Monday in Shanghai was quite a busy one. We started the day with some much needed Coffee Bean and then headed to our first meeting of the day.
During mid-meeting, I decided to make a rule. I love making rules. Sometimes I hate to repeat myself over 10 times on certain issues, so I have to do things like this to get my point across.
The rest of the day was filled with mumbo jumbo.
We headed over to dinner to show Brian what a real Shanghai meal consists of. This one in particular was pretty spicy, but damn good. The kitchen is all exposed, so you can see the chefs grinding away.
Our gracious hosts for our Shanghai and Beijing wing of our trip; Major and Charlie. These guys rock!
After dinner we went to our hotel to crash. On Sunday, a spontaneous idea came to my head. Why not go to Beijing to check out some of the sites? I realized that my Tuesday meetings could be shifted to late Monday afternoon and we can head over to the capital city. After some phone calls and maneuvering around, we had our agenda. So Tuesday morning our flight left out at 8am for Beijing. I haven’t been this excited about a trip in a long time. I’d heard that Beijing was an amazing city with much history and culture. So here we come, invading the city.
Of course, another funny Chinese sign at the airport. This one was in the security line. There was a special line that you could cut if you were one of the following:
FOR STAFF, VIP (something else, I forgot what it read), THE OLD, WEAK AND PREGNANT
Who says old, weak and pregnant?????
Anyways, we landed into Beijing around 10am and it was freezing cold. I’ve never been in this kind of cold weather. Our driver was taking us to our hotel and he randomly put in a CD in the changer. What was it? Eminem…it was so random, every time I’d been in a car in China they are either play Chinese music or American love songs…not this dude, he was a hip hop head.
After dropping our luggage at the hotel, we went straight to the Great Wall. It was damn cold up there. Really cold. So cold, that Brian had to add some accessories to his outfit.
Ryan, on the other hand, looked like a Japanese female swimmer w/his look.
The Great Wall is probably the most amazing site I’ve ever seen in the world. Something about its power and grandeur that is unbelievable. And again, it was damn cold up there so my thoughts were kind of frozen.
Our outfits were pretty funny. Brian, Eman and I had a five four down jacket on, the same style! We looked like the Five Four Power Rangers.
We took a lift up to the top, I’m pretty afraid of heights…not a good look.
Once we got there, there was a lot of walking and climbing to do. We didn’t anticipate it to be a workout. Climbing up this one part below, was real grueling. I felt like I was on that TV show American Gladiators.
Definitely an amazing site.
This angle below, is where the soldiers would hide and shoot at the enemy.
Chairman Mao said, “not a lucky here until one reaches the great wall.” I guess I’m a hero now.
Power Rangers on top of the wall.
Power Rangers striking a pose.
Eman and Ryan decided to have a young game of racing down the steps, we caught it from our position. A position from the top, because we were so tired to start the climb down unlike these two orangutans.
Brian was pondering about doing the same, but he decided he'd probably fall off the wall if he did.
Ryan decided to mimic this beggar we saw earlier singing and begging on the steps. We thought it was quite odd that a beggar was on top of the great wall and he also pretended he was missing a leg. Now how does a beggar with no leg get to the top of the great wall? The lift alone costs a couple of bucks.
So its funny that 10 minutes later we see this so called beggar walking down one of the passages on the wall laughing and strolling just fine. This guy was as fake as the Louis Vuitton luggage in Shanghai.
This sign was pretty interesting.
Everyone’s gotta get their hustle on…here we have some people who print out photos on many things such as cups, posters, etc. for tourists. Hustle hustle.
Power and Grandeur: Part 2 coming tomorrow.
FF Power Rangers invading Tiananmen Square!!!