So he took us to this little hole-in-the-wall place that only locals obviously go, and, of course, the menu was totally in Chinese characters. We stared blankly and helplessly at it while the server, a doll-like thing with an easy smile and dimples, gave us all these choices that we didn't know anything about. I think she was asking, 'What kind of meat do you want?" "What kind of vegetable?" "Do you want pan-fried or steamed?" At the time, I didn't even know the Chinese word for "steamed" so we were in a world of trouble. Ordering 3 dishes was an ordeal, and she kept laughing at us, but in the end the lamb pan-friend dumplings and steamed egg-and-chive dumplings were great, as was this salad made of raw napa cabbage.
Saturday, got up not so early and missed breakfast, then went straight to Tiananmen to meet a friend. By the time we got there it was too late to get into Mao's Mausoleum, which I have identified as the one thing I can't leave Beijing without seeing (weird, I know--I've wanted to see it ever since I took a Cultural Revolution class in college). Walked around the square, which is ENORMOUS, walked north to the north gate and the Chairman's benevolent portrait overlooking the whole scene.
The Forbidden City is also ENORMOUS. I can't get over how many millions of stones must have been laid out by the hands of hardworking Chinese laborers. I was disappointed to find that the most important buildings were under intense renovation, but the Imperial Garden was totally lovely.
Afterwards, grabbed some snacks at Wangfujing Snack Street, where we had lamb skewers, some kind of puff pastry like thing, a kind of Uigher bread stuffed with lamb and leeks, and this amazing invention: a pile of french fries with fried egg on top. And when we ordered it, the guy dunked it in hot oil to be fried AGAIN! It was delicious. We gawked at the availability of starfish and other strange sea creatures impaled on skewers.
Then, still hungry, we made our ways over to Li Qun Roast Duck Restaurant in the Dongcheng district. It is tucked away into some back alley that is really hard to find except for the crude, stick-figure drawings of ducks on the walls and arrows leading us further into the courtyard.
The duck was delicious, though probably on par with Quanjude.:
Went to Tom's Shop for DVDs afterwards and bought:- Lilo & Stitch
- Pan's Labyrinth
- Paris J'taime
Sunday, got up relatively early with the intention of going to the Summer Palace. However, the Beijing Marathon thwarted our plans, and we had to settle for Yuanming Yuan, the Old Summer Palace which turned out to be pretty cool in its own right--a huge park with lots of lakes and trees. The most interesting part though, were the ruins of the old summer palace of Emperor Qianlong. The emperor had built many Western-style buildings which were all burned to the ground by the "8 Countries Army" - basically a force of many European countries + Japan, and I think the Chinese still feel some serious rancor towards the Japanese for this hairy incident, among others:
My favorite part was the maze the Emperor has built for his guests and concubines:
Afterwards we went to this nearby restaurant serving, I believe, Shandong food. It was a kind of hot-and-sour hotpot made of some tomato based broth, onions, ginger, etc. We steeped a whole catfish (yummy!), lotus root, seaweed, and tofu. It was eaten with many delicious condiments like ground peanuts, fresh garlic, cilantro, scallions, and some kind of nutty paste I couldn't identify.
Spent the afternoon at the new Summer Palace, the one overrun with tourists. Saw the Empress Cixi's chambers, then strolled along Kunming Lake:
Then clambered up some seriously steep stairs to the Tower of Buddhist Incense, this gorgeous temple perched atop a high cliff. From the top, we saw the Thousand-Handed Guanying statue, and a beautiful Beijing sunset in the distance.
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