The Great Wall Marathon!

Hands down, the best race that I have ever done.  Also, the most difficult and the most complicated to get to. Totally worth it, but I would probably never try and do it again. I'm sure that it is much easier to manage if you go with a tour company but you also pay quite a bit for this service.  Because we live in China, we were able to just book the race through the Great Wall Marathon company.  The  problem with doing it this way is that you have to figure out how you are going to get to where you need to go, and where you are going to stay.

We decided to fly rather than take a train.  (Either way we end up in Beijing. )  We flew out Thursday night and arrived around 11:00 PM.  From the Beijing Airport we took a cab to our hotel in Beijing.  Now the race is not actually in Beijing.  It is about two and a half hours away by car or bus.  The tour company gives you a choice of leaving from Beijing for the race (bus leaves at 3:30 AM) or leaving from Jixian which is closer to the race start and the bus leaves at 5:00 AM) on race day morning.  We decided that we would would rather stay in Jixian because a two and a half hour bus ride on race day morning does not appeal to me.  After many emails back and forth with GWM we decided to book the Jixian Marriott through GWM because that was the only hotel still available where the bus picked up on race morning.

The problem was getting from Beijing to Jixian the day before the race.  There are no trains or buses that go there, and to book a private car would cost about of $250 US one way.  Since each of our plane tickets to Beijing cost that much, it sounded really expensive.  (Hindsight being 20/20, we definitely should have booked the private car.) Now if you went with the tour company there was a bus that takes you to Jixian 2 days before the race.  Since we only arrived 1 day before the race we couldn't take that bus.  But apparently there were other locals who also needed transport to Jixian so they offered us a minibus to Jixian the day before the race. Originally they said it would be a bus leaving at 1:00PM for 180 RMB per person and then later they changed it to a minibus leaving at 4:00 PM for 100 RMB per person.  They email instructions listed this vague location in Beijing where we were supposed to meet this van.  We managed to find it as did the  2 other "locals." Around 4:20 PM on Friday afternoon we left for Jixian. (Not the best time to travel.) Now I could do an entire blog post on this ride and nightmare driver but I am trying to forget it.  Long story short(ish) our driver was effing crazy.  What should have been a 2 hour drive turned into a 3 hour drive.  He spoke no English and we are pretty sure that he took us way out of the way in order to avoid paying the tolls on the road.  The drive involved ridiculously high speeds and at one point he was driving on the wrong side of the road for an extended period of time.  Despite us telling him to slow down, he didn't.  Then, when we finally arrived in Jixian, he had no freaking idea where the hotel was! So we drove around some more while he kept getting out and asking directions!! When we finally arrived at the Marriott we were all ready to kiss the ground!

Now Jixian is not a very big city so we were shocked at the size of the Marriott.  It was brand new and had only been open about 2 weeks.  It was a gorgeous hotel and the staff were all very nice and accommodating.  It almost made us forget the ride over.

Marriott Lobby

The rooms were gorgeous and the entire hotel was really elegant and the staff all spoke English.  They only had a mini menu in the restaurants because they had just opened but the food was all very good.  Also, the next morning they opened breakfast at 4 AM to accommodate the runners.  There were 2 busloads of us staying there. At 5:30 AM the buses left for the race.  The bus ride took a little over an hour and it involved windy roads in the hills.  We had a much better driver this time!

At about 6:45 we pulled into the race start and there were lots of people already there.  We got off the bus and it was freaking freezing! Luckily, we had our luggage with us so I quickly took out a long sleeve shirt and a sweater.  Then we went to check in.

 We took a quick selfie before we entered the square. 

Once inside, we checked our bags and then went to line up for the toilets.  They were basically squatter port-a-potties.  Now, the one that I went into was fine.  They had foam that is squirted over the bowl so that you can't really see or smell what is going on down there.  There were some people who came out looking a little shell shocked, or who opened the door and then refused to go in, but mine was fine.  Didn't even smell bad. (A fan came on when you locked the door.) What I found odd was the little sign up top.  I tried to take a picture of it but you can't really see it.  The top flashes vacant or occupied in both English and Chinese.  It also flashes a time once you lock the door.  Not the time of day but the time you have spent in the bathroom so that everyone can see how long you have been in there.  My line seemed to be going very quickly but the line on the end had someone inside who must have been having a bit of trouble because everyone kept commenting on the time.  When he got up to 8 minutes, everyone was talking and joking about it.  Poor guy, he had to have heard because it's not like those things are soundproof.  When he finally came out it had been 9 minutes plus.  Everyone looked to see who took 9 minutes.  Myself included.  He looked a bit sheepish.

Bathroom needs taken care of we stopped to take a picture. This was the wave corral at the start. There was so much excitement at the start of the race.  We were in wave 2.  After our start, we basically ran about 2.5 miles uphill on the roads.  This was the point where I could see the wall.

You can barely see it in the picture but it's there! 

This was when I got to the entrance.  There was a bathroom there so I stopped to use it.  By this time I was no longer cold and the temperature had increased quite a bit.

 On the wall!

Since I was not exactly speeding along at this point I stopped to take a selfie.  Notice the vein bulging out of my forehead.

Now two days before the race there was a race site tour that you could take.  All around you could hear people who had taken the tour talking. Every time we came to another hill of stairs, they kept saying "I'm pretty sure this is the last climb." But then every time we got to the top there seemed to be another one looming in the distance.  Not that it was a big deal because the downhill was actually harder to maneuver.  There were parts that had no stairs at all that were really quite steep.  I didn't take pictures of these parts because they were also where the traffic backed up and you had to hold the handrail and very carefully watch your step and foot placement.

This was the point where we were coming down off the wall and you can see where we started from in the distance.  We eventually went past it and then came off the wall.  That was about 5 and a half miles.  You would think that the downhill would be faster than the uphill but between trying not to fall and the back up in spots, miles 4 and 5 alone took me almost an hour! (Mile 4- 28 minutes and mile 5- 23 minutes.)  I had originally had a "goal time" of 3 hours which is quite generous but at mile 5 I realized that I was probably not going to make that, since it took me almost an hour and a half to go just 5 miles! I was pretty tired at that point and yet I still had 8 miles to go.  The rest of the race went through the town.  There were spectators everywhere! Tons of little kids holding their hands up for high fives! I must have slapped a hundred hands. (I could never leave a little kid hanging!)

All in all, just freaking amazing!  I only did the half and it took me about 3 hours and 8 minutes.  I can not even begin to imagine the full! I was not in the best shape for this run at all since I had gotten sick and therefore didn't train much.  But I must say that all the stair training that I did worked because while I was still extremely fatigued the next day, I was not at all sore! Yay!  Matt did really well.  His time was 2 hours and 40 minutes I think.

I didn't take any video because it totally drains my battery on my iPod but I did find this on YouTube and it is much better than anything I would have shot.  The race was exactly like this.  So freaking amazing that it makes me want to cry when I watch it.

That was from the Great Wall Marathon 2013.  We actually had much clearer weather.  Beautiful day.

Afterwards we all piled back onto the buses for a 2.5 hour bus ride back to Beijing.  Not exactly ideal but much better (and shorter) than our original minibus ride to Jixian.  Much nicer driver that time too! AMAZING!

Food

Oh China, why do you frustrate me so?  This morning I am sitting in the Cosy Day coffee shop because once again they have turned off the power in my building.  At 4:30 AM, while people are sleeping, they cut the power to the building and it doesn't come back on until after 10:00PM at night when you are getting ready to go to bed.  They did this on Tuesday.  Then we had a break yesterday (Wednesday) and this morning, (Thursday) they once again shut off the power at 4:30 AM.  We have been told that it will come back on after 10:00 PM tonight.  I have no idea why they do this.  I can only assume that it is to save power.

I've given up on the refrigerator.  I took out all the stuff from the freezer that has been melted, and refrozen.  All that is left is ice. (Soon to be water and then ice again.) We are leaving tonight for Beijing so I should be packing right now but I didn't sleep well last night.  If there is no power, there is also no internet and I am currently doing a time sensitive internet course online so I stayed up late last night trying to finish it.  Then at 4:30 AM when the power goes out, my electric fan also goes out.  I use this to drown out the street noise.  I definitely notice when the power goes out. Also, when the power goes out there is no hot water but for some reason that doesn't come back on until around noon the next day so for the past 3 days we have had hot water for about ten hours total.  Good times.

I decided this morning that coffee was more important than packing especially since I was ready to start slapping the cars that seem to be trying to run me down in the crosswalks and yell, "Really?!! Are you trying to kill me??!" Yes, coffee is probably best.

Our day today seems to be revolving around food, wifi, and electrical outlets.  We went home after Cosy Day and I managed to finish packing my stuff.  A car is coming to pick us up at 6.  We're leaving a bit early because I would rather sit at the airport than sit in my apartment in the dark.  Currently, we are sitting in a new restaurant that just opened up a couple of days ago.  We were a bit confused by the signage.

We weren't sure if it was "Big Ones" or perhaps a misspelling of "Bygones" or as Matt likes to keep calling it "Bigones," pronounced big-oh-knees. Today we went inside and the mystery is solved.  It is definitely "The Big Ones."  I ordered "The Big Ones Sandwich," mainly because I wanted to see what exactly "Reasonable Meat" was.

Lucky for me, it turns out to be Spam!  Matt ordered the Burger.  Both pretty good.  A tad on the expensive side but most western food is here.

Mmmm Spam.

In case you were wondering, I definitely eat other things besides spam.  In fact, I like most of the food here but there is one dish that I really don't like.  I was first introduced to it in Macau and I never liked it there either.  Over there it was called "chicken soft bone."  Here, we order by pictures and it actually looked good when we ordered it and when it arrived.

The problem with this dish is that when you bite into it you are expecting chicken but what you get is something like knuckles.  At the time that we ordered it I did actually eat quite a bit of it.  It's weird.  You bite into it and there are the bones, but there is also something in-between the bones.  I pondered as I chewed and my mind went back to a recent comment on a Facebook post.  Laurel had mentioned that she had torn her meniscus, and I thought, if I were ever planning on eating a meniscus, I bet that this is what it would taste like.  A couple of days later, we accidentally ordered it again.  That time we left it.  I can eat a lot of things, but I really don't need to choke down meniscus twice in one week.  

 One time we ate at Mc Donalds.  I ordered a beef and rice wrap.  It was not bad.

This was a pie.  I think it was taro.  Normally I hate taro.  It was actually really good.  I felt pretty sick afterwards but that is pretty much my reaction to any Mc Donalds.  

This is a German place over by Big Wild Goose Pagoda.  Matt likes this place but it requires a taxi ride and it's a bit far.  We would eat there more often if it were easier to get to.

Spaetzle

My favorite nearby place is "Inimitable." It is a Japanese sushi place.  Super yummy.

I also like this Macanese Restaurant called St. Louis. It's about a mile and a half away.  

Everything has been good there.  And no matter where you go, if you order a chicken, even if it comes all cut up, they always leave the head.

So, obviously I'm not starving here despite my empty fridge.  At least it's not raining.  

Worst Ice Cream Man Ever!

I've been meaning to post this for a while but I just haven't had the time.  Then, last week I overheard  a group of children coming into the school singing "Jingle Bells" at the top of their lungs.  It didn't even occur to me to ask them why they were singing "Jingle Bells" in May.  I knew why. It's probably the same reason that I often find myself singing "Jingle Bells." (Although I tend to sing it quietly in my head so that I don't appear crazy to those around me.)

When I first got to Xi'an and we were still staying in the hotel, I went out walking around the neighborhood and I heard what sounded like the ice cream man.  (If you're not from the states, it's basically a guy who drives around in a van blasting music to attract children to then sell them ice cream and popsicles.)

The first one I heard was playing the Happy Birthday song over and over.  It wasn't the ice cream man.  It was the street cleaner.  I thought it a bit odd but then just carried on with my day.  It was over the next few days that I realized that the street cleaners mostly played Christmas Carols.

Jingle bells is a very common one.  I hear it all the time. It tends to get into your head and stick there.

This one is not as common.  It's "Frosty the Snowman."  I cut it off a bit, sorry.  But you can still get the gist of it.

And even if I don't go outside, I can still get the merry holiday sounds delivered right outside my apartment.  I took this one from my living room window.

Not exactly a "Silent Night."  

I also hear "We Wish You a Merry Christmas"quite a bit, and lately, "It's a Small World."  I don't have it on tape but by now I'm sure you get the picture.  I'm assuming that the music is to alert you to get out of the way so that you aren't sprayed with water, I am just confused by their song choices.  I think that I will add "street cleaner in China" to the list of jobs I don't want.  

Mmmmm Spam!

The Great Wall Marathon (of which I am only doing half) is next weekend! Am I prepared? No. Do I care? Hmmm, truthfully, not really.  I was really only worried about the stairs and since Mt Huashan didn't kill me, I am pretty sure that I will survive "The Great Wall."  From what I hear, there are sections of the race where there are so many people on a narrow area that everyone has to walk anyway so I am just not going to worry about it.

April was my worst running month this year.  I barely got in 40 miles for the month.  I went two weeks where I did no running what so ever. I did manage to get in an 11 mile long run last weekend but I was so slow that it took forever! Then I was planning on doing a short run on Tuesday but I was just so tired that I skipped it.  Then today (Thursday) I wasn't tired but it was just too hot.  (I'm getting really good with the excuses.)  Perhaps I will try tomorrow if it has cooled off some.  Perhaps not.

At least the warmer weather has made it a bit easier to get a taxi in the morning! In fact the other day my taxi driver took me down what looked to be a new road that was barely occupied and got me to work in about 10 minutes.  I'm not sure if they just opened this road or if all the other taxi drivers have been taking me the long way.  Yesterday and today my taxi drivers both took me the same old way.  I'm hoping that they just don't know about the new road and there isn't some big taxi driver conspiracy where they are all trying to drive me crazy.  Or perhaps the road was only open for one day??? Maybe I imagined it.

The way home is much more relaxed because I am not pressured for time.  I take a tuk tuk half of the way and then I usually walk the rest of the way home.

It's not the most comfortable ride but it's cheap and better than walking.  There is also one that looks like an open air minibus.  It's much more comfortable.

Usually I am quite hungry by the end of the day because lunch is at noon and by 5 I'm starved.  I've been stopping at this grocery store on my way home to pick up staples like bread and eggs.

I don't know the name but I like it way better than Lotus. They have a little deli counter inside where they have things like potato and egg patties, and these huge eggy crepe type things.  They also usually have some pre made sandwiches. They have egg sandwiches and spam sandwiches.  I have been getting in the habit of getting a spam sandwich and eating it on the way home.

I stopped in on Monday because we really needed bread.  I went by the counter and they only had one egg sandwich left but they also had an interesting noodle dish as well.  I ordered some of the noodle dish to take home and the woman packaged it up.  Then I pointed to the last egg sandwich.  She picked it up and took it to the back and came back out with two pieces of spam.  Then she proceeded to get a roll and she sliced it up and made me a fresh, warm, spam sandwich.  I'm telling you, it was just the best sandwich ever.  Mental note * I may be eating too much spam.

This is Why I Don't Like Mondays.

Ok, today I have some news that may surprise anyone who knows me well.  I have gone and gotten a job.  (Pause for *gasps*) It's true! (That is how much the noise outside my apartment annoys me!) In case you don't know me all that well, or you didn't read my Riyadh blog, here is a link to a post where the only job I really wanted  had to do with coloring.  Unfortunately, I left before that particular job ever materialized.

All right, so... the new job.  I'm teaching, and I will have been there three weeks tomorrow.  Today is Labor Day in China so I am off today, which is why I am blogging.  (Working definitely limits my blogging time.)  Of course, having been out of the teaching game for several years now, I promptly got sick after about a week.  (I have definitely lost my "teacher immunity.")

Every morning, I need to catch a taxi into work which is about 8 kilometers from where I live.  This is my least favorite part of each day.  Some days, I get a taxi quickly.  Other days, I can be waiting on the street for twenty minutes or so before one finally stops.  Unfortunately, the later it gets, the worse the traffic gets, and the harder it becomes to get a taxi that will take me to school.

Now that it has been about three weeks, I am beginning to see a pattern.  On Mondays, I start early and hope that I get a taxi right away because the later it gets, the less likely it is that any taxi will take me at all. I'm learning that if it's raining, try and suck it up and hope for the best.  Also, bring a change of shoes.  If it's raining and Monday... Well, I am starting to think that the better option is to stay at home, curl up in the fetal position and just start rocking back and forth in frustration.

The day after we hiked Mt. Huashan, I awoke with a bit of a sore throat.  It was Sunday so I just rested and didn't do much other than drive back to Gao Xin.  On Monday, I woke up feeling about the same.  A bit of a sore throat but not too bad.  It was raining fairly hard.  It had rained on the previous Friday when I was going home (a whole other story which will probably be it's own blog post later) so I had an inkling of what to expect.  (Others had warned me about how difficult Fridays are, but no one had mentioned Mondays.)

At 7:15 I was on the street corner trying to catch a cab.  After 3 empty cabs purposely passed me by one finally stopped.  I told him where I wanted to go and showed him the Chinese address and he said something to me in Chinese and waved his arm at me in a way that pretty much said "No way!" And he drove off.  It is now about 7:25.  Around 7:30 another cab stops.  This time, I get in first and tell him where I want to go.  He starts to drive down the street.  Then he starts speaking to me in Chinese.  I have no clue what he is saying.  He starts speaking to me louder while still driving.  I still have no clue.  He pulls the car over and turns around and yells at me.  I get the picture that he has decided that he doesn't want to take me so I offer to pay 40. (Usually costs 15) He yells at me a bit more in Chinese and then he turns back around so all I can see is the back of his head.  He holds up his right hand and starts making a wrist flicking waving motion to basically tell me to get out.  Then he proceeded to sit there waving until I got out.  So now I am no longer on a busy street corner but a good ways down the street in the middle of a very long block.  I have basically cut the amount of cabs available to me now in half.  Around 7:45 a third cab finally stops and agrees to take me.  By this time, the traffic on the regular streets is horrendous.  The school, however, is located on a rather narrow street.  This, combined with the late hour and the rain apparently makes the narrow street virtually impossible for a taxi to maneuver.  (This was probably what the other taxi drivers were yelling at me about.)

So we turned down the narrow street, and got maybe 100 meters in and traffic came to a stand still.  After about 5 more minutes of sitting there, we had gone maybe 10 feet.  At this point, the taxi driver started speaking to me.  I was hoping that he was telling me to walk.  The previous Friday, my taxi driver got stuck and when I got out she was really yelling at me. She charged me extra and yelled a lot.  I was really hoping this guy wasn't going to yell at me. (I'm really getting tired of that.) Luckily, he didn't.  He was very good natured about it so I was grateful for that. I stepped out of the cab and started walking towards the school.  After about ten feet I could feel the water seeping into my shoes. After about 2 minutes, my shoes felt like sponges squishing water with every step.  I can not even begin to describe the walk in to work that day. Luckily, once I was past the worst of it, I took a bit of video so I won't have to try and describe it.  And yes, I am walking down the middle of the street because the sides are pretty much flooded.

It should be noted that after the second video ends, I had to walk through the "puddle" on the right at the end of the video because there was no other way to go.  I will admit that there were quite a few "swear words" going through my head at this point.  I felt quite depressed as I continued my trudge into work.  I arrived around 8:25 (25 minutes late) a bit "shell shocked." I had no other shoes to change into, so I shoved some paper towels in my shoes and frequently changed them throughout the day.  They started feeling a bit "drier" around 5:00 in the evening when it was time to go home. It was still raining when I started my trudge in the opposite direction this time, and within 5 minutes, my shoes were once again soaking wet for my walk home.

The next morning, I had a sore throat and a runny nose. The morning after that, I had developed a cough as well and basically I have been sick ever since.  I am on the mend and the weather seems to be improving, but I still never know what to expect when I leave for work in the morning.  I have learned to keep my expectations low.  Very, very low. Because, while this was my worst day thus far, I do fear that it could possibly get worse.