Finally

Sorry it's been a little while. China got in the way.

Day 70 (03-29-09)

Rainy day. No bueno. It’s pretty foggy this morning. But outside of the ship’s windows, we have the most amazing view of the Hong Kong skyline. We couldn’t be docked in a more perfect location. It’s crazy. I looked out the window and the first thing I saw was the building Batman jumps off of in The Dark Knight. It was exciting.

Random fact: our ship is docked at a shopping mall. Like… we walk off the ship in an airport style gangway, and the other end of the hallway dumps us out into the 4th floor of an upscale shopping mall. It’s so random. So now when we get back onto the ship at night, we’ll be walking into a mall with very low lighting, no open stores, and only a few security guards to keep us company. When a bizarre place to have a port terminal.

After getting off the ship, my friend Mandy and I set off for the Star Ferry that goes from the Kowloon side of the city to the downtown Hong Kong side. From there, we walked to the ferry terminal for the hour-long trip to Macau. Brief geography lesson: Hong Kong and Macau are both Special Administrative Regions of China. They operate within the constructs of the People’s Republic of China under a “One Country, Two Systems” initiative. When China regained control of the two cities (from the UK and Portugal, respectively), the government allowed them to retain their own administrative systems to ease their transition back into Chinese rule. As such, both Regions still issue their own passports and run their own governments. Both are very capitalistic, and they differ from mainland China greatly in these respects.

Anyway, since these two cities are their own separate entities, we had to go through customs when we left Hong Kong and entered Macau, and now an entire page of my passport is dedicated to a day’s worth of stamps from the two cities. It’s pretty cool. Why go to Macau in the first place? Bungy jumping. The world’s tallest bungy jump is located on top of Macau Tower. 760 feet. And it isn’t your typical bungy jump. Usually, you jump off of a bridge or some kind of cantilevered platform that allows you to swing underneath it. Not here. The tower looks like a mini version of Stratosphere in Vegas. So when you jump off of the observation deck, you’re heading down towards the Earth just a few meters away from the tower as you fall. You can see the structure whipping past your eyes as you plummet downwards, giving you an unbelievably clear idea of how fast you’re actually moving. Clearly, I loved it. And so did Mandy. She’s afraid of heights, and I’ve been talking this up so much in the past few weeks that she decided she had to come and face her fear. It was a milestone day, I suppose.

Afterwards, we wandered around Macau for a little while. It’s essentially China’s version of Las Vegas. There are casinos everywhere (including an MGM Grand, a Wynn, a Sands, and a Venetian), and it’s heavily under construction with more. The economic crisis deal kind of made it hit a snag, but it’s still growing.

Another hour-long ferry ride later, we got back to Hong Kong just after sunset. The championship game of the Rugby Sevens was in town tonight (it’s the final game of the world’s biggest rugby tournament of the year), and tourists from all over the globe were in town to see it. The streets were filled with people. It was nuts. I imagine this is what it felt like to be in Germany during the France/Italy World Cup match in ’06. Maybe to a slightly lesser extent, but it was still a sight to behold. If only we were able to have more time here. The city seems incredible after walking around it for a few hours. But our flight to Beijing leaves tomorrow, and we have to make it to the airport in the morning. I’d love to come back here someday, though. Hong Kong is the first BIG city we’ve been to this entire voyage. And I love the feel of a big city. Bangkok was big, but it was sprawling, and there was no defined skyline. Walking around it, I didn’t feel like I was in a downtown area of a big city. But Hong Kong definitely felt that way. It could have been Manhattan. Only the streets were much cleaner and less narrow. It was refreshing.

After some more wandering, we headed back near the ship to grab some internet for a couple calls home. Hooray. Mainland China tomorrow. Bring on the Commies.

Day 71 (03-30-09)

Wake up. Pack. Terminal. Meeting. Crowds. Hangovers. Sucks for them. Bus. Airport. Chinese food. Crazy Airport. Huge Airport. Escalator. Another. Another. Tram. Walkway. Where the hell is gate 49? Moving sidewalks. End of the terminal. Boarding. Takeoff. Naptime. Landing. Are we all here? Let’s go. Bus ride. Hotel. Crash.

Ever have one of those days where everything kind of runs together? It’s just a giant blur of events that passes by without you noticing where the time went. Today was that day. After checking in at the hotel, we wandered up the street to find some dinner. Authentic Chinese food. Guess what: it’s pretty much the same as ours. Only the portions and the plates are smaller. We ordered a bunch of meals, and they came out family style. There was a smaller rotating glass table on top of our actual table, and we just spun it around to take portions of the food that we wanted. Chicken. Beef. Vegetables. Rice. More rice. Dumplings. All of it. After 3 hours of eating an talking, we went back to the hotel to prepare for our upcoming adventures in Beijing. What have we gotten ourselves into this time?

Day 72 (03-31-09)

After a nice breakfast our group of 140 students divided itself into 5 smaller groups. Mine had 26 members and our tour guide was a little Chinese guy named Tony. Several Tony the Tiger jokes ensued. First stop: modern Beijing. You know what I’m talking about. Bird’s Nest. Water Cube. Olympic City ’08. World Records. Phelps. Bolt. You know what’s happened since then? Nothing. The stadiums are only being used as a draw for tourists. The Olympics are over. The Bird’s Nest is being used for one event in 2009. One. A 423 million dollar stadium. Is being used. Once. In the calendar year after it opened. Once. Are you kidding me, China? What are you thinking? And it’s lack of use and upkeep is showing already. The sidewalks outside are being overgrown. The underground entrance plaza has doors that hang crooked off of their hinges. It’s blocked off for visitors, they have to walk in through a smaller gate on the ground level. We didn’t have enough time to go inside the stadiums, but they look just like every other stadium once you’re inside, anyway. No big deal. The Water Cube still looks decent. So that’s good. Oh, and they aren’t lit up at night anymore, either. I suppose it makes sense, as there would be no use having fluorescent lights flowing over empty stadiums, wasting energy by the minute. But these venues don’t have any glory anymore. They’re just hollow shells of their former selves. Waiting to rot away into obscurity. Such a shame.

Our afternoon continued with a visit to the Ming Tombs. Here, the 3rd-5th and the 7th-13th emperors of the Ming Dynasty are enshrined. We went down into the underground tomb of the 13th emperor, as his is the only one that’s been excavated. It was 9 stories underground, separated into different sections representing the Earth and the Heavens. Craziness.

Lunch. Szechuan-style Chinese food. Spicier that normal. But very good. And still in that rotating table-style setting. How enjoyable.

A 3-hour nap/bus ride later, we arrived at the Great Wall of China. The 2nd of the New 7 Wonders of the World that I’ve seen on this voyage. We hiked up a section of the wall and watched the sunset over the mountains and the Wall. Surreal is probably the only word to do this situation justice. I’m whipping through this blog pretty quickly, but I think this moment deserves a little bit of a pause. Today, I got off of a bus and walked onto the Great Wall. Of China. THE Wall. The one that runs over 4,000 miles across the country. And then, we weren’t even rushed. We had over an hour before the sunset. So we sat back and enjoyed it. Time almost seemed to go at a normal pace here, instead of the Houdini-like time travel we always end up dealing with. I’m standing on the Great Wall of China watching the sunset with some of my best friends. How…? Nevermind. There’s no way to even fathom this situation myself, and I’m the one that’s actually here. So I’m not going to try and pose any questions to anyone else. Nothing I say can aptly describe these circumstances, and I’d like to avoid sounding like a pretentious little snob. But it was beautiful and unreal and I still don’t believe it. Anyway.

We walked back to the buses, got some dinner, and then we hiked up onto a different section of the wall. It’s dark. It’s 25 degrees Fahrenheit. We’re layered. We’re cold. But you know what? It doesn’t matter. Because we’re sleeping on the Great Wall tonight. We got up to our terrace/watchtower and laid out our sleeping bags. Then we explored. Without a guide. Without a guard. Just a small group of students. Feeling like Indiana Jones or something. We had flashlights and water. And we started walking away from the camp, further out along the wall. It was incredible. There’s no light. No railings. No signs. Just a wall to walk along. And this section of the wall is authentic to the Ming Dynasty, and hasn’t been rebuilt or restored in the past 600 years. It’s creepy. After about a half-mile of walking, we stopped in a watchtower to take it in, and a few other people from our group started walking up the path behind us. I crept into the shadows, turned off my flashlight, crouched down onto the ground, and I waited. That poor girl. She never saw it coming. As she entered the watchtower with her friends, shining the light around, there was no way she could have known that I was behind the pillar. But I was. And I jumped out and yelled with perfect timing. Her scream was so shrill and genuine. It was beautiful. I’m a creep and I’m mean, but it was so worth it.

Okay, here’s the tricky part. We have to sleep on the wall tonight. It’s 25 degrees outside. I was hoping it would snow, but to no avail. But yeah… umm. It’s really freaking cold out here guys. This was a pretty miserable night’s sleep for us all. I had to put my shoes on inside the sleeping bag at one point during the night because I had lost feeling in my toes. But the rest of me was alright temperature-wise. I just lacked a pillow and a mattress. Both would have helped exponentially. Oh well, we survived the night. Which leads us to morning…

Day 73 (04-01-09)

I woke up this morning on the Great Wall of China. How did you start your day?

Well, we’re awake… now what? The Hike begins. Six miles of hiking along an authentic portion of the wall between JinShanLing and Simatai. Up. Down. Stairs. Ruins. Rubble. Dirt. Gravel. Great. Wall. Of China.

Life goals added whilst on Semester at Sea:
1) Climb Kilimanjaro
2) Solve World Hunger
3) Backpack Myanmar/Thailand/Laos
4) Live in Cape Town
5) Hike Great Wall End-to-End
I’ll see how that works out for me.

After the hikes and lunch, we drove back to the hotel from our first night in Beijing, and stopped for showers and such. Then we headed out to the Silk Market for some cheap knockoffs. I’m not much of a shopper, so I called it an early night and went to bed early after that. The hike was pretty draining today, and we’ve got more touring tomorrow.

Day 74 (04-02-09)

We got to sleep in a little bit today. Our bus didn’t leave until 8:30am. Woo hoo. First up: Tiananmen Square. Oh, here’s a fun little experiment. Google Tiananmen Square at home. Browse the results. See what information you can find about the massacre that occurred in 1989. Now, go to mainland China. Google Tiananmen Square. You know what you’ll find? A nice description of the Square and its relevance in modern Chinese society. A few nice pictures of the area. Some sites about the Forbidden City, the National Museum, and Chairman Mao. But nothing regarding the “incident.” Our tour guide, a 27 year-old man, still didn’t really know what happened there. He just told us not to mention the “incident” while we’re in the Square, as the area is monitored and Chinese officials have been known to hassle and hush those that are vocal about such things. The censorship here is unreal.

We wandered around the Square for a bit and went into the Mausoleum of Chairman Mao. He’s been dead since 1979, but he elected to have himself frozen and put on display. You know, like most people. So every day, he’s elevated from his freezer, and put on display in his crystal coffin while citizens and tourists alike file past. He’s been dead for 30 years. And I saw his corpse. It’s creepy. Apparently I could’ve done the same thing in Vietnam; Ho Chi Minh is on display somewhere. And Lenin in Russia did the same. But that’s just weird.

Next up, passing through the Red Gate, we entered into the Forbidden City. See, I always thought the Forbidden City was just near Beijing, but separated from it somehow. Maybe in some dense forest, surrounded by trees, shrouded in secrecy somewhere. Silly me. The Forbidden City is in the heart of Beijing. And there are actually no trees anywhere near the main section of the city for security purposes. I guess that shows what I know.

Next up: Lunch. This one is important. Dad, this is for you. You remember when we were talking on the phone in Hong Kong, and you were a smartass and asked about finding a Chinatown in Beijing? Well GUESS WHAT. We ate in Chinatown in Beijing. It exists. The Chinatown Restaurant. Almost within sight of the Bird’s Nest. It’s there. We ate inside it. It was delicious. We got McDonald’s milkshakes afterwards. It was a great time. And I completed your task in the process. Chinatown. Check.

A quick stop at the Pearl market gave way to the end of our Beijing adventure. We went to the train station and boarded our overnight sleeper train to Shanghai. I had never been on a sleeper train before. I felt like I was in a Harry Potter story or something. It was cool, but the pillow wasn’t comfortable. And a good pillow is the key to a good night’s rest. Maybe that’s just me, I don’t know. But we had some fun on the train and then slept until our rude awakening the next morning…

Day 75 (04-03-09)

Some Chinese lady unlocks the cabin door at 6:40am, yells something about the trashcan, takes the garbage away, and then leaves without shutting our door. Good morning to you too, sunshine. We got off of the train at 7:15am and made our way to the bus that brought us back to the ship. Ah, the MV Explorer. Home, sweet home. Some breakfast and a quick shower were the only stops this morning though, as today is the only time we have to explore Shanghai. We grabbed a taxi to Pudong and went to the world’s second tallest building, the Shanghai World Financial Center. The only building officially taller than it is the Taipei 101 building in Taiwan, but that includes the antennas and such on the roof. As far as strict building height goes, from ground level to roof: the World Financial Center is the tallest in the world. And it has the world’s tallest observation deck. Which I went to. It was pretty foggy again, like in Macau, but it was still a great view. Shanghai has 3 of the world’s tallest buildings, so it was interesting to see the other 2 buildings look small while I was standing above their peaks. After descending back down to the basement level, we found a Cold Stone and decided it was necessary to get ice cream. I mean, come on, it’s Cold Stone. We walked around the city a little more, and actually discovered that there’s another building under construction right now that’s going to dwarf the Shanghai World Financial Center in height, so I don’t even know what they have planned over here. This city is booming. It’s under massive amounts of construction, more than I’ve seen anywhere else in the world. I was not expecting that from Shanghai. I think it might even rival Dubai for the amount of development that’s going on right now. Who knows.

We made it to a mall for some lunch and some shopping (I was with girls, it happens), and I got the rest of the clothing I need to finish out the suit I had made in Vietnam. Vest and skinny tie: check. We hopped a cab back to the ship and relaxed for awhile as the rest of our shipmates filed back onboard. The Shanghai skyline looks incredible, especially at night, and we have a perfect parking spot just like in Hong Kong. I don't know who plans this stuff, but our location couldn't be any better. Crazy day. Crazy week. Crazy life. Goodnight everyone.

Day 76 (04-04-09)

My napping was rudely interrupted by class today. How sad. Some giggly Japanese girls gave a presentation about tea ceremonies and other mildly relevant Japanese things at our cultural pre-port this evening. And then I didn’t go to sleep until 3:30am. Silly rabbit. I don’t know where time goes or why I lose track of it so often. And yet, here I am. At least I’m consistent.

Day 77 (04-05-09)

They weren’t kidding. As soon as we hit Thailand, time just sped up completely. Five days on, two days off. Five on, two off. Six on, two off. What are we doing here? Not to sound like a broken record, but there really isn’t any time to process all of this. Maybe that nine-day stretch between Japan and Hawaii will give me some time to make sense of it all. But whatever. I’ll be in Japan tomorrow I guess. Just another country to try and digest in far too little time. Not that I’m complaining by any means. This voyage is amazing and I’m not taking any of it for granted. But now that I’ve gotten a taste of so many places, I want to go back for more. I just hope I get that chance. Goodnight all.