Acrobatics Show in Beijing

I was able to watch one in Shanghai sometime last year and I was totally amazed. Chinese acrobatics is part acrobatics, part incredibly bendy people doing all kinds of amazing, sometimes painful to look at stuff. Needless to say I didn't mind watching one again and the added bonus in this show was that I was allowed to take pictures (in Shanghai it was not allowed).

Ming, our guide also told me that in her opinion, the acrobatics show in Shanghai is much better than in Beijing but the Kung-fu shows were better in Beijing. Good to know if you're going to both cities.

Despite the many different feats performed in these shows they are highly standardized. I saw many things in common with the Shanghai show, like the plate balancing act, the cloth trapeze performance and pretty much everything else. Ming was right though, in Shanghai their performance was beyond reproach. When a performer went out and started balancing plates, he actually put the plates on the poles on stage. In Beijing they came out with the plates on the poles and true enough, one girl messed up as she was exiting the stage and one could see the plates were taped on the poles.

Nonetheless, there were some performances that you couldn't cheat on like the girl who balanced trays of crystal goblets while she contorted each and every way. There was just no way to cheat there, good grief I can't even touch my toes.

The Trousers

I had a bit of free time in Beijing and my first impulse was to visit the Olympic venues. Then I changed my mind, the Water Cube, Birds Nest and even the new Grand National Theater of Beijing must have had their picture taken from all imaginable angles already so I decided to go visit what is undoubtedly the most interesting building in Beijing.

It isn't finished yet but is has been completed to a point where you'll understand my amazement for this building. It is the new CCTV (China's State Run Television Station) building, more affectionately known as "The Trousers" by the locals.

The angles are wild and I was told by my architect brother that it was even more amazing when the two sections had not yet met. In any case, should you find yourself in Beijing, it's definitely worth the trip to go see it. Take the number 10 subway line and get off at the Jintaixizhao station.

People Taking Pictures

It's hard to take unique photographs of Beijing. With the spotlight on it during the Olympics, China has become a cliche of photos that people now associate with the city. So when we got to Tiananmen Square I did what most people did, take pictures of Mao, take pictures of soldiers, take pictures of the flag.

Then I thought it might be nice to take pictures of people taking pictures, there were enough of them around and I got some interesting images out of it.

The classic peace sign photo.


The up and coming classic jump photo - had a few taken in the Philippines



Here's one of auntie getting wheeled around to take pics "a little to the left sonny".


And the artistic flags in the foreground picture. This one I found interesting, here I was with all my hi-tech kit trying to take interesting pics and here is this guy, with a point and shoot (I'm even pretty sure it's a film camera) and a hand full of flags composing what I believe will be a great image.

Beginning in Beijing

Okay, strictly speaking, Beijing was never really part of the Silk Road but it being the capital of China our tour began here.

Yes, I decided to do this trip via a tour shunning our usual mode of traveling which usually involves us bungling along on our own. A trip of this undertaking would be too difficult to handle on my own, especially without my wife to ask for directions. Also, traveling through central Asian states like Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan would be too stressful for me to handle on my own (you should read the Dangers and Annoyances section of their guide book, true most of the items there are exaggerated but I didn't want to risk it) .

The solution was to book a tour with World Expeditions. A tour group that specializes in small group tours that handled more exotic destinations. This at the very least eliminated one of the things about taking a tour I hate, going with a gazillion people stuck in one tour bus.

Back to Beijing, we only had a couple of days here and officially the tour began with a welcome dinner. Ming, our tour guide brought us to a restaurant close to the hotel as some of the members had literally arrived just minutes before. The group was effectively made up of one Filipino (me) and nine Aussies. I had asked earlier about the composition of the group and was told that we would be comprised of singles and couples born in the 1940's, 50's and 60's and except for Brooke who I assume was born in in the 80's I'd say the description was pretty much spot on.

Just when I was wondering how I'd get along with everybody, the call for drinks came up. When a near unanimous order for beer came up I knew I was in good company.

Back from China and Central Asia

I'm back, and not a moment too soon. Do you know the phrase, it's a nice place to visit but you wouldn't want to live there? Well after a month of travel I was through with visiting and ready to come back home.

Don't get me wrong, my Silk Road trip was, how do I put it . . . . E P I C. I ended up literally traveling across China from Beijing in the East and ending in Kashgar in the West, crossing over the mountainous Torugart Pass into Kyrgyzstan and finally ending my trip in beautiful Uzbekistan visiting amazing cities like Samarkand, Khiva and Noble Bukhara.

The people along the way were amazing too from all the interested Chinese people who were eager to practice their English on us, to the Uighur Muslims who patiently allowed us to take their pictures, the Kirghiz musicians that performed for us and the Uzbek who were keen to show us their cities. Ordinary people too, like the Chinese merchants who we haggled prices down to 20% of the original price quoted to the quirky immigration people made our trip amazingly rich in experiences.

I was planning on updating the blog from the road but internet access was at best intermittent the way we were moving around and I found out that my blog, for whatever reason was inaccessible in China. Luckily I haven't lost the long lost art of keeping a travel diary, parts of which I will be quoting in the following entries.

So I hope you'll enjoy the succeeding posts on my blog.