China

China already! This rapid travel is really getting intense, and as I
write this we are a mere two days from Japan. Time is going by so fast!

DAY ONE

Today was my free day in Hong Kong! Hong Kong is pretty separate from
mainland China. They use their own currency, and Americans don't need
a visa to visit Hong Kong, but Chinese require a permit to go to Hong
Kong. I spent the morning walking around with my friends Lexi and
Alexa. Our port was in a nice mall area, and our first stop was
Starbucks. The first Starbucks in months! Alexa's brother has a
friend living in Hong Kong, and she recommended a temple for us to go
to. We had no idea what we were going to, but the temple ended up
being really cool! It was Palm Sunday, so on our way to the temple we
saw lots of people in Christian services walking around celebrating
Palm Sunday. The temple itself was very crowded! It was a huge
temple, and there were people everywhere. There was also a lot of
incense burning. We spent about an hour just wandering through the
temple and trying to see everything. Around noon Lexi had to go back
to the ship, so Alexa and I decided to get our fortunes read.
Apparently this area is famous for palm reading! The woman said that
I would be rich - she could tell because of my nose. I hope that's
true! The first thing she asked when she looked at my palms was if I
had had an accident with scissors as a child. I don't know if I have
a scar or something, but when I was in third grade I did accidentally
cut my hand with scissors!

After the fortunes, I had read about a place called Snoopy's World, so
we decided to go there. Snoopy's World was definitely meant for
kids! I'm a huge Peanuts plan though, so I still had fun looking at
all the giant Snoopy statues! Right next to Snoopy World was a random
dance competition, so we watched one of the dances. That was pretty
interesting! Alexa's brother's friend was meeting us for coffee, so
we headed to the area where she was meeting us. We walked around that
area for awhile, and then found Alexa's friend - funnily enough, she
was also named Lexi! Lexi had brought another friend, and the four of
us went to a very cute independent coffee shop. It was definitely the
type of place I would frequent back home. We then headed to
Victoria's Peak, and we were going to go up, but the line was over an
hour long! We decided to instead head back to the ship for dinner and
go to the Hong Kong International Film Festival. We saw a very
strange Japanese film! It was cool though, it was very crowded! It
was cool to go to an international film festival in another country!

DAY TWO

Time to go to Beijing! I came to Beijing on a SAS trip. We spent
most of the day traveling. When we got to Beijing, we met with our
tour guide and went to a local restaurant for a traditional dinner of
Beijing roast duck. It was pretty good! Our tour guide, Jessica,
spoke very good English, which was very nice! She was very
informative. Apparently, English has replaced Russian as the most
popular foreign language for Chinese people to learn. Jessica also
mentioned that people are still very proud of the 2008 Olympics - it
was a very big deal! Our hotel was the Holiday Inn- Temple of Heaven,
which was pretty funny. It's the nicest hotel I've stayed at on this
trip. We even get HBO!

DAY THREE

We had a continental breakfast at the hotel, which had everything from
fried rice to Honey Nut Cheerios. After breakfast we went to
Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Tiananmen Square is huge!
There lots of Chinese tourists there as well, and they kept taking
pictures of us! THat was pretty funny. Tiananmen Square was very
impressive, and then we entered the gates to the Forbidden City. It's
called the Forbidden City because when the Chinese emperor lived there
commoners were not allowed within its gates. The Forbidden City is
also huge! It feels like it never ends. I really liked exploring it
though, especially the Imperial Gardens. Again, it was very
impressive! I liked it more than I was expecting. After lunch we
went to a silk "museum". This stop wasn't listed on the itinerary and
it was basically just guided tour of a government-owned silk shop.
Very strange! After the silk store we went to the Guang Ai Migrant
School, which was a boarding school for kids whose parents don't have
the means to provide for them. We played basketball and tug of war
with them. It was very different than the school in Ghana I went to!
The kids did not seem so excited to see us. It was a good experience
though. After the school we went on a rickshaw ride through a very
cute area of Beijing to a local home for dinner. It was very good!
They even taught us how to make dumplings. It was a very busy day!

DAY FOUR

Today we went to the Great Wall of China! It was fantastic, I can't
believe I was really there! It's pretty funny, there's a big market
and a Subway at the bottom of the wall. We took a chairlift up to the
wall, and had about an hour to explore it. There were some sections
with very steep steps! I really liked it. We even got to toboggan
down! After lunch we went to a kung fu school. Students at this
school performed in the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the 2008
Olympics, and they performed for us! That was very cool. After the
performance they taught us some kung fu. It was a lot of fun! There
were lots of cute little kids there, and they were all so talented!
Afterwards we passed the Olympic Village on the way to dinner, and
then went to an acrobatic show. The acrobatic show was very good! My
friends and I snuck up to VIP seats, so we had a prime view. It made
me miss gymnatics!

DAY FIVE

Last day in Beijing! We spent the morning at the Temple of Heaven,
which was even bigger than the Forbidden City. We spent most of the
morning playing shuttlecock, which was fun. We had a tea ceremony at
the temple, which was very interesting. We tried some delicious tea!
After the ceremony it was time to fly to Shanghai. Once I got back to
the ship I met up with my friend Alexa, and we wanted to go see the
Hunger Games. Unfortunately, the only English movie at the theater we
went to was Wrath of the Titans, so we just got chocolate from the
Hershey store and walked around Nanjing Street for awhile.

DAY SIX

Today I went with a large group of people to the Shanghai Science and
Technology Museum. The museum was pretty good, but the English
translations for the exhibits was a little humorous at times. The
museum was crowded with schoolchildren! When we were done with the
museum we got lunch at Papa John's - we were a little done with
Chinese food! Papa John's was actually a sit down restaurant, and it
was delicious. After lunch we wandered for a couple of hours through
a large underground market. We found lots of knock-offs! There were
even knock-off iPods that played MP5s - not sure those would be a wise
purchase! Later, Alexa, Liz, Peter and I tried to see Hunger Games at
yet another theater. Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that the Hunger
Games is playing at all in China - no one knew what we were talking
about! That was a little disappointing. We went back to the ship for
dinner, and then I met up with some other friends and went to a local
bar. There were lots of SAS kids there - I think we overwhelmed the
bar! It was a fun evening though.

DAY SEVEN

A week has gone by already! It went by so fast! I had an FDP in the
morning to two different temples. The first was the Longhua Temple,
the largest Buddhist temple in Shanghai. It was fun to just explore
all the different buildings. They were all very beautiful, inside and
out, decorated with lots of different art and sculptures. The next
temple was the Jade Buddha temple, home to the largest jade statue of
Buddha. It was very pretty. This temple was smaller, so instead of
wandering we had a tea ceremony. It wasn't quite as good as my tea
ceremony in Beijing, but it was still fun. Afterwards, I went to
another market with my friends Matt and Liz. This market was a lot of
fun - it was very busy with a lot of locals! Unlike the other
markets, this place actually felt like a cultural experience.
However, this market didn't have the same knockoffs, so we went to yet
another market to buy knockoffs. There were even knockoff Rosetta
Stones, so now I'm going to learn Italian!

I really enjoyed China! I had a great time here. There's so much to
see - again I feel like I barely scratched the surface of this country!