On the Road: The Hot City of Beijing
Source: Fracisco Diez at flickr
I writing today’s entry at the Beijing airport, waiting to leave on my flight to Xi’an. Having spent 4 days here, I am of mixed emotions as I leave. On the one hand, I think I am ready to go to someplace new, and on the other, I feel like I hardly saw or did anything and will probably need to come back in order to experience it better. There is just so much to see and do here!
Did I have Peking Duck here? No. Did I have more than one or two decent meals? No. Did I even enter the Forbidden City, the most famous landmark in Beijing? Also no. (It was way too busy the day I went, and I was way too tired from walking there.) I have to ask myself, what DID I do?
There are two things about Beijing in the summer that makes it a difficult place to get around. One, it’s hot. The temperature never got below 35 degrees C during the day, and even late at night the heat makes you soak a shirt through in 5 minutes.
And two, taxis are difficult. (My hotel was 30 minutes walk from the subway station, which I hear is nice.) It’s not that taxis are impossible; it’s just sometimes a lot like trying to catch a cab in downtown Manhattan at 5pm on a weekday. You’re going to be waiting a long, long time for an empty one to pass.
Now I actually did not have much trouble with the actual taxi experience once I got one. It’s true that drivers rarely speak much English, but the hotel had this very handy card with its address on it written in Chinese, and the addresses of the top 10 tourist attractions. I carried that card with me everywhere, it was very handy. I hope they have that in Xi’an.
A couple of taxi drivers tried to play the “no meter, no meter” game with me. But at least they were up front about it. Taxis in Beijing are extremely cheap. A very long 30 minute cab ride will only cost you about $10. As a result, when it’s a busy time to catch a cab, the driver is likely to want to double, triple or more the meter price. It’s basic supply and demand. Most times, I said no and left the cab. Catching the next cab was not a problem. But once I did agree to go off the meter, and it was actually a good experience. The taxi driver was very friendly, funny, and spoke pretty good English.
So, to answer the question, what DID I do in Beijing. Well, the hotel I stayed at was in an actual “Hutong”, which is itself a tourist attraction. It is a very narrow street where people who worked in the Forbidden City used to live more than 1000 years ago. The one I stayed on had restaurants, markets, and various vendors lining both sides of the street, like a mini-market.
I did walk for a few hours one day, and saw a strange entrance down the end of a short street. Of course, I investigated, and was charged 10 Yuan ($2) for the pivillege of entering this garden. And oh I am glad I did. It ended up being the Imperial Palace Garden and Temple. and it was almost completely empty of tourists! I walked about, enjoying the gardens, and each of the ancient buildings within. There were places for animal sacrifice, and places for prayer. There was a very large set of bells for playing music on, and in general I was in awe of the real history I was just idly wandering through.
Of course, that feeling didn’t last long as I left the park and tried to make my way to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square itself. Let me tell you, there must have been 100,000 people there. After walking for hours, and spending more than an hour in a peaceful park all by myself, I had no appetite to fight the crowds. And so I made my way back to my hotel, which was still a long way away.
I managed to take a tour while I was in Beijing, which took me to The Great Wall. I tried to climb it, and made it about half way up the first section. The climb is very steep, and well I decided I still had a long day of touring ahead and did not want to kill myself before lunch.
I also saw a place called Ming Tombs. This is the site where 13 of the Ming Dynasty emperors are buried. If I recall the tour guide correctly, they opened one of the tombs in the 1950’s, most of the silks and textiles that were found inside the tombs deteriorated quickly. They emptied the tomb too quickly, and there was very poor documentation over what was found and where. Basically, they will not be opening any more tombs until a technology exists to ensure the artifacts inside will not be destroyed, which will be a very long time.
So, to sum up Beijing: hot, crowded, scary, exciting, fun. Hopefully the next few days in Xi’an are quiet before I hit the supercity of Shanghai. The hotel has a pool apparently, so perhaps I can make use of that. And it won’t be so hot.
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