Day 11: Shanghai

We started off today with hitting up a three story indoor market. They had tons of knock-off stuff here...from bags to jeans, shirts and watches. We all ran around negotiating with the sellers and getting good deals. A lot of people bought luggage and filled it with tons of stuff to bring home. I restrained myself, but did end up getting a few bags, scarves and a Lacoste shirt for Bryan. It was pretty fun, and a lot less intense than the other silk market in Beijinng.

After the market we got lunch on a ship restaurant and then headed to the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. When we got there, there were about 200 children practicing for a New Years celebration show - so cute. We went up to the second highest level of the tower to get a full view of Shanghai. It was pretty cool because they had pictures of the city sky-line all the way back to the early 90's...you could really see how quickly and how much the city has grown. The view from the tower was awesome.

Next, we headed to the Yu Garden Market - it was this huge old-style bizarre of shops, restaurants and food vendors. Lauren an d I walked around to find tea, paintings and a wooden box she was looking for. We really got the bargaining down and got some really good deals - it was fun.

After the market we headed to our farewell dinner at one of the more famous restaurants in Shanghai. It was a really nice send-off. When we got back to the hotel, a few of us walked to Pizza Hut with our tour guide, Vicki. I was so surprised how nice it was - really an upscale Italian chain for them. We got a few pizzas and a few bottles of wine. It was nice to chat with Vicki and everyone. After that I went back to the hotel and hung out with everyone. We were so beat that nobody was really up for going out. We stayed up for a while but probably headed to bed around 1:00. Overall it was a good day, but I was feeling pretty tired just gearing up for the long trip home.

Day 10: Shanghai

We started off today with a lecture on "The Global Economic Recession and the Chinese Economy" at Fudan University, the university that my professor did his undergraduate work at. The guy giving the lecture was pretty good, albeit a bit unrealistic about China's future economic plans in my opinion. He talked about their plan for increased investment in public housing, rural infrastructure, transportation, R&D and industrial and rural home support. He forecasted that this year that their GDP would be fueled by 25% government, 25% social and 50% consumption. What about exports and investments? There are certainly some serious implications to think about if China breaks away from exports - particularly for the US. I doubt that they will completely stray from this model anytime soon, but it's something to think about none the less.

After the lecture we grabbed lunch and then did some walking around on Nanjing Road - an old shopping street. It was really crowded, but such a nice day. We also walked along the water on the Bund - really cool to see a view of the city during the day. Next, we walked to Deloitte and sat through what was one of the worst presentations I have ever seen. The poor guy just read his powerpoint slides with his back to us... very slowly in broken English. His knowledge of accounting was limited, so he couldn't really even answer people's questions.

Next we went to the "New Heaven and Earth" area to walk around. It was almost like Fanuiel Hall - tons of little shops and restaurants with outdoor seating. After walking around for a while we went to our last company visit at McKinsey. While we were there, we met with the author of one of the books we had to read for class "Operation China". It was interesting to hear him talk about the transformation of China over the last 20 years and his opinions on where it was heading.

After the lecture we had free time, so a bunch of us decided to stick around the New Heaven and Earth Area to walk around and find some dinner. We ended up stopping at this packed restaurant/bar. We sat outside and ordered all of the American food we had been craving (Nachos, Baked Brie, Mozzarella sticks, steaks) - it was awesome. Glasses of wine were also buy one get one free for happy hour, so that was pretty sweet. It made me wish that Boston had happy hour specials. We also met 2 Canadians who were traveling with Disney on Ice. We had a pretty long dinner, so after we were done I went home and crashed.

Day 9: Shanghai

Today we had some free time in the morning because our first company visit rescheduled. It was nice to be able to sleep in and get things reorganized. In the afternoon we had a lunch meeting with Wing, a Bentley alum and 2 CEOs who started their own businesses in China. It was nice to have informal discussion with people for a change, rather than the presentation style of the company visits.

The first guy we talked to was Ed - he has a company that deals with managing customer experience. Basically, we works with companies (such as hotels, restaurants) to train employees and develop standards for customer experience. Although he does some customer satisfaction surveys, they don't do any qualitative interviewing or focus groups. It was interesting to hear him talk about the Chinese attitude towards being detail oriented in regards to things like proof reading or resumes. In Europe or the US we would be sure to check a document for typos, but in China it's just not the case.

The second guy we talked to was Will - he heads up a private equity firm with offices in Beijing and Shanghai. He talked a lot about how blurry the rules were around business practices when it comes to dealing with the Chinese government - nothing is ever the same or simple. He also talked about the importance of personal relationships. He said that he does a lot more socialization with his clients outside of work than he did in the US. This is his primary mode of growing and maintaining his business.

After lunch we went to an EMC research and development center. We met with a sales guy there. I didn't realize that EMC stored 2/3 of the words data - yeesh. He talked a bit about their employee recruiting and work life. He also talked about how they're releasing their first consumer use storage product and the relevant challenges associated with that in the Chinese market.

After the company visit we went to eat at a Japanese restaurant - great to have a break from Chinese! It was another one of those all you can eat deals...but the entire menu was in Chinese (with pictures, of course)...we basically just pointed at a bunch of stuff we thought we wanted and waited to see what came out. The food was really good and we had tons of it. They also gave us plenty of beer and hot sake - a few people tried to do sake bombs, but the cups were too big and got stuck in the larger glasses... it was actually pretty funny.

Next we went to an acrobatic show. There were tons of contortionists, gymnasts and dancers. Although the story-line of the show was pretty lame, the people were definately talented. We got to see 5 motorcycles drive inside this ball - apparently this is the world record for something like that, so it was pretty sweet.

After the show, a few of us decided to go out to a bar and meet Wing (the former Bentley grad) and Ed, one of the guys we met with for lunch. It was great because they had a deal where it was open bar for like $15. We stayed there for a while and then headed to this other lounge-type place. The whole place was covered in marble, and they had pretty good martinis. I tried to do some salsa dancing...I don't think I was all that successful..haha. Overall the night was fun - there was such a mix of people out, it kinda felt like I was in Boston.

Day 8: Shanghai

First thing in the morning we took a 3 hour bus-ride to Shanghai. Even though it was a long ride, it was nice to have some time to relax and read a bit. Shanghai is such a modern, beautiful city – a lot of the buildings remind me of something I’d see in the Jetsons.
We started out with lunch (in a giant banquet hall type-place as usual). We got sweet and sour chicken, french-fries and spring rolls…I was so excited J. Next we went to IBM. It was interesting to learn about their history as a company and more specifically in China. They also talked a lot about the challenges they faced entering the smaller markets in China. We had a lot of time to ask questions, so it was good. We also got a tour of some of their office areas- that was pretty cool too.

After the company visit we went to a 10 story mall. We walked around for a while and then hit up dinner. Turns out that it’s common for Asian countries to have their better restaurants in a mall. We had tons of different dumplings for dinner (this is what Shanghai is known for) – they were so so good. I’m really liking Shanghai so far – the food is good, the bathrooms are western (normal toilets, toilet paper, AND hot water/soap) and the restaurants, meeting rooms and lobbies I’ve been in so far have been heated!

After dinner we went on a river cruise. It was awesome to see the city all lit up, I really enjoyed it.

Day 7: Hangzhou

Today we started off the day with a visit to High Tech Zone, another science park like company, similar to the one we visited in Beijing. We met a few of the companies in the zone and sat through a presentation. It was decent, but nothing spectacular. Even though I have a cursory knowledge of IT, servers, mainframes…a lot of it was over my head. At one point one of our speakers referred to us as “geniuses from Bentley” so that was pretty cool…haha.

After the first company visit we hit up a tea village. First we had a few minutes to walk around the hills of tea and take a few pictures. After that we went in and got a demonstration on process of making tea and what makes good tea – it was really interesting. We got to try some different types of fresh tea, so it was really fun. The tea was loose and sunk to the bottom of your cup. She said that 2 pinches of leaves could last someone a whole day if they kept adding new water. A bunch of us bought some of the over-priced tea (including me). I didn’t really care though because I knew it was fresh and I really wanted something from that tea village we were at.

Next, we visited State Street Bank. Basically, this branch developed technology for other State Street branches and select clients. They were really excited to have us since they have had a few Bentley interns at this office in the past. Also, State Street sponsors Bentley’s school of Ethics and Social Responsibility. The talk was good – I learned about the constraints of conducting banking in a city like China.

After the company visit we went to a silk factory to see how silk is made and learn about the benefits of different silk products. It was really interesting – I fought the urge to buy new pillows, but I did buy a cute new scarf.

For the night we had free time. About 12 of us met up and got a late dinner at an Italian restaurant in the city. It was really nice to have a change from Chinese. We got a few bottles of wine and had a long dinner. Believe it or not they didn’t have chicken parm, haha. I got some eggplant parm and a green salad – so good. After dinner we went back to the hotel and chilled out in someone’s room. It was pretty low key, but good to just hang out.

Day 6 in Hangzhou

Today was a pretty long day. In the late morning we headed to the airport to catch a flight to Hangzhou. It was only a 2.5 hour flight, but the whole ordeal of getting 20 people to the airport, checking in, boarding, etc. was pretty tiring. We arrived in Hangzhou (just South of Shanghai) around 4:00 in the afternoon and met our tour guide Joe. Right away I noticed a drastic difference between this city compared to Xian and Beijing. The roads and sidewalks were spotless, the air was clear and there was tons of greenery. As we approached the city, the highway was lined with modern, multi-colored houses that were all different (yet all the same). Joe told us that each house was for 5 people – I couldn’t believe how much space people got. The city seemed to have an orderly, carefully constructed, communist feel to it that continued to the downtown area. The sky scrapers and cityscape seemed modern and calculated.

After driving for about an hour we got to our destination for the night. Our professor told us to dress warm because we were going to walk around a lake and then head to the “Song Dynasty” show. We got out of the bus and walked towards this area that looked like a cross between Disney world (without the rides) and King Richard’s Fair (yet Chinese) – weird I know. When we got to the gate we were bombarded by Chinese tourists . They were so excited to see Americans that they wanted pictures with all of us. Little girls were running up to get pictures with the “American girls”. It was such a weird feeling. Our professor told us that they would most likely go back to their villages and show off their pictures with the Americans. We didn’t sign any autographs, but we were kind of celebrities there for a few minutes, haha.

We got in and had a little over an hour to walk around. Even though it was dark and freezing out, we still had a good time. There were tons of people dressed in traditional Chinese garb serving food, hosting game tables and selling trinkets. A few of us wandered off and found this giant playground. We played on this huge thing that had rope nets, wooden bridges and swings. Next to the playground was this awesome human-sized hamster wheel. It was like a Japanese game show – two Chinese people would get in the wheel, one would inevitably out-run the other, one person would fall and then the other would fall. There were tons of people around laughing - none of us tried it though. After the fun times at the playground we couldn’t find anyoneeee – leave it to me, this was like my 3^rd time getting temporarily lost from the group haha. Our tour guide finally found us and then filled us in that everyone was inside one of the restaurants in the fair drinking tea – we had no idea.

After some tea we headed to the show. We had the front 2 rows of seats in the theater (which wasn’t heated!). The show was awesome – tons of dancing, intricate costumes and acrobatics. Most of the songs were in Chinese, so I didn’t understand much of the story-line…but it was still cool.

After the show we went to a late dinner and had a cake for Phil’s birthday! What I thought was going to be a fairly easy travel day ended up being a pretty long day, but a good one. I was so happy to finally check into our hotel.

Day 5 in Xian

Today we arrived in Xian at 8:30 am. I was pretty groggy from the train and not looking forward to carting my bags through the station and to our new tour bus. Thankfully the station wasn’t nearly as hectic as the one in Beijing- outside was another story. When we left the train station there were hundreds of people waiting around the doorway for arriving passengers- all looking pretty impoverished and dirty. We had to push our way through the crowd of people – it was really scary. We got to a white truck and loaded up all of our luggage … I was afraid I was never going to see my stuff again! After our luggage was packed in we walked about a quarter of a mile up the street to our tour bus. The air was thick and smoggy, even more so than Beijing. The area was dirty and filled with trash…we passed multiple people going to the bathroom on the side of the street- such a change from Beijing.

When we got to our bus we met our tour guide for the day- Key. He gave us a brief history of Xian and told us about the old city wall, 9 miles in diameter. It’s the largest, oldest one still intact in China. We checked into our hotel (The Hyatt!) and it was really nice. We all quickly showered and then headed on our way to the Terracotta Warrior excavation site. On our way there we stopped at a factory that creates authentic warriors. I got an archer (guy kneeling – he was my favorite).

We got to the excavation site and it was amazing. I can’t believe that these thousands of terracotta warriors were discovered in 1974 by a few farmers – and that tons were still intact. It was an amazing discovery because it revealed a lot about the advancement and skill of early Chinese sculpture as well as the use of helmets in war. Amazingly, the creation of the warriors to protect the emperors tomb (which took something like 4 decades) was never written about anywhere in Chinese history. We spent a while walking around the 3 pits of warriors. I was surprised at how cold they had to keep the excavation sites, I guess it is because any artificial temperature control would ruin the artifacts.

After we were finished there, the planned day was pretty much done and we had free time. A bunch of us jumped at the chance to get some American food at the hotel restaurant. I was so excited to have some margarita pizza and a Caesar Salad. Wasn’t the same as home, but still good. After dinner we hung out and then did some walking around to a few local shops. Our hotel was in a really central location so it was fun. I crashed at around 10 because I was so beat from the past few days.

Fourth Day in Beijing

Today was probably the longest day of any on the trip, and of course I was doing it on about 5 hours of sleep. After I blogged about Day 3 I decided that instead of just going to bed, It would be more fun to hit up the hotel bar and see who was hanging out. Had a few drinks and then decided to head out to experience some of the night life in Beijing. There were 7 of us who ended up going out. The first street we went to had tons of different bars – it was decorated with tons of lights and decorations. They had everything from live bands to traditional Chinese music and rap. I even heard some Chinese man doing a cover of “Sweet Child of Mine”- hilarious. We decided to head down this ally to a back street and found this bar called smugglers – it was like a sports pub atmosphere. After that we took a cab over to Vix to try and meet up with a girl we met at that day’s company visit. It ended up being this huge club – everyone was all decked out (I was NOT). Even though clubs really aren’t my scene, we ended up having a fun time – they played some pretty good music too.

So, to start day 4 off we packed up all of our stuff and checked out of the hotel. After that we headed to a pearl factory and did some shopping there. We got to see the process of cultivating fresh water and sea pearls. After some shopping we hit up the Temple of Heaven. It was gorgeous and seemed to go on forever.

Next, we grabbed some lunch at a traditional Mongolian hot-pot restaurant. Basically everyone gets their own pot of boiling soup. In the middle of the table are plates of raw meat, seafood and veggies – you can take what you want and use your broth to cook it. I was really nervous to eat this meal – the uncooked meat sketched me out, and I really didn’t want to be sick for the overnight train. I ended up being fine, but a few of my classmates got a little sick or couldn’t really stomach the food.

After the hot-pot we hit up Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City – this is probably the most recognized place in Beijing. We spent some time taking pictures in the square and then headed over to the Forbidden City. We walked through the city for over 2 hours – all ancient palaces with traditional architecture and bright colors… I took tons and tons of pictures. As the sun went down we all got really cold. It seemed like the palaces were going on forever and we’d never make it back to the bus…when we finally did it was so nice to get some heat. Next we hit up a shopping street with high-end department stores and a huge mall. I went in the mall and stocked up on some candy for the train ride. I fought the urge to go to McDonalds for some fries! After that we got some dinner. I was really hoping for some noodles tonight, and I actually got some (turns out all we had to do was ask.. haha).

It was pretty late after this, so we headed to the train station… In all of the traveling I’ve done, this was by far one of the most hectic events I have ever experienced. The 20 of us got to the train station in Beijing…the first thing we had to do was put our bags through security screeners…there were hundreds of people trying to get through 2 lines. Nobody would just wait in line (cutting and pushing are not seen to be that rude of a thing in Chinese culture). This guy in front of me had a huge burlap bag of god knows what and he couldn’t move it around to save his life. I was just praying I wouldn’t get pick-pocketed or have anything stolen. Somehow we all made it into the station – we headed upstairs and waited in the soft sleeper lounge for about an hour until we could get on the train. There were such massive crowds of people, it was really stressful staying together and watching our luggage. We finally made our way through the crowds (all together) and boarded the sleeper train. The rooms were really tight, but we somehow fit all of our luggage in and got as comfortable as we could. I was so tired from the day of touring and going out the night before I passed out and slept the night on the train. Certain times in the night I’d wake up to the train whistle or the sound of us passing another train (pretty freaky), but besides that it was a pretty good night.

Third Day in Beijing

Today was another busy day, but really fun. The morning started off as usual with breakfast downstairs with everyone.. today I discovered a guy that made waffles in the back and some banana bread, so i was pumped. I'm still having a little trouble with the getting up early thing... woke up at 5, 6, then 7. At least I was able to get back to sleep though...a few of my classmates are having even more problems with sleeping too.

We started off the morning with a lecture at Peking University on the Chinese Market / Consumers. I was excited for this lecture since it's the thing most related to what I'm currently doing. It was also good because I'm most likely doing my research paper on consumerism / conducting consumer research in China. The discussion started off with an overview of the 7 main regions (markets) of China. It was interesting to get an overview of the other sections beyond Beijing and Shanghai (the only regions that my company has done research in). We also talked a bit about the young Chinese consumer and the increasing influence of American culture. There is also this idea of the post-80s generation and determining one's own life.

Next we learned about brand perceptions and Chinese awareness of foreign brands. It was interesting to hear the stereotypes that go along with owning various car brands in China. For example, the image of BMW was pretty similar to the US - basically a symbol of richness and the divide between the rich and the poor. It didn't seem like people had all that positive of view of the people who chose these cars. It's much more acceptable to drive an Audi. Since government officials drive these cars, it's seen as a sign of loyalty/respect, but still a high quality car.

We went over a pretty interesting case study that outlined Pfizer's introduction of Viagra to the Chinese market. There were all sorts of glaring issues such as price, cultural impact and distribution/PR that all seemed like they could have been avoided if the company did a little research/thinking.

After the lecture we had some time to tour around the campus- we took a few pictures in the courtyard and hit up the bookstore. I bought a small leather bound notebook to take the rest of my notes on (I was sick of carrying around a big legal pad). After walking around some, we went to lunch at a restaurant on campus - I think this is where I hit my Chinese food wall (only 2 full days of food. I know- pathetic). I was all ready to dismiss the rumors of people getting sick of the food in China, and then there I was, basically sick of the food. Phil, my Chinese classmate, said that this was the most authentic food we had so far... . I hate to be picky about the food we have, because I feel disrespectful...but I'm really starting to crave something different.. like anything with cheese or pasta...

After lunch we headed over to Bayer for a company visit to meet with their VP of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The meeting room was pretty sweet - the 32nd floor and all windows. It was disturbing to look down at the city and see so much smog and traffic though. The lecture was really interesting. We talked a lot about how being socially responsible can be strategic for a company while at the same time be a positive thing for others. We also got into what Bayer, specifically, is doing as a chemical and pharma company to be more socially responsible.

After the company visit (that ran really long) we headed to dinner (Thai food - yes!). As usual we sat in a lot of rush hour traffic.. I was so pumped for some pad Thai I didn't even care. Come to find out, I was terribly mistaken...the food was okay, but extremely spicy.. I had some veggies and white rice. At least we had plenty of Pijiu to go around (that's Chinese for beer, pronounced "p-jew" haha).

Tonight I'm laying low and packing up. We're out touring all day tomorrow and then taking an overnight sleeper train to Xian. I'm really excited.

Second day in Beijing

Today was another busy day, but really awesome. The morning started off as usual with breakfast in the lobby with everyone - I woke up super-early for some reason, guess I'm not completely used to the new time yet. After breakfast, we all got on the bus to head outside the city towards the great wall. On our way there we stopped at a jade factory - we got a lecture about jade and then we got to see the whole process of making/carving all of the different pieces. I got a jade pendant for myself, it's really cute.

After the factory we made the rest of the drive to the great wall. We went to the Badaling section - it goes on foreverrrr. Our professor picked this one because he said it had the best view. We got there and it was freezing and windy out (as expected). Thankfully I brought along a hat and gloves with me (thanks Bryan!). Climbing the wall was the coolest thing ever...it twists and turns through mountains and seems to go on forever.
After the great wall we hit up a giant restaurant with french fries and closer to american-like Chinese food, it was great. They also had a copper enamel factory downstairs, so we got a quick tour of that, and then did some shopping at the gift shop.

Next, we went to walk around the olympic village..we saw the water cube (where all of the swimming and diving events took place) and the bird's nest. It was awesome to walk around there and take pictures. It was weird because like every where so far, there were still Christmas trees and Santas up all around the village.

After the village we headed to the silk market on the other side of the city. It was 10 floors of everything you could ever imagine. Really cheap prices, but the pushiest people I have ever seen. It was too much for me to handle, so I didn't do a whole lot of shopping (so unlike me!).

Next, we headed back to the hotel and had some free time. A bunch of us went to the Japanese restaurant in the hotel. It was like $17-18 for all you could eat off the menu and all you can drink beer and rice wine..needless to say we got a ton of sushi and ate/drank there for like 2 hours..it was fun :). I crashed shortly after dinner.

First full day in Beijing

Today was our first full day in Beijing. In the morning we all met up for breakfast in the lobby – it was a huge buffet, similar to the one I experienced in Korea, but not quite as nice. I couldn’t bring myself to have dumplings and noodles for breakfast, so I stuck with toast and fruit.

The day started off with a trip to Peking University, where we met our guide Rebecca. She took us through the university and to our lecture hall. The architecture there was amazing … the section we were in had architecture from the Ming Dynasty – all of the buildings looked like old Chinese palaces. Tons of students were ice skating on the large pond in front of the building – our guide told us this story that the original founder of the school felt that the lake was so beautiful he called it “no-name lake” because it was too beautiful for a name. We also saw tons of students on bikes and walking to classes.

Our lecture hall was gorgeous. I was expecting a typical room with small stadium style seating and a podium up front. Instead, we sat at this long, ornate Chinese table, almost like a board room. We had these huge, heavy wooden chairs that were too heavy for me to even push in. Our first lecture was on the economic and social history of China. The woman giving the talk was really engaging. We learned a lot about the various dynasties and stages in China’s history and how the country's history and values impacts business relationships.

The professor lecturing shared with us a few interesting reactions to some current events in China. First she brought up the opening ceremonies in Beijing for this past year’s Olympics. While we all said that we were impressed by the ornate ceremony, she disagreed. Her reasoning was that she felt the ceremony was too narrow in scope and that it did not reflect the diversity of Chinese culture (she felt that it only reflected the 95% dominant Han). She commented that in other countries the ceremony was more world focused, something that is important for the Olympic games. She also talked about last year’s earthquake in western China. There was some negative attitudes towards US and other international companies with offices in China that did not quickly make charitable donations. I was under the opposite impression, since I heard a lot of news about the outpour of support for the victims and for the area’s restoration. It was interesting to hear her view as a person living in China at the time.

The second lecture was on Confucianism. We learned all about the central values of this philosophy and how these ideals play into Chinese business relations. Much different from the US, they place much importance on establishing deep, personal relationships before starting any business relationships. The idea of trust, respect and hierarchy are still present in Chinese culture and business today.

After our lectures we went to lunch on campus. Lunch was very similar to dinner the first night, with the round table and many dishes of food. The food was slightly different, but good. Way more than I’m used to eating for lunch.

After lunch we went to TUSpark or Science Park. This is the technology center of Beijing and holds companies like Google, Microsoft and a bunch of small start ups. There model is to combine larger international companies, smaller start-ups, and a university to create an environment of prosperity. The smaller companies can learn and benefit from the larger ones and vice versa. Companies have the benefit from recruiting from the university..you get the idea. We had a few lectures there from some small start-ups. It was interesting to hear about the transition that China is trying to make: from “made in china” to “created in china”. China has historically been known as a manufacturing hub, whether it’s cheap toys, clothing or electronics - so many products are made here. It is a huge initiative for the Chinese to create intellectual property (IP) products. It actually only makes up something like 5% of their total business. To hear them talk about the innovation and education opportunities available in the US was humbling.

After the company visits at TUSpark we went to a large technology market in downtown Beijing. Basically it was a 15 story building with every electronic you could imagine (laptops, cell phones, cameras) and tons of people heckling you to buy stuff from them. It was really uncomfortable because we all clearly stood out as tourists…I felt targeted. After about 5 minutes of that, a group of us decided that we wanted to go outside and walk around for the hour of time we had. It was absolutely freezing out (probably like 10 degrees). We walked around and hit up a Chinese McDonalds and Starbucks. We noticed that drivers have no regard for pedestrians, even with walk signs...so that was interesting.

We went to dinner at a nice Chinese restaurant downtown. Again, we sat at a round table while plates and plates of food were brought out. This time I tried lily root, which was really good. Although the amount and variety of food was impressive, I’m still not used to eating this massive combination of meats and veggies at once.

After dinner we went back to the hotel. A girl from across the hall and I decided to go out and do some exploring around the hotel. We walked in every direction and found shops, street vendors and a few restaurants. It was nice to get out and check out around the hotel and to see the city at night.

I’m dead tired right now, so I’m going to head to bed…tomorrow is another long day (Great Wall, Jade and Silk Market.. yeah!). It’s nice to have such full days, but really tiring at the same time.

Even though I’m missing some stuff from home, I’m already really glad I decided to take this trip. Yay.

I made it!

So, I’m finally here with some free time to start up this blog! The trip here was long, but not as torturous as I thought it would be. The flight to Chicago was pretty easy - I read a bit and actually ended up falling asleep for a few. Once we got to Chicago, we got lunch together as a group at Chili’s and then got on the flight. Of course I had a middle-middle seat. Awesome. It ended up being okay though…it was an entire row of us from the Bentley trip, so it was cool to chat with everyone. There were some pretty random movies on the flight – I ended up watching this Nicholas Sparks movie with Richard Gere- obviously I ended up crying like an idiot, great. I probably slept like 7 hours off and on, but it was still a really long time (13 hours) to be cramped on a plane.

The hotel we’re staying at in Beijing is nice – it’s in between the 2^nd and 3^rd circles of the city (I think there are 6 in total) and it’s a Park Plaza… for some reason I was picturing something like the one in Boston, not quite..but it’s not so bad. I’m rooming with a girl named Lauren – she met up with us at the airport in Beijing because she was traveling to the west coast and then to Bangkok before coming on the trip..it sounds like she had a really fun time. We get along well so far, she’s cool. For some reason the rooms here are stifling hot, just like they were in Korea! I discovered that the window opened today, so that’s good..haha.

The first night we were all pretty out of it, but we went down to the hotel restaurant for a late group dinner. We sat at 2 large round tables, each with a large rotating glass plate in the middle. Waiters and waitresses kept bringing out plate upon plate of communal Chinese dishes – we had duck, beef, chicken, lamb, all different kinds of fish (even jelly fish!) and a ton of other seaweed, vegetables, fruits and desserts. I even ate 100 year old goose eggs- I know, weird. The plates would sit on the large glass plate and people would turn the plate until the dish they wanted was in reach. I was thankful that I had so much practice using chopsticks in Korea- really came in handy. Way wayyy too much food for us to ever dream of eating, but I guess that’s a big part of Chinese culture- It would be embarrassing to not have enough food, so they tend to lavish their guests and potential business partners.

I fell asleep almost instantly when we got back from dinner at like 10:00…woke up a few times at night, but convinced myself to fall back asleep. . glad that I got a good night sleep though because there was a long day ahead.