Saturday, September 18, 2010 and Sunday, September 19, 2010
I’m on the plane on my way to Hong Kong. Cannot believe the last 2.5 weeks with my dad are over. I’m having a hard time with the fact that I’m on my own again. I know that just like the first night of my trip when I cried myself to Singapore that this will pass too. And it’s not that I’m not excited for this next stage of my trip, but it is very hard to leave my dad. I guess it’s a good thing that I love my parents enough to get upset leaving them, but it doesn’t make it any easier on me. So I’m in that transition stage again.
The good part is that I’m back on my around the world ticket and this plane has a proper business section. Check-in was a breeze; I relaxed in the lounge before boarding the plane, enjoyed a fairly nice lunch and watched Letters to Juliette. Now I’m trying to look back at my China notes so that I’ll actually be able to update my blog with something from China. Dad and I have been so busy that I haven’t written properly, plus, 18 days of my long journals wouldn’t go over so well, so I’m just posting notes from our days and funny stories.
Yesterday morning after breakfast at the hotel, we met our private tour guide Qing. Dad and Qing went to take a bag of laundry to get dry cleaned (since we learned that they don’t have normal laundry mats that take your clothes and charge by weight) while I washed some stuff in the sink. When I came down to the lobby, they were just returning, having had no luck in securing a one-day turn-around for the clothes. Oh well. So we ventured out into the rain to find a taxi to the Summer Palace. The Palace was first built in the mid-1700s and was rebuilt a couple of times and contains the longest corridor in the world, 700-something meters long (in the Guinness book of World Records). Qing told us some history and showed us the highlights the enormous summer home of the emperors.
By the time we left, it was 1pm and dad decided that he was more interested in seeing a hutong (the old streets) than going to the Temple of Heaven. So we hopped on the subway (changing three times) to go to the area where Qing lives. She first took us to a local dumpling shop where we each had a bowl of soup and shared 20 dumplings, all for 14 Yuan (just over $2). Then she took us to her home. It was pretty spectacular as I don’t think she’s ever taken anyone to her home before. The hutongs are streets that run east to west and all the houses are built around a courtyard. The one she lives in was given to her grandmother and it has been in her family for almost 100 years, a building which once belonged to a high ranking official and had a large courtyard. During the Cultural Revolution, a number of people were given rights to live in the hutongs and buildings were constructed in the courtyard. Their “house” has three rooms, a small living room, a bedroom and a bedroom with attached kitchen. The toilet is in the courtyard and is shared by eight families, but they have a shower in the kitchen. We got to meet Qing’s parents but not her husband. All four of them live in this tiny structure. She and her husband share a room that is basically the width of a double bed plus four feet. There was so much clutter that its hard to say how much space they actually have, but its not a lot. Not only that, but housing prices have increased so drastically in Beijing that its hard to afford an apartment, so she and her husband applied for government housing, which is based on earning below a certain amount of money and then a lottery. They got an apartment and should be moving into it sometime soon, but its much further out of town and Qing really likes her neighborhood. In any case, it was an eye-opening afternoon.
From Qing’s house we walked to a local food market (indoors so much nicer than the others we’d seen) before heading to the electronics market to find an external hard drive. When you make a purchase you can get entered into a drawing and I won a scale! So exciting (not). Qing dropped us off at our hotel and we relaxed for a couple hours. I didn’t know what I wanted to do for my last night with my dad, and at 8pm, I decided we should just have quiet dinner at the hotel (they serve tapas and Western food) since it was the only night this month when nothing was on.
Well, we were wrong about nothing going on. There was a Fashionista Party put on by City Weekender, a fortnightly publication which highlights everyday people with interesting styles. The music was blasting as a pretty blonde Australian woman explained the details of the event. And we just wanted some dinner. I actually went back upstairs to change my shirt since I felt so underdressed and while I was gone, dad started talking to an older gentleman who was also looking for a quiet night in. The three of us ended up having dinner together and trying to talk over the blaring music as the Fashionista party continued around us. It was a fun evening, totally unexpected, but then it was time to pack. I cried when I went to bed and didn’t have a very restful sleep.
This morning I finished getting everything together, including my laundry which hadn’t fully dried and after a nice breakfast, dad and I jumped in a taxi to the airport express subway station. A teary goodbye from my side and I got on the train. And that brings me to now. The plane will be landing in Hong Kong in 30 minutes and my next flight leaves two hours later. Don’t think I’ll have much time to relax between the flights. Can’t believe I’ll be in Hanoi in less than 6 hours. Ahhh…
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