Sarah has let me borrow her blog to write about the family arriving in Beijing. The adventure for us began at the airport when the driver from our hotel met us with a large sign "James Widder" but we could not leave until we found Sarah and we could not tell him this very well -- not being able to speak a word of Chinese. Fortunately, Sarah arrived through the crowd and we got to go together to our hotel, which was in the western part of the city. The hotel was wonderful -- it was a traditional hutong which is several stone buildings all centered around a courtyard. While in Beijing, we hiked the Great Wall - a section that was not so well traveled and very beautiful.
We also went to Tiananmen Square, where there was this sculpture next to a mausoleum for Mao. The square was filled with people, many of whom we think are in the city for the New Year holiday. We took a tour of the
Forbidden City with a young Chinese woman named April who was very nice and had just graduated from a local university and was trying to earn money to travel. When Sarah told her that her name was "Sarah," April said, "oh, like Prison Break" -- we unfortunately have never seen "Prison Break" but it is a very popular TV show in China. The lions are from the Forbidden City. We met a friend for dinner who has moved to Beijing and his wife is from here -- they picked out many (it seemed like a dozen to me) things for us to try and we tried everything. I
t has been a great introduction to China. I think my favorite thing was the drum tower -- it is very old and they had 24 or so drums that they would sound to tell the time. They had a demonstration of just 3 of them and the sound was wonderful. There was a great view from the tower of the part of the city where we were staying and the many people, cars, bikes, and pedicabs that are part of city life. It is so much to take in at once and the best part is seeing Sarah.
Sarah has let me borrow her blog to write about the family arriving in Beijing. The adventure for us began at the airport when the driver from our hotel met us with a large sign "James Widder" but we could not leave until we found Sarah and we could not tell him this very well -- not being able to speak a word of Chinese. Fortunately, Sarah arrived through the crowd and we got to go together to our hotel, which was in the western part of the city. The hotel was wonderful -- it was a traditional hutong which is several stone buildings all centered around a courtyard. While in Beijing, we hiked the Great Wall - a section that was not so well traveled and very beautiful. 
We also went to Tiananmen Square, where there was this sculpture next to a mausoleum for Mao. The square was filled with people, many of whom we think are in the city for the New Year holiday. We took a tour of the 
Forbidden City with a young Chinese woman named April who was very nice and had just graduated from a local university and was trying to earn money to travel. When Sarah told her that her name was "Sarah," April said, "oh, like Prison Break" -- we unfortunately have never seen "Prison Break" but it is a very popular TV show in China. The lions are from the Forbidden City. We met a friend for dinner who has moved to Beijing and his wife is from here -- they picked out many (it seemed like a dozen to me) things for us to try and we tried everything. I
t has been a great introduction to China. I think my favorite thing was the drum tower -- it is very old and they had 24 or so drums that they would sound to tell the time. They had a demonstration of just 3 of them and the sound was wonderful. There was a great view from the tower of the part of the city where we were staying and the many people, cars, bikes, and pedicabs that are part of city life. It is so much to take in at once and the best part is seeing Sarah.
1 comment:
haha thats funny because i do watch prison break... and Sarah on the show is a doctor/former heroin addict who falls in love with a prison inmate. what a thing to aspire to sarah :)
happy valentines day yesterday! it was amazing - we had a huge snow storm and Cornell actually had a SNOW DAY.
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