Saturday, July 21, 2007
♥ Trip to Wuhan
Day 1, 1st July
At the Bai Yun Airport at Guangzhou, we were cheated of our money. The staff there led us to the baggage packing area where they will tie our luggage to secure them. We didn’t realise that we have to pay for it. So we went there. We thought that they will secure with transparent plastic wrapping but it was the yellow tape. It was 10 yuan for small luggage and 20 yuan for big luggage. On our part, we were also dumb for not checking whether there’s a fee. Wasted our money on the few little yellow tape. But when it comes to retrieving our luggages, it was easy since we were the only ones with yellow tape around our luggages.
Then, like what I sms the other day, the flight from Guangzhou to Wuhan was delayed. We waited for 5 hours plus doing nothing at the airport. The pilots and air stewardess had done all the necessary preparations and the receptionist was late. It was until the auntie at the front of the queue went to call the office to complain then the recept came. It was a big commotion then. The locals were very pissed with the recept and they actually said they wanna finish complaining first before they board the plane. We were still joking about complaining in english.
After boarding the plane, it had to land at Yi Chang airport due to bad weather conditions. The flight was super rocky and I feel like puking then. It sux. Waited for another 2 hours in the plane before it took off to Wuhan. Super Sian! Ended up we reached Wuhan at 10 plus pm instead of 6.20 pm. Look at our sian look below.
We lived in hotel instead of the student hostel.This is our room and the toilet stinks.
Day 2
Orientation and campus tour. The student volunteers are really nice people. They like Singaporeans( because we are bilingual) so we are given special treatment. Haha. They were actually fighting to take us out. There’s students from different parts of the world. My favourite french people are around, koreans, japanese, british, canadians, dutch bla bla bla. Went to lunch with the koreans and I realise they have a small appetite( referring to the girls). One of the japanese named Yuko lived in taiwan for a year so she knows how to speak in chinese. I was shocked when she approached me cos I thought she’s one of the student volunteers. There’s this french old man who’s very eager to learn chinese. During the welcome dinner, he sat beside me and kept asking about how to say certain phrases in Chinese, eg. What is spicy in chinese, how to bargain in chinese. The Dutch are dao though. They talked among themselves and ignore the rest. They didn’t bother to talk to the other people.
The Koreans who we had lunch with. One look at the guy n u will know he’s korean. He’s quite quiet anyway.Isn’t he lucky to have all the babes around him.
The female student hostel. The local guys were surprised to hear that guys can live together with the girls in the same block of hostels. See how lucky u guys are. Haha.
This is the flight of stairs to the library. While I was taking this photo there’s an ang moh just right behind me. His hand was just above my head taking a photo. A pity my roomie can’t capture the photo in time. It was a funny scene.
The field is made of artificial grass. Heard from Yirui it’s good for hockey wor. She was from SAJC hockey team.
This is the main campus. Spot me? We were sitting in the middle of the road taking this picture. The photographer was very garang, somewhat similar to Wui hui’s dad of working style. Kept shouting “U there squat, u shift here, squeeze more” (in chinese). Oncoming car drivers laughed at us.
I was wondering whether this car driver knows how to read chinese.
Day 3
Attended the very first chinese lessons. It was super boring. Then after the lesson, the whole group went to the sports hall to learn Tai Ji Quan. I used to think that Tai ji quan is easy but after learning the basic moves I realised it is very tiring. Now i do not dare laugh at jerryl for practising Tai ji.
Our Tai Ji teacher is the one wearing pink pants. Anyway, this picture is supposed to be a NTU picture but the girl on the extreme right came in suddenly. Gonna crop her away before submitting the photo to Johnny, our Summer Studies coordinator in Singapore.
The lecture on Chinese geography is like talking about tourist attractions and I can’t make out what the lecturer is trying to say. (he’s speaking in english)The videos are boring too. So I played 10x10 bingo with my friend, Mandy.
At night, it’s havoc night. We requested to go KTV and shopping. One of the malls is exactly like Takashimaya. Prices are almost the same. Therefore, the girls have no shopping mood. Went to KTV and sang and played bridge throughout the night till 5 am. This guy by the name of Guan Hua can really sing man. It’s really damn nice. I think can fight with Alvin Junior. He works in marina square as a singer. He’s pretty irritating though. Kept treating me as xiao mei just because I’m younger by 4 years. The next day, every student volunteers knew that we( all the singaporeans) went to Sing KTV till morning. Aren’t we attracting attention? The noisiest, the most united group. Haha.
We are a few crazy asses taking photo in the middle of the road. Note it’s only 5.00am.
Day 4
I pon chinese lesson in the morning. By the time we get back to our hotels,it’s 5.30 am and bathe and hand washed our clothes, it’s 6.30 am. Still a few singaporeans went for lessons. They only slept for 2 hours. Zai hor. I woke up at noon. N I’ve got gastric! It’s the first time! I never had gastric before. Super sick ar. I thought it’s gonna be ok after a while and went for lecture. But it became worse. Ate gastric pills n the pain was still pretty terrible. At night, we went to Yangtze river. Took a ferry to Han Kou. I was praying that the ferry better be stable. N phew, it wasn’t like what I expected. The ride was pretty smooth. The whole group went to one of the restraurants in the hotel to eat. The Ang mohs really pissed me off. We asked them to look at the menu( at least the pictures) and say what they would like to order and they dun bother at all. They wanted potatoes and they complain that the fish and chicken had bones. Then one of the guys, Ronnie(Singaporean), Said “ there’s no chicken fillet and potatoes here.” So turned out we ordered for them, only about five dishes cos it’s quite expensive for locals. The student volunteers had forked out quite a sum of money just to accompany us to eat. After that, we wanted to treat the student volunteers since they forked out their time to accompany us, show us around. Then one of the ang mohs said,”Why should we pay for them?” The meal cost 17 yuan per person (if we count in the student volunteers), if we treat, it cost 20 yuan per person. It’s just a 3 yuan difference. Then somehow they were very rude, they looked down on china’s currency. They joked about it’s like treating the locals a sweet or maybe a lollipop. Insensitive assholes.
The sunset at Yangtze River.I look so sick in this photo.She’s Mandy.
By the time we finished our meals it’s close to 10 pm. There’s no where we can go but back to hotels to sleep. It’s quite retarded cos we specially took a ferry to Han Kou to eat. Duh. N the bloody ang mohs took so long to decide where to go. They wanted to go pub in the end. NTU students took taxi back to hotel though. First time we so guai, even the student volunteers were shocked.
Day 5
It’s either I can’t get used to the food here or I’ve been exposed to coldness for too long, I’ve diarrhoea. There was a sharp pain in my stomach when I woke up. I went to lesson for only an hour (it’s suppose to be 3 hours) and came back to the room to rest. The pain was unbearable and I cried. Ate medicine but the pain doesn’t seem to stop. There’s an excursion in the afternoon and I wun be able to go. Sad… My friends took photos on my behalf. My roomie informed the teacher in charge and she gave me tea to drink. Felt so much better so I wrote part of this while I’m resting in my room. Of course, I recovered. I dun dare to go to any of the hospitals or clinic here lor. There’s a video attached in the mail. It’s a chimes performance that I missed in the afternoon. Pretty nice.
Day 6
Trip to Three Gorges Dam. All the students in the program gathered at 7 am. Took a tour bus to the Dam first before going to the boat ride. The mountains and scenery was amazing but we can’t really take nice photos with our digital camera.
One of the nicest photo I can take while I’m on the bus. It’s a bit foggy so not very clear.
Anyway, the water colour shouldn’t be that blue. It’s slightly towards yellow colour. On our way there, we passed by a village and I think our bus actually ran over a puppy. I saw the puppy running towards our bus and the next moment I saw a pool of blood on the ground. Those sitting at the back freaked out. (I was one of them.) After having dinner, it’s boat ride. Our room in the boat was terrible and horrible and the toilet was the “best” part of it. It stinks and the tap water is yellow in colour. I bet they took the water supply from YangTze river which is not very clean. Videos tell u everything about how we felt.
It’s quite cool to actually see how the dam works. We were in between the dams waiting for the gate to close and the water level to rise. It’s a nice experience. Before the gate closes and after the gate closes.
Enjoying ourselves on the boat. It’s party time at night for the Caucasians. They bought beers and smoke and chit chat till 2 am before they go to sleep.
Day 7
We were supposed to wake up at 6 am and leave the boat for another smaller boat at 7 am. Then, we came to realize that the we were in between another dam for the whole night. The boat did not move on any further due to the thick fog and were not given permission to pass the gate. So we have to wait till the fog to disperse away then we can move on. Woke up so early just for breakfast lor. Still have to wait for another 3-4 more hours to reach our next destination.
This is our breakfast. These people are Dutch. They brought biscuits to eat instead. They didn’t really sleep very well as the beds were too small for them. Moreover, they totally sian diao when they heard that they couldn’t get off at 7 am. Waited waited and waited. Had lunch on the boat and finally able to get off to another place.Got onto a smaller boat to enter into the gorge to see mountains and coffins and caves.
Our bukit timah hill is really nothing compared to this.
Able to spot a wooden coffin? It’s not a block of wood. It’s really coffin.
There’s another coffin here in this pic. It’s supported by two wooden branch in between the slit. Our ancestors are very pro to be able to do that.
They call this place an AAAA graded tourist attraction. I hated the performance though. Too loud and it’s hurting to the ears when they sing local songs.(super high pitch) Just before we went back to our boat, we saw something very interesting.
The chinese characters and english translation has total no link.
Went on to the even smaller boat to move on to the shallower side of the gorge. The life jacket stinks like hell. The men rowing the boat are all in their 60s but they are very very very fit. Skinny and fit.
These people pulled the boat instead of row when we were at the shallow end of the river. In the past, they used to be naked. Really naked, from top to bottom, nothing on as there were fewer tourists at that time. After this trip, we went back to our big boat to rest. To our surprise, we have another trip at night, 9.30 pm to Bai Ling Temple. N the student volunteers told us that we would get back to the boat by 11.30 pm and ended up we got back at 2 am. We had to climbed about 500 plus stairs to reach the temple and the entrance fee is 70 yuan. Seriously I think it’s a waste of time cos there’s nothing much there. It’s all about the Three Warring States.
The ghostly photo we took. I have no idea why they chose to use green light to shine up the gate.
Day 8
Lucky I’m not cheated by the volunteers announcement. They said to wake up at 5.30 am and 6.30 am, we’ll get off the boat to take a bus to Jingzhou ancient city. I woke up at 6.30 am instead. N the boat, just as I expected, haven reach our intended destination. During the wait, Yirui went back to her room to take a nap but a cockroach ran across her face. She freaked out and cried. Ronnie did not bother to lend her his shoulder and wanted to go back to sleep. This really angered her. If I were her, I would be angry too. She went into the room n hit him and we dun dare to get near them since they need a good talk. At last, they patched. Phew… We managed to get off at 7.30 am. Finally, we can leave the boat. I didn’t wanna bathe in the stinky toilet and so I was like dirty and sticky for 2 whole day. It was so much a relief to leave the damn boat.
Took a 4 hours bus ride to the Jingzhou musuem. This is our palace. We are the princesses. There’s a corpse in the musuem. His organs were removed from the body and his body was preserved. He’s the ancient corpse whose body was the only one found intact. Quite a poor fellow. He was displayed naked. Die also cannot rest peacefully. N had to be seen by so many people.
Finally, we were at the Jingzhou ancient city. This is the fake great wall of china. We can lie to people that we’ve been to the Great Wall of China. It was super hot then. Nothing much here too except for the great wall of china look alike. N yesh it’s back to hotel to rest and clean up. Never been so eager to get back to hotel before. Woo Hooo…
Day 9
There’s supposed to be a lesson on learn how to sing a Chinese song and it was cancelled. It was replaced with a trip to the fabric market. It is similar to the one in People’s Park back in Singapore. Surprisingly, lots of Caucasians were tailor making cheong sams. It was really cheap to make one in China. It cost about 160 to 200 yuan depending on the type of fabric u choose. I bought a few fabric to make a scarf. Bought them real cheap. 15 yuan per metre and 28 yuan per metre for cotton-silk and pure silk respectively.
Rushed back to the hostel for lecture and I went out half way to dye my hair. The salon sux. My hair colour wasn’t obvious at all. It’s red but it’s hidden beneath my thick layer of black hair. Lucky that they have a policy that unhappy customers are able to get back to them within 3 days. Went shopping with Mandy after the hairdo. I got myself really cheap denim skirt, a “chiong” nike tennis skirt and three quarter jeans for altogether less than 50 sing dollars. Wahahaha…
After putting my shopping stuff in my room, I went to KTV with Guanhua, Huimin, Mandy, Song Song. Yirui had a menstrual cramp and she couldn’t go. Ronnie, of course stayed behind to accompany her. Immediately, when I sat down in the KTV room, I slept cos I had a fever. The others were really worried about me and gave me pills and jackets to rest. At 5 am, I thought I had recovered from fever. But I had a diarrhea later on. Sad…
Day 10
Woke up in the morning and I felt very restless. Had diarrhea and fever at the same time. It was so serious that I had to go to a hospital with my teacher, Ms Liu. She was having a cold. The hospital is a super old building and I’ve walked past it several times and I didn’t notice that it’s a hospital. There’s no sign board indicating that it’s a hospital until u walked to the main gate then u will notice a plus sign at the top. Walking into the hospital is like entering a time machine, right back into the 80s. I was too weak to take any photos then so just imagine it yourself. I went through a lot of procedures before I can finally receive my treatment. I was diagnosed with virus infection in my intestines and I have to endure the stupid needles in my butt to cure my fever and another on my hand to replenish my glucose level. I was put on drips. My first time on drip was in china. I can’t believe it. Not only on one small bottle but 3 big bottles. *faint* It took me 5 hours plus to finish 2 bottles. I had to go back for another bottle the next day. Sian… I missed the excursion to East Lake again. It’s always east lake.
After this incident, I was famous for the one getting sick again and again. I want to thank all who was there taking care of me. N sorry for all the trouble that I brought.
Day 11
Back to the hospital for another bottle. From now on, I have to watch my meals. No oily, salty, difficult to digest food to be eaten. I can only eat plain porridge and bun. Sad… Din do much today. Spend most of the day resting in my room.
Day 12
Yeah, I think I’m feeling so much better and I guessed I recovered. There’s an excursion to Yellow crane tower and Guiyuan Buddhist temple. This is gonna be our last outing. There wasn’t much at the yellow crane tower except for the bell. Yet we can stay there for quite long. Next, we went to Guiyuan temple to pray. Excursions are always photo taking session for NTU students. Nice photography by strangers too.
Our group photo with the student volunteers. We intend to make a souvenir for each of the volunteers. But there’s too many cameras, so there’s no focus. See the eyes are not on one camera. Sad…
The Yellow Crane Tower
Yeah! First time all girls took a photo together. We were at the top of the crane tower.
The bell in our hands.
I like this photo a lot. I think it’s nice. It looks like it has been edited through photoshop but I can assure u it’s 100% not edited version.
Day 13
Lessons in the morning as usual but I went for only an hour and pon the rest of the lessons. Otherwise, there’s gonna be a debate in chinese on “Who will be a better husband? Sun Wukong or Zhu Bajie?” Lame topic… Afternoon was our time allocation for preparation of seminar for the next day but I went shopping with Mandy at somewhere near the fabric market. Bought a few items for friends. We reached hostel at about 6 plus pm. We started our project about that time. I was super hungry then and we ordered pizzas for dinner. It’s the first time all NTU students sat together to eat. There’s always missing people during meals.
Our group photo in room 102 having our pizza dinner with Ms Liu. Rare occasion.
Day 14
Seminar day. Jieying went up to present for the whole group. The topic was Famous people and the Chinese culture so we presented about Qian long. Seriously, it was a boring topic. The whole seminar group was half dead for most of the seminar. I was too, almost dozing off. After all the presentations, there’s a mini graduation ceremony held. We went up to collect our certificate of completion of the summer program and took photos with the teachers. Next it’s our farewell party held at Wu Zhou restaurant which is right beside our hotel. The lunch was nice and for most of the dishes, it wasn’t too oily. Lucky for me… haha…
My graduation photo. Too many cameras, dunno which to look at.
Following our lunch, there’s performance by the student volunteers and also the students from each university. The NTU students sabotaged Guanhua and Huimin to be representatives of Singapore to sing. N it was super successful. We knew that Guanhua can really sing very well and thus decided to sabo him to sing alone. With the help of the Ms Liu, he had to sing.
I have to admit that he’s pretty charming when he’s playing the guitar and singing. No wonder he’s working in Ai Qin Hai at marina square. It was the last day at Wuhan University. I managed to take down a few contacts from the student volunteers. Really hope we can stay in touch. I kinda missed the place and the people already. When there’s a beginning, there’s always an end. So eventually I still have to say goodbye. I’ll remember this trip and u people.
Day 15
Woke up in the morning, preparing to go for Beijing.
Our last group photo in Wuhan University.
The uni arranged a bus to drive us to the airport. When we reached the airport, we realized our flight to Beijing had been cancelled and Air China did not inform any of us, not even through mail. We were pretty lucky to be able to switch to China Eastern airline with flight MU2451 departing at 8.10 am, 10 minutes later than the original flight time we were supposed to take. It’s quite a cool experience. We cut queue cos we were late( it’s about 7.15am) at checking in our baggage. Rushed for the custom and ran for the gate. Usually, people chase after the bus, we chased after the airplane. Finally, we reached the airport at 10 am but we had to wait for our pickup to our serviced apartment. Beijing is totally different from Wuhan. Beijing is so much cleaner and the roads are so much better organized than in Wuhan. I’m a city person so I felt so good when I’m in Beijing. I dun mind working in Beijing for half a year. Hmm… I may consider applying for the Global Immersion Program.
Anyway, I’m really satisfied with the serviced apartment that I’m living in with my travel mates, Jieying, Vily and Venny. It’s so clean and near shopping area.
Ok yes we are 4 ladies travelling together in a foreign land. It sounds dangerous but I tried travelling around free and easy with 3 other ladies as well so I dun think there’s gonna be a major problem in a capital city. I’m only worried about the trip to Hangzhou and ShenZhen where it’s not very safe.
After settling down, we went to the Temple of Heaven which is about 15 minutes walk from our apartment. It is really tiring to be walking inside. The interior from one gate to another, it’s far and it’s really really really big. Our legs were aching like hell. We learnt a lesson here in China, dun ever trust the map. It looks like it’s very near but in fact it’s super duper far.
Temple of heaven.
We were too bored and played around with my scarf taking such a dumb dumb photo. This is one of them.
We really cannot tahan anymore and took a taxi to Wangfujing Dajie to eat and shop around. We stopped at the Oriental plaza and ate Sizzlers there. There’s offer set that cost 39 to 49 yuan with free flow of salad, soup and fruits. Other main courses ranges from 70 to 200 yuan. It’s much cheaper here than in Singapore. By the time we finished our meals, it’s about 8.30 pm. The shops close at about 9 to 9.30 pm. So we didn’t really do any shopping. The only thing I bought was the Beijing 2008 Olympics JingJing cushion. I think it’s really cute and I wanted something to prove that I’ve been to Beijing.
No taxi wanted to take us back to our apartment and we walked back instead. It was freaking far. It was said to be a 15 minute walk and turned out to be more than 30 minute walk. We were really dragging our feet back to our apartment. SHAG!
Day 16
Met up with Ronnie and Yirui to go to the Forbidden City together. They pretty garang. Didn’t plan anything. Only bought air tickets to go to wuhan and that’s it. They bought tickets to Beijing in Wuhan during the last few days of our stay in the university.
Us at the Tian An Men Square with Mao Zhe Dong.
Before going in the Palace museum, we went to eat. Finally we found a restaurant that sells Singapore food! We were so touched. Still there’s limited choices and I prefer hawker standard.
Vily was so blur that she threw away her 60 yuan ticket together with a stack of advertising papers. N she had to purchase her ticket again cos someone took it. This trip cost her quite a lot. Her sad face below.
The Forbidden City is really huge inside and a pity we weren’t able to view the complete palace as certain parts of it are undergoing renovation. It was super crowded. It’s so much more bigger than the Temple of Heavens and we walked all the way into the Imperial Garden which is situated way way back into the palace. Looking at the architecture, it was really amazing how the people managed to build such intricate piece of art. Almost all the stairs and ceilings of royal family chambers had carvings on them. A pity the skills had not been passed down to our generations.
This is the lovers’ tree found in the Imperial garden. I’m expressing my love to u. Ok it’s not very obvious.
Part of the forbidden city. Can u see what we were doing?
On our way back to the Wu men, we took a photo wearing the princess costumes. Cost us 50 yuan for 3 photos. I look like the naughty princess who do not want to tie my hair. No choice, I have short hair so quite difficult to pin. Please dun laugh after seeing the photo. This photo was a snapshot. We were not suppose to use our own camera to take photos.
First time I took the metro in china. Train stations are very old and even taiwan’s metro is more high tech. We still have to go to the counter to purchase our train tickets. The track is not as high as that of Singapore. The train is fast though.
Went to Wangfujing to shop again and we met Germans and Koreans from the summer program. It was such a coincidence. Beijing isn’t that big after all.
Day 17
Great Wall of China and Ming tomb.
We went to take a cable car instead of climbing up and stroll around for an hour at the Great Wall. The weather was very bad and I couldn’t take nice photo. Mini me in the photo.
Venny bought 10 pairs of panda on the way down from the Great Wall. Vily bought 3. Cute pandas!
Trip to the Ming tomb was boring. Lots of exhibition of ancient items n Venny took her time to read each and every one of the boards for explanations. She’s very into the Chinese history. It was estimated that we could end within an hour but we spent 3 hours in the Ming Tomb museum. Legs very the SUAN.
Cos we rent a car, we asked the driver to bring us for shopping n he took us to silk museum. The silk is cheap and of good quality but too china especially the clothes. Silk blanket very comfortable, price of 380 yuan, quite cheap for real silk but luggage cannot take it ar.
There’s a cat at our apartment. Very obedient. Cat’s eyes are blue, very nice. I’m gonna miss it when I leave for Hangzhou.
Day 18
Zoo, Summer palace and old summer palace.
Went to the Beijing zoo to see pandas. N we only saw pandas sleeping and scratching themselves.
Special sleeping position. Neck like very “comfortable”.
Panda scratching. The zoo a bit cheat tourists money. Go into the zoo, wanna see penguins have to pay another 10 yuan. It goes the same for other animal halls. Prices differ.
I like this little one. It’s very cute.
We went to the wholesale market next to the zoo. I was pissed off with one of the sales assistant. She’s super rude and I didn’t even say I want the clothes and she packed them in a bag insisting that she’s gonna sell to me even when she’s not making money. Initially I’m interested in the vest and it’s not sold separately so I dun wan. Given her service attitude makes me even more not interested in buying any of the clothes in her shop. I walked away and she grabbed me back to the shop and even scolded me crazy, my brain got problem. I feel like slapping her. BITCH! I was so angry that I was scolding out loud FUCK and 死38 while walking away. It ruined my day.
It was pretty rush to the Summer palace. We reached there at about 3.30 pm.
Nice palace and Kunming lake. We were too lazy to climb.
The Long corridor mentioned in the Guinness World record. Every single wall is painted with a different picture. It’s very comfortable in the corridor. We were enjoying the breeze there. We only went to the long corridor in the summer palace as the place closes at 5 pm. Anyway the whole place looks the same as Forbidden City. Next, the old summer palace was our most satisfied trip. We only spent 5 yuan each person to rent the costumes and we can take unlimited numbers of photos with our own digital camera. It was initially 10 yuan per person per costumes. This is so unlike the one we took in Forbidden City where we pay 17 yuan per person to take one pathetic photo.
Our Prince Guan
The five princesses, Chun Chun gege, Pei Shan gege, Minting gege, Yirui gege and Jieying gege. This photo makes me look so short.
We had serious shot and here we had naughty shot. I look fat in this costume.
The must go attraction site, the maze. It’s the original structure in old summer palace. The design of the building is a mix between English art and Chinese art.
Original structure of the maze
Day 19
We had a packed schedule again. First go DVD shop, then to Prince Gong’s Mansion and last stop Silk Alley to shop. Then to the airport to leave for Hang Zhou.
The mansion is a smaller version of Summer Palace. The corridors are narrower. The special thing is that there’s a 福 word written by Kangxi Emperor and we went through a super squeezed tunnel to touch it. It’s like the culture of the Chinese here to push their ways through. Irritating.
Quite sad that I didn’t manage to do much shopping in the silk alley as there’s no time. We had to rush to catch our flight. There’s so many shops and of course a number of them sells “chiong” adidas, nike, puma products. Lots of Caucasians there and I think most of them didn’t bargain much and bought things at 100 yuan when it can be bought at 10-20 yuan.
Met friends from the Summer program again when we were rushing to the metro station.
From left to right, Lee, Vily, Venny, Lorna, Me and Adam. I’m very very dark in this photo. Argh!!
We rushed to the airport only to find out that our flight to Hangzhou was delayed indefinitely. Air china again! First, flight from Wuhan to Beijing was cancelled next delayed flight to Hangzhou which is as good as cancelled. Roar! We had to switch to another airplane, go through another round of security check, wait till 2210 to board the plane. From 2040 to 2210. We were not the worse, there’s others who were there the whole night. Their flight was delayed for the whole night due to bad weather but our situation was different. It wasn’t because of bad weather that it couldn’t take off. By the time we reach Hang zhou, it was 0030 and we were still deciding whether to take a taxi tour hostel or stay in the airport till daylight. Initially we wanted to stay in airport till daylight but there isn’t any security guards there. Furthermore, 4 ladies with luggage around us were easy targets for robbers. So had to take a taxi to the hostel. Immediately when we step out of the airport, a guy approach us asking whether we wanna take a cab and we simply ignored him. There’s tour guide or maybe locals at the gate shouting robbery in Chinese. I guess they meant that the guy is trying to either charge us high prices for cab fare or really to rob us once we get into his car/cab. We managed to squeeze into one cab and off we go to our hostel.
Our room is cosy and clean. Bunk beds and a toilet, lockers available. Very nice environment.
Immediately took a shot in the room.
Day 20
Break time for the girls. Cos we arrived too “early” at the hostel, we wanna sleep for longer hours. As we cancelled our trip to Huang Shan, we had no hostel to stay in and had to source around for another hotel/hostel. Our priority, accommodation! We wanted to continue staying in West lake youth hostel since the environment is really very good and it’s only a 5 minute walk to the west lake. But for the next 2 nights there isn’t any more vacant rooms. What to do? Went online to search for alternatives and booked the Mingtown garden international hostel. While I was doing the job of searching for alternatives, the others were sleeping as they fell sick. Currently, I’m the last woman standing. Haha. When they woke up, we went out for dinner and surprise surprise, the staff members in the youth hostel managed to make a room for us for Saturday night. YEAH! I prefer to stay in this youth hostel then to shift to another hotel/hostel. However, we were still unsure of our accommodation on Sunday as there might not be vacant rooms for us. Pray hard…
The environment in the hostel is really wonderful. Very ideal place for meeting people. We met a Singaporean lady who was away from Singapore for a month. There are books, board games, TV comfy sofa and really friendly staff. Highly recommended to all who are gonna travel to Hangzhou to stay here.
Food in this restaurant is pretty good. Not too oily and salty. Thumbs up.
Jieying playing with the guitar at the hostel lounge. Action action only. Haha.
Day 21
Woke up pretty late so we were unable to catch the boat around the west lake. Stayed in the hostel for breakfast and the American breakfast was nice. (maybe we were too hungry so whatever we eat was nice) However, I feel that we were pretty dumb as we went out to the Thunder Peak Pagoda in the afternoon, the time of the day that is super hot. The hot here is the dry type of hot. When we walked in the streets along Singapore under the sun, we feel sticky sticky due to humidity. In Hangzhou, it’s the desert type of hot that is really unbearable.
Thunder Peak pagoda. Lucky there’s an escalator to the pagoda. But somehow the lift inside isn’t working. In the pagoda, we still can’t avoid climbing the stairs. Aiya!
Bai Suzhen’s story being depicted in the pagoda. It’s a nice story. I remembered watching the Story of the white snake when I was young. Anyway, Venny bought the DVD about the Bai Suzhen while we were in Beijing.
We couldn’t stand the weather and went back to the hostel to rest. We had a very late lunch at the hostel again and went out to try our luck at the boat ride but we were very unlucky, the weather changed. It’s raining. Took a bus to He Fang Jie and walked through the street and saw Wushan pagoda. Went through the Wushan antique night market, took a cab to Carrefour and back to the hostel to have our dinner. Seriously, the meals in the hostel are really nice. Yum Yum…
The Wushan Pagoda in my hands. Wahahaha… Ok lame…
Venny and Chef in the hostel. He’s a good cook and easy to bully. We love u!
Our delicious dinner: Pizzas!!! Bananas were bought by us at Carrefour.
Day 22
Woke up early to catch a train to Shang Hai since we cancelled our trip to Huang Shan. It was a one and a half hour ride from Hang Zhou. It was the first time I took a train (other than taking MRT).
We were in the train. Looks comfortable huh. We got ourselves the first class soft seats.
The train station at Shanghai looks like an airport. So clean and spacious. Hopefully, they keep up the standards since this station is newly built for the Olympics 2008.
We met up with Jieying’s uncle and he brought us to a Japanese restaurant to have our lunch. Nice sushi!
Jieying and her uncle at the Shanghai Bay.
On our way back to Hang Zhou, we found another funny translation at the train station. Spot it.
Day 23
It’s our last day in Hang Zhou so we had another tight schedule to follow again. Finally took the boat ride around West Lake. It’s freaking hot even in the morning 10 plus. My shades broke into half. Sobs…
We went to Yue Fei’s temple, six harmonies pagoda and off to catch our plane to Guangzhou. Air china never failed to disappoint us. Our flight wasn’t delayed this time round. It was shifted to the morning slot and yet again we weren’t informed. We had to switch airlines again. Roar! People, please don’t take Air China, the management sux.
When we arrived at Guangzhou airport, it was chaotic at the taxi stand. They charged us 200 yuan to get to our hotel. Wow… they think we dunno the price. Jieying called her uncle to check again and he told us to take a bus instead of taxi. It’s not safe. Guangzhou is a big city but the security has to be improved on. I dun think I will wanna go back to Guangzhou except maybe for shopping. Haha…
Day 24
Went to Shen Zhen’s Windows of the World. A very big place indeed and we couldn’t go to all the “countries” in half a day. It’s similar to the one in Thailand which features miniatures of the countries famous buildings. Thought we could actually shop in Shen zhen but we dun have the time.
Day 25
Checked out of our hotel and off we go to Hong Kong via train. We were pretty dumb to take train from Guangzhou when it is more convenient to take from Shen Zhen. Had a hard time sitting down properly as the luggage was blocking my way. Ewww…. Vily’s cousin came to pick us up from the train station and brought us to nearby restaurant to eat our late lunch. First day in Hong Kong more or less was just orientation; finding out how to take train to places of attractions and of course shopping places. Wahahah…
Day 26
It was recommended we go Victoria peak first then to the ocean park since both are at the same place. But we somehow decided to go ocean park first and if we have time, to the Victoria peak. Ok guess what, we were rushing for time again. Ocean park is BIG. Main aim; to take the thrill rides then sight-seeing. Thrill rides isn’t that exciting too. And there’s too few. Argh! The Abyss was a shiok ride. (it’s a free fall ride.) Love it. Venny bought another panda at the ocean park. It has a passport. She’s a panda fanatic.
Flash of an eye and it’s evening time. It’s shopping back at Yau Ma Tei. We walked to Ladies street and it’s a long stretch. Everyone of us shopped quite a lot. Hee…
Day 27
Vily had a family gathering at night and her aunt wanted to bring her around. It’s gonna be pretty awkward for the three if us to tag along and I bet her aunt is gonna pay for our lunch and dinner. We paiseh la so insisted to go back and shop on our own. I was desperately looking for office wear and I can’t find one! Finally found G2000 in Hong Kong and the whole set was so cheap yet dun have my size. Jieying bought 10 bottles of medicated oil plus 4 bottles of cough syrup. She looks like she’s importing the oil. Lol. Anyway, it’s for her relatives. Along the streets of temple street, I was quite surprised that they sell sex toys openly like pasar malam. (some of the stalls set up age limits). Ok I’m curious about the price range and took a look. It’s so much cheaper as compared to Singapore.
Day 28
This is the day that we are going back HOME. We finally ate the breakfast provided by the hotel. It’s not too bad. I still prefer dim sum. After checking out, we went to the Victoria peak, Madame Tussaude and we took a lot of funny photos.
At the Bai Yun Airport at Guangzhou, we were cheated of our money. The staff there led us to the baggage packing area where they will tie our luggage to secure them. We didn’t realise that we have to pay for it. So we went there. We thought that they will secure with transparent plastic wrapping but it was the yellow tape. It was 10 yuan for small luggage and 20 yuan for big luggage. On our part, we were also dumb for not checking whether there’s a fee. Wasted our money on the few little yellow tape. But when it comes to retrieving our luggages, it was easy since we were the only ones with yellow tape around our luggages.
Then, like what I sms the other day, the flight from Guangzhou to Wuhan was delayed. We waited for 5 hours plus doing nothing at the airport. The pilots and air stewardess had done all the necessary preparations and the receptionist was late. It was until the auntie at the front of the queue went to call the office to complain then the recept came. It was a big commotion then. The locals were very pissed with the recept and they actually said they wanna finish complaining first before they board the plane. We were still joking about complaining in english.
After boarding the plane, it had to land at Yi Chang airport due to bad weather conditions. The flight was super rocky and I feel like puking then. It sux. Waited for another 2 hours in the plane before it took off to Wuhan. Super Sian! Ended up we reached Wuhan at 10 plus pm instead of 6.20 pm. Look at our sian look below.
We lived in hotel instead of the student hostel.This is our room and the toilet stinks.
Day 2
Orientation and campus tour. The student volunteers are really nice people. They like Singaporeans( because we are bilingual) so we are given special treatment. Haha. They were actually fighting to take us out. There’s students from different parts of the world. My favourite french people are around, koreans, japanese, british, canadians, dutch bla bla bla. Went to lunch with the koreans and I realise they have a small appetite( referring to the girls). One of the japanese named Yuko lived in taiwan for a year so she knows how to speak in chinese. I was shocked when she approached me cos I thought she’s one of the student volunteers. There’s this french old man who’s very eager to learn chinese. During the welcome dinner, he sat beside me and kept asking about how to say certain phrases in Chinese, eg. What is spicy in chinese, how to bargain in chinese. The Dutch are dao though. They talked among themselves and ignore the rest. They didn’t bother to talk to the other people.
The Koreans who we had lunch with. One look at the guy n u will know he’s korean. He’s quite quiet anyway.Isn’t he lucky to have all the babes around him.
The female student hostel. The local guys were surprised to hear that guys can live together with the girls in the same block of hostels. See how lucky u guys are. Haha.
This is the flight of stairs to the library. While I was taking this photo there’s an ang moh just right behind me. His hand was just above my head taking a photo. A pity my roomie can’t capture the photo in time. It was a funny scene.
The field is made of artificial grass. Heard from Yirui it’s good for hockey wor. She was from SAJC hockey team.
This is the main campus. Spot me? We were sitting in the middle of the road taking this picture. The photographer was very garang, somewhat similar to Wui hui’s dad of working style. Kept shouting “U there squat, u shift here, squeeze more” (in chinese). Oncoming car drivers laughed at us.
I was wondering whether this car driver knows how to read chinese.
Day 3
Attended the very first chinese lessons. It was super boring. Then after the lesson, the whole group went to the sports hall to learn Tai Ji Quan. I used to think that Tai ji quan is easy but after learning the basic moves I realised it is very tiring. Now i do not dare laugh at jerryl for practising Tai ji.
Our Tai Ji teacher is the one wearing pink pants. Anyway, this picture is supposed to be a NTU picture but the girl on the extreme right came in suddenly. Gonna crop her away before submitting the photo to Johnny, our Summer Studies coordinator in Singapore.The lecture on Chinese geography is like talking about tourist attractions and I can’t make out what the lecturer is trying to say. (he’s speaking in english)The videos are boring too. So I played 10x10 bingo with my friend, Mandy.
At night, it’s havoc night. We requested to go KTV and shopping. One of the malls is exactly like Takashimaya. Prices are almost the same. Therefore, the girls have no shopping mood. Went to KTV and sang and played bridge throughout the night till 5 am. This guy by the name of Guan Hua can really sing man. It’s really damn nice. I think can fight with Alvin Junior. He works in marina square as a singer. He’s pretty irritating though. Kept treating me as xiao mei just because I’m younger by 4 years. The next day, every student volunteers knew that we( all the singaporeans) went to Sing KTV till morning. Aren’t we attracting attention? The noisiest, the most united group. Haha.
We are a few crazy asses taking photo in the middle of the road. Note it’s only 5.00am.
Day 4
I pon chinese lesson in the morning. By the time we get back to our hotels,it’s 5.30 am and bathe and hand washed our clothes, it’s 6.30 am. Still a few singaporeans went for lessons. They only slept for 2 hours. Zai hor. I woke up at noon. N I’ve got gastric! It’s the first time! I never had gastric before. Super sick ar. I thought it’s gonna be ok after a while and went for lecture. But it became worse. Ate gastric pills n the pain was still pretty terrible. At night, we went to Yangtze river. Took a ferry to Han Kou. I was praying that the ferry better be stable. N phew, it wasn’t like what I expected. The ride was pretty smooth. The whole group went to one of the restraurants in the hotel to eat. The Ang mohs really pissed me off. We asked them to look at the menu( at least the pictures) and say what they would like to order and they dun bother at all. They wanted potatoes and they complain that the fish and chicken had bones. Then one of the guys, Ronnie(Singaporean), Said “ there’s no chicken fillet and potatoes here.” So turned out we ordered for them, only about five dishes cos it’s quite expensive for locals. The student volunteers had forked out quite a sum of money just to accompany us to eat. After that, we wanted to treat the student volunteers since they forked out their time to accompany us, show us around. Then one of the ang mohs said,”Why should we pay for them?” The meal cost 17 yuan per person (if we count in the student volunteers), if we treat, it cost 20 yuan per person. It’s just a 3 yuan difference. Then somehow they were very rude, they looked down on china’s currency. They joked about it’s like treating the locals a sweet or maybe a lollipop. Insensitive assholes.
The sunset at Yangtze River.I look so sick in this photo.She’s Mandy.
By the time we finished our meals it’s close to 10 pm. There’s no where we can go but back to hotels to sleep. It’s quite retarded cos we specially took a ferry to Han Kou to eat. Duh. N the bloody ang mohs took so long to decide where to go. They wanted to go pub in the end. NTU students took taxi back to hotel though. First time we so guai, even the student volunteers were shocked.
Day 5
It’s either I can’t get used to the food here or I’ve been exposed to coldness for too long, I’ve diarrhoea. There was a sharp pain in my stomach when I woke up. I went to lesson for only an hour (it’s suppose to be 3 hours) and came back to the room to rest. The pain was unbearable and I cried. Ate medicine but the pain doesn’t seem to stop. There’s an excursion in the afternoon and I wun be able to go. Sad… My friends took photos on my behalf. My roomie informed the teacher in charge and she gave me tea to drink. Felt so much better so I wrote part of this while I’m resting in my room. Of course, I recovered. I dun dare to go to any of the hospitals or clinic here lor. There’s a video attached in the mail. It’s a chimes performance that I missed in the afternoon. Pretty nice.
Day 6
Trip to Three Gorges Dam. All the students in the program gathered at 7 am. Took a tour bus to the Dam first before going to the boat ride. The mountains and scenery was amazing but we can’t really take nice photos with our digital camera.
One of the nicest photo I can take while I’m on the bus. It’s a bit foggy so not very clear.
Anyway, the water colour shouldn’t be that blue. It’s slightly towards yellow colour. On our way there, we passed by a village and I think our bus actually ran over a puppy. I saw the puppy running towards our bus and the next moment I saw a pool of blood on the ground. Those sitting at the back freaked out. (I was one of them.) After having dinner, it’s boat ride. Our room in the boat was terrible and horrible and the toilet was the “best” part of it. It stinks and the tap water is yellow in colour. I bet they took the water supply from YangTze river which is not very clean. Videos tell u everything about how we felt.
It’s quite cool to actually see how the dam works. We were in between the dams waiting for the gate to close and the water level to rise. It’s a nice experience. Before the gate closes and after the gate closes.
Enjoying ourselves on the boat. It’s party time at night for the Caucasians. They bought beers and smoke and chit chat till 2 am before they go to sleep.
Day 7
We were supposed to wake up at 6 am and leave the boat for another smaller boat at 7 am. Then, we came to realize that the we were in between another dam for the whole night. The boat did not move on any further due to the thick fog and were not given permission to pass the gate. So we have to wait till the fog to disperse away then we can move on. Woke up so early just for breakfast lor. Still have to wait for another 3-4 more hours to reach our next destination.
This is our breakfast. These people are Dutch. They brought biscuits to eat instead. They didn’t really sleep very well as the beds were too small for them. Moreover, they totally sian diao when they heard that they couldn’t get off at 7 am. Waited waited and waited. Had lunch on the boat and finally able to get off to another place.Got onto a smaller boat to enter into the gorge to see mountains and coffins and caves.
Our bukit timah hill is really nothing compared to this.
Able to spot a wooden coffin? It’s not a block of wood. It’s really coffin.
There’s another coffin here in this pic. It’s supported by two wooden branch in between the slit. Our ancestors are very pro to be able to do that.
They call this place an AAAA graded tourist attraction. I hated the performance though. Too loud and it’s hurting to the ears when they sing local songs.(super high pitch) Just before we went back to our boat, we saw something very interesting.
The chinese characters and english translation has total no link.
Went on to the even smaller boat to move on to the shallower side of the gorge. The life jacket stinks like hell. The men rowing the boat are all in their 60s but they are very very very fit. Skinny and fit.
These people pulled the boat instead of row when we were at the shallow end of the river. In the past, they used to be naked. Really naked, from top to bottom, nothing on as there were fewer tourists at that time. After this trip, we went back to our big boat to rest. To our surprise, we have another trip at night, 9.30 pm to Bai Ling Temple. N the student volunteers told us that we would get back to the boat by 11.30 pm and ended up we got back at 2 am. We had to climbed about 500 plus stairs to reach the temple and the entrance fee is 70 yuan. Seriously I think it’s a waste of time cos there’s nothing much there. It’s all about the Three Warring States.
The ghostly photo we took. I have no idea why they chose to use green light to shine up the gate.
Day 8
Lucky I’m not cheated by the volunteers announcement. They said to wake up at 5.30 am and 6.30 am, we’ll get off the boat to take a bus to Jingzhou ancient city. I woke up at 6.30 am instead. N the boat, just as I expected, haven reach our intended destination. During the wait, Yirui went back to her room to take a nap but a cockroach ran across her face. She freaked out and cried. Ronnie did not bother to lend her his shoulder and wanted to go back to sleep. This really angered her. If I were her, I would be angry too. She went into the room n hit him and we dun dare to get near them since they need a good talk. At last, they patched. Phew… We managed to get off at 7.30 am. Finally, we can leave the boat. I didn’t wanna bathe in the stinky toilet and so I was like dirty and sticky for 2 whole day. It was so much a relief to leave the damn boat.
Took a 4 hours bus ride to the Jingzhou musuem. This is our palace. We are the princesses. There’s a corpse in the musuem. His organs were removed from the body and his body was preserved. He’s the ancient corpse whose body was the only one found intact. Quite a poor fellow. He was displayed naked. Die also cannot rest peacefully. N had to be seen by so many people.
Finally, we were at the Jingzhou ancient city. This is the fake great wall of china. We can lie to people that we’ve been to the Great Wall of China. It was super hot then. Nothing much here too except for the great wall of china look alike. N yesh it’s back to hotel to rest and clean up. Never been so eager to get back to hotel before. Woo Hooo…
Day 9
There’s supposed to be a lesson on learn how to sing a Chinese song and it was cancelled. It was replaced with a trip to the fabric market. It is similar to the one in People’s Park back in Singapore. Surprisingly, lots of Caucasians were tailor making cheong sams. It was really cheap to make one in China. It cost about 160 to 200 yuan depending on the type of fabric u choose. I bought a few fabric to make a scarf. Bought them real cheap. 15 yuan per metre and 28 yuan per metre for cotton-silk and pure silk respectively.
Rushed back to the hostel for lecture and I went out half way to dye my hair. The salon sux. My hair colour wasn’t obvious at all. It’s red but it’s hidden beneath my thick layer of black hair. Lucky that they have a policy that unhappy customers are able to get back to them within 3 days. Went shopping with Mandy after the hairdo. I got myself really cheap denim skirt, a “chiong” nike tennis skirt and three quarter jeans for altogether less than 50 sing dollars. Wahahaha…
After putting my shopping stuff in my room, I went to KTV with Guanhua, Huimin, Mandy, Song Song. Yirui had a menstrual cramp and she couldn’t go. Ronnie, of course stayed behind to accompany her. Immediately, when I sat down in the KTV room, I slept cos I had a fever. The others were really worried about me and gave me pills and jackets to rest. At 5 am, I thought I had recovered from fever. But I had a diarrhea later on. Sad…
Day 10
Woke up in the morning and I felt very restless. Had diarrhea and fever at the same time. It was so serious that I had to go to a hospital with my teacher, Ms Liu. She was having a cold. The hospital is a super old building and I’ve walked past it several times and I didn’t notice that it’s a hospital. There’s no sign board indicating that it’s a hospital until u walked to the main gate then u will notice a plus sign at the top. Walking into the hospital is like entering a time machine, right back into the 80s. I was too weak to take any photos then so just imagine it yourself. I went through a lot of procedures before I can finally receive my treatment. I was diagnosed with virus infection in my intestines and I have to endure the stupid needles in my butt to cure my fever and another on my hand to replenish my glucose level. I was put on drips. My first time on drip was in china. I can’t believe it. Not only on one small bottle but 3 big bottles. *faint* It took me 5 hours plus to finish 2 bottles. I had to go back for another bottle the next day. Sian… I missed the excursion to East Lake again. It’s always east lake.
After this incident, I was famous for the one getting sick again and again. I want to thank all who was there taking care of me. N sorry for all the trouble that I brought.
Day 11
Back to the hospital for another bottle. From now on, I have to watch my meals. No oily, salty, difficult to digest food to be eaten. I can only eat plain porridge and bun. Sad… Din do much today. Spend most of the day resting in my room.
Day 12
Yeah, I think I’m feeling so much better and I guessed I recovered. There’s an excursion to Yellow crane tower and Guiyuan Buddhist temple. This is gonna be our last outing. There wasn’t much at the yellow crane tower except for the bell. Yet we can stay there for quite long. Next, we went to Guiyuan temple to pray. Excursions are always photo taking session for NTU students. Nice photography by strangers too.
Our group photo with the student volunteers. We intend to make a souvenir for each of the volunteers. But there’s too many cameras, so there’s no focus. See the eyes are not on one camera. Sad…
The Yellow Crane Tower
Yeah! First time all girls took a photo together. We were at the top of the crane tower.
The bell in our hands.
I like this photo a lot. I think it’s nice. It looks like it has been edited through photoshop but I can assure u it’s 100% not edited version.
Day 13
Lessons in the morning as usual but I went for only an hour and pon the rest of the lessons. Otherwise, there’s gonna be a debate in chinese on “Who will be a better husband? Sun Wukong or Zhu Bajie?” Lame topic… Afternoon was our time allocation for preparation of seminar for the next day but I went shopping with Mandy at somewhere near the fabric market. Bought a few items for friends. We reached hostel at about 6 plus pm. We started our project about that time. I was super hungry then and we ordered pizzas for dinner. It’s the first time all NTU students sat together to eat. There’s always missing people during meals.
Our group photo in room 102 having our pizza dinner with Ms Liu. Rare occasion.
Day 14
Seminar day. Jieying went up to present for the whole group. The topic was Famous people and the Chinese culture so we presented about Qian long. Seriously, it was a boring topic. The whole seminar group was half dead for most of the seminar. I was too, almost dozing off. After all the presentations, there’s a mini graduation ceremony held. We went up to collect our certificate of completion of the summer program and took photos with the teachers. Next it’s our farewell party held at Wu Zhou restaurant which is right beside our hotel. The lunch was nice and for most of the dishes, it wasn’t too oily. Lucky for me… haha…
My graduation photo. Too many cameras, dunno which to look at.
Following our lunch, there’s performance by the student volunteers and also the students from each university. The NTU students sabotaged Guanhua and Huimin to be representatives of Singapore to sing. N it was super successful. We knew that Guanhua can really sing very well and thus decided to sabo him to sing alone. With the help of the Ms Liu, he had to sing.
I have to admit that he’s pretty charming when he’s playing the guitar and singing. No wonder he’s working in Ai Qin Hai at marina square. It was the last day at Wuhan University. I managed to take down a few contacts from the student volunteers. Really hope we can stay in touch. I kinda missed the place and the people already. When there’s a beginning, there’s always an end. So eventually I still have to say goodbye. I’ll remember this trip and u people.
Day 15
Woke up in the morning, preparing to go for Beijing.
Our last group photo in Wuhan University.
The uni arranged a bus to drive us to the airport. When we reached the airport, we realized our flight to Beijing had been cancelled and Air China did not inform any of us, not even through mail. We were pretty lucky to be able to switch to China Eastern airline with flight MU2451 departing at 8.10 am, 10 minutes later than the original flight time we were supposed to take. It’s quite a cool experience. We cut queue cos we were late( it’s about 7.15am) at checking in our baggage. Rushed for the custom and ran for the gate. Usually, people chase after the bus, we chased after the airplane. Finally, we reached the airport at 10 am but we had to wait for our pickup to our serviced apartment. Beijing is totally different from Wuhan. Beijing is so much cleaner and the roads are so much better organized than in Wuhan. I’m a city person so I felt so good when I’m in Beijing. I dun mind working in Beijing for half a year. Hmm… I may consider applying for the Global Immersion Program.
Anyway, I’m really satisfied with the serviced apartment that I’m living in with my travel mates, Jieying, Vily and Venny. It’s so clean and near shopping area.
Ok yes we are 4 ladies travelling together in a foreign land. It sounds dangerous but I tried travelling around free and easy with 3 other ladies as well so I dun think there’s gonna be a major problem in a capital city. I’m only worried about the trip to Hangzhou and ShenZhen where it’s not very safe.
After settling down, we went to the Temple of Heaven which is about 15 minutes walk from our apartment. It is really tiring to be walking inside. The interior from one gate to another, it’s far and it’s really really really big. Our legs were aching like hell. We learnt a lesson here in China, dun ever trust the map. It looks like it’s very near but in fact it’s super duper far.
Temple of heaven.
We were too bored and played around with my scarf taking such a dumb dumb photo. This is one of them.
We really cannot tahan anymore and took a taxi to Wangfujing Dajie to eat and shop around. We stopped at the Oriental plaza and ate Sizzlers there. There’s offer set that cost 39 to 49 yuan with free flow of salad, soup and fruits. Other main courses ranges from 70 to 200 yuan. It’s much cheaper here than in Singapore. By the time we finished our meals, it’s about 8.30 pm. The shops close at about 9 to 9.30 pm. So we didn’t really do any shopping. The only thing I bought was the Beijing 2008 Olympics JingJing cushion. I think it’s really cute and I wanted something to prove that I’ve been to Beijing.
No taxi wanted to take us back to our apartment and we walked back instead. It was freaking far. It was said to be a 15 minute walk and turned out to be more than 30 minute walk. We were really dragging our feet back to our apartment. SHAG!
Day 16
Met up with Ronnie and Yirui to go to the Forbidden City together. They pretty garang. Didn’t plan anything. Only bought air tickets to go to wuhan and that’s it. They bought tickets to Beijing in Wuhan during the last few days of our stay in the university.
Us at the Tian An Men Square with Mao Zhe Dong.
Before going in the Palace museum, we went to eat. Finally we found a restaurant that sells Singapore food! We were so touched. Still there’s limited choices and I prefer hawker standard.
Vily was so blur that she threw away her 60 yuan ticket together with a stack of advertising papers. N she had to purchase her ticket again cos someone took it. This trip cost her quite a lot. Her sad face below.
The Forbidden City is really huge inside and a pity we weren’t able to view the complete palace as certain parts of it are undergoing renovation. It was super crowded. It’s so much more bigger than the Temple of Heavens and we walked all the way into the Imperial Garden which is situated way way back into the palace. Looking at the architecture, it was really amazing how the people managed to build such intricate piece of art. Almost all the stairs and ceilings of royal family chambers had carvings on them. A pity the skills had not been passed down to our generations.
This is the lovers’ tree found in the Imperial garden. I’m expressing my love to u. Ok it’s not very obvious.
Part of the forbidden city. Can u see what we were doing?
On our way back to the Wu men, we took a photo wearing the princess costumes. Cost us 50 yuan for 3 photos. I look like the naughty princess who do not want to tie my hair. No choice, I have short hair so quite difficult to pin. Please dun laugh after seeing the photo. This photo was a snapshot. We were not suppose to use our own camera to take photos.
First time I took the metro in china. Train stations are very old and even taiwan’s metro is more high tech. We still have to go to the counter to purchase our train tickets. The track is not as high as that of Singapore. The train is fast though.
Went to Wangfujing to shop again and we met Germans and Koreans from the summer program. It was such a coincidence. Beijing isn’t that big after all.
Day 17
Great Wall of China and Ming tomb.
We went to take a cable car instead of climbing up and stroll around for an hour at the Great Wall. The weather was very bad and I couldn’t take nice photo. Mini me in the photo.
Venny bought 10 pairs of panda on the way down from the Great Wall. Vily bought 3. Cute pandas!
Trip to the Ming tomb was boring. Lots of exhibition of ancient items n Venny took her time to read each and every one of the boards for explanations. She’s very into the Chinese history. It was estimated that we could end within an hour but we spent 3 hours in the Ming Tomb museum. Legs very the SUAN.
Cos we rent a car, we asked the driver to bring us for shopping n he took us to silk museum. The silk is cheap and of good quality but too china especially the clothes. Silk blanket very comfortable, price of 380 yuan, quite cheap for real silk but luggage cannot take it ar.
There’s a cat at our apartment. Very obedient. Cat’s eyes are blue, very nice. I’m gonna miss it when I leave for Hangzhou.
Day 18
Zoo, Summer palace and old summer palace.
Went to the Beijing zoo to see pandas. N we only saw pandas sleeping and scratching themselves.
Special sleeping position. Neck like very “comfortable”.
Panda scratching. The zoo a bit cheat tourists money. Go into the zoo, wanna see penguins have to pay another 10 yuan. It goes the same for other animal halls. Prices differ.
I like this little one. It’s very cute.
We went to the wholesale market next to the zoo. I was pissed off with one of the sales assistant. She’s super rude and I didn’t even say I want the clothes and she packed them in a bag insisting that she’s gonna sell to me even when she’s not making money. Initially I’m interested in the vest and it’s not sold separately so I dun wan. Given her service attitude makes me even more not interested in buying any of the clothes in her shop. I walked away and she grabbed me back to the shop and even scolded me crazy, my brain got problem. I feel like slapping her. BITCH! I was so angry that I was scolding out loud FUCK and 死38 while walking away. It ruined my day.
It was pretty rush to the Summer palace. We reached there at about 3.30 pm.
Nice palace and Kunming lake. We were too lazy to climb.
The Long corridor mentioned in the Guinness World record. Every single wall is painted with a different picture. It’s very comfortable in the corridor. We were enjoying the breeze there. We only went to the long corridor in the summer palace as the place closes at 5 pm. Anyway the whole place looks the same as Forbidden City. Next, the old summer palace was our most satisfied trip. We only spent 5 yuan each person to rent the costumes and we can take unlimited numbers of photos with our own digital camera. It was initially 10 yuan per person per costumes. This is so unlike the one we took in Forbidden City where we pay 17 yuan per person to take one pathetic photo.
Our Prince Guan
The five princesses, Chun Chun gege, Pei Shan gege, Minting gege, Yirui gege and Jieying gege. This photo makes me look so short.
We had serious shot and here we had naughty shot. I look fat in this costume.
The must go attraction site, the maze. It’s the original structure in old summer palace. The design of the building is a mix between English art and Chinese art.
Original structure of the maze
Day 19
We had a packed schedule again. First go DVD shop, then to Prince Gong’s Mansion and last stop Silk Alley to shop. Then to the airport to leave for Hang Zhou.
The mansion is a smaller version of Summer Palace. The corridors are narrower. The special thing is that there’s a 福 word written by Kangxi Emperor and we went through a super squeezed tunnel to touch it. It’s like the culture of the Chinese here to push their ways through. Irritating.
Quite sad that I didn’t manage to do much shopping in the silk alley as there’s no time. We had to rush to catch our flight. There’s so many shops and of course a number of them sells “chiong” adidas, nike, puma products. Lots of Caucasians there and I think most of them didn’t bargain much and bought things at 100 yuan when it can be bought at 10-20 yuan.
Met friends from the Summer program again when we were rushing to the metro station.
From left to right, Lee, Vily, Venny, Lorna, Me and Adam. I’m very very dark in this photo. Argh!!
We rushed to the airport only to find out that our flight to Hangzhou was delayed indefinitely. Air china again! First, flight from Wuhan to Beijing was cancelled next delayed flight to Hangzhou which is as good as cancelled. Roar! We had to switch to another airplane, go through another round of security check, wait till 2210 to board the plane. From 2040 to 2210. We were not the worse, there’s others who were there the whole night. Their flight was delayed for the whole night due to bad weather but our situation was different. It wasn’t because of bad weather that it couldn’t take off. By the time we reach Hang zhou, it was 0030 and we were still deciding whether to take a taxi tour hostel or stay in the airport till daylight. Initially we wanted to stay in airport till daylight but there isn’t any security guards there. Furthermore, 4 ladies with luggage around us were easy targets for robbers. So had to take a taxi to the hostel. Immediately when we step out of the airport, a guy approach us asking whether we wanna take a cab and we simply ignored him. There’s tour guide or maybe locals at the gate shouting robbery in Chinese. I guess they meant that the guy is trying to either charge us high prices for cab fare or really to rob us once we get into his car/cab. We managed to squeeze into one cab and off we go to our hostel.
Our room is cosy and clean. Bunk beds and a toilet, lockers available. Very nice environment.
Immediately took a shot in the room.
Day 20
Break time for the girls. Cos we arrived too “early” at the hostel, we wanna sleep for longer hours. As we cancelled our trip to Huang Shan, we had no hostel to stay in and had to source around for another hotel/hostel. Our priority, accommodation! We wanted to continue staying in West lake youth hostel since the environment is really very good and it’s only a 5 minute walk to the west lake. But for the next 2 nights there isn’t any more vacant rooms. What to do? Went online to search for alternatives and booked the Mingtown garden international hostel. While I was doing the job of searching for alternatives, the others were sleeping as they fell sick. Currently, I’m the last woman standing. Haha. When they woke up, we went out for dinner and surprise surprise, the staff members in the youth hostel managed to make a room for us for Saturday night. YEAH! I prefer to stay in this youth hostel then to shift to another hotel/hostel. However, we were still unsure of our accommodation on Sunday as there might not be vacant rooms for us. Pray hard…
The environment in the hostel is really wonderful. Very ideal place for meeting people. We met a Singaporean lady who was away from Singapore for a month. There are books, board games, TV comfy sofa and really friendly staff. Highly recommended to all who are gonna travel to Hangzhou to stay here.
Food in this restaurant is pretty good. Not too oily and salty. Thumbs up.
Jieying playing with the guitar at the hostel lounge. Action action only. Haha.
Day 21
Woke up pretty late so we were unable to catch the boat around the west lake. Stayed in the hostel for breakfast and the American breakfast was nice. (maybe we were too hungry so whatever we eat was nice) However, I feel that we were pretty dumb as we went out to the Thunder Peak Pagoda in the afternoon, the time of the day that is super hot. The hot here is the dry type of hot. When we walked in the streets along Singapore under the sun, we feel sticky sticky due to humidity. In Hangzhou, it’s the desert type of hot that is really unbearable.
Thunder Peak pagoda. Lucky there’s an escalator to the pagoda. But somehow the lift inside isn’t working. In the pagoda, we still can’t avoid climbing the stairs. Aiya!
Bai Suzhen’s story being depicted in the pagoda. It’s a nice story. I remembered watching the Story of the white snake when I was young. Anyway, Venny bought the DVD about the Bai Suzhen while we were in Beijing.
We couldn’t stand the weather and went back to the hostel to rest. We had a very late lunch at the hostel again and went out to try our luck at the boat ride but we were very unlucky, the weather changed. It’s raining. Took a bus to He Fang Jie and walked through the street and saw Wushan pagoda. Went through the Wushan antique night market, took a cab to Carrefour and back to the hostel to have our dinner. Seriously, the meals in the hostel are really nice. Yum Yum…
The Wushan Pagoda in my hands. Wahahaha… Ok lame…
Venny and Chef in the hostel. He’s a good cook and easy to bully. We love u!
Our delicious dinner: Pizzas!!! Bananas were bought by us at Carrefour.
Day 22
Woke up early to catch a train to Shang Hai since we cancelled our trip to Huang Shan. It was a one and a half hour ride from Hang Zhou. It was the first time I took a train (other than taking MRT).
We were in the train. Looks comfortable huh. We got ourselves the first class soft seats.
The train station at Shanghai looks like an airport. So clean and spacious. Hopefully, they keep up the standards since this station is newly built for the Olympics 2008.
We met up with Jieying’s uncle and he brought us to a Japanese restaurant to have our lunch. Nice sushi!
Jieying and her uncle at the Shanghai Bay.
On our way back to Hang Zhou, we found another funny translation at the train station. Spot it.
Day 23
It’s our last day in Hang Zhou so we had another tight schedule to follow again. Finally took the boat ride around West Lake. It’s freaking hot even in the morning 10 plus. My shades broke into half. Sobs…
We went to Yue Fei’s temple, six harmonies pagoda and off to catch our plane to Guangzhou. Air china never failed to disappoint us. Our flight wasn’t delayed this time round. It was shifted to the morning slot and yet again we weren’t informed. We had to switch airlines again. Roar! People, please don’t take Air China, the management sux.
When we arrived at Guangzhou airport, it was chaotic at the taxi stand. They charged us 200 yuan to get to our hotel. Wow… they think we dunno the price. Jieying called her uncle to check again and he told us to take a bus instead of taxi. It’s not safe. Guangzhou is a big city but the security has to be improved on. I dun think I will wanna go back to Guangzhou except maybe for shopping. Haha…
Day 24
Went to Shen Zhen’s Windows of the World. A very big place indeed and we couldn’t go to all the “countries” in half a day. It’s similar to the one in Thailand which features miniatures of the countries famous buildings. Thought we could actually shop in Shen zhen but we dun have the time.
Day 25
Checked out of our hotel and off we go to Hong Kong via train. We were pretty dumb to take train from Guangzhou when it is more convenient to take from Shen Zhen. Had a hard time sitting down properly as the luggage was blocking my way. Ewww…. Vily’s cousin came to pick us up from the train station and brought us to nearby restaurant to eat our late lunch. First day in Hong Kong more or less was just orientation; finding out how to take train to places of attractions and of course shopping places. Wahahah…
Day 26
It was recommended we go Victoria peak first then to the ocean park since both are at the same place. But we somehow decided to go ocean park first and if we have time, to the Victoria peak. Ok guess what, we were rushing for time again. Ocean park is BIG. Main aim; to take the thrill rides then sight-seeing. Thrill rides isn’t that exciting too. And there’s too few. Argh! The Abyss was a shiok ride. (it’s a free fall ride.) Love it. Venny bought another panda at the ocean park. It has a passport. She’s a panda fanatic.
Flash of an eye and it’s evening time. It’s shopping back at Yau Ma Tei. We walked to Ladies street and it’s a long stretch. Everyone of us shopped quite a lot. Hee…
Day 27
Vily had a family gathering at night and her aunt wanted to bring her around. It’s gonna be pretty awkward for the three if us to tag along and I bet her aunt is gonna pay for our lunch and dinner. We paiseh la so insisted to go back and shop on our own. I was desperately looking for office wear and I can’t find one! Finally found G2000 in Hong Kong and the whole set was so cheap yet dun have my size. Jieying bought 10 bottles of medicated oil plus 4 bottles of cough syrup. She looks like she’s importing the oil. Lol. Anyway, it’s for her relatives. Along the streets of temple street, I was quite surprised that they sell sex toys openly like pasar malam. (some of the stalls set up age limits). Ok I’m curious about the price range and took a look. It’s so much cheaper as compared to Singapore.
Day 28
This is the day that we are going back HOME. We finally ate the breakfast provided by the hotel. It’s not too bad. I still prefer dim sum. After checking out, we went to the Victoria peak, Madame Tussaude and we took a lot of funny photos.
9:50 AM
