As you might have known, few months ago I went to Beijing, China, for five short days.
Here goes the complete journey of my first day in Beijing (I will divide the journey into five parts.)
[1]. Mint and hazelnut ice-cream [2] The inside of the Temple of Heaven [3] Lion doorknob
[4] Chinese tea at local restaurant [5] Temple of Heaven [6] Lotus flower on my porcelain bowl
[7] Fruit dessert [8] Vanilla and watermelon ice-cream. Yes, watermelon. [9] Random regulation I honestly can't read ._.
This post will be picture-heavy.
We took a flight from Jakarta - Beijing the previous night, and arrived at Beijing airport in the morning. I had to pee, so I went to the airport toilet. There was a used tampon lingering innocently at my restroom booth. Note to self: restroom in China are dirty.
Had a little problem finding our tour guide because I saved a wrong phone number of him .__.
After being taken from the airport, we went to the hotel to change clothes put up suitcases.
Take a quick shot in front of the Grand Mercure hotel in Xidan area, Beijing.
Went having late breakfast / lunch, a local Chinese menu.
It's already in our tour itinerary that for this stay we'll be having a traditional Chinese menu, so yeah.
Took some photos because the waitresses on this restaurant wore a traditional princess-y dress. They even wore a platform sandal. Forgot to take a photograph of their shoewear.
Anyway I spotted a pink Hello-Kitty themed car in front of this restaurant, too bad I didn't get to photograph it .__.
And some sceneries I took while riding in the car.
Seriously temped to buy those magazines at that stall, but well yeah I can't read Mandarin .__.
And then we went to the Temple of Heaven
Temple of Heaven, or literally the 天坛 (Altar of Heaven) is a complex of religious building located in the southeastern part of Beijing. The temple is said to be visited by The Emperor for annual ceremonies of prayer to Heaven for good harvest.
Well I took this description from wikipedia, but our guide pretty sure told us the same.
In front of the ticket stall. That's our guide buying us tickets while we were taking photographs.
The complex itself is surrounded by huge green garden. There's also long hallway to the temple. Elder locals sat at the hallways; some just went there to hang out with his elder friends, and they do things like playing traditional chess.
Yes, traditional chess, or whatever they call it.
So this is the detailed photo of the temple, which I didn't edit the hue or whatsoever. It's so detailed, right?
Our guide told us, that the temple was built with no nails, fully by woods. There are three layers of the temple, and each was built by covering the previous layer with ground.
Ok I know my description is a little bit weird. Here is the simple one: They covered the first layer with ground when they built the second one, and they did the same thing with the third layer, too. Then, after all the layers were done, they removed the dirt. Such a complex way to build a temple, right?
And there are this lion doorknob and golden thingy at the gate. It is said that if you rub that golden thingy, they will grant you good fortune.
Some more sceneries I took.
Unlike in Indonesia, people in China walks. That's why they have slim and slender legs (which I envy). Motorcycles are rarely seen there, it's rather bike, public transportation, or personal vehicle.
We went for a walk in the famous Wangfujing road.
The peak of a Roman-Catholic Church, which we entered.
It was kinda nice seeing a Western-styled building in an Eastern city.
Took a lot of photos --where my grandpa wanted to look cool by posing a rather heroic pose.
The road was long and wide, and we could see varieties of shops here.
I love the colors of the shops --traditional with their own style.
And welcome the fried insects!
Yep, that's my grandpa, trying to steal my fried grasshopper.
I also tasted some fried tarantulas and scorpions. Woohoo.
And witnessing some beautiful seafood in a stick on our way home, which was beautiful. 'Nuff said.
(I happen to be a fan of seafood. They're lovely.)
Those foods are tempting. Even the stalls look tempting.
We had dinner at this long-garden-view restaurant. It was in the middle of a flower garden --which was kinda nice, because they had big windows so we could see the garden as we had our dinner.
The entrance, and there goes my mom and grandpa.
We ended the day by going to a Chinese circus (or that kind of thing)
Got the front seat and feeling like a boss already.
The whole circus was great, and the boys were handsome (not the point? Okay then)
Unfortunately my grandpa's camera ran out of battery and he forgot to bring the charger, so the next remaining days we took pictures only by my dad's camera.
We returned to the hotel, and afterward watch TV where Chinese track and field athlete Liu Xiang fell and then being helped by fellow athletes (and I cried watching this scene, sigh).
Okay, the end of day one. See ya.
