Trip to Xi'an

Went there from Apr 2 to Apr 5 which was quite long ago. Finally the busy me has time to talk about this trip.

Xi'an is one of the oldest city of China and is the capital of Shaanxi province. Dynasties such as Zhou, Qin Han, Sui and Tang have made Xi'an the capital of China. Ok cut the history crap. Go http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xi'an to read up more if you want to.

Okay. It was a 3 days 3 nights trip. We chionged home after work on thursday night to take the 11-hour long train there. The trains have a few classes of seats: hard seater, soft seater, hard sleeper and soft sleeper. Think our train didn't have hard seater? We took the soft sleeper cos we had quite some money to spare and didn't want to torture ourselves for this long journey. OMG i can never imagine the inside of a train to be so nice and cozy! The soft sleeper was incredible considering China's stuff are normally old and rundown. And we actually had Scottish youngsters who were on a field trip led by their teacher. Woot~ Not like we did anything with them though. Merely had simple introductions and we went on to do our own stuff.

Reached the city in the morning and met up with the tour guide and the bus which was supposed to bring us to the attractions for the 3 days. Checked into a 2-star hotel immediately. Realised it's some kind of hotel whereby ppl go for one night stands. Hotel 81 that kind. But bo bian we're poor students so can't stay in better ones. However, the hotel rooms are still quite nice with all the necessities.

First stop was to the Terra-cotta warriors 兵马俑 exhibition site. I'm sure you've heard of it or at least seen it on tv or books. It's the humongous number of clay statues of soldiers and horses which Qin Shi Huang got it built and buried together to protect his tomb. Supposed to be a representation of him still having power and control even in his afterlife. It's quite a cool and cultural place actually. But after going around the site, it got quite boring as it was just repetitive bunches of clay soliders.

Went on to the tomb of Qin Shi Huang after that. It was also very similar to the Ming 13 Ling tomb which we went to few weeks before. It's mainly the different carvings and structures around the tomb which was built all the way up a hill. The actual tomb was supposed to be buried beneath those. The sight of the surrounding from the top of the hill was good though.

At night we went to the Muslims Chinese market street. It was incredible to see so many chinese wearing muslim's headdress. The food they sell is, of course, halal too and no pork was available. This is a great contrast to the rest of the chinese who always eat pork. Their food was not bad, and they sold a kind of pastry that looks like tutu cake back in sg. Very similar, except that they have other kinds of flavours such as rose which i tried. It was yummy! Roamed around the place a while more before returning to the hotel. Received a call for a massage session which, of cos, i turned down.

Ah-tiongnisation

It's been 3months and 10days since i went away. I miss singapore so much that i dunno what to say. Well...it's not that bad. I kinda miss sg food. China food is soooo salty and oily. But luckily i haven't totally gotten used to it. If not i'd have totally ah tiongnised. Hope my liver and kidneys are still working fine.

Weather is finally totally warm already. First time actually experiencing the season change. Spring was absolutely windy. Luckily there wasn't sandstorm so air wasn't that horrible. Forgotten how sg's weather feels like for the past two months. But now summer is here so memories of sg's weather is returning.

Okay, let's talk about food this time. China's food tend to be saltier and oilier than sg food. So if you actually buy sg food from stalls owned by china ppl, dun complain cos it's their style. Meat here is also quite little. For a 10RMB meal, which is abt SGD2.5, dun put too much hope in the amount of meat they'll give. But be prepared for a great carbo diet. Probably you'll get abt 2 to 3 bowls worth of rice. Veggies that come with it will probably be green capsican. It will be quite nice if not for the extra salt and oil that they always use.

Now, let's talk about public transportation. Buses during peak hours are always very squeezy too. If you ever think sg buses are squeezy, think again. Imagine 360º around you with people touching you. I've been experiencing it for the past 3 months here when i go to work every monday to thursday. Dun really feel terrible about it though. But my friends seem to hate it greatly. Bus conductors also shout every time to get people to squeeze more or to get people to get down the bus quickly. As there is no ticketing machine on the bus like in sg, bus tickets have to be bought from the conductors. And the conductors are normally trapped in between the crowd of passengers so just getting to her (usually) requires total squeezing through the pile of people. Luckily beijing public buses also use EZ-link cards which gives a 60% discount compared to buying of tickets so such horrendous feelings can be avoided. These three months of bus experience has kinda made me feel accustomed to pushing people on the bus. Hope i dun do this back in sg. Another funny thing is if you're standing near the door, blocking another passenger's path to get out of the bus, he or she will ask you "Are you getting off? 下车吗？" It's a good way to getting through the packed crowd of people on the bus. No one in sg does that. If i ever do that back in sg, stares will confirm come to me.
Oh taxis are cheap in beijing too. The flag-down price is 10RMB which is abt SGD2.30. Normally fares won't go above 30RMB unless you travel the distance of like pasir ris to boon lay like what we did on valentine's day. Damn cheap man. But we also never take it often since we're not tourists here. If we keep taking it, the amount of money spent won't be small either.
Finally, it's time to talk about the subway. It's literally subway for beijing's trains. Most of the stations are underground. It costs 2RMB to travel from one stop to any other stop (other than the airport express line which costs 25RMB), no matter how far or near the stop is. This is really a good thing as we can save a lot on transportation. The trains are similar to sg ones, except food is allowed on it. So i always bring food up to eat. Such good feelings can never be experienced in sg.

Yay to GIP!

I realised i seriously hardly blog much about this GIP trip. Every time i'm free i'll choose to play guitar till i sleep. I must learn to spend more time to blog.
Let's reminisce and talk about something that happened in March. Trip to Tian Tan, the place where the Ming and Qing kings prayed at.

Went with a large group of people. Let's see..there were my household three people: bor jenq, jiwei, sihan; shengyuan, zequan, junwei, shunyu, yew kiong, choon tat, rena, cheryl, kenneth, junhui, and two other girls that came for INSTEP whom sihan invited. Hmm..that's a lot of people. Anyway, it was a nice trip looking at old temples and buildings. Couldn't do much there other than looking at those unique buildings.

Nah actually it's not just the buildings. It's actually quite happening. Lots of old people actually go there very often to mix around and lots of makeshift stalls are set up around many of the walkways. Chapteks were also sold and played around the whole place. Bought one from a nice uncle that played with us.

Further updates on BJ!

Finally another update. I'm so lazy to blog but still gonna do it for memories sake.
Let's see...been to a lot of places around BJ and also outta BJ. But before that, lemme talk about the chinese cough medicine that i bought from a pharmacy here. It comes in bottled form and requires a straw to be inserted through the aluminium cap to drink. It's quite effective for a short while after drinking. Guess my cough was too strong since it lasted for a few yrs so gonna get other medicine after that.

The cough medicine

Oh also went to Tsinghua's fast food restaurant. QQ fast food. It's something like Mac, and the logo looks very similar too. The way they put the QQ together resembles Mac's M. It sells around the same things too. Except that it also has china style food, like grilled lamb and chicken sticks.

QQ filet-o-fish meal

Haoledi is one of China's famous KTV. OMG it beats Kbox hands down totally. It's so much cheaper, each person paid abt SGD$10 for quite a few hrs, has very updated songs, and has lots of entertaining things. It has the computer option to make whistles and applause or jeer to add to the singing atmosphere. Pom poms are available too!! Actually not really. Has one thing to make noise one...whats that called...something to make 'clang clang clang' sound one. Dunno the name. Jus look at what some of the guys are holding.

Clang Clang Clang

Updates on BJ!

I love BJ!



Not really love actually. At least it's so different from always stayin in sg. Let's see...it's been about slightly more than 5 weeks since i first touched down. Since then, it's being eat and eat and eat and eat everyday. Not bad i think i'm still quite thin. Recently started tryin out the roadside stalls. Surprisingly my weak stomach could take it without any problem at all. Maybe they're actually much cleaner than what we thought, at least for BJ.
Since the ski trip, we've done lots of other things around other than still eating like a piglet. School in Tsinghua started on 27 feb. Talkin to the tour guide that brought u around, i realised that the genius sch has lots of ppl committing suicide every year. Compared to tsinghua, what's NTU's duo incidents man...
Ppl from all over china aim to go tsinghua or beijing uni. Only the top very small percent in each city can get in. They're the talents in their cities. But what happens when all the talents meet? Smart ppl versus smart ppl, some ppl will end up being stupid. They take the bottom ranks in sch and kill themselves every year. Thats talent sch. Work so hard and die for such thing.. Kinda saddening.

Our classroom

Lessons are still quite interesting, learning about the things such as old chinese words and history of many things. A bit of linguistics stuff too, talkin about links of chinese with japanese and korean.
In tsinghua, bicycles are super common. Everyone cycles cos between lessons they only have 5min interval to reach their classrooms which are further than NTU's north to south spine. And they'll rather not go than be even a minute late for class, unlike sg ppl who'd rather be very late than dun go for class...or maybe will end up not going in the end.

A road in Tsinghua

A canal in tsinghua with workers breaking super thick ice

A pretty lake in tsinghua which has a long history

Went to the 13 Ling Imperial tombs, whereby 13 of the kings of Ming dynasty are buried. Before reaching there, we were approached by two uncles who offered to drive us around at 5rmb per person to get money to buy cigarettes.
First place we went to was the wax museum which shows the different scenes of the story of the Ming dynasty. It was really incredible, with really nice was figures and backgrounds. Even madame tussauds museum can't be compared with it i feel.

BJ Wax museum for the Ming dynasty emperors

Headed to Lao Beijing after the museum as it was along the way. Saw lots of olden time buildings. Many scenes in Huan Zhu Ge Ge was filmed in that place. Even saw the bed which Ziwei consumated with her husband (er kang?) It was quite rundown and empty though. Probably only tourists will go there and they'll go as a tour group.

Entrance of Lao Beijing


Brothel in Lao Beijing


Bed in the brothel whereby Ziwei and Er kang consumated

Passed by the Shen Dao 神道 whereby the Ming kings will walk through when they go visit the tombs. It was filled with many statues of animals and scholars and guards. Other than that it was quite boring.
Went over to the 13 Ling after that. However, only one of the tombs was excavated. It was a really disappointing trip we felt. There was hardly anything there other than the beautiful castle walls. The coffins all those were all fakes as the original ones were all decayed. Didn't really spend much time there in the end. Luckily we went to the wax museum beforehand as recommended by the driving uncles. It was the only thing worth going.

Ski!!!

Went for ski on 22 feb with my housemates! Wan Long Ba Yi 万龙八易滑雪场 ski resort! It's located not too far from central beijing, jus a train and a short bus ride to reach. First time i ski. Really wanted to snowboard cos got experience in wakeboarding so feel safer about it. But ended up didn't go for it cos the whole group wanted ski.

Anyway, ski wasn't too hard too. Started at the beginner slope and went down safely without much problem. There was a moving track to bring ppl up the slope so it wasn't tiring to climb up and ski down. But the track moved quite slowly so a bit boring.

Went for the intermediate one soon after the beginner one. That one was slightly more challenging and i fell a few times there. Ski isn't really that easy afterall. But the fall was still not that bad and i followed jiwei and bor jenq when they went for the advanced slope. We took the ride up the hill. It was quite cool for it's my first time.

Up at the top of the advanced slope, my legs turned jelly. It was much higher and steeper than what i had imagined. OMG. But i jus went down the slope anyway. I fell after abt 3m and slided abt 5m down the slope. One of the ski came off and i picked it up and wore it back. Then ski down again and fell after abt 5m later. This time i lost grip of the ski stick and continued to slide downwards with the ski left behind. Damn the stick was stood standing on the ice about 5m uphill. It was quite a steep slope and i couldn't climb up the slope to retrieve the stick. I had to crawl like an idiot. Felt so noob but oh well. The remaining journey down the slope was fast cos i jus tumbled all the way down.

Putting on the ski after i fell

I decided not to attempt that challenging slope after that. Went for another advanced track on the other side. It was slightly easier, but i still rolled down everywhere. There was one roll that cost me 100RMB. A hard roll down made my ski stick bend. Bor jenq tried to bend it back for me later on and it broke.
Shag to ski but it's worth the experience!

My dinner for 17 feb!

Special request by Mr Lua Choon Cheng, I've taken a picture of the dinner i prepared for me and bor. It's a simple meal of beef, veggies, eggs and of cos, rice. Didn't take too much time to prepare. Abt 45min and everything was ready to eat. Simple home-cooked food which taste good except for the rice which still has some hard parts even though i added more water compared to the one i cooked yesterday.
Anyway today's the first snow for this winter in BJ! My first time seeing snow too! Soooo happy~~ but too bad i dun have time to enjoy the snow...

Happening valentine's day!

Such a happening vday. Weather was getting cold though spring is coming. Thought will be another boring vday again this yr. Ended up lots of adventures happened. Or can i say suay.
Left house at abt 2pm with my other three apartment mates, bor jenq, sihan and jiwei, to have lunch at the eatery nearby. Ordered 3 dishes, long beans, mutton and water-cooked fish 水煮鱼. This kind of fish is from fresh water and it tends to have a lot of bones. The long beans had some kind of spice that made my tongue numb and i couldn't taste much. Mutton wasn't too bad. But we waited 1hr for the fish. They must had been tryin to fish it out from the river which was frozen. The fish turned out to be 油煮鱼 oil-cooked fish. It was damn oily. Dunno why they have to use so much oil. But luckily the fish was tender and still not bad.
Went to the national stadium bird nest after that. It was very clean, as if we were in another country. We reached there late and could not enter the stadium anymore. Could only look at it from outside. I dun think the stadium is really nice. It only looks nice on tv. The national aquatic centre was jus beside too. Didn't find it nice too.

Outside Bird Nest Stadium




Statues around bird nest and aquatic centre

Went Bagou to check out the vday party. No one we know was at the party and there was an entrance fee too so we decided to skip it and head for Wudaokou for pubs and food, leavin bor to go home himself for his vday night.
It was already freezing. We suffered thru the strong winds and roamed around the place in search of a good place to eat. Finally settled at a steamboat restaurant. T6 hotpot something like that. It was really nice. The first restaurant we went to that has good service. The food was nice too. Can't remember what we ordered exactly though. Think had mutton, prawns, some kind of meat rolls with cucumber...and several others. Three kinds of soup, one spicy.

Headed for a pub near the steamboat place after that. La Bamba if i nv remember wrongly. Smoking was allowed in the place but luckily it was too smokey. Alcohol was, obviously compared to singapore, much cheaper. I ordered a vodka redbull at 20rmb which was like abt SGD$4 and the three of us hung around there for quite some time.
Headed for the train station to catch the last train back. OMG were we unlucky or what. Missed it by 3min. We were in the northwest area of beijing and our house was more in the southeast. So took the other direction hoping to close up the distance to our house. It was the last train too for the opposite direction. Hopped onto it and thought we'll be fine. Great things jus happen when you least expect it to. The train terminated halfway thru the whole line and we were left stranded at the north of beijing. Probably distance to our house was 2 times pasir ris to boon lay?
We left the station to take a cab. A stranger approached us to ask us if we need a ride back. He charged us 70rmb for it. We didn't know how much a cab will cost for that distance and it was near midnight too so we jus hopped onto his car. Was worried that he'll bring us to some place where they'll rob us of our organs. Haha luckily we got back safely.

One full week in Bei Jing

Seems like a long time since my gang and the programmers sent me off. So glad that so many ppl came to send me off. Luckily i didn't cry.

Programmers!!

Time flies. It's one week in BJ. First time in China and first time experiencing winter. It wasn't as cold as what i thought it'd be. Yeah it's cold, but not that kind that will really kill you i feel. Reached BJ airport on 3rd feb morning. Think the temperature was -4°C. Smoke came out of the mouth when we talked. Went to the BJ NTU office and went to our apartment soon after that. Ate mac breakfast provided by NTU. McPork?
The house is on the 28th floor. Checking of the apartment for damages was tiring and time consuming. Spent abt 4 hrs with the landlord. But he was very helpful and told us several places where we can get our groceries.

View from the window

Went 王府井 on the second day to walk around. It's really like orchard road except for the huge walkways and streets and not as squeezy as orchard. Went to a food street and bought skewered lamb. Got exotic food too. Scorpions, starfish, silkworms and centipedes. I hum so i nv dare to eat. I guess no one i know dares to eat it anyway.

Street of Wang Fu Jing




Nice food

Went for a briefing for the coming sunday fireworks held by singaporean executives. They brought us to the world's biggest LCD display screen, abt 150m by 50m. Humongous. Gave us a treat at a Macau restaurant after that.

Went Tian An Men too the following day. Took lots of pictures, went around quite a bit, and went to a park with entrance fee of 3RMB. The ice in the river there was frozen hard. Dun think sumos will fall in even if they jump on it. Guess i'll talk more abt Tian An Men again when Tsinghua brings us there next time.

Finally ate BJ roast duck at one restaurant recommended by the SG executives. Operated by 狗不理包子, it was really very cheap. SG$10 per person only, including lots of other dishes!! Where to find so cheap stuff man.

Sunday was fireworks day! Organised by singaporeans in BJ. They spent dunno how many thousands RMB to buy the tons of fireworks. They're crazy. The smallest boxes were the biggest ones we programmers set off in kukup last time. The biggest box was abt 50kg. OMG... Luckily no injury in the end. Never have i gotten sick of seeing so much fireworks.

A medium-sized box i'm holding

Chingay Parade!!!

First in my life. Never watched any Chingay Parade before, not live, not on tv. First time knowing about chingay is thru the actual performance.
The actual parade was yesterday, Saturday. Did a preview parade on Friday night with PM Lee as VIP and President Nathan as the VIP for actual day.
Didn't really expect much of Chingay Parade when i first joined. Thought it was a troublesome thing. I'm so glad that i'm inside the parade. Joined the Japanese Association of Singapore with NTU's team of Japanese lovers and 4 Japanese exchange student, Takako, Yuko, Yumi and Chika. These two months of practices for the parade was really interesting. Met many different people and know more about Japanese people too thru this interaction.
The dance seemed a bit gay to me at first but after several practices i jus got accustomed to it. I really liked the dance in the end haha.

Another group practising

Ryuu




Dawn Yeo was special guest for the Japanese group.




mE and Yumi






Me and Yuko


Me and Junhong