Happy Thanksgiving...China style!

Not having good internet in China has put us behind on our blogging, but we thought we should skip ahead a bit and talk about Thanksgiving!  Back to the Great Wall, Xi'an, and Shanghai later.

Our last meal in China happened to be Thanksgiving Day so we decided to go all out.  We weren't going to let being half-way around the world stop us from celebrating one of our favorite American holidays...it was time for a feast!  They don't have turkey in Shanghai, so we went with the next best thing, Peking Duck.  Peking Duck is from Beijing (Peking is the traditional name for the city), so we did some research and found an authentic restaurant that serves it in Shanghai.  I think we made a good choice because the place was packed with Chinese and there was a big cart of ducks being carved up at a station near the door.

carving up the duck

Since it was Thanksgiving, we wanted to have a full table of food, so ordered several dishes to share.  This is a typical Chinese way to order at restaurants, so it worked out pretty good.  We went for anything that sounded remotely "Thanksgiving-ish."  We had...

a feast

Peking Duck - They brought us a platter of thinly sliced pieces of meat, sauce, some crispy and thin slices of greens, and Chinese "pancakes".  We had no idea what to do with all of this, so we tried to sneak a peak at what other people were doing.  We never had a good view so we are not sure we did it the right way, but what we came up with was dipping a couple pieces of meat in the sauce and putting it on the pancake with a little bit of the sliced greens and then wrapping it up and eating it.  Seemed right.  Adam wasn't too fond of it, but I actually didn't think it was too bad.  I liked that the meat was wrapped up and I didn't have to look at it when I ate so I didn't have to think about the fact that I was eating duck.

Chinese Yams with Pomelo Sauce - We knew when we ordered this that pomelo is a type of citrus fruit, so the combination didn't sound good...but yams fit in with Thanksgiving so we were hoping to be surprised.  Unfortunately, we were right and it wasn't good.  It tasted like cold mashed potatoes topped with sour fruit sauce. I ate a little bit but Adam was done after his first bite.

Broccoli - Doesn't scream Thanksgiving, but it's hard to go wrong with steamed broccoli.

Apples cooked in toffee - This one wasn't too bad.  It was a mound of apple chunks covered in rock hard caramelized sugar.  The only problem was we weren't sure how to eat it since all we had was chopsticks and they weren't putting a dent in the toffee.  The waitress set a little bowl of water by the plate and pointed to the apples, but we weren't sure what it was for.  She saw us struggling with it a little later on and brought over a knife which made it a lot easier.

Homemade Pumpkin Pie - We couldn't believe it when we saw this on the menu.  How perfect!  We had a feeling that it wasn't going to be normal pumpkin pie since it was the cheapest thing on the menu at only 1 RMB, about 15 cents, but it was worth a shot.  When this dish came out it was a big surprise.  Hard to explain, but it was a kind of sticky steamed dough with a Chinese design stamped into it and filled with red bean paste.  Didn't taste the least bit like pumpkin although it did have a slight orange color.

It turned out to be a very memorable Thanksgiving dinner.  Probably not our favorite turkey-day meal, but still a memorable one!  We have so many things to be thankful for this year...being able to see so many amazing things and places, meeting new people, and having the support and love of our family and friends back home. Plus there's each other, but after almost 4 and a half months of being together 24/7 we're more thankful that the trip is almost over! No, just kidding, it's been an amazing journey so far with it's up's and down's, but we're both thankful to have somebody to share it with. All that said, we do hope it's the last Thanksgiving we ever spend in China!    

Highlights of Beijing

We weren't going to let the chilly weather or a silly tea scam ruin our time in Beijing, so we spend most of our days out seeing the sights, always making it back to the warmth of our hostel just after sunset. We weren't prepared for weather like this. Beijing has some amazing tourist sights, many of them I'd consider 'world-listers' or 'bucket list' or however you want to put it. Here's a few...

Forbidden City
Officially known today as the Palace Museum, the Forbidden City is where the Emperor and his court lived. It is a huge complex covering 14 square kilometers of temples, courtyards, living quarters, and everything else you would need for a private, secluded city. Completed in 1422, the Forbidden City housed 24 emperors until the revolution of 1912 and from then, the Forbidden City was forbidden no more. Today it serves as a huge museum, as most of the buildings have been restored or are left relatively unchanged, and many smaller buildings house small collections of art, clocks, jewelry, tableware, carvings, etc. It would take you at least one full day to cover it all, but not having the energy for that, we sought out what we thought looked cool and wandered around some of the quieter courtyards and alleys.

moat and guard tower around the Forbidden City

Steph loves this shot so I put it in

one of many walkways separating different parts of the city

Tiananmen Square
Many people do a 'superlatives tour' of China - they have a lot of the world's biggest, longest, tallest, etc. to be proud of here (and some maybe they shouldn't be proud of). Well, here is the most populated country in the world we have the largest public square on earth. I must say, it is huge, but I don't really understand what's so great about that. It's just open space. Couldn't anybody tear down a few buildings and have a big open space within a city? The history of this square, though, cannot be disputed. From the proclamation of the People's Republic in 1949 to the massacre of protesting students in 1989, a lot has happened here. Being so big, I didn't find it all that recognizable, except for the famous portrait of Mao on the Tiananmen Gate.

famous spot

the square

Sunset from Jinghshan Park
Beijing is very flat, which is part of the reason the bike is the traditional transportation of choice for the locals. Maybe it was the cold weather or the fact that owning a car is a hot commodity in modern China, but the bike lanes were largely empty while we were in town. Anyways, the city is flat except for 3 hills. At least one of these is the home to Jinghshan Park, just north of the Forbidden City, which makes it an excellent place to watch the sunset.

looking down on the Forbidden City

Temple of Heaven Park
The Temple of Heaven is a famous temple where the emperor would go every year to pray for a good harvest and fair weather. The grounds of the enormous park surrounding the temple were originally closed to the public, until 1912 on the Republic of China's first national day. Today is a sprawling area of trees, grass, and walkways where many locals come to play cards or Chinese chess, practise some dancing, or play music. We didn't care much about seeing the temple and instead just strolled around watching the locals. For some reason, whenever it's their turn to play a card or make a move in chess, they slam down the card with authority. Then there's also the old ladies swaying and gliding around the park as they practise their traditional dancing and sometimes singing.

all the old people gathered to play some cards

these guys are playing chinese chess

Olympic Park
Since the 2008 Olympics, who didn't want to go see the bird's nest and water cube in person? I know I did and they did not disappoint. You walk out of of the subway station and bam! there it is! A huge, jumbled, beautiful mess of twisted steel. It's an amazing sight. We were there at dusk so got to see the water cube first light up and watched as they slowly lit the bird's nest level by level. Two amazing structures, surrounded by some equally enchanting buildings like the big IBM building next door.

the Bird's Nest! so cool

Asian photo in front of the Water Cube

not to be outdone, the Bird's Nest is lit up nicely at night too

Oh, ya, there's also some big wall near here that is pretty famous. It was so good that it deserves it's own post.  Stay tuned...

The Beijing Tea Scam

I guess it was bound the happen eventually. All around the world people have tried and we've always been wise to it, but our first day in Beijing we were finally scammed. Bad. By three friendly Chinese ladies, too. Let's start from the beginning. We had just finished visiting the Forbidden City and were standing just outside the gates alongside Tiananmen Square. As we were taking some pictures in front of the famous Mao Zedang portrait, three Chinese started chatting with us. Where are you from? First time to China? That sort of thing. Happens a lot. Eventually the mentioned that they were just about to go get some tea before a flag-lowering ceremony in a couple hours in the square, and wanted to know if we'd like to join them. This happens fairly often, and normally we just make up an excuse and politely refuse. Maybe we're cautious, maybe we're anti-social. This time, we couldn't really think of a good excuse. It was cold, hot tea sounded good. The ladies were nice. Many Chinese will literally pay you to practise their english on you, so it didn't seem out of the ordinary at all. So, we agreed to tea. We set off to find a place and the ladies were busy firing off questions and chatting us up. No warning bells whatsoever.

scammer's hunting grounds

We wondered around for a bit, and almost passed a place that said "Tea/Coffee" outside. One of the ladies stuck her head in the door to see if it was open. At first we thought it wasn't and were going to keep looking, but finally someone did come out and showed us to a room. They presented us a menu that listed the types of tea and quoted "39 RMB/per person/per person" which was not only expensive (about $6), but also didn't make a whole lot of sense. Reluctantly we agreed that this was okay, since we were enjoying the conversation and it was just that cold outside. We settled in and had a good time chatting it up with our new friends. They were from somewhere in the north and were having a ladies holiday in the capital, while their husbands were home working. We chatted about everything from Jackie Chan to a secret Chinese boiled-Coke and ginger sore throat remedy. They were really nice ladies. Still no warning bells.

the most expensive tea and snacks ever

Everyone ordered a different tea and they came out and did a little ceremony for each one. It was fairly interesting - some teas they made you smell and one of them they poured a little bit over a small "tea Buddha" figurine before serving it to us. I still can't decide if this was a total croque or legit tea-ceremony rituals. For each tea they gave all of us a small shot glass-size taster. We made it through our 5 teas and decided to have one more since 6 is a lucky number in China, or something like that. Everything was going good, of course, until the bill came. Originally we had a tiny little girl serving our tea, but for the bill they brought in the stern manager, who showed us a calculator reading "302." At first I thought this was the total bill, which should have been about what we were expecting. Slowly we realized, with horror, that this is what EACH of us owed. Our heads were spinning. What is going on? How much is that? We did the math - almost $50 each. Over $90 for tea?!? Wait, that can't be right. I kept looking at our Chinese friends and they were just counting out their money. They were billing us $6 for each tea we tried, plus essentially $15 for a "private room fee", as well as for each of the two bowls of bar snacks they had brought for us, as well as a 10% service fee on top of all that. We just couldn't believe it. We didn't even have that much money on us, but they kindly informed us they took credit cards. Nowhere in China takes credit cards. That should have been yet another clue that we were getting scammed, but still we just couldn't see it. We were just so confused and shocked. We paid up and got out of there as fast as possible, fuming. Still with no good excuse, we simply told the Chinese ladies we couldn't go to the flag ceremony and parted ways. At this point we're fuming, confused...what the heck just happened? Then we got back to our hostel, got on Google, and looked on in horror as we read the hundreds of accounts of the Beijing Tea Scam. Account after account of the exact same story as ours. How had we not heard about this?

if in Beijing, don't go here!

After reading people's postings on their Tea Scam experience, many of which went back and got their money back, we went to bed determined to do the same. First thing the next morning we headed back by the tea shop to take some "surveillance" pics and get the address to show the cops. The little girl that had served our tea saw us and asked us if we needed help. It started cordial enough, but eventually I got into her a little bit and told her I was going to the cops if she didn't give me my money back. She immediately offered half the money, but wouldn't go past giving 400 of our 600 back. We were determined to get 500 back, as even though 100 RMB ($15) is a lot for tea, it is about what we had agreed to pay. So, we went and found a policeman to help us. He hardly spoke a word of english, but when he heard "teahouse" he made a slight grin, nodded his head and said "I know, I know." Eventually we ended up in the back of a Beijing policecar with two cops who spoke no english at all. They knew the place. The second they walked in the doors with us in tow, the girls at the teahouse turned real friendly again. They immediately offered to refund our credit card and did, but reminded us that "in China, nothing is free." We agreed and paid them 100, which we thought was more than fair and they took happily. Probably shouldn't have given them a cent, but didn't feel right about it even if they had scammed us.

So that was it. We originally weren't going to tell anybody about the whole ordeal and just forget about it. When you try to explain it to someone, you feel like a real idiot for falling for that, but I can't tell you how flawlessly this rouse was pulled off. It was brilliant. From the acting jobs of the 3 Chinese ladies, to the way they almost missed the teahouse, to the confusion of the menu, to the stern manager demanding money just when we were shocked from the bill. To this day I have a hard time believing those three sweet ladies were in on it. How could they? And that brings me to the most depressing thing from the whole ordeal. When traveling, you simply cannot trust anybody you meet on the street. We ran into this in Egypt, South America, Thailand, and now in China. There are lots of people that genuinely love to talk to a foreigner (especially an American) and to practise what little english they may know. But there are also people that pretend to be interested in talking to you but are only looking to scam some money out of you. You can't tell the difference. It truly is a shame. From now on, if people try to talk to us on the streets, we basically say "no thanks" and keep walking, and that really sucks. I hate wondering if anybody we talk to is just trying to scam us. Meeting locals is one of the best parts of traveling, and now we are suspicious of anybody we talk to. Ugghh. It's frustrating. At least we learned a valuable lesson and have a good story to tell. We weren't going to let it dampen our spirits too much though, because we have a lot to see in Beijing!

Our Last Two Days in Tokyo

We're back! Yes, we were away. You didn't notice? There was a bit of a problem with "the Great Firewall of China" but I seem to have bypassed it. Blogging, with photos, should return. As usual, we're a bit behind...

Tokyo river ferry

When we first planned our flights for this trip, we had figured 5 nights in Japan would be enough to see Tokyo for a few days and a couple days in Kyoto or somewhere like that. Once we started doing some research and realized how incredibly expensive Tokyo is, we changed our flights to only allow four nights. Looking back, 4 nights was a good amount of time to spend in Tokyo but I wish we had more time to see the rest of the country. It's just so expensive. Like we've said almost everywhere we've been, we want to go back. Probably not for a while, though, so we had to make good use of our last couple days in Tokyo. One of the neighborhoods I wanted to check out is Shibuya, known as an area for young Tokyoians to come shop for the latest fashions. The fashion trends over here can be, in a word, ridiculous, so we wanted to see some of it for ourselves. Our first stop was right next to the train station - a statue of a dog named Hachiko. As the story goes, Hachiko and his owner were very close. Every morning Hachiko would walk with him to the train station, then come back later and wait until he came home from work. One day the owner died while at work, yet Hachiko still came every afternoon to wait for his master. Every day for 11 years. A very touching story, especially if you're a dog lover. Today there is a famous statue of Hachiko outside that same train station as a symbol of loyalty, now used as a nice photo-op for the locals.

What is it with Asians and the peace sign?

There is a chain of stores in Japan known as Tokyu Hands that I had been wanting to check out. They carry your standard home decorating items, as well as supplies for DIY hobbiests. Okay, so maybe it's a 'you had to be there' kind of thing, but it's much more interesting than it sounds. This store has everything. Looking to make snow globes for Christmas presents this year? They've got you covered. Can't choose which color sand you want to use in your model train village? Pick a few, they have at least a dozen to choose from. Test tubes, magnifying glasses, back scratchers, hoola-hoops. Not only do they carry all these things, but they have a wide selection. Seriously, they have a good 15 types of back-scratchers to choose from. As I type this, it doesn't sound so great, but trust me, this store is awesome!

Who knew there were so many back-scratcher options available?

I've always wanted a fake rubber pizza that I can spin on my finger

After exploring Shibuya in the morning, we headed north to Yoyogi park. This is the place to be on weekends, where all kinds of teenage cliques and musicians gather. Goths, punks, rock, street performers, the whole lot. It's supposed to be a real spectacle. Unfortunately we weren't there on a weekend, so we had to settle for more normal Tokyoians. Still, we got to watch some extremely unathletic Japanese attempt to play basketball, a couple taking their cat for a walk (on a leash), and some locals practicing anything from acting to sword fighting and bartending tricks. Plus, the weather was perfect and the fall colors were nice.

Sword practice. Japanese take their hobbies VERY seriously

Located adjacent to Yoyogi park is Meiji Shrine, the must-see shrine in Tokyo. Set in a large forested area, it is a beautiful set of courtyards and buildings. I don't fully understand the difference between a shrine and a temple, or even what it is a shrine for, but it was pretty.

Meiji Shrine

A few families had their kids decked out in traditional outfits

After Meiji shrine, we had a real trek to get to the Government Metropolitan Building to see sunset from their viewing room 45 floors up. I may have mentioned Steph is usually the slow and steady type when it comes to walking or hiking (emphasis on slow), but when she wants to get somewhere she does not mess around. We covered what was probably close to 3 miles in about 45 minutes and made it just in time to see the sun fall behind Mt. Fuji. It was incredible. One of the most amazing views we've ever seen. The lights of Tokyo stretch as far as you can see in every direction, and it was our first glimpse of Mt. Fuji, silouetted against the orange-red sunset. Stunning.

Our last morning we finally made it to the Edo-Tokyo museum. We had tried to go our first day, but it was Monday and therefore closed. We can't keep track of the days of the week. Anyways, the Edo-Tokyo museum looks exactly like a spaceship from Star Wars, so I was humming the theme song all day.

How does that song go again?

So, Edo was the original name of Tokyo. Originally it was a small fishing village that grew into the effective capital of Japan in around 1500 or 1600 even while the emperor lived in Kyoto. Tokyo was officially established in the late 1800's after the 17-year-old Emperor Meiji moved to Edo. It all sounds familiar to 'The Last Emperor', but our tour guide said the movie was "weird." It's amazing that Tokyo is really only about 400 years old - an incredibly short amount of time for a city to become one of the biggest, most important cities in the world. The museum was really nice and organized in true Japanese fashion and we were happy to accept the services of a free personal guide. Actually we made money by getting a guide - afterwards she gave us a 5 yen coin (about 6 cents) that symbolizes friendship. A really nice thing to do, and we were extra happy because the 5 yen coin has a hole in the middle and we needed one for our coin collection. Bonus!

They were really proud of this model village. Each figure is hand-made, unique, and cost like $200! There's 800 of them!

A traditional Japanese play. The guy in black is the hero

We were really sad to leave Tokyo behind. We felt like we had barely scratched the surface of Toyko, much less the whole country. Despite the high cost of living (or maybe because of it), it's probably the most liveable foreign city we've come across. How cool would that be? Those dreams (pipe dreams, I might add. Don't worry mom, we're not gonna move to Japan...probably) will have to go on hold as we get set to touch down in the capital of the People's Republic of China and home to life-listers like the Great Wall, Bird's Nest, and the Forbidden City - Beijing! Oh ya, click HERE for all of our pictures from Tokyo - there are a lot but some of them are pretty funny.

Tokyo: First Impressions

Five-story pagoda

The Greater-Tokyo area is home to over 33 million people, making it the largest city in the world. But it's not just one city - it's made up of 23 city wards, 26 cities, 5 towns and 8 villages, and let me tell you it is massive. Just mind-bogglingly big. The Tokyo Metropolis is kinda like a state, and includes many small islands and areas far outside the city. When you look at just the city center, it's the most densely populated metropolis in the world. Knowing all of this, I'm sure it'll come as just as much of a surprise to you as it was to us that Tokyo is probably the most peaceful city we've ever been in. It's remarkably quiet. Owning a car is very expensive (and this is already a very expensive city as it is), so there's not a whole lot of traffic. The cars that are on the road actually follow these things called "driving laws" which have been largely ignored pretty much everywhere else we've been. And they don't honk. Ahh, the sweet bliss of traffic without all the honking. Most people seem to take public transportation or ride bikes. It's pretty flat and there's plenty of bike lanes or at least wide sidewalks that make biking very easy. It's not uncommon to see old people probably in their 80's riding home from the grocery store.

like this guy...

Then there's the public transportation. Where do I begin... it makes Marta look like Thomas the Train. There's the subway system, then a rail system (which is operated by over 30 different companies), and we haven't even attempted to use the bus system. It's hard to even grasp the complexity of it, but there are 882 different rail and subway stations. With very little signage in english, let's just say it can get a bit confusing.

this is just the subway map

overlap the JR train map over the subway map, then add about 20 more lines not served by JR

Adding to the peacefulness of the city are the shrines, temples, and of course the japanese gardens. We've been to a few temples so far and I have to say they're not super interesting. Pretty much all of them were either destroyed by a major earthquake in 1923 or air raids during WWII. The architecture is cool but there's not that much going on inside. There are, however, a few rituals going on outside that are worth noting. Our favorite would be the fortunes. For a 100 yen donation (about $1.25), you shake a metal box with a small hole in it until a stick slides out. You match the symbol on the stick to the correct drawer and retrieve your fortune! As fate would have it, I drew a "Bad Fortune" on my first go, but since I forgot to make a wish I cheated a little and drew again, this time only receiving a "Regular Fortune" which I was satisfied with. Steph of course drew a "Good Fortune" on her first try and was very happy. Whatever wish she made is sure to come true, though she hasn't received her "free Starbucks for life" voucher quite yet.

Sensoji Temple

Steph excited by her good fortune

oh no! bad fortune!

There are also incense burners outside most of the temples, where you're supposed to waft the smoke over yourself as it has healing powers. I sent some the way of my receding hairline. Another popular ritual is the purification fountain. It's usually an intricate fountain where you use a ladle to rinse your left hand, then your right, then put some in your mouth and spit it out. It supposedly purifies your hands and mouth, but I found it slightly ironic that it wasn't clean enough to drink.

not enough incense in Japan to cure this one

cleansing myself

It's no surprise that the gardens here are lovely. All the stereotypes are here - manicured hedges, arched bridges, and lots and lots of koi. The best so far has been the East Gardens of the Imperial Palace, which are housed on the former site of the Edo Castle, dating back to the 15th century. Edo was the original name of Tokyo until it was changed in 1868. We've been loving the fall weather here - cool and sunny - but while there are some nice fall colors here and there, there's not a whole lot of flowers blooming and especially none of the famous cherry blossoms, much to Steph's dismay.

this is actually at Ueno Park

As is this one. Steph is dying to come back here in spring - the orange trees are cherry blossoms

the walls of Edo Castle in the East Gardens

bamboo garden - who knew there were so many types of bamboo?

picture-perfect

the Imperial Palace is gorgeous

There's been so much to see in Tokyo we've been fully entertained by just walking around and observing. Let's go over some of the things we've done and seen. The first thing we did once we got here was go find an electronics store to get a new camera. You may not have noticed since we've edited every photo we've put in the blog, but our old camera had a few scratches on the lens and some dust on the sensor that was creating some nasty splotches on our pictures. It was very frustrating, especially since electronics are much more expensive everywhere we've been so far. Who would have thought the US is the cheapest place to buy electronics. Luckily Japan is nearly as cheap, so we've been waiting a long time to snag a new camera. The electronics store was a massive 8 levels of everything a techie could dream of. The amazing thing was that it was just one of a chain of stores, and there are a few other big chains. They certainly love their electronics here.

Another thing they love here is Christmas. We don't really understand why, but there are certain things from Western culture that the Japanese just go crazy for. Christmas just happens to be one of them, so we've been enjoying all the decorations and holiday music. Another thing they go crazy for is home grown - video games. We've seen gangs of people clustered together at random locations playing handheld Nintendo games. We went to a 6-story arcade (and they say everything is big in the US...) and saw the experts play Guitar Hero-type games at unreal speeds.

Gameboy party

Some of the more traditional Christmas decorations we've seen...

...and some of the more strange. Notice the rabbit is holding a mannequin baby with shades on

I guess the Japanese like to know what they're getting into before ordering a meal, so instead of just showing pictures of the items on the menu, all the restaurants of have display cases with plastic replicas of their food. I have no idea where they can get such specific replicas, but some of them do look tasty.

yummy

People watching is also pretty fun here. Some of the haircuts and outfits of the "fashionable" young adults border on comical (scratch that, they can be downright hilarious). My favorite though, are the adorable old people. I seriously think the Japanese shrink with age, because we've seen many old people that are no more than 4 feet tall. They're always hunched over, usually a couple out for a walk, all dressed up like it's 1920. The only problem is taking pictures of them without them noticing.

cute old couple

she's in front of Steph and still looks so much shorter

Tonight we took a train out to an artificial island called Odaiba. There's a lot of shopping to be had on Odaiba, but we were mainly there for the view. It's situated in Tokyo Bay and has a great view of the Tokyo skyline, especially at night. We tried to walk across the Rainbow Bridge that connects to the island for the best views, but it closes early in winter. So, we had to take the high-tech, fully automated train to and from the island. This reminds me of another cool thing about Tokyo. You know how I said how quiet it is? Well, you're not allowed to talk on your cell phone while on a train or subway, and people actually follow the rule! The cars are usually packed full, and people just stand there in silence. It's amazing.

Rainbow Bridge