Nemo made it to Beijing

This week, I hung out with Joe before he left for London on Friday. On Thursday night, we went to have dinner with a few of his friends at Rumi, a Middle-Eastern restaurant where we had some hummus and kebabs. Nothing really special about the food but the decor was nice.

After that, we went to Wain Wain, a Japanese bar with an incredible view of the city by night (see picture below). It also has karaoke rooms but we were not in the mood for it. This place is however pretty impossible to stumble upon if you don't know it... like most bars in Beijing! I don't why things ended up the way they are but bars are often located on random floors of business buildings, at the corner of hutongs or on the top floor of hotels like Q Bar.

On Saturday night, Yiting invited me to dinner at her place, with her parents. Her mom cooked and it was delicious! I had some cooked leaves from a plant that comes from Yiting's hometown in the North West of China and that is very similar to endives. They apparently serve it with honey though. We also had some tofu and black mushrooms and some marinated pork (I presume) similar to "ti kro"... Sorry grandma, I don't know how to spell that correctly... I'm better at eating it :) All this was served with steamed rice and soup with lettuce and fish balls to accompany it. Nothing's better than a homemade meal!

This weekend I went to Bejing Haiyangguan and Dongwuyuan which are respectively the aquarium and the zoo.

The aquarium is fantastic! I mean only if you like sushi, sashimi... More seriously, it has an incredible variety of fish species and some of them are enormous. What exactly do they feed these guys? Proteins? It wouldn't surprise me at all! As most of the tanks don't display English captions, I don't really know what I've seen but here's a quick selection of my favourites...

THE BIG ONES

THE UGLY ONES

ABOVE: Famous moray eels... quite disgusting!
BELOW: Definitely not his best profile!

THE GOOD LOOKING ONESABOVE: Nemo 1, Nemo 2, Nemo 3, Nemo 4, etc...

They also have some good shark tanks with one in particular that makes you feel like you're inside... I shot a video that you'll find below!

JAWS 2008

But the Chinese dolphins were not left out and put on a great show, Chinese-style! Have a look...

As for the zoo, I'd like to quote the above-linked article because I think that'll sum it all up..."Beijing Zoo (Beijing Dongwuyuan) lies to the south, and despite improvements to some areas -- notably the Panda House -- the zoo is more likely to traumatize your child than provide entertainment.". What can I add to that? Indeed! As pictures are much stronger than words, here they are...

Do I look happy? Why are you taking my picture then?

I want to go out!!!

I may be the Valentine's monkey (my head is in the shape of a heart)
but I ain't got no love for you unless you help me get out of here...

I spared you the poor elephants and other rhinos, foxes, wolves, pumas, mini monkeys and giant pandas. Trust me, none of these dudes did seem to be having a good time! This was really sad!

When I left the zoo, I passed by the place below. I didn't know what it was at the time, I still don't but I will find out... soon!

And finally, I shot a video of this crazy guy on the other day. Don't ask me what he's doing or saying, I don't know much more than you do :)



Last note: I don't have chicken pox! Yeeha!!! To make a long story short, I thought I had finally caught it cause I have all the symptoms but after visiting 2 hospitals (yes, you've heard me) it turns out it's not. I think I've never been so happy to have allergies... although I don't know what caused it but that's another issue that can be solved tomorrow :)

Last last note: When exactly are people supposed to stop playing with Fireworks in Beijing? I guess the answer is whenever they run out of stock! Damn it! It sounds like war... all these bombings and all the time! It's a never-ending New Year!