So the perks to living in China are pretty awesome. We can do things like decide on Monday that we are going to go to Beijing for the weekend. There were 10 of us girls that went. It was a great group of people, drama free. And thank goodness that I have a wonderful best friend that was able to hook us up with a sweet hotel room at the Fairmont Beijing! Thank you fwiend! It was probably the nicest hotel I’ve ever stayed in. It was so nice to sleep in a nice bed and super awesome sheets.
The trip didn’t start off on the best foot though. We left the school super early to take a cab to the airport since we’re not paranoid of missing transportation. So we took a black taxi from the school with two other students from the school. They were on their way home, so they were just going to get dropped off as we went to the airport. It was good to have them because they were able to barter with the driver and translate for us. So we drive for about half an hour and then the car starts to slow down. Then he has an argument with the student, and then the car stops and we ask her what just happened, she says that he went the wrong way and we have to get out. He was also going to wrong way to drive her home as well. So we get out, get a new cab, and then she helped us tell the taxi driver where we were going. So, we drive on the highway for awhile, and then come to a complete stop. All the cars turned off their engines and we were sitting still for an hour. The whole time we’re starting to stress out because we need to catch this flight. We were also worried that we would get left behind because the other girls were coming from Vanke. They ended up calling us and they were stuck in the same traffic. It also turned out that they were only two cars beside us because 5min later we saw them walk by to go pee on the side of the highway, haha. Anyways, once we got to the airport it was a mad dash to the emergency check in and rush to our gate. Our flight was boarding when we got to the gate, so we just made it on time.
The next day we started off with a delicious Western style breakfast with eggs, bacon and French toast….mmm! Hehe, it’s funny how you miss simple things like that. Once we were all fueled and ready to go it was off to the market to barter and shop the day away. It was a fun experience but you really have to be in the mood to barter with these people. Some of them can get super aggressive if you try and walk away from them. I had some of them call me crazy girl, or hit me if I tried to go too low on price. It was pretty funny. It really gets exhausting by the end of the day though. We bought lots of stuff, and I was able to get presents to send home for Christmas J Fun fun! To relax after a long day of shopping we went to the pool at the hotel and hot tub. I really miss being at the pool sometimes. The little fish inside of me just wants to get out and swim! Hehe. I really wish that we had a pool here. That night we went out for some wings and beer because we aren’t really able to get that type of food around here. We wandered around in some pubs. It was so weird to see so many foreigners though. And this time we found ourselves staring at anyone that spoke English since we are not used to seeing that here. We were not in Wuhan anymore :S
The next day was a little bit of a later start as we needed to pack up all of our loot. We headed to the silk market which was just across the street from the Fairmont, so we were able to walk there. We bought some more stuff, checked out, and then headed to the forbidden city. It was a super cool experience. I had another one of my ‘I’m in china moments’ as we were walking through. I just get so amazed that I can do things like head off to Beijing for the weekend. The joys of living in china is just crazy sometimes. It was sooooooo cold walking around though. We were able to get some pretty sweet shots and had a great time walking around. As we left we got some pictures of Tianamen square, got in a taxi and left. What a packed weekend!
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