450 km/hr

450 km/hr. That's how fast the Shanghai Maglev took passengers from the middle of Shanghai to Pudong International Airport. It would normally take 60 minutes by car to get from the city to the airport. On the Maglev, it took 7 minutes. I took it to the airport, and it was definitely quick. It took about 3 minutes to reach top speed, and then traveled at 450 km/hr for about 30 seconds, and then started to slow down as we approached the airport.

I could see where a Maglev (magnetic levetation) train would come in handy. Say, from Seattle to Portland to San Francisco to LA to SD. I bet, if you timed it right, you could catch a game in Seattle and San Diego in one day, no problem. =)

Amy x 3

Amy G - tourist

Amy B - tour organizer. She got me on this trip. Without her, I don't know if I would have ever made it to China =)

Amy C - tour guide/tour mom. She basically got us from Beijing to Xian to Shanghai. She met us up with our local guides. She made sure our whole tour group got on the plane. She tried recovering my jacket from the hotel in Beijing. She did a lot of things for us, and the fact that she is an Amy makes her the coolest tour guide ever =)

More Shanghai pics

The Shanghai skyline at night


Amy B at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf
Me, Amy B, and Lili at the Yu Yuan Garden
Me, Lili, and Amy B on the river cruise with the Shanghai skyline at night
Us having lunch...I am blocking Lili with my big head =(

"Death Cab" in Shanghai

I would not want to drive in China. Cars cut across 4 lanes at a time, people make left turns from the right hand lane. The horn is the most used part of the vehicle. Pedestrians and bikes are merely temporary road blocks.

But I don't think I want to get into another taxi in Shanghai. I somehow ended up sitting shotgun for most of the taxi rides that we took there. And I got a great view of all the potential accidents. (Side note: Eddie says don't ride the dark red cabs...they rip you off cuz they don't have meters). Usually there were three lanes, but the taxis seemed to think that the space in between the cars in those three lanes were also lanes. So we squeezed by numerous cars like this. Although "squeezed" isn't quite the right word..."whizzed by" would be more appropriate. Without any hint of hitting the brakes, the taxis would pass vehicles in these make believe lanes, with inches to spare on either side of the car. Another taxi driver decided that he was facing the wrong direction, so he made a U turn from the right hand lane, cutting off traffic in the left hand lane. Another taxi driver decided that he wanted to get back to our hotel as fast as possible. So he speeded down the road, and almost hit another taxi driver who was standing outside his car AND almost hit the taxi coming from the left hand side trying to cut our taxi guy off. There was some honking, and he slowed down just enough where if I had my windows rolled down, I could have touched the taxi driver standing outside his car. There were rides where I thought we would definitely, without a doubt, hit a bike, motorcyclist, pedestrian, or concoming vehicle. The only reason we avoided the moving objects seemed to be because the taxi driver used his horn to warn them that he was going to hit them. There was also that driver that ran through a red light, as if it were completely normal...

Needless to say, I did not breathe while the taxi was in motion. I may have turned blue during the ride, but it was impossible to ignore the fact that at any moment, I could die. Amy B even admitted that Shanghai drivers were worse than NYC taxi drivers. So, I've decided that the next time I have to ride in a cab in Shanghai, I am putting on the seat belt, and sitting in the back seat.

Shopping - Shanghai style

For our day by ourselves, we did the following:
Went to the French concession where they have a lot of foreign restaurants, and to Amy B's delight, a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf

Ate lunch at a hot pot restaurant (eddies recommendation), where we managed to order ourselves a pretty good meal, considering I couldn't really decipher the menu, and the only English speaking waitress had difficulty explaining some of the things on the menu. Oh, I also had to draw a shrimp in order to indicate that we wanted shrimp. Pictionary does come in handy!

Took a night time river cruise, which was beautiful!

Got a full body massage at the hotel!

In between all that, we shopped. Shopping in China is different for tourists. You barter. And you barter for the price you think it cost for them to make it...and that's probably still even a bit high. If you are shopping for knockoffs, you follow middlemen to the back streets of Nanjing Road where they sell knockoff hand bags and shoes in small apartments. We followed two people into the back of the alley places for Lili to successfully acquire two Coach purses for $15 each. And you just keep bartering. You stick to your price, and if they don't give it to you, you walk away. And then they chase you, and then you stick to your price, and then they say no, and then you walk away, etc. And this goes on until they finally give it to you for the price you state. you communicate via calculator. You say yes or no.

This got to be very tiring, and we were all glad to go into UniQlo (Asian version of the Gap), and get clothes that we liked without having to barter for it. After that, it was a little more shopping here and there, and then we were done. =)

The New York of China

The first thing that you see in the Shanghai skyline is the Pearl Tower. We went up the tv tower our first morning in Shanghai, but the sky was overcast, and we weren't able to get a good view of the city. However, it was interesting to see all the construction that was happening from a bird's eye view. I could tell that there were many construction sites preparing to build more sky scrapers. I'm not sure if they were business or residential buildings, but there were about 4 visible plots in the vicinity of the Pearl Tower.

Next was the Yu Yuan Garden, which was surrounded by a huge tourist market. The garden itself was very beautiful. The flowers were real, the trees were real, and the architecture of the houses and walls was amazing. The main path through the garden snaked around into various corners, and each provided a great picture taking opportunity. It was amazing to think that all this nature was neighboring a loud and crowded tourist shopping area.

The Jade Buddha Temple was next on our hit list. We went through various portions of the temple, and got a chance to see monks doing their routine prayers. We later found out that this was an extremely rich temple, and that the monks here could probably afford a Mercedes a month if they were given the opportunity. Many people come to this temple because it is famous and because it has two of the largest Jade Buddhas in China. Later on we went to a Tea House and sampled some tea.

We all also signed up for the Shanghai Acrobatics Act for that night...yet another must do tourist thing in Shanghai. The acrobatics were amazing! They must have been up and coming gymnasts or has-been gymnasts because these people were buff and flexible! Their abs must have been made of steel, and I'm pretty sure that their muscles stretched to about 4 times that of a normal person. I was envious...I can barely bend down to touch my toes =(

Part of the Yu Yuan Garden
Monks coming out of a prayer session
Amy B and Lili sampling tea
Me with the Shanghai skyline
Me with another part of the Yu Yuan Garden
The Pearl Tower from street level
If only I were that strong and flexible...

"Ask Eddie"

When we arrived in Shanghai, we were introduced to our local guide, Eddie. He started talking about the history of Shanghai, and then he asked "do you want to hear a song?" He broke into a pretty good rendition of "American Pie". He later told us he liked karaoke.

Amy B, LIli, and i were going to spend a day in Shanghai on our own, so we ended up asking Eddie a lot of questions. Where can we eat hotpot? How can we get to the shopping district? How do you write the name of our hotel? What time is the river cruise? Where do we have to go to reserve the river cruise? Where is the maglev station? How long does it take to get there? How long does it take to get to the airport? It was endless...

So, the motto of our stay in Shanghai became "Ask Eddie"

The world's largest jigsaw puzzle

The following day, we drove out to the site of the Terra Cotta Soldiers mausoleum. I was totally impressed with this place. There are three main buildings, each covering three separate excavation sites. The first building is the largest, and held the bulk of the "army". Each statue is made with details down to the fingernails, and the facial expression on each of the soldiers is different. Each statue held some sort of weapon, and the hairstyles indicated the rank of that soldier. The warriors definitely looked ready for battle.

The amazing thing is that these statues weren't discovered in tact. They had been through flood, fire, tremblers, and other natural disasters. The tunnels that they were buried in were made of wood and would eventually collapse. The wooden pillars and roofs are now petrified, and the soldiers were all crushed underneath the weight of the earth. So archaeologists have to now go through and reassemble the warriors. About 7,000 in all. All in pieces. They apparently have software to help them match pieces, but it is a daunting task. That's why I think of this as the world's largest jigsaw puzzle.

The mausoleum also had displays of fully assembled soldiers as part of their exhibit. There were soldiers in chariots, and terra cotta horses (much to Lili's delight), and everything had been made to be exactly like a real life army. We were all impressed with the craftsmanship as well as the great lengths the emperor had gone through in order to protect his tomb.

Main building of the site. Seemingly endless row of soldiers

Me holding a replica of a soldier

Summer Palace

Lili and I went to the Summer Palace, and decided that it was our favorite touristy destination in Beijing. We managed to escape from the crowds, and climb up the hill that overlooking the lake as well as the outskirts of the city. We climbed rock formations around former buddhist temples, and went around the lake crossing several unique bridges. Willows gracefully swayed on either side of us as we walked around the park. Although it was a tourist spot, it was serene just walking along the path around the lake. Lili said that when she got married she'd want willows on either side of the main aisle. I'm sure that can be done...otherwise, she'll have to have her wedding in the Summer Palace in Beijing. =)

We followed this older lady all the way up the stairs to the top of the mountain. Chinese old ladies can really move...
Lili making her way across some boulders to a gazebo thing near the temples
One of many beautiful bridges embraced by willows along the lake
Standing amongst the rock formations near the temples
The hill that we climbed is in the background, and so is the lake!
The view of the lake from on top of the hill!

Seeing Xian

We traveled from Beijing to China via Eastern China Airlines very early in the morning. Upon arriving in Xian, we realized that we had too much luggage. Even though there were only 15 of us on the tour, we were barely able to fit all our stuff in the Chinese version of a 15 passenger van. The van was leaning to it's side when we were going down the freeways.

To my delight, we had hot pot for lunch!

And then we went to the Bell Tower and then the Drum Tower. The Bell Tower rung at dawn, and the Drum Tower beat at dusk. We took pictures in front of these landmarks. We also discovered that the cherry blossoms lining the streets around the towers were fake. They were just cherry blossoms neatly tied to bare branches. It made me wonder if the tulips and greenery around Xian were fake or real...

We went to the Confucius temple where they kept the ancient stone tablets collected from around China that documented the teachings of Confucius. While we were there, we observed some workers making ink rubbings of the tablets. We then went to the Wild Goose Pagoda, took pictures and walked the gardens. We also visited the Xian city wall - a massive wall surrounding the center of the city. Cars go through it now (there are tunnel things), but it would have been tough for outsiders to break into the city with this thing.

After that we went to dinner, where we were entertained by Tang Dynasty performances. It was definitely a tourist thing. And it was the fastest 10 course dinner I had ever eaten. The waiters would come by and set down a dish. You would barely have time to admire the presentation before they came by with the next course. And then they would give you a look of annoyance if you had not finished the previous course. By the time the 3 different desserts came around, I was tired of eating, and completely full. I was also tired. And the performances were good. Although sometimes we couldn't tell if the singing and instrument playing was pre-recorded, or if they were actually singing. We were pretty sure the dancing was real...although I can't say whether it was authentic Tang Dynasty dancing.

Amy and I in front of the Bell Tower with the fake cherry blossom trees
Entrance to the stone table exhibit
Worker making a rubbing of a tablet
Standing on the Xian city wall
Performers during the Tang Dynasty dinner show
Amy, Lili and I at the Wild Goose Pagoda

DVD Shopping

On Monday night, Kyle took us to a "really good" DVD store. This was not one of those "back of a restaurant illegal dvd selling" operations. This place had quality DVDs, in nicely made cases, and actually had a store front. It was oozing "legit, but only in China". Lili got a number of quality DVDs from this place. I was looking for Napoleon Dynamite, but came away with Wallace and Gromit.

However, there were a couple of problems this particular night:

No. 1 - Kyle couldn't exactly locate this place. He had been here once before when he was "kinda" buzzed, and so it took him a while to get oriented. He wasn't able to find it until after he made Lili and I walk through the shady bar area where foreigners and guys were drunk and trying to lure us into having drinks there. Someone even tried to steal Kyle's Gillette shaving cream from his coat pocket. However, Kyle did eventually find this DVD store, all the while avoiding the drug dealers the next block over. Whoo hoo!

No. 2 - We had about $30 between the three of us. This meant careful DVD-buying planning in order to have enough money for the cab right back to Kyle's. We were fortunate enough to realize this prior to our actual DVD purchasing. Had this not been the case, we would have had to ask the drug dealers next door for some cash...which probably would not have been a good thing.

All in all, Kyle (with the assistance of fellow Microsoft person Eden) made Beijing a fun and really eye opening experience =)

This is NOT a Smoothie!

Dinner on Sunday night was with Kyle, Lili, Amy B, Stacy, and Jason. Stacy and Amy B knew each other from Spain, and Jason was Stacy's boyfriend. Kyle managed to get us two taxis that would drop us off at the Bellagios restaurant near the Workers Stadium in Beijing.

Bellagios was a Taiwanese restaurant. Kyle was mistaken about two things that night. He promised Amy B that they had western food on the menu...but unfortunately, there was none. So as the waitress hovered over us waiting for our order, and Kyle trying to communicate to her that we needed 5 minutes to make our decision, we ordered our taiwanese dinner. Some rice, chicken, beef, etc.

Kyle also convinced me to order the green tea smoothie. I thought "yum, smoothie". Kyle also ordered a peanut butter flavored smoothie. However, what came to the table was anything but a smoothie.
In the picture above, there is a green mound of something near my elbow. That would be my green tea "smoothie" - or what would normally be called a yummy green tea icy dessert with red beans. It was really good. It was definitely not a smoothie. The food was excellent. The slight brain freeze that I got from consuming my "smoothie" was also excellent. =)

After Kyle mislead us at dinner, we were afraid to follow him to a place that was highly recommended for a massage. However, we made the right decision to follow him. We ended up at Bodhi (www.bodhi.com.cn) - also known as bliss. For about $15, we got a "foot massage" that massaged every part of our bodies and muscles that we never knew existed. Chinese massages are excellent!I could have melted in the chair! It totally made up for Kyle's miscue on the western food and "smoothie" =).

One Giant Stairmaster

Sunday morning, Lili and I met Amy B in the lobby along with other ASME conference attendees, and piled into the bus to see the Great Wall and the Ming Tombs. It was about a 1.5 hour drive out there since traffic was bad. The bus pulled up to the closest section of the wall from Beijing. From there, we embarked on our journey to the highest point we could see from the tour bus parking lot.

The Great Wall is amazing. Not only is it long, but it goes across the tallest peaks as it traverses across the country. Although it has been rebuilt numerous times since it was first commisioned, it is still an amazing feat. AmyB, Lili, and I started up the long flight of stairs up to the distant watch tower. The steps are not uniform, and some of them are very steep. The wall twists and turns, and there are few landings in between each building along the wall. It's just a straight up climb. I started sweating about 10 minutes into it. The only reprieve came when there was building, where we would occasionally stop and take pictures from. We weren't able to pass too many people on our climb up. There were some other tourists climbing with walking sticks, and I thought "wow, they are smart".

The three of us, after 1.5 hours, eventually made it to the top most watch tower. I was tired. My quads were burning and trembling beneath me, trying to hold me upright. The view from the wall was unfortunately hazy that day. We couldn't see much of anything. But at the top, I was just happy that I had made it up that far; never mind that the tour buses looked tiny from up above. I realized that the Chinese who built this wall had to be extremely fit in order to get everything up the mountain. And those who guarded the wall also had to have been very fit...or at least had really strong legs.

Once we caught our breath, we tackled the way down. Weaving among the sea of tourists attempting to climb the wall, my legs shook with each step I took. I thought that at any moment, I would tumble down the Great Wall. That would have been quite the story...but I managed to climb back down uneventfully. It only took us 30 minutes to get back down. We still had time before the bus would leave, but I don't think any of us wanted to attempt any part of the wall again.

The rest of the day, we were at the Ming Tombs. We went to one of the three open tombs, and walked the grounds, and went underneath into the tomb itself. It was hard to hear our tour guide since there were about 4 other flag bearing tour guides leading their tours into the tomb. I just kicked back and thought that this was a lot for people to have to go through in order to get buried during the Ming Dynasty. And to think that were 13 more that were like this tomb was slightly mind boggliing.

Welcome to China!

I arrived in Beijing on 01 April 2006. Earlier in the week, Kyle informed Lili and I that he would pick us up from the airport. The first thing you see upon entering China is none other than Starbucks! It's like you never left the USA...

Kyle and his friend Eden took a very tired Lili and I to hot pot after checking into the Beijing Friendship Hotel. Hot pot has become my most favorite chinese meal. It's such a simple concept! I'm not sure why I didn't really try it earlier! Dinner was also very cheap. Four people's dinners and drinks came out to $4 per person! It was the beginning of some cheap good meals in Beijing =)

This was also the night that I discovered the ordering style in China. As soon as you are seated, a waitress hands you the menu, and hovers over you as you make your decision. Never mind that you have no idea what you want, or that you want more time to decide. They just hang out for as long as you need to make up your mind. It's a little weird at first, but I guess like anything, you get used to it.

My 2nd favorite city

My heart will always be with San Francisco. However, Berlin is my favorite city in Europe that I've been to. I spent the weekend there in March 2004. I woke up at 4:30 am in order to get to the train station for the first ICE train to Berlin. I couldn't sleep. First I was nervous traveling over the weekend by myself. I'd made reservations at a hostel, but I was a little wary about sleeping in an unknown place with 6 other strangers in a room. I also wasn't sure if I could see everything all in one weekend. But I somehow managed sleeping a little in the hostel and didn't fear getting pickpocketed or mugged or whatever during my stay in Berlin.

The Reichstag is the most awesome thing. It is where the German parliament sits. People stand in a long line just to go to the top where there is an awesome dome. It's supposed to be a very energy efficient design, and the dome is part of that efficiency. I heard that in the summer you would have to wait several hours in the heat, but since it was March and not quite high tourist season, I waited for about 30 minutes in line while chatting with some other tourists.


The inside of the dome looks over the main Parliament assembly room. The whole thing is just awesome.

There is a little of everything in Berlin. It's like it took little highlights from every city in the world and crammed it into Berlin. There are very old buildings with scars from the war standing next to state of the art brand new buildings. Apparently, ever since the fall of the wall, this city has been changing rapidly. Potsdamplatz used to be ghetto, then popular, then ghetto, and now it's finally popular again. There aren't many signs that the wall even existed here. The checkpoint charlie museum is there to document the wall and those who managed to bypass it. However I tried looked for parts of the wall, and I couldn't. Maybe I wasn't looking at the right areas, but I couldn't find the wall.
Checkpoint Chairlie Museum next to Checkpoint Charlie. Checkpoint Charlie is now just a touristy thing. There are guards there, but I think they are just there to take pictures with tourists

There was some difference between the former west and east sides. I could tell that the east side buildings were a little more concrete and boring looking. The west side of town had residential areas with victorian style houses. And the streets were all tree lined on the west side, while the east side had hardly any folage. But there are definitely areas of the east side that are looking more modern. It would be interesting to go back in a couple of years to see how things have changed.

I ate at a bar called "Kaiser Soze", which was near the "Mudd Club". I wasn't sure what kind of club it was, but Kaiser Soze was a bar/cafe. I just thought it was awesome to be able to eat at a place called kaiser soze.

I knew I had seen most of the touristy stuff when I went to a place selling postcards and looked at a "hi from Berlin" postcard with all the major sites printed on it. I had gone to all of them. By then, I was tired, but very satisfied that I was able to get around to seeing everything that I needed to see.

The world clock that tells the time for anywhere in the world
Green means go! I love this little man. There aren't many Berlin street crossings with this little guy left. I think it was an East German thing, and I love it! The "stop man" is pictured below

The old church in Europaplatz. It is surrounded by nice modern buildings and it's near the western main train station.
I believe that's the goddess of victory, Nike on this tower in the middle of town. I climbed up to the top, and the view of the town was amazing!

More Vienna/Prague pics

Mom and I in front of the Haptbahnhof in Salzburg
Mom and I in the gardens of the Schloss in Vienna
In front of the St. Stephens cathedral in central Vienna
Auntie and Mom in front of the cathedral in the castle in Prague
img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/1375/2743/320/736.jpg" border="0" alt="" />Powder Tower in Prague
Those are camels in the median of the main boulevard in Prague. I'm not sure what they were doing there. I think it was for some ad thing.
The main boulevard in Prague