Useful tips on Beijing DIY

If this is your first time to Beijing, i bet you would get culture shock in a way or another.

So, i would like to share some tips on surviving Beijing, taking into consideration my personal experience.

1. Taxi

Taxis are cheap in Beijing. 

From the airport to town, it will probably cost around RMB80 - 100 (including toll of RMB10). Once, i was stuck in a jam for an hour, but the cab fare only came up to about RMB40.

There will be touts lingering around airport arrival hall and wanting to help you with your luggage and telling you that they will bring you to the taxi. Do not follow them and do not let them lay their hands on your luggage. 

Getting a cab in airport couldnt be easier. Taxi stand is located at on Basement of the airport. You can take a lift down from arrival hall. 

We travelled for quite a bit for 6 days (we were staying in Chaoyang District), and on average, it will cost abt RMB30 to 40. There were 3 of us, so it made most economical sense to take cab to everywhere. 

The flagdown price for cabs is RMB10, this will cover the first 3km of your journey and every subsequent km will be RMB 2. 

I m really surprised how all the cabs we took were super clean, better than some we have in Singapore.

Now, it is important to learn how to identify a legitimate taxi. All legitimate taxis in Beijing have car plate that starts with "京B". 

Always insist on meter, unless you are travelling out of city, to the Great wall for example, you will be quoted a fix price as it will be considered as chartered taxi.

However, the tricky part is, taxis are not readily available. Its a chore to flag down a cab in some tourist places. E.g. Sanlitun, Forbidden City and worst of them all, Wang Fu Jing.

We were stuck there twice, once about 11+ pm after later dinner, another time was 4+ pm on a saturday. We were stranded for more than half an hour each time, and there will be cabs, but they will not be willing to take you or stop for you.

Note the following tips for better cab experience (tried and tested) :

* Look out for cabs that is stopping near you with passenger getting off. Once they are paying, dont be shy, run to the cab and open the door. If you are more thick skinned like me, hop on the cab first. Locals are very used to this, so most likely, they wont stare at you like you are a freak. 

* Try not to ask the driver if he knows how to go to the place that you want to go before you board. Just hop on and don't get out. Once, we were rejected by a cab, but a group of locals just hop on the same cab when it was waiting at the traffic light and they succeeded :( But if you want to do this, you must be very sure to know the address of where you are going. 

A famous tourist spot may not be whats famous to locals/drivers, and Beijing is so big, its impossible for them to know the exact place you are going if you are just going to tell them the building name. Print out address in Chinese, and best, maps. 

* Try to know the direction you are going. We were rejected a few times one night after dinner at Guo Mao area, although there were plenty of cabs. Later we found out we were  at the wrong side of the road, and we had to cross over and got our cab in no time. At some places, cab drivers are unable or take a long route to do a U-turn.

* Best to break your notes for cabs, for a RMB20 cab fare, they may insist that you get the change for them. To minimise trouble, keep loose change in 10s and 20s. 

* No calling to book taxis, they will ignore the request. Once we were stranded, and called the hotel to arrange a cab to pick us up, the response i got from reception was, we are not able to do it because the driver will not be able to find us. -.-

* If you are unable to get a metered taxi at tourist spots, do walk a street or so and try. Works for us many times, although some of them will tell you its not possible to get a cab, but we insisted on trying to flag one. If you do not wish to engage their service, just smile and say no then walk away.

* Cab experience are generally nice in Beijing. We have met a few drivers, who are blunt and fierce and grumble at you for something that is not your fault, but they are all really harmless and brought us to where we wanted to stop. So its all cool. If they offended you, pay them and quickly get off at your destination and do not attempt to argue with them. 

* If all the above fails, and you really need to get back to hotel after a long day. You may consider what they call the "black taxi", but do be very careful. They will quote you a sky high price, like RMB100 for a RMB 30 ride, do bargain and make sure the price is per trip, instead of per person.

If all else fails, you can learn how to take a train, which i will cover in the next point. 

 2. Train

Train could be the cheapest mode of transport to anywhere in Beijing. RMB2, regardless of transfers or destination. 

Most of the tourist attractions like Tian Tan and Wang Fu Jing can be easily accessible by train.

It is also easy to get a ticket at the ticket automated machine, most of the time they will have an officer there helping you to get your ticket or break your notes. 

However, one big problem is, the train is usually super duper extremely crowded. 

Get ready to alight asap after the train departs from the stop before your destination. Squeeze and push your way out and you gotta be fast, chances are the stops you will be alighting will have lots of people getting up as well. 

Another point to note is that when you need to transfer lines, it could be a long 10 mins walk.

3. Food

An average meal in restaurants are reasonably price. On the average, all the meals we had in chinese restaurants cost about RMB200 for 3 pax, RMB60 per pax.

Fast food meal at Macdonald cost abt RMB20.

But if going to small eateries, one decent meal can cost as low as 10RMB. 

It all depends on what you want to eat.   

4. Toilets

I am sure a lot of people are worried about this issue, just like me. 

I have heard horror stories about dirty toilets and those w no doors.

Nothing of such happen to me. I mean, the no door toilet.

Throughout the trip, i think i only encountered one really unbearable toilet. the rest was surprisingly clean. 

Try to stick to toilets in restaurants, cafes and avoid public toilets, and i m very sure you will be just fine.

Do remember to bring you own toilet paper though, some of them do have it, but just in case. :)

Also, not all the toilets are squatters, so not to worry if you child doesnt know how to use the squatter!

5. Bargain

SMILE. No matter how high a price they try to quote you or pressure sell you their stuff. Always remember they are just trying to make a living.

Its only natural that they are offended if they are willing to meet your buying price but you decided not to get it in the end. Its just not a nice thing to do. So only bargain if you are really interested in the item. 

Set a maximum price that you are willing to pay for the item and honour it if they are willing to relent. Basic guideline is to bargain at 20% of the starting price, but this is subjective to where you are going. A more touristy spot may have a higher starting price, you may bargain to 20 - 30%, but if you are in a wholesale market, chances are the prices is already very low, you prob wont get much discount at all. 

Thank them even if you win the bargain war (which usually you will) to make the deal a pleasant one. 

Yashow is a good place for bargain as compared to Silk Market as the sales person can be really aggressive. If you are one who doesnt like to be pressured to buy something, Yashow or Hong Qiao Pearl Market will be a good place to shop. 

Always check your merchandise before you leave the shop or stall to avoid dispute. A "brand new" piece may or may not be better than the one you saw on display.

6. Drinking water


If you are one with weak stomach, i would suggest you to buy bottled water from convenience store for daily consumption.

But what i did was boiling water in the hotel every night and fill up my bottle.

Convenience stall, however, is not readily available. At least i dont think there is plenty of it around town.

Bottled water cost abt RMB3.

7. Souvenirs

From "ObaMao" tee shirt and mugs to packed snacks can make good souvenirs for friends and family.

I got the ObaMao tee shirt from the Great Wall Village at RMB20. 

Got some snacks from YuShiYuan, its supposedly famous for local snacks. Bought a bag of Lv Da Gun (Rice rolls with assorted flavours) & Ai Wo Wo (Glutinous rice balls with assorted flavours) and other snacks to bring back for my colleagues. 500 grams for 28 RMB. 

These can be found in Airport as well. 

Highly recommend Lv Da Gun, as its supposed to be a traditional sweet snack. 

If you are more adventurous, the famous Quan Ju De also have vacuum packed Peking Duck for you to bring back home. :)

Thats all for now. Will be updating pics of my trip soon. Stay tune :)

Beijing. Foreword

:( Cant believe how lazy i have been and totally stopped blogging about Taipei after Day 3.

After Taipei, i went to Bangkok in Jan and and i just touched down from Beijing yesterday. Well, i guess everyone is very familiar w Bangkok.

But i had problems doing research for Beijing before i embarked on the trip. So prob i will just do Beijing and skipped Bkk altogether.

Beijing was a lot more than what i had expected. Like any typical Singaporean, once they hear "China", they go like.. "huh. why u wanna go there? Isnt it like nothing there? Is it clean? How you know the meat in the bun is not dog meat" -.- i get that alot.

Well, the whole agenda for me to visit Beijing was because of this concert. I m a huge fan of Mayday. And they were the first band to perform in Beijing Stadium, Bird Nest. It was a significant milestone for the band, we wanted to be part of it. So a few of us planned this trip together, it was our first trip together and first trip to Beijing. Plus, i have always wanted to visit The Great Wall, for once in a lifetime. And i did. :) it was pretty amazing~

And like i said, i wasnt expecting anything from China. I brought as little as SGD 400 for a 6 days trip. LOL. And i even though that it will be my first and last trip to Beijing.

But i liked the plaec. Apart from the bad traffic and ridiculous cab grabbing. I will definitely want to go back there again :)

5D4N Taipei

Day 3: Miramar, Wu Fen Pu, Shida, Lava

First destination was Miramar. Nope. not the ferris wheel, we are both afraid of heights. lol.

Some afternoon halloween event.

The main reason we were there was for this:

Famous hundred year old shop - 金春發牛肉麵. The shop is located opposite Miramar.

The shop is apparently famous for the last item, fried curry noodles. Didnt order that :/

Got a curry beef with rice.
some mixed beef soup & a small plate of stir fried beef organs.

Not a fan of fancy beef parts, but what impressed me was the curry beef & beef soup. the soup was very light and sweet, yums,

Its worth a try, but not fantastic imo. Will consider if i will go back to it the next time.

As the beef didnt satisfy us, we decided to eat something more before we start our shopping spree.

We headed to Saboten instead. lol. i noe, i noe, i noe theres a saboten in singapore as well. but at that point we were craving for tonkatsu very much.

And we wanted to see if it will be on par with katsukura, the tonkatsu place which was so unforgetable.

Of cos, we are half full from the beef place, so we just ordered a set to share.

Its good! But katsukura is still the best. =D

After a heavy lunch, we headed to Wu Fen Pu, wholesale market for some shopping to work off our lunch.

Took the train and alighted at Hou Shan Pi, its about 5 mins walk to the market.

If u are a fan of Braised pork rice, en route you will see the famous, 胡须张鲁肉饭。

B n I went seperate ways, as WFP is really big, we tot its more efficient to cover our own things and set a place to meet.

But WFP was sucha disappointment. The clothes there are really expensive if you don buy more than 2 pieces? And the quality of the merchandise is really inferior. :(

Forced myself to buy 2 belts and a necklace for B and decided to call it a day at WFP.

If you are like me, disappointed with WFP, i recommend you the following place,which have really nice and cheap clothes & yummy food altogether.

Shida night market.

It was my first time to Shida market even though this is my 3rd trip to Taipei, cant believe i missed it the first 2 times! I have always imagine Shida to be small & un-interesting. Boy, i was wrong.

Things here are nicer and cheaper than WFP, makes us regret e time we wasted at WFP :(

But beware, it can get really really crowded during weekend!

Tips: If you wan really good bargains, do go to XMD after 10 PM when all the shops are closed, there will be illegal street vendors selling clothings and acccessories. I bought most of my loots there, no need to squeeze w pple and can bargain for a good price!

10NTD sesame pancake! famous 卤味 stall. very long q.

settled for this stall selling 甜不辣，which has much lesser q. the wait was about 10 mins.

mixed 甜不辣
阿鑫面线！very addictive!
After dinner, we then took a cab back to hotel to rest for part 2 program.

buzzling Xi men ding on a saturday night.

It was the halloween weekend! decided to check out the halloween party scene in taipei.

got some alcohol from the convenience stall, its really CHEAP.

Some cheap alcohol and rest got us all ready for the halloween night at Lava!

We took a cab to NEO19 at abt 12+ am, tinking there may be a really long q, but nope, the Q was all right for a halloween night.

dressed up for halloween.

impressed with the efficient crew who got us into the club in no time.

Cover was 1000 NT that night, with 2 drinks.


camwhoring buddha!bartenders.
music was not bad, and we met 2 fellow singaporeans at the bar. but i tot it was a tad empty for a halloween party, maybe there were more happening party out there. o well..

it was a really unforgettable, long night.

Day 2: 十分，九分，基隆

Day 2: 十分，九分，基隆

A beautiful morning to wake up to. Windy and bright.
Transformer costume for Halloween the day after.
Original Koi fruit tea to start the day~ theres one located near our hotel.

Never ever eat the hotel buffet breakfast when u are in Taipei, they have got the yummiest breakfast on the streets (unless u are staying in a 5 star hotel, then pls take the buffet breakfast and make sure u have some space for awesome local bf)
B is very in love with this. 葱抓饼 with bacon and egg and cheese. this is wat heavenly breakfast should taste like! Its like our local prata but less oily and with spring onions. 25 - 50 NT depending on the topping you add.

Got this from a push cart stall in Xi Men Ding when all the shops are not open yet.

Famous 永和豆浆, this is not the main branch and is located at a corner in Xi Men Ding, near East Dragon Hotel.

Its a take and go breakfast shop so there isnt any eating area. All items are made fresh upon order.

A big range of breakfast items.

脆皮菲力鸡 25NT. this is so so so yummy~ pan fried instead of deep fried but still crispy and tender.
锅贴 x 7. 25 NT. comfort food.

the soya bean milk is nice but nothing to shout about, almost the same as SG's

After a filling breakfast, we headed to Taipei Main Station to buy HSR ticket to Ruifang.

Our original plan was to reach Shifen before 12PM. FAILED.

We bought the ticket to Ruifang and the train departs at 12.35 PM. =X

We had about half an hour left, so we decided to walk ard in the underground mall.

Clean & spacious. Reminds me of JR in Japan. If you have space in your tummy, do try their Railway bento 铁路便当。

It takes about 40 mins to Ruifang, from there, change to a local Pingxi line to Shifen. You have to purchase another ticket at the station.

Its another 20 mins to Shifen station.

The train experience is cool. Its really those old school trains
scenaries along the way.

rched!

u can mail back a postcard from this shop here.

old school mail box.

steam yam & sweet potato. always take the sweet potato. i m a yam lover but its too bland to eat it on its own

Wild boar taiwanese sausage anybody~ its very Q. must try~

the railway tracks cuts through the street and pple can walk on it when theres no oncoming train. cool~ our first time walking on railway tracks

hanging bridge.
Shifen and Pingxi is 天灯的故乡，of cos we must release one! Last time the sky lanterns are only avail during lunar 8th month, but in order to boost tourism to these small towns, sky lanterns are avail 365 days a year. :) awesome isnt it?

B writing his love declaration with 毛笔。=D

Theres plenty of shops selling the lanterns, pick one u like and they will guide u thru the process and take pictures for you.

Cost of releasing the lantern range from 100NT (single color) to 300 NT (multi color).

Each color symbolises different things.

Most generic wish. haha.

As we still have some time, we decided to talk to the famous Shifen Waterfall. Boy, it was a very long walk, lucky for us, it was a good weather to do those walking.

Took us about half an hour =/

Coal mine museum, doesnt look fancy

another 300 m! *faints*

B was worried this might be the 'mighty' waterfall that we walked so much for. lol

little boy face =)

And tadah~ finally we reached and greeted w an unpleasant surprise.

No one told me, the waterfall was located inside a water theme park and we had to pay an entrance fee to enter :(

Since we walked this much distance, B insisted we pay although it looks damn sorry from outside and i was really reluctant. feel so cheated. BAH.

the so called water theme park is like a small park w some benches, lotsa flies and mossies, a few playground facilities and of cos the water fall.

to be fair, the waterfall looks really nice. maybe i would have appreciated it much more if i know i have to pay for it. u know, the difference in expectations~

in the theme park

After the disappointing waterfall hunting, we decided that it was late and we wanted to head to Jiu fen, and fml, we missed the train and the train will only reach in 40 mins or so :( So pls check the timing of the trains before you proceed to explore Shifen, so you wont waste any time :(

Took the train back to Ruifang, from there we took 基隆客运 from the bus stop outside Ruifang station. You can now pay for the ride on your Youyou card, i remember we can only pay by cash awhile back. Bus ride about 20 mins, 19NT, but theres plenty of cabs avail so if you have 4 pax, you can take the cab, which cost about 200NT one way.

Because we wasted time waiting for the train back from Shifen, it was already dark when we reach Jiufen, about 6 + PM.

And we were famished, so we bought grilled smelly toufu. 35 NT. First stall on the right as u enter the Jiufen street. Very nice!

螺 with chilli sauce, quite so so. taste powdery for my liking. 80NT.
they say jiufen night looks better in day, indeed. but some of the shops were close by the time we were there. :(

teahouse. it will be nice to have a cuppa at one of those tea houses in jiufen in the noon. relax and chill.

卤味。 supposedly famous. many things for you to try.
ah ma is very nice, we were spoilt w choices, so we wanted to order just one piece of fish cake, ah ma say let us try for free! :P and it all taste v nice btw :)

As you may have already know, jiufen is famous for taro balls and the most famous being 阿柑姨芋圆。finally we found the shop! its tucked on top of this flight of stairs that is not on the main street.

long q when theres alr not much pple at the street
choice of hot or cold. and choose the toppings, i ordered the mixed beans.

40 NT for this bowl of dessert. its super super nice!!! i still miss it :(

alcoholic dog. haha.

as most of the shops were closed, we finisihed the main street in half an hour, contemplating if we wanted to head to Keelung since its late. B insist we go, so yea, went to the road junction to catch bus to 基隆庙口。The waiting point is near the famous cake shop 李仪饼店。It was a pleasant night bus ride, always love night buses. :)

Napped a bit and reach our destination in 30 mins or so.

基隆庙口 is abit out of the way if you stay in taipei but its a must go for me when i m in taipei. bustling, cheap food and apparels.

my fav candied fruit.

my fav stall to have crab broth and 油饭。

love the 油饭

another stall for oysters, butter crab & fish, everything cost us about 10SGD only!

Camera died after this. :(

took the HSR back to Taipei Main Station from Keelung train station. About 40 mins ride.

Went back to the hotel to rest before we headed to Barcode, one of the most famous pub in Taipei. Lotsa pretty pple hanging out there, its located at Neo19 building near Taipei City Hall station. :)

The night ended at Room 18 with complimentary entrance by spending dunno how much at Barcode earlier.