Jiadong...err I mean James, like "Bond...James Bond" and me at the Tea HouseLast Friday Jiadong took Liz and I to the most famous tea house in Beijing. Naively I expected a large menu with tea and some funky music in a dark room with small tables and foot stools with pillows. Ya know? At any rate, I was waaaaaay off. Not only did I get Chinese tea, I got delicious Chinese pastries and 8 classic Chinese performances. There was a stage at the front with shows ranging from traditional folk music to Shadow puppeteers, and kung fu to crazy tea pouring guys who treat tea pots like swords....very interesting. I tell ya what, as great as the Opera, Kung Fu and dancer chicks were, NOTHING and I mean nothing, compared to the crazy Chinese precision tea pourers. They mean business with that tea. Not only did they whip the giant tea kettles with 4 foot long spouts around like it's easy, twisting, turn and contorting the kettle around their bodies, but they also poured the tea onto each others kettles and even onto the head of their lovely tea lady assistant. So weird and so impressive! At any rate, the show went on for roughly 2 hours. It was well worth the 180RMB! (or roughly $23) As homesick as I get from time to time, it's seeing bizarre stuff like that, that makes this experience well worth it and unforgettable. Oh sure sure work is great, bla bla bla but what could be more interesting than this?
Happy Monkey from the Opera....actually it's a naughty Monkey that stole wine from the Emperor. It's fine though, the Monkey totally gets away with it!
Words just can't describe. When they say "a picture is worth 1000 words" this is EXACTLY what they meant! True story.....
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