fond
memories of your trip....Who else has been to Beijing? jojo
Date:
Sun, 11 Jul
1999 23:19:35 EDT
Subject:
Beijing Account
Ana, Mila & Daddie - Here's the first installment of the account of our
Beijing trip.... There will be 5 installments.....Hope
it brings back
fond
memories of your trip....Who else has been to Beijing?
jojo
Five Days in Beijing
On the wings of a bird….
June 13, 1999 and June 14, 1999 (Sunday, Monday)
Sali and Richard came to take us to the airport at 7 am….
Breakfast at
Denny’s and then on to the airport…. It’s raining so
worried about
delayed
flights…. Checked in at airport… Agent asked if we wanted
to catch an
earlier
flight to Detroit, leaving at 10:45 am instead of 12:00,
we said yes..
better
be sure about making our connection…..
Arrived at Detroit airport, Concourse F… took a shuttle
to
international
concourse…. It’s lunch time, so we stopped at a hot dog
place… hot dog
for
me, polish for Rudy….. On to our gate to wait for our
plane which was
delayed
coming in from Amsterdam due to the weather…. Spotted
3 people who had
Pacific Delight tags on their luggage… must be on our
tour also…. Where
are
the rest, we wondered??? Finally, boarded flight… chaotic
since
everyone was
tired of waiting at the gate and wanted to leave…. We
still had to wait
on
the plane because of other passengers who were still
late due to their
connections.
Plane was absolutely full, with one empty seat. All in
all we were 1½
hours
late in taking off which I really didn’t mind cause I
settled in my
window
seat with Rudy next to me and was asleep immediately
after boarding…. I
slept
for most of the flight except when I watched the movie,
Analyze This
with
Robert DeNiro and Billy Crystal (very funny!)… There
were other
features but
I’ve seen them on other flights and the other movie was
in Chinese with
subtitles, so I just slept…. I think Rudy watched some
of the movies
but also
slept most of the time….
Flight was 13 hours taking us mostly overland through
Canada, Alaska,
crossing the Bering Strait into Russia, Siberia and then
China. Arrived
at
Beijing International Airport at 6:30 pm, Monday, June
14…(there’s a
plus
thirteen hour time difference between Beijing and Chicago)
… A lady
approached us brandishing a red Pacific Delight folder
at the gate(we
later
find out she is our tour guide during our entire stay),
told us to go
through
immigration and customs and meet her outside… We got
through without
incident
and stood outside and waited for the tour guide and the
rest of the
group… It
was a mob scene outside and impossible for us to see
each other,
especially
since we don’t know anybody in our group and Rudy was
looking for a
guide
wearing red, she turned out to be wearing black and white.
It took
forever to
get together… Needed to use facilities…. Oops , it’s
a hole in the
floor… not
sure how it works….
Finally, met up with the rest of the group, It turns out
there were 18
of us,
one was still missing….From what I can tell initially,
there are 4
husband
and wife couples, a mother and a daughter, a grandmother
and a
granddaughter,
a family of 4 ( 2 small children) and a single gentleman.
The 17
walked to
the bus while the guide went back to find the last person,
who turned
out to
be a gentleman from Vietnam, she had some difficulty
finding him
because he
looked Chinese…. Our luggage took a ride in a van. Drove
through their
new
expressway, less than 3 years old. Many people still
in the streets.
The
hotel was about 45 minutes away from the airport…. We
took the
Vietnamese to
the Trader’s Hotel (which according to the guide is very
nice, but only
4
star, our hotel was much better- 5 star). We arrived
at the Palace
Hotel,
where the 17 are staying at about 9pm… impressive… We
went through
special
check in on the 2nd floor, asked to change our room to
non-smoking…
Everyone was whisked to their rooms fairly quickly. We
got to our room,
but
we could not turn on the lights…. We finally figured
out we needed to
put our
hotel key card in a slot by the foyer wall in order to
operate the
lights,
etc. in the room… Try to figure this out in the dark.
Room 715 was
appointed
just like any first class western hotel, 2 full size
beds, a TV stand
with
drawers, a bar, a safe for your valuables and a marble
bathroom with
stretchy
toilet paper, everything was push button controlled from
a console by
the
bed, the lights, the TV, the radio, the clock and the
do not disturb
sign…
pretty modern.. I have not stayed in a hotel with this
feature…. They
also
equipped the room with hair dryer, toothbrush and toothpaste,
nail
stuff,
robe, slippers, laundry detergent, sewing kit and the
usual amenities
(shampoo, conditioner, bath gel, hand milled soap, etc).
Our luggage came shortly, tipped the bell boy and then
we went
searching for
a place to have dinner… We walked inside the hotel to
check out
restaurants
past boutiques of Chanel, Armani, Fendi, Bally, Versace,
Louis Vuitton,
Cartier, Baccarat, Kenzo, etc. Very upscale and expensive,
a Tshirt was
over
$100.… No Donna Karan, we decided it’s because she was
not upscale
enough.
There was a newspaper stand, a karaoke bar, a business
center and a
beauty
salon. There was also about 6 different restaurants (2
Chinese, French,
Italian, German and a coffee shop. Stopped to convert
money into Yuan
at the
hotel’s exchange desk… One dollar is equivalent to 8.07
yuan. We
settled on
the Palm Coast coffee shop on the first floor… I ordered
chop suey with
prawns skewered in lemon grass and Rudy had chicken curry,
good
presentation
and delicious, but not cheap (280 yuan)… Went upstairs,
unpacked,
showered
and went to bed (nice linens, no ratty blankets here
just crisp 350
count
ironed duvet covers enveloping a down comforter)… It’s
12:45am. We were
to
meet at 8:30 am for the tour of Forbidden City and Temple
of Heaven…
Feng Li
or Jessica, our guide warned us that tomorrow will be
a long tiring day
with
a lot of walking, so eat a heavy breakfast and wear comfortable
shoes…