Temple of Heaven Park & Fun with Kites

When I was in my second or third week of the big Beijing trip, I covered one of the tours to the Temple of Heaven. Now, while the temple itself was pretty cool, and something to see, my favorite part of that day was the fantastic park that surrounded.

It was basically a daytime social center for the city of Beijing. A place where apartment dwellers could feel like they have their own backyards. All these local people would gather to entertain themselves with all sorts of outdoor activities. Some examples...

The women doing a fun rhythmic, ribbon dancing thing to music that they played on a portable stereo and speaker.

In one area, a bunch of folks were dancing to traditional Chinese music. It was a funny mix of young & old and good dancers & bad dancers.

And there was a bunch of teenagers that were obsessively playing this hackysack-like game in group circles. The difference was that the actual hacky sack had these feathers sticking out to make it fly pretty high in the air. I even joined in and played for a little while.

FYI : Hacky sacking with the feathered hacky sack is harder than it looks!

Of course, I totally bought one of these feathery hacky sack things.

The Day of the Kite

My favorite part of the park by far, was all these people flying kites. It looked like so much fun! I was talking about for weeks wanting to go out there and try. I was bugging my coworkers and my new friends to go with me, but to no avail. Finally, in the 6th week of the trip, I decided to buck it up, buy a kite, and fly it by myself.

Well basically, hilarity ensued.

Problem #1: When you buy a kite in China, it comes unesembled, and you have to put it together.

Solution: This nice kitestand worker put mine together for me.....because I was clueless.

The finished product.....

Me & my new kite, ready to brave the winds in the park.

Problem #2: I don't remember how to fly a kite. The last time I did it, I think I was 7.

Solution: Stand in the field of the park holding your kite in your hand and looking very confused. Eventually someone will come help you. Like this old man....

He tried (in Chinese) to explain to me how to fly the kite. We got nowhere. Then, he even helped me launch it by throwing the kite up in the wind while I ran with the string spool. Again, we got nowhere. He eventually just smiled, nodded his head, and walked away.

I tried for awhile on my own.

Problem #3: Flying a kite is a two person job. One to run with the spool, and one to hold & throw the kite.

Solution: Run around with the spool in hand, letting the kite drag 25 ft. behind you, in hopes that someone else will feel sorry for you and try to help.

Enter these 2 ladies....

They examined my kite for awhile, and tried, again in Chinese, to tell me what I was doing wrong. Well, it seemed the two of them had very different opinions on kite flying, and they ended up getting in a bickering agrument as to how to help me. It was very entertaining watching them yell in Chinese and hand jesture to me and eachother.

They soon gave up also, and I was left to have a go on my own.

And, unfortunately, after almost 2 hours of attempting to fly my new Chinese kite, this is about the best flying attempt I had, and look where it ended up...

Oh well. Still a very enjoyable afternoon.

Quickie: The Famous Door at the St. Regis

Do you remember a few years ago when President George Bush was in China giving a press conference, and he tried to walk out the wrong door? There were all these pictures, and videos of him looking pretty stupid pulling on the locked door, and then just standing there confused.

Here's a visual.....


Well, this liitle incident took place at the hotel that I am staying at in Beijing, The St. Regis. The now infamous door was right outside the ballroom where our group dinners were held. And just for fun, and a bit out of boredom when I was having to cover the dinner, I decided to do a little reinactment of the event.

So, here I am on the 2nd floor of the St. Regis Beijing pulling on the exact locked door that thrawted President Bush in 2005.

Good Times!

The Night of the Crazy Mongolian Lady

I love a good night out. Especially one as random as the story I am about to tell. Oh, and just so you know, there are bits and pieces of this night missing in my mind. So, to quote a cheesy movie I loved....."I'm not going to tell the story the way it happen, I'm going to tell it the way I remember it."

And I'm doing timeline form. My favorite.

Backstory: This particular evening, I was going out on the town with my new friend, who I will call D, that was also a guest in the same hotel. We were heading to an area called Sanlitun. Known for its main bar street and backallies of smaller dance joints and cheesy pubs, it is popular with a fun international crowd.

10:30 PM: We head to a little hidden restaurant that I discovered called The Tree. They have awesomely greasy pizza and also some great beer brands you wouldn't expect to find in China. I was drinkin' some Strongbow this evening. Good times were being had.

11:30 PM: We somehow strike up a convo with this older, cougar-esque woman sitting at the bar by herself. She is actually hilarious, and we find out that she is Mongolian....hence the nickname. From here on out, since for the life of me I can't remember what her real name was, she will be referred to as CML (Crazy Mongolian Lady).

Love the fact that she is wearing her sunglasses in the bar....

12:30 AM: As I was noting CML's very intent interest in hanging out with us, she suggests that we follow her to another bar nearby that had a band. Although, in the back of my head, I was thinking she wanted to...ahem..."Ride the tricycle" (random How I met your Mother reference), she definitely seemed harmless enough and we agreed to go.

12:45 AM: While walking, I hear the faint sound of It's Gonna Be Me wafting into the street. Of course we can't just pass by a bar playing N'Sync, and not stop and get down. So, enroute, we make a short detour to this other club for a beer or two. I recall dancing with some Dutch students at this point.

1:15 AM: The 3 of us get to a bar that I believe was called Studio 65 to hear CML's recommended band. And they were FANTASTIC. It was this Chinese total rock cover band. So very fun.

This band had a great chick lead singer. Here we are with her.


I was dancing like an idiot to the great Nirvana and Areosmith tunes they were kickin'.

I also may or may not have been headbanging a little. My neck was hurting a lot the next day, so I think it was "may have".

By far my favorite band I have seen since coming to China. Thumbs up to CML's musical taste.


2:45 AM: The band finishes and the bar closes. By now, we have made friends with some Chinese guys who were also at the bar, and all of us were hanging outside and snappin' pics of ourselves with the band.

At some point, and I'm not sure how they came on the scene, we added these 2 Austrian guys, one's name was Dan, into our group. Well, CML now suggests that we hit a late night place called Maggie's.

Here's where I get suspicious.

I had heard of Maggie's. One of the hotel contacts had mentioned it to me before because it is near the hotel, and apparently an establishment popular with those seeking ladies of the night, if you will.

I share this tidbit with CML, and she just laughs it off. When I mention something to D, he says, and I quote..."She steered us right to this bar, let's trust her on the next place." So, I play along.

3:00 AM: CML, the 2 new Austrian guys, D, and myself all stuff in a taxi on our way to Maggie's. I am sprawled out sitting across everyone in the backseat. I think my legs were literally hanging out a window.

3:20 AM: We tumbled out at our destination and stumble into Maggie's.

Let me give you a visual: The place is very dark, and decorated with cheesy velvet chairs and tall booth couches. It is full of old Western men, most of which were in suits, or at least jackets. The only girls in the joint were very scantily clad young Chinese girls.

I was sooo right....it was a hooker bar!

3:23 AM: I totally realize that I had been wrong about CML. She wasn't just a cougar looking to possibly third wheel, She was a madame. This was confirmed when, right after we walked in, she went to talk to all these young ladies that she apparently knew.

Like a light bulb turning on, it all came together. She was bringing the guys here to hook them up. Now the question in my head was, how was she planning to get rid of me?

3:30 AM: Being the curious and adventurous person I am, I start walking around this bar taking it all in. The place really was hilarious. I was the ONLY nonChinese girl in there. Everyone was staring at me. Luckily, we were so overserved by this point, I just decided to go with it.

The first 45 minutes here were actually fun. I was lovin' the people watching. And they had a dance floor where the DJ was totally playing stuff like Beyonce. Awesome. I recall doing a performance of the Carlton dance. And I know I slapped the floor at least 4 times. We owned that dance floor!

4:15 AM: O.K. This next part is very fuzzy. At some point, this large guy who I think was Russian, but know was creepy, tried to talk to me when I was on my way back from the bathroom. I believe there to have been a boob graze.

....And that was my cue. As much fun as the dancing was at this place, it was time. I said a quick goodbye to CML, who looked very disappointed that we, or at least D, was leaving. Thought about saying goodbye to the Austrian guys (but their attentions were engaged with some new female..ahem...friends of CML's), and we walked back to the hotel, laughing the entire time about what all had transpired in the last 6 hours.

All in all, definitely a very entertaining night in Beijing.