Well it's been an eventful weekend so far. We got out of work on Thursday evening (04.30.09) to head out and watch the acrobats show at the Chaoyang Theatre. We got the cheap tickets and to our surprise, we were sitting 2nd row. Apparently the more expensive tickets are further back but it's understandable because at times the people were literally doing stuff right above us. What an amazing show. I said that after seeing that, it's understandable as to why the Chinese are so good at gymnastics. There were certain things that just didn't seem possible; it was a true "did that just happen" moment. Between the ladies spinning plates and piling 12 deep on a bike, and the men doing crazy jumps and death defying stunts (I sound like an advertisement); it was just pretty awesome.
After the show we walked around the district a bit, but then ended up heading back to Sanlitun to grab a bite to eat and a drink. We were planning on heading to the Great Wall on Friday, but got a phone call saying it was supposed to rain, so we cancelled the trip. Therefore, we decided to stay out a little while in Sanlitun. We stumbled upon a rooftop bar called Bar Blue (after running across the Cheers bar we were searching for a few weeks ago and eating a stomach ache in a wrap aka lamb doner). We met a few new friends (guy from Ireland, Wisconsin, and North Carolina - and another from France). We all went out to another bar which was an old Firehouse but pretty lame (after running into our friend Tim on the street - Beijing maybe isn't so big!). The music was pretty bad, but the french guy loved it - he was pumping it to "it's raining men" and "ymca". Pretty funny.
Friday we decided to experiment with the bus and subways (not too bad and very cheap - we like it) and head out to Hou Hai and check out the Bell Tower, Drum Tower and all the different Hutongs. The area is a place that many of the people at work always talk about going. It was really cool. All the different alley ways with all the little hidden bars was pretty nice to walk through. We checked out the tower and looked over all the Hutongs and out towards the Forbidden City. We were also approached by a chinese artist who took us into his studio and showed us all of his work along with his daughters work who is hoping to go to Boston next year. He also painted our names for us as a gift. It was pretty nice of him. We grabbed a little snack and headed back to the apt for a little relaxation. And by relaxation, I mean a nice foot massage downstairs. We headed back towards the Drum Tower later that night to meet up with a friend of a friend (Thanks Swati!) who has been living in Beijing for a couple years and was having a goodbye party for a couple expats that were heading back to Australia. We are slowly getting into the loop here, so that's nice.
Today (Saturday) is another nice day. Apparently the rain that we cancelled our trip for was not natural or so we heard (Chinese government making it rain for the holiday weekend to make the weather nice – how about we do that every weekend).
More from the weekend to come...
After the show we walked around the district a bit, but then ended up heading back to Sanlitun to grab a bite to eat and a drink. We were planning on heading to the Great Wall on Friday, but got a phone call saying it was supposed to rain, so we cancelled the trip. Therefore, we decided to stay out a little while in Sanlitun. We stumbled upon a rooftop bar called Bar Blue (after running across the Cheers bar we were searching for a few weeks ago and eating a stomach ache in a wrap aka lamb doner). We met a few new friends (guy from Ireland, Wisconsin, and North Carolina - and another from France). We all went out to another bar which was an old Firehouse but pretty lame (after running into our friend Tim on the street - Beijing maybe isn't so big!). The music was pretty bad, but the french guy loved it - he was pumping it to "it's raining men" and "ymca". Pretty funny.
Friday we decided to experiment with the bus and subways (not too bad and very cheap - we like it) and head out to Hou Hai and check out the Bell Tower, Drum Tower and all the different Hutongs. The area is a place that many of the people at work always talk about going. It was really cool. All the different alley ways with all the little hidden bars was pretty nice to walk through. We checked out the tower and looked over all the Hutongs and out towards the Forbidden City. We were also approached by a chinese artist who took us into his studio and showed us all of his work along with his daughters work who is hoping to go to Boston next year. He also painted our names for us as a gift. It was pretty nice of him. We grabbed a little snack and headed back to the apt for a little relaxation. And by relaxation, I mean a nice foot massage downstairs. We headed back towards the Drum Tower later that night to meet up with a friend of a friend (Thanks Swati!) who has been living in Beijing for a couple years and was having a goodbye party for a couple expats that were heading back to Australia. We are slowly getting into the loop here, so that's nice.
Today (Saturday) is another nice day. Apparently the rain that we cancelled our trip for was not natural or so we heard (Chinese government making it rain for the holiday weekend to make the weather nice – how about we do that every weekend).
More from the weekend to come...
stomach ache in a wrap
you can't have doners without a disco ball
we are training to be acrobats
some of the local artists through our studio tour
Gao "Vincent" giving us a tour of his studio
it's totally legit
the kid on the left proceeded to try and sell us stuff... seriously
cheese
Bell Tower
steps to the top
overlooking the Hutongs "old china"
Drum and Bell bar with some friends
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