beijing

Hey there loyal followers!

For the last 8 days I have been in Beijing. Buckle up.

Beijing is one of the most polluted places in the world. The air was literally gray with stuff in it. That stuff being pieces of cotton. No wonder they wear those masks...It hurt to breathe deeply. We might have the black lung by the time we get home.

Friday night all 16 of us headed to the airport to catch our collective flights. Naturally since we're in China and nothing ever goes according to plan, our flight was delayed for 6 hours so we didn't make it to Beijing until the middle of the night.  5 am rolls around and everyone was pissed off because we hadn't slept and the flights were all so delayed and then cherry on top of the cake the hostel we were staying in that was supposed to be super nice was actually the grossest. All good though because we're young and its part of the adventure to stay in the most random hostels in the slums. There were these shaved cats roaming around that hissed all the time and cat hair everywhere. There was a big sign that said "don't touch the cats. the cats are aggressive." If you know me at all you know I hate cats. barf. Anyway so we finally went to go to lay down in bed and a big whirlwind of cat hair comes swirling everywhere. No AC either so we all wake up real sweaty. 

We woke up after a short nap to head to the Summer Palace. Honestly all I know is that it was the home of the royal family during the Qing dynasty. It was really cool though. All of the buildings started to look the same. The Chinese really like their decor but it doesn't vary much. Lots of red paint and swoopy roofs.

Something totally weird and gross...we saw this like 85 year old lady breastfeeding a 6 year old. Whole shirt up.

On Saturday night everyone was real tired and hungry We got lost on the subway for 2 hours trying to find this mall that is supposed to have really good Western food.  I don’t know how western they were thinking cause all it was was middle eastern food but Abby, Morgan, and I decided to try out this one Turkish restaurant. It was this huge outdoor restaurant that had the kind of seating where you sit on the ground on pillows around a table and people are smoking hookah. We got this to die for shrimp and pineapple dish and fresh made hummus and naan bread. After dinner Abby and I went to the Adidas store which was huge! There was definitely stuff in there though that was made solely for China. Definitely their style but things that would be worn nowhere else ever ever ever….. Anyway abby and I splurged and bought this way cute Adidas shirt.

On Sunday we went to the Forbidden City. Once again all of it kind of looks the same but it was still so cool! We went to tianaman square too. Actually we more so passed through it going to the Forbidden City. It really was just a square with government buildings. I thought it was going to be completely different than it was considering that whole protest happened and people got run over by tanks but I guess not. That's definitely not advertised there.

After a few hours at the Forbidden City we went out in search of a taxi to take us to the pearl market. Not a single taxi would take us....after about an hour we finally found one for a reasonable price and Abby, Morgan, and I headed over to do some damage to our bank accounts. We had so much fun bargaining. This place had so much stuff it was insane. Kate Spade bags to Yeezys to Beats. After a few hours my arms were heavy with bags and my bank account was a little lighter. Whoops. I'm only in China once. 

Monday morning we woke up bright and early to meet up with our tour guide, Sonya. She was taking us hiking and camping on the great wall of china. Yes, you read that right. I camped on the great wall of china. Let that sink in for a second. I, Hadley Powers, slept on one of the 7 wonders of the world in some teeny tiny town in Northern China. It was so cool!!! Only slightly miserable though haha. Let me elaborate. So we wake up and its weirdly cold for May in China and there is a forecast for thunderstorms but it wasn’t raining yet so we thought maybe we would get lucky. Nooopppeee. No such luck. We pile into this huge van and everyone passes out on the 2 hour drive to the Wall. We wake up to pouring rain and lightning. But we all dropped $130 on this so we weren’t about to back out. So we put on our rain coats and ponchos over our bags and start hiking. Now Sonya took us to a completely non touristy area so it was basically just us up there. First we went to an unrestored part of the wall. We had to hike up to the wall first so we were exhausted and soaked before we even got up to the actual wall.  We finally make it up to the first guard tower and its POURING. Like every part of our bodies is soaked and our bags are drenched even though they were covered by heavy duty ponchos. Could we be colder? Apparently because it only got worse haha. So we are hiking up and down to a few guard towers on the unrestored part and its like treacherous hiking. I kind of felt like I was hiking Mt. Timp. The unrestored parts have trees growing on the wall! Isn’t that crazy? After about 2 hours we start to hike back down but we went a different way and man alive it was an adventure. By now its raining even harder and we’re way up in the mountains so its freezing and we’re all in running shorts, running tanks, and sneakers. ROOKIE MISTAKE. We start walking on what normally would be a dirt trail but because of all the rain it was just a straight giant puddle of mud. No avoiding it. It was crazy slippery and the kind of mud where it just sticks to your shoes so you have no traction at all and your feet are slipping everywhere and everyone is falling in this gross thick mud. It was honestly hard not to laugh just thinking how dumb we were to hike this on the one day it rained. Made for funny memories though. So after about an hour of slipping and falling and tracking through mud that I don’t think will ever come out of my shoes (bye bye nikes you’ll be missed), we finally get to go eat lunch. Now lunch here is never as exciting as when you’re at home in America after a long day and you’re thinking about all the good food options you have. Nah its more like hmm what will they serve that is edible and I can eat as minimal as possible so I can make it to the next meal and once again eat minimal fried seaweed, tofu, and sometimes fried rice. Oh they had eggplant too….just looking at it makes me nauseous. I have food poisoning to thank for that one. So we eat and try to warm up for a while before we head back out. Thankfully it was only drizzling at this point so hopes were higher and we were a lot more stoked. At this point we have to start carrying all our camping stuff so we all have these huge backpacking packs on. Certain parts of the wall were so steep it felt like if the wind blew any harder we would tip right over if it caught our packs. We hiked about 2 miles up to one of the guard towers where we set up camp. This was easily the most insane leg day workout ever. Our guide does it 5 times a week!! She has got to have legs of steel…she wasn’t even breathing heavy. We naturally had to sing “I’ll Make a Man out of You” from Mulan as we hiked the great wall. That’s something I never thought I’d do. Alright so anyway we get up there around 6 and it is FREEZING so we set up camp as fast as possible, ate rice, and went to bed at 7.I must say rice is definitely not as good of a camping meal as hot dogs and s'mores.  We woke up at 6 with numb toes and packed up camp to hike back down. I camped on the great wall of china!!!!!!! So tight.

We run into other ILP groups a lot of random places in China and they have like no crazy stories…..nothing bad ever happens to them haha so in hindsight our stories are cooler. Norovirus from strawberries, rainy/muddy/cold camping on the great wall, no Chinese ERs, no being swindled for their money from boat guides. We ran into this one group who is staying at the same hostel as us and they were like did you guys here about the group who got the norovirus???? That suckkkkssss….and we just laughed and were like yeah that was us.

Crazy thing that keeps happening to us but only in Beijing….the taxi drivers and restaurant people all keep saying our money is fake…not good.

On Tuesday my parents finally made it to China!!! Boy I have never been so excited to see them. They picked me up from the hostel and we headed to the Marriott with our driver. A very nice and very welcome change of pace. Then we went out to dinner at this supposedly famous duck restaurant. 

This hotel had the best breakfast I have literally ever had. 

Wednesday morning we hit the Great Wall again. Thursday we went to the Llama Temple, the Summer Palace and to this street that is a little like Time Square in New York. Friday we went to the Forbidden City, the Beijing Olympic Park, and the Temple of Heaven. Saturday morning or basically still Friday night since it was so early we went to the airport to head to Shanghai! 

Traveling tip: if you travel with Kim Powers you will eat one meal at 8 am and one meal at 10 pm and nothing in between. Be warned. 

great wall of china!!!!!

we may or may not have been struggling real hard here. the great wall is a serious leg day workout. 

summer palace with cute abby

some random lady handed me her kid. i don't think she likes me.  

forbidden city ft. lions and syd

our humble abode.

seen one building, you've seen em all.

elli defacing property. to be expected. 

the attention to detail is crazy. 

do we look sweaty and tired? we most definitely were after trying to track down a taxi unsuccessfully for an hour. i'm sure we looked ridiculous waving our arms like maniacs at every taxi that drove by. 

freezing cold. very, very wet. but so excited we finally made it to our campsite on the great wall. we definitely weren't prepared for the buckets of rain that poured down on us. 

we camped on a section of the wall that hardly anyone was on. it was so cool to see parts that weren't restored. 

heading back down the wall after half sleeping half shivering through the night. 

peking duck resturant 

my parents came to china and naturally the first thing we did was eat. if you ever come to china, the food is not like pf changs which is disappointing. i already have my lists of foods to eat when i get home.

great wall pt. 2 with my parents. we went to a more touristy part of the wall and took a gondola up. definitely the smarter move over hiking up to the wall then hiking forever on the actual wall. on the way down, mom and i took an alpine slide that pretty much felt like it was falling apart at every turn. yikes. 

the chacos have gone international. 

burning incense at the llama temple.

a million stairs later i had to sit down. my fitbit step count was through the roof this week. 

cute mom. 

i'm ready for my olympic career. 

echoing wall at the temple of heaven.

there are these little workout parks everywhere in china. this guy was easily 70 and way more ripped than me. 

lots of cool doors at the summer palace. 

more cool doors.

typical tourists. notice how far off the ground my feet are not. it's been determined i cannot jump more than an inch off the ground and most definitely cannot land gracefully by any means.

cold, wet, tired & high on life. and wayyyy high up in the mountains.