Month: May 2007

… but I’ll take it. I was watching a match while eating the only decent cheeseburger I’ve had since I left the States. The Dubai airport isn’t so bad really, at least when it’s not crowded and you know where the best locations are for stuff. i won’t revealing all of my secrets, but knowing where the least crowded bathrooms, couches you can lie on, and places to plug your laptop into and have a chair are very worthwhile if you spend any time here at all. If any of you are looking at spending some time in Dubai’s airport, drop me a line and I can make your stay a lot nicer:-)

So yeah, watching cricket while eating my BACON cheeseburger is pretty nice, almost as nice as listening to Pavement’t first album during the call to prayer… I did nap a bit on the floor, I’ve been in more comfortable beds before, but I needed the sleep. The floor is your typical slab of concrete with a thin carpet over it. I was tired enough that the blindfold I got from Emirates was all I needed to doze for an hour and a half on the concrete. I can’t seem to sleep on the flights, even when I have enough leg room. God it must be nice to be small on flights. Since the seats don’t go back very far, my neck stiffens up and hurts like hell. I can either lol to the side or droop forward, both hurt. I can’t get to my side which is my favorite sleeping position. My cousin beth gave me one of those neck cushions before I left. I think it saved my life on the way over here on that 13 hour flight. I figured I didn’t need it for these short flights, but I neglected to take into account the hours were all during times that I’d normally be asleep. Plus it would have been a nice pillow when I was laying on the floor. Next time I’ll know better…

I’ll actually be buying some stuff at the duty free shop this time. Two liters of whiskey for a friend in Sana’a and I’m going to load up on chocolate. I’m buying a handful of big Lindt dark chocolate bars with almonds. All I can get in Yemen is milk chocolate, and rather sweet stuff at that. I’ll also be getting some chocolate with liquor inside of it. It tastes amazing, they have jack Daniels, a couple of cognacs, grand marnier, and that orange liquor I can never remember the name of. I find them to be heavenly, much like that bourbon fudge I used to get. I hope that will keep my chocolate ravings under control for a while. They have quite a selection of alcohol here. It ranges from the cheap, regular stuff to thirty year old scotches and even Louis the 13th cognac at a cool $1300…

It’s a bit of a cultural whiplash going from the cheap, haggle away Chinese markets to the real upscale, if you have to ask the price kind of place. They are raffling off a new Porche and a BMW 7 series car. There are only a 1000 tickets for each, but each ticket costs a little over $150. Definitely not your typical door prize. I briefly thought about getting a hotel room when I got here because of how tired I was. Well, since they seem to start at $160 a night, I decided the airport was fine:-) Dubai is pretty nice as long as you have some money to blow.

It’s my last day in Beijing, my flight leaves at 11:55 tonight, so I have almost the entire day to myself. I just had a few things to do. I needed to send off the postcards and the quilt back to the US, and I wanted to get a lighter quilt to take to Yemen. Went to the post office, turns out that they are full service here. They wrap and package your packages as well as send them. There was only one guy working the package counter (post offices are the same everywhere it seems) so it took a while. I needed to get some cash so I started looking around for an ATM. Yemen has spoiled me when it comes to exchanging money. There, you walk up to the shop, hand them your money, and they give you riyals. I brought cash with me to China, what a pain. First they tell you not to take your passport with you when walking around due to pick pockets. Then when you need cash, they want to see your passport… The banks have an incredible amount of paperwork and they scrutinize the bills throughly. I tried to change $150 US into Yuan, it took me a half hour at the counter window. I had to fill out two forms, sign three, and the clerk used two different stamps on 6 different pieces of paper. In the end, they wouldn’t take two of my 20’s for some reason.

Anyway, I got to the post office and realized that I’d need more cash. I wasn’t going to walk all the way back to the hotel room just so I could enjoy sitting at the bank counter again being treated like a criminal. I popped in my bank card and… nothing. It wouldn’t accept it. I went outside and used another bank’s machine, nothing again… I ended up using my Visa card, God oly knows what they’re going to charge me for that connivence…

The stuff got mailed out alright. I sent the quilt with the proverbial slow boat from China, it’ll take a couple of months for it show up in the states, but it was cheap. I then ate and got a taxi to a place that sells quilts. I wanted a lightweight on to take back to Yemen. Well, it turns out that they only make the light ones in single and double sizes. I had already bought a queen sized cover for it, so I didn’t want to have to buy another cover… In the end I decided against getting the other quilt. I wandered around a little and found more markets with amazing assortments of cheap junk. It has become clear to me that despite the fact that some very nice things are made in China, not many of those things makes into the domestic market. Maybe if I went to Shanghai…

I scored some really decent incense when I went to the Lama temple. I do like burning incense, but the good stuff. Back home I had a selection of Japanese (the kings of good incense IMO) incenses, but I left them there for the trip with the idea that I’d buy some in Yemen. Well, that hasn’t worked out so well. Yes, I can buy frankincense and myrrh, but they are very simple, one note scents. They are nice, but I get tired of them quickly. The other problem is that you need to put them over some coals to burn, there’s no way I am going to have fire or coals in my room… I could buy some Indian incense in Sana’a, but I find the Indian stuff to be very heavy and thick smelling. Plus, it just isn’t my kind of smell.

I was probably the only one who walked into the temple empty handed and left with a bunch of incense. Everyone else made offerings… I got three simple, but nice versions, and one that is a real heady, complex one. The simple ones cost a little more than 2 bucks for a whole box (probably closer to 15 in the US) and the complicated one cost me just under 8 bucks for a box (as opposed to the likely 40 bucks it would cost back home). There were some really lovely smelling sticks that I just couldn’t bring back, they were huge! Some of the sticks looked like a type of firework they were so big and long, about 3 feet long! There were shops that sold nothing but incense, it was quite fun. Most of them leaned towards the earthy, pungent side, not my cup of tea. The Chinese and Tibetans ascribe a variety of health benefits to some of the blends. Sorry, I can’t imagine that inhaling lots of smoke is anything but bad for you….

Today I went back to “silk street,” one of the markets filled with crap that you can haggle over. I needed a cover for my comforter, but I didn’t want to spring for a silk one. Cotton is just fine. The local mall had them for around 750 yuan, just under a hundred bucks, ouch! Looking online I could order one in the us for around 50 bucks, so I used that as my baseline. It was actually fun watching the girl trying her best to make me buy something. They really have the “no one walks” mentality. I told her that the prices she was quoting me were more than what I could get in the US. Of course I wasn’t going to tell her that hers was a little nicer and I wasn’t paying shipping or tax:-). She started out right where the mall was, right around 700 yuan. I stuck to my guns and got it for 300 yuan. It’s quite nice. I went with a cream color as opposed to white. I know from experiance that white things become pretty dingy pretty quick in Sana’a’s water. I’m going to get a lightweight comforter for Yemen tomorrow, I’ll send the heavier one back home. The light silk quilts are only around 300 yuon, so why not?

I am impressed at how clean this place is. Apparently there is an army of street cleaners working all the time, it shows. Even the air has been very clear. I had heard that this place has terrible smog. Other than a sand/dust storm the first day I have not noticed any smog at all. I think that the dust really helped keep in the fumes…

There are a zillion little steps that are around 2 to 3 inches tall everywhere. I never expect them and I’m afraid that I’ll really hurt myself before I leave. they’re on the sidewalks, in my hotel rooms, in the tourist areas, etc. Not sure why they have so many of them, I wonder if it is just a “fudge factor” from sloppy construction.

They still really think highly of Mao despite the fact that prosperity has been gained by doing exactly the opposite of what he taught and did. Our first tour guide gave the impression that he thinks the world of Mao. I really don’t understand. Clearly he led them down the wrong path, the trail of millions of bodies and unrelenting poverty should have been a tip off. How they can revere him and enjoy the current growth boggles my mind. Mao and Stalin are my two least favorite people of all time. Sure Hitler and Pol Pot are down there too, but these guys set the bar. Stalin probably had a higher deliberate body count, but the famines that Mao initiated are unforgivable. When are the Chinese going to realize that they could have had a “revolution” without so many deaths? When are they going to realize that Mao set them back a 100 years or more? When are they going to realize that if they did back then what they are doing now, they might be as wealthy as the US today? Like I said, I don’t get it…

I expect that people will eventually stop eating entrails here as the wealth of the country goes up. I doubt that many Irish or Brits still eat sheep’s heads or kidneys. As they got more wealthy, they stopped eating the slop and went to the good stuff. Maybe in 20 or 30 years you will no longer be able to order duck webbing, goose intestines, fish heads, or tripe from a decent restaurant here.

Most of the crafts here will be very successful with the domestic market, but demand from the west will lag behind unless they make stuff that is more to the liking of westerners. With the exceptions of the silk rugs and pearls, almost everything else is geared towards the Chinese. It will be interesting to see what happens as people’s spending money goes up here. They will be able to buy the cloisonné that their parents only dreamed about owning. On the other hand, it will become more and more expensive to make this stuff as wages go up. It will be interesting to see what happens, but this may be the golden age for crafts such as silk rugs and cloisonné. It may just be too expensive to make here anymore in 20 years…

They are very proud of the fact that the olympics are going to be here in 2008. Our guide was quick to point out signs and the new stadiums. He even suggested that we pose in a certain place at the Great Wall in order to get in the “2008 summer olympics in Beijing!” sign in the background. He seemed a little annoyed/dismayed that we didn’t react with glee when he took us to an official olympics souvenir stand. We couldn’t think of a polite way to tell him that we really don’t care…

I’m sure other things will pop into my head later, I’ll add them later.

I’ve stopped doing tourist stuff here. I think I’ve hit all of the major sites, and I need to rest my feet. In order of must see to less so, I think the sights here have to go in this order:

Forbidden city
Great wall
Lama Temple
Temple of heaven
summer palace
Ming tombs

I feel like the Lama Temple in particular is underrated by many people, do try to go see it if you can. If authenticity is important to you, I would place this above the Great Wall since the Lama temple is the actual thing and the wall that you’ll see is mostly a reproduction. Ideally, you’ll get to see all of these things, but if you have to prioritize, that’s how I’d do it.

In addition to the sights, make sure you get to go to some of the state run stores/factories that sell silk, silk carpets, pearls, jade, and cloisonné. Even if you don’t buy anything, it’s interesting to see how the stuff is made and learn how to detect the real stuff from the fakes. Also make sure you go to a reflexology place, an even better idea is to get a full body massage. It’s cheap and they know what they’re doing.

I think I’ve stayed here in Beijing just the right amount of time, maybe even a little longer than necessary. If you’re coming from a developed place like the US, a week would probably be all you would need. For people like myself coming from a third world country, 10 days is nice. I’ll post about general thoughts about the place a little later.

I have always loved Chinese food, so I was really excited to get out of Yemen for a while to come here. I gotta say, the food experience has been a mixed one for me. Our first tour guide told us that the Chinese eat anything that flies in the sky except airplanes and anything that crawls on the ground except babies. He should have added anything that can be pulled out of the water… They eat snake, scorpions, jellyfish, insects, and anything else that was once alive. Two people asked if I could believe that the Japanese eat fish raw, they were horrified at the thought. Of course they wouldn’t think twice about eating fish heads or chicken cartilage… It’s a little challenging to find reasonable food for a westerner here.

I went to a restaurant today for lunch. Like the others I had been to, at least half of it was seafood. That narrowed it down for me considerably. I say this mostly in jest, but it seemed like they made many of their dishes by fishing through our dumpsters. All sorts of entrails, tripe, feet, and heads were featured. The really curious thing was that there wasn’t any mention of the rest of the animal sometimes. One dish was mostly goose intestines, but there wasn’t another goose dish on the menu, what happened to the rest of the goose? They listed chicken livers, hearts, intestines, and even cartilage, but I never once saw chicken breast listed. Hell, I’d be happy with the thighs! It’s as if they prepare meat the opposite way we do, eating all of the stuff we throw away…

When we were on tours, they would always take us to restaurants that serve food for westerners. I’d say the quality overall was pretty low, I got much better food back home. I have had sweet and sour pork, chicken with cashews, spring rolls, and a number of other things that I would get back home, none of which was as good as I was hoping for. The best meals I have had here have been the Peking duck (you can’t go wrong with that, and it’s really cheap here) and my time at the cooking school. Of course I cooked some of the food there! That reminds me of a traveling hint that I had forgotten until jut now. Wherever you go, in the US or outside of it, and you want to eat well on a budget, look for the culinary schools. They always have a restaurant, and it will be pretty good and cheap. I’m going to have duck again tonight, and I may try to find a more western place tomorrow, my last day…

Shopping here is a bit of a mixed bag. There are 5 different “classic” Chinese crafts that the tours really push and that they really do well here. They are jade, cloisonné, pearls, silk, and silk rugs. You can get these things in both state run stores and the markets, the trick is that you really need to know what you are doing in the markets. Unlike Yemen, people here will cheat you in a heartbeat. In the markets, they will look you in the eye and lie through their teeth. Looking for suckers is what they do every day. I was looking for some fountain pens. I have bought some Chinese ones before. They are decent cheap pens (around 15 bucks with shipping from Honk Kong) and I was hoping to get one or two really cheap. I picked up one and asked if it was a “Hero” pen, that is an old and well known Chinese pen manufacturer. She said, “No, that is a Mount Blanc.” I could tell right away that it wasn’t one, the nib was clearly stamped and the fit and finish was not up to my Chinese pens, let alone a Mount Blanc. I decided to play along… “How much?’
“400 Yuan” Hmmm, let’s see that’s about 53 bucks, a far cry from the $400 Mt. Blanc, but also quite a bit more than the better built pens I had already gotten. It’s one thing to put the marketing spin on it and say that it is as “good” as a Mt. Blanc. After all, they both write and they are both fountain pens, in some people’s eyes that is just as good. Of course going the one step farther and saying it is a Mt. Blanc is an entirely different thing, and is clearly not true. If you go to the markets, be aware that anything you pick up (including the pearls) has a good chance of being fake. When it comes to electronics and clothes, you can bet that they are fakes. Of course if you know what you are doing, it is quite possible to get a good deal in the markets if you are a good haggler. Be aware that the vendors there are relentless, if you show any interest at all, they will work and work until they work out a price, they want to make every sale they can. If you even make eye contact, they are likely to grab you and literally pull you into their shop/kiosk to hawk their wares. Even if you don’t acknowledge them, they constantly yell for your attention.

I don’t find that to be a very pleasurable experience, some people do I guess. I much prefer the state run stores for the handicrafts. First of all, they are quiet and the sales people do not hound you. In addition, you can be sure that what you are buying is the real deal. All of the ones that I went to started out with an education about the craftwork. They are informative and they give you some pointers for picking out fakes. Be aware though, the information always turns into a sales pitch, and they do it very well. I bought a silk quilt (actually a comforter) and I had no intention of doing it when I went there. I have no regrets, but they did do an effective sales presentation. The other couple that was in our group ended up buying two silk rugs and my mother was teetering on the edge. If her husband hadn’t been there to dissuade her, she would have gotten one. Brenda did get two really nice rugs, and at one hell of a good price, but I think that it was a bit unexpected. Anyway, you have been warned…

Surprisingly, I was least impressed with the jade. I’ve always liked stones, but this stuff left me cold. The Chinese ascribe all sorts of properties to the material that just sounds goofy to westerners. I was shocked at the prices, they were far higher than anything I had seen in the states. One part of me thinks that perhaps I had never seen “good” jade (jadeite actually) before and that is why the prices seemed higher. I think the more reasonable explanation is that the Chinese value it more. The jewelry was plain, but the jade carvings were downright ugly. That’s not very PC I know, but please, those things were hideous. A lot of the subject matter had deep significance to a Chinese audience and bewildered westerners. Who wants a jade cabbage ($900), a pile of food being eaten by mice ($1200), or even a mystical frog with three legs ($1000)? I have pictures up if you don’t believe the ugly factor. Even when the subject matter had the potential to be interesting, the carving quality was pretty poor. I saw two places that enormous eagles (wingspan must have been 5 feet or more) carved out of a solid piece of jade. Impressive, but crudely carved and a real waste of a nice rock…

The cloisonné is actually very impressive. In case you aren’t aware, it looks a lot like porcelain or pottery, but it is actually hand enameled copper. That makes it not only more durable, but it also allows much more intricate designs. Like I said, it is impressive, but it is very… Chinese. Most of those objects are not things that you can just plop into any decor and have it work, they have a definite Asian/Chinese feel to them. Not something that I’d buy being a bachelor with much more subdued tastes.

If you like pearls, China has a lot of them, and at good prices. I’m not into them so much, but if you are thinking about getting “that” saltwater pearl necklace with the matching bracelet and earrings, you might want to come to China instead. You will probably save enough to pay for the airfare…

Silk is everywhere here. Once again, the ready made clothes are really Chinese for the most part, I couldn’t find anything that I’d like to wear in the state shops. Buying material here is probably a seamstresses dream, there are a ton of options available and the price seems to be pretty good. The biggest surprise for me was the quilts. They are actually comforters, but they call them quilts. Silk makes a great comforter, it is breathable, hypoallergenic, durable, and it won’t lose it’s shape. The hotels I stayed in both used them and I really like them, so I got one. A queen sized one cost me 79 bucks. After you decide to get one, they put the hard sell on for you to buy a silk cover for it. There’s no way in hell I am taking anything silk that will get dirty to Yemen, especially when they cost what they do. I am sure that they are good prices for them, but cotton will do just fine for me…

The most amazing thing I saw were the silk rugs. OMG they are beautiful, I never thought I would want a rug, but now I do. Silk is very durable, and get this, the carpets change as you look at them from different angles! The silk threads reflect light in such a way to make the rug look totally different when you view it from 180 degrees the opposite way. The detail, color, and designs are to die for. Of course there’s the small matter of the price… Rugs that you would actually put on the floor ranged from 1500 to 50,000 dollars. There are smaller rugs, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into lower prices. Many of the smaller rugs have higher knot counts and therefore greater detail, that makes the price go up considerably. The really large rugs took 4 people 2 years to make! I fell in love with a tiny carpet, maybe 2 ft by 1 ft. It was exquisite, incredible colors and an amazingly complex, detailed designed. I thought that maybe I would pop for one of these as a souvenir. Turns out that it was a special ones made for collectors, it ran a cool 3k. Apparently it took a “master” 8 months to do it! So no rugs for Isaac, but these were the things I drooled over the most here…

One last thing, the current exchange rate is 7.6 Yuan to the dollar. hardly a convenient figure. Everyone has calculators here, but it wouldn’t hurt to bring your own so you can figure things on the fly…

Today I went to the Lama temple, it’s the only Tibetan temple in Beijing. It was originally some sort of palace back in the 1600’s, but then some emperor converted over to this type of Buddhism and he turned it into a temple. The place is large and is packed with interesting things to see. It’s a wonder that none of it was destroyed in the various violent parts of Chinese history. It is still a functioning temple as well, many many people were there today making offerings and praying. Interestingly enough, I saw no Tibetans, at least I didn’t see anyone that looked Tibetan to me. The temple houses many statues, including the largest Buddha in Beijing (in China?), it’s 18 meters tall. The building it is in barely holds it, the head is touching the roof. Every building had something amazing in it, statues, paintings, relics, etc. Unfortunately you are not supposed to take any pictures in the buildings. I’m not sure if that is to protect the artifacts or just to keep some decorum in a place of worship. it didn’t stop some French tourists from snapping away though, they were oohing and aahing over the people praying and offering incense as if they were doing it for the tourists. What a bunch of asses…

I never got into Tibetan Buddhism, it is far too complicated for my tastes. There are 4 different schools and seemingly endless practices spread across those four schools of thought. The Tibetans took very seriously the idea that there are an infinite number of ways to achieve Buddhahood, there are seemingly an infinite variety of practices in the Tibetan tradition. A reporter once incredulously asked the current Dali Lama if enlightenment could be found through drugs, the Dali Lama’s response was, “I sure hope so!” The Tibetans recognize types of gods in their canon, but interestingly, they are subject to desires and disappointments just like humans. Some practices involve the building up of a certain god in the practitioners mind, what he looks like, his powers, etc. and then deconstructing him until there is nothing left. The process can take 10 years or more. Another school (one of the tantras?) makes initiates perform 100,000 prostrations to Buddha before they begin the religious training. And those are full prostrations, starting from a standing position and ending up prone with the forehead on the floor. it takes people 2 to 5 years to do this typically…

Suffice it to say I didn’t really understand or appreciate everything I saw today, but i did see one thing that I enjoyed immensely. The ideas in Zen Buddhism have had a great impact on me. Off to one side, there was a shrine to Shakyamuni, that is what the Tibetans (and maybe the Chinese in general) call the historical Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama). Along side him were two followers, Ananda and someone else. Ananda is considered the first Zen patriarch and how he got that title is one of my favorite religious stories. The Buddha called all of his disciples together and announced that he had a teaching for them. He then took out a flower and held it in front of him, not saying a word. All of the disciples were confused and didn’t know what to make of this, except Ananda, he just smiled. Ananda showed that he understood the true nature of existence and was not tied to language or thoughts to experience them. That is the essence of Zen…

I’m ranking this place right up there with the great wall and the Forbidden city as far as places to go in Beijing. I would definitely recommend this above the summer palace and the temple of heaven. Like the forbidden city, it is the original and unlike all of the other sites, it is still being used for it’s original purpose, it is not just a tourist attraction. I get the feeling that most of the locals, and certainly the tour guides do not think of this place as central to their history or culture. maybe it isn’t, but it sure is a great place to see and it is very interesting. I’ve put up the pictures, click on “The rest of them” in my pictures area to see them.

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Nancy picked me up around 10 and we went over to the cooking school for my lesson. The description I got when I booked and what I got was WAYYYYY off. It said I would be in a hotel that specialized in dumplings, that it would be 8 hours long, and that we would go to a market. I ended up staying at the cooking school about 3 hours, and we didn’t d any dumplings. She offered to take me to a vegetable market afterwards, but I decided that I didn’t want to do that. The lesson itself was pretty good. We made sweet and sour pork, a Sichuan chicken and peanut dish, and steamed a fish with ginger and garlic. It was probably the best (non duck) meal that I’ve had here.

It was interesting to see how little actual cooking goes on. Most of the work involves the preparation and selection of the ingredients. Cooking time for the wok dishes were all under 6 minutes. Nancy showed her lack of knowledge about western cooking when she said that Chinese cooking is much more difficult than western cooking. I believe that western style cooking is a bit more complex…

After that, I went on a tube hunting expedition. I had gotten some leads on where to look in my scouring of the internet. I will now offer some more detailed directions…

Take the subway to the Xidan stop and walk north. The street eventually turns into xisi beidajie (street) and you’ll see a bunch of electronic marts on the left side. These are pretty interesting, all sorts of connectors, capacitors, mosfets, diodes, hexfreds, etc. I had been to some markets for pearls and silk, this was just like them, but for electronic stuff. A few of them had some tubes, there is zero English spoken, so be prepared to do lots of hand waving and writing of models. I found a variety of Chinese tubes, but none of the really nice ones (valve art or TJ), one guy was buying some Chinese WE 6l6 reproduction (I can’t remember the model number) and they brought over a tube tester and were matching them for him. The best selection was at 93 xisi, a good part of the shop was dedicated to tubes and they had the prices listed right on the counter.

I didn’t end up buying anything from these guys, I was really hoping to get some good prices on the really nice TJ stuff like their 45, 50, px25, or even the 205d. No such luck… There is still an outside chance that I can buy them from the factory. It’s odd, the tubes are made here, but they are all destined for Hong Kong, the US, and Japan. I bet I could get some good prices in Hong Kong, oh well….

I caught up with Anne that night. Went to a locals place to eat, and then went to bed. I’m going to try to take it easy the next couple of days because I have been visited by the blister fairy…