I went to Harbin again for work, and it's already cold there!

Man I'm glad I don't live in Harbin anymore! It's already fleece and jacket weather, ewww. A few snapshots of the work trip:

Topiaries!

We went to dinner at a special Dongbei (northeastern-style food) restaurant where they have a floor show. It included:

A man playing the hulusi through tubes in his nose, quite a talent.

Let's sing old propaganda songs together, comrades! I remember seeing a show like this when I lived in Harbin before, and I couldn't believe people where allowed to do this. By this, I mean brazenly make fun of the old style Mao-worship.
Let's pull the silly foriegner on stage to sing propaganda songs, ha ha ha!

Scary, scary fat man who later sang a famous love song to me about an inch from my face while everyone in the restaurant went nuts. That's what I get for reserving a table in the front row, I guess!

And the Songhua River that runs next to Harbin. Lovely, isn't it? It was frozen when I was there. You could go down a 30-foot ice slide onto the river.

Night at Lao She Teahouse

Mom and I just spent a lovely evening watching the variety show at the Lao She Teahouse. There was Beijing Opera......kuaiban, fast talk, where the performer speaks in time with clacker things, usually tells a joke with lots of puns in it, I love it, I will learn it, just you wait and see......acrobatics......bianlian, face change, where the performer changes masks all the time, so fast that you can't see him do it, very cool...
Now I'm off to bed. Tomorrow I go back to work (boooo) and mom goes on a tour to see the Ming Tombs and the Great Wall (yaaaay).

Afternoon with the Ma

Important Photos from the Afternoon

It was clear out! And blue!
Delicious 'modern Brazilian' food at Alameda:
Beijing public phones, always the memorable orange clamshell:

My mom is visiting here in China

Mom's visiting, and we've done some fun stuff (even though during the week I have to be at work). It's actually worked out quite well, Mom can go on her own during the day to the tourist sites I've already seen and have no desire to see again, and then we go out to dinner and do stuff at night when I'm off work. Brilliant! Here was one of our first dinners at a vegetarian place where the food presentation is half the fun:The veggie restaurant has a Buddhist theme, please see the following menu excerpt for the 'Fire of Ignorance Tofu' we ordered.

I had a three-day weekend on account of Labor Day, so we took the opportunity to head to Pingyao, the city I missed out on seeing a few weekends ago on account of there being no train tickets. This time, I was smarter and planned earlier...and got a ticket agent to get the tickets for me. Sweet. So hard-sleeper tickets and 12 hours overnight later, we arrived in Pingyao Ancient City. Mom in the dining car:Our hotel:Scenes of Pingyao Ancient City:Muslim guy making lamian, pulled noodles:Guy shoveling coal in the middle of the street:

We returned to Beijing after a night spent on a traditional Chinese kang (brick bed that can be heating from below during the winter) via 1.5 hour bus ride to Taiyuan, and then a quick dash to a train that was leaving in 20 minutes. This time the train ride was only 8 hours...but we were only able to get hard seat. Ah well, it was during the day so it wasn't so bad, it's not as if we needed to sleep or anything. Mom was shocked by the seatless folk--you don't have to buy a seat either if you don't want to or they're sold out, you're welcome to stand the whole way!