First few days in Beijing

Arrg, I hate when I get behind like this!. I really just don't want to write this but I will do my best.

So I got off the night train and checked into my hostel. My first day in Beijing was a national holiday (didn't know), so once I got to Tiananmen Square I was greeted with a two hour line to get in!, security and guards everywhere!

Once in I have to say I was pretty disappointed in the square, really was nothing to it, just a big concrete square. I guess I should have seen that coming, but after that two hour wait I think I was only there for 10 minutes tops, honestly I would never bother going back to that square. There was one positive to it though, since I had cleared security I didn't have to get into the Forbidden City line which was huge!, at least a few hours, maybe more.

The Forbidden City was much better, and the size of it really is hard to believe, maybe getting close to the size of downtown Mount Maunganui in area, it took me about 20-30mins just to walk down one side of it without stopping. I think the only thing that made the city less special for me was that I had just come from Japan. Come on China!, there are more colours in the world than black and red with a bit of gold, eeeverything looks the same after a while.

Once finished with the Forbidden City, I walked up one of the few hills in Beijing, which gives a great view of the Forbidden City and Beijing (since it's so flat). From talking with people I found out that I had arrived in Beijing right after a massive storm which had blown most of the smog away from the city. Lucky for me because while I was in Beijing I thought the pollution was fine.

 The next day I went to the Summer Palace, this is where I decided I had had enough of Temples, Japan really had spoilt me with them, now they all just look like run down, half arse buildings. No more Temples for me. The location of the Summer Palace was great though!, once again it was on one of the few hills in Beijing near water, back in the day the Royal Family would stay here for those same reasons. I found a great big rock at the top and settled in to read the last of my book IT from Stephen King.

 This is the view from where i read my book

Once finished I got on the metro and found my way to Olympic Park to have the look of the signature buildings from the 2008 Beijing Olympics that clogged up the Discovery Channel back when they actually had shows that wernt about fishing, mining and moon shine. Seeing these in person was a surreal experience and I think I liked it more than the Forbidden City!

Finally I got back to the hostel, made a few friends then had an early night, ready to see the Great Wall of China.

Xi'an and the Terracotta Warriors

Now i had a massive write up about these two places, like my experience on my first night train and everything! but screw it, photos only. Darn you Beijing pick-pocketer!

UPDATE; Ok well since im not doing much in Bangkok since im trying to speed up my wisdom teeth healing i thought i would come back and update this a bit.

These first few pictures of the caves/buddahs are from Longmen National Park which is inbetween Xi'an and Beijing. It was really cool but gees it was expensive compared to anything else i did in China!

Great views everywhere!

Beautiful place ruined but shitty dirty water etc...its the norm though

I get asked everywhere in China for pictures, anyone not chineese does, although i think the beard brought over a few more lookeylous. Sometimes i ask for a picture too if i know its not a scam.

Now heres the Terracotta Warriors. Its definitely brought out my young dream of being a archeologist!.

Everyone (and i mean everyone) was doing selfies here, so thought i would join in!

His face made me laugh, so took a photo

This is one of two bronze chariots just recently found (not that recent). They look much better in person

Soom nay people taking a picture of this guy, had no clue why you would bother. Chinese just take photos of everything!, so i took a photo of them taking a photo.

Heres the Xi'an Wall which encloses the old part of the city and is approximately 14kms long. This was my highlight for Xi'an, much better than the warriors!. You usually hire a bike at the top and ride around it, but i thought since i had the time i would just walk around it, which was a great choice, so much to see from the top.

Shanghai

Shanghai is great, i hit gold with the hostel!, it wasnt fancy or anything but the people were great. In fact on one of the days i tagged along with some french guys that were in China to learn Kung Fu and were having a break to party. One of the guys had met a "promoter" so she took us to a awesome and very fancy club for free, with free drinks and everything!. Now it sounds pretty dodgy but ive talked to a few people and from what i get from it is that promoters find foreigners to bring to the club to pack it out and look appealing to the locals. This one i was at was super expensive for the locals, like $1000NZD just for a booth!

 Yes i actually rolled this!, talk about one in a million.

I didnt get to many pictures from this night, but heres one with a clown that was on stilts, walking around giving out drinks

I found my favortie local food here too, they are special Shanghai dumplings that not only have meat on the inside, but also a broth you such out of them first. Tastiest thing on my travel yet and cost about $1. Also its very important to eat them gently, slowly sucking out the juice, when i first got them i just bit into it and covered myself in it!

 The rest of Shanghai was ok, but in the end its just a big city.

Here is the "bund", the only real tourist thing Shanghai is famous for. its essentially just a walkway on the edge of the river, with big buildings on either side. Its packed, filled with all sorts just trying to get a photo of themselves with it in the background.

The rest of the photos here are from another district, with some local stores, old buildings and a garden. Gardens in China are much different to Japan, since they seem to revolve around rocks.

Takamatsu, then on to China!

The only reason i went to Takamatsu in Japan was that flying from its airport saved me hundreds of dollars compared to leaving from Tokyo. Overall it was a nice place, not too much to do but with the rest of Japan it was beautiful. Sadly i didnt get to go to their famous garden since it rained for the first time since my first day in Japan!

Overall, i loved Japan and definitely will go back, but maybe when i can afford to stay longer and see more of the country.

Photo tiiiiime!

Actually i lie, just clicked i didnt take any!

Back baby!

Well this in annoying, i had loads of these posts saved and ready to go on my phone once i finally got out of Chinas crazy internet censorship but nope, two days before i fly out of the mainland my phone gets stolen!. Im really glad i had so much free time before my trip, because everything of value on my phone auto updates onto "the cloud" so it wasn't even a big deal...apart from my blogger posts since China and google have some bad blood.

Anyways so since it was forever ago when i was still in Japan, these posts will be very brief, mainly just with photos.