Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Tang Gu 塘沽 & Wai Tan 外滩

Last Sunday 21/7/2013, I went to the Tang Gu 塘沽 and Wai Tan 外滩 with my J.Buddy and one of her first time meeting with her internet friend. My goodness, never knew the transport cost would be so expensive. I mean, usually the MRT fare was maximum RMB5, but this particular destination, wahhh made my RMB10 fly away. Okay larh even though it's still affordable, but if you can save, why not? Anyway, took roughly one and half hour to go there. 

To get to Tang Gu 塘沽, I have to walk to the bus station, then hop on to the bus, then MRT and interchange, then EMT. When transiting to the other place nearby, yes it's nearby for driving but would take ages to reach there if walk, so we took cab because... 

1. The weather is really hot!
2. There's like, 3 of us, so if we combine our bus fare to go there, it would turn out to be the same as the cab fare, so okay loh.
3. The weather is really hot hot! 


On the EMT, which is sort of train-style-like seating. See the yellow rubber ring thingy? I'm expecting white sand and beach and sunburn!


This is the XiAn style bread filled with braised pork and green pepper (西安肉夹馍)for lunch! RMB5 each, it's good!

The northern part of this area 北塘沽 is the beach, so they are famous for their prawn paste and cheap seafood.

Saw this decorative statue and thought i should do the typical touristy shot with it. And no, I also don't know what and why are the two pears doing down there.

This is actually a floor. Yes, a chessboard floor. Unique isn't? Kinda like the Harry Potter feel. Hah!!

Uhm.. What caught my attention was the 6 packs "oh another decorative statue! touristy shot again!!". I was standing on the left of the picture, next to the snake at first, then decided to change because.... I simply want to touch the fake 6 packs  the s2pid snake is creepy. 

You know, the whole point of coming over here is to visit this "Foreign Goods Market 洋货市场". I thought it would be like, many stalls and vendors would keeping shouting and yelling for sales and lots of people bargaining over there, and not to left out, crowded! 


I was terribly wrong. It was just a few shop lots and some people wandering there and very hot weather! All those comments and feedback from the internet are all !@#$%^&*().


And this, yes, another decorative statue marks the end of the "Foreign Goods Market 洋货市场".
  
Honestly, I was kinda shock and maybe slightly disappointed when I found out that this is it. I wasn't expecting to shop or anything, even though all the comments and feedback says that they are very cheap that is if you don't consider the quality of course.

Oh well, didn't really spoil my day though, because I wasn't really looking forward that much to this place actually, I'm targeting another place, which is Tesco nearby Wai Tan 外滩, for my honeydew rocky!! :D But I didn't take any pictures, was too excited, and it's... well it's just Tesco. Heheh.


Having performance, but it should be nicer at night time with the lightings effect and all, so we planned to come back in the evening, close to night for dinner! But things didn't turned out the way we planned, as usual, but this is good enough! 


Nice hor? With the pigeons and all chillaxing there. Makes you want to take a break, just like them as well.

I was trying to get an artistic close up shot of it, really CMI! But this is the best that I get, so just make do loh. 


See all the umbrellas.. If only they are in position according to their colour, in varieties of bright colour, I think the effect would be much better than this. 

Then, it was the buffet! RMB 39.9 with free flow of beers! Hahaha never been to any buffet with free flow of beer, but not that shock, because afterall, their beer is cheap over here. And when you drink lots of beer, you will be bloated very quickly, don't be cheated ah! :p

This is the night view, was kinda rushing for public transport, so we didn't get to walk much of the place at all, but I would definitely want to come back again, for the sake of the rocky/pocky varieties!

While waiting for the EMT to go back home.

Even though we didn't do much for the day, but I was very happy to finally, get to buy my honeydew rocky and to have a real steamboat buffet. Seriously, the last time they say buffet 自助餐, it wasn't the typical pay-a-price-and-eat-all-you-can buffet, it was eat-all-you-want-and-pay-whatever-you-eat-in-ala-carte-price. 

Want to know how I found out? 

....... *sighh* 

Fine, here goes... 

Yea it was when my boss asked me to arrange dinner with the client, and the client told me it was buffet. Then when we reached the place, the waiter told us we have pay according to whatever you eat in ala carte price. But that time I don't know, so end up my boss ask me, "I thought just now you say buffet?" :(

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Beijing 1 Day Trip


This is sooo overdue update since the start of my 6 month overseas internship attachment in Tianjin, China. Anyway, on last Saturday 6/7/2013 me and my junkie buddy, Serene went to Beijing, China for an 1 day trip. It was a very last minute planned trip so we purchased our to and fro tickets at Tianjin train station on Friday and start our 1 day trip on the next day, Saturday. We then start out research on how to get to the places when we came back from the train station. Of course, our mobile wifi was perfectly doing its job, allowing only one of us to connect the internet, which make things even better. However, that doesn't stop us from getting the information that we need, boo yeah!!

When we reached Beijing subway station, crowded with human!

On the way out from subway exit, it's Summer! Umbrella's up!

Reached Tian An Men 天安门!!

Proceed to buy the entrance ticket to forbidden palace.


My junkie buddy busy taking videos, no time entertain me, so the reverse camera comes in handy! :x Long Stone Carving by the way, with dragon.

I wasn't kidding about the heat! And yes, that's my umbrella.. :)


Fine i admit, i didn't read whatever that's on that board, they are everywhere! And it's really hot out there, halfway through i already wanted to get out of the palace already.


Wood window.

Dragon carving

I was sick of getting pushed and getting some sparta tourist sweat all over me and getting my neck dragged by aunty just to take pictures of the inner palace, so i go for the not so popular ones, the outer "wall" of the building.
  
My lunch! Microwave instant meal, 梅菜扣肉饭, freaking expensive for this "7-11" food.


Peach ice cream in summer? Perfect!


Went to the jade museum that was supposedly be the concubineS room 东六宫.


Jade artwork display.

连理树, the two tree that grows together into one.


The tree has smoother skin than i do! >.<


And of course, the royal garden 御花园 :)


Roof with dragon patterns ~~



The middle thingy is the place where everybody throws a coin into it, believing it will bring good luck to you, but .... refer to the next picture!


The signboard says, do not throw coins into it, i only saw this sign board when my bedmate told me to turn around  after I threw my coin :x what.... I didnt know what, and the board is like... blocked by all the human!!



And yes, yours truly with peace! my first thought was, my goodness I'm finally outta this place! HAHAHHA :P 


Next stop, jing shan park 景山公园!!


That's the way for eating watermelon and honeydew on-the-go!  Was very tempted to buy them actually, but was very  bloated with the bottleS of water that we downed in the forbidden palace earlier, so we passed.


Since we have extra time on hand, we decided to hog at this cafe with WIFI!! :D And of course, just to keep us occupied since we are too tired to talk, we ordered.


Cheese cake and Pancake with syrup, butter & jam! Yummmmy... <3 br="" nbsp="">

Right outside the forbidden palace, on the way to the Jing Shan Park, vendors selling souveniers to  scam  the tourist!


On the way up to the mountain, vendors again. They are just so good at this whole selling a bottle of water in triple of the market price thingy!

Fun fact : Just so you know, Jing Shan Park is an artificial mountain. And yes, I did saw the tree where the emperor hanged himself for the country. 


Finally, reached the highest pavillion. View of the Forbidden Palace, I know, it's hazey, but it looks great still! :) Was cheated a few times just because they have a few pavillion and they all have a great view of the Forbidden Palace.


Went back to the exit of the Forbidden Palace, its just directly opposite of the exit of Jing Shan Park. It was very late that time! Have to take cab and rush to the train station. So guys, if you ever wanted to go during evening hoping to see day and night view, and you need to rush for 8.30pm train to go back Tianjin just for public transport, good luck!


And that's the night view of TianAnMen from cab.

Okay, need to continue doing my work already. Tian An Men, Forbidden Palace, Jing Shan Park? Checked! :)