East meets West in MA

Whilst in MA April 2014, I went to a Japanese restaurant in Billerica.

Rather bizarrely there was a replica of a terracotta warrior, in the entrance, when terracotta warriors are from China not Japan.

Our food was cooked in front of us.

After eating, we had saki bombs. Basically it was set up like picture. Then everyone had to bang hands on the table. The vibrations, make chopsticks 🥢 collapse and drop shot into beer 🍺 You have to try and down the drink; sure not done in Japan!

A couple of days later, I went to China town in MA.

Chinese New Year

I like getting together with friends to celebrate Chinese New Year, but not managed it this year. Going out to celebrate Mum’s birthday and it may be Chinese.

Wearing Oriental style dress and red shoes which is lucky in China.

Chinese Year of the Dog

This is the year of the dog. It was also the year of the dog when I was born in 1982.

I like green, red, blue and emeralds, but not purple.

Award winning China photo

I recently entered some pictures I took in China, in a competition and won second prize in Everyday life category. I collected yesterday the certificate and soft panda I won.

The photo was taken in Yonshou. As part of a morning’s cookery course, we got to visit the market to buy ingredients and I took the photo there.

Wonderwall: Xian City Wall

A wall that just goes around part of the city Xian, which was formally the capital. Small enough,  circumference, that I cycled around it in an afternoon, with an ice cream as the reward after bumping around the cobbles on the bike. 

There is feng shui museum on part of the wall. Interesting metal signs and buildings to peer over the wall at and decorative building along the wall.  Probably did not need to ride the whole wall to see the sights but perversely it was good fun!

 

 

Wonderwall:Great Wall of China

As walls goes the Great Wall of China is probably the best known in the world, being the biggest in the world. So big, it can famously been seen from space. After hearing so much about the wall, it is amazing to be stood on it. You can stand and see ribbons of wall flowing over the undulating landscape beyond and behind. The wall does not run in a completely straight line and is broken up by different towers to explore and archways to cross under, revealing different snapshots of the wall beyond as you progress through.

I travelled from Beijing in September 2013 to see Mutianyu Great Wall. I took the cable car so that I could spend more time walking along the wall rather than spending time getting to it.

 

As well as seeing the grandeur of the wall, I managed to walk far enough to come to a part of the wall that was disintergrating which is a view of the wall that I had never seen before.When not gazing at the wall itself there is the, surrounding hills to look at.