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A TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow of a travel blog to Beijing, China by TravelPod blogger Iceice17 titled “First Stop China” Iceice17′s travel blog entry: “Nee-how from Beijing (thats hello). So finally arrived in Beijing after a surprisingly comfortable and delay free journey. All trains, tubes, planes and buses were on time in our 15 hour journey time. Bumped into our first backpacker straight out of the airport, a girl called Becky who looked as bewildered as me and Rich. So we tackled the bus system together which turned out pretty easy and arrived at our hostel relatively unflustered. The first day we just had a few beers and then went for a wander down to Tiananmen square which on our map looked about 5 minutes away. 30 minutes later we were still walking, Beijing is huge. On the way we met up with our first scam, this couple stopped us in the street to chat to us in English, very friendly and interested in where we were from. Anyway turns out they were students and invited us to see their free exhibition, which actually was just their own work which they wanted us to buy. We didn’t succumb to it, but they were still friendly. 5 minutes up the road we met another very friendly student but we’d clocked the scam by this stage and politely refused his exhibition. Tianamen square was impressive but we had just a quick look as we’d be back there again. In the evening we tackled a chinese restaurant (no cheating by going to the familiar western fast food for us). I had a …
A TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow of a travel blog to Hangzhou, China by TravelPod blogger Ilombardo titled “Here But Not All There” Ilombardo’s travel blog entry: “Two and a half days in Hangzhou, China…here’s what’s up: Sorry there are no pictures yet. I took a lot yesterday, but was not able to upload them to the site. The connection was too slow, but my roommate said that it might be better today. Here are some stories instead. First, the first thing that hit me about being back in Asia is the proverbial hard bed. Yes, Asians like to sleep on wooden planks with thin pads on top. While initially very uncomfortable, I find that I sleep better in Asia than anywhere else. I’ve woken up every morning so far before my alarm, feeling well-rested. Anyone who has ever had the unenviable task of waking me up in the morning knows that this is a small miracle. Second, the second thing that hit me about being back in Asia is being noticed in public just because I look different. This doesn’t bother me; actually it’s kind of neat. Probably it’s because there is usually a smile on the face of the person who is calling me out. For example, yesterday, I was taking a walk around campus (not lost, but looking around curiously) and three girls came up to me. They asked me where I was going, and I wasn’t going anywhere, but I told them I was going back to my dorm (but I didn’t say which dorm.) They enthusiastically pointed to the direction of my dorm and said, “You live right there.” I …
