This week I'm lazy, so I will refer to Silja's blog. There's some pics of the cultural festival which was organized today in front of our beloved studying place, the C-building, in Tsinghua Uni campus.

Today's plans are to order big pizzas and watch the movie "Up". Today I had the best massage ever for the price: 40 minutes and 10 euros for a very good back massage. Though I'd have to find some place cheaper. One really gets cheapskatish here in China..

On Friday we were drinking heavily with Silja and Jani. Along was also Antti (and Ruslan also, when we played uno in my dorm room) with more civilized manners. The plan was to go check out the famous Sanlitun bar street in the more central Beijing, but having drank whisky, spirits, beer and cocktails too much, we did not do it. Instead, we headed for the apartment of our beloved Estonian couple, Jaan and Marit, where Marit was throwing her birthday party (Jaan offered in a very noble way a lot of vodka shots, big hand for him for that). Of course, we had to come up with some kind of present for Marit. Carrying our own drinks in the dept. store we went on to buy some wine and a pig's leg. I wonder if it was appreciated at the receiving end.. :)

On this week started also the tai chi and kung fu classes. Both were quite pleasant. We have the same teacher on both classes. The classes are done on the edge of a sports (football) field, where we either do slow movements in tai chi, trying to reach the level of enlightenment, or then we try to do some serious kicking, to the height of our shoulder levels, in kung fu. Did not quite manage to do it.. (I will, though, after 10 weeks ;) ). Good exercise anyway, in addition to jogging.

Oh yeah, and another thing: We reserved with Silja and Jani tickets to South Korea, Seoul. We'll be skipping few days of school on 3.12 - 6.12. Just have to use the last entry available on the visa before completely leaving China.

Some pics from Friday:

23.10.2009 Marit's birthday

Kungfu show & Eastern Qing tombs

Dear blog,

last Wednesday evening I went to the Chinese Corner, which is organized by some foreign student organization. This time on the agenda was calligraphy, which they introduced to us (although most of the presentation was in Chinese...). After some guessing games we got to talk to the people around us. Some friendly Chinese girl came to talk to me and Antti, and she seemed to be genuinely interested in Finnish culture and habits. She also knew some facts about Finland and offered her e-mail and phone number to us. I gave her my e-mail, but she seems to have chosen Antti as her future husband, for she has been sms'ing Antti sometimes about her personal stuff :P Yeah, I heard the Chinese female students many times hit on foreign guys just to get out of China and get to live in the materialistic world of western culture that they think is so much better. Got to be wary around here...

Thursday evening Jani, Silja and I went to a kung fu show in the Beijing Red Theatre. From the amount of länkkärit I should have guessed that it is not going to be that good. Everything was commercialized and after the show every kind of merchandise was on the table for selling. The show pluses included very cool lighting and effects, and the music was majestic (although maybe an overkill compared to the stage events). The plot was very simple, a basic story of a young boy who in the end becomes a kung fu master having faced various challenges and mishaps. The plot was actualized in a very poor way. Most of the time the show tried to be too artistic with lot of scenes with too much waiting and standing still...gazing at the sky or something as cheesy. I expected it to be a kung fu show! Sure, they smashed some bricks and leaned against spears and cut metal into pieces with their heads.. and the fighting scenes were few and not that well scripted, so I would really have expected more from the capital of China in this regard.. Maybe I have to go to the Shaolin temple to see the real deal.

On Friday we were supposed to go with Jani and Antti to have, for the first time, some real Beijing Duck, but found that the famous restaurant was quite crowded on Friday evening, and so we decided to catch some basic pizza. Quite quiet night, because we were about to embark for our next tourism-trip in the upcoming dawn on Saturday: the Eastern Qing Tombs. The posse this time was me, Silja, Antti, Jani and the nice Estonian girl, Marit.

I faced the "old pottery and Chinese architecture" saturation point somewhat fast while checking out the tombs of some Chinese Qing-dynasty emperors. Having said that, one tomb though, particularly, was nice with its wall carvings and a tomb of 4 people. Nuff' said. The most interesting part of that day was the driver, who we hired to take us to the Tombs and back. He talked few words of English, and us, students, could polish our lately acquired Chinese skills on him. It was actually very amazing to find out that I (and the others) actually coult talk to the guy in a way that he understood. We were bombarding the guy with the basic questions one can imagine to learn in a beginner level of any language: what's your age, what do you like and so on. I did not understand the man that much with his replies, but fortunately Antti could translate his responses to an understandable form. Near the Qing Tombs we feasted with the guy in a restaurant and he helped us to order some good food. We, of course as rich westerners, offered to pay also for his food. But hey, everything was shared anyway, as is the custom way to do here, so it only felt natural. I like this way of sharing the food; this way everyone gets to taste everything and the expenses are easier to cover.

The Tombs were 125 km away but felt like being at least 200 km away when considering the amount of time that went to the trips. So far in our trips in China we have been lucky, so something was bound to happen this time. And it did, big time! Our car's cooling liquid hose had some major holes in it, and after a while of driving back from the Tombs, our car broke down. It's amazing how easy it is for a Chinesemen to get help from their fellowmen. Our Chinese driver, having wondered a minute or two of what is wrong, talked to some guy passing by, and after a while this guy returned with some tools. Another car noticed us and as well stopped for our aid. Now there were three Chinese men figuring out what to do to our broken vehicle. So, after fumbling the hose from under the hood, our driver left us his car keys and cell phone, and went on with the other Chinese guys to the nearest gas station for some spare parts. Just as we were about to lose our all hope, when it was beginning to be very dark, our driver returned with an intact hose, installed it, and after that we could wipe our sweat off from our foreheads. We were back in business!

After the long drive back to Wudaokou we decided to eat pizza (again), only this time in a far more better place. The pizzas were huge (see the pics), although they cost significantly more also. The day had taken its toll with dehydration, too little sleep and walking around too much. So, retiring to the dorms was the only sensible thing to do. No drinking this weekend (ok, one pint of beer in the pizzeria), yeah my liver is starting to show again some signs of life after five years!

Today, on Sunday, Jani, Antti and I went finally to taste the Beijing Duck! It was good but maybe it is more of a legend than some gastronomic ecstacy experience. The three of us ate one whole duck, and also got to taste some duck brain (quite odd aftertaste). After the duck I went to have an 1½ hour full-body massage for 12 euros. The massager told me that my back is in some points fucked up, which I already though knew, so he recommended me to take the cupping procedure as well as some odd treatment, on which he applied oil on my back and combed my back with some kind of device, which felt nice and apparently was supposed to even out the muscular imbalances around my back. The cupping procedure included these glass cups, in which were small amount of alcohol. The alcohol was then lit up and the cup put on my back. The negative pressure in the cup caused it to suck skin and superficial muscles upwards, so that some bad blood would go away from the muscles. Check out the pictures to see how my back is now :)

Next week it is more school and the elective classes (tai chi and kung fu) start also. We'll see how it goes!

Cheers!

PICS:

Qing Tombs & other stuff from the weekend

Life in Tsinghua VOL. 1

Man, I ain't done this much homework in ages!

Yes, as the school now seriously started, it is quite a task to keep up with the fast learning pace. Every other day we (would) need to learn 30 or so symbols, words and in addition some common phrases. The symbols have to be written on paper flashcards; we also (would) have to read fluently, learn one new out-of-the-book sentence every week and rememberize one proverb few times a week. In addition, there are some interviews to be made to practice the common phrases. Moreover, writing on paper the lessons from the book (no, not pinyin) and plain exercises also from the books are few of the chores. This means it is a lot of work for the whole semester, especially when the peer students seem to be cramming up (at least in my class). I would like better if I could learn basics of a language and then move on to another one. This way my livelihood would not be constricted to a specific-language culture. Anyway, anyone who knows me knows I, nevertheless, will do a lot of work just to keep up and not just "hang around", even if it might be unhealty (mentally) sometimes. Well, at least tomorrow I am going to watch a kungfu-show to some place called Red Theater in central BJ, so I also take some breaks from the studying :). And I have yet to cork my Suntory Whisky ;).

We got to choose some elective classes also. For 400 kuai I signed up for both Kungfu and Tai Chi classes - they are held once a week for one hour each. The classes start next week, so we'll see what they bring along to this otherwise eventless environment. Yeah, that is another thing. The information about events does really not seem to be conveying very well here. I know there are lot of associations and such, but no info regarding them is available. So I just go jogging and do some exercise in the dorm, mainly.

Funny observation was yesterday on my night jog at 23:30. Chinese students were still hanging out - playing basketball in the darkness, eating out, biking, doing their shit - as if it was daytime. No westerners in sight. Maybe it is their habit of staying awake quite late.

Wo xiang chi Fenlan cai means I want some Finnish food, which is correct. Although the food here is quite good, I miss a decent bread with proper cheese and a piece of lettuce still dripping water... Yeah, but the basic meal here costs somewhere around 50-70 eurocents.

My bike is quite nice: before yesterday one of its pedals was making driving the bike like 50 % less efficient (I was unable to go fast), the tyres were beginning to be empty, driving "wheel" wass starting to be loose in every dimension, even around its own axis, so it had to be taken for the repairs. While escorting Silja there (her bike's chains did not stay put) by the force of pulling, my other pedal detached and fell to the ground. So it was pretty good time to fix the bike. And they did. Now it works like a charm, although the pedal is again starting to show some symptoms. This is not all: my righthand-side break broke while I squeezed it, so now I've only one break, which works occasionally.

See you Finnish people in a bit!

Cheers,
Junnu

More pics from Tokyo

Heya, I added some moa pictures from Silja's collection. Some of them are duplicates compared to Silja's blog, but oh well, they are just so cool-looking :).

Arigato gosaimasssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.

Siljan Tokio

Vitutuksen multihuipennus (3.10.2009)

Whoops, sorry I forgot to post this as my first post from Tokyo :). Well, now this thing seems less serious, but back then it was a really annoying thang. Anyway, I'm back now in Beijing. If you ever go to Tokyo, I will recommend you one good Izkaya pub where we ate on the last evening: everything was totally awesome! Shouchi, Osakan omelette and all. I also have to commend Japan Airlines for the outstanding service they seem to be offering (although Ice Age 3 sucked, watched it during the flight). In short, it's a good airline company. BUT without further ado, the text from the beginning of the October:


Joo-o. I think I started Tokyo off with the wrong foot. Sitting in the dorm after the trip from Narita Airport to here - the almost-central Tokyo - I'm pissed off, hungry and tired, respectively. The flight was actually quite pleasant, because it turned out to be as short as 2 hours 45 minutes and they (Japan Airlines) served also a meal, which was a bonus as we did not pay for one. Every seat had a small display attached to its rear-end, from which I watched Transformers 2 every now and then, while at the same time trying to learn some Chinese symbols.

Narita airport was very clinical and the embarkation to Japan was quite effortless. The first fuck-up came when exchanging currency. I lost way over one hundred euro just because we were in a hurry to catch a train, which would take us to Tokyo (60 something kilometers away). So, the first money exchange place, right, there! The exchange rate, when compared to the exchange office downstairs, was 25 % worse. So, when exchanging 4900 yuan I'd expect to get about 525 €, instead I got approximately 400 € (in Yens of course). Man I'm angry at that kind of fucking scam (and it was an official bank, for god's sake)!

All I can say at this point is that the public transportation (I can guess it extends to every other areas of commerce as well) is somewhat confusing at the first sight, because there is too much information hanging from there and there and some more posters telling with small print what is where and oh, there's a toilet and a handicap toilet and yes there exits, lots of them, I just don't know which one to take, and there's the metro station sign, after having passed it the information stops just to get people pissed off for not getting anywhere because they just could not make it clear until the end.

So, we went past our station, when coming from Narita Airport. Luckily, it was only a short trip to our hostel with one transfer when using the metro (which of course were different companies' lines, so had to pay double).

It seems that Tokyo is quite pricey, and with what I got I'm sure to have to go to the ATM pretty quickly (EDIT: I didn't have to :) ). Now I'd like to sleep, after all I slept nearly 4½ hours last night because of not just falling asleep. I'd like to sleep but I'm too damn hungry. I'd like to eat but I'm too damn tired. What a dilemma. OK, I'm being a martyr and a crybaby here, but hey I want to be now, because I got fucking ripped off!

STFU!

[Time passes..]

OK, now I've eaten in Tokyo for the first time in my life. It was a basic grub of some Miso-soup and a bowl of beef'n'rice in a local cheap fast food place called Yoshinoya. Now I'm only tired (and pissed, but maybe one tenth of the earlier amount), so maybe to catch some zed and see what tomorrow brings along with it.

Still alive...

The typhoon, which went over Japan, was extensively covered (at least) in Finland. In Tokyo, you could feel the typhoon but there was nothing more to it. The heaviest rain I've ever been in and the most powerful wind I've ever experienced, but no dead bodies, nothing. So, I'm still alive.

As a more intimate review of the tuesday, the day started quite early (woke up at 7 A.M.) as we were headed to Tsukiji fish market in some part of the Tokyo harbour. People driving around in their Inex-like vehicles transporting maritime goods from one place to another.. Beheadings of gigantic tuna fishes, all kind of slimy and goofy-looking sea animals were everywhere. This place is the hub for the restaurant-owners of Tokyo to come to get their share of the last night's catch for the Tokyoites to eat in the daytime. After wandering around in the hall we tried the sushi I told you about earlier.

Tuesday was a day for the enhancement of the cultural knowledge regarding Japan. Tokyo National Museum was the main thing, with the whole Japanese history covered via displaying all kinds of objects from different eras and explaining the events regarding that particular period of time. I found it somewhat interesting. Having seen also Asakusa's main parts (including the entrance to the big buddha temple, and the inside of a few shinto shrines), it was time to try something the businessmen do after their long workdays: Sento and Izkaya.

Sento is a public bathhouse with a certain set of rules. The most important is to wash yourself very thoroughly before entering the bath. Separate sides for women and men, the sento was a relaxing experience with its small benches and faucets, from which water was poured down to a bowl for washing oneself. The water, where people hanged around, was at leat 45 degrees, so it was burning. I stayed there for about 10 minutes (which is about 5 times more that the other men did), after which my brains were boiling. The next 15 minutes I was pouring cold water over my head to cool it down. And yes, it was all naked business, so I felt more than ever that Japanese and Finnish people are somehow more related to each other (mentally) than many other nations. The sauna in the sento was quite lame, only about 55 degrees (cold).
Izkaya, on the other hand, is something we don't have in Finland. It's a place where businessmen come with their workmates to talk this and that, or to do some networking with business associates. Nevertheless, they are usually drinking quite much. Suddenly I started thinking, how can this thing work. I mean, men do work all day, then, instead of going home, they come to izkayas to (at least to some extent) talk shop in front of a beer keg - how can they find time for their families? Japan is traditionally a very societal country as opposed to Finland's individualism - people are taken care of by their own if something should go wrong, and everybody looks after one another; in Finland people are allowed to think and act more freely, but with a price of loosing a real connection to the people around. The family in Japan traditionally comes first. How about now, when people scarcely have time to do their job in 24 hours? Anyway, izkaya had a nice atmosphere, good food and of course lots of traditional Japanese drinks, such as sake, plum wine or the brand beers.

On Wednesday we visited Mitaka in the outskirts of central Tokyo. There was a museum called Ghibli animation museum (Ghibli is an animation studio, famous e.g. for Howl's Moving Castle). The design of the museum was very childlike, as there were various paths and holes from which to traverse the inner workings of the museum. The way of making animation was covered quite extensively. Unfortunately, everything was in Japanese, so one could derive information regarding animation-making only so much. The whole day was pouring water (in the anticipation of the typhoon) but the museum visit was worthwhile (I think I'm going to see Howl's Moving Castle today, on Friday). In the evening it was time to do some serious nighttime a la Tokyo. So, a tongxue (shchoolmate) from Tsinghua Uni named Oscar - from Columbia - and his newly-made friend Taka (from Osaka) were in the city, so we decided to hit the izkayas. Plum wine was extraordinarily good, something I hope to have also in Finland! Taka was telling us about Japan and its culture while we were busy explaining Finland and the similarities to Japan to Taka. The most important thing I acquired that evening was the information regarding what my childhood posters (some ninja posters) stated: "ninja", in Japanese (two symbols, whose meaning I had not ever understood, until now!).
After izkaya we went to try the Japanese karaoke: our own private booth with flatscreen TV, a wireless device for choosing the songs (with touch-screen of course), free and unlimited drinks for the time being there (1½ hours) and two microphones with a big echo effect :). Man, it was swell, we definitely have to have these things in Finland!!
After the karaoke, Taka, Oscar and I decided to try some bars in Ueno - we ended up to the other side of the city because of the difficulties acquiring proper public transportation - and got to Shinjuku. The bars were quite unpopulated but noisy, and due to the approaching storm the rain was starting to be quite unprecedented. It was pouring like hell, and not being able to find any decent bar we went to some local izkaya to taste some Osakan omelette, among others. Twas good, but no more drinks did we take anymore. As the weather was quite chaotic, we decided to do what we had avoided until now: take a taxi. And yes, it was totally too expensive, more expensive than in Finland. Water came down in such a speed that sometimes it seemed that somebody was pouring water down from a bucket: on one instant big splash came down on to the window.. finally reaching Asakusabashi, where I paid my share and ran to our hostel totally soaked @ 4 A.M. Nice.

On the other hand, Thursday was amazingly clear day. Windy it was like never before.. In the central district of Tokyo, Marunouchi, we strolled around to get to the Imperial Palace area. Marunouchi is very expensive place, and all the more cleaner.. Everything was glowing and suitmen had invaded the whole district. Women holding down their skirts to avoid the wind from getting the best of them, the breeze was quite massive. The Imperial Palace had nice surroundings, but for the general public it was forbidden to enter the Imperial Palace interior area, so some gardens and a moat was all the time in front of us. After walking to the west side of the are we saw a glimpse of the Diet (parliament house). Crazy. At 19.00 we had a date with Doro (from the Transmongolian train, she was now a student in Tokyo Uni) and exchanged our whats and whens. It was nice to see her again.

Now this day (the last day before returning to Beijing) is dedicated to laying low, eating well and maybe doing some symbol-recognition (Chinese ones) and watching a Japanese animation.

Best regards to all the readers, say hello for me to everybody!

Here's the pics:

Tokio

Tokyo, first impressions

Second full day in Tokio and already the old feet-ache is again hunting me.. It seems my feet can't take walking anymore that much.

Tokyoites appear to be very polite, respectful and a bit shy maybe, like Finnish people..you know, keeping their distance, respecting other people's private space and so on. Cleanliness has been taken to whole another level, at least when compared to other countries at these latitudes. Tap water is drinkable and you can get it anywhere in the city easily. Littering is forbidden under fine penalty, which makes the city extremely clean (in China people collect the trash because most of them are worth something, well every country seems to have its way around this problem). What I did not understand was the fact that it is hard to find trash bins anywhere, and as soon as I did, I faced the problem of choosing to which recycle-category my waste would go.

Apart from few bikes they are absent from the city picture. As in Finland. Personal car traffic was a) very quiet and b) very little. I would say that it is incomprehensibly small-scale business around here, when compared to e.g. Helsinki, where everybody are driving in their SUVs alone to and from work (or anywhere actually). This big city one would imagine it'd be filled with crazy Japanese white-striped businessmen in their cars driving like mad to do their 12 hour workday, after which it's either dinner or seppuku. But no, the businessmen are sitting with us in the subway, looking at us while we are on our way to our next tourist destination and they are going for work. Life is full of choices.

The cuisine here is quite basic, if one is as cheapskate as I am. Noodles (Sudo or Udon) with different stuff (Egg, beef, tempura) or maybe ramen-soup. At the Tsukiji fish market this morning I saw lots of odd deceased sea animals, after which I ate them in the form of Sushi. If I was diligent enough, I'd check out what it was I was eating, but I'm too lazy now. I remember that in one norimaki-zushi there was some sea urchin ("merisiili") inside, so now I've tasted it. And the clams were better that in Rainbow-cans!

Other places today included museum of emerging science & innovations (e.g. Asimo-robot was there to show off his / her ability to kick ball, dance or run) and Roppongi hills. It was very good exhibition both for me and for the hundreds of Japanese adolescents, who were there with some school class I guess. The best thing there was that the exhibition was really trying to show (in a very practical and funny way) how clean environment is of the utmost importance and how the current actions towards nature can only lead to something that is bad (through dialogues and such). Roppongi hills was quite oversplurge complex of all-too-expensive places, so we withdraw from there quickly.

Yesterday we went to see the Meiji shrine, which is built to commemorate emperor Meiji and his better half. Luckily, we also got to witness some kind of wedding ceremony at the shrine. Very traditional looking and dignified outlook was all over the ceremony, with costumes and all. Shinjuku ward to the north of the shrine was "the Japan i've seen from the TV". Too much signs and neon lights and noise coming from the massive arcades of some funny ball game (anyone care to tell me what they are?=). Therein stood also the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building, whose 45th floor was dedicated for observing the city below. Up we went and ascertained the vastness of teh Tokyo in its dusk.

Countdown to Tokyo

The pleasantly short schoolweek ended on Wednesday as Thursday was reserved for the glorious 60th national day of the People's Republic of China. In 1949 chairman Mao Zedong declared in Tianmen square that the PRC was established, and moved the capital of China from Nanjing back to Beijing. During Mao Zedong's somewhat controversial reign China definitely took some steps forward in terms of progression as a nation with cultural revolution and the great leap forward campaigns.

Nevertheless Thursday's arrangements and festivities were spectacular even though I was only watching it from the TV at the dorm. It had been raining during the night before, but by some miracle (or by some chemical agents injected to the skies) the sky was bluer than ever before I had seen in China. It felt like a little miracle, but the weather was exceptionally good (maybe +25 degrees of C). The flag-raising ceremony started at 10 A.M. and shortly after followed the inspection of the military troops by the state secretary Hu Jintao. Having completed the inspection and shouting something about comrades (tongzuemen..?) from his car (video below), the military parade initiated. The channel's (CCTV 9) commentator's were clearly reading a script as the only time they threw in something personal was the time when the commentator said that his work buddy was on one of the platforms. Commentators remembered to praise PRC a lot, though having seen the amount of work they had put onto this day, I'd have to agree with them (although being sceptical I kept in my mind the word 'propaganda'). Back to the parade. Military parade was impressive with the word pair 'information technology' coming up quite often. During the nuclear missile display the commentators emphasized on China's policy not to be the first one to use them and to have them only for the people's protection. Which is quite acceptable in my mind, if some other countries have the right to own nuclear weapons also (this does not mean I support nuclear weapons in any way - on the contrary). After the parade the citizens of China from all over the country and from different trades and positions conquered the stage (the road which is between Tianmen square and the Forbidden City). This pageant displayed more than 100,000 people passing by with their own theme ranging from environmental protection, olympic games, different ethnic groups (was actually the main theme) to China's space program.

All in all very nice. Everybody seemed to be very happy and cheerful (ok, I was thinking maybe they were hired, but their expressions were very real) and I think this shows how the Chinese people are really feeling this oneness and proudness of their power and most of all their traditions, different ethnicities and the country (Zhongguo) itself. It is true: you can't see hungry people in China (as opposed to the democratic nation of India, where half of the children are facing malnutrition) and it seems that the recent decisions concering e.g. environmental protection and way of thinking about how nations should live and respect each other, are something I deeply respect. They really have their shit together, I would say. Yeah, the wealth seems to be spreading more evenly than in our democratic western socities. Eat that!

In the evening of the 1st of October it was the grand Gala, in which singers, performers and all kind of whatnots did their part in this great fiesta. Fireworks were grand and were accompanied in nearly every performance. There was also this amazing massive human display, which, when seen from the air, was like any display with different colours and simple, fast moving symbols (the people responsible could change to 7 different colours, and they worked with amazing accuracy and synchronicity). I was waiting for a big fireworks after the event, which never came, so all the fireworks I saw was from the TV. Cool party nevertheless!

Yeah, so that was that. Yesterday I also wrote 176 symbols and 280 English-Pinyin translations on some paper just to try to learn them during some freetime on this holiday (lasts until 11.10.2009).

We will travel with Silja to Tokyo tomorrow morning. Our taxi comes at 5.00 A.M. to pick us up for the Beijing Capital Airport for the unbelievably long flight of 4½ hours to Narita Airport. This day I've tried to research Tokyo and what could we do there in a week. It seems were up for quite a treat! Harakiri!

PRC 60 years

Korean food, test tube beer and Simatai

Greetz!

The weekend started off on Friday evening with some stand-up comedy via laptop and playing one round of uno-cards. The 1.8 euro Chinese wine resembled mostly juice concentrate as it was sickeningly sweet.. Good thing I also drink Finnish ciders, otherwise the wine would have been a lost cause. Come taxi we went to this nice, not so noisy and populated Helen's cafe. There were some very interesting (probly at least to some extent due to my then prevailing state) U.S. and Spanish people, with whom I chatted while tasting the beer from this 3 litre test tube.

Having waken up in the Saturday morning with a mild hangover we decided to head off to downtown Beijing to buy some stuff. For my part, the outcome was: two pair of shoes (one normal, one running; total 20 euros, overpaid them big time), one pair of excercise pants and one pair of jeans. Now I finally could do some jogging and not use the same pants all the time - nice.

After this too long trip Jani, Antti and me decided to go to eat some Korean food. WHAT A MISTAKE! What we thought we ordered to the table could not have been further from the truth. In the end we got some table-grilled meat, which mainly tasted of something like chicken's stomach (the texture, the crunchiness); the next cusine was supposed to be chicken. Yeah, it was chicken allright, but to our misfortune it was chicken legs (No not the ones they serve in Sodexo, Otaniemi) with their claws and all still attached. Well, you could sort of eat the claws, but the upper part was quite wiry.. The last meal was supposed to be basic pork stew, and it was (again). The pork, however, was merely bones and fat. Well, at least we got the vegetables (too spicy maybe) and actually salad leaves were brought to the table as we consumed them. So, all in all it was time to do a trip to the store to buy some food for our churning tummies.

On Sunday it was time to do the great trip to the Great (fire)Wall of China. Arduous task it was from the beginning having to wake up at 6 A.M. to catch the buses that would leave from near the Qianmen square. Unfortunately, no buses left for Simatai there (only to Badaling, the tourist-inflated spot). So, after wandering around we decided to head off to Dongzhimen bus station for a bus no. 980 to travel to some town near (75 km away) Simatai section. With us were also travelling Marit and Jaan, two Estonian very friendly and cheerful folks. During the trip humour was attained from e.g. Maamme-laulu, Kalev, Finnish language, Estonian language.. What else could one expect :)? Anywheys, we wondered in the walls for about three hours, after which we decided to take the fast way down: a kind of aerial ropeway, which glided down from some part of the wall to near the entrance gate. The carrying apparatus was electric, so it had maybe too much intentional friction to slow the glide down. But beautiful views from maybe 70-80 meters up were worth it.

Simatai (Great Wall)

End of September

Chinese, here - I - come!

Greetings!

First weekend is far behind us now and the actual language studies began on Tuesday.

Insofar the studies have been quite nice except for one thing: they assigned me to this afternoon group (13.00 -16.40), so that pretty much makes living a lot harder. For example, it is probable that I will not wake up at 7 A.M. to do my stuff but instead will wake at around 8.30. Then a few hours pass by doing nothing specific, maybe some studying to review what was supposed to cling onto my mind yesterday. Some Internet surfing maybe, but that's all there is to it. Then off to school, while the morning group people do their daily stuff IN THE DAYLIGHT AS IT IS SUPPOSED. So, it gets quite tiring when trying to absorb information at 16.30. After the classes it's dinner time. After that it is dark. Nice.

In the evenings we have usually watched some movies or documentaries, which by the way have become a sort of a joke, because the documentaries we have been watching are notoriously anti-American in some sense, although my view would be that they are just truthful ;). Anywheys, evening do go quickly here.

Studying consists of listening, speaking and writing. Writing seems to be, at least for now, the hardest part, because the Chinese symbols (radicals and compounds) are supposed to be derived from their actual visual meaning, but rarely resemble at all their archetype. Speaking is kinda fun, although we would need more eveyday situations than these highly formal lessons. The teachers are nice though and do have some blinking eyes, which is good. They go on about and speak mainly Chinese, and 90 % goes over the head. But you still can understand the important bits, so it's OK, I guess.

Last weekend we tasted some Korean alcohol (some 20%) and played cards, after which Ruslan, I, Jason and Alex (a guy from Belgium) went off for some night-biking to the streets near the Wudaokou metro station, dodging cars, scooters, bikes and pedestrians like hell! There were a lot of "too close" situations, but it was actually quite fun to pedal on the edge of the highway.
My bike, for example, was 14 euros, so one cannot expect much. Having said that I really like it, the way it rolls on the roads, especially when the roads here have been designed to transport mainly bikers. My bike has been repaired twice in just six days, but it's OK, as long as it is free (one year guarantee).

We visited Summer Palace on Sunday, which was quite majestic for one family.. I wonder what they did there in the heat of the summer. The place was semi-crowded and had some nice architecture and views. Especially the Suzhou-like area was original and had nice surroundings.

Some words about the placement test (for Chinese). We just filled out our names and were then permitted to leave as we did not know any Chinese. So it was very simple.

Restaurants here are quite varied. For example, yesterday me and Silja went to another vegetarian restaurant just outside the campus area. It was delicious and very filling, but also quite expensive when compared to the cafeteria prices of the campus area. In campus,the maximum to pay for a student dinner is 15 kuai, so it is one euro cheaper than in TKK. But many times the fee is something like 10 kuai. Unless you go to Qingqing pizza or hamburger, which also have been tested. Quite OK both of them, but I prefer the Chinese grub.

Now it is time to let the pictures do the talking. Pazalsta:

Kampusta ja korttipelejä

Summer Palace

Plan updates I

Hiya!

Yesterday evening we went out to a bar to check out the local nightlife. It seemed there was lot of westerners but also a lot of Chinese people. The bar was called Propaganda and a small bottle of beer cost there about 2 euros. So not going to buy any drinks from there anymore :). It was just one game of pool and that was it, although it was nice to see what happens in the late hours.

Earlier that day I applied for a double-entry visa, since I and Silja are going to go to Tokyo, Japan on the third of October. We'll spend a week there because there are no classes here during that time: it is the national week (1st of October it's going to be crazy in Beijing since it is the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic of China). The usual plane tickets (BTW this is the first time we are going to fly on this trip) cost maybe 600-800 euro back and forth, but I managed to find some cheap offer for 380 euros for a roundtrip. Which was nice. Accommodation there is about 18 euros / night in a hostel called Khaosan Tokyo Ninja. The original plan was to go also to South Korea, but as it would have almost tripled the traveling expenses, we decided not to pursue it this time.

Yesterday I and Ruslan went for some shopping in a Korean market area, where haggling was part of the deal. I grabbed some easy-going clothes with me while Ruslan bought a watch, a belt and a wallet. Not so expensive yeah, but still I think I overpaid - I'm a cheapskate. Now off to hunting a cheap bike for me..

Some pics

First few days in Tsinghua

Tsinghua Uni and the first few hours

The train from Tunxi to Beijing lasted 19 hours. The day went fast by talking to some Chinese police/army guys, of whom some knew kung fu and were actually ladies, very militant-spirited.. So, they did not talk any English, but I presented the admission notice to them to explain what I was doing in China and bribed them (as you would do for the street polices here in China) with few 50 eurocents, of which they tried to offer me 20 kuai, which I then rejected. I taught them to play Uno and they taught me this really cool Chinese card game. In addition, there was this student guy, who spoke a little more English, and we talked of various stuff also with him.

The night, on the other hand, was a nightmare. Some got even three seats for sleeping, but I got only one from the aisle-side, so as an owner of not-so-good back, I could not simply find any position to sleep. I fell asleep constantly but woke up instantly having entered the dreamland, as I would have fallen out of my seat. So maybe one or two hours of very shrapneled sleep. I ate during the trip maybe few fruits and some cookies and maybe 2 dl water. T'was odd.

It was dark when we arrived again to Beijing. We ate our breakfast in front of the train station (some sausage-on-a-stick and my train leftovers). I also brushed my teeth at the same location :). After this we left for the metro only to arrive to Wudaokou metro station, which was the nearest to our Tsinghua campus.

We got our apartments and had to pay over for the whole supposed stay instantly, plus a deposit and an extra fee for Sampo pankki. Nice. Our apartments are across each other in this building's corridor, so no need to walk long distances to talk about something.

My roommate comes from Tchetchenya (or however you write it) and is called Ruslan. He's also going to study Chinese, but in a different department. Ruslan seemed to be a very nice and polite person. We went instantly shopping to equip our residence with some common supplies such as toilet paper. We also got the laundry card, cafeteria card, a local SIM-card (whose price was determined by the actual phone number - superstitious stuff) and a bank account, to which I shall transfer some funds from Finland.

The campus is big area, but luckily there are primarily only bikes and silent scooters, so it is totally different from the midtown traffic of Beijing. Few malls can be found and lot of sport possibilities: tennis, basketball, football (soccer) and a sport hall, which I haven't yet checked out. It all seems very promising. Tomorrow I'll go and enroll myself to this China's second valued university.

Handful of pictures

Finally I figured out how to upload some pictures as the blogger's own service would not always work as wanted. Here they are, in chronological order. Note there are also videos in some galleries.

Moskova

Transmongolian

Peking pt. I

Shanghai

Hangzhou

Tunxi

Mt. Huang Shan

Allright, so do look at these pictures and videos and refer to the down below texts. I am truly sorry for this to be as hard as it is, but insufficient time and internet connections really did not cater for other alternative. From now on I shall pull myself together!

Best regards,
Junnu

Vibrations of the kung fu mountains (13.9.2009)

Our trip to Mt. Huang Shan began by travelling maybe an hour with a minibus to a town called Tangkou, near the highlands. From there we took a shuttle bus to the eastern gate of Mt. Huang Shan. The weather was extremely misty and the bus drivers were blinking their emergency lights to spot each other on the meandering, 180 degree zigzag road. I don't know actually how high the bus drove, but I'd guess it to be something like 300-500 meters.

At the gates we had a pleasant surprise as our student ID's were accepted and we got in with half of the actual price. Our hiker-team consisted of me, Silja and Ginger (Virginia Harding), a 48 (or 49) year-old lady from the U.S. She was extremely tough in terms of endurance for her age (I think) - as it will become evident - and was a good travel company as she was, like any good American, very good at talking shop. Besides, she liked the Simpsons so we had a great time. It was fun to notice that we Finnish people are not that eager to start conversations, but once someone budges us a little, we can talk a lot about anything. What I also noticed during the trip was that the Finnish people are more likely to be pessimistic than optimistic, although I think our view of the pessimism is kind of vowen into this dark humour: to be able to laugh at our despair or squeeze some (bad) humour out of it.

Off we went for the challenge! The east side was the easier side to ascend as it was only 6.5 kilometers of rock stairs up. Okay, maybe one sentence is not enough to describe it. As we (at least Silja and I) had already been walking everyday until our feet hurt like hell, the ascent was not like just any walk in the park. Sweat was everywhere and we stopped many times along the way to drink water and eat some of our snacks (which by the way I did not like the least bit, I bought them on Friday from Tunxi supermarket). So there we were walking up often passing by the other tourists (mostly Chinese) as we were in such a good shape! :) It went so that I rushed always up ahead and the girls would follow (I thought that this way they have some mental objective with me being up ahead of them). There were also these "mountain slaves", who were carrying these poles, to which some sellable products were attached with rope (the markets high above would need these obviously for the tourists). Their walking speed was veery slow and it looked like a total agony, a hellish experience. They get more money the more they carry, so it was no surprise every one of them was walking really slow. The higher we got the more everything also cost for the aforementioned reason. Luckily I brought with me 3 L of water (though I felt it in my back). We walked faster than the average person, according to what we heard.

When we got to the "top" all beaten, we went about circling the eastern side of the Mt. Huang Shan scenic area. The area was covered in fog/mist, so we could not see that far. In a way it was fun, because there were these ledges, and if you went just to the edge, you could just imagine what might lie under the mysterious mist. It was really like from some Kung Fu movie (like the end of the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, where in the end the girl flies down the mountain to receive her destiny). The scenery looked a lot alike. Having wandered for some time we decided to get to our hotel/hostel, which was one hour away. We had to climb for the Bright Peak, which was supposed to be teh place to see the sunrise next morning. Up and down, there was our hostel. We barely used the bathroom and went out again for the next challenge. It was said that the western scenery area would take four hours to complete and the time when we left for it was 14.45, and it would become dark at 18.30.

The western scenery area was really nothing like before.. We were walking first the mountains as narrow as our paths with sometimes no handrails - just a drop of maybe 500 meters. Everywhere were these great stone spires with green plants piercing the fog that was way down below us.. and sometimes you could see very far without the fog. The path went stairs up, stairs down, stairs up... And some of us began to have doubts whether we would ever make it, but I insisted on going and rushed in front :P. After some point we noticed that we were not alone in our endeavour but other as crazy as us were on the move. Walking on these 30 cm thick stairs, which were literally attached to the side of the mountain was somekind of a leap of faith, because only this 30 cm separated me and my team from a certain death. And having heard of the Chinese bridge construction skills, I was half-sure to be dead after this trip. But as I'm now writing this back in Tunxi hostel with my legs bashed and numb and so on, I'm still alive and kicking. Anywheys, we managed to get back to our hostel just when the sun went down.

I lodged in the boys' dormitory, in which there was four Chinese guys and one Ostrailian (Australian) might (mate), who had done the same deal that day, so we were both a little exhausted. Anyway after talking a bit I decided to retreat to my bed only to awake at 4 A.M.

In total darkness at 04.30 A.M. we climbed to the Bright Summit. I jumped over some fence up there to get to a rock with great view. Other tourists followed me behind. The sun rose later than we had thought and we never actually saw the sphere; just the sun's red radiance through the thick clouds. The views were very stylish with all the peaks just waking up and showing their tops through the sliding fog whilst the horizon was filled with warm colours getting brighter and brighter all the time. There were A LOT of tourist packed on the peak. We decided to go back down to the hostel to eat some corn and eggs for breakfast. After this we headed down for the western hills for the big descent.

Some people were crazy enough to climb upwards the western side of the mountain, which we were going down (it was said to be 15 km). At that point of the whole trip, however, going down was very painful because all the muscles in the feet, especially thighs, were so sore that they were trembling whenever they needed to be used in any way. That is why I either walked with no suspension in my feet (walking with stick-legs to prevent any muscle usage) or I ran down the stairs very fast to minimize the time needed for muscle use (there were these plateaus every once in a while). Finally, we reached the end barely being able to walk. We took a taxi to Tangkou, from which we went on by a bus to Tunxi bus station, AND from there to the hostel with a taxi. And went to eat some well-deserved junk food in a local KFC-clone, just to "balance out the equation".

Tomorrow at 09.xx A.M. it is time to approach the essence of the trip: return to Beijing for the studies. We are supposed to be at the campus on wed-thu to show our admission notice's to some people at the Tsinghua uni. If everything goes according to the plan, we should arrive to Beijing 05.xx A.M. tuesday morning, so there is lots of time left :). We reserved the train tickets on Friday, and since every Chinese student is returning to study, we barely managed to get the tickets for the train. The tickets: no seat. Means probably we will be situated in a pig house wagon filled with late/poor students unable to move even one bit. So this is going to be our last experience. Yeah!

First evening in Tunxi (11.9.2009)

It is always pleasant to affirm that in the hostels of today there is always some kind of an Internet connection available, and usually it is also free in the form of wireless LAN. It is a funny notion that in these rudimentary sceneries of a town there are bits floating around beyond the human vision. It is China allright.

After catching a bus from the Hangzhou West Bus Station this noon, we headed off for Tunxi district, 230 kilometers of agonizing torture in a bus with some Chinese EXTREMELY noisy teenagers. Luckily I grabbed my earphones for listening to some of my best of the best music from my Nokia. I thought at some point that it's odd listening to Westbam's Wizards of the Sonic and watching the meandering mountain-scenery of the more innerland China. Relatively amazing and ample countryside portraits remained in my mind - some incomprehensible simple Chinese villages or houses with their farmers, who were either ploughing or scorching their plantations. This must be the real China everybody has been talking about.

We arrived to Tunxi, which was - against our expectations - not just a settlement inhabited by cavemen but a real city with lots of traffic. The highlight of Tunxi must be the ancient street, where our hostel actually is located. All kinds of nice looking tourist-objects and whatnots are available on the street market. I bought a small backpack for tomorrow's trip to Mt. Huang Shan. The bus leaves tomorrow at 06.15 from the hostel. We are going to leave our bigger backpacks to the hostel as we are definitely not going to carry them to the 7th heaven. Instead, we bought lots of food and such, because we heard that the food prices go rocket-high the more
altitude one gains. One of the main sights of Mt. Huang Shan is to see the sunrise at just before 5 A.M. when the morning mist recedes a little and one might see the first sunbeams coming through the clouds below. The hostel at the summit is mighty-well priced as it is also the weekend: 210 kuai / person / night.

Correct me if I'm wrong but..

..today's major achievement also was to re-discover some basic electronics. Was not it so that impedance consists of resistance (R) and the imaginary part can consist of both conductive and inductive reactance (if C and L are both present)? And admittance consisted of conductance and susceptance?

This interesting piece of information popped to my head when watching a sign in the island middle of the lake, where it said "No admittance". So if there is no admittance (admittance = 0), it must follow that the impedance of that place is infinite. So I'm definitely not going to get into that place. Nerd signing off.

Wonder of the West Lake (Xi hú) (10.9.2009)

It was a noticeable improvement to the air quality compared to the previous cities when arriving to Hangzhou. Hangzhou is a city of maybe one million inhabitants, and even though there seemed to be lots of this fog in the distance (smog?), the air was less stuffy as in Shanghai. Hot it was still, don't know how much but sweating occured big time.

It feels as if every time nowadays I go even for a short walk, legs start immediately aching. This happened also yesterday when we were strolling in the south-east corner of the West Lake. There were lots of pavillions and boats both coming and going from the several piers of the shores to the islands in the middle of the lake.

Also, I think a major scam was about to happen to us for the first time in China: this handicapped person from waist down came to talk to us with his three-wheeled scooter about Nokia and whatnot. Then I (to my misfortune) asked him about the local Longjiang (or something like that) tea and if he knew where we could get it for cheap. The guy said he knew and started yapping some prices for us, which we thought to be expensive, but I remember having read something about such amounts, so I did not get suspicious. Well, we thought why not, after all it is a local specialty and the guy otherwise seemed to have a good sense of humour and stories of all kinds. When we got to the tea place, the price was 25 kuai for one cup. We thought this might be too expensive for the both of us to take, so we decided to share one cup. The handicapped guy was translating the teahouse manager's speech and said that we had to take two cups. OK, so... well allright, let's take two cups, it's only a once in a lifetime thing. The next thing the manager came up with was that we had to pay all in advance. At that point my inner alarm bells sprung off to the fullest extent. I said no thank you, we are leaving now, rose up quickly and walked away from the scene. The snake tried to scam us big time.. I was upset some time but got over it. Had we seen the scooter-guy once more I don't know what would have happened. Probably nothing :).

On the same night we depraved ourselves of our Chinese McDonalds virginity. 2.5 euro for the most expensive meal (quite small actually), so compared to the price was OK, but otherwise did not fill up my westerner's expectations. I have to say also in this part that on the next day we went to KFC just for the fun of it. It was total crap.

In our hostel was this nice Chinese student guy, who was also travelling. It was fun to learn that in China there is also a surname that resembles to mine: Lehtinen in English is something like Leaflet, and in China it's Ye. So, thus far I might be called Johnny Ye. Not bad actually! :) Sounds like some American-Chinese videogame programmer name. AnywaIy, I was talking with the guy about the Chinese government. My conclusions were that the Chinese people do not care that much about the government and their way of doing things, because everything works just fine as they are. I have to agree that there has not been any friction between me and the authorities here in China. I pointed out that the Chinese freedom of speech and press transparence is not in the best shape in China. He agreed, and said he always reads the foreign newspapers also on the Internet. It was fun to learn that also the western media manipulates stuff: the guy said he had noticed that sometimes the western media stories are the complete opposite than they should be (of which he knows how they should be) or some part of the story is manipulated. That might be so.. I started to think maybe the western media is trying to make us westerners think of China as this non-free country, where one has to fear for his life. Who knows who is pulling the western media's strings in the background and what are its intentions. I put it this way to the Chinese guy and I also think this way: corruption can be either visible or non-visible. In China, it is usually visible. This form of corruption is not that dangerous if some next-to-nobody policeman takes some bribes. The hidden corruption is what is dangerous; it is what is probably practiced in every western "modern" government or some sort of power structure. These corrupted people wear smart suits and make decisions, which affect whole nations, even the whole world. And these are the people who have the final say in everything that happens. This is a scary thought. Maybe China, in its own way, is actually very free country indeed. Free of the power-having scum? Well, hard to say at least. Every country has its unique faults.

This day we went around the whole friggin' lake (the lake is quite big so it took a moment and another) and climbed up to this Leifeng Pagoda, which was at a quite high spot. You could see the whole lake and probably Hangzhou from up there, the views were very "niché". Finally, we took a boat to one of the lake's artificial islands, which was a nice pastime after the agonizing walk around the lake.

Tonight we splurged our splurgeness all over Hangzhou. In layman's terms, we went to a Japanese restaurant called Teppanyaki. We had read it would cost 168 kuai for a meal with no limits and one could have beer and sake as much as one would like. You guessed it yeah, there was no such deal. The cheapest thing in the menu was 180 kuai, so we took that (20 euros or so). OK, so there was this battalion of waitresses eagerly serving us and following every single move we made. The best of the best was that we had our personal chef, who cooked right in front of us by using the metallic table as a stove (or wok?). The dinner consisted of maybe 5 or 6 different portions: salad, soup, pre-main-course (cod), main course (chicken and steak) and the dessert (ice-cream, roasted banana plus some fruits). The amount of tea was unbounded, and every time my elbow would rise too high when having a sip, the waitress ran to me to serve me another cup. OK, so the total price rose up to 448 kuai (with one beer included), which is like 47 euros or alike. And there were actually 2000 kuai meals there also... So fortunately we took the cheapest.

Hangzhou was nice city, because it was less hectic than Shanghai or Beijing. We Finnish like this. What we don't like is that everybody's staring at us for 30 seconds at least and not even having common courtesy to try to hide it. Everybody also wants to take a photo with us for some reason.. Maybe we are so peculiar-looking to them. This morning in a restaurant some Chinese couple was laughing to the way we were eating with our chopsticks and staring harshly us.. So I always try to look as if though I was a common person just trying to survive my daily routines, but it becomes impossible when you feel eyes everywhere on you..maybe it's the Finnish shyness gene? From now on, if I become irritated I start photographing also the one who photograph me. See how it feels like to be a zoo animal in your own land, ha!

Tomorrow it's time to leave for our last "packet" of this tournee, namely the Huang Shan. We are probably going to bunk at a hostel in the Tunxi district (Huang Shan city downtown, it's all very confusing the naming), which is an hour drive away from the famous mountains of Huang Shan. There our feet will probably literally kill us when rising to the near 2 kilometer mountain tops. In exchange there' going to be some mighty fine scenes to be photographed!

Showdown (9.9.2009)

Writing this I am sitting on a train about to leave for Hangzhou, some 200 kilometers south-west of Shanghai. Little more than 5 euros for these seats, which might be classified in Finland as business class (soft seats with lots of space for feet). Not exactly sure though this is the right train, but let's see where we end up :).

Yesterday was another agonizing day for our feet. We woke up as early as 6 A.M. to get a glance of the lonely wolves, who do Tai Chi in the Century Park early in the morning. It was also a pretty good idea to have a breakfast picnic in the lake situated in the middle of the park. Menu included some sausage, sweet pastries, yoghurt (surprisingly good), nigiri sushis in a box, crackers, juice and a kinder bueno. Muy bueno! The park itself was neat and had some great scenery, shaped bushes and a fountain square, in which there were about 100 separate fountains in the ground, which were programmed to squirt water in some pattern, according to the song that was playing (clipping occured though) from the speakers.

After the stroll we walked via Century Road to Shanghai Science & Technology Museum. The museum as a whole was pretty normal, as there was lots of stuff that I - at least - knew already: stuff about physics, genetics, Heureka-type of wonder stuff and some network stuff that were praised from heaven to earth, how it shall change the world. And can you believe me, they actually have langaton intternetti there! Tell me something I don't know? Interesting stuff was some exhibition about different animals with lots of data about them and these cool stuffed versions, which appeared in their usual daily activities (e.g. lion killing a deer, whose intestines were shown). Another worthwhile exhibition was this geology-related tour, which had lots of info of earth's inner workings. Space exhibition was also nice in some parts. Probably the most relevant thing in the museum for me was my first touch with the 3-D (and 4-D!) movies. The downside was the movies were in Chinese with no subtitles. Oh well, the HD-quality of some verrry cool sea animals with soundtrack by Randy Edelman was enough to keep me interested for 40 minutes. The 4-D movie I mentioned was pretty authentic. There was e.g. Christopher Lloyd acting in this 25 minute flick, which had 3-D picture, but had an extra dimension: what the characters feel, you feel (externally of course :)) - when there was a storm, I would feel this breeze; whenever they got wet, I got wet; when some rats swarmed in the actors' feet, it felt that way also for me.. believe me, many rose their feet up and panicked! :)

Le Grande Finale for our Shanghai tour was - obviously - to go to a place, where they serve the world's highest ice-cream (served in a building). There was two options: either we would go to Shanghai World Financial Centre (SWFC, observation deck at ~450 meters) or Jin Mao tower (observation deck at ~340 meters). The latter was cheaper and had better view to the most important part for us: the Huangpu River and Pearl Tower. SWFC was behind the Jin Mao tower and although SWFC being a lot higher, Jin Mao would have blocked the view essentially. So there we were in the Jin Mao observation deck looking at the Shanghai lights at 19.00 (it was pretty dark already then, or at least very dusky). How big a city can be? You could just crop an area off from a part of Shanghai in your mind and think that "oh well, there went Helsinki".

After landing safely back to the ground we went to some restaurant for the last supper in Beijing and retreated to the warm bosom of our hostel beds.

P.S. Happy birthday to Miia Sahlman!

Animal agony and Russian rehearsing (7.9.2009)

Yesterday evening we rolled the dice regarding the upcoming program before heading back to Beijing. It shalt be so that we would leave on wednesday 9.9 to Hangzhou in the morning by a train, spend a few days there and finally go to Mt. Huang Shan for a few days of agony in the form of mountain climbing in exchange for breathtaking sights.

Today we used taxi for the first time in China to get to the Shanghai zoo. Everything went just fine, there were no attempts of abuse FYI all grannies and granny-minded out there :). Anywheys, the zoo was about 15 km from our hostel and was pretty huge, although I don't know how to compare it to e.g. Korkeasaari zoo, because I was there too long ago. Let's just say that every animal type was somehow on display. Mixed feelings about the whole place: lots of animals I have never seen and especially the monkeys were playsome. The darker side was e.g. the dogs, who were even sometimes alone in their very ascetic prison somewhere in the grim corners of the zoo, where hardly anybody visited.. They looked as though they would rather be slaughtered than stand there for people to be gazed at like some fools. Some of the animals we missed, like hippo or rhino, and some were just so bored and/or baked in the sun that they did not move at all and were (surprisingly..) in the hardest-to-see corner of their perimeter (I'd do the same thing actually, if I was imprisoned there).

Later that evening we met at our hostel some Russian people, on which we could practice our 2 weeks old Russian skills. They were amazed of my skills and told me that I should speak Russian to them instead of English :); I was of course flattered as much as delighted, as Russian is a language I somehow like... They offered me tea and some sweet cake to easen the pain of 7 hours of walking in the zoo. Ivan - the guy - gave me his contact info and introduced her mother to us. They were from Krasnoyarsk and had traveled through 8 cities in China in just 14 days, including Beijing and Guangzhou. They've seen many places I'd say! I heard there is a great big waterpark in Guangzhou - this place I must go to someday!

Badminton park (6.9.2009)

The next thing on the pipeline was the trip to the old city and (former) French Concession.

The old city radiated this old bazaar spirit with its hundreds of small boutiques. Probably the most ethereal visit so far was the tour around Yuyuan Gardens, which regrettably (on Sunday) was filled with tourists from China, Japan and Spain. Small ponds and pavilions in lush green surroundings, along with rockeries and nice little stone pavings.. The ponds were filled with big red fish. Yeah, Yuyuan Gardens I could have as my backyard. Another place in the old city was the Temple of City Gods. It was nothing compared to Beijing's Lama Temple, as it was just too commercial and had no pride in it.

Multiple parks, such as Huaihai and Fuxing park became familiar along the streets of French Concession. French Concession is an area near and around Huaihai road, which once was a place, which was inhabited by the French. It is apparent on first glance: both sides of roads are covered with trees, and the architecture has France all over it. There was this splurge-complex in French-like surroundings, Xiantiandi (Heaven and Earth). It appeared to be for those people, who also like their pedestrian streets to be free of any kind of reality that a city has to offer ;).

Lonely Planet misguided us as we were hungry as hell, restaurant was nowhere to be found. So we walked a bit until with our last handpowers we managed to crawl into a Chinese local restaurant in Ruijin Er road. We ate the Shanghaian basic food: xiao bao, some kind of fried buns with meat inside. We had no idea what other dishes they had to offer, because they had only Chinese menus. Fortunately we had this paper of various dishes, with both pinyin (Chinese in English) and Chinese characters. I took the best egg-tomato-stew ever, I hear it is the basic food in every restaurant. Silja took something, and finally they brought in forth of us what appeared to be some aubergine-pork-stew. It was delicious! And man we were stuffed up.. the price: 35 kuai - little less than 4 euros, so maybe 1.9 euros per eater.

However, the best road in the French Concession was definitely the Shaoxing road.. maybe because it was so calm in Shanghai's otherwise congested neighbourhoods. The street was beautiful with its trees lining nicely as far as the eye could see. And there was this park (Shaoxing), to which we went to watch old men play cards and few kids play badminton. Suddenly one of the kids asked me to play badminton in the park. I said why not, and punished him (or her?) severely :). But man I was sweaty. After this we retreated back to our hostel via metro - although first buying some Suntory and Snow beers.