ChinaIII Pearls and More

We woke up well ahead of the wakeup call (Sat. March 21st). I took a shower and washed my hair and organized my purchases in my luggage. In a few minutes we'll head out for the Pearl Factory (Shoot me now!) and on the way we'll see the "Bird's Nest" Olympic Stadium. This afternoon a rickshaw ride to a large privately owned home in the Hutong District for dinner. should be interesting. (Hutong is the Chinese word for alleyway.)

We did a drive by of the olympic stadium, (the "Bird's Nest"--and yes, it does somewhat resemble a bird's nest)) but the picture isn't very good, even after enhancing. It's set well back from the road, the picture was taken through the bus window, and there was quite a bit of haze in the early morning air. Beijing is noted for its serious air pollution problems, but most days it wasn't too bad. I had brought along a filtered mask just in case, but didn't need it.

Early Sunday March 22. The Pearl Factory was very nice, and yes, I bought pearls!

This lovely young Chinese woman showed us how the pearls are harvested from the fresh water oysters grown at the plant. She was typical of the local guides at the places we visited in that she spoke a precise English with a similar accent (were they all educated at the same school?) and was attractive and sophisticated. I expect these are plum jobs for young women in China.

While ocean oysters produce only a single pearl, fresh water oysters produce multiple pearls of various sizes and colors within the same oyster. The guide explained that the young oysters are injected with what she called "meat" (a protein based irritant) to promote development of the pearls. There were 36 pearls in this particular oyster. I think the guide's black nail polish contrasts nicely with the pearls.

We went to the Summer Palace, which is on a lake and very beautiful, and since it was Sat., also very crowded with local and Western tourists.

Quoting from "Eyewitness Travel, Beijing & Shanghai": " The sprawling grounds of the Summer Palace served the Qing dynasty as an imperial retreat from the stifling summer confines of the Forbidden City." The book goes on to describe how the grounds were remodeled several times through the centuries, most notably by the Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-1908), who is remembered as one of China's most powerful women.

One could easily spend an entire day roaming the huge area, but we saw only a small part. We did see the Long Corridor, a 2,288 foot covered walkway decorated with over 14,000 scenic paintings.

The Long Corridor. Note the Chinese guide in the left background with his own group of (Chinese) tourists.

Our guide took the group walking down a portion of the Long Corridor, but since by this time I had developed two painful blisters on my right foot, I chose to sit on a ledge at the site where they entered the corridor. She explained they would exit further down and then return on the adjacent sidewalk. Staying on the ledge turned out to be a serendipitous choice!

As I was sitting on the ledge I noticed sitting near me, also on the ledge but facing inside the corridor, a young family with a little boy. I grinned at him and said "Ni hao" (hello, in Chinese). His eyes got big and he turned to his father, who said, (in English) "Say 'hello' to grandmother." The little boy said hello and grinned back at me. Then the father said, pointing to the name tag dangling from my neck, "Is this your name?" I replied, "Yes, it is." He said, "Is it 'Vennie'?" I answered, "Yes, Vennie". He smiled broadly and pointed to the little boy, "That is also his name--Vennie!" ( I don't know how he would have spelled it in Pinyan, the Western alphabet phonetic spelling of Chinese characters, but he definitely pronounced it the same as my name.) I was astounded! "Oh my goodness!" I said. Then to the little boy, "May I take your picture?" The father said something to him in Chinese, and the little boy nodded. Here is his picture.

Note the Nike cap and Osh Kosh jacket! What a cutie! I wanted to give him a dollar, but I refrained. He was playing with a small toy, and Chinese custom dictates if someone gives you a gift, you must give one in return. I feared he might feel he had to give me his toy, and I didn't want that. I thanked him and his father profusely, and just about then, the rest of my group arrived, straggling up the sidewalk. First time in my life I was ever happy to have blisters!!!

Anna, our Beijing guide, is wonderful and keeps track of all of us, especially those of us who have some difficulty walking or climbing in rough areas.

This is our Beijing tour guide, Anna, another lovely young Chinese girl, age 26. Because of the angle she's holding it, it's hard to see the "SB 3" sign. "SB" stands for "Santa Barbara", which was our designated group name for the trip. The entire group from California was divided into 3 buses, and ours, bus 3, was the smallest group at 21. Each bus had its own tour guides in both Beijing and Shanghai. These folks are very knowledgable about their areas and their English is excellent, if occasionally a little quirky.

We returned to the Pearl Factory for lunch at the restaurant next door. This lunch was buffet style and adequate but not lavish like our hotel's breakfast buffets.

After lunch we went to the Chinese Medicine Institute. A lady spoke for a few minutes about Chinese medicine...

...and then in came a veritable hoard of Chinese doctors and interpreters. They took our pulses, had us stick out our tongues, and attempted to sell each of us several hudnred dollars of Chinese herbal medicines! No one in our group took the bait. I had a coughing spell and asked if they could give me something for my cough--nope, only several hundred dollars worth of herbs etc. for my liver and kidneys. I'd give a lot for a bottle of Robitussin! I took the last of my cough medicine today, but I still have cough drops. The cipro I brought along and starting taking is helping but I'm still hoarse and occasionally have a bad coughing bout. I feel fine (other than the blisters on my toes!) so it's more an annoyance than anything.

This was the only part of the trip I did not enjoy. It became pretty clear on the first day that we were in for one long shopping trip, but no one seemed to mind. The places we visited were interesting and the things available for purchase were reasonable--and no one put any kind of pressure on us to buy. I enjoyed the lecture about Chinese medicine, but the "hard sell" for the Chinese herbal medicine was irritating to say the least.

After leaving the medical institute, we went to a place where we were met by several rickshaws--one for each two of us. Along the route to meet the rickshaws we passed a lot of sidewalk vendors.

Here is a shot of some of the sidewalk vendors from the back of the stalls. Most of these were food vendors, and as it was near suppertime, many people were buying and eating on the go.

Peter and Bill, two younger men with our group who were more adventureous than most of us, bought some odd foods on a stick. This is Peter eating deep fried scorpion. I kid you not! And he did actually eat some of it.

Barbara and I in our rickshaw. It was surprisingly comfortable. We were told to recall the number of the rickshaw and get the same one on the return trip.

Barbara and I hopped into ours, which was #137, and enjoyed the ride tremendously! The rickshaws are bicycle powered now rather than pulled by a runner, but the rider must be very strong. We drove into the Hutong District to an old but luxiourious (by Chinese standards) home...

At a point we had to abandon the rickshaws and walk the rest of the way to the house. As you can see, the streets are narrow, as the Hutong District is in a very old part of the ceenter of the city. The Chinese faces you see in this picture are "mosquitoes", the Chinese term for the roaming sidewalk souvenir sellers.

A note about the Chinese street vendors. I had read and we were warned again by Anna, but boy, are they aggressive! They surround you wanting to sell choposticks, scarves, wallets, knock-off Guggi and Rolex watches, etc.

The shot below was actually taken in Shanghai later, but you can see how aggressive the vendors are. These two women were both selling scarves and I thought they were going to come to blows because someone in our group bought scarves from one instead of the other.

The girl in the background in the blue jacket holding the stick with the sign that says "SB 3" is Rainbow, our Shanghai guide. Anna carried a similar sign throughout Beijing. In a crowded street, sidewalk or square, believe me, you did not want to lose sight of that sign. We all checked on each other to be sure everyone in our individual parties were always in sight. Since there were six of us who knew each other--Carol and Mike, Barbara and I, and Bob and John--we looked out for one another. At 6'2'', Mike was pretty easy to keep in sight!

I kept saying "Bushi yao!" which means "I don't want it! in Chinese, but they barely backed off. After dark it was a little scarey just because they jostled us while we were trying to negotiate uneven streets and sidewalks. But we all survived intact!

Back to dinner in the Hutong District...

They divided our group of 21 into 2 rooms, each with a large oblong table and tiny stools to sit on.

A relative of our hostess brought in dish after dish and served us beer or sida. It was a delighful meal!

The other half of our group joined us after dinner and the lady of the house gave a little speech of welcome and information about her home, interpreted by Anna.

Our hostess in the Hutong District. She seemed happy to have us.

Although single story the house actually crosses a street and sprawls out into many small rooms; 19 family members live there. The room we were in was her son's room, and had a small refrigerator, a rather large new flat screen TV, a computer, a stereo system, nice (if unmatched) furniture pieces and a bed. The room was cluttered with odds and ends of knickkacks and the walls were covered with soccer posters.

Our hostess told us a bit about the house and also showed us a medal her husband had been awarded. It was for being an "outstanding worker" and she was obviously very proud of it. Anna told us this house is worth "over $6 million"! The house itself is nothing much special and parts of it, like window sills and doorways are actually shabby. But the property it occupies in the heart of Beijing is no doubt what makes it so valuable.

After returning (again by rickshaw) to our bus, we went back to the hotel at 7:30. Some of us, including Barbara and me, had arranged for massages again! Ahhhhh! How relaxing. 90 minutes of bliss for $30. After that we went right to sleep as our wake up call was for 4 am! (I'm writing this on the flight to Shanghai, so it's a bit bumpy.) Our plane left Beijing at 7:30 am and now almost an hour and a half later we are starting to descend.

I can't buy much more in Shanghai or I'll need another suitcase! Only small, lightweight stuff!

(Yeah, right!)

From the Shanghai airport we will go to Suzhou and then what? Not sure.

Here ends part 3 of the China trip. Part 4 will probably be posted on Monday, since tomorrow is Easter and I'll be spending it with my Mom.

Happy Easter, Everyone!