On my third day in Beijing, Boba and I went to the Summer Palace!!!! We were both super excited; we were also supposed to visit Tian'amen Square and the Forbidden City, but it was SO hot and we both had seen enough! We just wanted to relax after the Summer Palace.
Boba and I woke up around 10 am to eat before we left. I didn't know if there were any decent food options around the Summer Palace, so I wanted to make sure we wouldn't get hungry. The last thing you want to deal with is intense hunger, crazy heat, and expensive prices.
We walked to the DongSiShiTiao station and transferred to Line 4 at XiZhiMen. Then we got off at BeiGongMen which wasn't too far from the Summer Palace. The Beijing subway system is super easy to navigate and very affordable at 2 kuai per ride.
We did have some interesting moments on the way. These two older Chinese women stared at me like I was an alien and to make matters worse they did it the whole ride. After a few stops a white gentleman got on the train. They didn't even look at him. Some Chinese people think that white people are normal and everyone else is not. The excuse I often hear is that the majority of foreigners that come to China are White. I also think it has to do with China's discrimination against non-white teachers. A lot of schools here only want White teachers to work at their school. This tends to be a bigger problem at training schools, but it's still a rampant issue in China. Here's a post from a tumblr run by a 22 year old Black man living in Taiwan about this issue. I do know that Taiwan is a separate country (although the Chinese government will swear up and down it isn't and teaches its people this), but they both tend to treat foreigners the same.
I just ignored them, but there would have been a problem had phones or cameras popped out. I have only had a few annoying picture incidents during my time here. There comes a point during your time in China that you have to not become annoyed or irritated by the staring. One thing that wasn't hard for me to overcome was having people talk about you while you're near them. Heck, rude people do this back in America, but in a language that I can understand. As long as the person isn't pointing and/or laowaiing the hell out of me, we're fine (laowai is kind of a rude term for foreigner. Some non-native born Chinese embrace it, and some dislike it. I'll talk about this in a later post).
Most Chinese people on the train weren't staring. I think when Chinese people live in Beijing, they see a lot of foreigners, so it becomes normal to them. So, I figured they were tourists from their behavior. I could also tell by their attire. Most people in Beijing dress very stylishly regardless of their age. Turns out my observation was correct, they got off at the same stop as us.
Next, we followed the crowd of people to the Summer Palace. It wasn't too far down the street. There were some ladies selling bottles of water. I decided to ask how much they were, and to my surprise they were really cheap and the bottles were big. I bought one for us since we had forgot to bring water. Boba and I were starting to feel the heat. I figured prices would go way up once we got inside. We came to an opening and then we saw it!
We're finally here!
Let's take a celebration picture! Yay, we didn't get lost!
Oh, but wait! We didn't notice the crazy line. As soon as we looked to our right we were like, "Damnnnnnn!". This is a picture from when we were closer to the ticket booth.
There was a general admission ticket, and if you wanted to see any of the other special sections, you had to pay extra. At first, I was thinking about buying them, but we decided against it. There weren't any maps, and I didn't want to feel obligated to find each thing. Right after we buy a ticket a fight breaks out over an older lady cutting. This was strange to me because cutting in line is common here. Actually, lines don't exist unless it's some sort of Western place and even then people may not follow suite.
Boba and I move away from the drama and make our way inside. We crossed a bridge saw this shopping area below us, but didn't know how to get to it. We figured it was one of the places you had to pay extra to access.
Crossing the bridge.
Then we began our long climb up!
Picture of the plaza.
Boba in a Hobbit-like hole entrance.
We finally reached the water at the bottom!
On the way back, we got another staring duo. This time it was two older Chinese men. I think Boba let the first two slide because they were ladies. After awhile, he gave them a look and shook his head no at them. I think they understood that staring at me in my face for ten minutes straight wasn't cool. Then they said hi to me, but I ignored them. Is it really so hard to just look right quick and then look away? haha Apparently, for some people here it is.
Before heading to the hostel, we walked around the Sanlitun mall area. During our time there are few more interesting things happened.....
While standing outside of a dessert place looking at a menu, a group of Black guys walk past us and stop and stare at us. We keep going about our business until they leave. Boba and I burst out laughing after they left. This is only the second time something like this has happened. The first time I was called a sell-out in Brooklyn while walking to my best friend's apartment with Boba back in January. It was a little odd to experience their reaction because I had seen quite a few interracial couples during my time in Beijing. WMAW, BMAW, and even AMWW; The majority of the pairings I saw comprised of the first two. I guess we're extra weird haha But, who cares! I know double standards exist in interracial dating (as with anything) and who knows what those men were thinking, but I really don't care. We passed two other groups and received the same treatment.
We went inside and had some delicious cotton ice. It was like shaved ice, but thicker and fluffier; it was like eating a cloud! We walked around some more and found a book store! Reading is like a drug for me!!!! I have a serious problem with buying books! I have SO many books waiting to be read at my home in Alabama. I was trying to find the English section, and I let out a squeal when I did (in public, I know smh). I had gotten separated from Boba. I saw this guy start walking towards me with a smile. So, I simply ignored him and continued to look at my book, but he didn't stop walking towards me. Then with perfect timing Boba found me and hugged me; the guy quickly turned and walked away.
After that we didn't have anymore awkward incidents (Thank you!). We continued to explore, that area is pretty big, and ate dinner in the mall area. We headed back to the hostel around 7 or 8. We had SO much fun exploring the Summer Palace and the Sanlitun mall area!
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