One Night in Beijing

Erik and I had a great time in Beijing last weekend, despite the fact that we were unable to buy sleeper tickets for the overnight train between Shanghai and Beijing. We spent the night in seats, so did not sleep much before we arrived! We got to Beijing at about 7 in the morning and still managed to have an activity packed day despite being tired.

One of the first things we did was go shopping for shoes. I only brought my flip flops (of course!) and I wanted to see Mao's body. Chairman Mao was China's revered leader. After he died, they preserved his body so that people could continue viewing it and pay their respects to him. Last year, since I was not wearing shoes then either, I was prohibited from seeing Mao's body because to wear sandals is considered disrespectful. So this year, I was excited to finally see it. However, like most sites in Beijing, the place was closed for renovations. Beijing is preparing for the Olympics next year, so unfortunately many of the tourist sites were closed. We did spend some time hanging out in Tiananmen Square, which is the world's largest public square.

Us standing with Erik's mom

Erik's mom has also spent the summer in China, so we wanted to go to Beijing to see her before she returned to the US. We had an excellent time with her and Erik, of course, was very happy to see her. We all went out together to eat Beijing duck which was delicious. The husband of one of Erik's mom's friends lives in Beijing and graciously took us out to eat and drove us around to see the sights. Such a nice guy.

This is a picture of one of the Ming Tombs. Emperors from the Ming Dynasty (1364-1644) are buried here. Very beautiful.

Us and Benjamin at the Ming Tombs. Benjamin is our Chinese friend who came with us to Beijing.

We also visited the Lama Temple. This temple is much different from the other temples in Beijing because it is a Tibetan temple. Tibetan Buddhism is much more mystical then other forms of Buddhism and its temples are always painted bright colors. This temple is famous because it has a record size Buddha that is 60 feet tall.

Me standing under the ornate gateway.

Of course, no trip is complete without visiting my favorite, the Hard Rock Cafe. It always feels weird to be in an all white environment when you're in China.

We did some other cool things in Beijing (including, of course, seeing the Great Wall) but Erik will post later on that.