People's Fully Sick Mate Republic of China - Part 27 - Day 20 - Beijing / Forbidden City

I was awoken in the middle of the night by Ant who had fallen down the corridor outside of our bedroom – half naked – crying out for help from me. He had passed out after getting back from the bathroom – he was suffering from ultra bad gastro and was in a cold sweat. Luckily – I helped him out and we didn’t wake up Kip and Dan in the process…

When I woke up in the morning – Ant was feeling a little better but he couldn’t really remember the whole “passing out on the floor” incident the previous night.

I was enjoying playing with Louie and I soooo want a dog. The toy poodle doesn’t malt and Ant doesn’t seem to be having any allergic reaction to the dog. The only problem with us getting a dog is that we live in an Australian apartment complex which has the rule of no dogs or pets (unlike the Chinese – who don’t care). If I got one – hopefully it wouldn’t bark and I could smuggle it in a sports bag or something on my way out of the apartment.

We lazed around until 10 - Ant was still feeling sick and wanted me to go and do some sightseeing. He said “Go and see the Mao Museum and the Forbidden City!” – probably because it was the easiest thing for me to find by myself and I have a notorious lack of direction.

Kip and Dan left (just after me going into town) – and were on a “buying Chinese “Antique” furniture” mission for their apartment. Ant just rested in bed – Louie joined him and slept on my bed all day (big shout out for Ant for guarding my bed!)

The train ride to Tian’an Men Sqaure is relatively straight forward (there are two stops called “Tian’an Men Square East and West” which are kind of hard to miss). This wasn’t my first visit to the square – I had been there during our last visit – and nothing much had changed (except for less smog amazingly!). There are tonnes of Chinese tourists area (sort of a mecca for Chinese tourists), heaps of touts touting both westerners and chinese (sucked in!), heaps of armed police and military dudes everywhere and big monuments, museums, gates and mausoleums everywhere. You can’t help but feel a bit of a strange feeling being here (given the 1989 student protests). Apparently – we were told at NYE that a lot of Chinese people do know about it but they know it as the June 4th Incident (or something – not quite sure of the exact date)…

In an attempt to go to see the Mao Mausoleum (or Mao Museum as it was called in Beijing) – I had discovered that everything was shut. There was a sign near the bag drop off / collection area that said something about “2007 01 01 03” – but it was all in Chinese. Perhaps they had shipped Mao over to Russia for some maintenance during the new year?

Anyhow – I had ventured down to the northern end of the Square where the famous Tian’an Men Gate is (you know – the one with the huge Mao painting and all of those seats next to it – a la North Korea!). It was massively busy (being a public holiday and all in China) – and I always feel a little uncomfortable being around so many people by myself in a “strange land”… Anyhow – I didn’t get mugged and I managed to take a few happy snaps in the process.

I walked through the gate where you pass by some other massive gates and gardens until you reach the entrance of the “Forbidden City”. Ant and I during our last trip to China were forbidden to go to the Forbidden City because the Chinese Communist Party were celebrating their 55th Anniversary of being in power and had shut down most of the sites in Beijing to set up some fireworks. However – I was fortunate enough to go this time!

I got a little confused buying the tickets (as they call it “the Palace Museum” instead of the Forbidden City”) but they were a bit of a steal at only 40 yuan (or something). The Forbidden City is the palace complex of heaps of former emperors of China and all you can say is thank god the revolutionaries or the communists didn’t destroy it! It is a huge and impressive site – full of large gates, palaces and temples. Unfortunately – they were doing renovations to the biggest and most famous buildings (Gate of Supreme Harmony and the Hall of Supreme Harmony). I did take Ant’s digital camera over some of the barriers to take some pretty cool shots of the marble carriageway outside the Hall of Supreme Harmony. You got to love all of the names of buildings here – Hall of Supreme Harmony, Hall of Mental Cultivation, Hall of Immorality (my favourite).

All of the snow everywhere was an added bonus. It made everything look more pretty than normal. And thank god it wasn’t snowy during our time in Beijing. Beijing had a real cold snap when we were in Xi’an (hence the snow everywhere and the delays at the airport) – but this could have explained why we almost froze to death at the Terracotta Warrior museum!

The imperial gardens were rather impressive and I forked out an extra 10 yuan to visit the “Nine Dragon Screen, Jewellery Hall Complex” which was definitely worth checking out. The Jewellery Hall housed some mean jewellery back from the imperial dynasty days of China – there was even an old antique cabbage (agggh! Antique market flashback!). There was even a cool well where a concubine had drowned in (not quite sure how she could fit – unless she was a midget 3 year old).

After checking out the “western side” of the city – I checked out the Eastern side – where there were heaps of halls and palaces – complete with furniture and stuff from the era. There was also a funky little museum on the life of the Last Emperor (Pu Yi) who was abdicated back in 1912 and replaced by Dr Sun or something. Pu Yi looked about the age of 12 when he got married…

I avoided a few touts in the Forbidden City trying to get me to go to a “Mongolian Art” exhibitation – which was a little baffling considering there was no one else touting to see any of the other exhibits.

It was about 3pm and I had done a hard 3 and a half hours exploring the city and its various museums and collections – and my stomach was getting the better of me. I had spent the next 45 minutes attempting to find somewhere to eat. My first attempt was a Chinese place on the eastern side of the Square – which Ant and I went to on our first day in Beijing a couple of years ago. Although there was an engrish menu out the front – it was all in Chinese near the counter – so I gave it a miss… (it wasn’t all flash by memory). I then remembered that there was a McDonalds and 7-11 on the southern bit of the square. So I crossed about 50 underground tunnels to get there – only to discover that Mc Donalds no longer exists and that it is now a construction site! 7-11 wasn’t there as well L… I attempted to enter a “Food Court” mall – only to remember that it was a three floor mall only selling mobile phones (we had the same problem the first time to China). Agggh!...

I did notice a KFC on the South-western side of the square – so, being desperate, I crossed under 50 more underground crossing to get there. When I had lined up behind a guy at KFC – a young woman was sort of pushing her way in front of me – holding out a sweaty handful of yuan at the KFC dude. It was like she was at a nightclub ordering drinks. I then went to physically push her out of my way – and gave her a death stare. She looked a bit shocked, gave me a death stare back and I never saw her again… Please don’t report me to the “Australia Says No to Violence Against Woman” Campaign! It was only a gentle push!

I had managed to order a sort of vegetarian burger at KFC which was passable. Just so you can’t order something at KFC without meat – they give you a fried piece of chicken to compensate.

I headed for the nearest subway station which, at the time, I thought it was Tien’An Men Square West (on the #1 line)… However – I discovered that it was a train stop (Qienman) on the #2 line – which was a bonus as I didn’t have to change on a second train.

When I got back to the apartment – Ant was still resting but feeling a little better. I found that Louie had been sleeping on my bed all day (keeping it warm for me or something)… I attempted to do some blogging but the Taiwanese earthquake was still preventing me to blog…dammit!

Kip and Dan got back home not much longer after I got back – and had bought 1000s of yuan worth of furniture. Most furniture is pretty cheap here – and although it isn’t antique stuff – they are all made to look like antiques – which is the next best thing. To our somewhat amusement – Beijing have an Ikea – whose furniture would look completely out-of-place with your “antique” chinese furniture – unless you are going for the Swedish/Chinese fusion look.

We watched a bit of Pilipino TV with Kip – she loves the same sort of crap that I love (if I’m watching Foxtel – like Blind Date and the 5th Wheel) and all of those entertainment-y networks… So it was all good – except when Dan was wanting to watch something (he hates it!).

For dinner – we went to a local Peking Duck (or should that be Beijing Duck?) restaurant. Kip and Dan were surprised as the restaurant has completely been renovated and had an “Ambush Makeover” (one of Kip’s fav shows)… We let Kip and Dan (the local cuisine experts) pick what meals we were having – so we ordered one duck, another 4 dishes and rice. Apparently – it is tradition here in China to order 3 dishes (if there are 2 of you) or 5 dishes (if there are 4 of you) – typical Chinese “over-ordering” restaurant deal. In typical Chinese restaurant fashion – all of the meals came out in a weird order – Ant’s sizzling beef came out 10 minutes before any of the other dishes… And we were all completely full – 20 minutes had passed there was no Peking Duck yet!!

This sort of set off the “Consumer Watchdog” in Dan – and he then attempted to get them to cancel the duck. We were told by the staff that it was “tradition” for the duck to come out last (although both Kip and Dan dispute this claim)… The duck did come out – but Dan just got them to put it in a doggy bag for later. Dan amazingly even got the waitress to say sorry twice in Chinese (which apparently is a miracle/once-in-a-lifetime event in China).

It was sort of funny that they had stuffed up – despite the fact that the restaurant was completely overstaffed (another Chinese tradition). There were two people at the front door (whose job is just to open and greet the guests – not even take them to a table) and the place was filled with waitress… Dan was saying that the front door people probably only get 8 yuan a day ($1.35 AUD) – but this can be good money if you are from the country side and you get your accommodation and food thrown in as a fringe benefit.

We headed back home where we lounged around until 11pm talking about our experiences in China and stuff. I was sort of commenting saying that I had a hard time adjusting to all of the cultural differences in China (compared to most places in the world) – but that I had gotten used to it. Dan said that the people you have to look out for are the Chinese middle aged women – who are the rudest and most pushy people here (perhaps that KFC girl would make a fine middle aged woman).