China III - Stone Boats and Hutongs

The afternoon of our first full day in China, our tour took us to the emperor's Summer Palace which is located about 10 miles from the center of Beijing. It is a series of buildings, gardens and pavilions surrounding a large artificial lake called Lake KunMing. The lake was dug by hand and once again, the leftover dirt was used to build an artificial mountain (well a hill, anyway). Supposedly the area and the presence of the lake made this a more bearable place to hang during the hot Beijing summers. Unfortunately, one of the things the Chinese didn't invent was air conditioning.

A statue of a "Kylin" a mythical beast which was supposed to represent good luck: located at the entrance to the Summer Palace.

One of the features we were told we were going to see was to be the "world's longest corridor". Well, it turns out it is really just a covered walkway about 1/2 mile long. It is, however, magnificently decorated.

"World's Longest Corridor"

One of the many, many buildings in the Summer Palace. Notice the workmen - all the Chinese National Monuments, as well as their cities were kept spotlessly clean.

Along one of the pathways we came upon a man practicing his calligraphy skills with a 3 foot long brush which he dipped in plain water and then proceeded to write on the pavement. Calligraphy has the status of an art form in China. Also, red sneakers seemed to be popular among the Summer Palace visitors that day.

A pavilion located on a small peninsula in KunMing lake

The "Tower of Buddhist Fragrance" and the artificial hill built from the material dug from the lake.

A beautiful ornate gateway near the "Buddhist Fragrance". The Chinese are very keen on gateways. The silly-looking red lantern on a stick which will occasionally show up in some of our other pictures was carried by our tour guide to ensure that we could always find him.

The Stone Boat

The Summer Palace was largely destroyed by fire in the 1880's. However, our old friend the Dowager Empress, AKA the Dragon Lady, liked the area so she had it rebuilt and made it her main hangout. The story goes that one day she decided that it would be cool to ride around Lake KunMing on a boat. A suitable craft was procured but when she took her first boat ride she found to her dismay that boats have a habit of moving up and down and side to side. This did not set well with her tummy. Sooo... She commanded her minions to build her a boat that did not move and the result was the stone boat we see above, firmly embedded to the lake bottom. She would often spend hours on this - essentially artificial island - enjoying boating without all the inconvenience. Note the carved paddlewheels on the side.

After seeing and duly photographing the Stone Boat, and buying some souvenirs, it was time to move on.

Next on our agenda was a tour by "rickshaw" (actually pedicabs) of something called a "Hutong". Hutongs were and are the old traditional neighborhoods of Beijing, they have streets which are narrow alleyways, too narrow for automobile traffic (in fact the alleys are also referred to as Hutongs). They are formed of traditional-style one or two story residences which surround an inner courtyard and usually house an extended family. Most of these neighborhoods are long gone, replaced by wide streets and high-rises, but a few of them have been kept in an effort at historic preservation.

Our tour group sets off through the Hutong

Our tour was via pedicab and we were taken to a traditional indoor market which consisted of a series of stalls run by independent vendors selling meat, seafood, produce, spices etc. We also were shown a traditional courtyard home (complete with ghost-proof high thresholds). The funniest thing were the street vendors on bicycles who kept pace with our pedicabs trying to sell us souvenirs. Well, this tour wrapped up after about an hour or so, and it was back to the hotel, a quick dinner, and bed.

Next: Climbing the walls

China Part II - Sex and the Forbidden City

Having discussed the 2008 Olympics and China's air quality problems, I guess I'll get back to our sightseeing.

So, after we walked all the way to the other end of Tianimen Square, we came to the main entrance to the "Forbidden City" this is actually the palace complex of the former Chinese emperors and while it was once forbidden to commoners and non-official people it is now a national monument and tourist attraction. Anyone who has managed to sit through the rather boring but history-laden film "The Last Emperor" has seen the Forbidden City since much of the movie was filmed there.

A short video by Michelle of Tianimen Square seen from the entrance to the Forbidden City. It pans round to the gateway with the ubiquitous picture of Chairman Mao. Apparently Mao is still quite revered in China.

We entered the Forbidden City and spent the rest of the morning there. We probably walked at least 2-3 miles through the palace complex - it was enormous.

The front courtyard of the palace. The building is covered with scaffolding for pre-Olympic renovations.

The palace is actually many buildings which housed thousands of people during the heyday of the emperors. From what I gather they were mostly concubines and eunuchs.

The emperor's bed. Presumably he shared it with one of the many concubines on any given night. The concubines - sort of assistant wives - were chosen from important families throughout the empire and becoming one brought influence and prestige to your family.

One of these women in the late 19th century, who was beautiful, intelligent and apparently quite ruthless, became not only empress (i.e. #1 wife) but for the next forty years or so ruled China as the power behind the throne for a series of puppet emperors, some of whom met mysterious and untimely deaths. She was officially known as the Dowager Empress but behind her back she was called the "Dragon Lady".

This is a huge lump of crystalline quartz which was quarried and carted to the palace at the orders of the Dowager Empress. I think it's supposed to show her power or bring good luck or something - the Chinese people have traditionally been very superstitious about certain objects and symbols bringing good fortune.

One interesting thing we were told concerned the entranceways into traditional Chinese buildings. On palaces, temples etc. the entrance doors always had thresholds on the order of around six inches high. You literally have to step over them to get inside. The purpose of these is to keep out "ghosts" or evil spirits which can bring bad luck, sickness etc. The theory went that the "ghosts" did not have knee joints, so they could not step over the thresholds!

Eventually, we made our way through the Forbidden City and into the gardens at the rear of the complex.

The gardens of the Forbidden City. The rocks with lots of holes in them were brought from some distant part of China where they occur naturally - except for the ones that that area's local peasants drilled holes in when they found out there was a market for them.

A Tea-House in the Gardens

Finally, we made our way out through the rear gate of the Forbidden City and joined up once more with our tour bus which took us to lunch and thence to the Summer Palace.

The exit gate from the Forbidden City. The hill beyond with the pagoda is artificial. It was made centuries ago by hundreds of workmen with wheelbarrows (a Chinese invention). I think the dirt came from the moat around the Forbidden City.

We had a fairly decent lunch that day - all meals were served family style with Lazy Susans on the table to swivel the food around- and I'm proud to say that Michelle and I used chopsticks throughout the trip. Having got to this point in our trip with this posting, I think I will save the Summer Palace and the stone boat for the next posting.

Later.

Slow Boat to China

O.K. Some months ago, our friends Abe and Roz asked us if we wanted to join them on a nine-day tour of China. We signed up on the tour - run by Club ABC Tours - and became the third couple in our little group. The others were Abe and Roz and their friends Alex and Monica. Time to blog about the trip.

The first thing is that it's a 13-hour flight to Beijing China. We flew Air China which still uses Boeing 747's (haven't been on one of those in a while!). Now, if you've been, say, to Hawaii, you know that that's about a 10-hour flight. So how come China's only 13? They fly the shortest route possible - straight north over the Pole. It turns out that Beijing is at about the same latitude as New York and almost directly on the opposite side of the earth. So the quickest way to get there... (And I thought that Fairbanks Alaska was the furthest north I was ever going to get...)

Nevertheless, it was still about three hours longer than I ever want to be on a plane.

We left around 5 P.M. on a Monday and got to Beijing at 6 P.M. on Tuesday, their time. The time difference is exactly 12 hours so at least we didn't have to reset our analog watches. Oh well.

I will say that Club ABC did a decent job of running the tour. Their guide, Mr. Chen, met us at the airport as we cleared customs, led us to a nice modern tour bus, and saw to our luggage and hotel check-in. The tour group consisted of about 30 people, all Americans. Over the next few days we were happy to find that on the whole, our fellow tourists were fairly nice and easygoing people. This is always a plus. In an interesting reminder of China's non-democratic status, on our way to our hotel, our tour guide very politely requested that we not discuss or ask questions about political matters on the tour. Of course he was referring to the unrest currently ongoing in Tibet and the connection to the upcoming Beijing Olympics. The 2008 Olympics are really huge in Beijing - they are practically rebuilding the city for them.

Well, totally exhausted since we had had no sleep for some 24 hours, we arrived at our hotel. It was called the "Capital Hotel" and, like the other two hotels we were to stay at on our tour, it has a 5-star rating. The only problem we found was that the beds were extremely hard. Unfortunately, this is the custom in China. Chinese people prefer very hard beds, so the best hotels have hard mattresses. Otherwise, the place was great.

The Capital Hotel, Beijing

After a quick bite to eat, we collapsed onto our hard bed and passed out til' morning.

The tour included a free buffet breakfast every morning. So the next morning, before boarding our tour bus for the day's adventures, we charged downstairs to stuff our faces. The breakfast spread in the Capital Hotel (and indeed in the other two hotels they put us up in) was excellent. It included among a vast array of things, the makings of a reasonably decent American-style breakfast and always some fresh fruit. It was interesting looking at the Chinese breakfast selections - apparently the Chinese people eat soup for breakfast. After being sufficiently fortified with food and caffeine, we boarded our bus and off we went.

The first stop was Tianimen Square of fame and infamy. They walked us along the edge of the square and pointed out various sights to us. The public was not allowed to actually walk in the square, ostensibly because there was a Communist Party congress going on at the time, but I rather suspect it had more to do with government paranoia about the Tibet situation.

The Great Hall of the People in Tianimen Square - where the Party congresses are held

A little further along the same sidewalk from the view above, we came to an electronic countdown sign to the 2008 Olympics:

Olympic Countdown Clock

The 2008 Olympics are the biggest thing to hit Beijing since Ghengis Khan. They are literally rebuilding the city, including major skyscrapers and other projects. People are being moved out of surrounding villages to make way for Olympic construction work. Although, in fairness, the government's not just dumping people on the street - they're being given apartments and reimbursement. We were shown two massive constructs for the Olympic venues: a stadium nicknamed "the bird's nest" for its innovative design and a huge aquatic swimming pool building for the water sport competitions.

The "Bird's Nest" Olympic stadium - the picture was taken through the bus window causing the streakiness in the fore ground. However, note the general haziness in the distance. Beijing has a serious air pollution problem.

The Olympic water sports venue - note the exterior is painted to look like water

Apparently, the Chinese government is counting on the 2008 Summer Olympics to signal to the world that they "have arrived" as a serious and civilized member of the world community. Needless to say, anything which could tarnish this impression makes them very paranoid. Thus the concern over image issues with the Tibet crisis.

Personally, I think they have an issue closer to home which will not make them look very appealing to their Olympic visitors. China, and especially Beijing, has a severe air pollution problem. Our tour guide (being beholden to the government for his job - I don't blame him) gave us a song and dance about the haziness being due to "all the construction for the Olympics". The truth is more problematic. China has very little oil but lots of coal - so their basic industry runs on coal (they even still use steam railway locomotives in some areas). Homes are heated with coal. In addition, the number of automobiles and trucks in China has grown massively and added a mix of hydrocarbons to the coal smoke. Finally, in a peculiarity of Beijing, just over the mountains to the northwest (maybe 200 miles or less) lies the constantly encroaching Gobi desert. So, on top of everything else, Beijing is subject to sandstorms.

Now, I'm not an athlete, but if, after three days in the city, the air quality was beginning to bother me, what will it do to somebody, say, running a marathon?

The Chinese government are supposedly working like crazy to improve the air quality for the games, but I have my doubts.

Next: The Forbidden City and the Summer Palace

Road Trip III

When last we left you dear reader, Michelle and I were on our way back North from her sister's winter pied-a-terre in sunny Florida. As I had mentioned earlier, in a quick drive-through of Savannah GA on the way down, we determined that this lovely little city deserved a closer look. Since we were to make a stop at the home of our friends Marsha and Atlas in North Carolina, we figured out we could do an overnight and about half a day in Savannah.

Michelle booked us a room in a brand-new Holiday Inn Express on Bay Street, right near the historic riverfront and we ended up with a room that actually looked out over the river and had one of the best views in town. We checked in that evening and went out to find someplace to eat.

It turned out that across Bay street and down some steps was River Street with the actual water-level river front and docks along with lots of bars and restaurants. There we found a place called the "River Street Oyster Bar and Restaurant." Good food at decent prices.

River Street Oyster Bar

The next day, we booked a half-day tour on one of those buses that's tricked out to look like an old time trolley car. It was a good way to get a flavor of Savannah and the tour guide/driver was very knowledgeable.

A tour trolley makes its way along River Street

Savannah is a very pretty town. Its founders laid it out with over twenty squares that are really mini parks (think Grammercy Park in NYC). Most of these still exist and add a lot of charm to the city.

One of the Savannah "squares". This particular one is where they filmed Forrest Gump sitting on his bench eating chocolates.

The tour was over too soon and it was time to head for North Carolina.

That evening we arrived in the tiny town of Mount Pleasant North Carolina to spend the night with our friends Marsha and Atlas. They live way out in the country on a corner of what was once his family farm. We spent a pleasant evening there at their beautiful newly-built log home and after dinner we visited "Kitty City" a feline rescue operation at which Marsha volunteers in the nearby town of Concord.

The next day we drove 13 hours straight home to good old New Jersey.

Road Trip II

When we last left off, Michelle and I were leaving St. Marys Georgia for her sister's place in Delray Beach Florida. After about a six-hour trip on I-95 and the Florida Turnpike we arrived. Jody and Carole have a nice two-bedroom, two-bath condo on the first floor in an over-55 gated community. The apartment features a Florida room (a type of screened-in porch) which overlooks a pond. We spent a couple of nights there before heading to Miami to board our cruise.

Delray is in the general vicinity of West Palm Beach; other nearby towns are Boynton Beach and Boca Raton. The area is mostly over-55 communities and most of the seniors are from the New York City area. A large proportion of the citizens are Jewish and this population supports any number of delis, bagel bakeries etc. Carole says it's like the lower east side with palm trees. She especially likes the fact that she can get all the authentic foods she enjoyed growing up Jewish in NYC. E.g. real chewy "water" bagels (simmered in water prior to baking as opposed to the doughy roll-like things that pass for bagels in most of the U.S.), excellent lox and nova salmon, kosher pickles from the barrel and so on. I can attest that the "deli" - cold cuts, rye bread etc. are very good. They took us to a place called "3Gs" deli and restaurant and the food was excellent. We also went to a place on the Intracoastal Waterway which is not far from their home which had a great view and excellent seafood.

Well, we arrived in Delray on a Friday and two days later, bright and early Sunday morning, we were up and on our way to Miami for our cruise. We checked on the Internet and found that there was parking for a fee at the Port of Miami, so we took Michelle's car, loaded the luggage, and off the four of us went.

Incidentally, M. came up with a good plan for the luggage on this trip. We both packed small bags with just what we needed for the trip to Florida, including the two stops on the way down, while we left the main bags packed for the cruise. This worked out well and saved dragging the bigger bags in and out of the car.

To continue, I drove us all to the Port of Miami and dropped my companions and our luggage off at the dock and proceeded about a quarter mile or less to the Port parking garage. One word of advice: they want payment in advance and they only take cash! Fortunately, I had the $100 in cash with me ($20/day x 5 days) but it was a bit of an unpleasant surprise - especially since the Port of Miami website indicated that credit cards were acceptable. Well, I hoofed it back to the dock and after a fairly short wait, we were allowed to board.

The "Norwegian Jewel"

The cruise went to Cozumel and Grand Cayman. Cozumel was fun: we booked a snorkeling trip aboard a large catamaran and later to a beach. The down side was that there were more people than fish in the water where we snorkeled; the up side was that they gave us all the free drinks we wanted. Grand Cayman was interesting. The waterfront had all the usual Caribbean t-shirt shops and duty-free joints, but one block inland were wall-to-wall bank buildings. I guess the place really is a big money laundromat.

The cruise ship itself was also a lot of fun. The ship had some halfway decent entertainment in their theatre and the food was pretty good. NCL has something which I like called "free-style" cruising which means among other things that even in the main dining rooms dress is resort casual i.e. golf shirt and slacks. It was the first cruise that I ever took that didn't require a suit and tie - I loved it (the first cruise I ever took as a passenger - back in the 70's -I had to lug a tux along!).

One thing they had that was neat were these automated self-service coffee machines. They had rows of buttons for both regular and decaf coffee, cappuccino, latte, etc. I wish I had one at home.

The ship had a number of specialty bars, one of which was a single malt scotch bar. I asked the bartender to recommend one to sample and she poured me a drink of something called "Aberlour" 16 year old single malt. It was probably the smoothest scotch I ever tasted. It was like a cross between sherry and scotch (not surprising-it is matured in old sherry casks). Anyway, it was very good and when my birthday came along after we got home, Michelle bought me a bottle.

All in all, then the cruise was inexpensive and fun, and we all agreed we would cruise NCL again.

Well, the ship finally made port in Miami and we piled in the car and headed back to Delray for a few more days' visit with Jody and Carole.

Next: Savannah GA and Mount Pleasant NC

Road Trip

This past month, we decided to accept a long-standing invitation to spend some time with Michelle's sister Jody and her partner Carole at their winter digs in Delray Beach Florida. The broad outline of the plan was for M. and I to make our way to Delray, spend some time there at their condo, the four of us then were to embark on an inexpensive (<$400/person) 6-day cruise out of Miami on the Norwegian Cruise Lines' "Norwegian Jewel" and finally return to spend some more time in Delray before returning to New Jersey. The first decision was whether to drive or fly to Florida. Since we were now both retired, I reasoned that we had no time constraints that would require flying (and renting a car in FL) so it made sense to drive. Also, I hate all the happy horsesh-t involved in going through an airport - from taking off my shoes to getting my luggage lost and I don't mind driving on an Interstate.


Well, we decided to drive, which worked out well for a number of reasons. First, we used Michelle's car (an Infiniti M-Class) which is extremely comfortable on a long drive, but at the same time handles well and lacks the "mushy" feel of a traditional "luxury" car. In my perception, a ten-hour drive in this car is like driving three hours in anything else. Then, since we were driving and passing through North Carolina anyway, Michelle made plans to stop on our way back and visit her friend Marsha who lives in a small town outside of Charlotte. And then, a few weeks before we left, Michelle, through the use of the internet, located an old friend from her operating room nursing days whom she hadn't seen in a dozen years or so. It turns out this lady, Gail, lives with her husband in the lovely little town of St. Marys Georgia, just at the Florida border and about five minutes from I-95. So, we had a place to stop on the way down.


Well, about a week or so before we left, I came down with a sort of 24-hour intestinal virus which produced the usual symptoms of those sorts of things and made me feel crappy (literally) for about a full day and not great for maybe one more day. What has this got to do with our trip? Well, apparently, despite diligent hand washing etc. I managed to pass the bug on to Michelle who was hit by it full force the night before we were to leave. We did have a day or so leeway such that we could have stayed home for a day for her to recover, but she decided to go for it and keep to schedule. So, there we were at Seven A.M. the next morning, loading the luggage and a somewhat out-of-it wife into the car and heading south. Normally, M. and I share the driving on a trip like this, but this first day, she was pretty much semi-comatose in the passenger seat so I drove the whole way to Florence North Carolina where we had a hotel reservation that first night. As I mentioned, her car is great on a road trip and since we managed to avoid the dreaded rush hour going around Washington D.C., the 11-hour drive was surprisingly easy.



Another pleasant surprise was the hotel in Florence, NC. It was called the Springhill Inn and Suites and it was terrific. The room was a two-room mini-suite with a microwave and refrigerator and it had one of the softest, most comfortable beds either of us had ever slept on. In fact, M. hit the sack shortly after we checked in and slept for about 12 hours which is exactly what she needed to pretty much recover from her malady. The next day, she felt 100% better and elected to drive the six hours or so to her friend Gail's at the other end of Georgia.



On the way to Gail's we had a couple of hours to kill since she would not be home until mid-afternoon, so we swung through Savannah GA. It's only a short hop from I-95 via a feeder interstate and we liked what we saw so much we decided to stop there overnight on the way back.



We arrived Gail's in St. Marys GA later that afternoon. Gail and her husband Hal were originally from New Jersey and when they retired a number of years ago, they first moved to Florida, but they grew dissatisfied and searched around until they found St Marys. They have a really beautiful home in a gated community. Their back porch looks out across a marshland and the St. Marys River to the Florida sandhills on the other side. Gail made us dinner and afterward we took a tour of the town and hit the local hangout for a beer. The main thing was that she and Michelle got to catch up with years of gossip, chat etc. from their days in the operating room together. The next day, we were up and off to Jody and Carole's in Delray Beach Florida.

Next: Delray and off on the Norwegian Jewel

Retirement

This past November, the 16th to be exact, Michelle retired from her job at the State Psychiatric hospital. She said if she stayed any longer she would have to check in herself as a patient. Now, however, I am the only lunatic she needs to deal with.



In celebration of this milestone, we invited family and friends to a festive dinner at the Vila Nova restaurant in the Ironbound section of Newark. Readers may recall an earlier blog which described a previous trip there.



In total, there were some twenty people. This included Michelle's sister and her two sons and their wives and Michelle's brother and his wife. And, of course, Little Mark, the World's Cutest Grandnephew. When he marched into the restaurant with his mom, he came up to Michelle and handed her a single red rose (Awww...) but of course he couldn't understand why she wouldn't give it back so he could play with it.

Once again, we consumed mass quantities of amazingly good Portuguese food along with copious amounts of sangria. We had a great time and all in all it was a proper feast to commemorate Herself's retirement.