back @ work after break

it's been a while since i last put up an entry here and the reason for it is, i've been away for a week in china. it was a family trip thingy since the last one back in 2000. this time, we were off to beijing, cheng de and tian jin. it was a 7 days 6 nights holiday cum tour. didn't managed to visit tian jin as the weather turns ugly on the day due to thick fog that causes visibility degrades to less than 500m. we were lucky that we still can visit other places in beijing as some of the other tour groups got held in tian jin due to road closure.

the places that i visited are such as tian an men square, forbidden city, great wall, temple of heaven, summer palace and lots more. other than that, as what most of the tours will do, they'll take you to factories that makes jewellery out of crystals, jades, pearls and hoping that you will spend money. one thing interest me is that, most of the factories producibles is guaranteed by the government of china and that makes buying more secure from counterfeits.

weather wise, it's cold as it's end of autumn which means beginning of winter. the temperature is at a high of 14 to 16 degrees during the day and low of 0 to 3 degrees at night. that's the best part that i'm looking for especially i'm only clad in t-shirt and pants. it's slightly more cooling in cheng de and that's a town that will definitely snow during winter.

overall, it was a good experience visiting those historic places especially the forbidden city where the emperor runs his administration and also the great wall. many of the sections were destroyed and some of it is under renovation works to restore its original structure. climbing the great wall is another exciting part where it really test you in both mentally and physically. as for me, i managed to climb to the extend of where tourist are able to and that's about 888m. at that peak, you'll be able to overlook the other sections of the great wall and most of it is badly damaged.

the only bad experience from this trip is the food where it just tasted so badly. as we were told by our tour leader, beijing food is more salty compare to other province that could be more sweet or sourish. for the entire trip, i took more than 900 photos and i'm still in the midst of getting it sorted out. will try to upload some of them once it's all ready.