BEIJING; ALL THE THINGS TO EAT.

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I’m thinking I should get this out of the way and dedicate an entire blog post to the food that I ate while on tour in Beijing. I have to admit, it was definitely an experience (and a delicious one at that). We got the opportunity to eat at some of the flashiest joints in Beijing without having to toe shuffle and wait about – show lucky is that? Very lucky, I should think.

BEIJING DUCK: The most definitively delicious point in the tour was found at this joint  - Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant (全聚德):

“This is Beijing’s most famous Peking Duck restaurant, and also one of the oldest, having been established in 1864. The huge, plush dining hall is filled with diners eager to try this dish in its most authentic setting. A basic duck starts at CNY108, but the pancakes, scallions and sauces are extra.”

Since our group of hungry tourists was quite large, they sent chefs, en-masse to to our banquet room, where they skillfully sliced and diced our duck for us. Mmm, delicious.

To be truthful, i'm actually not a fan of duck at all, but this completely changed my opinion - it's crispy, greasy and meaty texture, mixed with fresh spring chive slithers and wrapped in a thin pancake-like bread - ohhh, heaven.

CHEAP BEER: We managed to be seated with a group that weren’t big beer drinkers. Interestingly enough, when we asked to switch out one of our bottles of beer for a bottle of Coke we were told that we could not – apparently, Coke (and other Western soft-drinks) are twice as expensive as beer. JAW. DROP.

BEIJING YANJING BREWERY: the company is one of the largest breweries in Asia. The company has approximately 20,000 employees, and is one of the largest beer manufacturers in China. They produced 3.11 million tons of beer in 2005 alone.

SNOW BEER (雪花啤酒): Directly translated as "snowflake beer" - apparently this is the world's biggest selling beer? I don't know, I'm just repeating what The Google tells me. PS. It's pretty tasty.

ALL YOU CAN EAT ADVENTURES: This gem was one that we scrounged out at the Silk Market – “Beijing Duck” Patio Pizza - which apparently specialises in Beijing Duck Pizza – an all-you can eat extravaganza, it also features a few sneaky tricks – if you want a cup of tea, be prepared to fork out a few yuan. Sly, sly, sly.

My favourite thing they served? Chicken nibbles - hey, I didn't say that the joint was healthy, did I?

TEA: All sorts of tea – of course China would be the place to go and buy silly piles of tea. We were carted off to a place near the Olympic City, joyfully labelled “Dr. Tea” (茶博士家) where we got to sample different types of tea and surround ourselves with all things tea-like. Chamomile is still my favourite – Pu er tastes manky to me and always will. The lady doing our demonstration had the most clean accent I had heard up to that point, in Beijing – without the very curly Beijing accent attached to it.

BEIJING HOT POT: Now, we had hot pot previously at a chain-restuarant, but this time we went to a legit place (complete with birds in cages singing and hanging from the ceiling) to experience some hot pot loving. They pulled all the stops at this place and made sure all the tables were decked with a huge choice of additions. Oh my.

Various vinegars and herbs are tapped-off these and used in the soups and sauces.

BUNS AND DUMPLINGS: We managed to score a booking at the famous Gou Bu Li (狗不理) Restaurant in Tianjin (天津 ) – which, apart from epic traffic jams (seriously, epic), is a town known for being the home town of these steamed buns – which are usually stuffed with meat filling made of pork, fresh shrimp and all things delicious.

I only managed to get this sorry excuse for a picture as everyone at the table had managed to snake one from the plate before I could even get my camera out. Oh, those old people, faster than they look, I tell you.

The name “Goubuli Baozi”, literally means “stuffed bun that dogs are not interested in”.  The name originated from a boy’s nickname. Many years ago, a chinese family found an abandoned child in a garbage dump and adopted him. Alluding to his good fortune in not being eaten by dogs, they nicknamed him Gou Zi, or “Doggy.” The child grew up to become an accomplished chef whose steamed dumplings were unparalleled in the area. His buns were very popular and his business became so exceptionally good that his customers would have difficulty getting his attention. People began to refer to him as “Goubuli (Doggy ignores us).” With the passage of time, the bun became widely known as “Gou Bu Li Bao Zi”.

COFFEE: Is REALLY bloody difficult to find – well, a good coffee is really bloody difficult to find. Being from a city that’s doing it’s best to rival Melbourne as the coffee-city of the nation, I found it heart-breaking to be in a country where nobody really thought of coffee as an important beverage. This left me super sad – and after trial after trial of drinking odd Starbucks concoctions (in the hope that they would suddenly be better if I kept on drinking them), I gave in and glugged instant coffee and looked hangdog-awful for the days we were in Beijing. Moral of this story? Well, it doesn’t have a moral really – I just wish Beijing had better coffee.

At the airport when leaving Beijing, we found a Costa Coffee joint - packed with people and the smell of coffee in the air. We practically ran inside and snuffed up the store.

MARKET MISCELLANY: One of the more memorable moments was spent at one of the undercover markets in Tianjin (天津) – filled with people selling all sorts of wares (mostly tacky things with goggly eyes) but also all sorts of food stuffs and random animals spewing strange bubbly water and eschewed with numerous tentacles. Tasty!

In case you're wondering - yes, that IS an alligator head. It's actually pretty small, all things considered.

Snails - making a brave escape from their not-very-effective casing.

WINNER; numero tres

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NOTE: THE WINNER (number 1)
(OF THE AWESOME KIT) is:

{ CINDII AKA @PURRINCUP }
http://purrincup.blogspot.com.au/

CONGRATULATIONS!

I’ll be EMAILING you soon! Huzzah! Also, please note, this giveaway involves you having to send me your mailing address as I can’t send things to thin air! I will be sending this out tomorrow before I leave to NYC! MEGA BIG DISCLAIMER, that once sent, it is no longer my responsibility if it gets there or not – as let’s face it, I have no control over the postal system and HEY, IT WAS FREE (for you) ! So no complaints about the slowness/lostness, mmmkay?

GIVEAWAY; numero tres

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HEY, 100 FOLLOWERS: So I promised a giveaway when I reached a nifty 100 FOLLOWERS. So kids, I’m not one to flake on promises – follow the instructions below and enter at will! I’m sure these nifty little gifts will go to a loving home – remember to follow/subscribe to my blog before entering!

GIFTPACK:

  • TSUMORI CHISATO: Medium-sized nylon pouch. Perfect for storing away your cosmetic doodads and to stop them from migrating fiendishly around your handbag.
  • BEAUTY DIARY: Face masks. The only face masks that don’t turn me into some crazy sloppy mess.
  • DECO SEAL: Adorable Deco Deal stickers foR making all things cute and adorable. Picked up from my trip to Japan.
  • KUTUSITANYANKO IPHONE 4/4S CASE: San-x cat case made from durable TPU. The cute little cat ears will keep you amused for ages.
  • PUDDING PENS: Set of 10 gel pens that can be used to write on anything.  Nails, glass, paper, polaroids, anything.
TOTAL PRICE: $35AUD

HOW TO ENTER!

WHO’S CAN WIN?
Anyone, even the bum on the street (providing they have internet access and a postable address. Oh wait)! I’m willing to ship internationally so no worries if you live outside Australia.

HOW WILL I CHOOSE (YOU)*?
I’ll be utilizing http://randomizer.org/ to select a random number and then match that to a person’s comment number on this blog entry. Replies and double comments won’t be counted into this. Only the person’s first entry will be counted and all of my REPLIES WILL BE REMOVED FROM THE TOTAL! *I should not use Pokemon references, but look, I just did! Oops!

HOW DO I ENTER?
Just comment on this entry making sure to fill in the email text area so I can contact you if you win! *If you’re not interested but still want to comment please let me know in your comment!! Or else I’ll assume you’re interested in the giveaway.

TIME LIMIT?
I’ll leave this entry open for a whole week. The winner will be posted on my March 15th, 2012 Blog Entry!

GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED!

THE FORBIDDEN CITY; OH, BEIJING.

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Beijing, day four was basically one big taxi ride out to our new hotel – we were to start our big, absolutely arranged, Beijing tour on the fifth day of our travels – the new hotel was swanky, clean, but also in the middle of nowhere – it was a good hours drive out of the city and from where we were staying beforehand. I had a feeling we would be Driving Forever. Too true.

On the upside, our tour of somewhat epic proportion began with a bang on day five – after competing with hoards of hungry touring families and old folks (and a surprising large number of Singaporean/Malaysian Australians) during the breakfast buffet, we boarded our buses and were shifted out the Forbidden City (紫禁城) – a massive citadel that housed the emperors and their families from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. Now, I’m not going to lie, this place is HUGE. Ridiculously HUGE. The scale of the place is so hard to convey – but imaging a grain of sand – ok, that grain of sand is you. Now imagine a sea lion. A huge, angry sea lion. Okay, that sea lion is the Forbidden City. No joke.

We luckily managed to arrive on a very rare sun-soaked day – on the downside it was so hot. On the upside – ridiculously blue skies and amazingly punched colours – all the amazing details of these buildings were magnified by the sunlight. Oh, by the way, if you havent’ already noticed, this blog post will have a bazillion photos. Just saying. You’ve been warned.

Yellow is a royal colour, thus the colour of the roof tiles. The red colour of the walls symbolize happiness and auspiciousness. Auspiciousness - it's apparently a word.

There were masses of tour groups out and about the Forbidden City when we ventured out - an Indian-led group very hilariously were led by a little comical poo on a stick. I had to score a picture as proof.

The Hall of Supreme Harmony - absolutely flocked with tourists - I managed to get up close - but not too close. I also managed to get an elbow to the cheek - which was a little too close for my liking.

It was about this time in the trip that I began to bore of the endless courtyards and hordes upon hordes of tourists - that is until I found this girl - BOWL HAIRCUT OF DOOM.

Amazing marble detail - carved from a single piece of stone 16.57 metres (54.4 ft) long, 3.07 metres (10.1 ft) wide, and 1.7 metres (5.6 ft) thick. Yikes.

The throne in the Hall of Preserving Harmony (保和殿) - a smaller version of the one found in the Hall of Supreme Harmony. I didn't have to elbow any small children to get the photo. Hurrah.

A large chunk of crystal in the concubine's residency to remind them to stay pure . How lovely. Picture comes with supporting tourists in the background.

This has to be one of my most favourite parts of the entire tour (well, the Peking duck part of the tour was pretty fabulous as well) – but I loved the history and the atmosphere of the Forbidden City – to be immersed in all of this detail and have the opportunity to experience it first-hand was truly amazing. Of course, our tour guide spoke in slightly Beijing-accented Mandarin, which is usually no problem for me, but since I was too busy taking pictures of things, I would occasionally return to his informative speeches half-way through and constantly had to ask my sister or my parent’s to go-over what he said. I’m not sure they were all too pleased with me – what I do know is that I have discovered that I know very little about Chinese history. Oops. Time to crack out the textbooks.

OH JACKET, MY JACKET.

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My love-hate relationship with attempting to acquire New York City friendly outfits has turned into a little bit of an obsession. Constantly turning websites over and over in my head – patching together outfits, churning through my wardrobe and returning to my computer with an upset turtle-face laid on thick. Yes, once again, I have nothing to wear.

My main fear is looking like a complete and utter tourist – yes, I know I actually am a tourist while I am in New York, but the fact remains – I DON’T WANT TO LOOK LIKE A TOURIST. Shamefully, I still will be posing in front of ALL OF THE THINGS with my hands curled in the telltale “rabbit ears”, but what the hell, I put that down to genetics.

So when I found out that the utterly lovely Cintya was clearing out her own wardrobe to accrue some funds, I leaped at the opportunity to, not only weed through her collection of clothes, but also, to seek out a jacket to take with me to the Big Apple.

And my, was I in luck – I managed to score this fabulous like-new khaki jacket with detachable collar and detachable inner lining – that’s right – depending on the level of cold, you can defrag the jacket until it suits your temperaturely-surroundings – the perfect jacket for me, since I will not only be in New York for over a week, but I will also be heading out to Taipei on my way back (yes, MORE shopping).

The jacket arrived, packed up perfectly, in a plastic sleeve and tough bag – a great idea, since over the last few days, the rain has been creatively soggying up the place. Once pulled out of the packaging, I found that the jacket smelled great – freshly laundered! I immediately stuck my face into the jacket, and wiffed-up the super-clean scent – like some catnip obsessed cat.

Packaging aside, the jacket (from Lowry Farm’s sub-brand, LEPSIM), was absolutely fabulous – it is made out of heavy khaki, and sports a handful of nifty pockets and a snap-button cuffed hem. The jacket hem sits just on the hips – it seems a bit snug, but when tried on with Heattech and a sweater underneath, it still does not appear bulky. I nearly melted with joy…oh yeah, and heat.

The padded interior and fluffy collar very easily attach and detach with small button loops that line the interior of the jacket – and once removed, the jacket transforms into a very cute, military style coat, that can be layered over an array of dresses and tops from Autumn right through to Spring.

The collar is super-soft – I have an inkling that it is actually rabbit fur? I’m not certain (as it clearly does not smell of rabbit…also, I haven’t smelt a rabbit for a good long while) – but I would not be surprised if it were. I spent a good long while rubbing it against my face, it was so very fluffy.

In addition to the cute jacket, Cintya also including a few adorable little gifts and a postcard that she picked up on her recent trip to Vietnam! Oh my, what a sweetie!

LEPSIM is known for their Mori-Girl* style – and even looking at their site inspires me to tweak my wardrobe and ready myself for cold weather – I’ve always wanted to invest in a high-quality khaki jacket, and thank-goodness for Cintya, because now I have achieved that – but at only a fraction of the price! YESSSSSSSS! Also, Cintya does also have a few things left in her little shop, go check it out – expecially if you’re looking for some great bargains, with goods from both Australia and Japan!

Other adorable Lepsim looks that I will be emulating. Or, just viewing from afar and drooling over:

Oh wait, let’s not forget the actual Lowrys Farm label, too! Oh my, put it in a bag and give them all to me right now:

* The mori girls (森ガール) belong to a Japanese subculture. ‘Mori’ means forest in Japanese, and mori girls look like fairytale forest wanderers in their loose dresses, vintage prints and quaint accessories. Mori girls choose to live their lives on their own terms, stopping to appreciate the little things that others overlook amidst the hustle and bustle of daily life.