Woke up to even stronger solvent fumes. Called front desk to see about changing rooms. They said they would reserve one of the premium rooms on the 17th floor for us, with a scenic view of the Forbidden City. Cool! On the itinerary today was a visit to the residence of Prince Gong, and then…

General Wang Ju-chin was in charge of a number of the southern provinces in the late days of the Qing dynasty (late 19th and early 20th century). As a high ranking military man, the family was well-off, and owned a number of these quadrangle residences in the hutong area. The one we saw was actually…

Slept until noon as usual. The banging and hammering of renovation upstairs was much reduced now. We had lunch at the one of the hotel restaurants. A bowl of ginger congee for Sabrina, and fried Udon noodles for me. In a country where the appearance of food is nearly as important as its taste, they…

Woke up to the sound of renovation on the floor above us. Hammering, drilling, scraping, grinding, dragging, all day long. Sabrina is still weak today, so we spent most of the morning in bed. Still, with the help of another Tylenol, she felt well enough at noon to venture out. We had lunch at one…

Woke up at 7:30, only a few hours of sleep, but much refreshed. Breakfast was kinda crappy in this cheap hotel. “Orange juice” was actually Tang, dilluted with too much water. And the first cup drawn from the dispenser was full of black floaties. Disturbing. Bus trip back to airport didn’t seem as interminable as…