We visited the Summer Palace today. I had no idea that it would be so gigantic. We began walking around and soon found it was difficult to not get lost. There were several rooms in the beginning with jade statues and other old artifacts. Then we moved on to see the pagodas on top of the hill, which was beautiful. There was a great view of the water and buildings below. It was a cloudy day with a few drops here and there, but it was a good atmosphere for the palace. We then rented paddle boats to see some other parts of the palace. This was extremely fun because we first raced around and then began having water fights with the other boats. We teamed up with one boat to get Dr. Gao and had success after a long chase that was tiring. We also did some shopping and ate ice cream while we were there.
After the palace, we came back and ate at an interesting restaurant. They had hotpots, which are pots of boiling water with spices in them. We were given a plate of various vegetables, duck blood, and meat (I got lamb and beef). The goal was to cook the food ourselves in the hotpots. It was a little difficult at first, but then I got the hang of it and really enjoyed the food. When we finished, we shopped around a little bit and got some cheap DVDs and eventually made our way to a club called Propaganda. It was cool to see how the Chinese people danced to American music. At one point everyone was doing the Macarena to Shaggy’s “It Wasn’t Me” which was really funny.