We went, we saw, we ate scorpions

Maymester China 2012 group

Apologies for the lack of a blog the last few days, it got crazy pretty quickly.  Lets start from the top and work our way down.

Wednesday was our first free day and our professor, Hamilton Bean, arranged for a group of us to meet with one of the head guys at East West PR around 11 A.M. Well it was on the opposite side of Beijing essentially and we had to get there on our own because our group was too big to fit into one cab. There were three students including myself in one cab and we wondered around downtown Beijing for about half an hour before we were finally escorted to the door of the PR firm. We all went to lunch at a wonderful outdoor cafe however and were able to chat about an array of topics (picture in the slideshow).

After the trip to East West a group of us went to meet a parkour group, parkour is a very interesting form of exercise. Look up a video if you have no idea what I'm talking about, it's worth your time. We trekked to Olympic Park and wondered around there for about an hour and finally gave up and found a restaurant. When we were finished at the restaurant we walked across the road to the Bird's Nest which is a stadium built for the Olympics as well and there was all sorts of things to see.

There was a food court area that was really interesting and lead us to the scorpions. Before we left for China there was a dare thrown down by a fellow student that I could not eat a scorpion, so when it was available I figured I would take the leap. Honestly, it tasted like deep fried. There is parts of me that wished it tasted worse since I made a 15 minute to-do about eating it. Oh well. After we ate some gross and delicious food we just made our way (on the subway!) back to the hotel.

Thursday we were taken to 798 which is an art district. It was really interesting to see a whole bunch of interpretations of art. There were a lot of models and photography happening as well which was interesting to watch. The mood was different than all the rest of Beijing that we have seen so far, I think it was because it was slightly more free and freedom of speech was enhanced so people were able to do and say what they wanted, to a certain extent of course. After the art district we went to the area of the Drum and Bell tower which had a bunch of shops that were interesting and fun to walk through. The Drum tower gave you a great view of the city (and the skies were clear too!!) which was a fun perspective of the city that you would not see otherwise.

Today we were taken to the Temple of Heaven which was kind of more of the same. That sounds terrible but all the historical sights begin to meld into each other after a while but it was still beautiful and great to see. After the Temple of Heaven we were transported to the Pearl Market . . . boy howdy, it was insane. In China you can (and are supposed to) bargain at all times. I am not good at this nor am I comfortable with it either. I feel bad haggling with people and I hate confrontation but I did pretty well. I picked up gifts for my whole family and a pair of shoes and sunglasses for myself . . . all for under $80.

Well I have to actually do some school work for tomorrow so I shall close here but until next time gentle readers, eat and live well!