Beijing, China

Basically, I thought that I could always tolerate cold really good, but that was until I came to Beijing. When they say its cold here, it literally is. Lets put it into perspective, the iPhone is touch screen, and is activated by the body heat of your fingers... well my hands were so cold that none of the buttons worked when I pressed them! When I leave to go outside, I honestly feel like a walking marshmallow. I put on so many layers that I become really plump and like waddle when I walk LOL.

My outfit consists of: 3 pairs of socks, 3 pairs of pants (leggings, thermal, jeans/sweat pants); 4 tops (tank top, thermal, another thermal, long sleeve); 1 huge jacket (with fur inside); scarf (made of wool); hat (covers the ears); ski gloves - Normally it takes me a while to choose my outfit in the morning, but not in China. Instead it takes longer to actually put on all the layers. The coldest it got to be was -14 degrees Celsius.

Apart from the weather, everything is great!!! To my surprise, the food wasn’t too bad, I ate LOADS of vegetables, and I mean loads. Vegetables that I have never heard of or even thought about trying. And they do really good soup here... perfect for the temperature outside. But, all those “rumors” you hear about China, and how they eat everything that moves (besides humans).... well they are actually true! I went to the local park where they had a festival going on, and they were selling fried roaches, scorpians, worms, and spiders!!! IT WAS SO GROSS. You should of seen the look on my face when I saw all of this.... I was about to throw up. I wanted to see somebody actually eat it but nobody around me was... until i turned around and saw this guy putting a scorpion in his mouth. I literally just stared at him, my jaw dropped in shock. There are just some things I’ll never understand! Apparently it’s a delicacy and they only eat it on special occasions.

On a lighter note, I managed to do everything that I wanted to do in the 10 days that I was here: The Great Wall, Ming Tombs, Tian’anmen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, and Summer Palace! Everything was so beautiful! I had a tour guide that showed me around because it was literally impossible to walk to each place... especially in this weather. She told me the history of the places, and took me to the important parts of each site.
The Great Wall: It was about an 1 1/2 drive from where I was staying and it was about 3-4 degrees colder, but I knew this already so I came prepared with an extra jacket, pair of gloves, and hat! I took the cable car up to the Wall, climbed it, and then took the slide down! While I was climbing, I had to stop a few times to catch my breath! There were so many steps and they were super steep, and scary. A couple times I had to grab the edge of the wall to keep my balance. It was a great work out though - I talked to a bunch of random people along the way to keep myself occupied. And obviously took loads of pictures! There was a group of Philippino people on my tour as well which were extremely friendly so we took the slide down together! It was basically a luge ride going down where you sit in this buggy, and have a stick to gear it! The breeze in your face didn’t feel that great but it was fun.

On the days where I didn’t have many plans, I basically chilled; watched movies, walks, dinners etc. My friends that I was staying with introduced me to some of their friend so we went out for dinner a few nights and spent time with them. 

There’s a huge language barrier in China. Most public places have everything translated into English but it doesn’t matter when the people can’t speak English. The taxi drivers don’t even speak English so getting around was very hard; I had to get the address of the place written in Chinese and then show it to them so that they’ll understand. But it was a great learning experience, it allowed me to plan different alternatives and realize that “there’s always another way”