Mittwoch, 11. August 2010

Forbidden City, Tuanjiehu Park, Rush-Hour-Biking and Pizza (10.8.10)

Today, I decided to get up early and have a visit at the Forbidden City. The weather was beautiful as well, so I easily got up at 8:30 in the morning. As the Forbidden City is way to far away to walk on the one hand but the way is rather easy to find on the other hand, I decided to go there by bike. And I can tell you, going by bike here, is an adventure for itself! Though, I was able to take some pictures while riding:
As I arrived at the Forbidden City, I understood the advice of Mario not to be late, because there were thousands of people already. I became a part of the stream and entered the Forbidden City. At first, I was impressed. But after I passed the third or fourth gate which looked the same like the one before, I got a bit bored.
 After 30 percent of the way, I had to buy a ticket to move further on. The queue was massive. I sneaked in only 15 m in front of the ticket counter, but it still took me about an hour to get my ticket … I felt sorry for all these honest guys standing 100 m away from the counter.
However, I got my ticket and I reentered the “stream” again. After several more gates looking exactly the same, I arrived at a beautiful garden! It would be too much to say that this park was worth the “pain in the arse walk” but I have to admit that I calmed down a bit. Going left, there were some tiny alleys, which were almost nobody was, so I had a try there. But there was a reason why it was empty… boring! I went back to the garden and from there to the exit. 
I just realized, that I got out on the very opposite site of the entrance, which made my bike about an hour walk away… well, so I started to walk.
Arriving at my bike, I decided to have a walk across the “Platz des himmlischen Friedens” (don’t know the English precise translation) but there was nothing thrilling on it, either.
So I got back home by Bike. After a few hours of relaxing, I tried to find the train-ticket office for my journey to Shanghai. The place where it should be was marked by Yaping on my google map, and the way did not seem very difficult. In fact, 20 minutes later, I was on the very spot the office should be – but there was no office anywhere around. After half an hour confused searching in the area, I gave up and headed home again. 
On half way, I crossed an entrance to a park where I have not been, yet. So I parked my bike at the street and went in. Beautiful!! :-) I walked through it and sat down on a bench right at the lake. On the other side of the lake, there were sport facilities, which were in heavily used by plenty of Chinese guys. Fitness is very important here!! As it became dark, I decided to leave and go home. 
Meanwhile, Rush Hour had started. And poor little Max has to fight his way through the masses of cars, bicycles, motor bikes, electro bikes, and so on … It was frightening! 
However, I survived! Luckily! 

Tao and Lorenz invited me to have a Pizza with them in the evening. Being sick of the Chinese food already, the prospect of Pizza made my stomach smile! The restaurant was right next to the football satium, I got there by taxi. We shared a big one:
Afterwards we had some beers in the streets and walked around a bit. As I was pretty tired (remember when I got up ;-) ) I took a taxi home then.

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