Beijing (12/28-1/2)

On December 28th I flew into Beijing from Shanghai, still very much suffering from the food poisoning from that hot pot from hell. Cece and I left at almost the same time but on different flights and her Dad graciously picked us up from the airport. He has another apartment in Beijing so I stayed there, and after 2 nights Leyna and Pat joined me there. The first night I just passed out and tried to survive the night. My second day in Beijing, Cece and I went to Tiananmen Square, which is really just a big square plaza that wouldn't be famous if not for its historical significance and the presence of Mao's petrified body.

Tiananmen Square

With Cece at Tiananmen Square

Outside the Forbidden City with Mao

Inside the Forbidden City

Forbidden City

Forbidden City -- This stone was apparently dragged across China on blocks of ice in the winter time in order to get it to Beijing. There are 7 dragons, symbolizing...something.

The Seven Star Stones symbolizing Taoist balance and the 7 peaks

Temple of Heaven

One of the gates at Tiananmen Square

Temple of Heaven

Temple of Heaven -- It was so cold that my fingers hurt from taking them out of my gloves for so long

North Korean alcohol, courtesy of Cece's Dad

One of the fantastic dinners Cece's Dad took us to

My impressions of Beijing are much different than my impressions of Shanghai. While Shanghai was bustling and preoccupied with the tourism industry, active with foreigners and stores catering to foreigners, Beijing was very much a city that looked like it was torn between communism, its storied history and rapid development. Many of its older buildings looked plain cold (this was helped by the weather being really damn cold), its historical roots looked out of place and there were random signs of prosperity in the form of mansion-like complexes sprinkled throughout the city. I did a lot more sightseeing in Shanghai, even though there's more to see in Beijing (evidenced by the disproportionate number of pictures I took in Shanghai compared with Beijing). This was primarily due to it being way too cold to spend much time outdoors, especially considering that the history museums I like so much are lacking in quality in China, and that the plazas and temples are all outdoors. Arguably the three big sites to hit in Beijing are The Forbidden City (check), The Temple of Heaven (check), and The Great Wall (sorry I'm not sorry for saving my toes).

Shanghai (12/23-12/28)

As I mentioned in my previous post, I went to China for 11 days from 12/23/10-1/2/11. It was the first of two big trips I have planned. For future reference, my winter break plans look like this:

China - 12/23-1/2
Teaching a winter camp 1/3-1/14
Japan - 1/16-1/24
CLEA Korean language class 2/4-2/28

I flew out of Incheon into Shanghai where my friend from high school, Leyna, and her sister Pat met me at the airport. After a few days, our other mutual friend, Cece came to Shanghai. Between the three of them, they did an awesome job of showing me around Shanghai and Beijing. Without them, I would've been totally, utterly and hopelessly lost since they did all the speaking for me when Chinese was needed and even played hardball in the outdoor markets when I was shopping for souvenirs. In general terms, a good portion of my time was spent eating Western food like sandwiches, that I can't find in Korea but oddly enough I can find in China, sight-seeing, and going to random events like Leyna's grandmother's 90th birthday, an Amway Christmas party and numerous extravagant meals with Cece's Dad and his friends. I'm going to take a different approach and let the pictures speak for themselves for the most part.

Leyna and Pat's Grandmother always cooked up a feast when we came to her house.

At the Amway Christmas party where they had endless entertainment provided by young child performers.

The host is on the right.

These two boys basically flipped hats at each other for 5 minutes. It might sound boring but in actuality it was wildly entertaining.

This girl was a contortionist who was able to balance herself in a variety of positions.

At a Shanghai club with my friends from high school

At the hotel where Leyna and Pat's Grandmother celebrated her 90th. The food was really good, which was a consistent theme up to this point. That came crashing down on me the last night in Shanghai though.

Leyna and Pat and their extremely hospitable family

Shanghai

Pearl Tower in the background

In front of the Shanghai Museum, which according to my guidebook is one of the best museums in China but still wasn't very impressive given China's immense history.

Shanghai Museum - Tibetan masks

Shanghai Museum

Shanghai as the sun begins to set

Shanghai at night

The last night in Shanghai we went for shabu shabu. I got food poisoning so this is a touchy subject. I was extremely sick but I made it onto the plane and to Beijing anyway.

The hotel in Shanghai

China loves Yao Ming and basketball in general

Shanghai soup dumplings. These are way better than anything Joe's Shanghai has to offer in NYC

One of the best things I've ever eaten, hands down.

Jade Buddha Temple - you get to make a wish if you get a coin to stick, which I did

Jade Buddha Temple

Jade Buddha Temple

Pictures of the huge Jade Buddha weren't allowed so these are of the outer grounds

The temple was right in the center of Shanghai

These are the guardians of the temple

Memorial Museum of the First National Congress of the Communist Party of China - another museum lacking in just about everything. Also there weren't pictures allowed inside.

Outdoor market

The Bund at night

Soup dumpling

The Bund

LaGuardia High School '06

The Bund

My trip to Shanghai was really busy because I was either running around with Leyna and Pat while they took care of their family commitments, or I was with Cece sight-seeing. Of course the last day I spent in absolute misery but overall my trip to Shanghai was a memorable one. My impressions of the city couldn't have defied my expectations any more. Shanghai is like Palm Beach with fancy foreign cars and high end foreign stores as far as the eye can see. Furthermore it seems to have just as many foreigners as Chinese people and English is so pervasive that I forgot where I was at times. It just boggled my mind how prevalent western food, culture and stores are in Shanghai. Even after 5 days there, I still had trouble wrapping my mind around the concept of the divide in this country between foreigners and Chinese people with money, and those without money. China is absolutely a country of have's and have not's, which is what happens when a country develops as quickly as China is currently developing. People become infatuated with brand names and symbols of status which drives the markets for them.
One more thing that I should note since I am an English teacher after all is that compared to Koreans, I found Chinese people to have an overall better grasp of more natural accents when it came to spoken English. I'm told that there are more similarities between English grammar and Chinese grammar than between English grammar and Korean grammar, but I'm not sure if I can peg the more natural accents of Chinese English speakers to that. Whatever the reasons are, not only is their level of fluency better than Koreans from what I experienced, but they're also not afraid to use it like many Koreans.
A last few things to note: pushing on the subway is OK, the weather in Shanghai is pretty moderate, bargaining is an art form, everything is cheap, nothing is cute, the air is dirty, under no circumstances should anyone eat something called "stinky tofu" -- there's a reason it got that nickname.

Wrapping up 2010

I know it's 2011 now, but I want to wrap up a few things I didn't get the opportunity to write about in 2010. First, I finally uploaded a picture of 엿 which is this sweet sticky candy that Koreans give to people for good luck. Supposedly the luck "sticks" to you. One of my co-teachers gave me some before I took the LSAT (I hope that some luck stuck to me!).

엿

My host Mom gave me a box of chocolate that was signed by the rest of my host family. She claimed it would relax me if I enjoyed it the night before, which I did. Even though I'm not too fond of sweets, these Belgium chocolates were really, really good.

Chocolate

Finally, here's a picture of the Christmas tree at the Hilton I stayed at in Seoul. To the best of my recollection, it was the only Christmas tree I saw in Korea. There's also an especially sad looking Korean Santa sitting in front of it.

December 22 was my last day of teaching and on December 23 I flew to China for 11 days behind The Great Cyberwall of China. On December 21, my host family took me out to eat 오리 again as a final meal of the new year. Although I had eaten it before, this was at one of the most famous duck restaurants in Daegu. It was absolutely packed on a Tuesday night, and with good reason. Instead of the traditional hot plate grill, this restaurant cooked its duck via personal table rotisseries. One of the reasons I like these Korean BBQs is because I get to eat copious amounts of garlic. Gross, I know. I also got to try 오리 똥집. My readers might remember I got to try the chicken version a while back. This time it wasn't fried, so it wasn't nearly as good. Plus, I knew what I was eating this time around, which understandably detracts from being able to enjoy it. (If you can't remember, it's the anus of the bird.) On December 22, some of the male teachers and I went swimming and then they took me to try 뼈다귀해장국, which is a soup made from slowly boiling the backbone of either a cow or a pig. It was a really hearty soup that qualified as one of the better things I've eaten in Korea. Anyway, happy New Year and there will be more to come on my adventures in China.

Duck

뼈다귀해장국