China

The city of Harbin is nearly three times the size of Chicago, population-wise at least, so we couldn’t even tell you in what direction the river was from our hotel, nor Beijing for that matter. My dad suggested we get a bird’s eye view of the city from the Dragon Tower, one of the 25 [...]

I will tell you that, more or less, all fast food worldwide tastes the same. And then KFC creates the spicy chicken breakfast sandwich and I find myself passing the one KFC in Sevilla reminding myself about it. We hopped on a plane to Harbin, a town two hours south of the Russian border, a [...]

Our last day in Beijing started just as early as the others, even though we took a van down Wafujing Jie to the Temple of Heaven. Dad went out to get breakfast and found just McDonalds. Signs around the city advertise value meals for the equivalent of about $2.80!! My dad got breakfast for four [...]

Mr. Xian picked us up early to take us to the Ming Tombs, a necropolis where 13 of the 16 emporers from the dynasty are buried. My father talked about these huge animal statues and how elaborate all the temples were…which led to my extreme disappointment. Jack told us there were two tombs – one [...]

Day three: The Summer Palace and endless shopping The ever-so-talked-about fog finally hazed over the city, making it impossible to see past a few blocks from our 10th-floor rooms. The city had receieved it´s first dose of snow for the year, and there were seemingly thousands of road-cleaners brushing the dust off of sidewalks and [...]

Day One: Travel and Wafujing Jie I arrived to a snow-covered mountain framed Madrid after hoping a high-speed AVE train from sunny, 65+ degree Sevilla. I’d been anticipating going to China for six months – reading non-fiction memoirs and historical novels, mapping out Beijing and Harbin and mentally preparing myself for eating something with four [...]