May 27: I <3 Woking

Tina, I will make us t-shirts that say 'I [heart] Woking', I promise! Send me your address in Sierra Leone. I wish they had Woking post cards, but haven't found any yet...

Well, my ambitions for a big out of town Bank Holiday weekend this weekend all fell through, either due to flight schedules or cost, so I am FINALLY just hanging out in Woking to relax a bit. The only other weekend I've spent in Woking since I arrived on this side of the pond on March 18 was the Stonehenge weekend, which included some quality sightseeing around Salisbury and Stonehenge, followed up by a big night on the town in Woking, so it doesn't really count. This weekend has demonstrated the 'English weather' to its fullest with overcast skies and drizzle the entire time.

I have spent two amazing days just studying my Accounting course, eating up my now-plentiful groceries, watching episodes of The Office Season 2, and going to the gym. Yes, the gym. I know, I can hardly believe it, either! I went to Peak Fitness in Woking yesterday with the 1-week free membership pass I got from work last month to redeem it for this week, only to find that it had expired in April. I convinced them to let me in for free as a trial anyway for the day.

I got a fun test in math in the form of unit conversions: all the weights, both free weights and those for machines, are listed in KG. This of course makes sense, but I didn't come prepared, so I THINK I had a good workout yesterday, but not totally sure.

The soreness all over my body today indicates that it was a decent workout after all, or that I've just really let myself go, equally plausible. I decided today to go ahead and barter for a membership for the remaining 3.5 weeks that I'm here; I need to shape up in order to look decent in the strapless bride's maid dress the weekend I come back, June 23, plus, doing regular leg exercises on the machines will keep my knees from aching as much. I managed to talk the Peak Fitness guy down from ₤35 down to ₤30 since I wouldn't be here for a full month and got my membership, which includes unlimited use of the gym, the saunas, and all the fitness classes. They have spinning (yay!), step and cardio classes, and yoga and pilates, so I'm happy.

This time, I used the treadmill, another exercise in conversions, as the LifeFitness machine registered my speed in kilometers per hour. It's a little disconcerting to have a speed set to '7.0' but still be walking.

Miles, kilometers, whatever -- I'm really out of shape. I'll be going to Peak Fitness as frequently as possible for the rest of my time in Woking, that's for sure! Luckily it's a 1 minute walk from work and I don't have to be in the office until 9 AM.

My multiplication and division skills are going to be MUCH sharper than when I left from having to do all these conversions. I still don't quite have the Celsius conversion down yet, though.

Oh and my boring weekend this weekend is more than made up for by my planned trip to Istanbul with HS friend Adrian Baker next weekend, and then visiting my Chicago-roommate in Barcelona the weekend after. Just need to come up with ideas for my last weekend here, June 16 - 17. Manchester maybe?

May 19: China Day 4 - Temple of Heaven & Silk Street

Saturday was our last day in Beijing, and we decided to go back into downtown to see the Temple of Heaven. This was another spectacular complex with temples, long procession aisles, and a burial mound for making sacrifices to the gods. There was a whispering wall, too, just like St. Paul’s except this one was outside. One of the best features of the Temple of Heaven, however, is the expansive grounds with rows and rows of cedar trees planted by various dignitaries and historical figures of importance throughout the centuries. The lush green grass and dirt pathways provide a very nice area for anyone to come to enjoy an afternoon or a picnic, for only RMB 15 (about US $2), which is a ticket just for entrance to the park.

This time we got a more traditional Chinese lunch than our first day spent in Beijing, though the restaurant staff decided to bring us the potato dish we ordered, even though they didn’t have any more potatoes. I guess they thought that their substitution of Chinese broccoli would suffice.

The afternoon was spent navigating the 5 stories of booths in the large Silk Street Market. I brushed up on my bartering skills (and my math skills – it’s not easy dividing by 7.6 to get the US $ equivalent of the prices they were asking for). Admittedly, I could have done better at bargaining, but oh well. This was all done using calculator screens and involved many merchants running after us, sometimes for quite a distance down an aisle. One woman in the Dolce & Gabbana section, who was confounded as to why I wasn’t about to pay US $100 for a t-shirt, chased after me outside her section and grabbed my arm, trying to pull me back in. Crazy.

We left successful: I had a new red necklace (a long-awaited purchase), Victoria Beckham jeans, knock-off Gucci sunglasses, and a gift for Bryce. Probably the best purchase was made by my sister, who walked out with a new 12 megapixel lightweight digital camera, 2GB memory stick and leather camera case for US $250. The thing takes pictures with no delay whatsoever. I’m a bit jealous.

It was nice being in the company of so many English-speaking Chinese at the markets, though it was rather clear that the merchants’ vocabulary consisted primarily of ‘Hello!’, ‘Okay!’, ‘Best price!’, ‘pretty girl’, ‘just for you’ and 'very good quality'.

We navigated the Beijing subway system to get as close to our hotel as we could before hailing a cab, but still didn’t make it back in time to join the bus hired by the conference to take members and guests to dinner in downtown Beijing. We would have just stayed downtown to meet them if it weren’t for our inappropriate attire. So our last dinner was the uneventful hotel buffet, that consisted of many leftovers from the ‘gala’ the night before.

May 18: China Day 3 - Spa Day & Dinner Entertainment

Friday was the day my dad had to give his talks, so my sister and I were on our own to explore the resort. We paid about $16 each for an all-day pass to the hotsprings and spa, which also included a 45-minute foot or ‘doctor’ massage. In the morning, we relaxed in the hotsprings, which honestly looked more like dirty hot tubs than what I had imagined as a hotspring, as the water was infused with various minerals and other ‘healing’ elements. Then, after lunch, we set out to get our ‘doctor’ massages, which we both chose over the foot massage, because we couldn’t imagine what someone would do to our feet for 45 minutes. Big mistake. After a sleepy relaxing morning where I dozed off several times (also caused by the little sleep I was getting from working each night until after midnight or so), I was abruptly revived by my ‘masseuse’ who chose the most painful pressure points all over my body to administer the ‘doctor’ massage, starting with my face. These pressure points included the soft spots in my temple, the insides of my ears (!), the spot right under the inside of my elbow, and the spot at the very top of the backs of my thighs. I started being able to predict where he would administer the pressure next by considering where would be MOST painful for him to exert all his strength. My legs, after the strenuous day of Great Wall climbing, were the worst and I think I squirmed enough to keep him from administering the full brunt of the massage.

Feeling quite black and blue, my sister and I changed back to swimsuits to relax again in the sun next to the outdoor pool for the rest of the afternoon.

Dinner that night was a special one for the members and guests of the conference in our hotel. We had several different authentic Chinese dishes served to us continuously, including full-on unpeeled and un-beheaded prawns. Towards the end, we enjoyed a performance of traditional Chinese entertainment, starting with dressed up and painted warriors acting out an intricate sword-fight. The next act was Chinese opera, which I appreciated very much for novelty and insight into Chinese culture, but not very much aesthetically, as the ‘singing’ sounded to my western ears more like nasal screaming. We were also sitting really close to the speakers which made things worse. Next up was a dance with girls imitating peacocks, which was lovely. Then we saw an acrobatic display where a woman balanced on a board atop a rolling tin cylinder, where she caught metal bowls tossed to her, inched them to the end of the board, then flicked them up and caught them on her head. Next up was an actor who could change masks so quickly you couldn’t see her doing it and her face seemed to transform in front of your eyes. This deserves a video clip:


After that, we watched the acrobats come back out and set up a collapsed round table while a little girl, maybe 8 years old, performed all kinds of contortionist acrobatics. Quite a bendy little girl; it’s disconcerting to see her little angelic face on the floor next to her feet facing forward… Her grand finale involved spinning around with her body fully arched so her feet were over her head, holding onto nothing but a dirty rag on a stand inserted into her mouth. The adult acrobats came back out and did a roller-skating act on the round table they had set up before. Towards the end, the little girl came back on with one of the hotel waitresses in tow. The male skater picked the waitress up around her waist and spun around and around and around on the table, her feet flying out in front of her and her hands over her eyes. When he finally let her down again, she could hardly stand, her face was red, and she was gasping and sobbing. I don’t think that was meant to be part of the act. Their grand finale was skating around and around facing each other with linked ropes around their necks until the female picked up enough speed to let her body fly out holding onto the male skater, then they let go, attached only by the rope around their necks, and he spun her so that she whirled around perpendicular to the direction they were already spinning around in on the table, quite a comeback from the botched waitress-spinning before:



The next act was another dance by the peacock troupe, this time in elaborate gold costumes mimicking a goddess figure with multiple arms by lining up in a vertical line from the audience. The final act was traditional Chinese kung fu with dramatic fight scenes and the breaking of very hard objects using their bodies. There was the standard brick-chopping and also the shattering of long wooden poles over various parts of another’s body, starting with his arm, and included his back and his thigh. The information screen said that it didn’t hurt the actors, but judging from their expressions as they left the stage, that wasn’t entirely true.

May 17: China Day 2 - The Great Wall of China

The next day we hired a taxi to drive us to and back from the Great Wall of China, which is accessible from our hotel by about an hour’s drive. It was incredible. To think that humans built that immense structure starting primarily around 200 BC is just astounding. And the fact that the Mongols were eventually able to breach the wall is even more so. We were barely able to climb it from the inside. Contrary to my original conception of the Great Wall, this particular area does not offer itself to a leisurely stroll down the predominantly flat middle-section. Rather, the interior of the wall was made up with incredibly steep stone steps that varied in height from 3 bricks high to a single worn-down brick high. It was very difficult and strenuous to climb. In addition, the weather was extreme and sporadic like I’ve never seen. One minute it was warm and sunny, the next it was overcast and drizzling. The change came literally that quickly with a spread of at least 15 degrees Fahrenheit if the sun was out or not.

We set out with an idea of following the wall all the way around in the neat triangle that this section formed, but after making it up and then down the steepest and most difficult 2/3 of the route, we decided against trying for the last section, which would likely make us late for our taxi back to the hotel.

So we got popsicles instead and found our taxi about 20 minutes earlier than the agreed-on time.

Too exhausted to try for any more sightseeing, we spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel, my dad and sister sleeping and me working.

May 15-16: China Day 1 - Arrival, Forbidden City, Shopping, Peking Duck

My dad was invited to speak at a medical conference in Beijing, China, and decided to bring my sister and me along with him. I managed to negotiate the time off my project by promising to work at least 16 hours over the duration of the week. Originally, the conference was booked in a downtown hotel and conference center in the middle of Beijing, but just about a month before it was to take place, some Chinese state event declared they needed that block of rooms and the conference was bumped out. I feel bad for the event-planner, as these things can take years to put together. We therefore stayed at the Juihua Resport and Spa that was over an hour outside Beijing amongst the farmlands. Trust me, it's not as nice, yet, as it looks on that site. It is still very much under construction, I don't know how they came up with such nice looking photos of the place. This is the view out of my hotel window. Farmlands.

Since we were out in the Chinese boonies, in a country that already has very little English, the English proficiency level at my hotel was about 0.5 on a scale from 1 – 10, with 10 being proficient. It took over 30 minutes to check in and get my room key, with no queue. That first day was pretty much a bust as I arrived at 8 am at the resort, but had to wait until almost 5 pm for my dad and sister to arrive from their direct Chicago flight. So I slept and worked, as there was literally nothing to see around our resort had I been brave enough to venture out alone in the first place.

The next day, we paid for a taxi ($20) into Beijing to see the Forbidden City, a huge royal complex that was originally built in the 1420s and has been inhabited by all the Chinese royal families (dynasties) since then. There is building after building included in the complex, with important halls and temples in the center. It was beautiful. It’s amazing that such a vast expanse of land exists right smack in the middle of downtown Beijing.

We exited the Forbidden City though the Meridian Gate to the south and were shuffled along the available bridge space for tourists, as the center one was closed off and guarded. We weren’t allowed to take any photos looking back at the immense gate with an enormous portrait of Mao displayed in the center until we had reached the other side of the bridge. There were guards everywhere outside the gate and also across the huge thoroughfare in Tianmen Square. I still find it a bit shocking how revered Mao is considering he put 45-70 million of his own people to death.

I am ashamed to say that we stopped at this enormous Beijing McDonald’s for lunch as it was the first food place we came across after 15-20 minutes of walking, and we were pretty starving by this point. It was the first time I’ve had McDonald’s since I backpacked Europe in June 2004 when Shelley, Nora, Kristy and I arrived in Budapest on a Sunday and it was pouring rain and everything was closed. I think the Chinese version actually contains more real food items: my chicken sandwich looked like real chicken, albeit dark meat instead of white. And I didn’t feel sick to my stomach afterwards, either!

We hailed a cab after lunch to take us to the big Beijing market, but on the way determined through hand-gestures (don’t ask me how) that it was closed for renovation, so we went to the Pearl and Silk Market near the Temple of Heaven instead. My sister and I got silk Chinese-style shirts and Dad purchased gifts for his secretaries and nurses and wife. I got a necklace out of it too. J And my sister and I got mobile phone dangling ‘charms’ thrown in for free as well. Say what you will, but that ‘phone jewelry’ as I like to call it is kinda cute and makes finding my phone in my purse much easier!

We were next guided upstairs and given a tour of the silk-making process. We saw the silk worms in all stages of development and then experimented with real silk worm cocoons sitting in large baskets. You could hear and feel the dead worms jiggling around inside. Then we were led to the machines that pull the bits of silk from the cocoons and thread about 8 of them together to form one strand of very strong silk. These strands are then lumped together and gradually stretched out over arched posts. The stretched out bundle is stretched further still to the size of the top of a bed where it is combined with many other layers the same size and placed inside a duvet to become a very soft and very warm bed comforter. Our guide did her best sales pitch for us to purchase one of these bed covers, but none of us much wanted to pay the $200 or so for the pretty patterned silk covers that would go over the raw silk-stuffed comforter.

We finished our first day with an adventure to this ‘famous’ Peking Duck restaurant not far from the McDonald’s where we had lunch. We attempted to find it on our own, even though the guidebook said it was ‘difficult to find’ and it wasn’t marked clearly on the map. We finally asked the waiting bicycle-taxis about it and sure enough they had signs printed in English with the name of the restaurant on it. We took two of these bicycle cabs to the restaurant, which we would NEVER have found on our own. We were pulled at least 10 minutes into the depths of a Chinese slum, where residents paid no attention to us whatsoever. It must be a pretty common thing to see Westerners bicycled down their ‘street’ (or rather, dirt path) to this restaurant. The place was tucked away down an ally of sorts and blended right in with the slummy surroundings. The kitchen and eating area would certainly not have made code in the United States to serve food, but we got our Peking Duck adventure. We asked for one duck and had some delicious duck mushu pancakes with Tsingtao that night for dinner.

A Word About My Work...

So some of you may be thinking: gosh, Laura is just traveling and playing all over Europe (and Asia, now) and it's like one big holiday with no work. True, I am having some amazing experiences and enjoy telling everyone about them through this blog very much. However, I am actually working, too! :) Here's a better description of what I'm doing out here in Woking for Plan:

I’m working on a 3-month web strategy project for Plan International that includes two streams of work. The first and primary stream is an evaluation of the existing international site, including content, information architecture, look and feel, and navigation structure. For this stream, we have enlisted the voluntary support of several UE experts to perform a heuristic (usability) review of the site and compile recommendations, and are also working with a graphic designer to propose a few options for a redesigned look and feel of the site. The second stream involves gathering the requirements for website services requested by the National Offices, which are the Plan offices located in developed countries to raise money (US, UK, Germany, Finland, etc), and determining which services might be most beneficial and cost-effective to offer centrally rather than requiring each office to develop the service, such as virtual gift shops, individually. The final piece of the project is documenting a formal web governance structure for making updates and requesting new services related to the web, etc.

It has been very interesting work and we’re coming along nicely with our deliverables. It’s hard to believe there’s just a month left. When it's time to leave, nothing will be implemented here at Plan, but we will have provided them with Requirements, a professional Heuristic Review with recommendations, a Mock-Up with the proposed redesign of the look and feel, a new Site Map for the existing site, a Business Case with our findings, research on a few website capabilities, and risks and challenges, and an Implementation Road Map with our proposed order of implementations. We are also creating the Governance Structure mentioned above to keep the whole system working well. It will be up to Plan to move forward with this information and determine what recommendations to act on. They might hire more consultants to help, or they might start dedicating their own resources to implement the recommendations.

It's hard to determine what about the office culture here is unique to an NGO and what is different about working in the United Kingdom vs the United States. For one, and this may sound mean, no one here in the office is overweight. I was surprised by narrow doorways and tight spots that wouldn't fly in the US, also because I think we're a bit more 'accessibility-conscious' in terms of wheelchairs and other physical disabilities. Also, there is a sense of formality as people don't open up immediately with informal banter and discussion about private lives. Conversational formalities certainly exist, such as 'How was your weekend?' and others, but without delving into the private details. I appreciate having had the opportunity to also view office environments abroad, but again didn't necessarily spend enough time in each place to make an accurate observation, other than those I've already made, such as the extensive public (tax-funded) programs for mothers-to-be in Finland and the formal structure expected from meetings in West Africa. I just keep my eyes open and try to follow the lead of other people in the offices we visit.

One thing is for sure: I really know what it's like to be the odd one out. I don't really blend in anywhere, especially when I open my mouth to speak and the American accent gives me away. And I'm also completely desensitized to Duty Free shops.

May 5–7: Cornwall, England

After my adventure back from Arica, I found the ‘icing on the cake’, if you will, when I opened my suitcase at the hostel in Newquay once we arrived in Cornwall… Remember the peanuts I was given as a gift from the office staff at Plan Senegal? Yeah, about a pound of peanuts had exploded all over my suitcase during my journey. Seriously. Luckily no one was allergic because I was digging those things out of my clothes the whole weekend and smelled like a giant peanut most of the time. Was it karma for having snuck them through UK customs? Perhaps.

Day 1 of Cornwall was a free day with a few options for activities. Most of the group chose to go to the Eden Project, which includes two giant biomes erected in a hillside about an hour from Newquay. It’s been open since 2001 and attracts visitors to view the perfect tropical rainforest and Mediterranean-esque temperate landscapes developed within the biomes. It promotes environmental awareness, with sophisticated recycling programs and educational material. Our group, Tina (also works ADP at Plan, see blog link on the right), Carolyn (Tina’s friend, also from Accenture), Anna (Aussie from Paddywagon), Tammy (Anna’s Aussie friend), Penny (Aussie from Paddywagon) and I had a great time exploring. By the time we came out of the tropical biome we had shed all but our inner-most layer of clothing and were drenched in sweat.

The coolest thing in the tropical biome by far was this ‘sensitive plant’, which closed up its leaves if you stroked the underside of the stem. See this video clip with my lovely modeling hand:

In the tropical dome, we also had fun posing with the creepy (and random) wooden slats with faces painted on them.

After the Eden project, we had to wait a while for our bus to take us back to Newquay, then it made a detour on the way into what we called the ‘bus graveyard’ – the storage place for city buses and also apparently where drivers switch off when a shift ends, as we learned when our driver did just that.

Finally arriving late in the afternoon back in Newquay, we feasted on Cornish pasties like every good tourist should do and walked around, poking into little tourist shops along the way. Tina, Anna and I came dangerously close to purchasing big red ‘I ♥ Newquay’ sweatshirts, but then decided that 20 quid wasn’t worth it.

That night was supposed to be the big tour group outing to the Walkabout, but the bouncers were carding anyone who looked to be under 25. Apparently no one in my group does (not even me, I know, shocking), but many others from our bus tour were sent away as no one in Europe is in the habit of bringing ID with them to bars. Our group still had a fantastic time out and danced the night away. I finally got my ‘Mr Brightside’ played, without any prompting from me, by the live cover band and so I got a bit excited. Tina and I both tried to facilitate a hook-up between Tammy and our tour guide, John-o, but to no avail unfortunately.

Day 2 of the Cornwall bus tour involved a drive out to St. Ives first thing in the morning where we strolled around the charming little town and got (of course) Cornish pasties for lunch. We guarded our lunches closely sitting on a bench facing the beach, as the seagulls down there are notoriously vicious and aggressive when they see food in unsuspecting tourists’ hands. We watched one girl from the bus tour hold up an empty ice cream cone as an offering to them, and sure enough, from 15 yards away, a seagull swooped down and snatched the entire cone from her hand, shoved it down its throat to protect if from the other seagulls, then coughed it back up once back on the ground to break it apart and eat it in a matter of seconds. We saw a similar episode with someone’s unfinished pasty.

The next stop was St. Michael’s Mount, a monastery build up on a hill in the sea that becomes an island when the tide comes in. Many of you may think, as I did, that this is just like Mont Saint Michel in France on the border of Normandy and Brittany. In fact, it is quite the same concept, except the English switched around the name, and this Mount is a far less spectacular version of the Mont in France. It still makes for a nice picture of the skyline.

Next on deck was a trip to the Minack Theatre, which is an elaborate outdoor theatre carved into the Cliffside overlooking the sea. It started with Rowenda Cade who permitted local performances of plays in her garden. Gradually the theatre became this incredible place for concerts and plays to be performed, as weather permits. We were fortunate enough to see a male singing group perform, and even got to chime in during the last number for the final verse of ‘Oh When the Saints Go Marching In’.

The final stop on this whirlwind bus tour of Cornwall was Land’s End. Yes, I know all these stops sound like bath and beauty products (St. Ives, Land’s End) but the places actually exist! Land’s End is the southwestern-most point in England and it is terribly windy out there. It reminded me of all the coastal and blustery visits our tour made in Ireland. It was a bit overcast at this point, and we were getting pretty cold, but the views were worth it.

That night we had dinner with our tour guides, fondly known as ‘Ginger’ or ‘Ranger’ (Aussie terms for red-heads – even though his hair wasn’t even that red) and John-o at a Thai restaurant, then went out (again) to the Walkabout for some more dancing.

Day 3 we packed and loaded our bags onto the bus and drove out to Tintagel Castle, which allegedly had something to do with King Arthur. Many places in England hold this claim, and this castle likely cannot substantiate it because it was built long after King Arthur died. But it still afforded a fun and beautiful site for us to visit. My weather luck had definitely run out at this point, as it was freezing cold, windy, and raining when we arrived. We then had to climb up some dramatically steep and slippery stairs and then descend down some even more treacherous stairs, only to ascend once again out on an island of sorts carved out by the mighty waves where the castle ruins could be seen. The views from the top were beautiful, but we were grateful to finish our tour and make our way back into town for some hot jacket potatoes before the bus left.

Then it was back to London where we all parted ways. I don’t know if I’ll get to see Carolyn or Tammy again, or any of the others on the tour who we met. John-o generously gave me a RoadTrip t-shirt on the busride back, and so I have a great souvenir from the trip, even better than the red ‘I ♥ Newquay’ sweatshirt.