Back to Beijing
CHINA
The Final Chapter
By LYNDI
Saturday, May 7, 2016
After our Kunming taxi driver tried to get us to pay for his airport exit fees, we waited at the Kunming airport for hours until our delayed flight finally showed up. For being such an organized and well-run country, China sure could use a flight tracker that updated departure times. Our flight to Beijing showed as “on time” while we lingered for 2 hours in an airport covered with people spitting loogies on the carpet.
Back in Beijing, we took the subway to 365Inn like the pros that we now were. We walked through the hutongs easily and even picked a nice restaurant to finally enjoy the Peking duck meal we’d heard so much about. We were actually pretty blown away – we’d had some great meals in China, but this. was. awesome. We complemented the Peking duck with – what else – roasted donkey and then headed back to the hostel next door for a few evening beers.
Sometimes when I travel I have inner battles to determine if I should do the totally cheesy touristy stuff – or stay away since it will inevitably be disappointing. I think this is how my inner dialogue went:
Me: “Well Lyndi, here we are at the end of our trip to China and you still haven’t eaten any bugs”.
Me: “Yeah, no kidding. That’s disgusting.”
Me: “Come on, it’s clearly a Chinese delicacy.”
Me: “No it’s not. And frankly, I’m a little disappointed in your cultural misappropriation.”
Me: “Do you even know what ‘misappropriation’ means?”
Me: “No, and neither do you. What’s your point?”
Me: “Fine. What if I told you that Future Lyndi would want you to eat a live bug in the night market, because when will you ever have another opportunity?”
Me: “Dammit. You know ‘Future Lyndi’ always gets me. Let’s go”.
And so off we went to the Wangfujing Night Market. The narrow, brightly lit alley stands out among the glitzy bank towers and shiny corporate offices. The market probably only extends about 2 blocks, and as you walk through you are surrounded by crickets, scorpions, spiders and beetles of all shapes and sizes. And a fun fact? They are alive.
So Aaron, Cal and I walked through once to look at all the offerings, and then reluctantly walked back through to pick our poison. The vendors are strict about photos, signs in English tell you “no photo”, and if you ignore it they cover up their wares with cardboard. So now the stakes were raised – if we wanted to get a photo of the bugs, we had to buy them.
As we neared the end of the alley, I saw a small girl jump up and down in excitement as her dad handed her scorpions on a stick. And that was all I needed – if a little girl loves it, how bad can it be? I bravely ordered my own scorpion on a stick and watched as the little guys desperately trying to crawl their way off the stick they’d been pierced with were placed on a grill, flattened a bit and salted. They cooked for about one minute and then were served piping hot.
I was less than enthusiastic about it, but knew that bitch Future Lyndi was making me do it, so I closed my eyes, took a little teensy bite… and really liked it. I think it was buttered and salted so much that my tongue thought I was eating movie popcorn. I happily ate the rest, and then shared with Cal and Aaron. After a successful night of bug eating, we headed home to rest up for our final day in China.
In my head, I thought going to The Forbidden City on my last day in China was like saving the best for last. Here was the throne of one of the world’s greatest empires, with beautiful architecture, stories that transcend time and sacred history all bound in 90 palaces, 150,000 square meters… and one giant tourist attraction.
Knowing this would likely be the only time we would be in Beijing, we had to go for it, despite the fact that it was a Sunday. And we knew better than to visit touristy places with a huge domestic tourist crowd on a weekend.
We paid dearly.
It was fortunate that the Forbidden City was only about a 20-30 minute walk from our hostel. We packed our bags and stored them at the front desk as we would have to leave for the airport around 2pm.
As we approached the City, we saw something strange. It was a giant, snaking, never-ending line to something. We were sure glad we weren’t going there and headed onwards towards the city. Naturally, that giant snaking line was actually for the Forbidden City – so we got in line approximately one mile away. I can’t remember how long it took us to actually get through that first line, but being physically crushed by 2 million of your closest Chinese friends is never a great way to pass a morning.
We finally made it through to Tianamen Square with about 400 tour groups. I’m not sure what I expected of the square – it’s just that. Square. It did make for a nice entry to the Forbidden City, so we kept cruising through to the ancient palaces.
After at least an hour of waiting and walking, we arrived at the City’s gates to buy our tickets where only there – inside the gates, past Tianaman Square, past the entry lines, past the metal detectors, past the hotel front desk – did we see a sign saying foreigners would need passports to purchase tickets. I was a little panicked. The Forbidden City was a must on my bucket list, but there was no way we had time to return to our hostel, get our passports and go through that ridiculous rigamarole again. So we did what we needed to do. We cheated.
Cal was smart enough to have brought his passport, so he bought two tickets at two different windows. They noticed that his passport had already purchased one during our second attempt, but he was able to convince them it was an error – and off we went! Aaron headed back since the crowds had crushed his spirits and we thought trying it three times was pushing it.
Cal and I had determined that we only had about two hours to spend in the city before we would need to get back to the hostel, so we moved at a pretty good clip. I had rented a headset self-guided tour which worked okay, but the enormous crowds coupled with a lot of closed exhibits made it hard to follow.
The City is undoubtedly impressive, but I probably would have been better off paying for a tour guide. There is so much history and context that the nice British lady on my headset couldn’t possibly fit into the short tour.
For the time we had to spend there, it was great, but I wish I had allotted more time. The Chinese have done an excellent job of keeping the place in perfect condition – but just like how all churches in a European city start to look the same, so too did all the palaces in this city start to look the same.
Cal headed back a little early as we estimated it would take one hour to walk home. I decided I would use my final yuan to take a cab so spent more time. But then my epic fail began.
I headed through the city to the exit, only to find it wasn’t an exit, and I would have to walk back through the city to the “real” way to get out. So after this half hour detour, I hightailed it to try to find a way out. Once I got out of the Forbidden City, I asked a taxi driver how much to my hostel and he grossly overpriced me. I didn’t even have as much cash as he was asking for, so I kept walking, hoping the next offer would be more reasonable. And kept walking. And walking. I couldn’t believe there were no taxis!
So then I started to panic. I asked a man on a corner where I could find a taxi and he pointed across the street. Well, in Beijing you can’t just cross the street – I ran to the nearest underground tunnel to take me to the other side, only to find that taxis couldn’t stop there. So just imagine a crazy, sweaty, louwai girl running through the streets, flailing herself in front of taxis, only to be picked up by a pedicab driver that took me 4 blocks where he then seemed to indicate that was all my money was worth, to continue running all the way back to the hostel.
I was sure Cal and Aaron would have left for the airport without me since I was horribly late. But much to my surprise, they were sitting in the bar, halfway through a beer, and wondering why I had sweat coming out of every pore on my body. I guess this is why people wear watches – I had totally misappropriated the time.
And with that – we headed off to the airport, saying farewell to China. Through our two weeks here, I’d lived my dream of hiking Tiger Leaping Gorge, walking cobblestone streets lit by little red lanterns, climbed the Great Wall – and even eaten live bugs. Even though I checked off many things on my to-do list, I was constantly adding new sights and provinces to it.
When we arrived, I thought I was coming because I may never get another chance. When we left, I knew I was leaving because I had a million good reasons to return.
