Shopping and show

We rented the tandem bike again today and went sight seeing in the direction of Pearl Market. Along the way we passed a pedestrian street, Qianmen Dajie, with traditional buildings and a restored tram in the middle. The side roads are hutongs, which show the Chinese's preferred housing style in the past. A hutong provided security because the houses are built close together. There is no toilet inside. So you see countless toilet buildings near the hutongs. The Pearl Market offers much more than "just" pearls. This place has the same wide selection of replica brands as Silk Street. It is hard to say which one is the best, as they are very similar. Silk Street is probably the bigger of the two, but Pearl Maket has fewer tourists, so it's probably easier to get good prices there. We bought: 3 watches + extra batteries (2xChanel and 1xSwatch) 120 yuan. Trendy no name ladies bag in red leather 30 yuan. 2 pairs of shoes 200 yuan. Music Angel, which are trendy speakers for USB stick or Iphone, 50 yuan. All-round earphones 25 yuan. For lunch we threw ourselves into a real local specialty....Hot pot. There is a pot standing in front of each place with boiling water. A large plate of Chinese cabbage, lettuce, carrots, noodles, raw eggs, seaweed-like mushrooms, tofu and stiff duck blood is served. You cook your own food at your own pace. It costs 28 yuan. There is enough food for 2, so you can easily settle for just ordering a plate and sharing. Jan tasted the congealed duck blood - it didn't look like it was going to be his new favorite food :) We sat next to an American woman who works for the UN in Beijing. The most different thing that she has tasted in this country was fat from the inside of a frog's ovaries... Yes, the Chinese have a wide variety of ingredients when they cook. Or it just says that EVERYTHING can be eaten :) Kung fu, opera and acrobatics shows are some of the things where the perfectionism of the Chinese really comes to the fore. We saw a fabulous and very impressive acrobatics show. Many are skilled acrobats, but these were just a notch better and more fascinating than others we've seen. Each and every artist took their show a little bit further than we expected. It cost 200 yuan per person. person. The acrobats could twist their bodies into impossible positions. They bounced around as if there was no gravity. The show starts with a clown coming in, he seems a bit out of place. The artists themselves were so skilled and talented that it seemed mysterious to have a clown suddenly enter the stage to look at them. The Chinese loved him. He lifted some tourists onto the stage - they weren't the ones we had come to see. But all in all, it was a really nice show that can really be recommended.