appened last June 25, 2010.
The first Fudan Filipino Day was the brainchild of some of my GBF-mates Ben, Jay-R, Christine and some more. With the consent of everyone else as well as long hours and practice and planning, we were all able to hold this event with much success.
Ever since I came to Shanghai, my classmates have always been asking me what the Philippines is like. And we say, the Philippines is a beautiful place, with much beautiful places and beaches especially. Usually, we would end this conversation by saying "you should come visit the Philippines." Thus, we feel that we are not only GBF scholars here in Fudan but also walking promoters of the Philippines. So that, the turnout of foreign students in the Filipino Day was way more than what we expected.
During the day, we had programs, games, and FOOD!! I especially love the Kontragapi performance, the games when the foreigners were playing it, and most especially the food provided by Luneta, the only Filipino restaurant you can find here in Shanghai. Needless to say, these things I mentioned were also the top sellers among our foreigner friends and classmates! They also probably liked the Tinikling as a lot joined and tried the dance when they were invited and of course who can ever forget the raffle where one Chinese local won a roundtrip ticket courtesy of Cebu Pacific to the Philippines. Lucky you, I say.
When the program and raffle draw was over with, that was when we decided to insert a little "merienda" time. Knowing that most foreigners were also in this for the food, we worried much on whether some would still stay for the games. So we had a back up plan - that worst comes to worst, we would be the ones to play the games instead. But they stayed and played. And played they did. Two even volunteered to hold the bamboo sticks for the pabitin. Yes, we had to modify some of the games because the GuangHua people were, maarteh!! But it's okay.
When all was done and over with, we all cleaned up the place and started our dreadful walk home. I say dreadful because, it was really dreadful! Imagine being tired and walking that 40-minute walk to the dorm during this hot, humid weather! This, they say is the China July weather. So I was tired upon reaching the dorm. Of course some people such as Anton and Desi were even more tired because they carried the stuff all the way back home. Don't blame me, I tried to help!
So at night, I felt like I just wanted to rest. Plus, it rained. That's how unpredictable the weather is nowadays. So I didn't feel like going to the dinner they organized in Momoya. But since when I called Eds she said everyone was going, I decided to brave the rains and my laziness and go. So we walked and when I reached Momoya, not everyone was there!! Coz some fell asleep and some just had other plans. So I just ate, it's Momoya after all.
But even after I ate, I still felt tired and not in the mood for it all. Good thing Prim asked if I wanted to get Coco. So I went with him buy Coco even when it was raining. Coz after buying I decided to go walk home alone. Why? coz I just really didn't feel like joining them anymore. I later found out that the people in my table also went home ahead of the pack. I kinda knew it if you ask me.
But the Filipino Day was truly an event to be remembered. For foreigners, for Filipinos, for everyone.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
the last 15 days..
It's 2:20 in the morning. Earlier, I was already very sleepy but then RG asked me to go to his room. So that now, I once again find myself blogging. Technically, it's already the first of July. Which only means that I, and the rest of my GBF-mates, are down to our last 15 days here in Shanghai!
I remember the first few days we had here. Most especially our field trip to LuJiaZui. During that day, the weather was so bad, I decided to go grab something to eat together with RG, Cheng, Anton, and Tiff V. We found a place in Superbrand Mall and at that time, I already knew that Superbrand was LOVE. It's one of those places I've been to here in Shanghai over and over again! Even if it's kinda far from our dorm.
These past few days I often found myself thinking about stuff to do as well as places to go to. I look at my list of things to do in my ipod and I see that we've probably done everything we can do here in Shanghai. Also probably been to the nearby places we wanted to go to. Perhaps not all but pretty much those that we wanted to go to. I still have 2 Expo tickets with me but I feel lazy already. The Expo is nice and the feel is also nice in a way that it is theme park-ish, but I guess, cueing up for something was just never really my stuff.
I also often find myself now thinking about the things I wanna do when I go home. I wanna go home. I miss home. After almost 5 months of not being in the Philippines, yes, I miss it now!! The small things, the big things, everything!! Believe it or not, it was only here in China where I learned to really check the Inquirer site for daily updates on my beloved country.
I learned a lot from my 5-month long stay here in China. A bit of the language from school and my daily life here but also and most especially on being independent and discovering a new place along with 36 other fellow scholars who were in this journey with me. Personally, I feel that the bit of the Chinese language part that I learned was good enough for me considering that my primary purpose in taking advantage of this opportunity was really to learn more about the life here in CHina as well as to learn more about myself. A nice break as many here in this program would put it. I call it, the time to once again rediscover myself. And I can truly say that I sure did!!
Now I'm down to my last 15 days here. These days I usually spend revisiting my favorite places here, chatting with my fellow scholars, spending time with my classmates, as well as the things I know I won't really have an opportunity to do again in the Philippines. These days I also spend thinking about what awaits me when I go back home.
I remember the first few days we had here. Most especially our field trip to LuJiaZui. During that day, the weather was so bad, I decided to go grab something to eat together with RG, Cheng, Anton, and Tiff V. We found a place in Superbrand Mall and at that time, I already knew that Superbrand was LOVE. It's one of those places I've been to here in Shanghai over and over again! Even if it's kinda far from our dorm.
These past few days I often found myself thinking about stuff to do as well as places to go to. I look at my list of things to do in my ipod and I see that we've probably done everything we can do here in Shanghai. Also probably been to the nearby places we wanted to go to. Perhaps not all but pretty much those that we wanted to go to. I still have 2 Expo tickets with me but I feel lazy already. The Expo is nice and the feel is also nice in a way that it is theme park-ish, but I guess, cueing up for something was just never really my stuff.
I also often find myself now thinking about the things I wanna do when I go home. I wanna go home. I miss home. After almost 5 months of not being in the Philippines, yes, I miss it now!! The small things, the big things, everything!! Believe it or not, it was only here in China where I learned to really check the Inquirer site for daily updates on my beloved country.
I learned a lot from my 5-month long stay here in China. A bit of the language from school and my daily life here but also and most especially on being independent and discovering a new place along with 36 other fellow scholars who were in this journey with me. Personally, I feel that the bit of the Chinese language part that I learned was good enough for me considering that my primary purpose in taking advantage of this opportunity was really to learn more about the life here in CHina as well as to learn more about myself. A nice break as many here in this program would put it. I call it, the time to once again rediscover myself. And I can truly say that I sure did!!
Now I'm down to my last 15 days here. These days I usually spend revisiting my favorite places here, chatting with my fellow scholars, spending time with my classmates, as well as the things I know I won't really have an opportunity to do again in the Philippines. These days I also spend thinking about what awaits me when I go back home.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
HangZhou
a Row 5 affair!
have I ever mentioned the Row 5 soon to be Row 6 to you previously? Probably not since it only started a few days ago. So allow me to introduce to you the idea of the Row 5 soon to be Row 6 as well as its origins.
Here in Shanghai, and even back then in Rosario, our GBF group has always had the Row 4 from the Shanghai ban. This mainly consists of Allan, Rain, Pinky, and Eds. Back then and even here in Shanghai, they were always together in going out. This pretty much continued here where they would often go out together. Thus, the trademark, "Row 4".
A couple of nights ago we hanged out in Helen's to watch the World Cup. This was an everybody is invited affair since people from GBF also performed to promote the Filipino Day. So I went, lots of people went. And this was where I found myself seated with the members of Row 5: RG, Anton, Sigh, FRed, and yours truly (ME). The same group who went to HAngZhou yesterday. Why we are Row 5? I'll explain on a separate blog. BUt definitely not because of Row 4. Pretty far, actually.
So, HangZhou.
Lots of people have already been to HangZhou. At first we were still in doubt if we were to go but since most of them said that it was not to be missed, we decided to go. Since people now never go on big groups like what happened in our SuZhou, there were lots of groups who went on different dates. The only question there left was when we were going. Then one day RG called me up to ask me if we can go with him and Fred in their HangZhou so it won't seem like they were on a date. So I said okay. After all, I had other plans the day my roommate, Cheng, was supposed to go. A few days after and RG was also able to invite Sigh. So that you get the Row 5 all under one trip.
RG bought tickets the time we were in Beijing. So I learned that we were to depart Shanghai at 11:50AM, arrive in HangZhou after two hours and depart HangZHou for Shanghai at 8:50 in the evening. See, if we can, we try as much to avoid overnight trips.
So we went yesterday. It was rainy, yes. But still okay. At least it was not the sunny-that-makes-you-sticky weather that we really hated. Coz that was the weather when we had our field trip the day before we went to HangZhou.
Since it was raining, and a little bit foggy when we arrived at the West LAke, we decided to go up the Pagoda first. But since we got tired half-way, we had a detour and decided to chill first at the coffee shop on top of the hill a few steps before you arrive at the Pagoda. And since the owner was very kind as well as the waitresses, we decided to go full blast on chilling first, get some coffee, and perhaps have a little "chika" session. Then we decided to go up the Pagoda.
The Pagoda was nice even when it was raining. So we took pictures and enjoyed the view of the West Lake. Then we went down and walked to the West Lake. At the West Lake, we found dry chairs and sat first for a while to enjoy the calming and relaxing view. This was where we met the strangest stranger ever while we were seated in one of the benches along the Lake. Why strange? check this out:
So she comes to us asking, "可以说中文吗？“
shocked, we said, "什么？“
Stranger says, "可以问一下？“
so we say, "可以。“
At this point she speaks English and says (addressed to me, Sigh, and Anton),
“Among these two, who is your girlfriend?"
So Anton, still shocked, said “没有。”
RG, who at this point came closer already goes on to say,
“她们都是好朋友。”
Then she gave us a grumpy face and started walking away in a tantrum-ish manner.
Weird? Oh, tell me more about it. LOL.
Conclusion: baka type ka Anton!!
So we continued walking to go look for QingHeFang, the cultural street where Cheng asked me to buy something for her. So we rode a taxi since we didn't have much time.
Upon arriving at QingHeFang, we decided to walk around the street and check out the stuff. Indeed, this was a cultural street. These streets characterizes China so much. With stores selling mopit brushes and Chinese calligraphy as well as keychains where they can engrave your names or what-nots. This is among the things I really love about China. Plus, there was a show I missed because I was looking for the store Cheng said. But it was okay. I really enjoyed the street.
Before going home, we decided to grab something for dinner. We ended up in this resto selling CHinese dishes that were, according to them, the best. We tried the specialty dish in HangZhou called West Lake fish. It was delish. Plus, this was one of those rare times we had seafood for dinner. After dinner, we then decided to go back to the Railway Station to catch our 8:50 train to Shanghai. We were early, hooray! But still ended our trip running for the trains! The Shanghai Metro.
You see, in the morning, we arrived at the station late because of me. When we arrived we thought we had time so we bought KFC in the station. Then when me and Anton decided to look for our boarding gate, we learned that our gate was still below and not on the floor we were in. And that we still had to go out of the station and go out. At this time, we only had 20 minutes before our train was to depart for HangZhou. So we ran and we ran until we found the boarding gate. Just in time, the people were lining up to board. At night, we decided to end the day running for the Metro because Shanghai Nan is 90RMB away from us, that's an hour and 18 stops in the Metro. Plus, the cost is less also since Metro is just 5RMB plus our tuk-tuk to the dorm.
So that now, I once again found myself here in my room, blogging, and I am really late for class! How very Row 5!
have I ever mentioned the Row 5 soon to be Row 6 to you previously? Probably not since it only started a few days ago. So allow me to introduce to you the idea of the Row 5 soon to be Row 6 as well as its origins.
Here in Shanghai, and even back then in Rosario, our GBF group has always had the Row 4 from the Shanghai ban. This mainly consists of Allan, Rain, Pinky, and Eds. Back then and even here in Shanghai, they were always together in going out. This pretty much continued here where they would often go out together. Thus, the trademark, "Row 4".
A couple of nights ago we hanged out in Helen's to watch the World Cup. This was an everybody is invited affair since people from GBF also performed to promote the Filipino Day. So I went, lots of people went. And this was where I found myself seated with the members of Row 5: RG, Anton, Sigh, FRed, and yours truly (ME). The same group who went to HAngZhou yesterday. Why we are Row 5? I'll explain on a separate blog. BUt definitely not because of Row 4. Pretty far, actually.
So, HangZhou.
Lots of people have already been to HangZhou. At first we were still in doubt if we were to go but since most of them said that it was not to be missed, we decided to go. Since people now never go on big groups like what happened in our SuZhou, there were lots of groups who went on different dates. The only question there left was when we were going. Then one day RG called me up to ask me if we can go with him and Fred in their HangZhou so it won't seem like they were on a date. So I said okay. After all, I had other plans the day my roommate, Cheng, was supposed to go. A few days after and RG was also able to invite Sigh. So that you get the Row 5 all under one trip.
RG bought tickets the time we were in Beijing. So I learned that we were to depart Shanghai at 11:50AM, arrive in HangZhou after two hours and depart HangZHou for Shanghai at 8:50 in the evening. See, if we can, we try as much to avoid overnight trips.
So we went yesterday. It was rainy, yes. But still okay. At least it was not the sunny-that-makes-you-sticky weather that we really hated. Coz that was the weather when we had our field trip the day before we went to HangZhou.
Since it was raining, and a little bit foggy when we arrived at the West LAke, we decided to go up the Pagoda first. But since we got tired half-way, we had a detour and decided to chill first at the coffee shop on top of the hill a few steps before you arrive at the Pagoda. And since the owner was very kind as well as the waitresses, we decided to go full blast on chilling first, get some coffee, and perhaps have a little "chika" session. Then we decided to go up the Pagoda.
The Pagoda was nice even when it was raining. So we took pictures and enjoyed the view of the West Lake. Then we went down and walked to the West Lake. At the West Lake, we found dry chairs and sat first for a while to enjoy the calming and relaxing view. This was where we met the strangest stranger ever while we were seated in one of the benches along the Lake. Why strange? check this out:
So she comes to us asking, "可以说中文吗？“
shocked, we said, "什么？“
Stranger says, "可以问一下？“
so we say, "可以。“
At this point she speaks English and says (addressed to me, Sigh, and Anton),
“Among these two, who is your girlfriend?"
So Anton, still shocked, said “没有。”
RG, who at this point came closer already goes on to say,
“她们都是好朋友。”
Then she gave us a grumpy face and started walking away in a tantrum-ish manner.
Weird? Oh, tell me more about it. LOL.
Conclusion: baka type ka Anton!!
So we continued walking to go look for QingHeFang, the cultural street where Cheng asked me to buy something for her. So we rode a taxi since we didn't have much time.
Upon arriving at QingHeFang, we decided to walk around the street and check out the stuff. Indeed, this was a cultural street. These streets characterizes China so much. With stores selling mopit brushes and Chinese calligraphy as well as keychains where they can engrave your names or what-nots. This is among the things I really love about China. Plus, there was a show I missed because I was looking for the store Cheng said. But it was okay. I really enjoyed the street.
Before going home, we decided to grab something for dinner. We ended up in this resto selling CHinese dishes that were, according to them, the best. We tried the specialty dish in HangZhou called West Lake fish. It was delish. Plus, this was one of those rare times we had seafood for dinner. After dinner, we then decided to go back to the Railway Station to catch our 8:50 train to Shanghai. We were early, hooray! But still ended our trip running for the trains! The Shanghai Metro.
You see, in the morning, we arrived at the station late because of me. When we arrived we thought we had time so we bought KFC in the station. Then when me and Anton decided to look for our boarding gate, we learned that our gate was still below and not on the floor we were in. And that we still had to go out of the station and go out. At this time, we only had 20 minutes before our train was to depart for HangZhou. So we ran and we ran until we found the boarding gate. Just in time, the people were lining up to board. At night, we decided to end the day running for the Metro because Shanghai Nan is 90RMB away from us, that's an hour and 18 stops in the Metro. Plus, the cost is less also since Metro is just 5RMB plus our tuk-tuk to the dorm.
So that now, I once again found myself here in my room, blogging, and I am really late for class! How very Row 5!
Beijing..
Let me tell you about my Beijing.
So I've been living in China for more than 4 months now. And I really, really, wanted to go to Beijing no matter what! Because when you say China, people will naturally automatically think Beijing! Plus the fact that of course it was where we had the Olympics. So when Anton mentioned a long time ago that Desi was gonna make a plan to go to Beijing, I said I'm IN easily! Because I chose to go to Xian also for the Fudan field trip and told myself at that time that whatever happens, I AM going to Beijing anyway.
So a new holiday came to Shanghai last June 14-16. I think it was the Dragon Boat Festival. Desi planned everything and we just joined in everything. We were a total of 9 people (me, Anton, Desi, Jed, Christine, Tim, Aby, Christine GBF, and Renee). Just right if you ask me since more than this number would/can spell trouble already. The "sir" that Desi is, we had meetings previous to our departure as well as quite a few number of email exchanges regarding our itinerary. Needless to say, it was exciting. You see, this was Beijing. Also, almost all of us knew each other from GBF except for Aby (who's among the Filipino group we met here in Fudan and Tim (Dutch) and Christine (French) who we usually hang out with. Tim is a classmate of Desi, Chrsitine is his girlfriend, Aby is Desi's student from Davao. Ok, did I just explain that? This was a fun group.
So we left the dorm at around 7:30 in the evening to catch our 9:58 train to Beijing. Yes, I took the train. We went to Shanghai Nan Station which is 90RMB and 40 minutes by taxi away from the dorm only to arrive there at around 8:30 and realize that our train WASN'T there. We were to depart at the Shanghai Station which is a few metro stops only from our dorm. LOL. So we decided to rush off to the nearest Metro stop at Shanghai Nan to go to Shanghai Station. We arrived just in time for boarding.
13 hours after we arrived at Beijing Station at around 12 noon the following day. While in the train, we met this English speaking local who worked for a tour agency in Beijing. He helped us fix our itinerary as well as find our way through Beijing's Metro system. See, what are the chances that you actually meet someone as kind as him in this HUGE country that is predominantly Chinese-speaking?!? So we were so happy! But we arrived at our hostel only to find out that they had problems with the rooms that we booked. So they had to transfer us to another hostel which was hassle for us in a way but I guess okay too since it was also near the Metro stop. Plus, because we were troubled by this, they helped us get discounts at our new hostel. So we got it for only 45RMB/person/night. TAKE NOTE: THIS WAS MY FIRST TIME EVER TO STAY AT A HOSTEL AND MORE SO ONE WITH A SHARED BATHROOM!
We got two rooms. One 6-bed and the other, a 4-bed room. Room assignments were:
6-bed: Desi, Aby, Chrsitine, Renee and Jed.
4-bed: me, Anton, Tim, and Christine.
Because of all the delays, we decided to just chill out through the day and check out the food street, WangFuJing and proceed to HouHai. HouHai is almost like Singapore's Clark Quey. Very nice. And oh did I tell you that I took ONE BITE of STARFISH!! IKR!!
Second day we decided to go to the Great Wall. Somewhere in QianMen Metro stop we found a tour that was only 50RMB. I was shocked. This was Great Wall we were talking about. And for 50RMB, you got to admit that this price was quite cheap! So excitedly, off we jumped on that tour bus! True enough we had the Great Wall for our first stop and it was nice! I later found out that this was not yet the amazing part of the Wall. But it amazed me already!! Don't anymore ask me about the rest of the trip since our motto for that day was that: AT THE END OF THE DAY, IT WAS JUST 50RMB!!
On the way home we passed by the Olympic Village and asked to get off that site and never join the rest of the group anymore in going back to where we found that tour. The Olympic Village was nice. We wanted to wait till they open the lights at 7:45 but it rained and the sky became so dark and it got so cold we decided to go home instead and eat Western buffet at a place near our hostel. YUMMY!! Something to make up for the lunch we had at our 50RMB tour which made me experience the feeling of eating only cucumber for lunch!! Good thing there was YangRou outside the resto!! Oh, thank heavens!!
Since the forecast said that it was gonna be rainy the next day, we decided to tweak our itinerary a little but so that the next day we spent going around The Summer Palace in the morning, Tian'An Men and Forbidden City in the afternoon, and The Silk MArket in the evening! This was definitely our longest,, most tiring day!! Especially because the weatherman was not accurate and it turned out to be really humid/hot!! It's like the sun is draining you of all your energies!! My personal favorite was the Forbidden City and of course, the 90RMB lunch of authentic Peking duck I had. They had certificates and code numbers! Our 30 minute wait to get lunch was well worth the wait I would say. Even though I am not really a duck person!!
And for our last day, we decided to go check out the Temple of Heaven where we saw the local scene. As well as the Art District of Beijing. It was pretty cool to see the locals dancing, doing exercise and what-nots. I had lots of water because.. the weather was really hot!!
We went back to the hostel around 7 in the evening to take a shower and rushed to Beijing Nan Station to catch our 9-ish train to Shanghai. Grabbed a quick dinner at the KFC in the station then boarded the train. And because the cheap sleeper were sold out already when we bought tickets, we were on hard seats going back to Shanghai. It was pretty good. Some kind of like the first class planes except the seats were hard, of course! We arrived in Shanghai the following morning.
Good bye Beijing, good bye McDonald's breakfast everyday. Now, I am once again back to Shanghai and The Bund!! Lovett.
So I've been living in China for more than 4 months now. And I really, really, wanted to go to Beijing no matter what! Because when you say China, people will naturally automatically think Beijing! Plus the fact that of course it was where we had the Olympics. So when Anton mentioned a long time ago that Desi was gonna make a plan to go to Beijing, I said I'm IN easily! Because I chose to go to Xian also for the Fudan field trip and told myself at that time that whatever happens, I AM going to Beijing anyway.
So a new holiday came to Shanghai last June 14-16. I think it was the Dragon Boat Festival. Desi planned everything and we just joined in everything. We were a total of 9 people (me, Anton, Desi, Jed, Christine, Tim, Aby, Christine GBF, and Renee). Just right if you ask me since more than this number would/can spell trouble already. The "sir" that Desi is, we had meetings previous to our departure as well as quite a few number of email exchanges regarding our itinerary. Needless to say, it was exciting. You see, this was Beijing. Also, almost all of us knew each other from GBF except for Aby (who's among the Filipino group we met here in Fudan and Tim (Dutch) and Christine (French) who we usually hang out with. Tim is a classmate of Desi, Chrsitine is his girlfriend, Aby is Desi's student from Davao. Ok, did I just explain that? This was a fun group.
So we left the dorm at around 7:30 in the evening to catch our 9:58 train to Beijing. Yes, I took the train. We went to Shanghai Nan Station which is 90RMB and 40 minutes by taxi away from the dorm only to arrive there at around 8:30 and realize that our train WASN'T there. We were to depart at the Shanghai Station which is a few metro stops only from our dorm. LOL. So we decided to rush off to the nearest Metro stop at Shanghai Nan to go to Shanghai Station. We arrived just in time for boarding.
13 hours after we arrived at Beijing Station at around 12 noon the following day. While in the train, we met this English speaking local who worked for a tour agency in Beijing. He helped us fix our itinerary as well as find our way through Beijing's Metro system. See, what are the chances that you actually meet someone as kind as him in this HUGE country that is predominantly Chinese-speaking?!? So we were so happy! But we arrived at our hostel only to find out that they had problems with the rooms that we booked. So they had to transfer us to another hostel which was hassle for us in a way but I guess okay too since it was also near the Metro stop. Plus, because we were troubled by this, they helped us get discounts at our new hostel. So we got it for only 45RMB/person/night. TAKE NOTE: THIS WAS MY FIRST TIME EVER TO STAY AT A HOSTEL AND MORE SO ONE WITH A SHARED BATHROOM!
We got two rooms. One 6-bed and the other, a 4-bed room. Room assignments were:
6-bed: Desi, Aby, Chrsitine, Renee and Jed.
4-bed: me, Anton, Tim, and Christine.
Because of all the delays, we decided to just chill out through the day and check out the food street, WangFuJing and proceed to HouHai. HouHai is almost like Singapore's Clark Quey. Very nice. And oh did I tell you that I took ONE BITE of STARFISH!! IKR!!
Second day we decided to go to the Great Wall. Somewhere in QianMen Metro stop we found a tour that was only 50RMB. I was shocked. This was Great Wall we were talking about. And for 50RMB, you got to admit that this price was quite cheap! So excitedly, off we jumped on that tour bus! True enough we had the Great Wall for our first stop and it was nice! I later found out that this was not yet the amazing part of the Wall. But it amazed me already!! Don't anymore ask me about the rest of the trip since our motto for that day was that: AT THE END OF THE DAY, IT WAS JUST 50RMB!!
On the way home we passed by the Olympic Village and asked to get off that site and never join the rest of the group anymore in going back to where we found that tour. The Olympic Village was nice. We wanted to wait till they open the lights at 7:45 but it rained and the sky became so dark and it got so cold we decided to go home instead and eat Western buffet at a place near our hostel. YUMMY!! Something to make up for the lunch we had at our 50RMB tour which made me experience the feeling of eating only cucumber for lunch!! Good thing there was YangRou outside the resto!! Oh, thank heavens!!
Since the forecast said that it was gonna be rainy the next day, we decided to tweak our itinerary a little but so that the next day we spent going around The Summer Palace in the morning, Tian'An Men and Forbidden City in the afternoon, and The Silk MArket in the evening! This was definitely our longest,, most tiring day!! Especially because the weatherman was not accurate and it turned out to be really humid/hot!! It's like the sun is draining you of all your energies!! My personal favorite was the Forbidden City and of course, the 90RMB lunch of authentic Peking duck I had. They had certificates and code numbers! Our 30 minute wait to get lunch was well worth the wait I would say. Even though I am not really a duck person!!
And for our last day, we decided to go check out the Temple of Heaven where we saw the local scene. As well as the Art District of Beijing. It was pretty cool to see the locals dancing, doing exercise and what-nots. I had lots of water because.. the weather was really hot!!
We went back to the hostel around 7 in the evening to take a shower and rushed to Beijing Nan Station to catch our 9-ish train to Shanghai. Grabbed a quick dinner at the KFC in the station then boarded the train. And because the cheap sleeper were sold out already when we bought tickets, we were on hard seats going back to Shanghai. It was pretty good. Some kind of like the first class planes except the seats were hard, of course! We arrived in Shanghai the following morning.
Good bye Beijing, good bye McDonald's breakfast everyday. Now, I am once again back to Shanghai and The Bund!! Lovett.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Shanghai...
Shanghai, where the sun rises early and sets late! where the day is always long, and the night short. where the weather is unpredicatble or sometimes just plain crazy. where everything is like my hometown yet also very different in the way people live their lives. Shanghai, this is my Shanghai.
I've been here for four months and yet I feel like it hasn't been that long a period of time since mom took me to the airport to go and experience life here in Shanghai. It's been four months and yet I feel that everything is still the same. What was in my mind when I arrived here still is the same thing that is in my mind. Confusion, and lots of what-if's in my perennial search of what it is that I really want to do in life.
I came to Shanghai hoping that at the end of this journey, i will come to realize what it is that I really wanted to do in life. But four months into this journey, I find out something about myself! I rediscover and relearn the beauty and the reason behind how I live my life. The philosophy behind everything that I do. Coz yes, at the end of the day, I've rediscovered that at the end of the day, I just wanna be happy. Then I know that everything's gonna be alright.
The day is long here in Shanghai! Personally I feel that there is just so much to learn! More than the language, I am more interested to learn from the experiences I gain every single day. The people I meet, the people I see. The lives I encounter, as well as from the lives I am able to touch. Shanghai, you've helped me once again figure out that no matter how complicated things can get, if I really, really want it, I can make it simple enough for me to withstand.
I've been here for four months and yet I feel like it hasn't been that long a period of time since mom took me to the airport to go and experience life here in Shanghai. It's been four months and yet I feel that everything is still the same. What was in my mind when I arrived here still is the same thing that is in my mind. Confusion, and lots of what-if's in my perennial search of what it is that I really want to do in life.
I came to Shanghai hoping that at the end of this journey, i will come to realize what it is that I really wanted to do in life. But four months into this journey, I find out something about myself! I rediscover and relearn the beauty and the reason behind how I live my life. The philosophy behind everything that I do. Coz yes, at the end of the day, I've rediscovered that at the end of the day, I just wanna be happy. Then I know that everything's gonna be alright.
The day is long here in Shanghai! Personally I feel that there is just so much to learn! More than the language, I am more interested to learn from the experiences I gain every single day. The people I meet, the people I see. The lives I encounter, as well as from the lives I am able to touch. Shanghai, you've helped me once again figure out that no matter how complicated things can get, if I really, really want it, I can make it simple enough for me to withstand.
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