June 6: We arrived in Beijing on the evening of the 5th (The day after the 10 year anniversary of Tienanmem square) On the morning of the 6th, we had our first group breakfast. We ate in large groups the entire trip. I think there is a greater emphasis on the "group" which can be seen in the way people eat there. Notice the circular turntables that all the dishes are sitting on in the center of the table. Everyone shared all the food instead of the food being split up from the very beginning like in America. Most would pick food straight from the turntable.
breakfast 1
breakfast2
The foriegn student dorm.
This was our home base for the first month of our trip. The small 2 person rooms
seemed cruddy at first, but we soon realized that we had it good. Most students
at Tsinghua University shared the same size room with five other students, and
ha to walk to a separate building to take showers. Considering this, we were
treated extremely well!!!
Fields of Bikes
American Woman. We met a lot of people in the foriegn student dorm who held a stereotype that American women looked like the girls from Baywatch. We had to explain that this was just a myth. We decided to try to explain our own stereotype for the more common American trailertrash woman with this drawing!
June 7: We visited the Summer Palace, a garden in the northwest corner of Beijing. It's one of the places the Emperor would go when he was not at the Forbidden City. two thirds of the hill that makes up the Summer palace was actually created by dredging up and increasing the size of the lake next to the Palace.
The group shot at the Summer
Palace. I'm kneeling in the front row (dark shirt, jean shorts, and baseball
cap)
Sneaky Fans. Little did I
know that while I drew, I was gaining quite a fan club!
USA girl. We were afraid that the
people might resent us since we arrived 3 weeks after America bombed the Chinese
Embasy in Kosovo. We were wrong!
The Summer palace (taken
from a boat)
Girls on Boat.
June 8: Today we explored the difference between a historical shopping district (Liulichang) and a normal everyday shopping district on Qienmen road (near Tienanmen Square).
Liulichang (historical shopping district)
Modern Shopping area
Heading towards Tienanmen Gate
and the Forbidden City
Tienanmen Gate Group Shot
The Gate, at this time, was being worked on to prepare for the 50 year anniversary
of Communism in China
A postcard shot of the Forbidden
City
Postcard shot 2.
Pic of Forbidden City Gate
Me drawing at the Forbidden City
Sketchers. Jay Garrot helps
my friend Jen with her pen and ink sketches
Emperor Pu At the end of the tour,
Randy Porter (Pu Rendi) found a group of people who would dress you up like
the Emperor and carry you around in small "emperor cart" of some sort.
From this point on, Randy was known as Emperor Pu... a real icon for our group
June 10: Today we got on a bus and traveled 4 hours north of Beijing to Chengde, the location of the Summer Villa. The Summer Villa was a place where the Emperor would go hunting. The interesting thing about this place was that the Emperor invited rulers throughout China to hunt with him... and he created replicas of each ruler's palace throughout the villa to make them feel more at home.
Later that night, my friends and I noticed a sign that read "4th floor, Kereoke, Bar, Massage Room". We all decided that it might be fun to check out. What we didn't realize was that we were walking right into a Brothel. Note to travellers... the universal sign for Kereoke (pretending to sing into a mic) looks surprisingly like the universal sign for blowjob. Kereoke at your own risk!
