Beijing, China. “Parks, Gardens, & Mischievous Me.” Enjoy this episode, and make sure to stick around for the awesome ending!

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Another episode showing a different side of Beijing life is coming soon!!

I’m currently staying in an affordable 2 star hotel in Beijing, making the most out of my little travel budget remaining. There is a PIZZA HUT right below me, as well as a KFC. I couldn’t resist trying both. The pizza I ordered at PIZZA HUT was delicious, and completely satisfied my craving for cheese & good pizza. It was expensive compared to other Chinese food here, and small in size compared to pizzas in North America. My pizza contained baked Atlantic Salmon, octopus, cheese, and a mayonnaise/wasabi sauce. Not a typical combination, but I do recommend it! KFC was incredibly crowded, and I had to wait extra long since many Chinese people carry some sort of “I’m elegible to cut in front of you in line” I.D. card which they refuse to show to me. This happens in subways and other places too. Overall, I recommend PIZZA HUT over KFC when traveling in China.

For breakfast this morning, I went over to the local supermarket and picked up some items to satisfy my hunger in the mornings for the next few days. This included:

-2 bottles of juice (900ml each), Mango & Orange
-1 instant noodle bowl (for a late night hunger emergency)
-1 package of chicken & ham sausages, which was on sale
-1 jar of yogurt with fruit pieces (they have lots of varities of good yogurt here, which I need since I can’t drink the milk and cheese is very expensive, hard to find, or poor quality)
-1 bottle of sweet green tea (Check under the cap, you can win an extra bottle. I’ve quite lucky with this and have won 3 times already).
-sliced white bread (also on sale)
-peanut butter mixed with chocolate and/or some kind of nutella. (a nice treat and quick solution for satisfying my hunger/keeping me from being too skinny)

Altogether, this was about 55RMB. In Canadian dollars, that’s about $9.00. Reasonable?

Don’t worry, I’m not only eating fast food/western food. In fact, I’ve mostly been eating Chinese food (so much that I forgot most of the names of the dishes). Tonight I had a delicious steaming hot bowl of 红烧牛肉面。It’s basically sliced beef with tofu, some veggies, and noodles all in a bowl of tasty soup. As always, I asked for a non-spicy one. It was quite filling and the price was less than half of my morning grocery bill.

Roasted Beijing Duck was awesome and memorable, as to be expected. I had it with some pineapple this time, a modern fusion twist to the dish.

I’m going to go boil some water. I want it to be cool and drinkable before I leave tomorrow morning.

Peace from Beijing,
-A.Z.

I forgot to post this episode! My apologies for its lateness. Although I’m in Beijing now, this video was my goodbye video to my previous travel destination: Taiyuan. Therefore, I will call this video: “The Forgotten Episode.” Enjoy!

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PS: Episode 27, my first Beijing episode, is coming soon!!

My basic yet limited understanding of Mandarin, and the lack of foreigners who speak it, adds an extra twist to the experience. It’s very hard to describe without going into long and complicated stories. And I know your time is precious. So here’s a sample of what I mean: the 3 most common things people say to me. I honestly hear these almost everyday, and often more than once.

1. Ni hui shuo zhongwen ma??!! (You can speak Chinese??!!) Usually this is said with disbelief, admiration, or embarrassment…depending on the situation.

2. Ta ting bu dong. (He doesn’t understand.) This typically follows phrase number 1, because Chinese people like to give me a time-limit to answer their questions, usually between 0.3 - 1.2 seconds. However, 57% of the time, they are right.

3. Hao chi ma? (Is it delicious?) Anytime someone cooks food for you or invites you to a restaurant, you will hear this question. It is frequently paired with “Eat some more.” The unknowing foreigner might feel greatly pressured by this, and will often reply, “Yes.” As a result, many foreigners will start to resemble to shape of the dumplings which they consumed 82 of. To avoid this, it’s important to know how to handle this delicate situation. You must learn every possible way to compliment food, and then use varying degrees of compliments accordingly. “This one is extremely delicious!” That one is very acceptable!” “Please help yourself to this one, it is too delicous for me.” etc. The Chinese are sensitive enough to notice these subtle differences. But be aware that anything you admit to enjoying will be ordered again if portions are running low. So it’s best just to eat, smile, nod, eat, and stop when you are full (and let others know you are full by saying so or by falling out of your seat onto the restaurant floor).

Peace from Beijing,
-A.Z.