Beijing, China - Day 1

My family and I recently visited Beijing - the capital of China in April. It has always been one of the place that I would visit in my lifetime, and the only place that I actually look forward to visiting in China.

We have a total of four full days in Beijing. We decided to engaged with a tour to cover the highlights of Beijing for two days, and then have two free-and-easy days in Beijing by exploring the city ourselves. For the tour, we took from Catherine Lu Tours after reading positive feedbacks in Tripadvisor.

Day 1

Tiananmen Square
Tiananmen Square is the fourth largest city square in the world. A lot of Beijing's important buildings are located in the Tiananmen Square It was really huge!! Our legs felt a little tired walking around the square... and it is only our first stop in Beijing!!!!

ZhengYangMen - the south end of Tiananmen Square

National Museum of China

Great Hall of the People

Mausoleum of Mao Ze Dong

The Mausoleum of Mao Ze Dong is the final resting place of the most respectable person in China. His body was embalmed and people from all around the world are able to enter to give their respect to him. When we were there, the queue to enter was at least two hours according to our guide!

Monument to the People's Heroes

Notice the picture above, where we were queuing in a line. This is the Dragon Line. The Dragon Line is a line running north-south through Beijing on which only the emperor was allowed to walk. Important buildings such as The Imperial Palace (aka The Forbidden City), Mausoleum of Mao Ze Dong, Bird's Nest and The Cube are built along the Dragon Line with the believe of good fengshui.

Tiananmen Square is also the entrance to the famous Forbidden City of Beijing.


The Forbidden City (aka The Imperial Palace)

Tiananmen Entrance of the Forbidden City

Notice the picture of Mao Ze Dong on the building? It is a hand-painted picture and it will be replaced each year.

After entering the Tiananmen Entrance

The next gate of the Forbidden City (can't remember the name) =.=''

The famous door nails

As the number 9 represents longevity and it is the emperor's number, the doors have 9 x 9 = 81 door nails. Rubbing the door nails also bring good luck, thus the above picture shows all of us getting our luck!

Look at the loooooooong stick that locks the door every night!

Another Gate

Beautiful roof structure

Map of the Forbidden City

The Hall of Supreme Harmony

What surprised me was most of the tourists there are all local tourists! Seldom see any foreigners even in such a tourist spot like The Forbidden City!

Coolest ground ever!

The picture above might look normal, but it is one of my favourite picture taken in Beijing! It is because I was standing on 15 layers of bricks below me. FIFTEEN LAYERS!!! These bricks are layered in different angles to prevent intruders to dig a tunnel from below to enter The Forbidden City and assassinate the emperor! How cool is that?!

Soldiers guarding the buildings

The Wooden Dragon Dome

Love the dome above in the Pavilion of a Thousand Autumns (Qianqiu). Beautifully carved wooden dragon at the center of the dome. 

One of the old trees in the Imperial Garden

3,800 meters moat

To think that once the highest ranking people in China live inside this little city is quite saddening. It is huge for a home, but not really that big once you realised that there is no coming out after you enter! Really cant help but to pity the maids, eunuchs and concubines in the olden days...

Overall, as a tourist, I was quite disappointed with The Forbidden City. I was expecting to see more artifacts such as the rooms, the jeweleries, costumes, etc of the ancient dynasties of China, but all we get to see is only the outside of the buildings! We didnt even get to see the famous emperor's throne! Maybe I had too much expectations after watching so many TVB series... lol... It was also very difficult to take photos as the place is very packed with tourists!


Hutong
Hutongs are the traditional narrow streets or alleys in Beijing. They are formed by lines of traditional courtyard residences called SiHeYuan.

Hutong

Hutong

We also learned that the old traditional residences in Hutong does not have a toilet. They uses the shared public toilet for daily clean-up! Even in this Hutong that we visited, most of them still do not have a private toilet in their residence and is still using the public toilet! And in a China way, most of them does not have a door at each cubicle... =.=''

Rickshaw

 We took a rickshaw and toured Hutong.

Rickshaws in Hutong

 We also visited one of the family that has been living in Hutong for a few generations.

In the courtyard of an old Hutong residence

Inside the House of a Hutong Family

Overall, the Hutong tour was not really very impressive. Just a simple touch of what was the old ancient Beijing culture and life. Maybe because it wasn't very much different from the Chinese culture in Malaysia.

Temple of Heaven (Tiāntán)
The Temple of Heaven consist of three important structures. 
 
While walking into the gardens, we spotted some really beautiful cherry blossoms and cant help but to stop and take some photos.

Cherry blossoms

 Then we walked across the garden and had the first view of the most beautiful structure in The Temple of Heaven - The Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests.

Sneak Peak

The The Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests is where the emperors will pray for good harvests for the country. This building is also built completely with wood and no nails!  Talk about impressive architects!

The Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests

Beautiful tiles

At first I was confused as I thought there is only one important structure in Temple of Heaven. I was wrong as I was even more impressed with the second structure - Imperial Vault of Heaven.

The Imperial Vault of Heaven is surrounded by a smooth circular wall that is called the Echo Wall. 

Imperial Vault of Heaven & Echo Wall

By standing at the left of the building and if you whisper to the wall, the person standing at the right of the building can hear the whisper! We gave it a try and it really works!!!  I was really impressed and I love it!

The third structure was also a surprise for me. It is called the Circular Mound Alter. It is an empty circular platform on three levels of marble stones.

Circular Mound Alter

There are 9 steps to each 3 levels of the platforms. The center of the altar is a round slate called the Heart of Heaven or the Supreme Yang. Because of the design of the alter, the sound from the person standing at the Supreme Yang will be magnified, thus was believe to help to communicate the Emperor's prayers to the heaven for good weather. Of course, all of us gave it a try and it really works! Our voice when standing on the Supreme Yang felt like we were talking into a microphone!  

Not to forget, the number of tiles surrounding the Supreme Yang is always the multiple of 9. Which means the first circle consists of 9 tiles, then 18, then 27...up until 81 tiles. Very impressive structure huh?

On our way out, we also spotted an old lady practicing her chinese calligraphy on the tiles using a big brush dipped in water.

Chinese calligraphy with brush dipped in water

Upon leaving the Temple of Heaven, we were greeted by a breautiful view of sunset among the trees at the gardens.

Lovely view

I remember thinking, Day 1 in Beijing has been fun! Will Day 2 top that?



***to be continued.......

Hong Kong for the 2nd time!

My friends and I went on a spontaneous Hong Kong trip during the New Year 2015. It was just a short 4 days 3 nights trip, where our plan is just to EAT all the nice food in HK! LOL


Day 1 - 01 January 2015 
Happy New Year! We flew via HK Express and arrived HK around 5am in the morning. Changed to jackets and boots before we took a bus to Mongkok.

First group selfie for year 2015

Riding our way to Mongkok

Checked into Dragon Hostel (room for 4 at HKD640/night). As expected, the room was super duper triple small!

707 - Dragon Hostel

I think this was our room, except that both were double-decker beds when we stayed.

Hungry as hell, so went to a nearby coffee shop for breakfast. First meal was a disappointment. Good news was we only ordered two and we shared. :)

breakfast

After a half-full stomach, we proceed to buy our Octopus Card. Then we took the MTR and visited our first destination - The Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC).

Loved the skyline in HK. Perfect climate on that day too!

Lovin' HK

Took a photos with the compulsory tourist spot - The Forever Blooming Bauhinia Sculpture.

tourist checklist - tick!

We had so much fun taking jumpshots too!

All legs in the air? Checked!

Happy to be in HK!

Managed to find someone to take a jumpshot for all of us!

The place was so lovely that we decided that we could just walk our way to the next destination.

HK in indeed a city full of skyscrapers! Glass window everywhere!

Saw some protestors' camps for the Yellow Umbrella Movement

Walked to a park with awesome view

Saw another protest along the way...

After a very very long stroll, we decided to have late breakfast at the famous Michelin Star Dim Sum - Tim Ho Wan. Queued for 2.5 hours which makes our brunch to late lunch. It's all worth it though! The dim sum was really two thumbs up!

HK style, sharing table for a meal.

I miss this soooooooo much!

After a full lunch, we were beginning to feel tired as lack of sleep the night before. So we went back to the hostel for a nap... zzZZzzzZZzzz

In the evening, went decided to go for an evening stroll in the Avenue of Stars and for view of HK night skyline. It was packed like hell! So we decided to come back only after dinner.

One of the few photos without being photobombed... it was packed like sandwiches!

By the time we maneuver over the crowd to get out of Arena of Stars, it was already 9.30pm when we reach our dinner venue. So our dinner turned to supper! LOL Indirectly it was good news, because we were having spicy steamboat buffet, and now we are paying for the same food, but at supper rate instead of dinner! Cheaper! LOL

I dont think I've ever eaten so many meat on one meal!

After dinner, we went back to Avenue of Stars for midnight stroll. It was really windy that night! We were almost frozen! Brrrrr........

No more crowd, but very windy!

Day 2 - 02 January 2015 
As expected, we woke up late. By the time we went out, it was already almost lunchtime. LOL Had a few snacks along the way, and also a quick lunch in a local coffee shop.

One of the few snacks for breakfast

Typical coffee shop in HK - very packed

Then we took a bus to Stanley and visited the overrated Stanley Market.

Stanley Market - which reminds me of Batu Feringgi Night Market

We prefer to enjoy the view from the Stanley Bay instead.

chilling at the bay

 Had a blast playing with the sun as well ! And we managed to catch the sunset!

Sunset love

:)

:)

After sunset, we took the bus back and decided to grab some dinner before heading to a bar! We were super hungry at that time and we just decided to eat in a random restaurant. We tried the porridge, wanton soup & wanton mee.

Not nice!

 After a huge disappoinment, we decided to just head to our next itinerary, Ozone Bar - Highest Bar in the World located in Ritz Carlton Hotel!!

Ritz Carlton, HK

Cool entrance of the bar

We almost froze to death sitting outdoor in the 118th floor. But the night view from above was really spectacular! 

HK from up above!

Two of our drinks

fingers and face almost frozen taking this selfie lol

On the way back to hostel, we spontaneously decided to just visit Lan Kwai Fong since it was on the way. 

We even entered one of the club that gives free drinks for ladies. LOL Nothing special on the club.


When we decided to go back to the hostel, we missed the last MTR back to Mongkok by 2 minutes! Argh.... Being confident, we decided to save money on taxis and opt to take the bus instead. We ended up getting lost and wonder around the streets for 1.5 hours. We only managed to find the place to take the midnight bus at around 2am! 

our relieved faces when we found the bus

Just when we thought the night was over, another drama began. Upon reaching Mongkok, two of us went down but the other two didnt manage to get down on time. The bus driver started moving. The first two who went down did not realised what happened until like maybe 30 seconds later (brain jam as it was already almost 3am at that time). Luckily we did manage to get hold of each other via several phone calls and meet at the entrance of our hostel. LOL 




Day 3 - 03 January 2015  
We woke up late again and had random snacks like smelly tofu, curry fishballs, and some dim sum in 7eleven. We also tried one of HK's famous food - the roasted goose in a local coffee shop. 

roasted goose

smelly tofu

Then we decided to go easy today and went random shopping in Mongkok for a while. 

We ended up in Esprit outlet store for many many hours! So, our plan to visit The Peak was cancelled. LOL

Of course in between, how can we miss eating at the famous Hui Lau Shan!

mango desserts FTW!

After shopping, we had dinner at Sushi One. It was also a late dinner as after 10pm, the sushi will be at half price! LOL

sushi one

After dinner, we decided to call it a day. We bought ciders and beers and played Heads Up! in our small hostel room.   

Day 4 - 04 January 2015 
Last day in HK! It was also the earliest day we woke up throughout our trip. LOL We packed our bags and went hunting for 20 packets of 7eleven curry fishballs to pack home. Mission accomplished after we visited about 5 different 7eleven stores.

Then we checked out but left our luggage with the hostel personnel. We then took the MTR to Causeway Bay to grab our food souvenirs.  I bought my share of Portuguese egg tarts. I'm not a fan of Portuguese egg tarts at all, but that was yummy! The one and only Portuguese egg tart that I eat. LOL

Lord Stow's Bakery

Along the way, I bumped into Godiva store and couldnt resist spending HKD45 on this! This ice-cream really tastes like heaven!

best ice-cream eveeeeeeeer!

We also bought some famous biscuits from the legendary Koi Kei Bakery originated in Macau. I bought some almond cookies as my family loves them!

We carried all these eggtarts, biscuits and cookies till our arms ache back to the hostel. Then we had only 30 minutes to rearrange our luggage to put everything that we bought inside! Had to make sure the curry fishballs were tightly packed in plastic bags just in case it spills. Had to make sure the eggtarts are all facing upwards. Had to make sure all our biscuits and cookies and egg tarts are easy to handle for our journey back to Penang!
  
Then we grabbed our luggages and went on to take a bus directly to the Airport. We had dinner in the airport foodcourt. Then we had a horrible run chasing our way to our gate to catch the shuttle bus to our plane! We almost missed our flight!

Finally, we arrived Penang safely a little past midnight, and suffered like a zombie the next day at work. LOL