Chinese Pizza Hut

Today was a very long and tiring day, but a good one. I have pictures from today and I'm going to try and put them up so we'll see how that goes...

First we went to a restaurant in Chongwen named after a famous Chinese author... the name is escaping me now but I'll edit with it later. It was really pretty, and good Shanghai food.

the roof of the restaurant

the entrance to the restaurant. There was a fountain on the other side but it wasn't going so I didn't take a picture.

This is me, Shelley, and Di all looking very full after lunch. This is not a cute picture of me. Gross.

After lunch we went to the Temple of Heaven. It's where the ancient Imperials went to pray for good crops and good fortune for the year to come.

The palace through the trees.

Me, Di, and Tara in front of the Temple

A good example of Ming dynasty architecture.

After the Temple of Heaven we went to the Silk Market in Chaoyang. It was nuts, seriously. All of these young women hawking their wares to you and calling you "pretty lady" in as many languages as they think you'll understand. You have to haggle to the DEATH, this one woman wanted to sell me a "jade" necklace for 350 yuan. When I walked away she CHASED after me and offered it to me for 30 yuan. I didn't buy it but that just goes to show you how much they inflate their prices. I ended up buying a pretty silk jacket and two rings. 

We had an INCREDIBLY long taxi ride back to the dorms, and when we got back Tara wasn't feeling well so we decided not to go to Sanlitun as we had planned. I hadn't eaten dinner yet, so I walked to the Pizza Hut by the dorms. I only learned the word for "cheese" because I thought it was going to be a normal American Pizza Hut but the Pizza Huts in China are NICE. They're like... sit down restaurants, I'd equate it to a California Pizza Kitchen in the US. I wish I had taken pictures, it was one of the nicest restaurants I've been to here! haha. I got take out and grabbed Zhang Yimou's Under the Hawthorne Tree at the DVD store. 

Tomorrow is back to class, and then we're going out to a village for some film screenings this weekend. I am tired! I can't believe this trip is already half way over. After last night seeing the "real" Beijing I want to stay even longer :/