ive always wanted to go to china and see the great wall, the only man made structure visible from outer space. i took up chinese mandarin for a semester in university and always said that id try to become an expert in speaking chinese and maybe be able to teach the language part time. well that never happened, ive kept about 3 to 4 sentences in my head..and i never got to use any of those when i went to beijing and never said one chinese word despite the fact that i brought a chinese-english booklet with me.
i love beijing. i stayed for a week there in a nice homey apartment owned/rented by filipino couchsurfers. oh they were nice to me and i got to stay for free. my friend jopet had created an itinerary for my weeklong stay in beijing. i followed most of it, changed the sequence of events and activities and dismissed a few items in it due to time, physical and financial constraints.
there's so many things i love about beijing.
food - just wonderful. authentic chinese cuisine.
i stayed at landscape apartment in chaoyang district and across the street at the corner is a restaurant that serves oh so yum dishes. not very pricey but the quality is good. i felt like i was eating in a nice expensive chinese restaurant in cebu but paid a quarter of the price. i had a spicy bean curd dish, spicy diced chicken with nuts and rice. i went there twice for the chicken with the nuts. there's always a mix of spicy and sweet and sour, never too salty. chinese food is just right for my taste.
one day i went to see a couchsurfer in a hospital he was supposed to host me but couldnt cos he got sick, i took a train from the hospital and stopped at liangmaqiao station. i walked out and went to the bus stop, i was very hungry. i couldnt take it anymore so i went to check if there are foodshops near the bus stop, i walked around the corner and saw a pricey looking italian restaurant and about 3 shops from it is a small eatery. i went inside and signed that i wanted the same thing that the man at the other table is having. the menu was in chinese so i couldnt understand, my body language mustve been effective cos after about two minutes my dumplings arrived. there are ten dumplings in one serving and i ordered the clear soup too with egg and vegetables. it was so good, and all of that cost me less than 10 yuan. it's a small shop, equivalent to a carenderia in the philippines but their food is good. and you can tell that they use fresh ingredients.
then i walked out and saw another small shop selling like some sort of pancakes. thought id try it. it was flat bread and you get to choose what you want to put inside it, they have spicy pork and i think sausages and chicken pieces. i chose the pork, he diced it and i paid 6 yuan, it was still hot. i never got to finish that one cos i was so full after having a dumpling feast. while walking down the street of nan lu guo xiang, dinah (my host) pointed out to me churros, a mexican snack thats made of dough shaped into about 5 inches long thick sticks and comes with a chocolate dip. cost, 15 yuan. and i said, okay i'll try. and i loved it. i loved it that when we got back to the apartment i quickly sent a message to my sister and told her that we have to franchise churros in the phils. and searched the net for churro recipes. surprisingly when i went back to cebu, i saw a churros franchise i thought nobody in cebu knew about churros yet, i bought some (this was in sm city cebu) and man they were terrible. really terrible, the ones i made at home after coming back from beijing tasted better. anyway, i liked the churros at nan lu guo xiang.. i tried to go back to that street just to taste it again but i got lost along the way so i turned back. and then i tried another day, and i was successful, i got to experience another time the buttery taste of the warm nicely done fried dough after dipping it in a melted chocolate delight.
during the last day of my visit i went out with a very nice chinese guy that i met in a bus that i got on mistake (this was when i got lost) we went to the summer palace together. he was so genuinely nice, liuzeyu is his name. liuzeyu tried hard to acquaint me with everything chinese and wanted me to have a great experience. before entering the summer palace, i noticed a crowd of people gathering around a mobile food stall. and because i am what i am, which is snoopy, i went near to see what it was. and i wanted some. the lady was selling like crepes the inside was stuffed with spicy sausage and some lettuce and an egg. i thought it was delicious and had it for breakfast. paid 6 yuan for it.
at the summer palace, liuzeyu made me try this traditional chinese soup. look i felt cold already so i wanted to buy some hot drink, i chose hot chocolate but liuzeyu insisted that i buy the soup. it was presented to me in a bowl. the seller put some powder (almond flavor, i think it was a mix of almond powder and starch) into the bowl and poured water in it then sprinkled black sesame seeds on top. it didnt look very delicious but looks can be deceiving. it was mmmm good at the first 10 sips but after that i felt that it became too sweet and got cold and i just had to throw it out. cost: 10 yuan.
after a few hours of walking i offered liuzeyu a snack that i brought from cebu. otap. i proudly declared, you know its a delicacy from cebu. liuzeyu was an honest guy, he ate some after i insisted that he taste it, and said "you know what, we have the same or almost the same kind of dessert here in beijing and to be frank, i think it's much better than this." i must have turned red even though it was freezing cold and we both laughed.
we went to a street called wangfujing. its a busy street with lots shops high end and bargain stores, locals and foreigners. i wanted to try something exotic as i heard that you can find exotic food in this street. and we did find the place after looking and asking around for almost an hour. you go inside a small alley and from the entrance you can already see and smell the exotic-ness of what;s in there. youll see displayed scorpions, bugs that look like beetles or fat cockroaches, seahorses, starfish..when i saw the starfish i was like, what? you can eat that? i heard they sell spiders and worms for consumption too. of course you dont eat them alive. liuzeyu and i paid 20 yuan for 4 dead skewered scorpions. theyre tiny. it was fried, until it looked like it has zero percent water content a dehydrated scorpion and dipped into a mix of spices. according to the person who sold this exotic snack to us, this is actually healthy and can help get rid of toxins from the body. oh well. so we went ahead, i ate two and liuzeyu ate two. i broke off the tail part where the venom and sting was supposed to be, i cant risk being food poisoned in china hehe. and my nice friend ate all of his share. it was nice. id probably do it again when i return to beijing.
...unfinished post
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