Sunday morning we sleep in, enjoying our insanely comfy beds, then head out to check out the Summer Palace….in the middle of January. Probably the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Pretty much what it is, is some emperor thought that his normal palace was way to hot during summer so he took over an entire lake and built all of these buildings and beautiful gardens and patios and whatnot along it. Thought it was freezing again today, it was so worth walking around outside for hours. The architecture and painting was exquisite throughout all of the buildings. There were crazies out skating on the lake even though some of it was not even frozen over….what. It would have been much nicer to go there in the summer because they had swimming and paddleboats and whatnot but oh well.
(Cute dragon with a bow at the entrance)
(Dressed up for Chinese New Years)
(Palace had to be miles and miles long. It was huge)
(Palace wrapped all the way around the lake)
(Emperor had his little toy army...cute...)
(sweet kettle)
(Crazies on the ice...)
(Marble Boat)
Heading out, we saw the practicing the dragon dance for tomorrow’s show they have at the Summer Palace (for New Years).
On our way home, we grabbed some curly fries at Mickey Ds (yup, curly fries, be jealous) and stopped at Tian’ Anmen square, which is like the National Mall in DC of Beijing. Impressive. Scary. Where we have the Capitol building, they have a Commy building with Mao Zedongs portrait across the front….
We also got a show walking home because it is new years eve, and everyone is lighting off their own fireworks. This is the only time of year it is allowed to buy and light them off. Each person is allowed 10 kilos of fireworks, which is a fair amount. We are probs just gunna sit in our room tonight, drink beers, and check out all the fireworks that go on all night and through the next day.
Fun Facts about Beijing Asians:
1. Their corndogs are waffles around a hotdog.
2. They love them some fireworks.
(This is just one family's supply of fireworks for the night...)
3. They play a game like hacky-sack but the ball looks like a birdy.
4. They don’t have big grocery stores and department stores. You have to go to smaller more individualized stores or street vendors to get different types of things. Same in Hong Kong and elsewhere in China.
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