Vacation Recap

I haven't been posting in the last week or so for a couple reasons:

1. I'm out and about traveling all the reaches of China before Fall Semester at Beijing Normal University starts.

2. Most of the time I either don't have time or can't find an internet cafe (which they call a Wang Ba) here.

3. I'm kind of lazy when it comes to writing all the crazy stories that I've already experienced on this 1 week length of a vacation.

Let me just write a few things to introduce you guys to the places I've been and a couple things I've seen.

Location 1: Qingdao

First off, the train ride to Qingdao was a beeezy. We went to the ticket place in Beijing really early but only managed to get a hard seater. We were thinking we would do this anyway because it would save us a lot of money on our trip right? WRONG. The hard seater was one of the most painful experiences of my life, but surprisingly, only the second most painful experience when it comes to my travels so far. I'll leave that for when I talk about the next destination. I sat for 9 hours in a sit that was crowded by Chinese people that smelled, standing in the rows between the chairs. It literally took 5 minutes initially to get into the chairs that were 3 feet away that we paid for to find that there were people already squatting in our seats. Not only that, it took 20 minutes to finally get settled because there were so many people in the aisles that paid for the cheapest "standing tickets" that also had a lot of luggage that was in our respective places, i.e. under our own chairs and by our own feet. Anyway, although it was a painful ride, we made it to Qingdao.

We thought the place would be boring but after the first day of nastiness (a downpoor of rain), we managed to find a LOT of things to do in the city. First off, Qingdao weather, aside from the rain, was amazing. However, not only was the weather nice, but the streets and ocean side reminded me so much of the Bay Area and San Francisco, oh the bay. They had sloping streets and salty air and nice about 50-60 degree weather with a constant nice breeze. The place was amazing for a city in China. That's what you get with a city inhabited by Europeans early in history and also a harbor city.

We went to the Qingdao (Tsingtao Beer Factory) first, which was cool to see the mechanism and the history, where we also found a travel agency that helped us book hard sleepers for our next train ride to Huang Shan. You need to do this in advance or you get stuck with the shitty seats, which we almost had to do again, for a ride that was 3 times as long, roughly 24 hours. In the three day span we were there, we went to a nice beach to collect shells, fish and sea critters hiding in the rocks. Take pictures by the beach/look in tide pools. Shop around local shops and eat at local places, especially eating gala (clams), which were cooked in this super good spicy broth. It was amazing. I also went to this place called the Underwater World with Tammy which was basically like the Qingdao version of Monterey Bay Aquarium, except this time it was in China and the restrictions are less, well...strict. We stood right next to a tank with a live shark in it and saw turtles, huge fish and preserved remains of a gigantic whale. It was cool, but I think the Monterey Bay Aquarium is better. We also saw cool things around town by just walking around and getting lost on the bus system, that's always the best. We left Qingdao reluctantly because there were a lot of things to do, but we knew Huang Shan, climbing it would be amazing.

Location 2: Huang Shan

On the train ride, even though it turned out to be around 24 hours, and we thought it was initially 12 hours, we had a good time. We were pretty nasty/sticky by the end of our train travels, but we met people that we exchanged contact with, speaking Chinese the entire time. They were also students and a family with one baby that was about 1 year and 7 months old. He was really funny. I think this travel period is turning out to be some of the best practice for our language and I think I can actually see some improvement. We talked to the students about school, America, places in China and the towards the end of the ride some people helped us to book with a travel agency the next day to get rooms for 2 NIGHTS and travel expense to Huang Shan for 345, student price. Not bad huh? Well, it turns out there is no such thing as THAT good a deal in China. We did get a room the first night, shadily in an ok room RIGHT NEXT TO the train station. As my paranoid self, I pushed a couch in the way of the door when we slept, leaving one light on to show that we were "awake".

Oh boy am I paranoid, but either way we made it through the night with no interruptions. We were starting to get the feeling that they were "shang dang-ing" us, tricking us into a scam because they seemed really unorganized and they just wanted to put our luggage that we didn't bring in a storage room in their own facilities that THEY locked up. But as there were other local Chinese doing it, I felt better, I took all my shit with me anyway. Anyway, the next day was a lot worse. The people brought us up and we decided to trek the mountain, but it turns out that they brought us to the west side, the MUCH HARDER WAY. It took us 5 hours of climbing and being scared that we would die, but we did get great pictures. The pictures just don't do it any justice. I was pretty much standing in the mountains among the clouds, shrouded by mist, and Oh Yeah, about 200 loud annoying Chinese people. It was fun though, I can't wait to update pictures, as soon as I get to a card reader.

Anyway, the worse part came at the top. It was about 5pm and they told us that we had to stay in a room that was dark and dingy and smelled like piss with 10 other people, either that or pay an addition 100 to stay with 6 people and get a shower or pay an additional 200 each to get a room for 3. Bullshit! Why didn't they tell us in the beginning, they also failed to mention to bring some warm clothes. The total 3 of us, 200 each could have paid for 600? a really nice penthouse down at the bottom of the mountain. I felt so gipped. My friend was really sad because the tour guide guy was really mean and yelled a lot and she just felt like she was being taken advantage of. I guess we were. Anyway, we decided to stick around this little tea bar and wait for the morning, but Tammy saw massage chairs and we were going to sit on those to sleep. Yeah, but do you know what massage chairs feel like in China...when you are trying to sleep on them when they are not in function? They feel like 7 hard rocks jutting out and stabbing you in the back while you are trying to sleep in freezing weather with shorts on in the lobby of the hotel next the the open front door, only allowing you about 1 1/2 hours of sleep before you have to trek down the other side of a mountain for another 3 hours at 530 am! Either way, that was also a good (painful) walk down and we got to see the sunrise from 1800 km up. I'm realllllly excited to show you guys pictures, but when I get to Shanghai.

We're going to Shanghai tonight by train hard sleeper again, thank god. I think it will be good living with my travel mates' family members (saving me money), and checking out Shanghai again, I think it will be good. I can't wait for Shanghai. Sorry if the update was too long. It was a week+ worth of good stuff. Haha.

To all you Berkeleyans! Good luck on your first day tomorrow. JUNIORS WHOO! I wish I could be there with all you guys.

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Time for a Quick Update, 美国加油， 中国加油 (I guess)

I've been so busy lately so I haven't had the chance to write a new blog post. I'll tell you about the most recent updates since I don't have pictures (I'm not using my computer) and I have little time.

With the Olympics now in full blast, we've been feeling the full effects of Olympic Fever, also considering that China has the most gold medals in the games. China, for the first time in years, has been leading the count in gold medals for much of the duration of the Olympics. But what led me to talk about the effects of the Olympics was an experience that occurred the other day. So I know I've told you guys about the experiences I've had with Olympic athletes. Admiring from afar, whether it be around 20-100 feet away, close, but nonetheless...still far. I finally experienced meeting one of the Olympic athletes face to face and talking to her for a short walk.

We were getting in from shopping for traveling gear when we ran into a 6'2'' girl at the gates of BNU (our school), she had the most upset and distraught face, speaking to the guards in English, though we all knew that they didn't understand a single word or gesture coming from her. So as we start talking to her she explains how she is so lucky and relieved to hear English again and to be out of that taxi she was just in for around 1 hour. The trip she told us she took should have been about 10 minutes...wow, they really do rip off foreigners. Nevertheless, she was happy again to have talked to us about it and then we walked with her and found out she was on the USA Women's Volleyball Team. It was really cool talking with her and listening to how she spoke, so American....by that I mean she used profanity openly and knew our "Norcal slang - 'hella'" because she was from Irvine herself. After saying bye and taking a quick picture (though we realized after we should have gotten a signature or some TICKETS), we looked her up and she is BOWN from the team, the one who was DOMINATING. Oh man, was that cool.

But in addition to the random occasion in which we met an Olympic Athlete face to face, I also went with Derrick and Angela to a USA vs. Greece basketball game, probably ranked 3 out of the 3 games I've watched but still very memorable. I took millions of pictures of all the players and cool videos of dunks and blocks, only to exhaust the hell out of my battery and my SD card, poor camera. I'm soo glad I bought it though, as it is my first camera, I'm fully enjoying the feeling of being picture happy and using any and all opportunities to take a picture. Anyway, at the game we ALMOST got our tickets signed by Deron Williams, just like we got our tennis tickets signed, but missed out on the chance because we got to the side too late and there were far too many people trying to butt in and lean over the spectator bars. Nevertheless, I got really close up pictures of many of the players who each looked at me (or at least in my direction) for a good period of time. The ranking of events in my book, after today 8/19 (my final event), goes #1 tennis (because of the amazing seats and because we got to see so many events and it was also our first event to see), #2 athletics (because we got to see so many events, though far away, but also it was in the National Stadium - the Niao Chao with the torch), #3 basketball (just because we had level A seating, but also got to move up even closer after the USA team had left and Argentina, another good team, started playing). I think the totality of my Olympic game experience has been really amazing. I chose the right games to go to.

Aside from that, we met at strange cab driver who blasted music in his car off his tape and continuously asked if we liked the Chinese music. We also met with our haircut people, who came out with us on Janelle's last night in Beijing. Janelle, who has been a loyal customer to the haircut people, invited them out to karaoke and buffet all for 45 yuan, what a great deal. You can never get that in the states. 4 hours of singing until your throat bleeds in Chinese AND English and a free buffet and drink stand. But to mention that I must also mention how it is sad to see all the Summer Session EAPers leave. We've spent about 2 months with the same people and not seeing them often in the halls anymore makes a lot of us feel lonely and missing our own respective homes. Nonetheless, we will be going on a trip (us fall people), I think it might just be Tammy, Ivy, and me, but that should be really cool, I think 4 is perfect, but 3 is good too. We will be going to Qingdao --> Anhui --> Shanghai --> Fujian --> Guangxi --> Yunnan --> back to Beijing for Fall Session in late September. We might make a stop in Guangdong for some Cantonese food and nice dian xin (dim sum). Oh boy, can't wait.

Hope that was enough for you guys for now, sorry I don't have pictures at this time, computer is away in storage. BTW, the Athletics events, including all the Finals events and the Medals Ceremonies were SICK, there were soo many US wins. It was amazing, so was the atmosphere. Too bad stupid Chinese hopeful for the 110M Men's Hurdles Liu Xiang had to hurt himself, I think since he wasn't in the event I paid too much for the ticket. But it was still an experience that I can never replicate. I'm glad I have 300+ pictures for that event alone, a good 4 hours spent the night before I leave for Qingdao. I just love it here in Beijing, especially during the hectic, crazy Olympic times.

中国加油！

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我最难忘的奥运会经历 (My most Unforgettable Olympic Games Experience)

So,

I just wanted to do a little update for you guys, but only a little one since I have FINALS starting tomorrow.

Yesterday I went to my first Olympic Games ever. I managed to find some cheap Tennis tickets with my friend Derrick, and we bought 4 for Tammy and Ivy to also come along with us. I thought it would be a really cool event to go to. Not only were these tickets for center court (which meant we got to go into the really big show court), but it was also for a ground's pass, which meant we got to walk around and watch the smaller singles and doubles games going around in the tennis arena area.

Anyway, ditched the second half of class, more like delivered our little speeches and told our teacher we were going to go watch tennis, she was really nice about it and told us how she had basketball tickets for that night. Well, as I was saying, we were late because we got out of the class at around 10:15 and the thing started at 10:30. The taxi driver didn't want to hassle himself with driving through the traffic getting to the venue and told us we had to take the subway. When we got there, we got a bunch of different instructions and directions on where to go. After sprinting around the entire subway station and adjacent bus station we found one bus that would take us to the venue, but it was SLOW AS HELL. It kept stopping and picking people up and we were thoroughly pissed off to see how there were taxis driving beside us, we coulda taken that damn cab the entire way.

Anyway, we got there about 50 minutes late, but still made it for the Rafael Nadal match, which they were only 1 set in, starting the 2nd set. We watched him win from the Category B seating, better than what we had on our tickets. Then Serena came out and we sneakily moved down to the Category A seating, closer, but still at the top of Cat. A, from there we cheered for USA. Then when Federer came out, a game we weren't supposed to see with our tickets (we just stayed in the arena), we moved even closer, to about 10 rows from the freaking court, the closest I've ever been to a professional athlete playing the sport (even more so than basketball). It was awesome. I got GREAT pictures, close ups, action shots, fist pumps, and disappointment. I took about 450 pictures and videos, ended up deleting about 100 because they were bad pictures, but nevertheless it was a great experience.

After watching, taking pictures, and cheering on Nadal, Williams, and Federer we went out and took pictures in front of the tennis venue, not realizing there were other small games going on with the ground's pass, these players were also Olympians and famous even in the US, what were we thinking?!?

So we went to the small courts and got even closer. Ivy even touched one trying to give her tennis ticket and get it signed. We met Paul Henri-Mattieu because he was watching a friend and we got a picture and a signature. It was cool, but I wish we got more. Ivy and Derrick got a signature from Monfils, someone that Tammy liked in the states. We all tried to get one with Harbady?, someone else Tammy has watched at home, but missed out on that too, he was nice though, he gave his best fans his racquet, CRAZY!

Anyway, it was a great first Olympic experience and now I have to deal with this BS Final tomorrow. I was having so much fun with the Olympics, buying and selling tickets, going to cool games for free with the money made off other sold tickets and just watching the games on TV.

I'll show you guys some awesome pictures.

Nadal

Federer

Serena Williams

Our picture with Mattieu.

The best looking Fuwa, Nini.

Did I mention the match was on NBC HD in the states? Tammy's friend said he saw her on TV, maybe you can see me too :)! I'm wearing that USA shirt you see in all the pictures, haha.

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Latest Updates! Including...the Men's USA Basketball Team

My bad for not updating, a lot of things have been happening since we had a week countdown before the Olympics official start, which starts today! at 8:08, can you believe it! I'm in the country and city where the Olympics will be hosted and in China, the number 8 is lucky! 8/8/08 at 8:08 PM. That's pretty sick.

Anyway, building up to this moment I've been very busy. I've actually, like I said before, become a Olympics tickets dealer, on a very small scale. I've bought tickets from people that are crazy and buy the tickets in bulk, making ridiculous amounts of money. This one guy we met, we'll call him Dannyclimber, since that's his account name on thebeijinger.com website (if you remember, its the Beijing craigslist). Dannyclimber, who we think might be gay, has so many tickets. We have gotten at least 6 from him as a group, and these tickets are to really good events, good finals events for prices cheaper than others out there. But he has weird conversations with my friend, who's been talking to him. He would be like, "Want to grab a bite when we meet to exchange tickets?" or call on Skype and talk casually instead of business saying, "What do you think of Skype? I think it's 'Hao Wanr'". Ohh too funny. Anyway, he pissed me off this morning because some tickets we had secured for a really good USA Basketball Men's game he sold to some other people, but I can understand I guess since they offered 700+ for each ticket. Greedy bastard.

Anyway, what happened in the end was that I was selling the tickets I was interested in initially. So to make long things short, I wanted to go to some events early on, only finding out that they were to the Women's only events...not as cool as I thought. So, I bought more because they were cheap tickets and good seats, only realizing these too were only Women's events. Losing hope I decided to put them up for sale. I did and got a million responses from people and was able to jack up the price two fold, making a profit and giving me enough money to bargain for good seats. Now, I have really good seats to a really good Finals Athletics game (this means track and field) and I only bought it for about $50, compared to the $300 it was really going for. $250 profit on the side for someone not serious about buying and selling tickets...not bad I would say.

But another funny side story about the ticket sales is that the people I finally agreed to sell to were people that knew each other. One woman buying my 8/15 tickets was the teacher to students that were buying 8/19 tickets and we met at the same place. Jeez, it was weird because we thought they were in cahoots to scam us. Anyway, the students were fine and paid us but the teacher was a BEEZY because she came to us and told us that she thought it was different, saying "What, I thought you were another guy selling 3 tickets for 400 each?" What a crazy request, these tickets that she was looking for were probably fake because nobody is selling that cheap, well unless they are fake, which I have encountered endless times. A good thing about some of the tickets that are being sold is that some, under a black light, have a China Olympic seal, which is really cool. I'll show you guys when you get back home. Anyway, we brought our price down from 1500 for the pair to 1350 because I'm just such a nice guy. I could have gotten more, but I was already out there and didn't want to deal with it anymore. Anyway, that small discrepancy was about $20 USD, so I thought it was not a big deal to risk not selling the tickets as a whole.

Aside from that entire ticket sale process, something else exciting has happened...

THE MEN'S USA OLYMPICS BASKETBALL TEAM IS HERE. THEY'RE HERE AT MY SCHOOL. Even though our school is ridiculously strict with an unusual amount of security, I was able to get some good shots in of some of the starters and key players. Let's see...I got a a picture of Lebron and DWade waving to me. A picture of Kobe, hiding behind a trainer. CP3, two pretty good pictures, and a bunch of pictures of Dwight Howard, Carmelo, Tayshaun, and others who weren't nice enough to look. I'll show you guys if you want.... :).

But I'm glad I decided to chase their bus and lose a sandal because I got to take nice pictures that no one else will have. It's because the time I got those pictures, the security was lower because they didn't anticipate all the US students coming to see their USA Basketball idols. I saw them entering, but when they were leaving practice (in the gym at our school that was specially made for them), some took a hidden entrance out, but this is even not accounting for the massive people blocks that the guards put up to keep the US students away. It was lame, but I'm glad I got my sweet pictures. I chased them one last time on their way out of our school and screamed DWADE, he looked at me and gave me a peace sign. Sweet. Too bad I couldn't get a good picture, their bus windows were tinted. Dream Team 2 Baby, they got the Kidd, how can they lose?

I think USA has a good chance to win it.

Just a small sample of what I got: Dwight Howard and Chris Bosh.

But now that it's the day of the Opening Ceremony, all the traveling has gone down for me. I'm thinking I might just stay at the apartment and watch the fireworks on TV. I know it sounds lame but I hear there is a terrorism warning from Muslims, telling other Muslims to keep their children and themselves away from any place a lot of Chinese people will be. How is that possible? This is freaking China! Anyway, that's what makes me a little worried and knowing that my mom instilled a paranoia in my head of avoiding trouble at all costs, I would rather be safe than sorry in this circumstance because if it turns out that it doesn't happen and all is fine, I'll still get to experience the roar of Olympic fever when I watch the finals Men's Olympics Track and Field!!!

Let me now show you some pictures from Summer Palace. I went there the other day for the second or third time, don't remember. It was very nice. Even though I'd been there before, and with less smog than there was yesterday, it was nice to reminisce and see how things have changed since I'd been there 2 years ago. It didn't change much, good preservation. No boats this time, but I did see the grass that this little kid in red was running on last time I went. It was so funny that I remembered it when I passed by it. Anyway, the other thing that was really awesome was that, when we were up at the top of the Summer Palace, where I went to 2 years ago, I was waiting for Tammy to come out (the others had already left the area. But as I was waiting for her, this reporter from CNN USA (San Diego and Miami) came up to me and asked me where I was from. I obviously tried to speak English as much as I could because I thought if he heard me, he might talk to me, which he did. As soon as I found Tammy, he came up to me and asked us where we were from. We told him we were from Cali and were study abroad students. Then he put the camera on us and asked us questions like "How does being here make you feel?". I answered with some BS response like "This place is very amazing, it allows us to slightly relive the past experiences here that took place during the Qing Dynasty. It's amazing to think that the Emperor walked these same steps...blah blah." Some corny crap, but if you see it online or on SD news, all you SDers out there, save it for me, I want to see it.

This dragon bush thing was pretty cool.

They almost closed us in the Summer Palace because we stayed past closing hours for the second half.

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I've found my Beijing equivalent of "Craigslist"

So, although we all know that Craigslist has a Beijing section where people can buy and sell things as well as look for people to "hang out", there is a Beijing specific website that caters to all the same finds that Craigslist does. The website I found, after reading a copy of their magazine, is www.thebeijinger.com. They have a website and I think they might be affiliated with the magazine "That's Beijing", something I was first introduced to on my first trip to Beijing a couple years ago.

Anyhow, the way I came to start using it as frequently as Craigslist, which many of you guys know is ALL THE TIME, was by feeling like I got REALLY ripped off. So most of you know that I've been looking for some quality Olympics tickets. Well, I found some, but they were sold to me by some shady EAP dude. Shady in the sense that I think he's a sleaze. Anyway, he sold me the tickets for about 600 total each, which I thought was reasonable, seeing all the other ticket prices. In the end it turns out that the original price of the tickets were RMB 80. Basically he jacked the price sooo far that I feel like I got totally ripped off. Immediately I was pissed and basically sold them off to the next bidder.

I've been looking on the Beijinger for something that is better pricing, but only some people are like me and spend all their time at the computer. I've only got a few hits. However, thinking about it now, one thing that the EAP guy's tickets were that they were 100% legitimate. If they aren't, there's always a way to find him and kill him. Anyway, I was just pissed a fellow American ripped off another fellow American EAPer soo hard. It wasn't even me who bought the tickets, it was my roommate who is supposedly friends with him. Anyway, his lame "friendly" act doesn't work on me! Cao ta ma! I will get tickets that are legitimate and better than his. Jeez, RMB 600 for and RMB 80 ticket, that's way more than I charged for the Kanye tickets. He shouldn't have done so much, I woulda felt a little more satisfied with the purchase if it was around 400 or 500 even, though that still sounds like a rip off. It is the Olympics after all, right?

What do you guys think? I'm looking for other tickets now, but don't know how much luck I will have, knowing that the games are starting very soon. Oh well, I guess my Craigslist days are back. Before I lose the tickets, I'll show you them.



These tickets sure as hell have some kind of chip in them to track us. They are pretty thick and feel like the new US passports, which are thick and have microchip tracking devices. Ohh, scary world.

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