Beijing Day 4

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Originally uploaded by jrherron.

On our 4th and Final Day in Beijing we decided we should finally get over to Tianamen Square and the Forbidden Palace. We started with a quick breakfast with Betty before she took off, and then had to fugure out how to get our enourmous set of frames home, so we had someone look into shipping for us and then mozied out to the square. It wasn't quite like I'd pictured it once we were there, mostly because there weren't actually any tanks trying to mow me down like the only image of the square I'd ever seen before, and it was painfully cold when we first got there. We wandered around a bit and then went inside the forbidden palace to get inside the walls and out of the cold air. The inside of the palace is pretty cool except they were doing maintenance on some of the larger rooms so we couldn't go in. We debated for a long time about getting the audio self guided tour, but were glad we didn't when we saw how much was actually closed for the winter. I guess this means we'll just have to go back sometime closer to tourist season. After taking in the wonders of the palace, we wandered around a bit trying to find a reasonable cab. Sometimes the cabs right outside of tourist areas find any way they can to charge you too much, so your better off walking away a bit to find a regular cab that will use the meter and take you where you want to go. We had the concierge give us the address to a shipping place that shall not be named before we left for the morning so we went there next to see about shipping our stuff home. W is supposed to get a corporate discount, so we figured that would be the way to go. We could not get anyone there or on the phone to actually acknowledge the discount but at the very least they gave us a huge box until we figured out what to do. You should have seen me in the subway with this huge box on a train that was completely packed. When we were trying to get out at our station I had to wrestle like crazy to get it out and still only managed because I handed it around some guy that was standing in the door. So We stopped by the hotel decided we'd try to pad the frames and check them like regular luggage. That would require bubble wrap. I don't know about you, but I don't know the chinese word for bubble wrap, so once we got past that language barrier the conceierge recommended the post office as a place to get some, and we could take the subway or just walk. Well the directions we got sucked, and we couldn't find it. After an hour or so of wandering we got in a taxi showed him the word post office someone had written in chinese for us even he didn't take us to the right place. Frustrated tired and hungry we got on the subway went back to the hotel and paid someone to run out and get us bubble wrap and tape. It was not good use of a vacation day. After getting all our stuff wrapped up we went for happy hour and then a delicous korean dinner. I had the most wonderful beef dish that came on a hot flagstone. Tired but with full tummys we went back to the hotel where we scored a massage for W and a place to sleep for me.