Here’s a shot of the easternmost town in the United States.  The town is named, against all odds, Eastport.

I was pleased to be able to fly from Boston to Los Angeles first class last week.  Thank you, frequent flyer miles!  The airline was United.

I was a bit shocked at the food served in first class, though. 

First they went around and said, “Warm nuts?”  Well, sure, why not?  Except the nuts they handed me were stone cold.  Nothing wrong with that, but why call them “warm nuts” when they aren’t?

Next, dinner.  I had a chicken breast thing which tasted fine.  However, it was accompanied by a “salad” that was simply one kind of lettuce in a bowl.  One kind of lettuce and nothing else.  That’s not a salad.  It’s especially not a first-class salad.  It’s a bowl of lettuce.

Even weirder were the side dishes.  They consisted of 1) potatoes and 2) corn and lima beans.  Hello?  While they are all vegetables in a botanical sense, in terms of the food pyramid they are starches, not vegetables.  Potatoes and broccoli would have been appropriate.  Corn/lima beans and spinach would have been fine.

But what moron do they have at United planning FIRST CLASS meals who thinks it’s appropriate for both side dishes to a meal to be starches?  That’s a mistake an eighth-grade Home Economics student wouldn’t make.

However, United came close to redeeming itself with the dessert.  It was hot fudge sundaes!  Actual hot fudge sundaes!  Never thought I’d have that on a plane.  They were constructed fresh right in front of you. 

So, come on, United.  If you can come up with a winner like that for dessert, you should be able to do better with the actual meal.  Aim higher, possums.

It’s 26 degrees.  On March 26.  I’m just sayin’.

I’d been to Minneapolis once before, but never in cold weather. It struck me that if you’d never been here in cold weather, you hadn’t really seen the place as it truly was.

So things couldn’t have looked or felt more perfect as I sailed up Hiawatha Avenue on the way from the airport on my way to the Holiday Inn Express where I was to stay for a month. Hiawatha, I thought, perfect. I even crossed Minnehaha Parkway.

I was surrounded by tall empty trees, snow and half-frozen lakes. It felt perfect.

My Mary Tyler Moore reverie was only interrupted when I realized that I couldn’t find my exit to Interstate 35W northbound. Actually I saw what was clearly the exit for it, but it was blocked off and the sign obscured. After a couple of further attempts, a lightbulb went off.

After successfully negotiating the detour, I finally found my way to the hotel.

“I’m just guessing that it was the 35W bridge that fell into the river last year, right?”

A moose-like nod indicated I was indeed correct.
“You know, ” I said, dripping the charm for which I am internationally unknown, “that would be a great thing to mention to out-of-state guests when they call to make a reservation, considering the bridge is right between the airport and your hotel.”

One more thing. As I approached the hotel, I realized it couldn’t have more perfectly blended in with the surroundings. In other words, it looks like a grain elevator.

Sorry these took so long, everyone.

So here was my first look at the sparkling skyline of Beijing:

 

No, I didn’t have the Sepia setting turned on on my digital camera.

 

This is actually what the air in Beijing looked like.

Well, since I was in China, I naturally began looking for its most famous landmark:  The Great Wall!  Turns out, finding it was easier said than done.

The Not Particularly Impressive Wall of China:

 

The Understated Wall of China: 

 

Your coorespondent in Tiananmen Square, the LARGEST PUBLIC SQUARE IN THE WORLD!!! (Just ask your tourguide if you don’t believe me!!)

 

The So-So Wall of China:

 

And what’s the point of traveling if you don’t make time for a little romance?

 

The Pretty Dandy Wall of China:

  

 

Ah, Esmerelda, my whole life has been leading up to this moment!

 

The Great Coca-Cola Ad of China:

 

The Bright Red But Still Disappointing Wall of China:

 

Insert hump joke here:

 

The Pretty Darned Impressive Wall of China:

  

At the Ming Tombs:

 

The Great Card Game of China:

 

More Ming Bling:

 

AT LAST!!  THE ACTUAL GREAT WALL OF CHINA!

  

Me and The Wall (I’m the one on the foreground):

 

No, you cannot see it from outer space, no matter what you’ve heard.

 

Plus it was a complete failure at its mission:  To keep barbarians out.  As proof, see this photo of me and my colleagues moments after breaching the Wall. 

 

 The lovely Summer Palace:

 

 It’s true.  I was the Largest Human in China.

 

 I pose as we set my interview on CNN as being The Largest Human in China:

 

With my colleague and Fabulous Babe Sara White in The Forbidden City:

Mao/Moi:

 

Yeah.  The main building that’s used in all the movies was hidden under scaffolding.  Thanks a lot, China.  Can I have my money back now?

 

 The Temple of Heaven. 

 

In Japan, statues must wear hats.  Why?  Because the Japanese are crazy.

 

A remarkably talented street performance duo:

 

In downtown Tokyo you can have your face carved into a huge jade boulder while you wait.  How do I look?  Does the yellow frame make my cheeks look fat?

 

And finally, here’s my very favorite Japanese children’s magazine.  Yes, it’s real.  Why would they have a children’s magazine with this title?  Because Japanese people are crazy.

 

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Lots of amusement can be had by simply reading the “English” signs around Beijing.  Here are a few of my favorites: 

Original Motive  (a store?)

Outside a monument:  Vigorously Prosecuted All Sorts of Crime

 A bakery:  Bread Talk

Yes House

Urban Street With Peaceful Name Defining Life

And, over the entrance to the Hard Rock Cafe:

No Drugs And Nuclear Weapons Allowed

In the end, I think what really bothered me the most in Beijing and its surrounding area was the crushing weight of 3000 years of tradition.  Coming from such a young country as the U.S., it’s  a stifling feeling being around a culture where everything important about life has been decided long ago. 

Chinese people are born with the weight of over 100 generations of ancestors bearing down on them, telling them how to think about authority, marriage, work, play, love and war.  America, on the other hand, was born out of the restless spirit of a people refusing to obey their colonial “parents.”  It’s hard to overemphasize what a difference this makes between our two cultures.
The result in China is a culture of sameness.  When I toured the various Ming Dynasty tombs, the Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven and other historical sites in and around Beijing, at first it was fascinating to hear the lore of what everything represented. 
Oh, I see, cool: Red is a color everyone can use, and its stands for happiness.  Green stands for prosperity.  Yellow is a color only the Imperial family can use.
See these two lions guarding the gate?  Which is the male and which is the female?  Oh, there it is: the male lion has a large ball (representing power) under his paw; the female has a lion cub under hers.  See these three bridges to the temple sanctuary?  Middle bridge is for emperor, left bridge is for common folks.
All perfectly interesting.  Until you realize EVERY temple and traditional building has the EXACT same color scheme, the EXACT same lions, the EXACT same bridges.  You even begin seeing exact motifs represented in art.  See the pretty jade horses representing good luck?  Now see the same exact set of horses in a hundred different sizes, carved out of a hundred different colors of jade, in a hundred different flea markets.  Mind you, I’m not referring to similar designs, but IDENTICAL designs. 

It’s as if the entire country is based on a set of immutable templates.
Compare this to old churches in Europe.  Even though you’ll see the flow of certain architectural traditions, like Romanesque, Rococo, Gothic, etc., within those traditions you’ll see a wild proliferations of variations on the traditional themes.

Not in Beijing.  Red, green, yellow.  Three bridges.  Two lions.
In stark contrast, the skyline of modern Beijing is a forest of fascinating and innovative new high-rises and skyscrapers.  Daring shapes, colors and designs abound.  The architects?  German.  Dutch.  Italian.  Not a single major construction project in the city has a Chinese architect.  What a shock.  I guess it’s a sign of progress that the Chinese can at least recognize their limitations and are willing to take the step of hiring foreigners to be innovative, since innovation has been bred out of their own national chromosomes.
Harsh?  Maybe.  But when you watch the Olympics on TV next year and marvel at the wild-looking Birds Nest Stadium and other cool buildings in the Olympic Village, just remember – ALL of them were designed by non-Chinese people who are capable of thinking out of the box.

This extends to all personal matters as well.  When I spoke to Chinese people and they learned I wasn’t married, they were honestly shocked.  Shocked, and seemingly almost unable to imagine such a state for a 47-year old man. 

It reminded me of how rich and valuable my heritage as an American is.  As an ornery citizen of the U.S., I actually get to decide for MYSELF what colors I’d like to put on my house.  Or how to build a family, or IF to build a family.  There are a thousand choices I can make a day that I can easily take for granted.  Well, shame on me – I’ll try not to take them for granted any more.

Will it stay this way forever in China?  Maybe not.  It’s very possible that, with the aggressiveness of their outreach to the West to build their economy that an influx of new ideas could flood into the country and be embraced by the younger generations.  I certainly hope so.
Remember, just because something is old, doesn’t make it good.  Just because we’ve done something a certain way forever doesn’t mean we’re doing it the right way.  You want me to list some of the institutions with a long and respectable history which are an abomination to modern man?  Don’t get me started.  That rant is for another piece.

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