China: our first international getaway since moving to Taiwan.
What, isn’t Taiwan a part of China?? Well, my friends, I challenge any of you to spend a week in each region and then, you tell me if they’re the same country.
First up, the big boy capital of China…Beijing.
The last time I was in Beijing I was slightly dumber and much younger, so I was looking forward to seeing it through more wizened, pre-presbyopic eyes with a husband and child in tow. Despite all of his international man of mystery travels, Philip has never been to Beijing, and Jules had been talking about going to see the Great Wall of China (长城) ever since he saw ‘Mulan’, so I thought, hey, wouldn’t seeing one of China’s icons be an awesome 8th birthday gift?
Parenting myth #1: You have control over the situation.
My vision of a fall-foliaged, happy family stroll along the Great Wall turned south when both rain and light snow fell over the several hours we huffed and puffed our way up to the top and back down Watchtower #20, which, in case we wanted to live, we had to descend backwards. Needless to say, we had a grumpy, almost 8 year old boy on our hands.
Since we went to the less traveled section of the wall, Mutianyu, and due to the weather, we had much of the wall to ourselves at times, which is no small feat in a country of 1.3 billion. The experience was incredibly special and Philip was definitely in love.
This experience was such a contrast to my last one here, where I was led down the garden path to the Badaling section of the wall, filled with vendors hawking cheap souvenirs and hordes of Chinese tourists, many oddly clad in high heels. My friends, Dan and Luke, and I decided to go rogue and returned to the wall at the Simatai section, hell bent on experiencing an untamed and quieter part of the wall. Ignoring the “Do not cross this line. This section of the wall is unrestored. Danger” sign, we felt like real mountaineers. Fast forward a couple of hours, and I was literally on hands and knees, crawling and crying on a crumbling, two foot wide section of the wall with sheer drop offs on both sides, until an elderly local lady carrying a small refrigerator on her back, who I was convinced was part goat, held my arm and guided me back down.
Here at the less dramatic Mutianyu section, all of us felt a sense of accomplishment once we reached the top of the last watchtower. Standing on a piece of history thousands of years old, amidst the mountains, where so many sacrificed their lives, well…. Not to mention we rewarded ourselves with Taiwanese bananas (you haven’t had a banana until you’ve had a Taiwanese banana) and granola bars…that’s a slice of heaven right there. Jules cheered up considerably and even challenged me to race him back down. Sadly, I have to report that although I have certainly aged since the last time I was here, I have not become any brighter, since I decided to accept his challenge.
Having destroyed my knees at this point, our driver, Jack, took us to the Summer Palace (頤和園) to relax at the summer playground of the rich and famous dating from the Qing dynasty. These landscape designers really knew what they were doing, and the view from just about anywhere on the grounds was simply stunning.
After a couple of hours at the Summer Palace, most normal people would have called it a day. Hoho, but this blog isn’t called ’27 Hours in a Day’ for nothing! Jack drove us to the behemoth Beijing Railway Station and helped us navigate the hundreds of lines in order to pick up our tickets for our next day’s bullet train ride to Luoyang.
Fact: Not all Mandarin is created equal.
Thank goodness for Jack. I am fluent in Mandarin, but due to different accents in China, I can understand half of what is said to me and about half of what I say is understood. This adds up to a whole lot of frustration.
To use up the remaining hour of daylight, Philip and I really wanted to experience the old hutongs (胡同), or alleys, of Beijing, which are being swallowed up by the fast and furious commercialization of China. To our disappointment, much of the old hutongs are now being converted into tourist traps. Feeling a bit bummed, we wandered down a quiet street, looking for dinner, when we spotted a few trendy young locals entering an unmarked, lit door. Well, if the hipster locals are going in, then there must be something good inside. To our sheer delight, we discovered a quaint Japanese restaurant inside an old hutong dwelling…yesss!!!
After a long and chilly day, we were in pure bliss, sipping our hot sake (Jules with a Japanese strawberry soda) in this sanctuary of history in a city constantly striving for the new.
