Saturday May 21st: Travel to Beijing:
This morning we awoke quite early, 5:30 AM, to checkout and leave for the train station by 6:30. We were told the turnaround at the train station was only 3 minutes, and we were all pretty worried about getting left behind. But it was actually 20 minutes and we all got on in plenty of time. The ride was a little more than 4 hours. We left the train station and walked into a city completely different than all the others we had visited. Hangzhou, Xi’an, and Shenyang were pretty small compared to Shanghi and Beijing. But even Beijing is completely different from Shanghi and a lot different from what I remember 5 years ago. We are staying in a different part of town now than the one we did when I was here with my parents, but the city is still quite different. There is a lot less smog and the whole place seems quite cheery. That could be because I was just super happy to get off the train.
After we found our guides and got to our buses we headed to lunch. It was a quick small lunch and I thought maybe this was just a one-time deal. There were less than a dozen dishes and all of them were on the table at the same time. Usually there are about half a dozen cold dishes and then a dozen hot dishes plus soup and fruit are brought out one by one. The food was good and I wasn’t very hungry anyway. We then left for the Temple of Heaven. This was one of the sightseeing places we went to when I came with my parents a few years ago. At first I didn’t remember what it was like, but as we walked through it all came back. The same types of music and same cheap vendors were milling around and talking nonstop.
We walked into the Temple area and it was like Dejavu. At first I didn’t remember what the Temple looked like, but once I saw it, it was quite weird. The sun was high and bright, making picture taking hard. We only had 20 minutes before needing to get back to the bus, but it was enough to refresh my memory and soak it all back in.
We then drove to the Silk Market and had 1 ½ hours to shop. This building is a grand 7 floors plus a basement and pretty much has everything in it. I went off by myself and had a blast. I walked around all the floors and didn’t see anything I liked or needed. I hadn’t done any shopping yet so I was a little worried I wasn’t going to find anything. But then I found some fans and bought a couple. I only haggled a few minutes, but still got a decent deal. I walked around the 3rd floor a couple times before deciding what to buy. I bought a couple horse things for myself. A box of 8 wooden horses priced at 1250 Yuan. I told the guy it was too much. He asked me how much and I said 100. He looked at me like I was crazy and said that was too little but he would give me a special price of 800. I told him I didn’t have that much and could only pay 100. The next 15 minutes consisted of me reminding him I only had 100 Yuan and him reminding me that his prices were cheap and I was getting a good deal. He finally had the price down to 150 and I turned around looking at other stuff. He took the price down little by little until it was 110. Pretty much all I had been saying was I only had 100 Yuan and I stared at him quite a bit. There were about 5 one minute sessions where we just stood and stared at each other without saying anything. Finally when he had it down to 110 I was quiet and stared at him trying to make myself not give in. Finally he said, “Ok, you special nice girl and I give it to you for 100.” I was pretty excited after that and went on to buy another horse thing. This was a glass plac with horses running on it and standing on a black wooden stand. The guy said 800 Yuan and I said 100. He said that was too little and I said that was all I had. Again I haggled for about 15 minutes while he brought the price down by 10 and I stayed firmly on my price. There was a lot of staring and I could tell he was getting pretty mad at me, but I did not budge. He finally gave in and I got it for 100. By this time I was super pumped but made myself leave that awesome floor before I bought anything else for myself. I went to the T-shirt floor and found a promising corner with lots of cool shirts in it. There were two sellers there, a guy and a girl. The guy was helping one lady and the girl started helping me. I started picking out shirts and asked her for a price. She told me to hush and went off to get a calculator. When she came back she would only haggle on the calculator because she didn’t want the other lady hear what price I was getting. I told her I wanted 10 for 200. She said 10 for 500. We went back and forth quite a bit for and finally settled on 10 for 350. Not the deal I wanted, but that’s about $5 per shirt and I was willing to pay that. So I picked out my shirts and then asked for one more. She said 1 for 50, I said 20. I walked away 5 times before she let me have it for 25. I listened and the other guy was selling shirts right next to us for 60 per shirt. Some people just don’t know how to haggle.
Later on the bus we were all sharing our haggling stories. Lots of people got ripped off and they pretty much agreed I had been the best haggler. I was taught by the best, my Dad!
We had another odd dinner. It was all very good, but only a dozen dishes and none of them were cold. We then headed to the hotel and while we were excited by the quality of the building, we were all super frustrated by the internet. No wireless and the Ethernet cost 12 Yuan an hour to use, which is why all my posts from Shenyang until LA were over a week late.
It was still pretty early when we checked in, so I headed out to look for internet. I went to a KFC and Pizza Hut. There was no internet and I didn’t want to walk around anymore by myself. So I went back to the hotel and got ready for the early morning.
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