Great Wall / Great Trip

I was originally scheduled to fly out of China the day after the Olympics ended, but when it became clear I wasn't going to have time to do a Great Wall trip, I knew I'd have to push it back, if possible. Fortunately, there was a spot on the flight the same daily flight the next day, so now I wouldn't have to kick myself for getting to China and not seeing the Wall.




Scott, Larry and I left the media village the morning after the closing ceremonies and went to the swanky Ritz-Carlton on the other side of Beijing. There, they had a half-day package to the Great Wall at Mutianyu where you get a tour guide, a van, a driver and passes for the lift to the top of the wall, all for 1800 RMB, or about $260 between the three of us.



As is common practice with these tours, they throw in a side stop along the way. Ours was at a plant where they did hand-made Chinese vases, urns, artwork, etc.. You get a quick tour through the shop where you see the process (above) and then there's the requisite gift shop at the end. Seems like it's a pretty standard practice at a lot of places. Since I'm a cheapo, I didn't buy anything...

Outside the factory was one of the many basketball hoops we saw during our trip. It's become one of the most popular sports in China with Yao Ming as the hometown hero, but also with the NBA being a HUGE draw. Kobe is a god here.

I was drawn to the lions alongside this beat up old hoop.

After about a 1 1/2-hour drive from our hotel, we get to the mountains and the base area for the Great Wall at Mutianyu, one of the seven sections that's open to the public. There's one a bit closer to Beijing called Badaling, but we're told this is better and less crowded. It's still quite popular and there's a lot going on at the bottom.

After getting out of the parking lot, we start walking up to the ski lift that will get us to the Wall itself. In doing so, we have to run a gauntlet of little shops where locals aggressively try to sell their wares, much of it the same, and as our guide warned us, most of it lousy quality..

After hopping in the cable car for a hot ride to the top that took a couple minutes, we were greeted by a pretty awe-inspiring sight..

Scott, Larry and I at the top.. The Wall itself stretched over 4,000 miles, just an unbelievable project that took millions of labors. Much of it is in disrepair now, but the seven sections open to the public have been restored and kept up. In other areas, it's been taken down or local villages have taken the stone to use for houses.

Our guide also told us they also say the Wall is the biggest cemetery in the world since millions of laborers who helped build it and died during its construction were also buried right in it...

Walking the wall is definitely not an easy stroll. It goes up....

And it goes down...

We walked just under a mile from Tower 14 over to Tower 6 and it was a pretty taxing hike.

There are A LOT of steps, many of them pretty narrow, so you have to walk a little bit sideways and all the stabilizing muscles in your legs are working constantly. We didn't even realize it at first, but then when we'd stop, our leg muscles would be shaking and spasming. It was definitely a good workout. Larry didn't come our direction, which was the more difficult route. He headed off to the left when we got to the top and took a more leisurely climb.

The wall itself is pretty big, well over 30 feet in places. And it's on the top spine of the mountain, so it's very imposing..

Here's a section with the steps heading down fairly steeply.. The legs aren't burning at this point..

Although it was hazy, it was still pretty hot on the Wall, so the towers made for a nice little respite. Cool and shaded, they invariably had some local who was set up just inside somewhere with a small cooler of drinks.

You know, when you have a GIANT wall on top of a mountain, how much more protection do you need, really? So we just let him sleep...

This was looking back up from the stretch we just hiked down. The plan, thankfully, was not to go back up and take the cable car back to the base.

Some very ornate carvings on one of the towers.. And of course the requisite grafitti from tourists..

And here's the plan to get back down.. At tower 6, there's a luge track. A metal chute that will take you all the way back to the bottom. There was really no question I was going to do this.

How could you not be convinced to take a toboggan down from the top of the Great Wall??

Simply had to be done.

You'd climb in the toboggan-like thing and there's a lever in between your legs. Push forward, you go faster, pull back and it slows down. Of course there's a lot of people going down, but there's a reasonable spacing and you just had to hope that you didn't get some slowpoke clogging the the way.

The run itself took about 5 minutes, which was pretty cool. I took some video on the way down, so have that to remember the fun... You could really gain some serious speed if the track was clear (and probably fly right off the sides), but there were too many other people to really open it up and the workers would be stationed at various curves in the course to yell at you when to slow down or pick it up. Was a good time. I made the run down, then stopped to have an ice cream at one of the shops and took the seperate chair lift back up to Tower 6 just so I could take the toboggan ride back down again.

Just an awesome experience all around. Needless to say, I'm extremely glad I moved my flight back a day so I wouldn't miss this..

Competition Over..

After 17 days of competition and even longer buildup, the Games finally drew to a close in Beijing.. Everyone is a little burned out and happy to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Everyone here is VERY excited that we won't be seeing anymore of these jammed shuttle rides too! Anytime we want to go to the major events, the buses are just packed. This was the one I took to the men's volleyball gold medal match on the final day of competition. Great story with the U.S. winning it all, but the cozy shuttles to and from the venues, media center and media village do get a little old after a few weeks..

Ah, and the cattle call heading into the venues too.. Those will not be missed.

Had a little lightning storm the night before the final day of competition.. Sick of the shuttle rides, Dan and I would often just make the 20- to 25-minute walk home from the media center to the media village in the middle of the night, occassionally with a beer in hand. Stopped for a bit to try and get one of the big lightning cracks, but this was the best I could do behind the main TV tower decked out with the Olympic rings.

After the closing ceremonies, I made the late-night walk home with co-workers Nelson (from our Beijing office), Baynes (Sydney) and Grant (Singapore). We had to take one last pic in front of the Water Cube as it changed colors into the night..

We also stopped in at the Bird's Nest stadium It was just hours after the closing ceremonies, but they were already hard at work closing things down and taking everything apart.

So while they worked around us, we headed down to the track and got in the blocks for one final race.. Okay, so we didn't really run, but that's only because blowing out a hamstring or groin muscle would have been a lousy way to end the trip.

To cap the night, we headed to our usual spot at the media village -- the little bar area outside the food court. It's funny how this place evolved over the course of the competition. At first, the bar was inside and was brightly lit. It just wasn't a very relaxing atmosphere. At some point, people just started taking the drinks outside, then someone brought a chair out and then tables.. Eventually, the organizers realized they really should just move a bunch of tables and chairs outside every night. There were a few nights that we'd get back at 1 or 2 in the morning after working late and then end up outside until 4 a.m... And inevitably there would be some Brits out there until the sun rose and a massive collection of Tsingtao bottles.

Tsingtao was the official beer of the Beijing Olympics and was unquestionably the drink of choice for this trip. Lost count how many I had as we'd meet at the end of the day to decompress, rehash the day's stories, share tales from back home and talk about all the nonsense everyone has to deal with in their respective offices around the world. Some things are universal, whether its office politics or enjoying a cold beer and some good stories at the end of a long day... and longer business trip.

Ah, the end is finally here.

The Silk Market

Ok, I'm not a big fan of shopping, as Carrie will tell you... I'm just too impatient to wander around stores for any long period of time. But I was told that the Silk Market in Beijing is one shopping experience that's just not to be missed. So Scott and

I took a cab downtown to check it out.

It's on one of the main drags in Beijing and features thousands of vendors over seven floors.. The place is known for wide selection of designer knockoffs, from clothes and bags to jewelry.

The place is jammed with merchandise and jammed with thousands of shoppers. It's truly sensory overload when you walk in; loud and bustling, with vendors constantly beckoning shoppers into their booths.

What the silk market might be best known for other than it's knockoffs are its aggressive vendors. They are, in a word, relentless. First they call out to shoppers, pleading for you to come in and look at their stuff. Some even grab you and try to pull you in. Then, if you do go in, they're going to do everything they can to make sure you buy something.

Here's a common sight above. The vendor holds the woman by the arm while they try to negotiate a price. She shows the woman her asking price on the calculator in her hand and then the haggling begins.. It's really pretty amazing. Everyone haggles on the prices. Many walk away and the vendors will chase them down the aisle.. Anything to make a sale because lots of others are hawking the same stuff.

There's plenty of Chinese knick-knacks for sale too, as you can see above.. You won't find many empty corners in these booths.

This was my absolute favorite picture of the day. This Ukrainian fellow COULD NOT get out of this booth. The vendor grabbed onto his bag and wouldn't let him leave. We stopped to watch for a little while and even jokingly reached our hands out to try and help drag him out. I finally had to bring out the camera and get a picture of him.. Felt a special bond with the fellow, but alas, we eventually had to leave him there; never did find out if he made it out...

After hitting just about every floor -- breezing through fairly quickly and haggling a bit -- we eventually headed out and walked the streets for a while.

Was a beautiful day to wander, so just checked out the local flavor. Plus, the streets, crowded as they might be at times, can't top the craziness of the Silk Market.. Definitely was a shopping experience like no other.

Boltin

After seeing Michael Phelps in the pool, I knew I had to take in Usain Bolt on the track.

First, though, I have to mention that I had my best dinner of the trip at a Chinese restaurant a couple blocks from our media village. Scott and I walked into town one evening and just had a tremendous meal of duck, ribs, dumplings, shrimp and, of course, General Tso's chicken. I simply had to try the real thing here in China since I get it so often in the states and it was, by far, the best I've ever had. Just a little crisp on the outside after being seared, perfectly cooked, great flavor and fiery, but not too much. Man, was it good.


So on this night I was working on other stories, not track, but figured it would be more fun to do it in the stadium surrounded by 91,000 people and soak in the atmosphere than in our bunker in the media center. Caught plenty of action, including Bolt absolutely cruising in another gear in his 200m heats, plus hurdles, javelin, discus and high jump.

Had terrific seats too. Second row off the track about 15 yards short of the finish line. Couldn't get much better.

One minor problem about being so close and also trying to work is that you're pretty close to the starting line for some of the races. I have to say, the starter's pistol is MUCH louder than I expected. While working on a couple of occassions with my head down, it startled the bejesus out of me when that thing went off..

Lots of different things were going on at the track at the same time, but this was one of my absolute favorite things to watch.

That little gizmo in the middle of the picture is yes, a remote control car. There were two of them that constantly ran up and back to bring the discus, hammer and javelins back to the competitors after they'd been thrown. I was absolutely riveted by this novel idea... The discuses would just be put in the back while there was a little cylinder for the javelins to go in. Then two guys sitting near the throwing point with their remotes would drive em on back..

What a terrific idea! I was waiting for some spinouts or loops on the infield in between runs, but never got em.

Pandaland

Before heading to China, I watched a couple shows on the Travel Channel detailing the country’s food, history, people, and of course, Pandas. It was those furry creatures that Hana and Maia were most impressed with, even if my Beijing-based colleague Nelson here calls them mutants…

Wasn’t sure if I’d actually get to see them, but decided I would try if the opportunity presented itself. After going over to the athlete’s village on this day for an interview, I got on the shuttle for the ride back and was informed it wasn’t leaving for another 50 minutes. It was about 3 p.m. and I had the rest of the afternoon off, so rather than walk a few miles in the heat, I decided to call a cab and just have it take me to the Beijing Zoo, which was about 20 minutes away.
I had some time to kill before dinner and zoo admission is free to media with Olympic credentials, so figured it was a great chance to take in the special Panda exhibit. The endangered pandas are unquestionably the biggest draw at the zoo. People have to pay a separate price to get into that section, but the crowds are still the largest.

I ended up picking the right time of day to go because this young fella was real active, running, climbing, swinging, tumbling, just having a great ol' time to the delight of the crowd. The pandas have a pretty big habitat, so he would climb across his set of monkey bars made of logs, then hang upside down and drop to the ground. Then he'd run through the grass to his slide or hang on his tire swing before finally climbing up a tree for a rest.. Check the video link at the bottom for this fella in action!

After the pandas, I decided to wander a bit and of course had to check out the big cats..

All these guys were in pretty small cages. There must have been about 10-12 big cats in this building, which absolutely reeked of piss. It was pretty overpowering.. There were quite a few people in there holding their noses.

This fella was just pacing and pacing across the front of his cage, while the black jaguar in the pen next door emitted growls that echoed through the entire building..

In the furthest reaches of the park was the elephant section; near it was a bunch of sculptures for the kids to play on. Right nearby was a boathouse on the canal that looped through the zoo. Here, you could get into an 8-person motorboat (in a canal that was about 30 feet wide) and the guy would just gun it like a bat out of hell and then swerve side to side, seemingly poised to flip the boat at any moment or at least roll the thing into one of the side walls.. I actually erased a picture my mistake and had considered taking a ride before worrying the boat would swamp and I'd lose my bag..

It was at the bridge across the canal where I had my first episode in which one of the locals wanted to have his picture taken with me. I thought he was asking me to move out of the way as I stood in the middle of the bridge watching the boat swerving wildly, but he then grabbed my arm and pulled me next to him. He then put his arm around my shoulder, and I put mine around his, as his mom snapped a pic. I then shook his hand and bid my new friend good-bye in Mandarin..




And of course, the star of the show!

Pine Valley

Well, I had to travel half-way around the world to do it, but I finally, finally got to play Pine Valley!

Ok, so it's not the No. 1 ranked course in the world, the one that's only about an hour and 20 minutes away from my house in New Jersey, but still.. This is literally the Pine Valley of China. A Jack Nicklaus-design, it's reputed by many to be the best course here, is very private and hosts a European Tour event. So when I was able to wrangle an invitation (thanks Butchie), I definitely knew I had to figure out a way to get there... After getting to sleep at about 2:30 in the morning, I woke up at 5:30 and caught a cab just after 6. The course is about an hour or so outside of Beijing, so wanted to make sure I got there for my 7:30 tee time.

The gate above is what greeted me when we finally got there... It's beyond over the top. That guard there then points down the road, so my driver pulls out, heads to the end and makes a turn that pretty much led us nowhere.. I start gesturing, trying to make the point that the original gate had to be the right one. He probably realized it too, so we turn around and head back, where I tell the guard "Guest." He understands. Excellent. Progress is being made. He indicates that I should wait for a cart to come pick me up. After getting picked up about 5 minutes later, I'm taken to the driving range, where I meet the director of golf, Dayong Hu. He says that I should go to the main clubhouse, so drops me off there and the fun begins.. At the main clubhouse (seen above), I go to the front desk and tell the girl that I'm a guest of Joy, the marketing director. She looks at the tee sheet and I'm nowhere on there. She's never heard of Joy -- at least that English version of her name -- and trying to comprehend marketing director? Yeah, right...

This is troublesome. I have no phone number for Joy, so I'm starting to fear this trip was all for naught. Fortunately, after some phone calls, she eventually gets in touch with the right person and Joy comes over. She's young and very nice and her english is passable. excellent.. Mr. Hu then joins us for some juice while I wait for the GM. He eventually shows up --- no joke, his name was really He -- and we talk for about 10 minutes (through Joy since he doesn't speak english). Then it's off to the posh locker room, where I changed into shorts, they hooked me up with golf shoes, and I stored my work bag. I got a set of Adams rental clubs, which were right outside the back of the clubhouse and loaded up on a cart waiting for me.. I played with the director of golf, Mr. Hu, and we each had a female caddie. Another first! As you can see in the above picture, the caddies, in addition to their myriad other duties, would even line the ball up for you on the putting greens! Amazing.

Get on that at Pebble Beach, Ian! After some VERY long work days and not enough sleep, I was a little fearful of how poorly I might play. Despite some stiffness, though, I fortunately hit it pretty decently. And the caddies were complementary pretty much no matter how I was playing.

Mr. Hu had only been playing about 3 years, but he was pretty solid. About a 10 handicap, but I think I might have edged him out on this day. He didn't speak great english and my Mandarin is woeful at best, but we had the golf in common, so shared some laughs and stories along the way. Naturally, three holes in, I got the requisite, "Tiger Woods, US Open... awesome." then a laugh.. We both agreed on that. When I came up short on a 12-foot birdie putt on the fifth hole, he says, "Ohh. Mm.." Yes, coming up feebly short on a birdie try is universally bad.



I kept thinking, "What better than to make my first hole-in-1 in China?" Alas, it never happened, even though I played on 8-18-08 and "8" is a lucky number in China. I had a couple par-3 tee shots that were right on line, but came up just short on both occassions.



I was hoping for a bit of symmetry: just 10 days before, on 8-08-08, Pops dropped the first ace of his life, at his home course of Rancho Canada. I got the news in an e-mail at 2:30 in the morning and couldn't have been happier if it happened to me...


Awesome stuff, Dad.

The course itself was good, but not great. It was well-kept and lush, but ultimately I found that the holes weren't all that memorable. If I had to compare to a course I'd played in New Jersey, it probably would be like a Fiddler's Elbow. Above you can actually see what appear to be giant Roman columns that are behind one of the holes and at the back end of the equestrian club's clubhouse.

We ended up playing two different nines. There's the main course, which hosts the European Tour stop, and then another nine. The second nine wasn't nearly as good, but one thing it did have as you can see above is lights. That's right, they had the course open for night play, which I thought was pretty cool...

I ended up shooting 44-46, which was pretty respectable. I missed a chance to crack the 80's by lipping a birdie putt on the par-5 18th hole. That's me and Mr. Hu on 18 above. I didn't drive the ball great and stubbed a few short chips around the green after not playing in a while, but was solid for the most part. Oh, and I ended up paying like $55 to get a glove and 6 pro-V1 logo balls before the round.. One good thing was that I ended up using the same ball the whole way thru. Always good.
And here are our caddies. They were great. That was my caddie on the right and she did a heck of a job reading the greens and nailing distances. That was the other thing, I thought that maybe I'd be having to do meter/yardage conversions, but fortunately everything was in yards and she was on top of that throughout the round.


It was definitely a GREAT time and an amazing experience. A most welcome break from the drudgery of the daily Olympic coverage. Just to get out in the fresh air, walk in the grass, see the mountains in the distance with the Great Wall running along their spine. Just surreal. Can't tell you how many times I'd be strolling down the fairway, looking off into the distance as I headed to my next shot and thought, "I cannot believe I'm effing playing golf in China."

After a post-round shower, I joined Mr. Hu for an authentic Chinese lunch in the clubhouse. There were a couple of things that were absolutely unidentifiable, no kidding. I have no idea what they were and he couldn't convey it.. But I tried them and everything was excellent.
After that, he drove me around the rest of the property for about30 minutes, showing me the equestrian club (above), the wedding chapel, the other clubhouse and it's golf memorabilia, the members rental houses, etc. All quite posh, but also an incredible mis-mash of styles which I found very offputting. I guess I was expecting one theme..

While I was getting the tour, he got a car to take me back to the media village. It ended up being a Pine Valley Lincoln Navigator, a strange sight here to be sure, and the guy rolls up with Heart's "What About Love?" playing on the stereo. It was absolutely surreal. Just an incredible experience all-around.

I can't believe I played golf in effing China.

Now to try and get on the NJ Pine Valley...