3rd September

We took the overnight train from Beijing to Shanghai. It was a tortuous, thirteen-hour ride and we barely managed to catch any sleep. For those who know me, I don’t sleep very well, so ironically, to my benefit; the lack of sleep affected me less than Calvin. The train finally reached the Beijing Railway Station and it was flooded with people. Although China is not an immigrant country, it is a melting pot in itself. Simply because China has so many minority groups and they all converge to the big cities along the East Coast, like Beijing and Shanghai. At the train station, you can see all kinds of people and hear all sorts of accents. Some PRC girls look quite exotic even though they were dressed like country bumpkins.

Because of the heightened state of security during the Olympics and Paralympics, everyone using the subway had to scan his belongings. While it is true that people in Beijing push each other to get onto the train, this is only slightly worse than the situation in Singapore. Our hostel is a ten-minute walk from the Qianmen station and fifteen minutes away from Tiannanmeng.

We reached the hostel and checked in. The hostel used to be an inn during the Qing dynasty, according to the hostel owner, was a place where young aristocrats used to come and have “fun.” I doubt it is a brothel as the long beds were more likely a place for those idle folks to have opium and zui sheng meng si. Anyway, the most important thing about the hostel was that it was cheap, had good location and was clean and staffed with friendly people. I had several good and long conversations with the hostel owner who was a native from Inner Mongolia. He was a hardworking individual, evident from the fact that he was doing night shift, and talked to me as I surfed the web. I can’t recall our entire conversation but I remember that my Chinese is really bad and it hindered my ability to express myself. Also, the Chinese people are very satisfied with the economic development in China and the Chinese government’s attempt in recent years to clamp down corruption.

After dumping all the stuff into the room, we decided to head out and eat some stuff and buy a pair of slippers for use in the public bathroom. At random, we picked a restaurant and tried the soy bean milk. It tasted terrible, was too watery and I had to continuously stir the sugar to dissolve it. After that, we went around checking the price of slippers and eventually settled for a pair that cost 2 rmb. I don’t know how Calvin felt about shopping with me, because it certainly took away whatever joy shopping normally gives to people. As a general rule of thumb, I don’t like to buy anything unless I have checked out as many prices as possible especially when the good is easily comparable. On those occasions when this principle is relented, I regret my decision.

After buying the pair of slippers, I walked down the street, making a mental note of what I wanted to buy and bring back to Singapore. After lazing in the room for a while since we were kind of exhausted from the overnight train, we proceeded to Tiannanmeng, the symbolic political square of China.

Maybe because I am typing this from the army and feeling more nuah, I can’t remember myself being particularly impressed with the Tiannanmeng Square. The square is big, filled with tourists and of course, it is empty. But, that is it. I suppose if I took part in the 1989 demonstration, it would probably have made a strong impression in my mind, Then again, I am not a person who is easily impressed, and most tourist attractions, along with many other things in this world, are highly overrated. We took quite a number of silly photographs. Calvin has a “SMU series” of photographs, which is a collection of him doing the SMU jump at different sites around the world (and he has a couple in Pyongyang for good measure.) Apparently, he intends to sell his pictures to SMU in the future. Imagine the headlines: “SMU student takes the road less travelled. No place is closed to an open mind. Take the leap of faith. Jump.”

After hanging around Tiannanmeng Square for a while, we decided to head towards the Forbidden Palace. The Forbidden Palace was probably the largest palace that I have seen so far. It took like freaking two hours to walk in a straight line from one end to the other. In terms of scale, it certainly reflects the grandeur and size of the Chinese Empire. However, it is less ornate than some of the other palaces in Europe, say the Belvedere. The irritating thing about the Forbidden Palace is that it doesn’t allow tourists to go into the main palace buildings so you can only try to get a quick view from the outside. So you don’t exactly get to enjoy the sensation of standing before the dragon throne especially since you have to squeeze against other tourists to get a glimpse of it. The best way to enjoy your trip to the Forbidden City is to walk along the side alleys from one building to another. While you may not get to walk the path of the dragon prince, at least you get to enjoy some solitude and a respite from the maddening crowd around you.

Like other parts of China, there are always people who are trying to scam you. Outside the main entrance of the Forbidden City, there are shops that charge you an entrance fee for their “exhibitions.” These exhibitions consist of only a few figurines in a room with little value of any kind. We went into the shop that displayed the “Li Dai Huang Di” signboard and were duly conned of 10rmb.

After the Forbidden City, we decided to take the train and go to Guo Mao, a v-shaped building which is the main CCTV headquarters. According to Calvin, who is an architect student, the vagina-looking building is designed and based on the concept that everyone is equal, so technically the building has no top or bottom. One may add that it is all about female empowerment.

After Guo Mao, we went to Sanlitun. Rather amused with the notion that China has Hooters, we decided to check it out. Much to our horror, the girls were ugly, the food was lousy and the bill was expensive. I have never been to Hooters before and according to Calvin, that place was worse than the one in Singapore. The really funny thing was that after we went back to the hostel and surf the web, the Afro-American sitting next to us was trying to bua the Chinese receptionist in the hostel. And guess what, he tried to ask her for a date in Hooters! Now, Hooters is a bad place to date a girl, and he was trying to convince her how great the burgers were etc. As I was trying to stir shit as usual, I told her that we just came back from that place and the food was really horrible and expensive. Well, he didn’t look too happy.

After that, we decided to head out of the hostel at around 9.00pm and checked out Xiu Shui Jie which was honestly a waste of time and it had a lot of fake goods. After that, we adjourned to Wang Fu Jin and there were a lot of shopping malls (I lost most of my shopping enthusiasm by this point) and they were all boring to me. I realized that I get bored very easily and feel sleepy. Anyway, we bought some lamb kebabs along the streets and the food was prepared by natives from Xinjiang and they tasted quite good. And XY, take note, they sell most parts of the sheep. They sell their eyes, liver, and guess what, their testicles.

All ready to be barbecued for a price, my friend.