Aug. 13, 2007 - A Visit to the Capital
Number One Son reports: I'm antsy today, I have a lot of responsibility to see that things go smoothly. Honorable Uncle told me to get to the site we were visiting today by 2pm, since it closes at 4, but we didn't get to the hotel until 2:30pm and get rooms until 3, we took taxi to world famous gate. They didn't allow us to take our bags on top, so we took turns watching over the bags and going up on the gate. We finished there and meandered up the 1000 ft passage only to find that they had shut down the ticket counters for today! Our customer really wanted to go to Nat'l History Museum, so we went there, but it was shut down; everything was closing -- what now?? We decided we will walk down toward nat'l numismatic museum -- then we changed our minds and decided to go to the famous elegant shopping district -- I got video of stuff all over the center of the city. I had a very interesting time, and got some most interesting video and very interesting pictures I'll share with you later.
On the way down there, we walked down to other end of of the city square and then realized that the shopping district started at the other end, so we walked back to other end, couldn't have been more than a mile or two :-) -- We finally got to the shopping district, stopping at the huge fancy mall we went to as a family a couple of years ago. I had skipped breakfast and had airline food (Did you have squid slice this time? - Honorable Mother) for lunch. We were both hungry, so we stopped and got some sweet stuff at that wonderful bakery there. I got the things I miss. I went to a place that was a Coldstone Creamery clone and got a cherry smoothy and then went somewhere else and got a garlic and oregano bagel. The customer got a sandwich, mango smoothy and tiramisu cake. I found out that he is a music afficiando - all sorts, jazz, classical, lots of things. We saw a music and dvd store. It actually looked like legal copies of things - nice labels with everything spelled correctly. It was more than street prices, but a whole lot less than western prices. We looked around for a while. I ended up just getting sound track cd from Return of the King. He got a couple of cds. We walked down the main part of the shopping street just watching people and looking around. We got to the other end and sat down in front of the cathedral. We talked for a bit and I found out his parents are Catholic, but he doesn't attend church. We got to see the thing where they strap folks into a capsule and fling them into the air on bungie cords. Watched that for a while, We were both beat, so we started talking about dinner: We can go to a favorite restaurant [that has a branch in both cities] or go eat Peking Duck.
We walked back down to our favorite restaurant there - I felt really weird ordering, I tried to get input from the customer, but he is extremely amiable. It is so hard to tell the difference between being happy and just going along with it. I am trying to plan ahead and think ahead without being overbearing and controlling. Please pray I don't inadvertently offend him! I am having trouble reading him. Yes, I am trying to be the perfect Bunter, Mom. [Bunter, the most excellent butler of Lord Peter Wimsey in Dorothy Sayers' books - if you don't know them, you ought to!]
So, we ate at [restaurant] and it was $32 for the two of us!! [At a very nice restaurant]. They brought us appetizers - boiled peanuts - it was challenge time - who can pick them up? I ordered the sauteed beef and sliced garlic which we had the other day in my "home" city. Wonderful! High quality steak chopped into one inch cubes, very thin slices of garlic sauteed into carmelization, with onions and peppers. I chose an order of ["home" city] pork dumplings, which they do so well, but I really wish I knew what dish we had the first time I went this summer: fried noodles in patty, sliced, with something like marchand du vin sauce on top - wow! There were not as many pictures in this city's menu, so it was harder to order. I ordered crispy noodles in a certain style - a pizza like patty about nine inches in diameter of crispy noodles with spring onions cut in pie wedges served with a container of sugar and one of vinegar. How in the world to eat it???? We managed to eat it rather messily :-) I worried if I had ordered enough, but the only thing we actually finished was the dumplings. I ordered braised veggies with mushrooms and they were good mushrooms. Plenty of food. Yes, by that point, I'd gotten a feel for how things were there, so I got some longjing tea. I drank a tea pot full in addition to two cokes. I did hand him the wine menu, and he glanced over it, while I ordered a coke, then he said, "I think a coke, too."
After we ate, he said, "Let's go back to the hotel, we're both beat." I suggested, "Hey, let's have them drive around the famous square on the way." He said, "Ok", so we did and it was all lit up! It was spectacular! Told driver in the patois, where to turn each time to take us around the square. It took about 10 minutes and I videotaped all the way. Then I told the driver to take us to the hotel. The customer insisted on paying for half the taxi, but I paid for all other expenses, per orders.
The customer seemed excited tonight. I negotiated for a car for all day tomorrow to take us to a unique world heritage site. They wanted to charge $13 more to go to another site as well and they wouldn't let you pay by the time, but wanted you to pay by the trip. Okay, I arranged for a car and driver just to the site. "What kind of car is this?" I asked as Honorable Uncle asked me to. "Maybe a [junky car used for taxi]." I said that was no good, maybe an Audi instead. The concierge winced, but we finally negotiated for $112 for the driver to pick us up at 8am and wait until we were ready. Drive us the 80 or 90km to the site and wait for us there until 4pm at the latest and drive us back. So glad that is over! I was pretty anxious about negotiating that!
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