Archive for August, 2008
Sunday, August 31st, 2008
Xi’an: The Tour
Having had little rest on our arrival day, I wasn’t very disappointed when we didn’t get to see the terracotta warriors that day. By the next day, however, I was in much higher spirits.
For my entire stay in China, Caitlin had influenced me into being a local — that is, going places locals go, eating [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Tourist Noobs, humor by Jeff
Sunday, August 31st, 2008
Jeff is a computer hog
So, I got an email from parents this morning basically wondering if I’m alive and what I’m doing. Obviously Jeff has been doing most of the updating, so while I have the computer, I just wanted to let everyone know I’m fine, and that Jeff is a computer hog. He has food poisoning combined with [...]
3 Comments » - Posted in Jeff Lee, TMI, humor by Caitlin
Sunday, August 31st, 2008
Xi’an: Terracotta Warriors
On Thursday, we went on a tour with our hostel to see the famous Terracotta Army. The army contains thousands of life-sized clay soldiers built for Qin shihuang’s tomb. As we learned from a slightly hilarious video reenactment of his reign, Qin shihuang — which actually literally means Qin first emperor — was the first [...]
2 Comments » - Posted in Culture!, Tourist Noobs by Caitlin
Sunday, August 31st, 2008
Xi’an: Day One
To be fair, our day started a little roughly. We got to our hostel around 4 a.m., and after sorting through all the business and whatnot, we finally fell asleep at 4:30. Our main purpose in Xi’an was to see the famous Terracotta Warriors, so Caitlin got up early to find out what time their [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Tourist Noobs by Jeff
Saturday, August 30th, 2008
Train #1
We’ve heard a lot about other people’s train experiences in China. Some say that you have to do a 37 hour ride in a hard seat at some point because it’s “part of the experience.” For us, that experience doesn’t really seem to be necessary.
There are four types of tickets you can buy: hard seats, [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Uncategorized by Jeff
Saturday, August 30th, 2008
The Journey Begins
All right, the journey began last Tuesday, but this is the first really stable internet connection we’ve had.
Tuesday morning, we set out for the train station for a big adventure. Caitlin had been worrying because I didn’t have a plan or much input on the trip, but my plan was to play things by ear [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Disorganization, n00b by Jeff
Saturday, August 30th, 2008
Getting Home
The Olympics tend to draw large crowds from around the world, so it was inevitable that there would be someone I knew in the city. As it turns out, I knew a couple of people, one of whom we actually decided to have dinner with.
Dinner was lengthy and enjoyable, and beforehand we even got to [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Beijing, Disorganization, Olympics, n00b by Jeff
Monday, August 25th, 2008
Meeting the Athletes
On our wanderings through the Forbidden City, we noticed that many of the Olympic people (minus the volunteers) were still wandering around wearing their laminated badges. On one of our many people-watching breaks, I discovered what sort of information was available. Directly beneath the photo comes the name, then role, then country. In the Forbidden [...]
1 Comment » - Posted in Beijing, Olympics, Tourist Noobs by Jeff
Monday, August 25th, 2008
The Amazing Shopkeeper
On our walk from the Forbidden City to the subway station, we needed to grab a snack. We poked in the shop, looking around and eventually decided on the food we wanted. When we went to pay, we gave the man money, he got us change, then handed the bills back to us. We “xie [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Beijing, Creatures, Mysteriousness by Jeff
Monday, August 25th, 2008
The Forbidden City
In a last minute decision not to walk through a park, we decided to go to the Forbidden City today. The ticket office said it closed at 4, and we got our tickets around 3, so we were planning on doing a little rush tour anyway. Fortunately, Caitlin had already been there twice, and we [...]
