Now that I'm settled, I get to have a full day of the Chinese culture. Julia thought it would be a good idea to hit up the Summer Palace first. It wasn't that far of a bus ride and it was one of the tourist places that I wanted to go to. I don't know the exact story but I think that some Dowager Empress misappropriated funds that she claimed were for the Navy and she built some huge palace for her to chill at in the summer since the heat was a big issue in Beijing at that time. You see a lot of signs about Anglo-French allied forces burning down the original buildings. That place was huge. My legs got a good workout. After all those stairs, I felt like I had buns of steel. I was sweating like a mad man. I think I'm gonna buy a little towel today to carry around.

Some couple came up to Julia and me and wanted a picture with us. I wonder what they were saying. "Let’s get a picture with those goofy Americans." "I think I saw that black guy in a movie." "This will make a good MySpace picture." I guess we'll never know. When we got down to Souzou Street, we got bombarded with all kinds of vendor requests/demands. It's funny how they call you beautiful when they want you to dress up in their stuff and pay for a picture. These two ladies draped me in some emperor’s outfit and would not let me walk away. I practically had to push them out of the way and then they started to take that outfit off of me. They were very aggressive.

After we left the Summer Palace, we decided to wind down at the hostel by playing some piggy game and various card games. That's when the guys from Julia's project showed up. Mark and Jean-Luc walked in with 5 or 6 other girls. They're all part of the archaeology work that Jean-Luc is doing for his PhD. Those guys were cool. The beer started flowing pretty heavily after they showed up. After the girls got settled, we met up with Mark and Jean-Luc in the alley for kabobs and beer. I found out that we were eating sheep. It tastes good to me. They call it mutton. I think we went through 27 bottles of beer (600 ml each). I'll let you do the math. And not everyone was drinking. That was a good night.

I also had the pleasure or walking into a public restroom while some guy was dropping a deuce in the squatter toilet. If you don't know what that is, just imagine a whole in the ground. That's pretty much it. They did have little foot spots so you don't slip while you're handling your business. I wonder how the guy felt with me pissing a couple of feet from his head. Once again, I guess we'll never know.

Day 2 Pics