Thanks!

Oh my goodness! What a whirlwind 4 months. How fast and slow time can fly! I cannot believe that I am back home, writing all of these posts. I am in Pittsburgh for a short while before I go back to Columbus to start my next quarter.

I have had the most amazing experience ever and I hope that this blog was able to give you some idea as to how I enjoyed or didn’t enjoy my adventures. There were definitely some ups and downs and some homesickness but that is all part of the experience! I am fairly sure that this is my last post on this blog unless I find something truly noteworthy about my transition back into OSU/American life.

I am truly blessed to have had the opportunity to adventure around Hong Kong and Asia. I met and traveled with some of the most amazing people ever. I have learned so much just by being around amazing people and experiencing so much.

I know that this transition back into life at OSU and in America is going to be a little difficult for me but I know that I have the support of my friends and family and I can’t wait to see some pretty special people. I imagine that I will not feel as though people here will understand exactly what and how I feel about my experiences in Asia but I know that I will always have the people that I met there and some of my fellow buckeyes to understand that. Hopefully, one day I will be able to help others to understand just how wonderful it is to live and study and travel around such an amazing place like Asia. Maybe then I can explain just how wonderful I feel to have had the opportunity to do so.

Special Thanks to the Fisher College of Business at The Ohio State University and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology for allowing me to exchange, all of the friends that I met in Asia for making this experience so wonderful and my loving family and friends in the US for all of their support over the last 4 months to 12 months that I have been involved with this entire study abroad experience. This experience would have been nothing without you and I couldn’t have done all of this without your help!

Thanks for following me through this experience and if you ever have any questions, feel free to let me know! :)

The Last Day and a Half in Hong Kong

Once I landed in HK, I went took a bus to Tung Chung MTR station, the MTR to Lai King, then transferred to the Tsuen Wan line towards Central to go to Prince Edward and then transferred lines to go to Choi Hung.

I got back, dropped my stuff off, showered and then headed back out towards Admiralty Station to meet Evan and Sumana. After meeting up with them, we waited until my brother got to the station and then headed up to Victoria’s Peak to look over the amazing skyline one last time.

Sumana and I had wanted to go up to the Peak at night for over two months. So to be able to do so on my last night in HK.. I couldn’t have asked for much more.

My brother joined us and took a bunch of probably spectacular pictures up at the top of the Peak. We would have stayed up at the top for way longer but we were all freezing so we had to leave a little earlier than we had wanted.

We took the minibus down to Central and then took the train over to Mong Kok where my brother and I proceeded to shop a little bit. I didn’t get everything that I needed to get so we cut out early to meet up with Sumana and Evan at the infamous, amazing desert place, Hui Lau Shan. The three of them got something to eat and then we went back to campus so that we could all start packing to get ready for the next day.

I stayed up pretty late to pack and do laundry and then got up fairly early to get ready. I finished my laundry, folded it up, closed my bank account, got my ID card deactivated, and then ran over to the souvenir shop to get a couple of UST tshirts. After that, I went into town and met up with Elizabeth and her great uncle and Aunt. We went into the ladies market where we bargained some and she helped me pick out some different gift items and wall hangings for my room. After I decided that I didn’t have any money left, we went over to TST and sat at the harbor and talked about a lot of stuff including how she decided to stay in Beijing for a full year and how I felt about going back home. After a good hour and a half of talking and freezing on the waterfront, we met up with her family again and bid farewell to each other. I am sure happy that we got to meet up while she was in HK.

I went back to Campus and started to pack. Sumana came to visit and sit with me while I packed and my brother came in and shortly after Suki and Koko (locals) came to sit with me while I packed. After short time, Ray came to say goodbye and after walking down to the waterfront one last time, I checked out of my room, said “see you later” to Sumana and then got into a cab to get to the airport. I might have had some tears while going back to the airport. I checked into my flight and found out that my bags were overweight so after some fandangling..I got my bags to be just right and went through the Hong Kong Resident’s side of immigration one last time. I got onto my flight and after a quick phone call to my parents to let them know that I was leaving HK, the plane departed and I fell asleep almost immediately. I definitely planned on staying up for the first 8 hours of my flight but that definitely did not work out so well for me.

I slept for about 7/10 hours of my first flight, landed in Vancouver, and then slept for the next 3/4.5 hours of my next flight to JFK. After reaching JFK, I proceeded to stay up all day and evening all the way. I think I was able to limit my jetlag that way and am so happy for that.

When I landed in Pittsburgh, I couldn’t help but feel mixed emotions. I was happy that I was home but I felt so incredibly out of place. It was an extremely odd feeling and I wasn’t expecting it in the slightest. I am used to feeling completely elated about being home but for some reason I didn’t feel as excited.

I got home and found that my mom had put our Christmas tree up for me and soon after getting home, one of my best friends came to visit and started to be my chauffeur for the day. I can honestly tell you that I felt really weird wandering around a snow covered city as opposed to a palm tree covered area. I missed Asia and Hong Kong and I saw some random reminders of the area that reminded me that I missed what I had only 30 hours earlier.

Kuala Lumpur and Singapore with the Family

I woke up around 5:20 am and got ready to go. I woke up my roommate right before I was about to leave so that I could say goodbye because she was leaving to go to Korea that night and I didn’t know if I would be in HK or not.

I arrived at the airport at around 7am, checked in at both Malaysia Airlines and Cathay Pacific and was told at both that my odds weren’t good but that I would be told at around 8:05. I grabbed a bagel and hung out around the staff registration counter, waiting to hear anything. 8:15 came and went and I still did not have word on my chances. At the last second they called all standby passengers to Kuala Lumpur and I got on the flight!

I got to KL at around 12:30 and came outside to arrivals. I was fully prepared to take my own taxi to the hotel and meet my family there but when I exited arrivals, I saw my dad waiting for me! He looked excited to see me and I, of course, was happy to see him as well.

We waited for my mom and then we waited for my brother, who was arriving at a completely separate terminal on Air Asia. After he arrived, we got into a taxi and went to check into our hotel. We arrived at The Legend Hotel and put our stuff in storage and headed out to the Batu Caves. It was raining earlier in the day but when we got to the caves it was completely dry. We climbed all 272 steps to the top. There were monkeys everywhere! They were occupied by a barrel of oranges left out for them. My brother told me that he saw one shoot past in front of my dad as my dad was concentrating on climbing the steps. Pretty funny. We got to the top and walked in and were astonished by the vastness of the caves themselves.

The Batu Caves are essentially a Hindu temple. It was pretty neat to see a temple inside the cave and we stayed for a good time marveling at marvelous cave.

After awhile, we climbed back down, had some fresh coconut and then headed back to the hotel so that we could move our stuff into our room and then head out to the bus station to pick up tickets to Singapore for the following day. We took the train to the station, asked each bus company which buses they had, settled on one and bought a ticket for 39 Ringet per person (12ish a person).

We made our way from the bus station to the city center where we marveled at the Patronus Towers. I’ll have pictures up in Picasa but these towers are connected by a skywalk that you can go up to for free if you have a reservation. We were in KL during a public holiday so unfortunately we could not go up to the top. It was beautiful though. The towers almost didn’t look real because of the way it was lit up. It was pretty gorgeous.

After wandering around the city a little, we went back to a mall next to our hotel and we had dinner together. We went back to our hotel and went to sleep because we had to get up early to get over to the bus station to catch our bus to Singapore.
We got to the bus station around 8:35 am for our 9am bus and bought some snacks for the bus ride. We meandered over to Platform 20, found our bus, and got ready for the 5 hour bus ride.

The bus left about 45 minutes late and all of us fell asleep almost immediately. I woke up a couple times to take pictures of the scenery but it was mostly banana trees and green grass so after some time I just went back to sleep again.

After awhile, we exited the vehicle and made our way through Malaysian immigration and back to the bus where we were told we had to wait for a different bus because that was the bus had clearance to go into Singapore as opposed to our bus. We got on the new bus, and were driven to Singaporean immigration. We went through immigration, went back on the bus and were driven into town where we were dropped off around 5 blocks away from our hotel.

We checked into our hotel and then went into the city to walk around. We walked from one station, across a bridge to Merlion Park aand One Fullerton where we saw the Merlion with the skyline in the background. After sitting for some time, we left and went over to Little India where we walked around and had dinner.

There was such a difference between Little India and the rest of Singapore. My brother told me that Little India is considered the dirtiest part of Singapore (environment wise). Which is really just sad.

After wandering around Little India for some time, we made our way back to One Fullerton so that my brother could get some really awesome pictures with his fancy camera. We headed back to the hotel and went to sleep early so that we could get to the airport bright and early.

We ended up not getting on the first flight back to Hong Kong but easily made the second one. What was interesting was that Cathay Pacific had 4 people working one flight and about 8 people working the later flight. It definitely didn’t follow queuing theory and I was pretty excited that I actually applied something that I had learned.

The End of Finals!

After my finance final, I was so ecstatic about being done that I had a quick meal at the Chinese restaurant with Sungwon, Andrew, Chris, Sharon, Koko, and Evan before we all parted ways. We talked about our finals, and random little things. After dinner, we got some ice cream and Evan and I went into town. Chris came with us because he was worried that we wouldn’t find what we were looking for.

I tried to convince him not to come with because had an exam the next day but he was determined to help out and took us straight to the place. Once we got there, he made sure to translate exactly what I wanted to the lady. It was a lot of give and take and some hilarious exchanged but in the end everyone was in agreement and everyone was having a good time.

We told Chris that he should get going and that we would wander around a little before heading back. Evan and I looked around that area and then we went over to the Ladies market to pick up a couple things before we headed back. After bargaining for a little, Evan and I were exhausted and went back to campus.

I talked to my family and decided that I would try and get a flight to Kuala Lumpur the following morning. The flight supposedly looked pretty bad but I knew that I had to try for a flight (standby) on one of the days so I decided to try for the entire weekend.

I ordered a taxi for 6:20 and then went to sleep around 2am.

The Family Comes to Hong Kong!!

After a day of studying, I met up with my family at their hotel in Yau Ma Tei. They were staying at the City View hotel. From the lobby it looked like a pretty spectacular place! We walked around for a little while in the city and ended up eating at Burger King and then I took them into Mong Kok to do a little shopping. My brother had never been there so I am glad that I was able to find something new for him to do.

I did a little bit of shopping and my family tried to gauge prices. After an hour or two with them, we decided on a time and place to meet the next day and then split ways. They went back to their hotel and I went back to campus.
The next day (Sunday the 12th), I met them at 9am at the Tsim Sha Tsui MTR station so that we could head on our way down to grab a Ferry over to Macau. We made our way down to the Ferry, bought our tickets cleared immigration and then got on the boat at around 10am.

We got into a taxi as soon as we cleared immigration in Macau and headed for the Macau Tower. We entered the tower, registered ourselves (my brother and I) for the Bungy Jump and then quickly gave our stuff to our parents so that we could head upstairs to get ready. We went all the way up to the 64th floor and registered our names upstairs where they gave us a Macau Bungy tshirt and asked us to change into it. We put our stuff in a locker and then went out to get harnessed. After they put on our gear we went to the holding area and watched a guy in front of us jump off the building. I can honestly tell you that I was not afraid. I was simply really, really, really excited. I feel like that could be an issue if I am not afraid of jumping off a building.

While we were waiting, people would walk by us and would be excited for us and tell us how afraid they would be to do this and would give us a thumbs up. It was like we were famous. It was pretty funny. I was called in first and they had me sit on a metal table and hooked me up to the bungy cables. And led me over the edge where we took some pictures. They counted down from 5 and then I just sort of…jump/fell off the building. It was the most spectacular feeling. I didn’t scream or anything I just sort of… went and had the biggest smile on my face. I was so excited. After falling about 233 meters, the rubber bands pulled me back up and I pulled the rope that was attached to my feet so that I could switch to a sitting position and I was lowered down to the ground

I absolutely highly recommend anyone to go bungy jumping. It is one of the most spectacular feelings in the entire world. I can’t wait to do it again.

As they were unhooking me, I asked the ground staff how many times they had been bungy jumping and the one guy said that he had gone over 900 times! HOLY SMOKES. Amazing. I ran over to my parents and gave them a hug and then we waited for my brother to jump. He screamed on the way down (for kicks and giggles)and after he was unharnessed, I ran over to give him a high five and we took a picture together. We went back upstairs to look at the pictures and the video and all, took pictures all over the tower, and were asked by several people to take pictures with them. So funny. :)

After we got our stuff, we went down to the lower observation deck where we stood on a glass floor. My brother couldn’t even stand on it because he was more afraid of it. It was pretty funny..he could sky dive and bungy jump but he can’t stand on a glass floor 61 stories high. Haha. But really though, it was scary.

While we were wondering around the observation area, we saw a big group of people standing near one area of the glass window. We saw/heard them take in a big collective breath and then make this scream like gasp together as the next person went bungy jumping. It was pretty hysterical.

We went back downstairs and then made our way to the Wynn Casino. We played penny slots and then headed back to the Ferry Terminal so that we could get back to Hong Kong and I could get some work done.

We got back into Hong Kong, I bid them farewell and made my way back to campus where I met some friends for dinner and then started to do some work for my exams.

Finals!

I feel like I was in a hole for about 2.5 weeks. Besides when my family visited, I was pretty much holed up and studying from the 5th until the 19th. I had finals on the 10th, 11th, 15th and 19th. My first was psychology. And I read the book, took notes and studied. I did pretty okay on that exam. My second exam was Operations Management. It was not a very good exam…difficult and all. The exam was actually not well written at all. I was pretty surprised that the instructor didn’t proofread or have someone else proofread his exam paper. I felt as though I spent a significant amount of time just trying to decipher the questions as opposed to thinking of the correct answer. The average was pretty low and I beat the average so that was good. I didn’t do as well as I would have liked but I ended up with an okay grade.

After my first two finals, I started studying for my next two exams because my family was going to visit. It was pretty hectic and I don’t think I studied and understood as much as I would have liked but I ended up doing okay. My globalization studies exam was a little bit ridiculous and I wasn’t too pleased with it. I felt as though the professor was simply trying to test the most obscure parts of the course and not the overall theme. Overall, I didn’t like that class and the final simply confirmed that fact.

My finance final was absolutely evil, as I expected but I was too ecstatic to be done with my UST classes to care so much. I cannot wait to get back to OSU. Its going to be amazing. Overall, I was not happy with my classes at UST. I felt as though it was less about learning and understanding and more about how to get the grade. My finance class was ridiculous and the professor did not make up her own slides but simply used publisher’s slides and was not available for questions. My globalization professor did not know what she was talking about and essentially ran out of the classroom as soon as class was over. She did not answer questions and every time you asked questions she was more and more condescending. The only class that I really did enjoy was my Personality Psychology class because the professor was absolutely amazing. You could just tell that she was really into what she was talking about and really, really wanted to make sure that she got the importance of psychology across to her students. She drove home the point that she was always available for questions and comments and that is definitely something that I really appreciate.

Happy Valley Horse Races!

I forgot to mention about my trip to the races! Ben, Sumana, Evan, Jane (UCLA) went down to Happy Valley (near Causeway Bay) and watched the horse races. I had never been to a horse race before so this was definitely an experience. Ben, Jane and Evan all bet on horses while Sumana and I watched. I bet on a horse in my head and it almost won but at the last second it got beat out.

The races were definitely an experience..we saw some people that were really, really into it. They took out their newspapers to check out the odds and were distraught when they didn’t win. It was a spectacular night and a very, very cool experience.

After a little while, Ben, Evan, Sumana and I went out to eat and then we made our way back to Campus.

One of the Most Spectacular Days…ever.

After some back and forth coordination events, all of us Buckeyes in Hong Kong left UST on the Friday before finals at around 12pm to head into town to visit Debbi at Mast Industries/Limited Brands!

We got to the office about 30 minutes early so the gang decided to grab a bite to eat in the nearby mall (malls are always nearby). We returned to the office post brunch, signed in and waited for Debbi to come out and lead us in.
We entered the back office and absolutely astonished to see the behind the scenes activity of Limited Brands (i.e. Victoria’s Secret, Chicos, Lane Bryant, Pac Sun, etc etc). We went into Debbi’s office and she gave us the overall run down of what she does, answered our questions, and then showed us around the office. We saw all of the sections of VS, and then headed to different floors so she could show us all of the other divisions. She walked us around into the design office and told us about the multitude of components in bras. And the fact that each bra is engineered and reengineered to do exactly what its supposed to do. Who knew that it was such an art?

After about an hour or so, we went downstairs to meet Bob, Dennis (an OSU grad), and a man from A&L Logistics (a third party logistics firm) so that we could continue our adventure to the Port. He took us by van to the Port where we went on a tour of the port. Halfway through the tour, we were able to get out of the tour bus to take pictures and take in the scenery. We got back on the bus and the guide answered our questions and then we proceeded to go into the warehousing area where we met another OSU grad (they are everywhere!) and she showed us around the warehouse and explained exactly what was going on.

I can’t believe that we were given the opportunity for these site visits. I can’t express my gratitude to Debbi for organizing all of this. These visits truly made this study abroad experience come full circle and really drive home the exact reason why I went to experience a whole new culture, area, life.

After we finished up, we went out for drinks with Bob and Dennis in Soho. We sat around talking about corporate culture, Hong Kong life, our study abroad experiences, UST and so much more. It was definitely one of the best conversations I had had in a long time. I learned so much just by listening. It was also nice to spend some time with my Evan, Lilian, Diana and Kyle. I didn’t spend a whole lot of time with most of them this semester so it was nice to do so before we all headed back.

We shot the breeze for a good while and then Debbi came by and we started talking to her about the Port visit and of what a great time we had. We thanked her profusely and continued to talk about Limited Brands, interviewing, internships and of the private investigating that companies do before they hire their employees.
After some time we decided to go down a little ways in Soho and eat at El Taco Loco. We talked about everything under the sun from how Debbi and Bob met to where she worked in between working at Limited Brands to how Dennis got started at Limited Brands, etc. They asked about what I liked to do and what I wanted to do with my life. After a good conversation with Bob, he asked if I had ever thought about going into teaching.. and I told them that I have considered it and I hope to get into teaching after I experience the world and feel as though I actually have some valuable experiences to share.

Dinner came and went and we moved our conversation to another bar and sat outside. Diana, Lily and I talked to Debbi while Evan, Dennis and Bob talked elsewhere. We talked to Debbi about a whole lot and she shared that after briefly talking with each us at the OSU-Michigan game, she had felt like we were special and that she wanted to share with us an experience that we would value so much. She said that she felt as though we would all succeed in life. We talked about how to go about marketing ourselves in interviews and to make sure that we remain as we are and make sure that we always remain humble and introspective about life and how we can better ourselves.

Debbi is such a great inspiration and such a wonderful lady! Even though she remains in such a high position, she remains down to earth and a wonderful leader. I can only hope that I can be half as great of a leader. We were walking around the office and while talking to Dennis, I just got a feeling about just how well loved she is at that company. Truly fantastic.

Special thanks to Debbi and Bob on bringing this experience full circle.

Shenzhen!

The week following our wonderful climb to Lantau Peak, Evan and I decided to use my last Chinese visa entry to do a little shopping (on Black Friday) in Shenzhen, China. We left for the border around 11 am. We took the minibus to Choi Hung and then transferred at Kowllon Tong to take the East Rail line up to Lok Fu, where we crossed the border into Shenzhen. The main reason why we wanted to go into China was to do a little shopping for friends and family members. I was primarily looking to get souvenir type things that people would like but when we walked into the commercial center right on the other side of the border, we were bombarded by fake name brand purses, watches, clothes, handbags etc. We could not find any good souvenir gifts. It was simply a building full of fake goods and massage parlours. It was a little ridiculous.

After searching and searching, Evan and I gave up in the building and attempted to seek out another place to buy gifts in the city. We took the train further into the city but to our dismay, we found nothing of what we were looking for. We turned around and came back to our starting point and eventually decided to get a massage and some fake movies.

We each picked up a drink from the 7-Eleven (Minute Maid Grape Juice…specially made for the Asian Market is DELICIOUS!) and were quickly approached by a man asking if we wanted any DVD movies so seeing as we had nothing else to do, we decided to entertain ourselves and go look at movies. They led us back into a backroom, near the jewelry section, had us sit down and brought over an photo album full of dvd covers. They mostly had newer releases and also had a lot of tv series. I was really tempted to buy the Friends DVDs but I decided against it and instead, got about 16 movies (most of which I had never seen before). Evan picked out a couple movies and a couple tv shows and after writing all of the names down, the man went to get a HUGE suitcase full of fake DVDs. It was a very elaborate system. I was expecting to simply be handed a DVD without a case but each of the DVDs were places in a flattened box of the “actual” DVD cover and most of them were then placed into a plastic case. Like I said, very elaborate.

We paid for our movies and then headed back through immigration and back to campus where we met Sumana for dinner. Overall, it was a fun day in a place that I probably don’t need to go to ever again. 

Thanksgiving!

I originally wasn’t planning on doing a whole lot for Thanksgiving because I had a whole lot of work to do in terms of papers and studying but in the end, Sumana told me that she and Eddric were going out to a vegetarian restaurant for dinner in Causeway Bay so I decided that I wanted to spend the holiday with friends instead of with my books (always a good choice). We went to a restaurant (the name escapes me right now) but ordered a multitude of different dishes including vegetables, a spaghetti-esque dish, potatoes, and lotus paste dumplings (Yummm).

I had asked for water but they didn’t have any so they gave me chilled coconut water…in a coconut. I was so ecstatic. It was absolutely delicious and I could totally go for another one right about now…but I am in the US while I am writing this and that’s just not possible anymore.

After dinner, Sumana, Eddric and I walked around the mall a little bit and then headed back to Choi Hung, parted ways and Sumana and I headed back to campus.

I spent a little more than I was expecting but it was totally worth it. A bunch of other people went to a restaurant called Fat Angelos in SOHO to have a full blown Thanksgiving Dinner. Since I don’t eat meat I decided I wouldn’t go there but I heard that it was quite delicious.

Even though its Christmas time as I am writing this, I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday full of family, friends and thanks.

Lantau Part II and OSU-Michigan Game!

The next weekend, Ben, Evan and I decided to hightail it on over to Lantau Island because we wanted to ride the cable car, Ben wanted to see the Big Buddha and the two of us wanted to hike a little bit. We met up around 11 am and headed out. Evan was wearing a sweater and a tie and Ben and I were wearing jeans and a jacket..this is much more useful information when you consider that despite the fact that we told Evan that we were going hiking, he didn’t remember or something and thus became the first person to climb Lantau Peak in a tie! Haha. Anywho, we met up and hopped on the MTR, switched lines a couple times and ended up at Tung Chung so that we could take the Ngong Ping Cable Car up to the Big Buddha. We underestimated just how long it would to get up to the Buddha and got stuck in the cable car line for about 30-35 minutes. The cable car took about 20 minutes to get from Tung Chung to the top and the ride was well worth it. I got to snap a bunch of pictures of the airport for my brother, see the wonderful mountains of Lantau and look out on the sea. We got to Ngong Ping Village, checked out the Buddha, snapped a couple pictures and then headed over to the Wisdom Path. The Wisdom Path is where there are Chinese proverbs engraved on half tree trunks. Its pretty cool but I wished I could read Chinese so that I would know what exactly they said. Maybe I could get my buddy to translate my pictures. Who knows.

Anyway, after we walked around that area Ben and I started to hike up a trail that was nearby to the Wisdom Path. Little did we know that this was less of a hike and more of a climb. This path was simply a series of very uneven, rocky steps. We climbed and climbed and I got more and more tired. We took frequent breaks and I felt a little bad because I am clearly not in very good shape and so I was going slower than I think Ben would have gone had he been with someone else. I think he nearly sprinted up a bunch of steps and then would wait a minute or two until I got closer and then he would start running up the next section of steps. A little ridiculous, if you ask me..run-climbing a mountain. I don’t know how he did it. It was a pretty difficult climb up to Lantau Peak (934 meters) and a lot of what was keeping me going was the fact that I wanted to be able to say “yeah, I climbed a mountain. ” Probably seems a bit silly but that’s definitely how I felt. I wanted to be able to have a story when I got back about how I climbed my first mountain in Hong Kong. And I can tell you one thing, its not going to be my last. I felt so incredibly accomplished when I got to the top and sat with Ben, overlooking the beauty of the island, the sea and feeling like I was on top of the world. I could have spent so long up there but we got there a little late in the day and we wanted to make sure that we got back down before it got too dark. Right as Ben and I were about to leave our rocky perch at the top, we saw Evan coming up the path in his sweater and tie. We had left him behind a little before because he told us to keep going up the hill. We both were pretty excited that he made it to the top and it was pretty hysterical. Climbing to that peak was such an amazing experience and I definitely want to make sure that I climb some more mountains. I think I may have found a new hobby? I am glad that I got to spend the day with the Ben and Evan. They are so fun and funny and made the day so much more fun.

We climbed our way back down (which is much worse than going up). I am not exactly a fan of climbing down really steep steps and it takes me a little longer than it should. Its weird, I want to go skydiving but I am afraid of going down steep steps? Hmm. Anyway, we took the bus across Lantau back to the MTR stop and found a mall where were proceeded to eat. I had Indian food…delicious!! And then we walked around the mall for a few (they were outlets, after all) and after deciding that the prices were a little too much for our liking, we headed back to UST…exhausted but happy. So happy.

After a quick nap, I met up with Evan, and Diana at Hall II so that we could hop into a cab and get over to Wan Chai to watch the OSU-Michigan game with a bunch of OSU alumni. We got there and met up with Lilian, another exchange student, and settled in to watch the game with some fantastic people! We met a wonderful couple from Columbus, Debbi and Bob, who are in Hong Kong for about a year while Debbi gets the HK office for Mast Industries/Limited Brands in full transition mode to a new leader. She invited all of us to come into the office for a visit and then offered to get us a tour of the Hong Kong Shipping Port. Amazing!

As usual, OSU dominated Michigan and we took a bunch of pictures and had a wonderful time with the OSU alumni. We got back to campus around 4:30 am and quickly passed out.

Special thanks to Jack and Nana Banana for hosting all of us throughout the season! It really made our HK experience that much better!

Stanley Part II

Wow Wow Wow… I can’t believe that I am on my way home now. I know its been a long time since I have posted on this blog. I have been trying to get into the swing of finals..studying and seeing Hong Kong before I leave for who knows how long. I guess I’ll hit the main points over the last couple weeks, and then talk about my finals experience, my family visiting and my last days in HK.

So about a week after I got back from Thailand, Sumana, Ben, Evan and I went over to Stanley Market again so that we could take a look at trinkets to buy for our friends. We took the MTR to Chai Wan and then took a minibus over to Stanley Market from the MTR stop. It was a pretty crazy ride that wound in and out of the mountains, across the Tai Tam reservoir and over to Stanley New Street where we proceeded to get off the bus and walk on over to the market. We went in and out of each shop and discovered that everything was much more expensive at Stanley than anywhere else. All of us had previously thought that we had seen lower prices at Stanley but we were completely wrong.

It was a really weird experience going from the city out to Stanley because as soon as you get off the minibus you are surrounded by expats from all over the world (mostly the US and Europe). I am sure that has something to do with why the prices are so astronomical in Stanley. We found many shops that would accept US dollars instead of Hong Kong dollars. I would never pay in USD..that just seems like a scam waiting to happen. After looking around for quite a while, we decided that we were getting hungry so we went over to the waterfront and found a multitude of restaurants offering only western food (odd, I think) and so we sat down at a restaurant and ordered (veggie burgers are delicious!) and shared a couple laughs about just how odd Stanley market really is. The people that live there seem to be shielded from the “real hong kong.” They are perfectly content in their belief that Hong Kong is simply the beach going, high priced markets, European version of HK…I have read a number of discussion boards online where they talk about Mong Kok and other ridiculously busy areas as “too crowded” and “to be avoided at all times.” Stanley market, we noticed, had more quality control than any other place that we had seen. There was a little more customer service (at the restaurants) and almost non-existent bargaining. After eating, we wandered around the market some more and ended up with little things like postcards, silk ties (10 HKD!!) and shot glasses (as this was the only place that we had seen fairly decent ones).

We found our way back to the bus depot, hopped on a double decker bus headed back into town and sat in the very front row at the top of the bus. Can I just tell you that double decker buses are the most exciting things since sliced bread? I absolutely loved sitting at the front in the top of the bus just because it looks like you are going to hit people and trees and the bus in front of you! That sounds kind of odd, I think, but its definitely something that I highly recommend if you ever get a chance. We got back to campus by the evening and as far as I can remember, we called it a day.

Bangkok

We got back into Bangkok at around 10:00 local time and we got to our hostel the Lub D. It was an amazing hostel. It was clean and classy and really felt more hotel like than anything else. If you are going to Bangkok I highly recommend it. We checked in and it took us a while to get everything figured out. There were a couple slight mis-communications but we managed okay and got everything all figured out

After we checked in, we went over to Khoi San Road where there is a lot of night life. I pretty much stayed with Lisa the entire time and we walked up and down the road trying different thing. We had a nutella and banana "rotee" which was superb and we also had some pad thai off the street and a passion fruit smoothie. Delicious. All of it. After a little bit of time, we met up with the guys and they got their fill of pad thai and we headed back to the hostel.

I love hostels. I met some of the coolest people. Lisa and I stayed in a women's only room because there wasn't enough space for all of us to stay together so I got to meet a girl that lives in Minnesota that traveled through northern India and then went down to Australia to work for 5 or 6 months. I met another woman that left her job (as a dance teacher in England) and left with whatever money she had and started traveling. She was in India for about 2 months and then got to Thailand and was about to meet a friend to travel over down into Malaysia. She said that estimated that her money was going to run out in about three weeks and thats when she would head back home to work for 5ish months, save and then leave again. I think that is the absolute coolest thing that anyone could do. I guess I value being able to see different places a lot and having the guts to just save and leave and save and leave would be the ultimate way to live...if I didn't have strings. But alas, I am too much of a chicken to do that.

Anywho- We woke up the next morning, got ready, ate some breakfast and then negotiated a Tuk-Tuk ride to go down to the pier. (We really had to negotiate well because they wanted to charge us a large amount and then they wanted to stop the fashion district on the way..shady business!) We negotiated to 10 baht per Tuk Tuk (Pretty much an auto-rikshaw) and made our way to the pier. The driver took us to the wrong pier but we just walked to the next one (the correct one). We got on the public boat and it took us down the Chao Phraya River. We got to see a bunch of cool temples from the side but eventually we got to our destination: The Grand Palace! We got off the boat and walked through market areas and entered the Grand Palace. Pretty much everyone in the group (minus me) was in violation of the dress code for that area so they had to borrow different articles of clothing (Guys need long pants and girls need to make sure that everything from their knees to over their shoulders is covered).

After we all added our articles of clothing, we entered the Palace. Everything was bright and shiny- gold plated and all. The statues were gorgeous and everything was just magnificent. It was a huge place and certain places were blocked off or were being renovated but overall it was a really cool place to see. Definitely check out pictures if you have time.

We left the Grand Palace and took a 3 baht water taxi over to Wat Arun (Temple of the Dawn). We payed the entrance fee there and climbed the ridiculously steep steps up to the top to check out the view. It was a little creepy coming down because you really have to hold on to the steps behind you or to the railing or something because one misstep and you are tumbling down stone steps. From the top of the temple you could see the Bangkok skyline as well as the Grand Palace and the Chao Phraya River. It was definitely really cool.

We headed back from the Temple of the Dawn and split up. Evan, Lisa and I went over to the Weekend Market and the rest of the guys (Ray, Tim, Justin and Steve) went to a spa to get massages. We ended up at the market around the time when they were starting to close but we still got to see a lot of neat things. They sold more than your stereotypical souvenir things (actually, I don't think I saw ANY souvenir type things). They had all sorts of different stores/stalls. Some with paintings, others with lamps or clothes or kittens. Yes, I said kittens! There were these people on the side of the street that had puppies and kittens in a crate for people to buy. Evan and Lisa played with them for awhile while I looked around for things for friends. I did hold a puppy though (first time ever holding a dog! It was adorable!)

After looking around a bit more, we got back to the hostel and met up with the guys to go out to eat dinner. We ended up at an Indian restaurant where I only got Samosas. I felt a little uneasy because I walked in and heads turned and stayed turned in my direction but thats oh well. We ate and then headed back out to walk around the city for awhile. We went into a 7-11 because people were hungry after a while, and while they were all looking around, Justin, who is on an Indian Dance team at the Univ. of Pennsylvania, wanted me to teach him some Bharatanatayam moves (Indian Classical). I blew him away with my VERY limited knowledge and tried to teach him the steps in the middle of the store. It was really funny. We ended up at a club that was like three clubs in one. Noone drank or anything but we got in for free so we just decided to dance and then leave. I really miss music and dancing. I really am not super picky about the music that is played..(though they did play Jai Ho...which is very much a club song but Justin would randomly pull out Indian steps which I thought was absolutely amazing.)..I just love dancing. It was sooo fun.

We got back pretty late and went to bed almost immediately.We woke up in the morning, checked out and headed on our way to Bangkok Airport to head back to Hong Kong.

Overall it was a super fun trip and I am so glad that I went! I was definitely skeptical but I had a great time!

Kanchanaburi- Elephants and Tigers and Waterfalls, Oh my Part 2

We woke up kind of late on Saturday. We hadn't slept much Thursday night so I think everyone was just exhausted. We woke up around 9:30, got ready and went over to that restaurant to grab a quick bite to eat before we went exploring some more. Everyone got breakfast-type items (I got a banana pancake that was more cake like than anything else). It was still delicious. Tim called up our taxi-driver friend and he came almost immediately to pick us up.

We negotiated a bit more and headed out. Our plans for the day consisted of Tiger Temple and the Erawan Waterfalls. It took some time to get to these places so we decided to play some games while we were waiting. So inbetween taking pictures of the beautiful landscape we played letter games where each person had to go around and say a letter while trying to spell a specific word and if you said a letter that people didn't think spelled a word than they could call your bluff. It was hilarious and we definitely brought out the itouch to look up some words that people were making up. So funny. We got to Tiger temple in about 45 minutes and a couple people had to change into more appropriate clothing. You aren't allowed to wear Red, orange or pink colored clothing. Girls have to have clothes covering everything from below their knees to over their shoulders. Its pretty strict, too. We entered the grounds and made some jokes about the goat that we saw and a little girl's slipper that we found, saying that the Tiger must have gotten her. It was pretty funny.

We didn't know where we were going at all but we found a sign that pointed us to Tiger Canyon so we went over there to check some things out. We got to see the tigers in their post-feeding form and it was really exciting. Everyone formed a line and then when your turn came up, they would take your camera from you and then would guide you to each of the tigers. They would place you behind the tiger and tell you to pet it or put your hand on it and then they would take pictures. It was soo cool. I have never been that close to such a big animal (minus cows and camels in India and minus the elephants from the day before). At one point, I was told to sit behind one of the tigers and NOT touch the tiger at all. Of course, I didn't but I really, really wanted to-just to see what would happen. It was a huge tiger. One other tiger had its paw up in the air and I put my hand on the paw that was on the ground and I kinda pet it and then a couple seconds later the paw that was up in the air definitely almost kicked me. It was pretty funny because I jumped a bit (Read: a lot).

After we left Tiger Canyon, we wondered around the grounds and found some tigers that were awake that we took some pictures with. At one point, Evan was sitting next to one of the tigers and I guess it didn't really like him because it was laying down and then it got up and was trying to turn its head towards him when the volunteers stepped in and got Evan out of there. They definitely kind of pushed him out of there which was really funny.

A Note: A lot of the workers there are Volunteers that applied to be there for a month or more. We got to talking to some of the volunteers and they said that they came here on a visit some time before and then decided that they wanted to apply. After a fairly rigourous process, they brought a set of volunteers from all over the world in to work there for a decent amount of time. The volunteers said it was one of the most rewarding things they have done so far. Definitely cool and if I wasn't afraid of cats I would thing about doing it. I'll stick to volunteering with people, thank you very much. They won't bite my leg off... ;)

So after we took turns taking pictures we decided to hurry up and get to the waterfalls because it would take a good amount of time to get there and they close kind of early. It took around an hour to get there but we played a memory game to keep us occupied. This time it was "If I was going to the Moon, I would bring..." and each person would take a letter of the alphabet, repeat what the last people said and then add a new word...so at the end you have "If I went to the Moon, I would Bring.. an Apple, a Babboon, a Car," etc etc all the way until Z. We had to stop around V to go play in the waterfalls but then as soon as we got back in the taxi we started up again and finished out the game. It was so funny.

We got to Erawan Waterfalls and found out that the upper levels closed at 4 but the lower levels closed at 5 so we pretty much stayed at the lower levels because we didnt have any other options but it was definitley worth the entrance fee. We jumped off rocks into the fresh water pond area and we swam across the pool underneath the waterfall and hung out behind it, took pictures, and then jumped off rocks, again, back into the pool of water. While you were stationary in the water, little fish would come and bite the bottoms of your feet. It was such a strange feeling and none of us really liked it all that much because it was tickling us but it was definitely really cool. We took some sweet pictures and then headed out, at around 5, to change and get back inour taxi so that we could catch the bus back to Bangkok.

Playing in a waterfall was definitely one of the most exciting things that I have ever done...ever. I am so grateful that we decided to do that.

We got back to the hostel, picked up our bags and then sped off to the bus station to make sure that we didn't miss the last bus. We made it in plenty of time and decided to wait one bus so that we could eat dinner. We ate really quickly at a place called the Charming Kitchen (pretty delicious) and then headed onto the bus (which I almost missed because I wanted to get street ice cream) and then we were on our way to Bangkok!

Kanchanaburi- Lions and Tigers and Bears , Oh my

Okay, so maybe not lions and bears..but definitely Elephants, Tigers and Waterfalls!

We arrived in Kanchanaburi on Friday around 1pm. We got off the bus and were immediately bombarded by people asking if we wanted a taxi ride. Now the taxis that you might be actually thinking of are not the types of taxis in Kanchanaburi. In Kanchanaburi, they have trucks that are covered on all sides (except the back). You climb into the back of the truck and hold on to a railing on the ceiling while the the "taxi" is moving. Its pretty fantastic and was definitely a our mode of transportation for the day and a half that we were in Kachanaburi. We negotiated a price to 10 baht per person to take us to the hostel and around the city.

We first went to the Jolly Frog Hostel, which the owner at the Soi 1 Guesthouse recommended. It looked okay but it didn't have enough of the right kind of rooms for us so we went elsewhere. We ended up at a different guesthouse which was actually pretty nice (About 11 USD per night) and we checked in, paid and then decided that we were going to go ride an elephant at that moment.

While we were checking in, Tim decided to negotiate prices with the taxi driver. Each of us paid 200 USD per day for the taxi services. He took us absolutely everywhere during those two days. It was probably a fantastic deal for him and a not so good, but okay deal for us.

We set our stuff down, got back in the Taxi and then drove all the way out to the elephant riding area. It was so far away (probably around 45 minutes) but we definitely had a good time watching the scenery (rolling grasslands with mountain peaks around us!) and playing mind games until we got there.

We finally reached the elephants and I pretty much leaped out of the taxi I was so excited. We went down the hill, negotiated a elephant ride and a rafting adventure down the river for 600 (she wanted 600 baht or 18 USD for each at one point) and headed over to claim our elephants. Evan and I were on one elephant and it was definitely a lot of fun. It was bumpy ride but our guide was the coolest. He would sing Thai songs and talk to our elephant (I forgot the elephant's name). He sat towards the top of the elephant's head and would kinda guide him but putting slight pressure on the back of its ears. It was really nifty and I definitely have pictures, if you want to go look. The path took us down towards the water, where our lovely elephant tried to spray us with water. :) We took some pictures and then made our way up a hill towards another grassy area. Evan and I almost ran into some trees but after about 20-25 minutes on the elephant, we were taken back to the starting point, were given life jackets and then headed down to our bamboo raft.

We got on the raft, sat down and left the dock. There was a small tug boat that pulled us up the river and partially filled our bamboo raft up with water. It was tons of fun. I put my foot in the water on the side of the raft but after seeing baby alligator/crocodile (I am not sure which one) on the the shore, I decided that I probably shouldn't risk my foot being ripped off. After a certain point, the tug boat left us and our raft driver paddled us down the river. We got to see the beautiful sun setting on the river. When we passed the area where we saw the baby alligator/crocodile it was no longer there and we definitely did not put any more limbs into the water. Haha.

The raft trip was so fun and we got back to the dock in no time. We got off the boat and headed back up the hill. I talked to the lady that ran the establishment and I asked her if the elephants pick people up. She either didn't understand me or something because she said that they don't do that at this location. Tough luck. Oh well, I got to ride an elephant and feel its back and thats definitely an experience in itself.

We got back in our taxi and headed back into town and had a contest over who could take the best sunset picture. I personally liked mine but I think Ray might have had the overall best picture. Though, the boys cheated because they all have "sunset mode" on their cameras. Cheap, I tell you. Cheap.

y the time we got back to the hostel, it was dark. We quickly recouped and then went to go find somewhere to eat dinner. We found a restaurant that was pretty close to our hostel called the Tai Thai. We were all starving so we ate there and then wandered around that part of the city for some time. After a little while, Ray, Tim, Steve and Justin decided that they wanted to get massages so they left and Evan, Lisa and I went back to the hostel to hang out. We hung out for a little while and then decided to go swimming in the hostel pool. The rest of our group joined us and after a while (around 10) we were kicked out and headed to shower and get ready to walk around again.

We walked around the area again and found a little restaurant/bar thing that had a fooseball table so obviously we ended up hanging out there for awhile. The guys ate again (after about 4 hours since the last meal) but this time had spring rolls and pizza. Crazy people, I tell you. :) Ray even fell asleep at the table! It was so funny and we definitely have pictures.

We went back to the hostel and Evan and I went to the cyber cafe to book the next two nights in Bangkok. We found a hostel called Lub D. We booked it and then looked at the pictures. It looked pretty cool but the last place that looked okay (Soi 1) online ended up not being the best place to stay.

After paying for the rooms at Lub D, we went back to our hostel and pretty much immediately went to sleep. So tired. Such a fantastic, but long, day.

Journey to Thailand!

Wow, I am FINALLY getting to writing about Thailand. I can't believe its been a week and a half since I got back. I am sorry it has taken me so long (if you have been checking), I unfortunately had some papers that took priority over this blog. Now that those are all finished, we are good to go! On to my Thai adventure! :)

We met up with each other in the lobby of my hall (Hall VII) at 7pm. I hadn't met a bunch of the people that were going on this trip and I barely knew one of the other ones so it was nice to get to meet more exchange students and go on a fabulous adventure with them. I met Lisa (Chinese, raised in Canada and goes to school at NYU), Steve (Vietnamese but now lives goes to UC), and Justin (UPenn)for the first time. They seemed pretty cool. I caught up with Tim (Georgia) and he asked me if I had everything planned out for this trip. He asked me what we were doing and after I told him a couple of the ideas that came up online he said "well do you mind going to the beach and all? Watersports? Not like all museums, right?" and in my head I was thinking "is that really your perception of me?" but I disregarded it and moved on, got in the taxi and headed off to the airport.

It took about 45-50 minutes to get to the airport because its on a completely different Island, on the complete other side of the city. I had never been to the Hong Kong Aiport, other than when I landed (and I definitely wasn't paying attention to anything beyond "Gotta find my buddy" to notice how beautiful it is). We checked into our flight (Emirates!) and headed off through passport control and eventually to the gate!

It was absolutely packed flight and I loved everything about the Emirates plane. They have TVs on the back of every seat with about a bazillion movie, tv, and game options. Their staff was very friendly and SO MULTICULTURAL! It was a bit unreal. At one point the first officer came on the PA system and said that on our flight (going from HK to Dubai via Bangkok), they had German, Spanish, Italian, Thai, Urdu, Arabic, Hindi, English, Cantonese, Mandarin and Dutch language speakers in order to cater to everyone on board! Absolutely unreal. I don't think I have ever been on a flight where they have attempted to cater to so many people. I bet people appreciate that so much, I know that I do!

I, of course, was planning on doing homework on the flight but as usual, it just didn't happen. Instead, Evan and I synced our tvs so that we were watching a movie together! It was so fun and we got the timing almost perfect. The movie, entitled "Julia and Julia" was an okay movie until the very end. I don't really recommend it.

We arrived in Bangkok after a short 2 hours and 40 minutes and a lot of people got off the plane. The boys decided that they wanted to go into the duty free shop and instead of waiting, Lisa and I decided to go through immigration and to the baggage claim so that she could get her bag. I was went up to the immigration counter and said "Sawadee" which is how you say "hello" in Thai and the man said hello and then he proceeded to say that I was beautiful. I said "thanks?" and then has asked me "did you come with anyone else?" Even if I hadn't come with anyone else, I think I would have said that I had anyway. I couldn't tell if this was normal immigration nonsense but I know for a fact that the "you're beautiful" comment was definitely not immigration appropriate. EIther way....

It was probably not a good idea to leave the guys behind. I only say that because we went through security and then down to baggage claim, immediately picked up her bag and then waited for the guys to get here. We didn't see them so we decided to go to the other immigration check point to see if they had gone out that way. We spent about an hour looking for one another and in the end, the guys were sitting in the arrivals hall. We finally gathered together and then found a taxi and then went to the hostel. We got into two taxis and we told our taxi driver to follow the other taxi. We kept asking about why the meter wasn't running and the driver kept saying "same meter as other taxi. Same meter as other taxi."

Now I was really, really hesitant about just going with the flow with a taxi without the meter running but at that point there wasn't really much that we could do. I have heard so many horror stories about how people have gotten into taxis and then the driver says one price, takes the people somewhere and then demands a different price. When the people don't agree, the driver threatens to call the Police (which tourists never want to deal with while in a foreign country. Who knows what rights you do or don't have). That didn't happen to us, though. And we paid the driver the same amount that our other taxi had to pay. Awesome.

We went into hostel "Soi 1 Guesthouse" and it was definitely more than a little bit sketchy. We had the entire 8-person room to ourselves though which was definitely a plus but we did get complaints that we were loud at around 4 in the morning. After we checked in, we left again to go explore the area around. The guys wanted to go to get some sort of street food or atleast walk around for a while. It was around 2 in the morning and the city was definitely still awake. There were food stalls open, tiny retaurant type things that were open and soo many people out on the streets. The traffic was still bad and there were people that were selling all sorts of different things like clothes and shoes and so much more, right on the side of the street. It was so fun to see. We walked around until around 4 and then headed back to the hostel where we talked and around 6, we went to sleep.

My alarm went off at 8 and I hit snooze and I got up to go get ready for our day. We were planning on catching a bus to Pattaya so that the guys could get in their watersports and we could maybe go to the Beach, ride some elephants etc. We all got ready and headed downstairs to check out where we met the owner of the hostel. We were asking him about how to get to the bus terminal so that we could go to Pattaya and he said "why do you want to go there?" He proceeded to tell us that Pattaya is the sleaze capital of the world. Full of prostitutes, strip clubs, dirty beaches, and old men. He told us that this wasn't the best place to see the amazing beaches of Thailand that we had heard rave reviews about or anything. He recommended that we go to Kanchanaburi, Thailand where we could go to see Tigers and Elephants and waterfalls etc. He seemed to convince Ray and the other guys enough so we decided to go there instead.

We went outside and hailed a couple taxis and tried to talk to the drivers. I think the owner of the guesthouse thought that we were having trouble and he came outside to talk to the drivers (he knew Thai) and he told the driver where to go and after the drivers asked where we were going the taxi drivers tried to get us to take their taxi all the way to Kanchanaburi (2.5 hours away). I pretty much thought that was a scam so we said no and we started to go on our way to the station. The driver tried to talk me into it all the way to the station but I kept saying no (especially because we had no way of communicating with our friends in the other taxi). We got to the station and looked around and Justin, Lisa and I waited around for the rest of our group to get there. It took them a while but they finally made it.

While we were waiting a lady came up to us and asked us where we were going. We were a little confused about why she was asking but we told her and she was like okay, I can take you to the bus. We told her we had to wait. Once our group got there, she led us over to the AC Bus and told us that it would take us to Kanchanaburi. The guys stocked up on some Dunkin Donuts and we got on the bus, paid for our ticket (84 Baht= 2.5 USD) and everyone (minus me) pretty much passed out from lack of sleep from the previous night.

I attempted to stay up 1)to guard our bags and 2) to see the scenery between Bangkok and Kanchanaburi! I made it about an hour and a half and then passed out for a while. It wasn't a sound sleep by any means because the bus would stop at random points to let people on or off and I would wake up abruptly to make sure that our stuff was safe and sound.

After about 3 hours, we made it to Kanchanaburi and we had to get everyone up and off the bus.

I'll end this one here and move on to adventures in Kanchanaburi!

Ahh

I have a lot to post about Thailand but I am currently trying to catch up in my classes so I don't feel completely useless during lecture. I will try and post as soon as I can (hopefully before Thanksgiving). Though, who knows if anyone is actually sad that I haven't updated. Haha.

Hope your November is going well. I can't believe its the last full week of November!

30 days until I am back in the US/Pittsburgh.
39 days until I am back in Columbus.

Wow, Wow, Wow. Time is flying.


I'll post soon. In the meantime, check out the pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/nhathi.13


Have a great day!

P.S. Happy Birthday, Christina! I hope you have the greatest day ever! Wish I could be there to celebrate with you!

Up till now

Hello Everyone! So I have completely waited a week to write this post even though I have had plenty to write. I don't have too much time right now because I am in between classes and packing and doing homework and all before I leave for Thailand!!!

Update on Classes: I still dislike them (hate might be appropriate, although passionate..I really really am not liking them right now). I don't know what it is but I just miss my OSU classes a lot these days. Maybe its the teaching style, maybe its the fact that I know that if I was at OSU right now I would be doing a lot better in my classes. I hope, if I happen to do poorly (Read: I don not achieve what the standards I set for myself) that, if a company sees this that the recruiter won't assume that I slacked off while studying abroad because thats surely not whats going on (or is it? hmm. I should figure that out).

Halloween: Halloweeen weekend was nuts here!
Thursday: Sumana's hall was turned into a haunted dorm type thing with each floor having creepiness as you come out of the elevator and then their laundry room/common room was turned into a haunted house! I typically hate those types of things but I definitely had a blast (made possible by the fact that Evan had a foam stick of sorts and would wack everything he possibly could before entering an area...hilarious!) And I also got to hang out with Evan's roommate from Kenya and met his friends from Sweden, India and Tanzania. They were really cool though the guy from Sweden was kind of a jerk. But oh well, ya can't win 'em all.

Friday: Evan and I went down to the Temple Street Market (close to the Jordan MTR Station) and we looked around. We both were trying to find some good souvenirs for our friends (Read: BARGAINING) but we didn't find all that much and people didn't seem too interested in bargaining. Probably because we both were starting really low to guage what we could get stuff at. I wasn't feeling so hot that weekend but on Saturday, we decided to call it a night at around 10:45 and head back.

Saturday: I was feeling kind of sick and I slept a lot on Saturday but in the evening, I decided that its only halloween once and what are the odds that I will be in Hong Kong on Halloween again. So I got myself out of my room, got ready and Sumana, Ben and I went over to LKF to see what the big deal was. It was PACKED. We exited the station and there were thousands upon thousands of people smashed into this little area. There were police all around and we were "herded, like cattle" in this long, elaborate maze type of thing into LKF area. I guess, in recent years, people have died from being trampled on just because there are so many people in the area. It was really crazy though because we were taken away from Lan Kwai Fong and then back and then up the hill a little and then away again and then up a hill and then back and we were finally in LKF. There were cameras EVERYWHERE. It was paparazzi times a million. I couldn't tell if these were actual photographers from newspapers and the like or just a bunch of people lined up at random points to attack unsuspecting people dressed up in costume. Nuts. We didn't spend a whole lot of time in LKF people watching like we wanted to. But there were just too many people to just hang out in. We made our way back down to the station and headed to TST to get FRESH JUICE (YUMM) and then went back to campus.

Since Halloween, nothing too special has been going on. I was sick for most of the week with a cold and kind of a fever (not really though) and then on Thursday I went to go talk with my psychology professor to talk about the class and see exactly how she got into psych. I was really interested in that because Psych, generally, isn't that common in Asia (its a growing field) and she entered about 15-20 years ago. Definitely interesting to talk to her. She told me that since she came from a poor family the fact that she got into a University made her parents extremely honored so they didn't quite know what she was studying there. She had some people ask her the age old, "What are you going to do with a Psychology degree" but for the most part she didn't have too much trouble because her parents didn't quite get it. I talked with her about my plans about I/O Psychology and we talked about bi-culturalism (she was really interested in my life history), arranged marriages, etc and then talked about how the whole PhD thing is kind of limiting in a way. She advised me to maybe get my Masters in I/O and then do a PhD on the side later. I definitely came out of that meeting a little confused about what I should be doing with my life. I think I will definitely have to address that when I get back to the US and talk, face to face, with a psych advisor.

One day, In Globablization studies, we had a discussion about western marketing and how it was spreading and..well, mainly about Globalization and Cultures. I am just gonna share a couple snippets of what some locals said.
1. People talked about how McDonalds is HUGE and goes absolutely everywhere but they try and adapt to what the local culture would like
2. Maybe the fact that McDonald's goes into places is a kind of good thing because it helps the local population adapt to what is "polite behavior" as in queuing in lines in stores, restaurant places, ticketing, etc.
3. This one guy talked about how US movies are soo incredibly widespread. He talked about how in the 90s- hollywood went on a "saving the world" spree. He added, that this might be because the US wants to be seen as #1.
4. Hollywood special effects are unparalleled (?).
5. English is the most widespread language. May be helping the decline and extinction of other languages.

I think thats all I have written down from that class. There were a couple more things that were interesting but I think I just got too caught up in the discussion.

This past saturday, the 7th!: I went with my friend Chris to go look at T-shirts to maybe have printed for Buckeyemela/Srujan (April 9-10, MARK YOUR CALENDARS). The quality looked good and everything seemed really clean and all. It looks like I would probably be able to get the shirts for close to 4 USD per shirt but I think the shipping might be too astronomical to make this feasible...

Monday: Sumana and I went into town to get some errands done. We went into Chungking Mansions, where they have a LOT of foreign currency exchanges (the best rates I have seen so far for both Buying and Selling USD) and a lot of little Indian stalls and such. We definitely didn't stay very long because we kept being stared at. It wasn't the little old ladies that were staring either, it was creepy men that would just stop talking and stuff and leer. It was really gross and we got out of there as fast as we could (I only wanted a Samosa and I didn't get that because we felt so uncomfortable). We talked about that on the way home and we couldn't come up with a really strong reason why this was happening (or if this was in our head) but the consensus was that if we were by ourselves we would not have felt safe and that in itself indicates that maybe it was not in our heads.

Tuesday: STEELERS BEAT THE BRONCOS! WOOOHOO! Now we just have to take out the Bengals and win atleast one agains the Ravens. :) GO STEELERS. I really miss football Sundays.

Either way...this week has gone SUPER fast. I am going to THAILAND tomorrow and I am really excited (mostly about riding an elephant) and I absolutely cannot wait to get there. Its going to be awesome. :)

I'll be back on Monday and from then on I will be in Hong Kong, exploring on the weekends and catching up/learning everything/getting ready for finals on the weekdays.

Have a fabulous weekend. Take Care. Miss you all!

Shanghai!

We arrived in Shanghai early in the morning, around 7:45 am. By the time we got a bearings straight and dropped off our luggage in the left luggage area at the Station, it was around 8:30. We decided that we would go to the Yu Yuan gardens first because it was a little bit out of the way and so we had to make our way over there. We took bus number 930 out to the Old City area and after asking around we found the entrance to the park. It was approximately 40 Yuan a piece but definitely worth it.

There were a bunch of little shops and stalls that we walked past and we made sure to look at the variety of different souvenirs and products that they were selling. It was similar to Hong Kong and the Silk Market but still cool.

We went into the park and we were just in awe of the beautiful scenery and ponds all around. I have pictures up on picasa but it was definitely a really cool place to visit in the area. The architecture was magnificent and it was carried out through all of the buildings in the area.

We walked out of the park area and down the street where all of these boutiques were you could see this older architecture all the way down the street but when you looked into the distance you could see the difference between this type of architecture and the newer buildings being put up in the distance. It was definitely really interesting.

Another interesting part of our adventure was when Sumana and I went into a shop inside the park itself to look at souvenirs or potential gifts for people. We saw these sandalwood fans that were pretty cool and they wanted to charge us a really high price. We said that we didn't want it because it was too much and they asked us if we wanted a receipt. If we did not want a receipt than they could bargain with us. Really interesting. We said that we didn't want a receipt to see how low they would go and when we still wanted to leave the ladies kind of followed us out and kept asking for "our price" to see if we could make a deal. Definitely really interesting and totally under the table.

We walked around some more, got some Dairy Queen (!!!) and then went in search of the bus to take us back to the city. We found the same bus and went back to People's Square to get back to the City.

The bus driver told us when to get off and we started roaming the area and took some pictures with the "people" in the square (statues) and then headed off down Nanjing Road toward the Bund. Nanjing Road reminded me of Las Ramblas, in Barcelona, without the bird sellers and the statue people. There were restaurants and stores all the way down the walking street. We headed past the end of the the walking street towards the Bund. We got to where the Bund was supposed to be and we found out that it was closed because it is under renovation for the Asia Expo that will be held in Shanghai in 2010. I was a little disappointed but we continued on our way to see the city from the other side of the river.

We got off at Pudong Avenue and attempted to find the view. It was definitely not there. We asked some local people where the "view" was and they were very confused. They tried to explain to us where we should go but we definitely did not understand. A crowd of like 6 people or so came out to all make an attempt to explain it to us and when we did not understand they explained that they would go and get someone that spoke "our language." They went to get him, asked us to follow, and when the man came outside he explained that we were at the wrong place (and we knew that). And then pointed us in the right direction. We headed off in that way. We met a Czech couple (maybe) along the way and we asked them if we were heading in the right direction (they had a map). We walked with them for quite a ways and found out that they were traveling around china for a good month or two. Fantastic! I wish I had that kind of time to just travel the world. I hope one day, I will. We left them and continued on our way. We weren't sure exactly where we were going but we asked a information desk person who spoke to us in Mandarin and then called his English speaking friend on the phone who told us that the view from this side of the river wasn't that spectacular but told us how to get there anyway.

We walked through a park that had the countdown to the Asia Expo running and walked toward the Oriental TV tower. It was gorgeous and a really cool building. It was also really expensive and we were low on cash so we stuck to walking around some more.

After we got our fair share of the area we headed back to the train station, picked up our luggage and then headed to Longyang Road to take the Maglev train over to the airport so we could catch our flight back to Shenzhen.

We arrived at the station, bought our ticket for the Maglev and went up to the platform. I am pretty upset that my camera ran out of batteries because I did not get a chance to take a picture of the train. It ran at 301 kilometers per hour (slow for the Maglev...we missed the fast train by like 10 minutes. That train runs at 431 kmph). We reached the aiport in about 9 or 10 minutes (19 miles away).

We checked our luggage in and then headed over to the gate. We left on time, got to Shenzhen, met a nice Pakistani man on the way to the MTR station who told us a story about how he invested in a fake company in China and how, when in business, we should always visit a site before we invest in it. Good to know. Slightly random for this story of my day but thats okay.

We went through the entire immigration process and arrived back at UST by midnight. Definitely a fun-filled trip and one of the best trips I have ever made.

Thanks to Elizabeth, Ben, Vinny, all of the local and random people along they way and especially Sumana for making this trip one to remember!

Summer Palace and on our Way to Shanghai!

Monday morning we said a sleepy goodbye to Ben and Vinny when they left at 6am and then went back to sleep. We had planned on getting up around 7 or so so that we could pack up, eat and then head out to the Summer Palace which is about 45 minutes to an hour away. We got up around 7:30 and started to pack up and get ready and we ended up leaving the hostel after breakfast around 10 o clock.

We took the subway, switched lines twice and we got to the station. We asked around and found out that we needed to take Bus No. 930 which would take us all the way to the gates of Summer Palace. The bus was only one yuan. Fantastic! We made it there alright, bought our tickets with our student IDs and then made our way into the park area.

My first thought was "This is absolutely gorgeous!" It was nothing like the rest of Beijing. It was absolutely clear skies (probably because it rained the night before) and there was a beautiful lake surrounding the area. (See Picasa Pictures). You would look one way and see an amazing bridge that connected the side we were on to an island in the middle of the lake and then you would look to the other side and see a light house type building set in the mountains. It was magnificent.

We walked along side the lake towards the main area where the temple was located. We found some other sites along the way and we were able to weave our way through the many crowds to see inside the old areas. The architecture looked midly like that of the forbidden city but the paintings on the pillars were more unique and colorful than that of the forbidden city or anything else that I had seen in Beijing.

We walked around and got to people watch for a little while. There were people selling corn at every stop and people that were playing with their kids who were also running around with each other. I took a picture of this little boy who seemed to be pulling along his little sister in every which way that he wanted to go and I saw another another little kid that was pushing his sibling (I don't remember if it was a sister or a brother) in a stroller and it reminded me of pictures that I have seen of my brother and I. Definitely made me wish that he could have been there with me (even though I think he has already been to the Summer Palace). Maybe it was more that I wish that I had a close friend or family member or someone from home that would be able to take in these amazing views and would completely understand what I have been seeing through these adventures. I digress...

We walked around Summer Palace and we bought a map of the area (that you could essential frame because its so pretty) and we discovered that the Summer Palace is absolutely HUGE. You could definitely not see it in the amount of time that we allotted for it. However, we made the best of it and took some pictures and then headed back towards the entrance to get back to the station.

Once we got back to the entrance we realized that we didn't quite know which way to go to catch the bus back to the station. We assumed that we would have to get on the bus on the opposite side of the road from where we got off so we headed in that direction. Wrong. We ended up asking a mechanic of some sort and he pointed us in a different direction. The two of us set off in that direction and found ourselves at the wrong bus stop. After using our lovely phrase book we went off down the street and got to the correct bus stop that was actually in a little alleyway. Who knew.

Anyway, we asked the bus driver whether the bus went to the right station but he said a different station. A station is a station so we got on the bus and we got off where the driver told us to. We didn't see the station anywhere so we chose a person off the street showed him the map of the subway station and gestured to figure out where the nearest station was. He tried to explain in Mandarin, realized that we had no clue what he was talking about and then decided to have us follow him because he was heading in that direction. Really nice of him. He spoke to Sumana in Mandarin and asked her where we were going to which she interpreted to be where are we from (Everyone is shocked when they see us) and she said India as a normal reply and he got really confused/excited/shocked. After a little while he showed us on our subway map about how to get to the airport. Hilarious.

We got to the station, thanked him profusely and then headed on our way to the Silk Market to argue with some of the shop keepers about the shoes that Sumana had bought (which had started to wear out the first day she wore them) and to try and get some name drawings redone or fixed. We had to argue for a good while to get people to fix things (with Sumana also demanding that her shoes be changed and standing at the shop and warding off customers..good work!) and in the end we got everything fixed up. She had to be stern with them because they tried to make it out to be like she was dumb and didn't know what she was talking about when she said that she got them from a specific store. Ha. We knew. She even talked to the girl that we bought them from who definitely recognized Sumana.

We bought a couple of trinkety things and then headed back to the hostel to get our bag and check Shanghai stuff, eat dinner and set out on our way to the train station!

After lugging our suitcase to the train station, we quickly found our platform and queued up to be let inside. We found out compartment and our beds and put everything away before settling in for the night. There was a little baby in our compartment that was definitely really cute and he would play hide and seek with his blanket and would roll around and kind of play with Sumana. It was cute.

The train left promptly at 9:40 and Sumana and I fell asleep, quickly, around 10:30ish. Soon it was morning and we were in Shanghai!

The Great Wall of China (or The Great China Wall as my mom likes to call it) and Where History Was Made a Little More Than a Year Ago.

When we got back to the Hostel on Saturday night we met up with Ben and Vinny who told us that they had booked the Great Wall trip, through the hostel, for Mutianyu. I was a little bit upset by this because Mutianyu is still pretty touristy. I wanted to go on the 10K trek on TGW that was between Simatai and Jinshanling which is supposed to be the less restored part of TGW. I accepted the adventure though I assumed that the two guys would want to go on a hike instead of the touristy part. But I think they also figured that they would want to go see the rest of Beijing when they got back and hoped that they wouldn’t be too tired.

Anyway, we were supposed to be up by 7 am and in the café area but we didn’t get up until around then so we hurried to get ready and then made our way to the café and had breakfast (which came with our ticket) and then hurried to get into the van to take the four of us, two other ladies and a Italian man to the wall.

While we were driving up to get to Mutianyu (about 2 hours), I kept thinking about what this trip means to me and exactly why I was so excited to do this whereas the other three weren’t AS off the wall. A bunch of people tend to think that I am not adventurous that I am a homebody that I don’t want to go out and see things and explore- see knew places. But I haven’t been asked the “where do you want to go, Neesha” type of question. I have wanted to see The Great Wall of China forever. I learned about it so many years ago and since then I have wanted to go. I have wanted to go since before my brother decided to take his Asian adventure-round-the-world trip and have been looking at pictures of The Great Wall of China for years now. I had wanted to go for so long and finally the day came when I was able to and it was so incredibly surreal. I know that I went to a more touristy part of the wall which was not quite what I wanted to do but it was definitely worth the experience.

We got to Mutianyu around 10am and my first thought was “Oh my gods there are so many tourists! I am going to hate this. This is not what I expected at all!” We had the option of hiking up the mountain (takes about 30 minutes to climb the steps or we could take the ski-lift up where we can see the view and the wall and it would only take around 5 minutes. We decided to take the ski lift because we were only really given about 3 hours on the wall and we wanted to make the most of it. We got on the ski lift (my first time EVER) and we headed up the mountain and it was so amazing. The view was absolutely gorgeous. All of the leaves were changing colors and the mountains in the background and you could see little villages set into the Mountains. Even though it was foggy/polluted, It was still so incredibly picturesque and wonderful.

When we got up to the top of the ski lift we had two options. We could either go to the right and go to the not so touristy part or we could go to the left and go to the more touristy part. We obviously sdecided to go to the right first and boy was that an adventure. It was characterized by EXTREMELY steep, uneven steps. It essentially went straight up and was very tiring. It just kept going and going and going. I felt really proud of myself when we got to the very top (where we were told we were not allowed to go further) and looked back and saw TGW stretching out for so long. Of course, we went further past the “no admittance sign” and onto the ruins of the wall. There were shrubs that had grown over on it and it was a winding path that ended at beat up ruins of a lookout tower. We climbed that and were in absolute awe of the scenery with the leaves changing and the remnants of The Great Wall stretching down the side of the mountain and up another mountain, deep deep into the mountains. It was beautiful to see and I cannot even imagine how it was built. I bet many of the people that built TGW probably had some sort of fear of heights and many more died trying to build it through all of the seasons. It was amazing.

We went back down the steps portion and we passed the ski lift and went up the other way. Ben and Vinny went scurrying off while Sumana probably went just as far as they did but took more time to enjoy the scenery and really take in the entire view. I really liked the more touristy part of the wall because there were trees that were growing on the side of the wall and the colors were changing and looked absolutely magnificent.

While we were walking we took the liberty of talking to some other people and Sumana started talking to this one fellow, in broken mandarin. He and his friend asked us if we were from India and because we didn’t want to go into all of the crazy details about our family and the moving processes we just said yes. We then met the cutest baby that was with his father or grandfather or uncle or someone and we ogled at it for awhile and then kept walking and then took some jumping pictures and after while we decided that we were going to get late so we started heading back when we met that same baby and its father/uncle somebody and I asked if I could hold the baby. I have a picture somewhere in my picasa but it was the cutest baby ever. The father/uncle/grandfather person let me hold it and I took a picture with both of them. 

We continued on our way and I saw a STEELERS FAN! He was wearing the hat and a sweatshirt and I yelled “Go Steelers” and he said the same back! I started walking back but then doubled back and asked to take a picture with him. I got a picture and then we started talking about where we are from (His wife is from Upper St. Clair) and then he asked what I was doing here and all that jazz. It was cool. Steelers Fans are EVERYWHERE. I love the City of Pittsburgh.


Anyway we went back down to the ski lift are and instead of taking the ski lift we decided to take a Toboggan down. It was so fun-speeding down the side of a mountain, through the woods with all of the leaves changing colors. It was definitely really touristy but soo much fun.

We got to the bottom of the hill and haggled with the shop/booth keepers and got some souvenirs and then met up with the rest of our group at a Chinese Restaurant which also came with our ticket to TGW. We were skeptical about some of the dishes but determined that there were 4/7 of them for herbivores and then we chowed down. It was pretty delicious-one of the best meals that I have had since arriving in East Asia. We had a tomato and green pepper dish and then some braised potato (YUM) and then some stir fried green beans (YUM) and some other stuff. We got to talk to the other people on our tour at that point. And I used my limited Spanish with the Italian man because he said that he could understand a little bit. At first I was pretty rusty with it and I couldn’t speak as quickly as I would have liked but by the end of the meal I was spouting off sentences and explaining why I was only in Florence, Italy for 4 hours when I went to Italy a couple years ago. He complimented me on my Spanish and my pronunciation, though I don’t feel that it was deserved. But I thanked him and we all went on our way back to Beijing.
We got back to Beijing and the four of us kind of relaxed for a few minutes. Ben and Vinny left to go to the Pearl Market and then we showered and ate dinner in the café and headed off to meet Elizabeth in the Olympic Village.

I was so excited to go to the Olympic Village. I absolutely loved the Beijing Olympics (minus the Chinese women gymnasts winning because they were definitely all 12-13 years old). I loved the Water Cube and the Birds Nest and I could not WAIT to get there.
We met up with Elizabeth and walked around the Olympic village and it was absolutely gorgeous! You could see the Bird’s nest with all of its colorful glory and the absolutely magnificent Water Cube. We, of course, attempted some jumping pictures but kind of failed and it was really windy and cold and it started to rain so we didn’t stay there for too long. I can’t believe I went to the Olympic Village where the most amazing, epic opening ceremonies was held, Michael Phelps won 8 Gold Medals and Usain Bolt broke the world record for the 100 meter dash with his ridiculously fast legs.

I was a little bit upset because I had heard that they completely shut down the Water Cube. I wish they could find someway to keep these facilities open and running because I feel like they could be very useful and helpful. They have the Bird's Nest open for tours during the day time.

Overall the day was pretty amazing and I absolutely loved every minute of it. After the Olympic Village, Elizabeth and I parted ways for another 8 or 9 months until we see each other again. I can’t express how excited I was to see her. It was so wonderful to see a familiar face and after so many conversations about the A-factor (Asian –Factor) that we had in high school- who knew that we would end up meeting up in Asia! We have been friends for over 15 years and it was wonderful being able to adventure around Beijing with her. She said she is going to try and visit Hong Kong towards the end of the semester and I really hope that happens. I would love to show her around here.

Thanks for everything, Elizabeth! 15 years and going strong!

A Day in Beijing with Elizabeth!

So I woke up around 7:45 to a line to get into the bathroom/shower. Ben and Vinny had arrived the day before and were planning on leaving early on Monday morning so they had limited time in Beijing to do everything that they wanted to do. Sumana let Vinny get into the shower before her and then she went in because she was already late in trying to catch a train to visit her Uncle about 2 and a half hours outside of Beijing.

I finally got into the shower around 8:15 (even though that was when I was supposed to leave) and then speedily made my way over to the train station to meet up with Elizabeth in the Forbidden City. I walked down the street towards the train station and there were so many people in the area! There was a market that happens every Saturday morning there. Fruits, Vegetables, Clothing..you name it, they probably have it. I snapped some pictures as I was zig-zagging through people so that I would get to Elizabeth before she started to worry too much.

I got out at the Tiananmen East Exit, went down the underpass and over to the entrance to the Imperial Palace (Forbidden City). First thing I noticed was that there were SO MANY PEOPLE. SO many. It was 9am and there were a couple thousand people right at the entrance. It was crazy. I didn’t know how I was going to go about finding Elizabeth but I figured I would just head over towards the gigantic picture of Chairman Mao and hope that she would be somewhere over there like we had planned. I crossed over the bridge and she was standing in the doorway! Thank goodness for that. Apparently she went around in circles through the Entrance and Exit to make sure that she didn’t miss me somewhere in between there. We walked through the entrance and there were so many tours that were going though. Mostly older people, all wearing the same type and color of hat and following a flag to make sure that they all stayed together.

We bought our ticket with our Student Discounts started our journey through the Forbidden City. It is HUGE. There is no possible way to get through the entire thing in one day. There’s probably, also, no possible way to FIND all the parts of the Imperial Palace. There are tons of little nooks and crannies and corridors all over the place. After walking through the imperial palace, ogling at the thousands upon thousands of people there and looking at the little rooms that housed the emperor’s everyday needs (a room to sit in before important meetings, a different room to change in before important meetings, etc) we made our way back out of the Imperial Palace and attempted to find the No. 5 bus to get to Jingshan Park.

We found the bus stop and the bus came within a few short minutes. It was a really interesting experience because everyone runs over to the entrance, pays the driver and then squishes as many people into the bus as possible. Elizabeth asked me if this was like India and I told her that in India, they fit as many people as they possibly can into the buses but that there aren’t really doors on the bus so people end up on the bus but hanging kind of outside. The Brightside about being squished on the bus is definitely not even having the opportunity to fall over when the bus breaks.

We got to Jingshan park and paid the couple kuai (another word for Yuan) entrance fee and made our way to the lookout points. The first thing that I noticed when I walked into the park was the cleaner air that I was breathing in. People aren’t allowed to smoke in the Park and the trees make breathing a much more pleasant experience. We walked around the park for a little, made our way to the different pagodas and saw the Forbidden City from the top. It was MASSIVE. You couldn’t exactly see all of it because of the pollution but you could definitely tell that it was a really, big area. It was interesting to look out on the forbidden city and not be able to see very much and then look out on the city on the other side of the pagoda and be able to see much more clearly. I am not exactly sure why that would be but it definitely caused us both to wonder. After munching on some bread and some shelf milk that Elizabeth brought, we headed back on the No 5 bus and were even more squished than before and made our way to the Subway line to head on over to the Lama Temple (a Tibetan Buddhist temple).

The subway system is pretty extensive and covers a lot of Beijing. Each trip is only 2 Yuan no matter how many transfers you make or how long it takes you. Definitely the easiest and cheapest way to get around Beijing (though I like Buses better because you can see more of the city (when you aren’t being squished in the middle of the train)). Trains are also very packed and people will run between transfer points to make sure that they are at the front of the line so that if there are open seats on the train that they can race one another to sit there. It was pretty intense.

We got to the Lama temple and paid our Student fee and then went inside through the park and over to the beginning of the temple. This temple was set up like Forbidden City where you enter through one part and go through it and then follow into the next part and keep going to the next one. The architecture was very similar. The Buddhas would start relatively small and by the last part of the temple the Buddha was 26 meters tall! 8 meters below ground and 18 meters above ground! It was massive and very beautiful. I snapped a picture and then got yelled at but it was worth it. We walked around the area a little more and it was so quiet and serene. Very peaceful and even though it was in the middle of the city, it felt as though we were farther removed from the sights and sounds and smells of Beijing.

The temple was about to close so we made our way towards the exit and over a street or two because I told Elizabeth that I wanted to walk through a hutong to see how a lot of people live in Beijing. We walked through what Elizabeth said was a fairly nice Hutong. There were several cars parked outside of their community homes. And we walked further inside and people were playing cards and smoking (the norm) and little kids were playing with their toys. We walked through some winding paths and some people had their doors open so we peeked inside and we could see people cooking on this small little stove that was in the entryway and they had a tiny table on the side that they placed their cut vegetables on. We came outside of there before it got dark and headed across the street into a different hutong where we were about to talk more about her sister and med school and my brother and his job and we reminisced about high school Spanish class and everything.

We started to walk back towards the way we came and part of the alleyway was more polluted than when we came in. It looked like it was stagnant in the air and not dissipating. We covered our mouths and noses and kinda jogged through it and then went around the corner a different way to get out so that we wouldn’t go further into the polluted air.

We made our way back to the subway station and went over to the Temple of Heaven park with the help of Elizabeth’s Lonely Planet China book. We got to the park and walked through the pitch blackness and stumbled upon people practicing their singing in the park and a whole lot more people watching someone else sing and some people dance. People seemed to really enjoy themselves. We went further on into the park and found another rather large group of people that were doing the same thing. We went further yet, almost to the actual temple itself and we saw some people playing Chinese hackey sack. We sat near them and people watched for awhile and they were actually pretty good. They were all older people and were spinning and twirling while they were kicking their feet up in the air. It was pretty nifty.

We started to get cold and we had to meet up with Sumana in Tiananmen Plaza so we made our way towards the exit of the park and we saw a whole lot of people standing and chanting and clapping so we went over there and we started doing it with them even though we couldn’t understand exactly what they were saying. Everything was being said in a rhythm and it was fun. People would walk past and they would do it with the crowd as they were going to their next destination and so we figured it must be something pretty well known. As we were leaving another couple was about to leave and Elizabeth asked them, in her awesome Mandarin skills, what this was. And the man said it was a kind of exercise that people did and to get more blood to their hands and keep warm. He also said that you could pat other parts of your body like your knees or your thighs or something to do the same thing. It was pretty interesting.

We walked outside of the park and low and behold we saw a group of people sitting there and watching two women doing ballroom. After a couple seconds the song ended and everyone paired up and they all started doing ballroom right there! It must have been a class of some sort but it was cool because everyone was doing the same moves at the same time.
As we were leaving, Elizabeth and I talked about how we would never see this type of thing in the US. People don’t generally meet in the park for random group activities like that. We talked about how there is less privacy here, in China, but there is more community involvement and community activities. We talked about how cool it was that older people would go to the park on their own to enjoy the company of other people around their age and have fun whether that’s singing and dancing or playing hackeysack, going for a walk, dancing on the plaza outside of the park. It was so cool to see all of that and I definitely felt like it was an honor to be experience this type of thing. I took some pictures of people dancing and singing and the Chinese people that were sitting there just smiled at me and nodded in approval. It was really nice.

We made our way back to Tiananmen took some pictures of the Forbidden City at night and listened to Sumana’s account of her day that included an unregistered taxi, a really nice driver, her train ticket getting stuck underneath the train 10 minutes before it was supposed to depart, really broken mandarin and a meeting with the Chinese and Indian National table Tennis teams.

Sumana and I headed back to the hostel and stopped to get McDonalds (GROSS) where we ordered corn (yummm) and fries (yuck) and then headed back to get ready for The Great Wall the following day. :D