Long Vacation: Day 3

Rolling out of bed at 11, obviously the result of our late night of clubbin’, was sort of a damper on the day but it couldn’t be helped. We still had the same number of waking hours, right? It just wasn’t during normal daylight hours..anyway, we caught a series of confusing subways and buses to a HUGE outdoor market where I felt too over-whelmed to buy anything but helped Amanda bargain down a bag because we taught the vendors the word "zipper" hehe, we went back to the hostel and again found ourselves on a desperate search for something edible and quick before heading to an acrobat show. We were in a hurry but I wanted dumplings so I had a brilliant stroke of genius and got it “to go”..very literally.

Jiao zi in a bag! Soy sauce and everything ;) Just add chopsticks!

We rode to the acrobat show in one of those gray big van/little bus type things that have become too familiar on vacations. The show was pretty cool but it wasn’t NEARLY as intense as I hoped it would be or as all long enough for how much we paid for it but it was still good for the Beijing experience. It’s just hard when I’ve seen more impressive things at Epcot in the Chinatown there, ya know? Still though, there were some CRAZY moments. Like this!

and they had this girl who did tricks holding herself up by one hand on a teeny stand for like 3 minutes and they had one of those big metal round cages with motorcyclists riding around inside and got FIVE of them zooming around inside. Wowzas!!

After the show we made the mistake of thinking we could get ourselves to a silk and pearl market on our own if the driver let us off near a subway station--we could just find it from there. Nope. It was not to be so-- we ended up wandering around for about 2 hours. In the process we found a cool building and I snapped a couple pics.

We realized a couple minutes later that we’d stumbled onto Tiananmen Square. Oh :) A nice little bonus but we’d have to tour it another day! The subway station was shut down there and for the next two hours we wandered the streets looking for another station, trying to hail taxis, getting directions from guards who didn't actually know what they were talking about, using one of the nastiest bathrooms ever, eventually getting all of us but Tiffany, Shaw, Amanda and I in a cab headed to the silk market, wanting to pull our hair out when the few cabs we managed to hail told us they couldn’t take us where we needed to go, needing desperately to sit down, shaking my head in disbelief when Tiffany’s pants ripped and walking down the street through the mud and some turnip-looking plants to a bus stop. In hopes of preserving any sanity I had left, I started to laugh. Good and hard. And suddenly the situation wasn’t so bad anymore! Amanda and I were giggling at the weirdest things until we made it eventually to the subway and FINALLY the market.

The source of much happiness during this trip has been the turtle face. It came out for a brief moment on this weird night. Oh the joys of being on the subway and finding any way to entertain ourselves!

FINALLY at the silk market, I plummeted in energy levels even further when all of the sudden I was bombarded by the weirdest shopping experience I think must be possible in this life. Seriously, it’s hard to describe it. Imagine Satan’s minions trying to sell you a scarf. Calling to you as you innocently walk by, telling you they’ll give it to you for a low price, even grabbing at your arm sometimes as you pass. Now imagine isles and isles of booths packed as tight as sardines in a mall-type store with everything and ANYTHING you could ever want to buy as a souvenier from China and anything you could ever want from anywhere. Scarves, pearls, jade, robes, knock-off name brand stuff from Diesel, Abercrombie, Dulce and Gabbana, Versaci—bags, jeans, shoes, jackets, ANYTHING. 4 floors of that!!! Now imagine all of these minions are Chinese.

THIS is Beijing shopping.

It’s weird because they actually speak English, unlike other places we’ve been where bartering is like a silent battle of the calculator where not much is said but emotion can be implied with how forcefully you punch in the numbers or how disgustedly you look at the price they are asking. Here it’s like a game. A battle of wits and flattery and strategy and boy, that first day it was over-whelming. By the time it closed at 9 I was confused as heck and dead on my feet. Earlier we’d planned to ride the subway to the Olympic park and as tired as we were pressed on. Until we were 2 transfers away and the subways stopped running because it was too late. We went up to the street and debated what to do. Everyone wanted to go back to the hostel for the night but Debbie, Joey and I just could not give up the dream of seeing the Bird’s Nest. With the thought of “what would an Olympian do?” we set off regardless of our aching feet and pressed forward in the direction of the stadium, while doing charades of our favorite Summer olympic sports. The song "We're Coming to America" from the Hope of America program may or may have not been sung in an epic manner at this point ;)

We came to a random little plaza park area and noticed people rollerblading. How quaint, we thought. The moment exponentially grew in coolness when we noticed there were rollerblades to be rented. OH. BOY. For 5 yuan, we were convinced easily. I admit I took no thought to what diseases might plague me later in life because of this choice but was just as admittedly relieved when I was handed 2 little plastic bags to put on my feet before strapping into the blades. Chinese people are crazy but it’s good to know there are some things even THEY know have gotta happen.

So we were psyched, rollerblading to the Bird’s Nest! How cool is that?? Until we realized the park ended without making it to the stadium and we’d have to cross the street in rented rollerblades to continue. So whether or not it was allowed we crossed the street and into the unknown. I blame Joey. After wandering down a street and under a super creepy under-pass we got as far as we could go without crossing a major highway, so the quest was over for the night. Seriously awesome photo op!

Does it get any better than this?

Another really late night dragging ourselves to the hostel totally beat but once again, we’re only here once :)