Tourist Days - 1

So Monday came around, Ewan returned to work and we gave Isabelle the day off from guiding us around as we ventured into Beijing to see some of the tourist sites – first stop was obviously Tiananmen Square which required a metro ride.  Obviously for a pair of transport geeks the trip was almost as exciting as the destination!  Once we’d managed to top up the Chinese equivalent of the oyster card (something which involved some hilarious gestures involving waving the card in one hand, a note in the other and physically bringing them together in a transport equivalent of matrimonial union) we descended into the bowels of the metro.  The Beijing metro was considerably easier to navigate than the Moscow metro because all of the signs were also in English.

Therefore we easily get to Tiananmen Square, unfortunately it was the labour holidays in China and the Square was heaving with people as you can see from the pictures.  It was also a relatively bad day for pollution which you can also see.

For balance as we included pictures of Lenin, here’s the outside of Chairman Mao’s mausoleum, which we also weren’t able to go in because it was closed.

After a spot of lunch in a fantastic restaurant called Capital M, we proceeded to the next geeky thing – the Museum of Urban Planning which was amazing!!  Seriously, it was full of scale models of the Forbidden City and Beijing which meant that we could do cool things such as see where we were staying in relation to everything else . . . see the Olympic park without having to bother with trekking all that way out there . . . .

Look like giants . . .

And plan our way around the Forbidden City which was our next port of call.

So we left the museum and headed over the huge picture of Mao which hung at the entrance to the Forbidden City.  Again, the Forbidden City was bustling and it was impossible to get away from the crowds which made it difficult to soak up the history and any atmosphere of the City and even harder to imagine what it would have been like when it was only open to the Imperial court.  However we did manage to get some good photos of deserted courtyards and alleyways as it was closing.

This one’s just included because it’s just so beautiful.

 

Weekend – Beijing style

After our first night sleeping apart, which many of you will appreciate was a real treat for Fern, it was glorious to be able to get up and potter around in our  PJs, eating our breakfast (marmite on toast!!) and being able to shower yet again – trust me it took a couple of days for this novelty to wear off.

Isabelle and Ewan then decided to take us to a nearby Daoist temple - Dongyue Temple .  The temple was split into a plethora of departments for the afterlife.  The belief is that the afterlife requires a lot of organisation and administration and so there is a department for every element of this from department for bestowing happinness, a department for signatures, a department for jaundice, the department for suppressing schemes and the department for instant rewards and retribution to the Timely Retribution Department, which just gives you an idea of the traditional levels of bureaucracy in China throughout the ages.

You can see where the creators of Buffy got some of their inspiration from!

Alice's colour scheme for her next house . . .

After taking in some culture we went for some delicious dim sum where Alice learnt that her mouth isn’t as big as Ewan, literally.  The instructions “Just put the whole thing in your mouth” led to a very messy outcome . . . So we took the sensible decision to retire back to the flat for some Sherlock Holmes (the 1980s version obviously) and a strategic nap before heading out for the evening.  We met Isabelle and Ewan’s friend Andrew on route and experienced Beijing traffic with 5 of us in a mini.  It was definitely on the cosy side and proper respect due to Isabelle’s amazing coolness under traffic pressure as we tried to find a parking space – there was some impressive navigation of some very narrow, winding roads going on whilst the three of us in the back took turns in returning blood circulation to our backsides!

Unfortunately we weren’t entirely sure where we were going in relation to where we had ended up parking, but we had a pleasant walk in the hutongs as we reoriented ourselves.  It was also very interesting to see an older, less western side to Beijing.  Our end destination was a bar called Bed bar where we were going to the leaving party of the Guardian correspondent who was moving to Rio – we obviously neatly fitted into the glamorous ex-pat lifestyle given the circles we frequent at home . . Seriously though, one day hope to be popular enough to have a leaving do of that size and that people write a song for . . .

Sunday dawned with a nice lazy day of which started off with coffee and cake sitting outside in Central Park and then we had to hurry off for our important manicure appointment – trust me, the toll the journey had made on our nails made this one of the most important things that we needed to do in Beijing ;-)

Suitably beautified we met up again with Isabelle and Ewan to do a bit of shopping for dinner which involved taking in the sights of a Chinese supermarket.  Whilst it was definitely an experience, it was reassuring to go to the more western supermarket to make the many purchases we needed for the delicious menu that Ewan and Fern were planning for supper.

Isabelle and Ewan volunteered to take the shopping back to the apartment while we ventured into nearby Ritan park.  For such a large populated city Beijing has some amazingly beautiful open spaces.

On our return to the apartment we encountered more of the People’s Army on the move . . . this time with a few people tagging on!

When we got back to the apartment, Fern and Ewan secreted themselves in the kitchen to make some delicious smells . . . until additional help was drafted in to assist in the mammoth pasta production line.  The filling was ready, Isabelle had made the fresh pasta dough and it was all hands on deck to get the pasta rolled and the ravioli created before the pasta dried out . . . the time pressure was such that even Alice was trusted with part of the process!  However, not only did we end up with a sublime dinner (even if it was slightly in the wrong order!) but we also managed to freeze the excess for Isabelle and Ewan to remember us by

Arriving in Beijing!!

So we finally arrive in Beijing after what was categorically the worst of our train journeys.  The Gobi desert  . . . turns out that it’s long, dusty and bugger all to see.  Combined with the fact that we were sharing a carriage which consisted of 90% gap year travellers making us feel old;  a couple of drunken, aggressive Mongolians and someone who was apparently from the Chinese mafia meant that this was not the most pleasant of times!!!

We fell into the arms of Fern’s cousin Isabelle who swiftly transported us to her (and her husband Ewan’s) amazing flat on the 27^th floor with fantastic views of Beijing where we spent the next couple of hours getting ourselves and our clothes clean.

Finally feeling like human beings we headed to the embassy bar around the corner (one of the fringe benefits of staying with diplomats) for a quick drink and to pick up another couple of people before meeting other at a restaurant for dinner.  We quickly adopted a new protocol for ordering whilst in Beijing – leave an expert to it!  Seriously, we didn’t order a single meal whilst we were in Beijing and it was a strategy that served us well . . .

Tran-Siberian Train Insight 4 – Things To Do on the Train

Alice blending in with the Russians in her trendy train clothes at a station stop!

Fern catching up on her knitting . . .

Shocker - Alice reading!!

Meeting new people . . .

Loitering in the corridors - a rare time when it wasn't filled with people staring out of the window or wandering up and down the carriage

Tran-Siberian Train Insight 3 – Scenery

Omsk train station

There were several of these incredibly small villages/hamlets in the middle of nowhere.  Still no idea what would induce people to create settlements so far away from litterally any thing else.

This has to be the coolest train sign ever!!

And the tracks go on . . .

 There was some random architecture along the way

Sunset on the rails

Ulaanbaatar

We returned to Ulaanbaatar by lunchtime the next day, stopping on the way at the Chinggis Khan statue and museum.  The Mongolian have recently built a 40m statute of Chinghis Khan apparently in the middle of nowhere, but we were told this valley was the site where he found his golden whip which apparently where it all kicked off for Chinghis.  The highlight of this was being able to go up in the elevator to stand on the top of the horse’s head – spectacular views and meant that we were able to take a close up of Chinggis.  Fortunately, given our recently failures, we’d given up on trying to take photos of us with famous statues at this point.

Bolod - our amazing Mongolian guide

When we got to Ulaanbaatar first thing on our list was coffee before Fern’s caffeine addiction caused some casualties!  We also succumbed to eating some Western food to counterbalance the greasy meatness which is Mongolian cuisine.  Suitably refreshed we headed to Chaojin Temple Museum for some culture.

We then headed to the main square, scene of the 1990 protests that ended communism in Mongolia, to check out the Parliament building, with the requisite statue of Chinngis Khan, before heading off to the State Department store (commonly known as the big shop) to do a bit of shopping.

It was with a slight heavy heart that we woke up the next morning to catch our final train across the Gobi desert to our end destination.

Bring on Beijing!!!

I think we’re turning Mongolese, I really think so!

We arrived at Magbal's yurt in time for lunch and sat down as an array of home- made bread, biscuits and tea as well as bowls of tea with milk was presented to us.  Luckily Fern had explained the concept of tea with milk containing salt in advance of our arrival in Mongolia so we were slightly prepared for the conundrum of our eyes and stomach expecting one thing and our mouth tasting something incredibly different.  Otherwise it could have been quite a messy experience as it's definitely a taste that takes some getting used to!!  After chowing down on this we were asked if we’d like beef and noodle for our second dinner which we thought sounded delicious for an evening meal.  Watching Magbal make noodles and cook dinner on a wood burning stove in the yurt was pretty impressive.

After the food preparation had finished we wandered outside to have a look at the surrounding area.  The family yurt encampment was the only encampment in the valley, the nearest yurt was in the neighbouring valley.  This was their spring encampment and it had taken the sons two weeks to build the fences before they moved the animals in.  The animals (they had goats, sheep, cows plus a horse with a foal) were let out to roam the plains during the day, but penned up again at night to protect them from the wolves. 

We had arrived just at the end of the lambing season so there were lots of lambs and kids gambolling around.  It was now we discovered Fern’s Heidi tendencies, she was literally a kid magnet.  So she has a back up career in case the Civil Service doesn’t work out as she clearly can’t rely on photography because she spectacularly failed to get a photo of Goats on Stuff for the (sadly not our idea) Goats on Stuff blog!

Walking back into the yurt, we were presented with what can only be described as a mountain of beef and noodles.  We literally had three times the size of portion of everyone else.  Given that this was about an hour after our last round of food, we looked at each other in horror. Fortunately it was delicious but we did have to give up about half way through, however the left overs were presented to us as breakfast which was a challenge even for "curry-for-breakfast" Alice.  Apparently it is traditional to rewarm left over food by putting it in a bowl of salty, milk tea, definitely an experience too far for both of us at that time of the morning!

Slowly working our way through the food allowed us the time to appreciate the inside of the yurt.  It was beautifully decorated, with all the struts being hand painted.  Around the edges of the yurt were three beds which doubled up as sofas and tables during the day.  One of these beds was folded out as a double bed for us to sleep on later.

After lunch, Magbal took out some traditional Mongolian and Kazakhstani coats to show us and then proceeded to dress us up in our own fashion show.  As you can see these were incredibly rich in detail and we were amazed to understand that these are typical coats which are worn when on trips to the village, and horse riding.  In fact when we were in Ulaanbaatar the next day we saw several women wearing coats such as these.

Fierce Mongol Face Pose

Mongolia's Next Top Model

In Natural Habitat

With Designer

This seemed an appropriate time to hand over the gifts that we had brought – some chocolate, postcards and some Brighton rock.  The rock appeared to cause much fascination as all of the family tried it, however Magbal did resort to cutting it with a hatchet to break it into individual pieces.  Can now see a gap in the Brighton Souvenir market!

Despite the fact that it was amazingly cold outside we were determined to follow in Chinggis Khan’s footsteps and ride across the plains – check out the Mongol warriors J The being dressed up theme continued as can be seen by Magbel's use of our existing scarfs/hats - Tots, while the Dr Who scarf was a vital piece of equipment on this trip, not entirely sure it coordinates well with the Mongolian delt!

When we got back the neighbours (yes, nomads can have neighbours as apparently they don’t move their yurts too far – having spring, summer and winter homes all in the same area) had popped round for a cup of tea and they seemed fascinated by our guidebooks.  It was proper cosy sitting round, sipping cups of salty tea chatting away - Luckily we also had our excellent guide Bolod acting as a translator for us.

It was a cosy night in the yurt as traditionally all the family sleep in that one open space so there were six of us which kept it nice and cosy as we drifted off to sleep . . .