We had one week to explore Beijing and Xian - challenge accepted! Read on to learn about our whirlwind trip. I hope it inspires you to explore China yourself one day soon (and take me with you!)
Day 1: Arrival
Our flight landed at 4pm, and we jumped in a car to head to our hotel. The traffic was insane – there was a conference in town and so security was doubled down. After we checked in, we went for a walk around the hotel – checking out Beijing at night for the first time was quite an experience. Our hotel was near the Silk Market, so we went over to try our hand at bartering. It didn’t go well.
Day 2: Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, and Easter Mass
Thanks to our crazy jet lag, we were alive and kicking at 4am, but did our best to fall back to sleep.. At about 5:30, we gave up sleeping and went to find the gym. The good part about the jet lag was that we got early morning workouts in almost every day.
We kicked off our first full day in Beijing with a visit to Tiananmen Square. The place was packed with visitors from all over China and the world. At the center of the square is Mao’s Mausoleum – the line to visit his resting place was over two hours long, as it’s regarded as a holy place for a generation of people in China. We made our way through Tiananmen Square towards the Forbidden City.
Holy wow. The Forbidden City was breathtaking. Every time we walked through an archway, we found ourselves in a new courtyard even more spectacular than the last. The details painted on every ceiling and beam were meticulous. There must have been tens of thousands of people walking through, but you could barely tell because the space was so massive. We could have spent all day exploring the hallways and gardens and museums. It was absolutely magnificent.
After the Forbidden City, we stopped for lunch at a local restaurant – mildly terrifying as it was the first time I was eating in China with my food allergies. But hey, it all worked out just fine and I found the easy staples for our trip – lots of broccoli, steamed rice, and black pepper beef!
Post lunch, we headed up the hill behind the Forbidden City to see the views. Again, breathtaking.
After the longest day (dealing with jet lag that got us up at 4 am), we were dropped off at the East Church, one of just two Catholic churches in Beijing (a city with a population of 21 million). The front doors were gated and we had to enter through a small side passageway. After such an unassuming entrance, the place was packed to the brim. It was beautiful to celebrate the Easter mass with people from all over the world!
Oh, and yes it was my birthday, which I pretty much forgot until we collapsed back at the hotel that night and began getting messages from my friends waking up in California. Ringing in 24 on Easter and in China - what more could you ask for?
Day 3: The Great Wall
It’s GREAT WALL DAY. We bounced out of bed with excitement. We visited the Mutianyu section of the wall, which is less crowded than the sections closer to Beijing but is about an hour outside of the city.
The Great Wall was even bigger and better and greater than I could have ever imagined. We took a chair lift up the mountain to the base of the wall. There’s something so magical and surreal about seeing something with your own eyes that you’ve seen a million times in photos. Because we were there early, we were able to take photos with a relatively clear background, which was a gift because it got much more crowded every minute.
We turned to the right, which meant about 400 stairs up to the top tower. The portion of the wall that is open to the public has been extensively restored – if you look beyond the final gate, you can see the rest of the wall crumbling – but still impressively preserved for a 2000-year-old wall held together with sticky rice and eggs.
Once again, I could have spent all day walking back and forth on the wall, looking over the sides at the stunning scenery and imagining what life might have been like for the souls who spent their lives living in the tiny huts along the wall, scoping out intruders.
Almost as much fun as viewing the wall was the ride down. The Mutianyu section of the wall has toboggans that you ride down the mountain – while it got a little gridlocked, it was exciting to zip down the mountain against the backdrop of the Great Wall.
On our way back to the city, we stopped for lunch at a local restaurant, and I had the best Chinese food of my life. Truly, it was unmatched.
We also stopped at the Beijing Olympic Park – we saw the Water Cube and the Bird’s Nest, both beautiful and ginormous. We didn’t go inside, but it was cool to see!
Finally, we went to an Acrobatics show. It was cool, but we were so worn down that we could have skipped it and gone to bed early.
Day 4: Temple of Heaven and Train to Xian
In the morning, we headed to the Temple of Heaven. One of the most interesting things about China is the retired population. Most people over the age of 60 are retired and receiving pensions from the government. Because they are relatively young when they retire, many people head to the local parks for morning exercises. Every time we visited a park, there were hoards of retired citizens exercising in the park. The most popular activities are square dancing, ribbon dancing, tai chi, yo-yoing, and exercising on the equipment that is built in every park. I loved this so much – what a beautiful way to build community and maintain good health.
The Temple of Heaven itself was another gorgeous place – made up of five or six buildings that housed holy tablets for the Taoist religion. I have a dream that if I came into a windfall of money, I’d travel the world studying the “Holy” for people of all cultures. I love love love any chance to visit a holy place and pay respect to the people worshipping there. Getting to learn about the Taoist and Chinese Buddhist religions during this trip was enriching.
In the afternoon, we took the fast train to Xian. I cannot recommend this enough! The train ride itself was about 4 hours, and it took us through rural parts of China that we wouldn’t have seen otherwise. I had packed books to read, but spent the entire four hours looking out the windows as we passed farms, rice fields, cities, and hundreds of apartment buildings. Seriously – check out the photo below, and then multiply that by about 40. There were really that many buildings along the way – and that was just on my side of the train!
Xian was wildly different from Beijing. The old city is surrounded by a wall, build when Xian was the capital of China and a center for the silk road. Xian itself is made up of many cultures, influenced from the people who traveled there hundreds of years ago through the Silk Road.
When we arrived at our hotel, there was booming music and noise coming from outside – of course, my mom and I went out to explore. We found a “Chang’an Welcoming Ceremony” – a walking performance with probably 200 dancers and actors involved. It was a Disneyland-level production. They even pulled up the 600 year old drawbridge and lowered it for us to walk across, into the walled city. There was no better way to start our time in Xian.
On our way out, we noticed people stopping to take photos with the wall, so of course we did too. Pretty sure it’s a lucky wall, so here’s hoping some luck rubbed off on us!
Day 5: Terracotta Warriors and Exploring Xian
This was our only day in Xian, and our first stop was to see the Terracotta Warriors. In short, it was an absolute must-see. There were thousands of unearthed warriors, made over 2000 years ago to protect Emperor Qin in his tomb. Every single face was unique… absolutely wild.
In the afternoon, we headed back to the city wall of Xian, and rented bikes to ride along the top. After that, we went to explore the Muslim Quarter. There’s a large Muslim population in Xian – about 100,000 people – with roots all the way back to the Silk Road. We tried a few unique foods being offered at stands up and down the street, before heading back to the train station and traveling back to Beijing.
When we arrived in Beijing at 11pm, it was freezing cold and pouring rain, quite a departure from how we had left it. After walking around in the rain and the wind (so dramatic, I know) we finally found our car and made our way back to the hotel.
Day 6: Panda-monium, Summer Palace, Lama Temple, and Sanlitun
THE SKY WAS BLUE!!
Never in my life have I been so surprised to see a blue sky. After five days of pretty rough air quality, we could actually see the tops of the buildings! The rain had cleared out the smog, and it put an extra pep in our step.
In a fun turn of events, we got to see the Pandas! I have never in my life seen a panda do anything other than sleep. But these pandas… they were on the go. They must have known that they’re international celebrities because they were putting on a show. Again, I could have stayed and watched the pandas all day, but we had to keep moving!
Our next stop was the Summer Palace. So much of China’s recent history is tied to the Dragon Lady, Empress Cixi, who basically ran the country for 60 years under the guise of raising up her sons as emperors. Not many people liked her, and she was definitely manipulative, but holy cow, that woman had a good life. The Summer Palace was her place- stunning gardens, manmade lakes, a beautiful temple on the hill – easily one of the most beautiful places in the world. Mental note – if I ever have a summer palace, it would definitely look like this. The juxtaposition of nature and bright, open buildings was swoon-worthy.
Finally, we visited the Lama Temple, run by Chinese Buddhist monks. The temple park was full of beautiful buildings, stunning courtyards, and holy relics. The whole area was a gift from a Chinese prince, who had built the buildings and lived there before becoming Emperor and moving to the Forbidden City. He gifted the land and the buildings to the Buddhist monks to use as a temple, and he also gave them a 2000-year-old tree, so they could carve a massive (four story) Buddha.
We met up with my friend Gabe, who is living in Beijing and working on his Master’s degree at Peking University, for dinner in Sanlitun. Sanlitun was quite a cute and trendy neighborhood, and it felt like a little bit of home as we caught up over tacos.
Day 7: The Final Day
We began the morning with a visit to the Beihai Temple, which was a beautiful park, and we again saw hundreds of people doing their morning exercise. This retired life looks like fun – count me in for daily morning square dancing! The park has another manmade lake, which was gorgeous and reflected the blue sky (day two of blue skies, bless up.)
After the temple, we visited the Hutongs, which are old houses and alleyways that have been preserved for over 200 years. Only a few Hutong communities remain after the Cultural Revolution, and the government now protects them for their historic value. One of the families welcomed us in for tea, and shared that their family has lived there since before the 1950s. Many of the people who live in the Hutongs have passed the homes down from generation to generation, as the location is ideal and the renting price (they, like most land in China, are owned by the government) is low.
After our visit to the Hutongs, we headed to the airport. Saying goodbye to Sonia was heartbreaking – but hopefully, she’ll come to visit us in San Francisco soon!
Do’s and Don’ts
Do: Get a Guide
Guides are plentiful in China – you can find them online before you arrive, and plan out your itinerary in advance. Since we were only there for a short time, having a guide is an absolute must. Our time was tremendously enriched by having her with us!
Don’t: Try to get clothes made
It is a funny story and was worth a try, but there are so many better ways to spend a short time in China
Do: Visit Xian
I loved Xian, and I wish we could have stayed there for a few more days! It was such a visitor-friendly city.
Don't: Put off the Visas
We waited in line for seven hours to apply for our visas... and my mom waiting an additional two hours to pick them up. There are countless pieces of information you need to have together to get a visa, so be ready with everything or you might get denied and have to go back later. There are also agencies that will do it for you for about $100 - I'd encourage you to look into that if you don't have seven hours on a weekday to spend at the Chinese Consulate.
Do: Take the Subway
It’s in English and Mandarin, making it easy to get around. And it’s also super cheap! If we didn’t have a guide, this would have been the best way to get around, as the streets are gridlocked all day. 21 million people = many many many cars on the roads.
Do: Get a VPN
Without a VPN, you cannot access Instagram/Facebook/Google. I used Express VPN and it was free for 7 days, which was perfect for the length of our trip.
Do: Bring Cough Drops
The hardest part about exploring Beijing was the air quality. It was not as bad as it gets, but it was pretty bad for us – close to how it was when the fires were in Northern California last year and the ash was thick in the air. Having cough drops was a life saver when our throats got dry and scratchy.
Overall - we had the most incredible time. I encourage you to visit China if you get a chance!
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