Singapore
We flew to Singapore first. I roomed with Adam Dean, who was a bit freaked out by the small room, which meant the beds were touching. He moved his about eight inches away.
Here's the potty and shower. Notice my bed is touching the shower. It was a very small room. There's a sink behind me in this photo.
We visited National University of Singapore (NUS), which is a world-class university. Everywhere we went in Singapore, the structures and spaces were designed with drainage in mind. Here's a trench that follows a set of steps.
The campus is beautiful, and has many open green spaces.
Singapore is also one of the busiest shipping container ports.
One evening, we went for a hike along the Southern Ridges Trail.
Part of this trail has a skywalk out among the tree canopy. Here, we're probably 20 ft off the ground.
We used the excellent subway quite a bit.
Beijing
After Singapore, we flew to Shanghai, and took the bullet train to Beijing. We were going about 300 kph, which is about 185 mph.
In China, all our tours were conducted by the official (government) tourism industry. Here, our Beijing guide Christine yacks at us on the bus. They were very well informed, in their way. Not too up certain matters, like the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.
They took us to several official factories, where we could buy stuff that was "guaranteed" genuine. Here is a jade factory, with a guy carving out a happy family ball. When we went to the government guaranteed silk factory, several of the ties were polyester, or "100% silk feel." So much for our faith in their assertions of authenticity.
We visited the Ming Dynasty tombs, near Beijing. Notice the flower atop Christina's umbrella. That was our flag. If you ever got lost, you looked for the flower. It is a standard Chinese technique, and is pretty effective.
That's me and Emperor Yongle, the one who moved the Ming capital from Nanjing (southern capital) to Beijing (northern capital).
We also visited a restored section of the Wall.
Greg and Stacey Roach got to ride up in the car Bill Clinton took when he visited the Wall.
The section we visited was very mountainous and steep.
Some lady would not leave me alone until I bought something from her. So I got a nice PLA hat.
Same lady pestering Aaron Schellenberg. Relentless.
Our whole group. From left: Garth and Ruth Miller, Alan and Joanna Dutson, me, Aaron Schellenberg, Bill Cooley, Adam Dean, Justin Miller, Jim Lawrence, Josh Tollefson, Nathan Harris, and Stacey and Greg Roach.
Tiananmen Square. Rainy, and lots of pink umbrellas, including Adam Daen's.
Just like in the US, it's summer holidays from school, so lots of. Families were vacationing with their kid.
The Chairman and me. In crowded places, our guide said to wear packs on the front. Seems a bit silly.
After the square, we went to the forbidden city. These buildings were renovated in the fifties, or later. Yellow roofs mean these are imperial buildings.
The more fabulous animals on the roof, the more important the building.
The upper parts of this building show what they were like before renovation.
They are all wooden construction, with some sort of coating involving straw or some other fiber, and then paint.
Peking roast duck for supper.
Tortilla-like "pancakes" that you stuff with duck, cucumber, onions, and special sauce.
There were many signs of caution, and prohibition, of every sort. This one just warns of general danger?
The Temple of Heaven.
Rickshaw ride to a traditional Beijing alley neighborhood.
Both sides of this alley have four-house family complexes, dating to about four hundred years ago.
Our rickshaw's chain broke on the way back, so the guy had to tow us by hand.
Xi'an
We then flew to Xi'an. This is one of the gates in the city wall. Xi'an's wall is the most complete of any Chinese city.
We rented bikes, and peddled all the way around on the top. About nine miles.
One of the corners.
Adam Dean, showing us how it's done.
A factory that makes terra cotta warrior replicas.
The warriors themselves.
Un-excavated rooms, containing terra cotta warriors. The waviness is wooden beams lain across brick walls. The beams have sagged over the years.
One of the guys, cleaned up and on display.
There were so many signs warning about various things. This one is for an escalator.
Buddhist temple.
And in among the tourists, there were people worshiping, and burning insense.
We visited a silk factory, where we learned how you make fabric. Each of these cocoons contains one caterpillar, and is made of one continuous fiber, over a kilometer long.
You boil the cocoon, to leach out the glue that holds everything together, and find the end of the fiber. Then, you take eight of the cocoons, bundle the eight fibers together, and wind them up onto a spool, to make an eight-strand thread. The eight cocoons just bob in the water as they unwind.
Greg Roach tries on a hair piece he stole from a mannequin.
This is how you do telephone wire in China.
A bazaar, with too many people.
Typical apartment building.
Shanghai
Finally, we flew to Shanghai, and took a maglev bullet train out of the city, to catch our bus.
The three big boys. Shanghai Tower, on the top left (to be one of the tallest buildings in the world), is nearing completion. They are building like mad in Shanghai.
Some few of the buildings in the new financial center.
View of the new financial center from The Bund, across the Huangpu river.
Volkswagon plant we toured un Shanghai.
The greenest grass I've ever seen, at our Shanghai hotel. I got food poisoning at this point, and didn't get to go to Sujou. Instead, I slept in preparation for the long journey home. But, I made it home alive, and with minimal discomfort.
Map showing Beijing, Xi'an, Shanghai, and the route home. Starting from Shanghai, to Idaho Falls, it took 35 hours to get home, including layovers.
