Asia's Got Talent

Part of going to China is going to a tea house. That's just how it is. We decided to have our tea house experience in Beijing. The entrance ticket includes what some might think of as tasty little treats, a montage of traditional Chinese performances, including but not limited to singing, dancing, magic tricks, kung fu, opera, acrobatics, and, of course, all the fresh tea you can down.
Words fall short of any explanation of the spectacle that we witnessed. We will let you be the judge of the talent level found in the Far East.

The Yellow Mountains

We spent the second part of our 2 weeks in Southern China bumming around the Yellow Mountains. This is the boat ride down the Li River.





















We hiked up "Moon Hill" just outside of a town called Yanshuo.
The moon shape in the mountain is all that remains of a limestone cave.







This is the view from the top of the moon :) Seems like the Yellow Mountains are misty all the time, so the picture doesn't really capture how far off they go into the distance.






We went on a self-directed tour of the farm lands in the area, and this was the local wild life/ very friendly bit of China we met on the way.

Beijing Night Market

We've really enjoyed all of the readily available meat-on-a-stick in Thailand, but China is much more open minded to what "meat-on-a-stick" is ...









For the most part Haylie was able to keep Stu away from trying too much of the local cuisine ( at the threat of no kisses for a week for every food he ate that was deemed "disgusting" ).
There was a momentary slip up where, despite strong opposition, he somehow found lamb testicles to eat.








We found an actual delicacy! Venison :) Very spendy, but a good reminder of growing up in Montana :)









Strangely, this was one of the few places we found with an excellent translation to English.

Terracotta Warriors

You might recognize these from "Mummy III" :) It's the terracotta warriors from the first Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang. He was thirteen when he got on the throne and started building his tomb with all the clay men. He specifically said that no two soldiers were to be made alike. This is also the guy that had the Great Wall made.


You wouldn't think it, but they're actually really friendly!














There's about 3,000 army men with some chariots, cavalry, archers, and everything all lined up in battle formation to guard his tomb.







Some farmer found the army about 35 years ago when he was digging for a well. And guess what! The farmer guy was there the day we went to see them. We could "shake his hand to get some lucky." :)








All the warriors were holding weapons that still had poison on them when they were discovered, but some overzealous archeologists took off with them right away. So all of the army guys have their hands holding onto imaginary spears and swords.

Lost in Translation

Of course there were tons of things translated into English with great intentions of helping out the tourists.
If anything, it provided a bit of confusion and a lot of entertainment.

Hope you have as much fun reading these things from signs, menus, and whatnot as we did!

Tiananmen Square and Forbidden City

Here we are in one of the most identifiable spots in Beijing, right between Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City under the HUGE portrait of Chairman Mao. China actually has his body preserved and on display in a mausoleum in the center of Tiananmen Square. Does it get any stranger than that? We stood in line for about an hour as they ushered thousands of Chinese people who came to give an offering and their respects to his body through the mausoleum.


The Forbidden City was where all the Royal People lived and did business.

Looks just like the movies about Chinese Emerors, huh?








The throne room! Yellow is the color of power and influence and red is the collor of good luck, actually we found out that almost everything in China means "good luck", " lots of luck", or " get some lucky".





Mostly we found out that the most exciting thing about The Forbidden City was its name, but this room was interesting. We learned that back in the day all the pretty ladies would use bronze mirrors like this one to get the perfect look. We couldn't quit figure out how they got thier reflections very clearly.

The Great Wall of China!

We found a "tour" thing that dropped us off at one point on the Great Wall and picked us up 10 Km down.





















We started at a point called "Jinshanling". It was built during the Ming Dynasty, and it's about 3 hours outside of Beijing. We walked/stair-climbed 30 some watch towers down to the "Simatai" section.
It was for sure not made for hiking! The Wall goes up and down ALL of the highest points on the mountains.





















Here is a fine example of what might be the world's most random "Great Wall" video. We were hiking with a couple of our teacher friends from Thailand. The novelty of where we were had worn off a little.