Rach's Adventures in China

We managed to arrive in Shanghai safe and sound! It was a bit of an epic journey but it all turned out OK. We left the hotel around 6 pm last night and had a few teary goodbyes before heading on an hour-long taxi ride to the train station. We'd been warned that nobody would speak any English at the station and we would encounter loads of problems but we didn't have any trouble at all. With our limited Chinese and the continued friendliness of the Chinese people, we were able to find our way to the right platform with ease.

We shared a cabin with a Chinese man and his son, who didn't seem particularly shocked to be sharing with 2 Western girls. That's not to say we didn't get any funny looks!! Most people who passed by our cabin stopped to have a bit of a stare at us. Our beds were remarkably comfortable and it was definitely worth paying the bit extra to have beds instead of chairs. We went for dinner on the train - ordered everything in Chinese of course! Then we went to bed around 9 pm! I didn't sleep great on the train but it was better than nothing. It was great having an overnight journey - we went to sleep in Beijing and woke up in Shanghai! The train journey took about 11.5 hours in total but it didn't really feel like that long.

Coming out of the train station, we got approached asking if we needed a taxi. We didn't have the address written in Chinese characters and the man got a bit arsey with us. We called the hostel and they explained the address in Chinese to them. But then instead of taking us to a real taxi, they tried to bring us round the side of the station to one of their mate's cars!! We said 'no thanks' and went on our way to find a registered taxi. It wasn't exactly straight forward where you have to go to get a taxi but we eventually figured it out and managed to convey to the driver where we wanted to go. They gave us a set price of 50RMB, which is expensive for the distance but we were knackered and couldn't be bothered to argue.

Our hostel here is really nice - probably one of the nicest hostels I've ever stayed in, actually. We've just had breakfast (a full English fry-up...it had to be done!) and we're deciding what to do for the rest of the day. Some of the other people from the summer school had gone to Xi'an and were going to meet us here but we have reason to believe that they couldn't get a train so I don't think we'll bother waiting for them.

The exam went well on Tuesday - everyone passed! We had our graduation ceremony at 4 pm which was fun - we had speeches from reps from BNU, Manchester Uni, the British Council, and our student ambassador, Caroline. Then they played the DVD which they had been making the whole time we've been here. I've felt like a bit of a celebrity - constantly being filmed by their cameramen, as well as being asked to have my picture taken by Chinese people! The DVD was really funny and it kind of made me realise that the trip was really over, seeing the highlights from it. After that, the mood was uplifted again by every class giving their performances. The funniest had to be what the advanced class did - they reenacted the Peking Opera, but their words were mostly the phrases which we had learned in class - ie, "Ni baba, mama, shenti hao ma?" (How's your mum and dad?). You kinda had to be there to get the full effect, I'm not even going to try to describe it!!

Next we had dinner at a restaurant on campus with some of the Chinese students. Some people were leaving that night to go to Tibet or Xi'an so there were a few goodbyes. After dinner, about 30 of us went to Houhai park and rented boats and went to the little island in the middle of the lake to play drinking games and have a laugh. It was great. We ended up at a club called Angel later on that night, which was pretty disappointing, and we ended up coming home around 2 am and buying Frosties and milk from the uni shop for a late-night fix of Western food.

The next day a few of us went off to a hutong to do a bit of exploring in the afternoon - it was really nice to just walk around some random streets instead of constantly doing the tourist thing. We had lunch at a Chinese cinema place which was in one of the market streets and then found our way down a dirt road. This is what I find really bizarre here - you can have a main road - 6 lanes, surrounded by high rises, constant traffic - and then take a left and you're on a dirt road full of shanties. It's weird. We got some funny looks walking down this road - I guess it's not really a tourist attraction!!

In the evening, we went back to our favourite cheap restaurant across the road - the family there have pretty much adopted us! We gave them a Mandarin/English phrasebook as a gift - I think I'll miss that place more than anywhere else in Beijing!! The food was amazing as usual and after a few drinks, we headed out to Propaganda, a bar that does All-you-can-drink for 30 RMB on Wednesday nights. Most of the cohort were there and it was a really fun night of dancing and chatting to everyone for our last night in Beijing.

On Thursday morning, I wasn't feeling so great. I would love to say it was a hangover but I'm fairly confident it was food poisoning - I never get sick like that from alcohol!! It was quite a painful day and it was debatable whether I'd be able to get on the train but luckily I pulled through in the end and we were able to make it here! It's almost midday and Shanghai awaits so I think it's time to get out and do a bit of exploring. We're booked in here for 3 nights and then who knows where we'll end up next...

Yesterday, after my last entry, I dossed around the apartment for a bit before heading over to the hairdresser's to check in on some friends. After my success last weekend, two of the girls decided to brave the same place although they went much more extreme than me - Liz got her hair re-blonded and her pixie cut trimmed shorter, while Caroline went from having long, thick, wavy golden brown hair to having short, dark red curly hair!! They both looked fantastic. Their cuts cost way more than mine - the salon uses L'Oreal products so to have colours and perms costs quite a lot - not as much as in the UK but not cheap!!

To celebrate their new hair, we got snazzed up a bit and headed out into town with some of the other girls to a hutong that they had discovered last week. It was by a lot of the backpackers hostels so there was many other Westerners around - not quite as many stares from the Chinese as usual! We had Peking duck at one of the restaurants there and then split off into groups as we had different agendas - my group ended up at a quaint little teahouse and were served free tea samples for the next couple of hours. A few other English girls came in and we invited them to join our table - turns out they had all just graduated from Oxford and were travelling around for a bit before starting work back in London. The teas were all lovely - my favourites were jasmine mixed with rosebud and milk oolong (which tasted a bit like white chocolate!). We also tried a really nice peach blossom tea and a sugary chrysanthemum tea, which were both nice but a bit too sweet for me. The only one I didn't really like was a gunpowder tea - it was very smoky. We sat there for ages chatting away and then finally decided on which ones to buy - I went for a pot of jasmine and a pot of rosebuds, of course! After that, we met up with everyone else at a bar in one of the hostels - it was really chilled out and one of those international kind of hostels where you feel like you could be anywhere in the world. It was cool to hang out there for a bit, they even had some live music. Becky requested 'A Whole New World' (from Aladdin) on our behalf - it's been the theme tune of our trip...long story! The guy didn't know enough of it so we decided to call it a night and head back to the hotel. While it was fun to be in a backpackers place for a bit, it kinda felt a bit touristy. I guess I can't really say much when I've been in a group of 100 Westerners for this whole trip - but somehow I feel like my experience of Beijing has been a bit more authentic than someone who stayed at a hostel here for a few days and just saw the Great Wall, Forbidden City, etc. Although I guess what's made my stay here more authentic was the fact that I've actually been able to speak Chinese to the locals!

While I'm sitting here typing this, Becky is next to me reading my last blog entry and we started talking about the visit to the British Council and how we seem to hit a brick wall whenever we ask questions about the political situation in China. It's really frustrating...you can't really get any straight answers. If you ask a Chinese person a question which they don't want to answer, they will just change the subject or find some way of avoiding answering your question in any comprehendable way. Becky went to church here on Sunday and apparently only Chinese people are allowed to preach - even in the English part of the church - because they don't want outsiders to spread any foreign doctrine. This seems a bit strange since they're encouraging their youth to go abroad and open their minds to education and new ideas in other countries.....yet the impression we're given here is that they are still highly indoctrinated with Chinese pride and nationalistic identity. We've just been talking again about the guy at the British Council meeting who yelled 'Are you Chinese or are you a foreigner?' - it's interesting that has such a nationalist point of view - it almost seemed like that the kind of attitude you could imagine someone having if they had never left China - not that of someone who had lived in London for 10 years and who used words like "cool" and tried to show us how well he fitted into life in the UK.

Anyway! This morning we had Chinese class from 8 - 11:30 as usual and then again from 1 - 2:30. We reviewed everything that we've learned and then worked on our little performance number which we have to do tomorrow during the closing ceremony - my class is singing the song from the acrobatics show with a little dance, as well as some acrobatic demonstrations! Should be interesting.. The afternoon was pretty lazy and turned into a little stroll with a bit of shopping down one of the streets near uni. Around 7 pm we met up with some more people for dinner at the cheap bar across the street and now I've just come back to write this before I go study up for the exam in the morning. I'm not worried about it at all, it should be dead easy, but it would be good to go into it with confidence. It's hard to believe that Chinese class is over - I want to learn so much more. When I get back to uni, I'm definitely going to keep taking Mandarin lessons.

On Friday, Liz and I spent 2.5 hours in the bank trying to get some currency changed into yuan. The other day when I'd gone to change some dollars, the manager gave me a VIP ticket and I was able to jump the queue - no such luck this time. Although I have to admit, I felt kinda bad the other day when there was about 50 Chinese people in front of me and I'd obviously been given preferential treatment for being foreign. We started talking to a guy in the bank who told us that he'd just graduated from Beijing Normal University (where we're studying). He explained that the reason the bank is so ridiculously busy every day is because of the stock market - nearly everyone in there was trying to buy stock. It was really interesting. We started talking about the Olympics and I asked him how he thought the city would cope with the massive flux of people next year. I'm finding it really hard to see how Beijing will cope. He says that the government is offering free English classes to pretty much everyone. Judging from my experience thus far, not many people are taking them up on the offer!! Every time we get a taxi, we have to have the address written in Chinese characters or have a map with us. Many Chinese people don't know pinyin (the words written out in Latin characters instead of symbols) and despite our best efforts, they don't always understand us if we say words in Chinese. The taxi drivers have been given tapes to help them learn English phrases for when they have foreigners on board, but instead of learning the words, they just play the tape when you get in. We're all getting the hang of China now - obviously we have a massive advantage since we've spent 2 weeks learning Chinese every day! I'm really interested to see what happens over the next year in preparation for the Olympics. It would be amazing to come back next summer and be able to make a comparison.

Anyway, after the bank, we decided to go for a massage. There's a parlour in the basement of our hotel and we got a 1-hour full body massage for only 48Y - less than 3 pounds! Over here, most of the masseurs are blind - which can make for some humourous situations. My massage was great and left me feeling very relaxed. We met up with some of the girls who'd gone shopping for the afternoon and had dinner together at a swish restaurant in the hotel. Being less squeamish than most of the girls I've met, I've tried to order something a bit different each time I have Chinese food. Last weekend I tried fish cheek for the first time - it was sooo nice. I think I put a few people off their food though when I was dissecting the fishhead though.. On Friday night, I ordered braised bullfrog with bamboo shoots. Everyone looked at me with disdain but I wouldn't be dissuaded! I have to admit - when the food came, the frog looked absolutely disgusting. Basically, it was just chunks of frog - bones and all - which had been braised in a sauce. It wasn't like frogs' legs or anything - this was just hunks of carcus. After some careful dissection, I quickly realised that it was delicious, albeit very challenging to eat. Only one other girl at the table would try it - most of them looked at it with disgust and quickly rotated the turntable in the middle whenever the frog landed in front of them. I can understand where they're coming from - maybe a few months ago I would have been the same - but since I arrived in China I've been really trying to have an open mind about everything to do with their culture.

Some of the girls went shopping again after the meal but I wasn't really feeling up to that so I had a nice chilled evening in chatting with Becky (who will be happy that I finally mentioned her in my blog) and then messing about on the Internet. Loads of people went out clubbing to 'Club Banana' but that definitely wasn't on my agenda. Sounds like I missed a good night but there'll be plenty more!

On Saturday morning, we left at 9:30 am to drive out to the countryside to stay at a farm. I still have no idea where we went - they didn't actually tell us where we were going. It was about 1.5 hours outside of Beijing though. The village was very rural and basic but they had obviously turned it into an attraction - most of the homes were also guesthomes and they were used to having tourists stay with them. There were 10 to a house and our lady welcomed us with open arms into her home. She had two basic rooms for us - one with a 6 person bed and one with a 4 person bed. When I say bed - it was basically just a hard surface with a mat thrown over it. It was comfortable enough once you got used to it - I actually had a great night's sleep!! She prepared a massive feast of a lunch for us which we scarfed down - it was really nice to eat some proper Chinese food in someone's home instead of at a restaurant. She had two children, including a 6 month old baby, who we played with. One of her friends came over to the house and started talking to us - she spoke no English and obviously our Chinese isn't great so we were pretty limited. It's really interesting trying to talk to people here. We know enough to be able to pick out certain words and so after a bit of group guesswork we can usually get an idea of what they're saying and banter back and forth. She invited us to come to her house, where a group of the boys were staying. We hung out with them for a bit and then 3 o'clock came up and it was time for our hike! We climbed a beautiful mountain in this town - I have no idea what it was called but it was obviously an attraction. It took us about 2 hours to climb to the top but it was worth every minute - the view was amazing. It was great to get a bit of exercise too. Obviously it wasn't a race but I was still chuffed to be the 2nd girl to reach the top!

On the way down, Becky and I climbed up another set of steps to a little pagoda which housed a bell. The view wasn't as amazing as from the very top of the mountain but it was still nice. I had a bit of a 'I'm the King of the world!' moment while leaning over the bar and my anti-bacterial gel tumbled down the side of the mountain - I was gutted. I won't go into detail about the state of the bathroom we had to use at the farm but it's not pretty and anti-bac is a MUST. I haven't seen it sold anywhere here so Liz and I are going to have to start rationing since it'll probably get worse when we're trekking through rural southern China in a week's time.

Our host cooked us another beautiful meal - we were all starving after the hike. At 8 pm, we wandered down to the playground area of the village where they locals had set up a bonfire in our honour. A sound system was in place and and some of the local women demonstrated some traditional dances and singing (it's more like rapping, actually). Then it turned into a big party and we drank a few beers and danced the night away...well...we danced until 10 and then they told us it was over. The locals were so friendly to us and even showed us how to do their dances. A lot of the girls got whisked away to do some ballroom dancing around the campfire! At the end, a few of us went back to the boys' house and sat outside playing a few games but we got booted out at 11 so it was time to head back to ours to go to bed.

This morning we got up at 8, had breakfast - which consisted of steamed buns, hardboiled eggs, rice soup, won tons, and a few vegetable dishes - then jumped on the coach to come back to Beijing. It was nice to spend a night somewhere like that but I'm glad it was only one night. The facilities at our house were truly basic - we didn't even have a shower, and as I mentioned, the toilet was literally just a hole in the ground in a little shack outside our house - the door didn't even shut.

It's nice to be back in Beijing - it's really started to feel like home here now!!! It's cold here today (only 22 degrees or so) and raining so I think this afternoon will be a bit lazy and then a bunch of us are going out for dinner and drinks at a hutong somewhere this evening. Tomorrow is our last Chinese class - we have class all morning and then for part of the afternoon too! On Tuesday we have our exam in the morning and then graduation ceremony in the afternoon. In the evening we have a social with the Chinese students which should be really fun. On Wednesday people will start leaving!!! I can't believe how quickly this trip has gone - I still feel like I only just got here. Liz and I have booked our train tickets - we leave for Shanghai on the 30th on the overnight train. We're meeting up with some other people from the group in Shanghai which should be good. The plan is to stay there for 3 nights and then started trekking down through southern China through some rural villages and get a taste of 'real' China before we get to Hong Kong.

Hey y'all.

I can't really remember where I left this off - it's been a few days.

Today we had Chinese class all morning and learned how to buy train/bus tickets etc, which will be useful because Liz and I are trying to buy our tickets to Shanghai!! In the afternoon, I had my 2nd optional class which was Tai Ji. The teacher told us a lot of info about Tai Ji (in Chinese - it had to be translated!) and then gave us a demonstration of some weapons. Then we did Tai Ji with him for the following hour, which was really great. At the end he showed us a few self defense moves which I couldn't really master and managed to get caught in a headlock by Caroline.

After a late lunch, we had a group expedition to the Peking Opera. I have to admit - I was pretty apprehensive about it after the taster we had at the Laoshe teahouse. I would love to say that my mind was changed but unfortunately I can't deny the fact that it really just wasn't my thing. Some people seemed to enjoy it and of course it was nice experience yet another part of China's culture. The acrobatics in the show were without doubt impressive but the singing made me want to put on my ipod to have an alternative soundtrack for the visual.

Last night was probably the best night I've had in Beijing so far. One of the guys had looked into the local football (soccer) team and found out they were playing so about 25 of us bundled into taxis to head off to the match. We had a bit of trouble finding the stadium - their normal stadium (the Workers Stadium) is under construction so we had to head out of town to the Fengtai Stadium - it cost about 60Y to get there which is the most expensive taxi we've had so far, I think. The drivers had a bit of trouble finding the place so we arrived a tiny bit late - after grabbing some team ribbons from the street vendors, we raced up to our seats to get our first taste of Chinese football. While the level of football is maybe not comparable to that of English matches, it was one of the best times I've had at a football match - alcohol isn't sold at the stadium and the Chinese fans are enthusiastic but not aggressive or rude. The locals loved having so many Westerners turn up to support their team and we started a wave which went around the stadium loads of times - it was so great. We got some people to explain the football chants and the name of the club in Chinese so we could sing along. At half-time, the crowd from the home supporters section came up to our seats and told us to come sit with them! I barely watched the 2nd half because we were having such a great time singing with the Chinese fans. Beijing had a great result - a 4-1 win! Everyone was elated and the celebations continued out in the street when the match ended - we paraded and danced and sang with the locals for what felt like ages! Eventually someone shouted 'To the pub!' - the Chinese dispersed - it's incredible to see the difference in drinking culture between our countries! We found a local restaurant to have a couple of drinks and then the group split up. About 10 of us carried on to a club in Beijing called Mix. It was pretty expensive in there - about 45Y for a drink - so we took it easy and just danced the night away. We got home around 3:30 - 4 am - it wasn't fun getting up for class only a few hours later!!

Yesterday afternoon, after Chinese class, we went on our placements - we had the option of either going to a beer factory and a car factory, or to the British Council. I chose to go to the British Council - I figured they could be good contacts to have in Beijing in the future. They gave us gift bags full of information about what they do as well as a free t-shirt and baseball hat, and even provided a lunch of fish and chips and some other British types of food! A welcome change from the constant flow of noodles and rice - although it did feel slightly wrong eating it! We had talks from various people at the council, as well as some Chinese alumni of British universities. It was interesting to hear about the Council's activities in China but I didn't realise that most of their efforts were geared towards getting Chinese students into Britain for post-sec education. Unfortunately they don't seem to offer much support towards Brits looking to move out to China so it wasn't very useful in that aspect. However, they do have a Language Assistant programme which runs from Sept - July where you can come out to China to be a teaching assistant in a school. It seems like there are a lot of programmes available like that here and while I'm sure it would be an amazing experience, it's not really something that appeals to me - I'd much rather get on some sort of placement with something media-related. I asked some questions about Chinese students going away to study in England because I was intrigued that the country was encouraging its youth to move abroad - everyone in NL will know all about the 'brain drain'. However, the BC rep said that a remarkable percentage of Chinese people who go away to study return to China to work - well over 90%. I thought that was pretty incredible, but I guess it's understandable when they have the fastest growing economy in the world. It was also nice to hear the Chinese alumni's experiences in England and we had the chance to ask them lots of questions, which made way for the most interesting point of the day. One of the girls was explaining to us about traditional values in China getting in the way of the modernisation of industry and the economy - not in a negative way at all - she was just trying to explain the socio-economical situation. Another alumnus had entered the room and upon hearing her explanation, started an antagonistic attack and accused her of not being Chinese - "Are you Chinese or are you foreigner!?!?!?!?!" - we were all completely shocked. The situation was handled well - one of the BC reps commented on the differing viewpoints of Chinese people - it was very interesting to see the contrast with someone who is very strongly nationalistic.

On Tuesday, we went to Beihei park...again. We realised that we'd never actually been - what we had thought was Beihei was in fact Houhei - it's a bit confusing. So we mosied on down there and had a relaxing day - we even rented a boat and sailed about on the lake for an hour - once again serenading the locals with showtunes and Disney songs. In the evening, a few of us headed over to the cheap bar across the road and had a quiet evening there with some cheap food and good company as usual.

On Monday, my plans got changed at the last minute and I ended up hopping in a taxi with 3 of the boys and heading off to the Olympic stadium. It was very impressive, although we were unable to get any closer than the outside of the construction site. We tried every gate and even offered a bribe or two (which is apparently very insulting to Chinese people but then again, I've also heard that the guards on the Great Wall used to let people through if they were bribed - I guess everyone has their price!!) but it was to no avail. It was still amazing and it made me want to come back to Beijing next summer for the Olympics - I'm still finding it hard to imagine how the city is going to cope with the event. We've been lucky since we've had intense Chinese classes every day, but I can't imagine how a city full of non-English speakers will deal with the massive flux of foreigners flooding in next summer. Even getting taxis is a nightmare if your Chinese pronounciation isn't perfect - it's always best to have the destination written in Chinese characters before you attempt any journey!!

We decided to go watch the sundown at Tian'anmen Square - there's a bit of a ceremony where they take the flag down - it always draws a big crowd. Since that wasn't until 7:30 PM and it was still early, we headed off to the Temple of Heaven to have a look around. We managed to get drawn in by the locals again and ended up being taught how to twirl these long ribbons on sticks - they made it look easy but it was far harder than I imagined. I think the coolest part of the Temple was the Echo Wall - allegedly you could be at two different points anywhere along the inside of the circular wall, which surrounded a couple of pagodas, and be able to hear the other person talking. We tested the theory and it did in fact work.

The sundown at Tian'anmen was slightly disappointing - it had been a particularly misty/smoggy day so the sunset wasn't anything exciting and we ended up waiting around for about an hour for the ceremony - which ended up just being a bunch of soldiers marching out from underneath the picture of Mao, taking the flag down, and then marching back in again. I had bought one of the games (the shuttlecock footsy thing) in the Temple of Heaven so we had a game in front of the Olympic countdown across the street from Tian'anmen and got a lot of smiles from the locals, as well as a lot of pictures taken. It still makes me laugh that people want to have their picture taken with us - I'm starting to feel like a bit of a celebrity, it's going to be strange to go back to England and not be followed by the Paparazzi. :P

After a bit of an epic journey, we arrived back at the hotel around 9 - 9:30 PM. I was pretty tired but instead of doing the sensible thing and going to bed, I decided to head out to a club with the guys to meet up with a bunch of other people who had gone out earlier. It turned into a bit of a drunken night of dancing and good times were had by all!

Right... I think that's just about it for now. Tomorrow I have class again and then we have a free afternoon/evening - I'm hoping to head out to the night market to try something interesting like seahorse on a stick! On Saturday morning we're heading out into the country again for a night on a farm and to do some hiking! Should be another interesting adventure - we've heard we have to share massive 6 person beds!!

I'm really sad that the programme is almost over. I've had such an amazing time.. it's hard to believe that this time next week we'll have all gone our separate ways.

Hi everyone! Sorry it's been ages since I've posted anything - we've been crazy busy and I haven't been on the internet at all.

On Thursday, we had Chinese class as usual and then a few of us had to jet off to our work placement to get there for 12. It was at the New Oriental Education & Technology Group. They're the most recognised brand in private Chinese education, offering the best English language skills programmmes. They're a massive company - they even have their own publishing house. We had a presentation and chat with a girl there who is putting together the curriculum for their new pre-school programme. She was actually from Toronto originally - she's the 2nd person I've met here who has emigrated from Canada to Beijing. It was really interesting to learn about the Chinese education system and she's going to e-mail me about the possibility of doing a work-term at their publishing house next summer!

We had to rush back to campus after the placement to take part in our Calligraphy class. We missed the explanation about the history of calligraphy but got to participate in actually painting the characters. It was fun to try it out but it's not something I'll take up as a hobby any time soon!

I wasn't feeling great on Thursday - we were all starting to get a bit run down from the lack of sleep and constant heat, as well as the massive change in diet. I wasn't really feeling up to a big night out at the Karaoke so I ended up going to the Silk Market with some people. The Silk Market is massive - 7 floors of markets!! You can buy almost anything there. A lot of the vendors are really aggressive, especially towards Westerners! They grab you and don't let go. It's a bit annoying but you just have to be aggressive back and tell them no. Like everywhere in China, they are far more courteous if you speak Chinese to them - everyone appreciates it when you make an effort. We spent a few hours at the market and then headed downstairs to a restaurant called 'Yummy yummy' - which is a cook-it-yourself restaurant. We were sat at a bar with pans of boiling water in front of us, into which they dropped lots of spices. Then they would bring you whatever you ordered off the menu - but completely raw. I ordered baby octupus and squid with some wong bok (cabbage type stuff) and noodles. It was good but I think I'll stick to having the food cooked for me from now on.

On Friday, we went to a Hutong after class, which is basically a little street or alleyway, often in the slums. This one is massively aimed at tourists though and was quite the commercial enterprise. We took rickshaws from the entrance of the Hutong down towards the entry of the park we were visiting - can't remember the name. The park was beautiful and we visited a teahouse and had a tea-tasting - I'm not exactly sure what the teas were, one of them was jasmine and I think one was lychee. They were all really nice.

In the evening, a few of us went out to dinner in Houhai (which is next to Beihai park). It was pretty expensive - it's pretty upmarket around there. The food was nice and we stayed there for a long time. The place is packed with bars - it's just a shame it's expensive. When I say expensive...it's still cheaper than the UK, but seems expensive compared to other places. We planned to meet up with some other people at a club called Suzie Wongs but we'd planned it a bit wrong - after talking to some Chinese girls, we realised we were a 3 hour walk away from where we were meant to be - so we called it a night and went back to the hotel around 1 or 2 am.

On Saturday morning, we got up early and went to Chengde, which is a 4 hour drive north of Beijing. It's the place that the emporor built as his summer resort, basically. I expected it to be very small but it was actually quite a big city - I think the population was something like 3 million?? In the afternoon, we visited the mountain resort, which was another beautiful park. The resort was similar to Forbidden City but built in a completely different style - apparently the emperor was trying to mix it up a bit! A few of us decided to separate off in the park and we rented a boat and toured the lakes for an hour. It was really nice and relaxing, much nicer than walking around in the heat. We serenaded some Chinese people with some silly English songs and they followed us around the lake!

After another delicious meal at the hotel, we ventured out into the night in Chengde to see what was going on. It wasn't the most lively place for nightlife and the best we could find was a karaoke bar. The man wasn't keen to haggle on price so we decided to walk around a bit instead. We found some people singing and dancing in the street and hung out there for a while. It started to get a bit late so we came back to the hotel and had an early-ish night.

On Sunday we visited two temples - I can't remember their names. The first one was smaller but I liked it a lot more. It felt genuine - there were actually monks chanting and praying and walking around playing their instruments. It was great. There was also a gigantic buddha - he's said to have 1000 arms, but he actually only has 42 because the Chinese say that each of his arms is worth 25 of ours. The second temple was massive and beautiful but far more touristy. Surprisingly, we seemed to be pretty much the only Westerners there - most of the tourists in Chengde are Chinese. We got lots of funny looks, pictures, and waves from children - getting used to it by now!! After the second temple, we had lunch and then got back on the coach to come back to Beijing.

I decided to get my hair cut so myself and another girl ventured across the street to a posh hairdressers. Only one or two people in there could speak a word of English so it was pretty funny trying to sort it all out. Luckily I had a magazine with photos of what I wanted so it was easy to get them to cut it. I had a complete blast in there - I was a bit nervous at first but they were all hilarious - between their bad English and my bad Chinese, we made lots of jokes and banter. Everyone in the salon was staring at me the whole time and all of the hairdressers who weren't working actually gathered around me and watched me! I managed to tell them that I was a foreign student studying across the street at BNU and they told me to come back in my free time to hang out with them!! The language barrier will no doubt continue to be a problem but I think I'll see if they want to go out for a beer - hopefully I've made some new Chinese friends!

After that, I showed off my new hair across the street at the really cheap bar where about 20 people had gathered. We dined on dumplings, noodle soup and fried rice, with lots of pijiu (beer). We decided to have an early night and I managed to get to bed before 1.

Chinese class this morning was good as usual, today we learned how to tell the time, which builds on what we learnt last week. It's all good to know but I think most of us would find it more useful to learn things which we can put into practice in real-life situations that we are in in Beijing. I've never had to ask a Chinese person the time so far!!

Anyway, sorry for the rushed entry! I don't have time to put up any pictures. I think we're off to the zoo this afternoon to see some pandas and then out on the town tonight. I'll write more soon!!