, a couple of monkeys, hundreds of peacocks, yaks, emus, cranes, and much more, including pandas, of course.

You could buy a carrot strung on the end of a stick to feed to the Black bears, and the same for the lions and tigers (only it was meat instead of carrots, of course).

Not only did they have several gorgeous tigers AND lions, they also had white tigers and white lions. And the baby white tiger trying to roar was hilarious--sounded more like a wild bird than anything!

Oh, yeah, and they had orang-utans. There was a tiny hole in the glass that separated us from them, and one of the females passed me a little piece of straw through the hole. I passed it back, and she at it.

The whole thing was pretty amazing.

Once again, I'm so sad I didn't have my camera...but maybe that helped me to really take it all in. It was fun.

Park

Found this big park not too far from my house... forgot to take more photos, but it had water, lots of walkways, and even little amusement-park-type rides! Tons of people were there, many sitting on the grass, so I did that too, to study my Mandarin lessons...only to get kicked out by the cops about an hour later. I guess there's a sign that says "keep off the grass." Oh, well!

There were some pretty fish, reminding me of Japan...


...and check out this crazy exciting play for the kids!

My Birthday Outing

We celebrated my birthday at Cacaja, an Indian Restaurant near Yunnan University... I want to get back to that area and explore Greenlake and some more good eateries!

The Office

The design office I'll be interning with is fixing up a new space. It's on the 30th floor of Building D (there is A-D) of a complex called "Good World," or 好世界.





some of the leftover scraps are kinda fun...

"Green" China

I was surprised by the steps to keep China clean and energy-efficient.

First, many stores don't give out plastic bags. You have to bring your own or buy a re-usable one like this one for 1 kuai (about 15 cents).




Then, at least on or after a reasonably sunny day, I take my hot shower with water from a solar-heated tank on the roof of my building, like this one here:



Other things include electric scooters (very few loud motorbikes here!) and of course bicycles... I was thinking there was something else that caught my attention, but it's not coming to me at the moment...

Bicycle

I have to catch up, so I'm posting again!

Here's my new bike! I love that it's turquoise and says "G & P" on the side. That's what we call my maternal grandparents (short for Granny & Papa). Apparently it had been on the floor forever, so they gave me a 25% discount. I paid 300 RMB, or about US $45.



The funny story is that when I rode my new bike up to the gate of my apartment complex, the guards would not let me in. I needed some kind of "permit," apparently. After my attempts at sign language (they make no attempts at English OR "sign language" but just kind of speak angrily toward you--though they're not really angry) I gave up and called a bilingual friend. She helped me understand they just wanted to know which building I lived in. Got the card, taken care of, right?

Wrong!

Next time I went to leave, they stopped me, looked at my card, and I got yelled at some more. They didn't seem to be allowing me to go on my way, so again I tried motioning filling out a paper, to find out what they wanted me to do. Again I called a bilingual friend and discovered all I needed to do was turn in the card when I leave, and get a new one each time I come back in.

Duh! It was that simple, but you would have thought I had stolen something or broken some huge law by the tones of their voices!

It doesn't help that they all the gate guards wear fatigues, making them quite intimidating...

So, I learned that it's not going to be easy understanding/communicating on my own, "yelling" isn't necessarily that, and the people seem to really love their rules!

Food

Last Sunday I had my first typical Chinese meal out... sorry I didn't save you much food!



And then two nights ago one of my classmates invited me to dinner and we made some good eats...

Just Arrived...

...in China. Arriving at 11pm on a Sunday, my friend met me and we took a taxi to her house where we had to lug my bags up to the 6th floor. The next day I moved to my own place, so we lugged them again up 5 floors.

I was so out of breath, but later realized I'm even out of breath without the heavy bags--which I suppose is normal for being suddenly transported to an altitude of 6000 feet. They say you'll accimatize 95% in the first 6 weeks, but 100% takes up to 6 months!

The apartment complex I'm staying at for now. The nearest tall grey building ("Good World, building D") is where the new design office will be. Just a 5-minute walk from here.


My language school is also only a 5-minute walk! It's a good location.
Here you see how tea is often served... with the whole leaves sitting in the cup! Since they're whole (higher quality!), you don't need a tea bag.


And finally, similar to Thailand, I guess folks here will carry just about anything on a motorbike! (It's a one-seater couch.)