From Alyssa

Alyssa Parker

6/18/2011

Blog Post 11

      So, nobody freak out, but Ashley and I think we may have contracted a mild case of food poisoning. Last night we ate chicken-on-a-stick from a street vendor, and since then we have been having intermittent stabbing pains in our abdomens. Both of us are having the same exact thing, so it must have either been from the chicken-on-a-stick, or the spaghetti we both ate that had unidentified seafood in it. Every time I have eaten since the chicken, it’s been upsetting to the stomach. It’s not so bad that we have to go see a doctor, but it’s kind of intense sometimes. Hopefully it will be gone within the next day or so.

      Yesterday night we went to Houhai area for dinner- this is an ultra-touristy area that has a million little sidewalk cafes, a lot of bars, hookah bars, and of course a few Starbucks. It’s very nice, and there is a lake in the middle that has paddle boaters and 9-10 person row boats. Of course, everything there is super expensive, and it’s packed full of waiguoren (foreigners). Ashley and I saw more foreigners in a couple hours here than we have in 3 weeks combined. So THAT’S where they’ve been keeping them all. Anyway, we ate dinner outside in a café and ordered spaghetti (which may or may not have contributed to food poisoning). It was a really nice night, and I could see it being a great spot for a romantic date night.  One thing I’ve noticed about China- it’s really difficult to get waiters to bring you cold water to drink during meals. It’s almost as though they just usually don’t have beverages during meals. Ashley and I always ask for bingshui (cold water) when ordering our food, but the waiter inevitably either looks at us really strangely like we are crazy for wanting water, or brings us hot water instead. I learned the word for bottled water just the other day actually. Another thing about waiters in China is that they HOVER. Woah, do they hover. Literally as soon as you sit down you are expected to tell the waitress what you would like to eat and drink. I always have to tell them to hang on a second because I need to look at the menu, and they give me the strangest looks like, “what? You don’t know what you want as soon as you sit down? Weird.” I actually had a waitress in a Korean restaurant tell me, “OK, I will let you look for a second, but hurry up.” Seriously, true story. But, when I go to meals with people from work, they always know exactly what to order as soon as they get there, so I guess it’s just the norm here.

      Today during the day we went to the Forbidden City with the undergrads from the China Studies Institute at Beida, who only just arrived here this week. I really envy these kids- they get to stay here until December and go through an intensive Chinese language immersion program. Anyway, the Forbidden City was really neat and we took a bunch of pictures which are posted below.

Houhai district in the central part of Beijing

Alyssa and Ashley's romantic dinner in Houhai

The family in front of the Mao tribute at Tiananmen

Alyssa, Ashley and Tamara inside the Forbidden City

Dmtryo trying to see what was behind a forbidden door in the Forbidden City- we then promptly heard an announcement on the p.a. system to back away from the locked door