Hou Hai and the Hutongs

At this point on our fourth day, we were able to visit almost all the places we wanted to go to in Beijing. These last two days were a little more stress-free than the previous ones. My brother and I decided to visit the Lama Temple first, which was also in our original itinerary. But while walking around the subway, we thought it would be best to go and visit The Egg again to take some morning shots. After taking some pictures of The Egg, we then went ahead to visit the Yonghegong Lama Temple, located in the northeastern part of Beijing. After dropping ourselves off the Yonghegong Subway, we saw three monks crossing the street and we kinda figured they’re probably on their way to the temple, so we went ahead and followed them. And we were right. I was not really impressed of the place, considering that we do have a number of temples here in the Philippines already, so nothing really spectacular there to look at. Aside from the way the people pray and do their worship moves, I kinda thought the place was really boring. Sorry, it’s just me. I have this thing about religious places of worship that bores me. Hey, now you know why I don’t go to church. And I felt like I was about to suffocate from all the incense burning going on around there. After less than an hour, we decided to leave the place and visit Hou Hai.

Considered to be one of the most interesting and popular spots in Beijing, the area around the joined lakes of Qian Hai and Hou Hai, is the home to many restaurants, bars and cafes. Traditionally been home to nobles and wealthy merchants, the Hou Hai area is surrounded also by several grand homes, hidden in the labyrinthine old lanes knows as hutongs. This is a rare quarter of Beijing where the 21st century is kept at bay, and these back alleys represent one of the most satisfying parts of the city to explore on foot or by rickshaw.

After having lunch in one of their McDonald’s restaurants there, my brother and I continued to walk and walk, not actually knowing where we were during that time. We both know that we’re in the Hou Hai area already, we just don’t know where in Hou Hai exactly (edited: we were actually in Nanluoguxiang!). A few minutes later, we saw a couple of huge towers, just facing each other. I scanned my little guidebook and saw that we were actually just outside the Drum and Bell Towers. Since there was a drum performance scheduled at 1:30PM during that day in the Drum Tower, and it was around 12:30PM already, we decided to enter the Bell Tower first. Originally built for musical reasons, it was later used to announce the time and is now a tourist attraction here in Beijing. We had to walk up around a hundred steps to reach the top and then take pictures of the Hou Hai area from the top. We then transferred to the Drum Tower to walk the same long walk to the top, watch the drum performances and take more pictures of Hou Hai from above.

We then decided to continue on walking, trying to locate Hou Hai Lake. Located between two other lakes in the scenic Shichahai area, the beautiful Hou Hai Lake is surrounded, not only by a number of bars and restaurants, tea and coffee shops, but also with a bunch of locals and tourists relaxing, hanging out and just enjoying the calming and peaceful atmosphere of the place. We really didn’t know between the two connecting lakes as to which one was the Hou Hai Lake and which one was Qian Hai. All we know was that they’re being connected by the pretty and arched Silver Ingot Bridge, which was also the perfect spot to view small boats being rented by tourists and locals to peddle on the lakes themselves. We would’ve wanted to stay there longer but the sky’s getting a little gloomy, so we decided to look for our last stop, which was the Prince Gong Mansion.

Prince Gong’s Mansion or Gong Wang Fu Museum is located in the western part of Central Beijing, north of the Shichahai Lake. Consisting of large mansions in the typical siheyuan layout and gardens, Prince Gong’s Mansion is known as one of the most ornate and extravagant residence compounds in all of Beijing. I would consider it as a miniature Summer Palace and the place was really filled with so many visitors. I think we were the only ones who didn’t look Chinese there. I don’t think I even saw any Caucasion tourists inside the mansion grounds that time. Said to be one of the most exquisite and well-preserved royal mansions in Beijing, Prince Gong’s Mansion used to house several families and has a total area of 60,000 square meters. Filled with buildings, gardens, mini-lakes, pavilions, artifical hills and several siheyuan courtyards, plus it’s own grand opera house, it was one of the highlights of this Hou Hai experience.

After roaming around the mansion grounds, we then decided to head back to the hostel. It was starting to drizzle while we were in the streets already. We happened to meet this friendly Chinese girl who spoke English that went with us to the Ping-Anli Subway Station and even shared her umbrella with me. She was very chatty and I had a great time talking to her about our experience in Beijing so far. She even mentioned that she finds their current climate hot. Huh? While I was already shivering from the cold breeze, this is still considered as hot? I told her she should visit the Philippines so she can experience a whole new level of crazy hotness there. I had a great time roaming around the Hou Hai area and the locals there were very, very friendly and helpful. That, I really didn’t expect. Once we arrived back at the hostel, we decided to rest for a while and head out to the Beijing Olympic Park to take some night shots of the Bird’s Nest and the Water Cube.

For our last day in Beijing, we decided to de-stress since we were able to go to all the places we wanted to go to for this trip. My sister wanted to do some bargain hunting, so I went with her to the Beijing Zoo Market, the most popular and cheapest clothing market in Beijing. Located just across the Beijing Zoo, hence the name, this market sells everything from clothes to accessories to sports equipments. I did not find it cheap at all. The Bangkok markets are actually cheaper for me, and had a lot of choices compared to this one. After buying some clothes, we passed by another shopping mall, the U Center and did some more shopping. In the afternoon, we went back to the hostel and after packing my stuff, I decided to do some more shopping in Wangfujing on my own while my sister went biking with my brother around the hutongs.

We decided to have dinner in one of the restaurants near the hostel, which has always been fully-packed with customers every day. Nothing on the menu was English so we just went inside, took pictures of the food on the other customers’ tables and showed it to the waiter. That was our last dinner before we leave for the airport. Our flight was scheduled to leave around midnight so we had the hostel arrange a taxi for us to be brought back to the airport. It was probably one of the most bittersweet moments I’ve had while on vacation, saying goodbye to all the sweet girls from Happy Dragon, which definitely made this vacation more special. We took some pictures with them and felt bad when we cannot add them on Facebook since it’s banned in China. I would have to say that this Beijing vacation tops them all as one of the most unforgettable and enjoyable trips I’ve ever had (sorry, Hanoi). I knew I would love this place, I did not expect it to love it that much. Definitely one of the places I would love to come back to again and again. And hey, I may not look like it, but I’m still part Chinese. My grandfather would’ve been proud of me. 🙂

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Beijing 2012 : The Summer Palace, Olympic Park & 798 Art District

For our third day in Beijing, I had decided that we will hire a car with a driver to bring us to the places we plan to go to for that day. These are places that are not easily accessible by subway so it was more convenient for us to hire a driver for 8 hours to make it easier for us to go to one place to another. I had made prior reservations with the hostel and instructed them the places we plan to go to for that date: The Summer Palace, Olympic Park and 798 Art District. The Olympic Park is accessible via subway but since we have some more hours left, we decided to squeeze it in as well.

Our driver picked us up around 8AM. The receptionist gave him the instructions as to where we plan to go to, and I had with me my little notepad of Chinese words that I have prepared the night before in order for us to communicate with the driver. We expected him not to speak any English so preparing ourselves with those Chinese words was very helpful. Stuff like “What time do we meet here”, “we would like to have lunch”, etc. are the ones on top of my list.

Our first stop was The Summer Palace, approximately one and a half hours away from our hostel. We paid for the entrance tickets, bought ourselves the map for the Summer Palace, studied it and started exploring. The place was huger than huuuuuge. It’s twice the size of the Temple Of Heaven or even more. Also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Summer Palace, considered to be a masterpiece of Chinese landscape garden design, is a majestic display of natural landscape of hills and open water, combined with artificial features such as pavilions, halls, palaces, temples and bridges to form a harmonious ensemble of outstanding aesthetic value. To put it simply, it’s like entering a whole new kingdom in China.

Probably my most favorite spot in this particular trip, the Summer Palace is a world on its own. Unlike the Forbidden City and the Temple Of Heaven, where everything looks almost the same over and over again, the Summer Palace is filled with just about every breathtaking sight to see. From the Longevity Hill to the beautiful Kunming Lake, the Marble Boat, the pavilions nested on top of large rocks overlooking the lake, the artistic bridges and the unique temples, it exudes with this relaxing zen mode type of feeling that would want to make you stay the entire day here or simply live here and never leave.

After three whole hours of non-stop walking and picture taking, we found ourselves leaving for the exit to meet up with our driver. I guess he was surprised that we were on time. If there’s one thing that I know I am good at, it’s time management. We then decided to have lunch and he brought us to this restaurant, that seemed like an eatery to me. Which was really cool, just the way I wanted it, eating on the streets of Beijing, not knowing exactly where we are at that point but just enjoying their local delicacies without a big bite on our budget.

Our next stop was the Olympic Park. Seeing the Bird’s Nest and the Water Cube is definitely at the top of my must-see places here. The driver gave us an hour to roam around the place. We were only there to take pictures of the two stadiums, so that was enough time for us to explore. Also known as the Olympic Green, the Beijing Olympic Park is located in the Chaoyang District and was specifically constructed for the 2008 Summer Olympics. They even had to create a subway line for this particular location.

The Beijing National Stadium or “Bird’s Nest” is the centerpiece of this project. It hosted the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics and also the athletics and football finals of the Games. Costing around US$423 million, with it’s artistic and futuristic look, no wonder many tourists and visitors are seduced to view and take pictures of this magnificent work of art. The Beijing National Aquatics Center or “Water Cube”, on the other hand, located just beside the Bird’s Nest, hosted the swimming, diving and synchronized swimming events of the Olympics. Since the Olympic Park is one of those sights best seen at night, we also decided to return here the next day to take some more pictures. And yes, it’s a hundred times more beautiful at night.

Probably the coolest place in Beijing, actually in China, the 798 Art District was our next stop. As the name suggests, it is an entire district that houses a thriving artistic community, among 50-year old decommissioned military factory buildings of unique architectural style. Everything here is all about art. From the stores, the shops, the food, even the vandalism on the city walls are all about art. We had three hours to explore the place. Good thing I have a map with me handy of the place. We actually got lost after circling the entire area so we decided to backtrack using our camera pics. Yes, we did that. That’s a big advantage if you are such a cam-whore I guess hehe. We went back to meet with our driver around 4:30PM to bring us back to the hostel. We then spent the rest of the day doing some more shopping in Wangfujing.

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The Great Wall Great Walk

On our second day in Beijing, we have scheduled ourselves to visit The Great Wall Of China, probably China’s most popular tourist destination and historical site. It’s one of those places that you’ve grown learning about through old history books in school and through travel shows on TV. They say you have never been to China if you haven’t been to The Wall, so not only is it a site to see, it’s a must for every traveller in China to come and visit the historical Great Wall.

We have scheduled through our hostel the pickup for our Mutianyu Great Wall adventure. The wall has a number of sections, due to it’s vast spread all over the northern boarders of China, and people online have recommended to take the Mutianyu area to experience the cable car and the toboggan run, one of the highlights of this tour. Other sections like Badaling, Jinshaling, Shanhaiguan and Simatai are either too far out or jam-packed with tourists already, so Mutianyu was the perfect option for us.

We arrived at the Mutianyu area at around 10am, approximately 2 and a half hours from our pickup at our hostel. We were briefed by the guide, showed us the Mutianyu map, and the various watchtowers and sections where we can try the cable car and the personal wheeled toboggan. We bought our tickets for the cable car and toboggan run and went ahead in crossing the mountains to the start our Great Wall climb.

It was a pretty sunny day during that time, but was super windy and cold, that I ended up suffering from super chapped lips. We had about 3 and a half hours to explore the Wall, took pictures here and there and just marveled at the experience of finally making it here to one of the places that has always been on my bucket list. A sense of fulfillment went through me as I absorbed the scenes from almost every spot during that long Great Wall walk.

My brother heard a couple of American tourists talk about going through the restricted area, where they heard that the views were actually more breathtaking. He convinced me to go through that area and they were right. The place was restricted because we were actually walking along the cliff, right at the edge of the mountains, surrounded by some ruins of the Wall, but it was an amazing sight to see. The panoramic view of that particular area in the wall was just so breathtaking, I didn’t want to leave. After a few minutes of picture taking and some daredevil attempts to stand at the edge of the cliff, we went back down the trail to continue on walking around the Wall.

After about almost 4 hours of non-stop walking and picture taking, we finally arrived at the toboggan run area to try this really cool luge ride down the Wall. It was a fairly easy ride to navigate, but the only thing I didn’t like about that ride was that we had to keep on stopping since there was a family with a couple of kids in front of us, who was sliding down really, really slow and had the audacity to stop and take pictures of each other as well. I really wanted to try it again and slide down the Wall in full blast, Fast & The Furious mode. I was pretty much cursing those kids the entire time during that ride.

At around 2pm, we met with the rest of the group from our bus and had lunch on this restaurant a few walks from the market area. We arrived back at our hotel around 4:30PM where we decided to take about a couple of hours’ rest. At about 7PM, we decided to visit the National Centre for the Performing Arts, more popularly known as The Egg, which was just across Tiananmen Square. The Centre, an ellipsoid dome of titanium and glass surrounded by an artificial lake is definitely one of the must-see places in Beijing. I’ve heard recommendations online that The Egg is best seen at night, so we took that opportunity to visit it and took some shots there. With its futuristic design, that looked like an alien spacecraft, it’s definitely one of those places that you can’t help but be in awe of.

We went back to our hostel around 10PM to rest early and prepare ourselves for another day of roaming around Beijing the day after.

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Once Upon A Time In China : Roaming Around Beijing for 16 Hours

Of all the places I’ve been to, this particular trip to Beijing was the most planned of them all. We had exactly 5 whole days in Beijing, not counting the dates of arrival and departure, and I knew I had to make most out of it. We had made reservations at the Happy Dragon Courtyard Hostel, which was located at the Dongcheng district in Beijing. After reading through some feedbacks online, I went ahead and booked the place. It was conveniently located near a subway station, so it was perfect. Being located near a subway station means it would make it easier for us to roam around the city and get back. I was able to buy this handy pocket guidebook called Top 10 Beijing from Eyewitness Travel, which proved to be my survival kit during this trip. It already includes a list of must-see places and tourist spots, how to get there, what time it opens, and entrance ticket prices as well. It also comes with a free pull out map of Beijing and a map of the subway, which was very, very helpful.

Brainstorming our itinerary was pretty easy. I just studied the map and planned out the places we’re gonna go to and made an estimate as to how many hours we’re gonna spend on that particular place, at the same time reading though comments and suggestions from other blogs and forums online. I also went ahead and listed down a list of Chinese words and sentences, that I know would come in handy if we decide to roam around Beijing ourselves, since almost everyone there cannot speak English at all.

Our flight to Beijing was scheduled to leave around 8:30PM from Manila and arrive 1:30AM in Beijing. We had our hostel arrange the airport pickup and we arrived at the hostel around 2:30AM. The place was beautiful. I actually felt like I was in a classic Chinese movie. As with the other hostels I’ve stayed in before, it has this delightful homey feel to it, which really made the experience more authentic. This is one of the reasons why I prefer staying in hostels compared to hotels. They have this homey and feel-good vibe to it and you actually feel that you are well taken cared of, plus it’s perfect for the budget.

We had a busy day ahead so me and my sibs went to bed around 3AM and woke up around 5AM, yeah, 2 hours of sleep. Blame it on the excitement. We had breakfast on one of the bakeries just across the main road, which was just a few minutes’ walk from the hostel. We bought ourselves their Transportation Smart Card for the subway for 20RMB. The good thing about Beijing’s subway charges is that no matter how far the distance, you’re still paying the same price, which was 2RMB or P14.

Our first stop was Tiananmen Square. We just followed the subway lines and referred back to our maps to get to where we wanted to go. When we got off the right station, we saw a bunch of tourists flocking on one area so we just went ahead and followed them. They were actually walking towards Qianmen, a place which was also on my planned itinerary, so we just followed them and took some pictures. We then went ahead to cross Tiananmen Square, which is one of the popular tourist spots in the city, known to be the third largest square in the world. It has great cultural significance as it was the site of several important events in Chinese history, including the Tiananmen square protests, which ended in 1989 with the declaration of martial law and the death of hundreds of civilians in Beijing.

Our next stop was the Forbidden City, which was just north of Tiananmen Square. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and has served as the home of emperors, as well as the ceremonial and political center of the Chinese government. The place was huuuuuge. There were towers and temples everywhere, that I lost count of them. It came to a point that I wanted to get away from the place because it’s just one tower, gate and temple after another. They actually looked all the same to me. The small lakes within the Forbidden City were actually a fresh sight to see. After about an hour of roaming around and picture taking, we exited at the Gate of Divine Might, to the north, which faces Jingshan Park.

Jingshan Park is a public park situated on an artificial hill located north of the Forbidden City. Jingshan is especially a popular place for elderly people socializing and gathering. There were people dancing, singing karaoke and opera, people doing some karate and tai chi, etc. We went up the Wanchun Pavilion to get a view of the Forbidden City from the top, which was beautiful. After we took some pictures, we decided to go and have lunch since we were all hungry from way too much walking already. We had lunch in this Chinese restaurant in the nearby Beihai Park area. The menu had no English descriptions, so we ended up pointing at the pictures to the waitress. After lunch, we decided to get back to the hostel, where we then ended up being lost in the middle of Beijing. It took us about another hour of walking and map-checking before we found the nearest subway in the area, which was the Dongsi Station.

After an hour’s rest inside our room, my brother and I decided to roam around some more. My sister was tired from all the crazy walking and maybe because of the lack of sleep, that she decided to sleep the entire afternoon off while we went ahead to our next stop, which was the Temple Of Heaven. Another UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Temple Of Heaven is another huuuuuge complex filled with religious buildings and a bunch of Taoist temples. The thing with the Temple Of Heaven was that its buildings are located way too far from each other, unlike in the Forbidden City. I literally had blisters on my feet from too much walking in that particular place. I ended up wearing rubber shoes the rest of this 5-day trip. Just like in Jingshan Park, the place is filled with people hanging around, relaxing, exercising, doing just about anything, since there are mini-parks within the site. It took us 3 whole hours to circle around this place and was able to visit every spot within the complex and take pictures like crazy.

We went back to the hostel around 4:30PM. My sister’s finished with her powernap, so we decided to have dinner and roam around Wangfujing, one of Beijing’s most famous shopping streets. We had dinner at McDonald’s (there’s something about me wanting to try the McDonald’s from every country I’ve been to), and roamed around the bright and colorful Wangfujing area. It actually reminded me of Orchard Road in Singapore, with shops and stores at every corner, and a big shopping complex called the Malls Of Oriental Plaza. The Wangfujing Snack Street, located in hutongs just west of the main street, is densely packed with restaurants and street food stalls. The food stalls serves a wide variety of common and exotic street foods ranging from bugs, scorpions, seahorses, centipedes, starfishes, snails, to every weird possible delicacy you can think of. Those scorpions being displayed were actually alive and moving, which totally freaked me out. I didn’t dare eat any of them. We bought some souvenirs, the ever popular ref magnets and a bunch of I Love China t-shirts, the usual stuff that I look for when I go market shopping in every new place I’m in.

We decided to return back to the hostel around 10PM, since the subway closes at 10:30. And yeah, we actually went out the wrong exit when we arrived at the subway station and ended up being lost at 11pm in the middle of Dongcheng nowhere. After another round of too much walking, we finally arrived at the hostel for some much needed rest. We had the long-awaited Great Wall climb scheduled the next day, which was a Monday, to skip the big flock of tourists during the weekend.

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China 2012 : The Preparation

I’ve really wanted to go to China as far as I can remember. Walking around the Great Wall, visiting Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, or simply to experience the actual Chinese culture itself, all of this has been in my bucket list. But one thing has always hindered me to book a trip for this : the visa application. I’ve heard about the Chinese embassy imposing strict requirements for those who wanted to visit China and I thought it’s going to be time consuming and stressful to process.

So when my sister was bugging me to book a trip to China for her birthday, I said I will probably do it if I get a seat sale from Cebu Pacific. At least if we get denied, it wouldn’t hurt that much. So when Cebu Pacific announced a piso fare seat sale 12 Midnight, sometime in January, I was already waiting in front of my computer to get ready. I had already scheduled the possible dates for the travel period so that I won’t need to consult or contact my sister anymore and just go ahead and book it. As always, with big seat sales like this, the Cebu Pacific website is expected to hang for so long. It took me 3 hours to finally get through, after all the refresh, error, re-typing and re-inputing of information, I was able to finally book a roundtrip ticket Manila-Beijing for just P3,500 each. It was an absolute steal! When my brother found out about this, he immediately booked himself a ticket as well, though he was not able to take advantage of the piso fare seat sale promo since it ran out after a few hours.

So once our flights have been confirmed, I went ahead and did my research to prepare myself for the visa application. Applying for a Chinese visa is relatively simple and quick, if you have all the COMPLETE documents. So it’s better that you have everything prepared and ready before you lodge your application in the embassy rather than risk doing it all over again.

A month before our actual trip, I decided to submit our application, so that in case of issues, we would have enough time to take care of it right away. I went to the embassy with my sister at exactly 5:30 AM and there were about 8 people in front of me, already lining up, sitting outside the building. I’d rather wake up early than waste my time lining up for hours. It’s better this way. Don’t forget to bring a newspaper for you to sit on the sidewalk, and a book or a magazine to read to keep you busy and not bore you to death.

We went inside the embassy 8 AM and the guard handed out numbers to make sure it’s first come, first serve. The counters opened 9AM and we were actually #4 on the application line. We finished everything 9:30AM. It was that quick, but the embassy is already jam-packed around this time. Good thing we were able to line up very early to get the first batch of numbers once the embassy opened.

Here’s what I have submitted :

1) Passport + photocopy of the first and last page of the passport (make sure the emergency contact details are all filled out)
2) My old passport. Since I just renewed my passport last January, I had to show them my old one in case they would ask me about the countries I’ve been to in the last 12 months.
3) Application form, printed back to back, used the A4 paper size, with a 2 X 2 picture (this should be pasted, not stapled)
4) Original NBI Clearance
5) Original Bank Certificate and the official receipt or debit memo (showed money for P90,000). Please note that you should bring the OR, that is a very important requirement.
6) Employment certificate
7) Photocopy of Company ID and TIN ID (front and back)
8) Printout of SSS Contributions and personal info printed via web (I have no SSS ID)
9) Latest Income Tax Return
10) Round Trip Plane Ticket
11) Hotel Reservation Confirmation

That’s it. If you have all these requirements. Then you are almost certain you will get a visa for this. Unless there are discrepancies with your bank certificate, name spelling, TIN ID, or whatever document issue, then you’re good to go.

The consul also reviewed my brother’s and sister’s docs. I announced my brother as a student since he recently resigned from his job, but he is taking up a masteral course, or whatever you might call it. And my sister, since she also resigned from her job, and seriously unemployed, I had to write a letter of support to show that I will be shouldering all her expenses for her trip, though she presented her own requirements as well. I also brought with me our original NSO-certified birth certificates, and submitted photocopies of it to show and prove that we are siblings. Don’t ask me why these creeps are resigning from their jobs, a few weeks before our scheduled application for the visa! Good thing we all got approved.

After reviewing all our documents, the consul handed us the pink slip, with the schedule of pickup, three days later. I was approved for a single-entry visa valid within three months of issuance, and to stay in China maximum of 14 days. I paid P1,400 for this, by the way. So that’s it. It’s pretty easy and simple, though a little stressful at times, but you gotta do what you gotta do if you really want it. The next thing to do is to prepare for our itinerary for our week-long Beijing trip!

EDITED : Effective July 16, 2012, the following additional requirements have been posted in the embassy for first time applicants :

1. Original Bank Cert with OR/Debit Memo. Acceptable accounts are Savings and Current account from commercial or rural bank and should be opened at least 6 months prior to applying for visa. The account should have an Average Daily Balance(ADB) AND Current Balance of at least PHP100,000 per applicant 18 years old and above.

Bank Certificate should include:
– with checkwrite
– account opening date
– type of account
– average daily balance
– to-date current balance

In addition to the Bank Cert:
– Statement of accounts detailing the transactions for 6 months OR
– Passbook detailing the transactions for 6 months

2. Submit roundtrip airline ticket and hotel reservation.

Good thing we were able to apply and get our visa before these new requirements were posted. For those with old and used visas already, you just need to submit a new application form and a photocopy of your old visas and Chinese immigration stamps and you’re good to go. Thank God we won’t be going through all of those listed above for our Shanghai trip this December.

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