January 19, 2023
Beijing, China: Big Buildings, Great Sights, Pushy People, & Crowdsby Randi / August 4, 2017
We’ve been together on this journey for a while, right? So it’s okay to get a little personal. Today we’re going to talk about what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real. The Real World: China. No we are going to talk about health issues we faced in Beijing, and then be rewarded with a look at our hilarious attempt to fix the little baby laptop in a huuuge Chinese computer parts superstore center where no one spoke English. It’s like an interlude. La la la la…
Just to clear up any potential confusion, no, that lead picture has nothing to do with anything. We just saw it on the street.
So, first of all, you think Beijing, you probably think air pollution. Luckily, the air pollution levels when we were there never reached high enough levels for an Unhealthy warning alert – according to @BeijingAir on twitter, the best provider for hourly updates and pollution levels. It’s incredibly useful and apparently trustworthy (run by the embassy, not by Chinese government, which has doctored the reports before, apparently). But even in the just ‘Moderate’ and ‘Unsafe for Sensitive Groups’ ranges, we were still uneasy about breathing in so much dangerous particulate matter. I mean, we were outside the whole time, walking around the super busy streets. So we did some research and found a shop in one of the business districts that sells masks. Not surgical masks, which do absolutely nothing, but legitimate face masks that actually filter out many of the dangerous particles. Doctor’s masks and scarves do zilch, p.s. Doctor’s masks, the ones they wear in surgery or at the dentist, and the most prevalent type you will see on people in China and other polluted countries, are only for protecting others (i.e. a patient) from any germs in the doctor’s mucus. They don’t do anything in the other direction, when the wearer is inhaling. It’s just a waste. Scarves, I imagine, are just as useless if not more so.
So, first of all, you think Beijing, you probably think air pollution. Luckily, the air pollution levels when we were there never reached high enough levels for an Unhealthy warning alert – according to @BeijingAir on twitter, the best provider for hourly updates and pollution levels. It’s incredibly useful and apparently trustworthy (run by the embassy, not by Chinese government, which has doctored the reports before, apparently). But even in the just ‘Moderate’ and ‘Unsafe for Sensitive Groups’ ranges, we were still uneasy about breathing in so much dangerous particulate matter. I mean, we were outside the whole time, walking around the super busy streets. So we did some research and found a shop in one of the business districts that sells masks. Not surgical masks, which do absolutely nothing, but legitimate face masks that actually filter out many of the dangerous particles. Doctor’s masks and scarves do zilch, p.s. Doctor’s masks, the ones they wear in surgery or at the dentist, and the most prevalent type you will see on people in China and other polluted countries, are only for protecting others (i.e. a patient) from any germs in the doctor’s mucus. They don’t do anything in the other direction, when the wearer is inhaling. It’s just a waste. Scarves, I imagine, are just as useless if not more so.
this is what I look like outside in China hahahahahahahahah #bankrobber
We made our way on our first afternoon to Torana Clean Air, a smaller store than we expected with a small range of face masks and room air purifiers. They did have the masks we wanted in the sizes we needed, just not a big range of colors, so we were stuck with this weird octagon color pattern. Whatever, I don’t care what I look like if it’s keeping my lungs safer. The mask is called the Vogmask, and it helps protect from airborne particulate matter and “non-oil airborne particles” like dust, pollen, and, best of all, SECONDHAND SMOKE! I’m gonna wear this baby on the trains so hard! I know that obviously this sort of mask isn’t perfect, but it is good at filtering big and tiny particles, according to studies, and decent at the dangerous sort-of-small particles, so as long as it’s better than nothing and better than a doctor’s mask, I’m happy. I would like to get one of those total face covers with the mouth hole that you blow out of but like I’m already stared at enough here I don’t think I would be able to handle more.
They were a bit expensive at about $30 USD, but that’s super worth it for something that is helping you not get asthma and lung cancer and all kinds of shit. I do feel like I can’t catch my breath sometimes here, so I will have to see a doctor when we get back about whether China-induced asthma is a thing, but overall it’s okay. Hooray for us looking like fools but acting like smarties! I like being healthy!
So, about that…
After we left Mongolia (hip hip hoorayyy!), I had some abdominal discomfort, like, in and around the kidneys. I was peeing a helluva lot more than usual, which by now you know is a lot anyway, and it wasn’t because of drinking much more fluid, so I was concerned. We decided to go to an international health clinic we had on our emergency list (we have a list of all the hospitals and clinics where we are going where mostly expats go, so they speak English), called Parkway Health. They made a same-day appointment for me and were so nice and professional and I love them.
It was a hilarious experience, if you forget the part about me not feeling great. With my symptoms, they pretty much just needed to do a urine test. So one of the many nice nurses led me to the bathroom upstairs, but it was locked. She got another nurse, and they both tried lots of random keys to unlock it, but nothing worked. I was just standing around for like 20 minutes. Finally one of them said, “Can you just hold it?” I did my best to communicate, “Um, I don’t just need to pee, you need to test my urine, like that’s the whole point of why I’m here??” Finally they got it open and took my sample off to the lab. Meanwhile, I met the doctor. She was a lady doctor so in your face, riddles. Her English was slightly less wonderful than all the main nurses’, but still good and I felt comfortable with her. She asked if we had been traveling hard for a while, and I explained that yes, we don’t sleep we just take trains to random places for like months now. I said I had just gotten to China from Mongolia AND SHE SHUDDERED. She gets it. I said how we were pretty much in a car for 7 days there where I had to hold my pee all day and I was also dehydrated. She was like no no no this is all bad! Are you sleeping? No I’m not sleeping as much as I should be or usually need to. She was SO CONCERNED. She kept putting her hand on my shoulder like for moral support, that’s how upset she was with like, these very minor complaints. It was like if I became a doctor. I would SO be the doctor telling everyone to sleep more and drink more water and getting so upset if they weren’t doing enough of either. She was like, listen, you need to sleep more, you need to drink more water, you need to eat berries, especially red ones (amazing medicine). Then she hit a language snag and said, “You need…it’s in Chinese pingwan (or pingyan I don’t know)…just….lying down on the bed is good.” I THINK SHE WAS TRYING TO TELL ME TO TAKE NAPS. I love this doctor! The results came back and showed signs of infection, and given the symptoms was 99% a UTI. Which, given how many jokes I made about getting UTIs in my recent posts, shows that the universe looooves messing with me.
if anyone knows why I’m sharing this picture we should be best friends
We went over the things that can cause a UTI and kind of just laughed:
Dehydration – CHECK
Holding urine – CHECK
Long car rides/travel – CHECK
Squatting instead of sitting when urinating – CHECK CHECK (all that business about how it’s better anatomically to squat is just for #2; for #1 for women it leads to incomplete emptying which leads to infection in the urinary tract which issss UTI)
Poor hygiene – CHECK did you READ the Mongolian outback post?
THANK YOU PARKVIEW I WUV YOU |
They brought me a paper cup of water in a plastic holder lolol |
I mean, every single thing! Man alive! She put me on a cycle of antibiotics (and I’m all better, p.s., this blog is on a 2-week tape delay). I went to the waiting room and told Z the good news (not sarcasm; it’s a simple easily treatable thing, that’s good news). Then I said, “The doctor said I need to sleep more, drink more water, and eat berries.” Z responded, “Oh SURE she did. Did she also order you to pet more small dogs??” I almost passed out laughing so hard and had a very hard time convincing him that doing more of my favorite things was indeed doctor’s orders.
I’m relieved that we went to a real doctor who believes in medicine and fixed me up. And mostly, I’m super grateful for our UK health insurance, which covers us worldwide and immediately gave the clear when the receptionists contacted them so we didn’t even have to pay out of pocket first. We area so lucky to have such good insurance that covers us everywhere we go – well, except in the USA. It covers us in freaking China and will continue to cover us in Kazakhstan and everywhere else, but it can’t cover the USA because their healthcare system is too much of a mess. Every other country is fine though! Jesus America.
Okay that’s enough about my insides! Here’s the treat I promised you (plus one more hilarious treat at the bottom) about our adventures in Beijing’s super intense electronics scene. One whole section of the city seems to be electronic parts superstores, selling all types of gadgets but most of all doing repairs and crazy customization of gadgets. Little baby laptop’s fan stopped working, so we took it to this section of the city and just dove in headfirst. We entered one of the giant buildings, and were greeted with four floors of indistinguishable counters with Chinese guys gadgeting huge messes of gadgets. We went over to one counter that we chose randomly and showed the guy the computer and mimed a fan turning with our hands and then did a NO gesture. He got it. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the part. We tried the next counter, and a guy was just not into trying to figure anything we were miming out (not as many English speakers as you might expect in such a city!). Onward! The guy at the next counter was in, and he rebooted the computer a few times and determined that the fan wasn’t actually broken, but that something was stopping it, so he needed to just go in there and clean the parts instead of replacing them. How we communicated this is a feat of human interaction and behavior because it did not happen with actual language.
So we watched as he took apart the entire little netbook, because since it’s so small everything is under the keyboard, and he really had to take every last piece out. Like, we went down to the motherboard. Little baby was in 30 pieces! And to check if what he did worked, he had to put it all together again, all the tiny little barely visible screws that each have a very specific part they go with so you have to keep all these tiny screws straight and it’s a mess! Of course, the first go-round didn’t jive well with the computer, because it refused to work! So back apart it all went, a little more fixing, and then back together. Oh it was EXCRUCIATING to watch. How can people watch actual surgeries?! Finally he did a few more rounds of fiddling and it was back! It took over an hour of stress and just sitting in the super hot warehouse with people staring at us like whaaat are these tourists doing here. We also increased the computer’s RAM (I think that means it has horns now!) and we got a Chinese power cord so we don’t have to keep plugging it in with an adaptor, and it all came to I think 230 RMB, which is less than $35. Not bad! It was kind of fun to have the kind of electronics experience usually reserved to locals who have a clue what they are doing with electronics. It was definitely out of the ordinary and cool to see.
ahhh GUTS
Okay, one more random thing, I guess relating to health? At the checkout at most grocery stores we went to, they have tons and tons of condoms where in the USA there would be, like, gum and candy bars. It’s a little disconcerting but hey, China is serious about birth control which is good! But one brand jumped out at us and we were CRACKING up.
UH HUH, that’s a condom brand called JISSBON. So shocking and hilarious! But it gets better, if you can believe it. Our Chinese friend said that jissbon is ACTUALLY WHAT CHINESE PEOPLE CALL JAMES BOND. So this condom line is named after James Bond! And it JUST HAPPENS TO SOUND HYSTERICALLY PERFECT FOR A CONDOM. Omg I can’t even believe. The writing underneath says something like “you can’t even see it”, something very 007 spy-like. Ahh it’s so funny!
Okay that’s all the random thoughts I have for today. And don’t worry Mom I’m all better and it was like nothing!
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A Day Trip to Chernobyl: Ukraine’s Infamous Disaster, Plus Dogs
Taking a tour of a disaster zone seems like it maybe would be lower down on the list of must-dos for a tourist visiting a foreign country, but when you are in Ukraine, a visit to Chernobyl is essential. This nuclear disaster from 1986 (actually, from April 25, 1986 so happy(?) anniversary) is something all of us have heard of, but few know the details about how it affected everyday people (in large part because of all the government-imposed secrecy and/or lies (‘ALLEGEDLY’)). Understanding how devastating the catastrophe was to ordinary people is difficult without seeing the damage firsthand. We hear too often about this or that terrible event that occurred here or there but when you’re removed from it, it’s hard to really grasp what happened. Visiting Chernobyl, we learned so much more about not only the disaster but about Ukraine and international politics in general than we could have otherwise. Seeing and experiencing this in person is necessary. And there is so much information about this horrible event still coming to light after years of lies and cover-ups, so a visit now is super interesting, providing a fascinating look into this sad history.
The Chernobyl disaster occurred during a safety test in the middle of the night, as ironic as that sounds. The test simulated a blackout power failure where safety systems were turned off on purpose. It is generally said that the operators performing the test were really bad at their job and they arranged the core improperly, so that a reaction occurred, and, since all the safety measures were turned off for the test, it got out of hand real fast. Like all events of this nature, there are tons of conspiracy theories floating around about what the real truth is, and though I don’t like to indulge such theorists, I must admit it is a little too convenient to blame all of this on a handful of individual workers doing their single task improperly. Anyway, there was a power surge and the attempts to shut it down added to all the power output and I want to say that water got into the core? And erupted into a steam explosion? And then a graphite fire? Firefighters tried to put it out with their normal methods but this wasn’t like a wood-burning stove, it was a freaking nuclear reaction, but they had no idea how to counter such a fire. It burned and burned for 9 days. Huge numbers of service people who tried to fight the fire ended up with radiation-caused illnesses – immediately, acute radiation syndrome and lethal doses of radiation; and longer-term, radiation-caused cancers. Many died painful, awful deaths, especially the bravest ones who had to get the closest in order to stop the flow of water into the core. These heroes were referred to as Liquidators, and approximately 600,000 such workers served in the aftermath of the explosion. That’s right, 600,000. Some organizations estimate that 60,000 (10%) died from radiation and 160,000 were disabled from it. Accurate numbers don’t really exist because of all the politics of the countries involved (and Russia pretty much refuses to honestly investigate it) so it’s safe to guess that real figures are higher. This is just one example of how the politicians involved wanted to sweep so much of what happened under the rug and refuse to tell the truth to the populace. And it’s not just the former Soviet block: As the radiation cloud blew over the USSR and Europe, France told its citizens that it was not dangerous radiation at all, outright denying that such a cloud was in their airspace, which it totally was. It’s not just Soviet dictatorships that lie to their people!
Everything about this disaster is terrifying, including how the people who lived in the surrounding area were treated. These were normal residential places, like Pripyat, a regular town that happened to have a nuclear power plant, like in The Simpsons. In the few days right after the explosion, a zone of 10 kilometers around the explosion was evacuated. The next day or so, the zone was increased to 30 kilometers, with more and more people bussed out day by day. All of these people were told that the evacuation would be for a few days only and so they didn’t need to bring any of their things. They could carry, well, only what they could carry. They were told they’d be back in their homes in a few days. In fact, none of them were ever allowed back into town, let alone into their homes, not until everything had long been destroyed at least, as we will see in this post. Eventually, as the explosion continued sending plumes of radiation into the atmosphere with no end in sight, the number of evacuees in that first year reached 135,000 people. The number would triple over the next few years.
Although the technical information about the explosion itself is what most research will talk about, the human element of all the residents whose lives were forever changed is really what a tour to Chernobyl makes you consider the most. Seeing all of the homes, the schools, the gyms, all the everyday aspects of an everyday town is more effective than anything else in showing how many people lost everything they knew before they knew it was happening. And they were the lucky ones who didn’t get exposed to lethal doses of radiation. What these residents went through is tragic and heartbreaking, and infuriating when it comes to the government.
So we had to go SEE the thing! as everyone who visits Kyiv should and does. We choked down some Cherno-bly and booked two spots on the group tour with SoloEast Travel Chernobyl Tours, the website of which features the host of Top Gear as their celebrity client, which adds to the whole ‘this is a weird thing guys’ vibe of a tourism jaunt to a nuclear disaster zone. SoloEast has great reviews so we paid the approximately $80 per person for the all-day tour. It’s a lot but it is all day and it is a reputable company that actually teaches you stuff. We met in the morning in the central square of Kyiv, called Independence Square, on the side where there is a McDonald’s which is great because Z could get coffee and I could pee twice before we left. The drive would be several hours but luckily they stopped enough at gas stations (usually for ice cream? for breakfast? I saw this all over this part of the world really) so I never had to worry too much about bathroom breaks. I mean I did still worry of course, but I didn’t need to. We got seats right up front behind the driver, my favorite seat, ostensibly so we could talk to the guides and ask extra questions and get extra guidance and info but really so I could become their friend and ask for a stop whenever I needed. Also it’s better for motion sickness. And also to get away from the yoots in the back (always) who bought alcohol at every gas station like they thought they were cool or something. Yeesh.
Lol my seat at the front, plus a look at the yoots being so cool outside
Oh and look at this one’s backpack. Man alive.
If you can’t read it well, it says LIFE IS PORNO. what does that mean. this is inappropriate for work and for Chernobyl
Okay that’s enough of the silly things. It’s time to get serious. You must wear longs-and-longs, in camp lingo – long pants and long sleeves, and closed shoes like sneakers. (This is to protect your skin from radiation, although it is generally safe to visit, no more dangerous radiation-wise than flying, really.) Once we got into the Chernobyl zone, there are a lot of checkpoints. Everyone has to get off the bus for the guards to look you over and check your passports. (Oh you have to bring your passport.) Sometimes the checkpoints were simple and fast, other times took longer. There is one main checkpoint into the area where all the busses of tourists coming that day convene and you can stare at all the other tourists and you can buy really weird souvenirs and most importantly you can pee. Oh I think it goes without saying, but bring all the water you will need for the day. And snacks. Lunch at the barracks is included (tomato and cucumber salad, what what! (and soup) (it was fine and very nice to accommodate vegans)) but anything else you’ll need, bring yourself.
Tour bus meeting point! partay
After that, the long day of learning and lamenting can begin. We started out by walking around small abandoned cottages out in the woods in the outer edges of the Exclusion Zone. Some people refused to evacuate, some came back as soon as they could, and some left forever, so there’s a real mix of what you’ll find out here. Mostly, though, you find completely trashed shelters. This is not from the nuclear fallout, no; this is from vandalism (yoots). Everything we found that was destroyed (which was, indeed, everything) all over Pripyat and the surrounding towns we visited mainly had shitty delinquent thieves and other generalized sorts of offenders to thank for the damage, all of that that wasn’t due to age and rust. People are terrible. Even so, it’s easy to see what utter abandonment did to the once vibrant towns.
As you can see, the floors are not in good shape. It is treacherous to walk around certain parts of certain buildings, so it can be a lil bit scary. If you are not in good ambulatory shape, this tour would be difficult, but I think you can still appreciate everything from outside peeking in (ON THE OUTSIDE ALWAYS LOOKING IN WILL I EVER BE MORE THAN I’VE ALWAYS BEEN CAUSE I’M TAP TAP TAPPING ON THE GLASSSSS I’m sorry I’m done).
Where we’re going, we don’t need floors?
In case seeing cottages destroyed isn’t enough, let’s look at all the markings of everyday life that were also ruined. Seeing things like schools, music rooms, auditoriums (I’m not going to say auditoria) (I know I just did but you know what I meant) (I’m not that much of a jerk) &c in this state really hurts.
YOUR CAR WILL STOP AND IN I’LL HOP AND OFF WE’LL DRIIIIIIIVE WE’LL DRIIIIIIIIVE then again maybe not
Some kind of auditorium room in what looked like a primary school. I have the same bug-eyes I usually have in such rooms but this time it’s not due to stage fright
someone’s notebook from school?
Once a gymnastics studio
the music room
After exploring these woods at the outer limits of the Exclusion Zone, we made our way closer and closer to the center – the reactor, and into Pripyat. The town of Pripyat was made up of more Soviet-style apartment blocks rather than single-family houses, and we went into the buildings that were more stable. I think these apartment buildings are even more emotionally challenging to reckon with than the houses because you’re seeing so many people’s lost homes at once, so much loss and wreckage in one place. Also climbing up those stairs was terrifying.
and I thought my landlords sucked. (also the requisite “Blursula” caption)
this is my ‘please dear god don’t let this roof collapse’ face
We also saw all the markers of a regular town, or what’s left of them. From the world’s saddest jungle gym to the world’s saddest Ferris Wheel et al. at the amusement park, to the world’s saddest indoor pool and the…well, you know, just the World’s Saddest everything/fill-in-the-blank.
The Ferris Wheel pictured below had the highest level of radiation as measured on our Geiger counters that we went around with, save for when we were driving through the Red Forest on our way out from the plant. Geiger counters measure the levels of radiation nearby. We took a ‘normal’ reading in Kyiv when we first met the tour guides, which was about 0.3, and we watched as the numbers changed through the day. It rose to 0.77 as we approached the Ferris Wheel and jumped to 4.78 when we touched the counter to the carriage. I don’t know if we were supposed to do that but there we are. Driving through the Red Forest it soared to 14!!!! And we were inside the bus! When discussing radiation levels, people often talk about bananas, because the forms of potassium in bananas have lil bits of radioactivity. In fact, scientists actually use the measurement BED, or Banana Equivalent Dose, which is hilarious, and I’m not going to get all scientific here or anything, but it’s not used because bananas are dangerous or anything; it’ s just because using something so recognizable that has some radiation but not a dangerous level or anything makes it easy for us normies to compare relative radiation levels and risks. It’s a point of reference, so be assured that bananas, although a tiny bit radioactive (the most of any fruit), are not dangerous (not unless you eat a shittonne so we can still hope that Freelee gets hers).
And here’s the saddest thing to me, an indoor pool without that amazing indoor pool smell. I know I’m weird but it’s the best smell. This is the hill I stand on, I guess.
One of the most effective parts of this tour, as you can see above in the pool picture and below, is that the guides often showed us pictures of what it looked like exactly where we were standing but before the disaster.
We also got to see the Duga Radar system, which was a Soviet early-warning system used during the Cold War. It was meant to detect ballistic missiles. This thing was enormous and Z was really excited to see it because he knew about its historic significance, while I pretty much just wanted to climb it (you can’t) (and shouldn’t).
Next, we made our way to the actual plant. Not inside obviously but pretty close. We were lucky to visit when we did, because the No. 4 building of the power plant, the building were the explosion began, has a pretty new cover, referred to as the sarcophagus. Early on after the disaster, experts realized that no matter what they did, it would be impossible to rid the plant of its beyond-lethal levels of radiation, so they decided to built a shelter to cover it up and limit the amount of radiation that got out. Design started mere weeks after the explosion! The original sarcophagus, however, corroded in certain spots and was never predicted to last very long anyway, so a shiny new cover was built from steel. This new confinement shelter was built a few hundred meters away and then wheeled into place, on top of #4, in November 2016.
This giant supershiny supersmooth tube-looking thing in the back is the new confinement shelter. The Geiger counter registered 1.17 here, so this thing is really doing its job!
OK, last but certainly not least, we need to talk about the most important issue in Chernobyl today. When I said at the beginning that the citizens of Chernobyl and Pripyat were evacuated and told to leave everything, I didn’t mention the most upsetting part of what they had to leave behind: their pets. Many dogs were left in what became the ghost towns. I know it’s hard to think about it without crying, and by hard I mean impossible. All those doggies made other doggies, as they do, and they beget the current residents of the Chernobyl area, All These Great Doggies. Rule #1, if you go on this tour, you MUST bring a giant bag of dog food, as I did, and feed all of them as much as they want because they don’t get good food regularly.
the only thing better than a dog is dogs
THIS MY NEW FREN
SO CUTE RIGHT? And so sad. These dogs rely on the kindness of the workers in the zone to feed them, but they need so much more. They need medical care. The great people at Clean Futures Fund have begun a project to help these dogs receive the veterinary care they need, from medicine to vaccines to neuter…onomy. PLEASE DONATE whatever you can to the CFF on their website so do it click here!
To leave Chernobyl, at the last checkpoint you have to go through the dosimeter, to make sure you and your belongings have not become radioactive. I didn’t get a good shot of anyone in the thing, but picture the full-body Rapiscan at airports (the worst thing), how you have to put your hands up and pray that everything goes well and all. Luckily, everyone in our group passed the test! The guide told us that people fail very rarely, usually only if they broke the rules or wandered off into the woods without a guide. One girl apparently had sat down on the ground in the amusement park or something and so her pants got an eensy bit radioactive and she had to leave them there! I don’t know if I believe that story!
So that was our day at Chernobyl. We learned so much – in addition to the guide’s constant guidance, they showed videos on the bus during all the longer segments of the drive. A lot of the videos had relatively new information, like about all the government cover-ups and things only now coming to light. It’s all fascinating and devastating at once. We got back to Kyiv after 7pm, so it is a very long, exhausting, exhilarating day. If you go to Kyiv, you must must take this tour. If you have no plans to go, please for the love of dog give what you can to the Clean Futures Fund Dogs of Chernobyl Project.
The monument to the heroes who sacrificed their lives to contain the explosion.
The Great Wall of China: More Like The Spectacular Wall AM I RIGHT
Time for a confession: I must admit that Z is the one that planned this trip. Doing the Trans-Siberian was always his dream, and it was his planning that created our route doing the Trans-Mongolian version of that, then touring China, then going back to London via the Silk Route. Literally all I was responsible for this summer was figuring out our one day visit to the Great Wall, which you most commonly access with a day trip from Beijing. That’s all I was doing, really. I decided I wanted to do the hike from Jinshanling to Simitai, a 6 or so hour hike that seemed challenging (yay activity!) but also beautiful, and not absolutely covered with tourists like some other sections. Yay, I made a decision! Go me!
Jinshanling is currently closed.
It’s hard to find information when all the internetting results are in a language you don’t speak, so we didn’t really know until we got to Beijing that we needed a new plan. Simitai itself in another direction was an option, but it’s the less beautiful, more treacherous/wild of the two, so it didn’t call to me. There were a couple other wild sections we could have gone to, but we aren’t expert hikers enough to deal with dangerous segments, and the more wild sections are at least a 3 hour drive away, and we didn’t want to waste yet more of our time driving after Mongolia. And Badaling was never an option – it’s the closest, yes, and it’s beautiful, but it’s the most touristed. It’s like Forbidden City levels of people, but on the Wall, when it’s even more important to get unobstructed views. We decided on Mutianyu, a good mix of all positives – gorgeous scenery, mainly paved with only a bit that’s wild, not toooo far (like 2 hours), popular but not crowded. There’s also a cable car you can take up to save time from climbing the 1000 steps or whatever it is, and a toboggan slide you can take down. Yesss. We booked our bus with the asshat who has a table in the 161 Wanfujing Hotel, that I talked about in the Beijing city post, and it was pretty reasonable price for the two of us to get picked up at the hotel by bus (giant bus instead of minibus like the guy told us, ugh), get a giant lunch (was good too!), and have a guide explain stuff to us. Not having to deal with the public buses going there was worth it. AND the bus made a lot of toilet stops on the way out, so that was good.
took forever to get a picture that wasn’t full of posing people
We packed my day backpack full of water, coconut water, bananas, pretzels, and random vegetarian meat jerky and other fun snacks and set off at 7:30am. Because it was a big bus, we made stops at other hostels to pick up as many people as possible before starting the real the drive – which wasn’t that bad, except for the super annoying Americans sitting around us who were like ‘totally finding themselves’ and also liked to talk about all the weird meats they’d eaten. ORIGINAL. Anyway, once we arrived at Mutianyu, we bought tickets for the cable car, which are 40 RMB for a return journey, if I recall correctly. We wanted to walk up the 1000 steps to get to the wall (we love climbing stairs!), but we were told that that would take almost half the time we had for the entire day’s exploration, and we would much rather use that time to go farther along the wall to the wild section, which we did, than just climb stairs with no view. Smart decision. The cable car was kind of long and rickety but they always seem longer and ricketier than they are to me. Scary! But fun! We wanted to buy tickets to take the toboggan slide down (I mean come on of course we did, is it a luge???) but they had closed the slideway because it was going to rain later. Boooo.
My disappointment at the slideway closure vanished when we got off the cable car at the top and made our way onto the main part of the wall. Guys, it really is Great. More than great, it’s one of the most spectacular things I’ve ever seen. Better than I could have expected just seeing pictures. It’s amazing, and even high expectations could not hold a candle to the real thing. Even just realizing that you’re here, on the real Great Wall of China, is the coolest feeling.
We met an Australian mother and daughter and became friends and did most of the hiking with them. The daughter was literally the Aussie version of me, down to the same thick frizzy long brown hair in a braid that tended to the left side. They were so nice and we enjoyed huffing and puffing alongside them. Mutianyu is no joke of a hike, people. There’s one section that is another 1000 stairs (maybe not really but felt like it, at least 100s), just going straight up, and other stair sections with super steep scrambly bits that you need to use your hands for too.
this section of steps was SO steep and they were sooo small
that’s not me
We went farther than most people ventured so we could see the wild, untamed section, the part that is mostly forest overgrowth on some old stone path instead of the solid path.
wild section begins
It was cool to see but not much fun to climb on because I was too busy maneuvering my footing and trying not to fall to enjoy the scenery. Still, that was only a small percentage of our hike. Most of it looked like this:
So flinging flanging gorgeous! Ugh it was amazing, it really was. It was much more difficult that I expected, with the heat and the steep steps and stuff, but it was so much fun. And to be really at the Great Wall itself was so special. You can’t actually see it from space, apparently, but it’s cooler than space is. I don’t like space.
We saw some amazing shirts on the wall, continuing one of China’s best trends for our amusement. And we saw a lot of kids – Mutianyu is apparently good for families, they say – including these adorable girls doing a jumping shot:
Do you see the one’s shirt? It says “mermazing”. I want it.
Not only shirts, but the signage on the wall itself was also amusing. Whyyyy is there a travel ban in this most famous tourist spot?
The only negative about this section is that there is only a bathroom at the cable car entrance point at tower 14 of the 26 that compose Mutianyu. So we got off at tower 14, hiked to 24 ish where it became wild, then went as far into the wild as we could given the time and the, well, wildness of it. Then we went all the way back down to 14 and then past it to see the preteen towers (more of the same, all beautiful), and there was only a toilet at 14, that whoooole time. That’s hours! Now I wouldn’t want them to change this historic monument by building facilities where they don’t necessarily belong, but, like, maybe I do. Just one little toilet in say tower 20 would be amaazing, k thanks.
Aside from that, it was the best experience. I could not get over how magnificent it all was and how special it was to be there. It was by far the biggest highlight of our summer so far.
Aside from that, it was the best experience. I could not get over how magnificent it all was and how special it was to be there. It was by far the biggest highlight of our summer so far.
don’t mind the super sweaty mess
