Shortly after I arrived in Shanghai, I felt kinda like I was home again. My phone worked, the street food smelled like stuff I knew, there wasn’t 10 7-11s on every street, I could buy things I liked again. It felt good. Later that evening I picked up Marina from the airport, as she had come to join me on my holiday.

Our first stop on the holiday tour was in Xitang “water town”, which is kinda like a Chinese Venice, Italy. With a river running through the middle, the city offered a great display in the evenings with hanging lanterns, floating candles, and romantic boat rides. Xitang isn’t really one of the “see things, do things” kinda places, it was more of a “sit on a porch, drinking beer and reading a book all afternoon” place; and the latter is precisely what we did.

Second stop on the tour was in the city of Shanghai. Shanghai, is full of high-end shopping, great eats, and beautiful sights. We spent a few days in Shanghai taking in the sights such as the area along the water full of huge, European-style buildings from the early 1900’s, commonly called The Bund. We also checked out the Science and Technology museum, did a little shopping, including checking out the newly-opened Apple store in Shanghai.

We also took a day to go to the Shanghai 2010 World Expo. The Expo itself was pretty crazy; the amount of people would pretty much blow you away. Many of the pavilions we wanted to see were swamped with 3 hour lines, Saudi Arabia had a line that was apparently 8 hours long! We were only spending one day at the expo and didn’t care to wait in line in the heat, so we only went to countries with short or no lines involved. Fortunately this included lots of little countries I’ve never been to, countries with great food, and great booze! Most larger countries also had restaurants outside their pavilions where you could have a local snack or brew. Wonderful.

Last stop on our trip, due in part to the giant beer festival and cheap last minute flight tickets, was Qingdao. In fact, it turned out that Qingdao was probably the best part of the entire trip. The beaches were beautiful, and the ocean air really cut down on the smog in the city. Not to mention everyone I met was really really friendly. I don’t think I could actually live there because it was too humid, in fact, my washed clothing never really dried, it just equalized with the humidity outside. But it is a great city. Marina and I enjoyed long walks and barbecues on the beach, and the most famous beer festival in all of China. The beer festival was great, but unfortunately it was way too expensive, 100 RMB for a liter of beer is a little extreme.

Finally it came time to head home, so Marina flew back to Taiyuan to spend some time with her parents before going to school, and I flew back to Xi’an where I’m now located at a new school and a new apartment, but that’s for another time. 

Upon arriving in Taiyuan about 2 hours later I was greeted by Marina. I was pretty happy to see her because she had been in Taiyuan for a little over three weeks before I arrived. We spent a good part of the afternoon just walking around and seeing things in her hometown. A bit later on we met up with

Back to School

two of her friends (one of which we visited in Chengdu in November) and hung out with them as well. They showed me their high school, we ate some local snacks  as well as a nice dinner and then went to a club for a few drinks. A very enjoyable day without all the touristy sightseeing.

The next morning I went to pick-up Marina outside her house so we could walk to the train station. There I met her mother who wanted to come out and see who this boy, her daughter was going traveling with, was. We didn’t really talk, but I said “hello” and shook her hand and 30 seconds later Marina and I were walking to the train station.

We rode the fast train to Beijing so it only took about 3 hours. From the train station we were able to get on a subway to go to our hostel. After checking in, we spent most of the day just hanging out and doing whatever we wanted to do before heading to the airport. You see, my friend Tyler is visiting for the next 18 days or so, and would be joining us in Beijing, so we went to pick him up at the airport later that night.

Of course since Tyler would be here we’d have to some of the more touristy things in Beijing, but this being my second trip to Beijing in two years, I made it a point to do some different things and see things that I hadn’t seen before. That way it’d be exciting for me and him, and hopefully Marina as well.

The first day we visited Tienanmen square, but unfortunately were unable to visit Mao Zedong because his mausoleum wasn’t open. After Tienanmen square we took a look through the Forbidden city, which is really quite large and impressive. It’s impressive due to the size and craftsmanship considering it was built hundreds of years ago. The best part of that day actually was when the three of us went to eat hot pot at Hai Di Lao that evening. Seeing Tyler fishing for food and having a hell of a time with chopsticks was very amusing for Marina and I.

Gate to the Forbidden City

The second day in Beijing we took a trip up to the Great Wall of China. I had already seen this before as well, but we were able to go to another part of the wall called Mutianyu. I actually thought this place was much nicer than Badaling, the place I visited before, as it was much less crowded with tourists and way fewer shops selling crap. The fresh snow on the wall also made for a beautiful and unique experience.

Tyler climbing the Great Wall

There were of course a many people selling shirts and other random things, but the funny part about this was their concept of “one dollar”. You see, we’d walk past and they’d hold up shirts saying “you want t-shirt? one dollar!”, we say no and they say “two shirts for one dollar!”. So Tyler took out an American one-dollar bill and tried to get two shirts. Of course they say they want Chinese money, and then they want 30 yuan for a shirt! Sorry but one American dollar is only worth about 7 yuan, so when I offered them 7 yuan for a shirt they told me I was crazy. I think they’re the ones that are crazy.

While in Beijing we were also able to visit the Olympic grounds, which, now that the olympics are over, are actually very empty. We also saw the Temple of Heaven, which, in my opinion wasn’t all that impressive. Perhaps I’ve seen too many temples or perhaps it is because I just don’t understand everything, but eventually a temple looks like a temple looks like a temple. They all just blend together and aren’t that special anymore.

Bird's Nest in Beijing

Our last day in Beijing we simply woke-up, and headed for the airport to go to Harbin. The day started out pretty well but turned bad quickly. Unfortunately I had forgotten to put something in my checked luggage and didn’t want to discard it when going through security so Marina and I quickly searched for a post office or place to leave it while our departure time was quickly approaching. We found one, but in all the running around and confusion she lost her ID card. So now, her only ID card is her student ID which isn’t nearly as official as her government issued ID. Marina and I were the last passengers to board the plane, but we fortunately made it, although without her ID. So hopefully we can recover the ID when we get back to Beijing airport.

Check out the pictures! www.shaneburkle.com/photos

• Added about 100 new photos of the area around my school and interesting things I snapped with my phone cam.
• Tomorrow evening I’m heading to train station for the first leg of my trip to Taiyuan. My vacation is finally starting!
• Keep checking back here as well as on Twitter, I plan to take a little bit of time and make some posts as well as update pictures throughout the trip.