Forbidden City Made Possible By...
...The American Express Company
There's nothing more enjoyable than getting away from here for an amazing weekend in Beijing, filled with real food and fun. It didn't start off too fun with train difficulties on Friday morning, but we arrived in Beijing all the same an hour or so late. After meeting with some friends of friends, and getting some food, I went to the Silk Market with Kim and Tami and did some bargaining for gifts. We were soon off to North SanLiTun, one of the bar districts in Beijing. I have been craving a real pizza for several months now and I was told about a great place there called The Tree which has real cheese, real pepperoni, and real pizza sauce! Most pizzas in China include corn/potato as a topping, don't have good cheese, and are served soggy. As soon as I stepped into the place, I knew I would have to stay and wait the hour and a half for a table. Not only was the Pepperoni pizza amazing, but I was able to get a Leffe too. The whole group of us then headed out to another couple of places and danced a bit (while some of the girls with us got poked by Chinese men, but that's another story).
The next morning I had some French toast, for the first time in 7 months, with Kim and Tami. We met up with Jodee and Stephanie from my school, as well as a bunch more people, then headed off to the Forbidden City (aka "The Palace Museum"). It was a beautiful day with amazingly blue sky and a warm breeze (the sky is rarely blue in Beijing), and the Forbidden City was pretty empty. It was actually a pleasure to walk through the huge complex, though it was odd to see at the bottom of every sign "Made Possible by the American Express Company". I was determined to find the controversial Starbucks within the compound and eventually decided on an amazing vanilla frappuccino. For dinner we headed to a great sushi place, then off to another district of Beijing for some expensive drinks by a lake to finish off the evening.
On Sunday morning I went for breakfast with Sarah and Josh at Lush, a cool place in WuDaoKou where you could hang out all day. I had my first pancakes with syrup in 7 months along three cups of amazing coffee, all for 20RMB ($3.00)! Amazing I tell you. After a real breakfast, we headed to the Capital Museum to check it out for a bit before heading to Carrefour to pick up some essentials such as pastries, chocolat milk powder, and cheese