Welcome to Ruudje's Weblog!!

This blog hasn't been updated since
Why?? Facebook came along... No need to keep updating the same stuff on two different places.


Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Back in China!!!

He's back!!!

The flight to Beijing went without any problems and I arrived as planned around 9.00. Grabbed my suitcase and bicyclebox (which arrived a little damaged, but the contents were still alright) and walked to the exit to enter China! And surprise, surprise... I even had a welcoming committee! Even though it was a single-person committee it didn't make me any less happy! Shoshannah was waiting for me and after several hugs and kisses we dropped my bike at a left luggage place and took a taxi to the center. The first day we walked around and after a trip around Hou Hai lake we decided to go for the HotPot place I loved so much when I was here last time! And it still exists!! Again only 20 kuai for all-you-can-eat-and-drink! Good food and lots of fun.

On Friday we did some shopping at one of the tourist malls. Lots of counterfeit stuff, but also some nice clothing, shoes, jewelry and anything else you can think of. We also changed hotels, because yesterday we came across this very nice, bright, well-located hotel called 7 Days Inn and I loved it from the start. Later that day it was time to do the thing I decided to do long before I got here: get a tattoo! We went to this really nice guy that did Shoshannahs tattoo as well last year. After some talking and showing him exactly what I wanted he copied the picture on some paper and then onto my arm. It took him a long time to prepare all his equipment and I did get pretty nervous. But seeing how he handled his stuff like he'd done it many times before made me feel more at ease. Then the actual hurting started... it feels like he's scraping into your arm with a very tiny and extremely sharp razor blade. It only hurts every once in a while, but in general I must say it wasn't bad at all!! The pictures below show the result!







She was supposed to get her tattoo redone after mine, but the tattoo guy insisted we had to have diner with him and his wife first and then he decided to watch a movie... at 23.00 we told him we would come back another day because it didn't look like he was planning to do her tattoo in the next hour or so... Chinese ;-) At night we had some drinks near the Worker's Stadium and went to bed slightly drunk :-)

On Saturday we made a trip to the Summer Palace. The weather was great and at moments like these the palace area looks incredible! After our trip we took a bus to a local noodle place and had some really good noodles. Later that night we again wanted to go out and have a party but it was kind of "dead" all around the lake... too bad, but we still had a nice night.



On Sunday we slept for a long time and then decided to go to the Forbidden City. Arrived around 15.00 both hungry, so we decided to get some noodles. While the noodles were being prepared I already got the entrance tickets and we sat down on a railing to eat the noodles and watch the Chinese do their thing. Had to go on a picture with a Chinese family (they just love white people...) and then wanted to go in. But... the big gate that serves as entry gate was closed! They stop allowing people in at 15.30 and guess what time it was... yes, 15.35 :-( At least that gave us a plan for Monday morning, back to the Forbidden City. So we went to the central shopping street of Beijing, looked around a little and again went back to the HotPot place :-) Lucky me!!



So on Monday we did the Forbidden city tour and got back at the hotel around 13.00. Got our bags, took a taxi to the airport, checked in, got on the plane and at 20.00 we were in my new home town: Kunming!! Again as taxi to the apartment, ordered some pizza and unpacked. Now that I'm "home", I can start doing everything that is needed to get a real life here. Look for a job, study Chinese and do everything possible to make me feel at home here, but I don't think that's going to be very difficult :-)



And you all know: you are always welcome!!
Greetingzzz,
Ruudje

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yo ruudje, klinkt allemaal weer erg interessant!! veel plezier en succes tussen al die kleine mensen...

spreek je John

PS: die vrouw op die foto's, je nieuwe chick;)?

none said...

Kick-ass tattoo. Good work, mi amigo. ...but why isn't there a photo of Sho's ink??

-Rodney

Post a Comment