Day 17 - Beijing

The Forbidden City in Hue, Vietnam has been mostly destroyed by bombs and not rebuilt, so it was lovely to go through Beijing's that has been very well kept and restored. In fact various parts of it are under restoration now. We entered from the back entrance ie not the Tianenmen Sq entrance, and discovered that most people start at the other end. Therefore we spent our whole day there walking against a sea of people.
In the evening we had tickets to see the Beijing Philharmonic Orchestra. We went to a little restaurant for a quick bite before the show. It looked like it hadn't been open for long, and I'd say from the attention we received, that we were the first westerners to grace their tables! Pretty much everyone who worked there came out to take our order. Again we weren't sure whether everything had translated, but the food came and was lovely.
We had great seats for the Philharmonic, until seconds before it started. The people sitting next to us also had seats in the next row, but at the other end. They seemed to be one seat short and decided that they would share a seat...some of which was MY seat! hmmm....interesting. The performance had a young German violinist as the guest artist. He was very good...quite flamboyant, although could do with getting some good fitting clothes made in China!!
After the show, we tried to get a taxi to no avail. We realised we weren't really sure what part of town we were in, but I had a feeling we weren't too far from Tianenmen Sq. As there were plenty of people around, we decided to go for a walk and try and get a cab further along. We ended up in the square, where there were hundreds of people just wandering around, flying kites, taking photos and enjoying the balmy evening. With the square all lit up, it was a lovely way to spend our last evening in China.

Day 16 - Beijing

John went to meet with government officials today who are involved with arts and music projects in Beijing. We are hoping to be part of their festivities next year during the Olympics. After lunch, we ventured into Tianenmen Square. Having been to Moscow, I can see the similarities with Red Square. The 2 countries have certainly influenced each other. Chairman Mao overlooks the square from the entrance gate of the Forbidden City. The square is pristeen and full of tourists - mostly Chinese from other parts of the country. In Shanghai, we weren't given a 2nd look as odd looking westerners, but in Beijing, with many visitors possibly from parts of the country that don't get a lot of passing trade, we grew accustomed to direct and long stares...mainly to John - he's so exotic looking (lol, ie Hairy!) Mao's mausoleum is closed til September, as are all the interesting museums, all being renovated for the Olympics. The Natural History museum, however, will be closed til 2010. This apparently happens quite often.
The Gate of Heavenly Peace, behind the Mausoleum, and formerly the entranceway to the city, is very ornate, houses some interesting historical pictures and museum pieces, and has great views of the city.
In the evening we had a gig at a venue that we don't actually know the name of! It certainly wasn't in a glamorous part of town, and wasn't much of a venue. The whole evening was a bit of a puzzlement. A businessman connected with the club in some way had paid our trainfare from Shanghai, 2 nights accommodation, and a flight for Ren from Shanghai also. The gig wasn't advertised, and we weren't even introduced.

Day 15 - Beijing

Having a relaxing train trip is one thing. Trying to get off the train at a busy station with too much luggage is quite another! Again, quite a hike to street level where we met Mr Liu who was sponsoring us for train travel and accommodation. There was quite a discussion about how to get us to the hotel as we stood in the heat fending off beggars. Finally, we were loaded up and on the road. The first hotel we were taken to turned out to be the wrong one. Shame...it looked quite nice. The 2nd hotel was ours - City Hotel Beijing. Shame...for the opposite reason. Our room was an apartment. The hallway looked like we were on an abandoned floor and our apartment wasn't much better. The floor looked like it hadn't been vacuumed for about 2 years. Not happy. We went down to reception and asked to see another room. The showed us exactly the same thing on a different floor. Not happy. 3rd time lucky, we asked to see a standard room, not an apartment, and this was fine. 2 3/4 size single beds that are hard as a rock, but otherwise just fine.
All settled in we then headed to the Great Wall. It's quite a way out of Beijing. Badaling is quite a tourist trap. I believe there are better places to go to, but this was all we could arrange. It's hard to walk 2 paces without something being sold to you, and they are very persistent. The wall is vast, as I knew it would be, but I wasn't expecting the steepness. It was very hot and I found it difficult to walk far as I was still not feeling great. John and I followed signs to the cable car. The first sign said 1100metres. That sounded ok. The 2nd sign said 3000metres. Hmmmm....I think the taxi drivers are in charge of putting up the signs. We had one guy follow us for almost the entire time we were walking! He just didn't get that we just wanted to enjoy our walk!
Back at the hotel we just crashed for the night.

Day 14 - Shanghai to Beijing

Our last day in Shanghai. We tried not to shop. We decided to make our last day at least a little bit cultural and had plans to go to the Urban Planning Centre to see what Shanghai is planned to look like in the future. Unfortunately due to my upset stomach, that didn't happen, so we will just have to come back and see it in the future. We got as far as the Jin Mao Tower. This is currently Shanghai's tallest building at 85 floors. I say currently as there is a taller building under construction just next door, so it will be knocked off it's perch somewhat! I wonder how it's tourism centre will go?? The veiws would be quite spectacular were it not for the dense pollution. There is a view down the centre stairwell of the hotel which is also head spinning. Plenty of things to buy there including an interesting little scam of sorts. For your admission ticket, you get to choose a fresh water pearl, absolutely free. You can watch them take it straight out of the oyster! You can then have a hole drilled into it - absolutely free. Then you can choose a silver chain - absolutely free. The catch? The clasp the attaches the pearl to the chain ranges in price starting from 100RMB. Not a bad scam really, and we enjoyed getting our own pearl necklace made up from oyster to chain.
All packed, we were picked up by Giselle and Peter, who came bearing gifts....lovely, but more packing!!....and went to catch the overnight train to Beijing. It was quite a hike so we were lucky to have a couple of extra hands. I have travelled by train in VietNam before, so had an idea what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised. The trains are much more modern and comfortable. We had booked a soft sleeper to ourselves. This means having to buy 4 beds instead of 2, but if your budget can stretch, I definately recommend it. The cabins come complete with nice quilts and pillows and are airconditioned.
The dining car is quite small for the amount of passengers onboard, but as you walk through the other cars, you can see why they don't bother expanding it. The locals all BYO! We ordered a couple of nice dishes but the last one looked like beef with green beans. WRONG!!! Green peppers. And very very very hot! The night was difficult for me as I wasn't well but it was as comfortable as it could be. Certainly safer than the internal flights.

Shanghai - Day 13 - Concert at Oriental Arts Centre

The big day - a concert at the Oriental Arts Centre, in the Opera Theatre which seats 2000, with the Shanghai Symphony Big Band. We had been told a few times that tickets were not selling well, so we were pretty nervous about what the night was going to turn out like! We set up and rehearsed and then relaxed in the dressing room. The girls from the Arts Centre, Kelly and Wendy, came to get us to sign some programs. I asked how many tickets had been sold, expecting under 200. They had already sold over 800, so we were very relieved. The first half of the show was just quartet. John on drums, Tim on piano, Ren from the JZ club on Bass and myself singing. It's hard to do an intimate set in a theatre that size! Celebrity owner of the House of Jazz and Blues, Lin Dongfu was our compere and did a wonderful introduction. I walked out to see at least 1000 people in the audience, so it was really exciting. At the end of the set we did the Beatles song "Can't Buy Me Love" which I use as an audience participation number. With an audience of 85% Chinese, it was really hit and miss whether this would work....but it did! The management were so shocked. We met with members of the Australian Consulate in the interval, then went on for the Big Band set. The Shanghai Symphony guys did great, with some wonderful solos also. The pieces that went down extremely well were the chinese songs we had prepared. Tim did a beautiful reharmonisation of a popular folk song called Jasmine. It was superb. After John's big drum solo to Caravan, I came out in a chinese outfit singing "Tian Mi Mi"..Sweet Honey. Needless to say, we were a hit! We sold a few CD's and did some signings after the show, then the General Manager of the centre took us all out to dinner with his staff. With 2 other shows on in the centre, that's a big sign of congratulations for us. They haven't really promoted a show as a "jazz" concert before, so we were very happy at the success for them. It also means that we have paved the way for more jazz concerts to be held there instead of all Philharmonic orchestras.

Shanghai - Day 12

I'm sorry to say that I went shopping again today. It does seem that it's all we've donen, but the shopping here is fantasic...and addictive! I went to a market place with Giselle near the Jing An Temple. It was all the same stuff we can get at home at Paddy's Market...funny about that! But ti was great fun and I got the last few things on my list like sandals for John's little girls, Mary and Sarah, to wear for the wedding. We can home and started to get things packed up ready for our move to Beijing, then in the evening headed nout for another performance at JZ Jazz Club. First we went to dinner up the road from the club. A morrocan restaurant called Marakesh. The food was great. North African food to give our tastebuds a break from the Chinese food. We also had a bottle of Morrocan red wine. Back at the club we were just playing a short set before the JZ Big Band so we decided to just call tunes we all knew. When I got on stage, I felt really strange. Not drunk. Not stoned. Just really spacey. I couldn't concentrate on what I was singing and, in my mind, sang some really awful stuff! Just not together at all. At the end of the set I told Tim that I felt strange and he said he felt the same. Don't know if we were just over tired, or if it was the wine...or maybe the cous cous!!! It was a bizarre feeling. We sat a watched the JZ big band which is a mix of local muso's and ex-pat musicians from USA. It was a pretty happening band doing very difficult charts by the director and arranger, a guy called Rolf from Germany. A woman in a very short skirt bought us a bottle of champagne and came over with her texan companion to hang. She is a lawyer who studied at the Sydney University. What was interesting is that she didn't cme to our gig there last Tues, she wasn't coming to the concert on Sunday, and she missed most of the short set we did that night. I think she just liked the celebrity factor!

Shanghai - Day 11

The time has come to actually do something other than eat and shop. Today we went to the Shanghai Museum. This is a beautifully laid out building with 4 floors of exhibits. The floors are set around an open courtyard style stairwell....not quite sure how else to explain it. Each room is a specific exhibit....coins, sculpture, pottery, textiles and masks, furniture. It was a pleasure to wander around and everything could be viewed clearly. As we left the museum, the boys stopped to haggle for Rolex watches...again. We moved on and were approached by a group of 5 young students who were learning English and wanted to know all about us. They were really fun to talk to and were all in their early 20's, on holiday from Wuxi, near Suzhou. They told us they were going to a traditional Chinese Tea ceremony and asked us if we'd like to come. One of this girls, Ling Ling, spoke English very well. So well, she barely stopped to breathe! She was an absolute livewire. The tea ceremony was very interesting, and Ling Ling was able to translate everything our host was saying about the where the tea is from and about the traditions behind the serving of it. After the tea ceremony, we needed to get back to the hotel but it was raining and getting a taxi was near impossible. The young students were spread out along Nanjing Rd trying to hail taxis for us. Finally on the road, we were all starving and the boys convinced me we should go to Hungry Jacks for a quick bite as we were short on time. Tastes just as disgusting as in the west!!!! After a very quick change, we were picked up by Giselle to go to the Peking Opera. She had secured tickets for us and also permission to go back stage to see the actors get ready for the show. That was amazing to watch. To see the incredible costumes up close and watch the actors putting on the traditional pink and white make up was such a treat. We were stuck in Friday night gridlock on the way there, but it was worth it. We were whisked away from there to go to the 65th floor of another hotel for a reception by AustCham - the Australian Chamber of Commerce. This was another opportunity for us to promote the concert. John and I did an impromptu version of Chega de Suadade with John playing the raffle box!!
Job done, we headed back to the Peking Opera and arrived in time for the interval. Our seats were front row and there were people in our seats who quickly got turfed out. The lights on stage are so bright that it feels like the house lights are up. The audience talk out loud throughout the performance and seem to clap and cheer at strange (to us) places. I wondered whether we could take photos. No need to wonder - people even had long lens professional cameras and there were 2 professional looking video cameras. As we were sitting in the front row I had excellent view for my little camera! Back to the hotel for an early night for me, but the boys have gone to the JZ club to see the Latino band.