We found a great Muslim food joint just around the corner from the hostel. Here they served the speciality of Dapan Gee, or Dapan Jizzle as it is more recently known. A large serving of chicken, potatoes, peppers and thick noodles in a spicy sauce, accompanied by a few lamb kebab skewers, mutton samsa's (little pies), Chinese Muslim style naan bread, rice and of course green tea. We must have ate this same meal 5 out of the 6 days we spent in Beijing, it was great. The other remaining night I convinced everyone to go eat some traditionally famous Peking Duck. It wasn't bad but I was expecting better.
We had much to do with our short time in Beijing but I think we saw everything we needed too. We visited the Lama Temple, which is supposed to China's greatest temple housing a 25m Buddha statue (Yep, another grand Buddha). We took a stroll through the Forbidden City, which was the Chinese imperial palace during the Ming – Qing Dynasty, built in 1406-1420, it has been amazingly preserved. This is where the emperor would live back in the day. This another UNESCO world heritage sight. Im sure if you are interested in Chinese history you would appreciate this place more than we did, even so, it was definitely worth the visit.
The metro system used in Beijing (and also Nanjing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Hong Kong) is so efficient. Trains are more frequent than the Tube, they are in far better condition, with hardly any graffiti or litter anywhere, plus it was incredibly cheap, around 20p for a ticket anywhere in the city!
Ok, the one we had been waiting for, it was the day to go trek The Great Wall of China. We teamed up with a dude called Elliot for the trek, a skater boy from Croyden, who was a hybrid version of Jeff Goldblum and the Simpsons' Mr. Burns, he was now known as Jeff Burns. We made our own way to a more desolate section of the wall in the area of Jinshanling. From here we would hike the wall 10km to the Simatai area. It was really cold and windy the day of the trek and there was even settled snow around the wall, but this did not ruin the magnificence of the incredible structure one bit. The reason we chose this section of the wall is because there were parts that had not been renovated since its construction in mid 6th Century, the stairs and towers were in ruins, which made the walk pretty intense at parts. The wall in total spans for an incredible 8850-odd km and is the only man made structure that is supposedly visible from space? The reason for the wall was to protect China from its northern border enemies, and a did a fair job at defending incoming attacks notably from Mongolia. The walk was great, I think because of the unsteady weather conditions we had the entire wall to ourselves. Not one beggar or woman selling bric-a-brac or army of tourists snapping away for miles, we were blessed. I think because of this, it will remain one of the highlights of the trip for sure, you have to see this one for yourselves.
We took a evening metro ride over to see the 2008 Olympic stadium, known as the Birds Nest. The athletics stadium and the aquatics stadium are directly across the road from one another and are lit up at night, in a deep orange and bubbles blue respectively. There is also the telecommunications tower at the west end of the road with the multicolored Olympic rings logo at the top in the distance. It must have been an amazing sight during the incredible open ceremony back in 2008.
We met so many people during our time at Leo hostel, who were all a good laugh to be around, except for one couple, a German woman who was pretty cool and her Australian boyfriend who everyone basically despised. He was a big guy (think rhinoceros) who was loud, obnoxious and wouldn't shut the f**k up! They had followed us to Beijing from Pingyao and were now asking questions about our next destination and whether they could join us. Despite the upcoming events Im about to share, we would have done everything in our power to avoid this from happening. Once again lady luck was on our side. The day the couple arrived they spent it drinking. An all day sesh to say the least. We had returned from the great wall to find them in a pretty smashed state (and just that little bit more annoying). We had been told the Rhino had already pissed a few people off by changing the music in the bar and being a control freak with the community card game. The night goes on, we play cards, Rhino suspects German girlfriend of getting too friendly with Maj, Rhino confesses his thoughts to another girl sat next to him, German girl hears this, the arguing begins, Maj is a home-wrecker. At this point everyone fled the bar area and went to bed.
The next moring........
I go for my morning shower and when I come out who should be there but Rhino, covered in blood! His own I might add, Yes! He tells me that his girlfriend had attacked him last night with a beer bottle and smashed him across the head a few times with it. I tried to control my laughter. He said he was going back to Oz and was leaving her. She had no money and was going to have to go back to Germany. And they were supposed to be working together for the next few months in Papau New Guinea, not anymore I guess. Call me a horrible person but I had one thought on my mind........At least they ain't coming to Haerbin!
Beijing was definitely the first place that I felt really reluctant to leave, especially as it was our last stop for Hassan our Turkish sidekick. We said our goodbyes and he looked really upset to see us depart, we also felt bad leaving him behind, but, the show must go on.
Beijing Photo Link:
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