Invasion of the Scots...

Amy and I endeavour to wake up fairly early on Thursday - in order to get everything done that we need to do and get to the Forbidden City. For the last couple of days we have had the room to ourselves which hasn't been disagreeable. This morning though we get a couple of new roomies (it's like big brother, who will you get? what will they be like?) who are in fact a couple and from Scotland! They are Rachael and James and are very lovely indeed. They have just travelled from Shanghai to Beijing via Chengdu and Xi'an, all the places that me and Ayms are destined for so we were eager to hear their stories.

Eventually we head out to the Forbidden City but arrange to go for some food later on, so we can show them some sights and sounds and help ease them into Beijing gently. The Forbidden City is a confusing place...also known as the Palace Museum. Amy and I were convinced we didn't want to go to the Palace Museum, just to the Forbidden City - this caused us problems because we were only able to buy tickets to the Palace Museum, there was no mention of the Forbidden City...a little later we discovered they were indeed the same thing!

We got into the City and lo and behold....it's under construction, we are now experts in Chinese scaffolding techniques and building equipment. We wander around, get stared at, wander some more, get stared at some more - our days are becoming fairly predictable at this point! THere is the usual crowds of tourists in red hats following a flag or an umbrella or someone screaming "BUS NUMBER 1, THIS WAY". It looked like one group had been told to dress up in their oddest outfits and that's how they would be distinguished for the day - there was a monk, a guy with a furry Russian hat on and a gaggle of women in 1920's style dress! The City was a lot of red buildings surrounding courtyards and off to the sides were small palaces with rooms and furniture...there was some information boards but not a huge amount to throw yourself into. At the back of the City was a garden which was nice apart from the lack of flowers, we ate some nutritional bread which was disgusting - apprently it contained carrots and eggs - we should have known from the start! On the way back to the exit we were railroaded into one of the courtyards and weren't allowed to leave. The crowd was already big and people were taking photos, we had no idea what was going on! Turns out there was some African officials being shown around and us lowly folk had to wait till they had passed.

Oh and Amy read somewhere that the Forbidden City is the size of Belgium?!?!? Enough said... :)

We left without anymore hassle and made our way back to the hostel. We met with James and Rachael again and decided to go to the Big Dead Fish Restaurant again - they gave us our own private dining room and free pork dumplings!? Amy will have to review these for you since I had already filled my "try one new thing a day" quota (that was the carrot bread Vikki if you already forgot :) This is the place to be if you have black micro fleece, they are all the rage!

Then to the hostel bar for a couple of drinks where we met Eric and a couple of hours later said goodbye to Eric - he's off to the more southerly parts of China. And then bed again...zzz zzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzz

PS. Amy's "OW"! count is up to about 400 in the last five days :)

Dead Fish!!

Ok, so everyday I need to ask Gem what day it is at least four times and know I'm trying to remember what days we did things on as well it is getting harder. I think we are now on Wednesday but all concept of days and time have left my head (a little bit like being at home, when I never knew when 9am was i.e. the time to start work ;) but worse)

We wake up late-ish, legs still ache and the plan was to go the Forbidden City. We then realise that the buildings are only open til 3.30pm so decide to leave this til tomorrow and head off in search of Beihai park instead.

Feeeling slightly brave this morning we stop off at some street stalls for some breakfast - nothing too adventurous - mainly bread but ridiculously feel very happy with ourselves with communicating with the nice Chinese lady - we've have learnt the hand signs for the numbers 1-10 and these are coming in very useful.

We continue walking, passed Tianenmen Square and up round the side of the Forbidden City and keep going. More walking, followed by more walking and then yep, some more walking until we turn the corner eventually and its there. The guide book describes this park as 'largely lake'!!! hmmmmm, me and Gem soon discover they have drained the lake :) and its under reconstruction as is the temple and most of the other buildings on the island in the middle. This city is going to look amazing for the Olympics!!! The rest of its is lovely though and me and Gem spend the next few hours wandering round.

You feel somewhat a celebrity in these parts when you are constantly being stared at. People aren't ashamed to do so either - the flip flops seem to be causing most amusement!! - and its all a little odd. We carry on regardless. Funniest moment happens when again me and Gem are approached and asked if we would mind having our photo taken??? This time by a young chinese boy on a class school trip it looks like. He's laughing while asking probably thinking we're going to say no, but hey why not?? We say yes and at this moment the whole class from this boys school is running towards me and Gem. Aaaagggghhhhh!!! :)

Its no use the feet will no longer work by the time we leave the park - so we have a choice bus or taxi??? hmm, new experience but there is no way there is going to be anymore walking. We make to the bus stop and then flag down the next taxi????? He has no idea what we're saying, where we want to go, but with whatever signs we used and with the help of the map we made it to our destination without being ripped off. oh yeah!! this chinese travelling thing is easy.

Confidence is up, we're starving so we head off to a small restaraunt not far from the hotel. Mmmmmm!!! It brilliant, sweet and sour pork, rice and deep fried potato things with drinks for about 3.50 pounds total!!! :)

The photos of the food are for you DJ :) Make sure you see the dead fish in the other one too. This was the only slightly concerning thing in the restaraunt. A fish about a foot and a half long dead floating on its back in the fish tank - dont know why but it cracked me up. Note to self - dont order fish off the menu!!

Back to the hostel and straight back out again - we are off to see the Chinese Acrobatics. Simple you would think but this firstly involves a 5min walk which involves crossing the road - not an easy thing to do here!! Follow the Chinese and hope for the best.

Show is amazing - some of the stunts the do are unbelievable!! the choereographed bits in the middle however to join everything together - comedy genius!!

A quick game of chicken with the traffice on the way home again, some drinks in the bar and lights out. I think we are turning in to old ladies!!

Houmous is not Cheese!

As a reward for all our hard work on the wall we went out for dinner with Eric and David to the chinese duck restaurant...so imagine the scene, David is about 7ft tall and in tow are the three of us...sunburnt (from the 12 degrees of course!) with quite obviously no idea what we are doing, the restaurant is packed with Chinese people and the waitress, although there is four of us standing in front of her repeatedly asks "table for four"? Eventually after she has paraded us around the entire room she finds us a table and we sit down．

Next comes the ordering saga, better known in our country as a game of pictionary! Davids duck was appalling - I'm surprised we didn't end up with eggs and bacon! But luckily international sign language prevailed and we got our duck, which was delicious. In an attempt to make life easier for everyone I decided to drink beer with the rest of them - I thought one glass won't be too difficult to drink?!...unfortunately the bottles she brought out were about the size of my arm, d'oh.

On the way back, David said he would show us where Tian'anmen Square was, this was highly useful since Ayms and me had gotten completely lost looking for it on the first day - turns out we'd gone in totally the wrong direction. Little did we know that the Square was a fair distance away - strike number two for the already sore feet. Outside the Forbidden City - we were cornered by some very excited Chinese man who wanted to have his picture taken with us...all together/individually...and then it was the turn of his brother/his sister/his friends...by which time a small crowd had gathered to watch this spectacle..."GREAT PHOTO!"

By the time we got back to the hostel there was no question that sleep was the only thing that we needed...and thus ended another day in Beijing :)

Being led into slavery??!

Welcome to entry #3...The Wall

Beep Beep Beep - the alarm goes off - its 5:45am...that's right, that hour does exist in mine and Amy's world! We dragged ourselves out of bed and manage to make it to breakfast across the way in the hotel - eggs, ham, bread/toast, bananas and curried potatoes!! Nice! We ordered some sandwiches - the vegeatable sandwich = bread and lettuce, tasty!

The bus ride took three hours and was a good opportunity to meet some folk, there is a fairly random assortment of people here, David some dude from Melbourne, a guy- Eric from Minnesota another one from Chicago/Limp bizkit, an older lady and a couple of older guys. All travelling on their own.

The tour started at Jingshanling which for us wasn't a car park full of tourist buses and hundreds of people milling about but a dirt track on the way up the mountain - confusion sets in but the driver quickly clears things up by pointing in the direction of the mountain. So we set off, not sure what to expect but soon realise we have to walk up the mountain to get to the wall - this wasn't an easy start to the day and should have prepared us for what was to come! On the way up the path a bunch of chinese people seemed to latch onto our group - were they another tour group? were they guiding us up the mountain? Well, they followed us up the mountain and halfway along the wall and then turned on us with their bags full of books and tee shirts and postcards. We ended up with a few postcards, which should be winging their way to you as we speak!

The first part of the wall was fairly easy, some big steps and steep climbs but all in all it was pleasant and the views were amazing. At the point when the Chinese folk left us, the wall seemed to become this crumbling mess of stones, at some points there was barely even a path - I think from this point on I spent most of the time looking at my feet trying not to trip over! We reached one tower and usually there is a step that leads down to the next section of wall - not this one, this one had a steep hill and a small ledge. To avoid falling into Mongolia Eric and David jumped down onto the ledge and then it was mine and Amy's turn, we had David propped against the wall and Eric on the ledge ready to grab us as we jumped...(Note to Amy's Dad - I know we agreed after the last piggy back incident that I wouldn't jump on anymore boys - but this was necessary!) Everyone survived unscathed though! So once we were all safely down we look up to see one of our group strolling round the side of the tower along a path!? "There's a path you know" Yeah brilliant - thanks for that!

The rest of the wall was the same, rockery ground, steep climbs...then very wobbly bridge which we had to pay to cross! At Simitai - the walking wasn't over just yet - there was the walk down the other side to get to the bus, improved only by the Chinese-English signs who have been translated by some imbecile - remember the fire is heartless, the scenery is beautiful because of our cherish, in thunderstorm weather do not stay overnight on the wall!

The bus ride home consisted of sleeping. The legs and feet just havent been the same since!

Crazy Frog

Hi again,

Ok, so we drive through Beijing to our hostel and there is no order to this city??? the crazy frog song is playing on the radio. aaggghhhhhhh!!! there is no escaping it. We take a right of the main street and turn into this unbelievable side street. And although I'm going to sound ridiculous when I say it is the most 'Chinese' place to the point that it is overly Chinese??? that I've ever seen. Stalls, shops spilling out on to the street, bicycles everywhere, rickshaws, men in business suits walking to work??, women standing outside their houses in their pyjamas and slippers, cars, dogs, buidlers of course, bright signs etc. It is mayhem.

We pull upside this plush hotel and me and Gem are obviously pleased. The man at reception however, isnt so sure who we are?? oh no!! but finds our reservation.......... but, of course we're taken back across the road to the hostel part of the hotel. back to earth with a small bump. room is basic but clean. everything we could need is downstairs, so we dump our stuff and move out. we manage to walk for about 45 mins find the supermarket try and suss out a few restaraunts before we are back at the hostel and sound asleep.

Wake up when our 'roomies' arrive back. A dude from Canada we think and his Taiwanese wife. Possibly more bizarre for them than us but they both seem nice. We manage to make it downstairs for some food and drink in the evening and book ourselves on the a Great Wall Tour for the morning - 6.30am start!!! before heading back upstairs for some more sleeping :)

The fire is heartless!!

Hi everyone,

So most of you should have got the first email saying we had landed in China all safe and accounted for. The website should now also be up and running if this first blog all goes to plan. Thanks J for all your help with the website depsite the Chinese emails - hopefully us squirlies should now have this sussed.

Ok, not all going quite to plan the Chinese lady has just been in to tell us the computers are to be shut down now. We've just managed to blag another 20 mins so this may be shorter than we had expected.

We get to Heathrow, check in and then I think nervousness and excitement sets in as we seem to be laughing at anything. Then me being me, I shout out that I can see Damon Hill standing over there. Gem has no idea what I'm talking about and starts turning round and round to see who I'm pointing at and then walks in to him!! brilliant!! a quick sorry to Mr Hill and we're off.

Fligth is boarding and we are told we've been upgraded. oh yeah!! thanks margaret!!! makes our journey much more comfortable but we dont get any sleep!!! much films, food and drinks followed by more flims, food and drinks before we land in China.

More forms to fill in at the airport - all relatively easy, get speaking to a girl called Jade - she's just arrived on our flight too and basically doing the same trip as us although the China bit is a planned tour thing and we head off to find our bags. It turns out some other girl on the flight has exactly the same bag as me. Oh dear!! I have visions of some girl taking my bag before I'm even out of the airport but all is well, both the bags are in our safe hands?? and now all we have to do is find the Chinese man with the sign.

Walk through arrivals and you are greeted with a million Chinese people all holding up name signs??? looking more unlikely that will find our man but turns out to be relatively easily. There he is in a brown hat and suit??? outside Starbucks!!! just like they said he would be. He speaks no English but me and Gem follow on.

First impressions are bizarre - its really smoggy and grey. spring is definitely not here yet and the whole city is preparing for the Olympics - construction sites are everywhere = equals small chinese men in yellow hats with spades.

I'm being kicked out!! lots more news to come. We're both a little sunburnt (sorry mums) even though it was only about 12 degrees but doing brilliantly. Back soon.

Amy & Gem
xxx

Gem snoozing

Gem snoozing
Originally uploaded by girlsbigtrip.

And this is me. I'm Gem. I also enjoy a bit of drinking and sleeping!

Amy snoozing

Amy snoozing
Originally uploaded by girlsbigtrip.

This is me. I'm Amy. I like sleeping and drinking!

What time is it?

It's Chico Time!
Originally uploaded by girlsbigtrip.

It's Chico time!

Welcome to our online journal type thing where we will be keeping you updated and informed about the "girl's big trip"!