China 2016!!!! (Part One)

5:53 AM

Hiiiii. Yes! I am actually writing about my china trip yay!!! OK!!!

With my little brother who is a fan of pokemon hehehe. He is so cute ^_^
Hugs for the little chubby! Arrived in Bei Jing, happy and well! Temperature was below zero already i think!
Cutie siblings!
Wore my scarf on the first day but it kept making me sneeze!!! Didn't want to wear anymore after that. My siblings trying to escape the camera!! T_T
My family met up with a old friend of my grandmother! She's the lady on the right and she was so generous and treated us to dinner in Bei Jing omg.. The food in China was actually expensive! More expensive than I expected. Life is hard for the Chinese because their pay is like average $1000 a month around there and living expenses are not that cheap.. :/
The largest fish I've seen in my whole life!!!! SO SOFT~~~~~~~~ Ahh.. such luxurious food I'm guilty to eat. Thankful for it though!! 
We are at day 2 already!!! Wearing the sweater that my aunt got me :-))

We lived at a hotel called Novotel which was conveniently located near San Yuan Qiao station!!!!! Love it because it is literally less than 100m away and it is so nice and clean!!! Reminds me of Downtown Line ehehehe. ^^^^^^ MY BROTHER !! EEHEEHE
All the subway stations along Line 10 are really nicely decorated according to different themes!!!
Finally arrived at our destination, the China Science and Technology Museum!!!! Stopping to admire the frozen lake!!! Ahh chilly at Bei Jing. It looks like algae in it or something!!!
What I want to point out is the lone little duckling swimming along the lake that was really cute
SUCH PRETTY TREES. This was pretty near the Olympic stadium. The entire place here is so vast and empty... Like I only see people jogging on the other side.
FINALLY HERE! Just to show you how empty it is!!! The 3 people in the picture are Josh, Glor and Pap.

The museum looked like it was going to be empty from the outside, but there was a school having excursion in the museum so there so many excited kids running around from exhibit to exhibit LOL. First time I see SO MANY KIDS in one area!!!! Me and my brother both did the bicycle thing! The place is filled with really cool math and science exhibits! Way better than science center! I visited the math corner and I was really intrigued with the place! When we solve math problems in school, it just doesn't seem very applicable to life, but they just make math come to life in a very cool way at the place!!!!!!!! Like so many topics you can explore for Math IA lah!!!! AHHHH
Disappointed at the counterfeit Gong cha. I really thought we came across a real gong cha and I was so :////
We still gave it a try though!!!!! Doesnt taste as good as gongcha but it is cheaper!!!!
Visited Da dong restaurant, which is I think one of the more reputable ones in Bei Jing. Also the most expensive one! I think we only choose more expensive options to avoid eating cardboard mince meat or getting food poisoning. Thank God!

We met up with our family friends!!! We knew each other since Gkidz days in church so we are actually pretty close, even though we hardly see each other anymore!!
Avocado salmon, which was so tiny and came in a huge plate. I felt really atas though.


BEIJING YA!!! ahhh just look at that fine meat!!!!

Us outside the restaurant!!!!! :-) Ok i'm only done with 2/14 of the days so I will be backkkk!!! :-))) Unfortunately you can't blog from the blogger app anymore (there is not even such an app), so I can't do it on the go.. I don't know why they removed the app!!! Apps are like the new trend now ahhh and it's much more convenient!! 
On our third day, we headed to a wholesale shopping area to get our ski clothes!!! :-) We shopped in the morning and had KFC :-)
You can see how the shopping area looks like from outside that window:)


We got ice creeammm YES. Yesterday I ate the Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Fudge ice cream and I want to eat more now!!!!

Travelling on the MRTs. Here I should note my experience with Chinese trains! They have really strict surveillance and we have to put our bags into the x-ray machines every single time we passed a gantry in Bei Jing! The Chinese there were also more caring, contrary to popular belief!!! Many times when we got on trains, the Chinese would give up their seat for my sister! I was so thankful!
We went to another tourist hotspot! I forgot what it is called already! We went in the evening and the surrounding sights were really prettyyy

Matthew bought a russian hat because he is really into tanks and alll!!! We were all surprised because Matthew hardly buys anything hahaha.
Cute sibling pair >_< ^_^

The first Starbucks we encountered on this trip!
Family photo with me as the photographer *hearts* *kisses*
Some sights of the place! I'm not very sure what this place used to be, but it might be kind of historically significant in some way!!! Anyway, most of the place is really commercialised already! There are some western shops too! If you walk in the back alleys, however, you can find small shops selling random goods -- the ones you find in a market or a thrifting area!!


Asking Josh to take a nice picture is like 1 in 5 shots.
We ordered piping hot milk tea to combat the cold!
We walked along the market and we saw this blowing candy thing.


I asked for a cow and this is how it turned out! And of course, when I passed it to Gloria for one minute, she dropped it and the cow shattered into pieces on the floor. It was 20 yuan, but worth it for the sake of the memory!
We bought special xiao long baos that require you to drink the soup out from a straw!

We chanced upon another spot where people can dress up and take photos. My adorable sister and mother. I am way too old for this. HAHA
Up the corridor to eat our second Peking duck meal in two days!!

MATTHEW AND JOSHUA
My Peking duck roll concludes the end of day 2. A cold and sweet day ~~* That is not how you should wrap the roll though! I was told you need to add more meat and less of the vegetable! 

GOING TO SKIIIIIIII YEEEEEEESSSSSSSS ! Look at the beautiful sky ~~ We took a bus to Nanshan to ski :)
What a caring brother *heart*

Decked out in ski gear LETS GO! Also Nanshan is a pretty good place to ski if you are a beginner!!! They have more than a hundred ski coaches who take so much initiative!! The moment we entered the building, 8 of them approached us. They helped get all our gear and lockers! We eventually had a coach for every pair for 2 hours! It was way more worth it than skiing in Korea!
Kids 4 and above could ski so Gloria had her first skiing experience in her really cute purple outfit!!!
That's us! I partnered with Uncle Mark haha. He was the only parent/adult who wanted to ski! We were about to go on the bunny slope :D
Gloria paired with Kennice who is p5 this year! Kennice's name means Beautiful. The coaches are really patient and they know their stuff! The lady who coached me has been skiing for 10 years ! I was really scared the first time I went down the bunny slope because I remembered how badly I skiied in Korea. She helped me to correct my position and after that I could ski confidently!!  Really!!! Almost all by myself!!! I think I learnt that I have to lock my knees in a certain way, not too low, keep back more straight, and try to stay more stable. I'm really thankful to her because her teaching allowed me to enjoy skiing !!! IT WAS SOOOO FUNNNNNNNN :))))
I'm not gonna pretend I'm very pro so I'm just gonna include all the stories here. They use this conveyor belt thing to let skiers go up some of the slopes, which I thought was a very economical idea compared to ski lifts. I went with Josh, Grace and Isaac after lesson to go on the bigger slopes. On the way up the ski lift, me and Grace were flustered by the sheer height of the slopes! We just picked a random ski lift and weren't very sure which slope it led to and we thought we had to go down that crazy high and bendy slope... Thank God the ski lift actually led to 3 different types of slopes and we just picked the easiest one. Fell down, couldn't get up at the steep bend, one of my skis fell off and I couldn't get back on it while slowly sliding down. Ahhh one of the reasons why skiing is SO thrilling to me!!! They waited for me to get back up heh! After a few rounds we found Matthew! We discovered he went ALONE and tried all 3 slopes, even the super intimidating and difficult one. WHAT.

Me and Grace went to do the level 2 slope, which has  very steep beginning. The thing about skiing is that you have to be BRAVE throughout the whole thing and not just the beginning. A lot of times the hardest part is the start, but for skiing you really gotta maintain for whole slope. The first time I did the level 2 slope.... The really steep part really scared me and I saw some one in front of me.. I screamed super loud, lost control of my legs and fell. The slope was really steep, I lost one of my handles while falling and every time I tried to get up I slided down more... So I skidded the rest of the very long slope to the bottom on my butt. It was a little embarrassing, but honestly it was quite an experience!!!! Josh was at the bottom of the slope looking at me slide down and he told me I was embarrassing. I was very sad Josh, how could you??????? Okay, Josh is a really good skiier. My brothers are better than me. Anyway, we went back to do the level 2 slope again. This time, I really tried my best and overcame the really steep part I fell at by keeping my knees tight! I went the whole slope without falling, which I'm so happy about!! I was abit scared whole going at it, but skiing is like conquering your fears!!! :DDDD

A photo we took after the delightful adventures that day :DD HAPPY MEMORIES *hearts*

For dinner, we went to my favourite restaurant in China, HAI DI LAO!!!!!!! Sitting beside my cute sis 
They gave her toys too!! Hai Di Lao's service is impeccable! The price is middle range and the food is not bad :)
TUCK IN EVERYONE! It was such a good meal :))) Thank God for the blessed and fun day spent with friends!!!!!!!!!! BEST 
The noodle dance!!! hahaha Gloria loved it alot :)) 

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