February 2011 - we decided to spend a very winter-y honeymoon in the very historic city of Beijing, China. Which we later found out was the perfect place to be during a Chinese New Year. Why? Two reasons:
(1) No foot traffic and (2) No vehicular traffic!
Beijing houses around 19.6M people according to Chinadaily and that's a "huge crowd" during rush hour if you ask me. It's very nice to know that during the two weeks celebration, almost everyone from the city has traveled back to their hometowns or provinces and are spending the National holiday with their families. So, we got to have the city all to ourselves (which is good since we are in our honeymoon). Travelling to get to the different tourist spots was a breeze.
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I have been very picky when choosing the hotel because if it's not clean I know I'll get sick especially when the weather's cold. Thank God that the hotel that we got turned out to be what they say they are in their website. It is really a charming boutique / business hotel which is in Wangfujing Business District, Hotel Kapok. And, it was walking distance from everything ---which I love love love!!! It costs around PHP4,000 or roughly $80 a night - which, for me, was all worth it because it is very clean and the staff has been really helpful with all our requests. We got the Courtyard room which (from the name itself) has its own courtyard where you can smoke (if you're a smoker) and gives you a little more space than usual. It also has good internet connection, a safe for valuables, mini bar and flat screen TV with loads of International channels like HBO, MTV, CNN etc. etc.
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I am a such a sucker for history and drama, so if you're like me, you would not want to miss out visiting the Forbidden City, which is very much the center of China's history. It was declared a UNESCO Heritage in 1987 and houses the largest collection of wooden artifacts in the world. I just loved seeing it with all the snow around, makes the scene more picturesque and much more dramatic. :)
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| Frozen River |
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| Rickety Chinese bridge |
A walking distance from our hotel as well was, Tiananmen square, also a big tourist spot, known for the thousands of people that were massacred there in 1989, I was kinda spooked walking in this place even though there are a lot of tourists and locals around. Makes you remember that you're in Communist China.
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| The Great Mao |
Walking to the Southern gate of Tiananmen square, is where the Mao Zedong museum is. I personally find the experience of having my picture taken with the big picture of Chairman Mao hanging in the background one of the most memorable picture I have of China. Memorable, not because I am a fan of his, but, because of a documentary show that I watched in History Asia channel entitled --- "Making Mao" that explained how Mao's "image branding" propaganda (with the help of that picture) changed China. Their strategy was ingenious that even up to this point, despite of how catastrophic his philosophies and political campaigns turned out to be, he still has many devoted followers up to this day.
And, just across the Mao Zedong museum is the Monument to the People's Heroes which was the tribute to all the martyrs who died during the Chinese revolution.
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| Me at the Monument of the People's Heroes |
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