Sleep on the train ride came much easier than I had expected, although a metal panel above my head was missing a screw and rattling through most of the night.  Eventually I got fed up and stuck my sock in the gap, but fifteen minutes later Sven came by and told us to get ready to disembark.

The right side of our cabin

         From the bus depot we drove through Dalian to our hotel.  Just over two decades ago, our part of the City was a small village comparable to Port Matilda.  Now it’s a legitimate city–not nearly as crowded as Beijing but impressive all the same.  Despite being newer, Dalian does not have the same touches that had clearly been added to Beijing in preparation for the recent Olympics.  The high walls that blocked off the dimmer regions of Beijing (homes that were little more than faded shacks) are not to be seen in Dalian.  The lack of Beijing’s heavy bicycle traffic is also a signal that we are surely in a new place. 

The 20^th story of our restaurant has a rotating restaurant like those in New York City and Toronto but smaller and lower.  The staff usually doesn’t rotate it during breakfast, but because we aren’t eating there for lunch or dinner during our two-day stay in Dalian, Xinli asked if they would turn it on as a special favor.  They agreed to, and so we received a 360-degree view of the city during our meal.  The food itself was great.  It had the standard Chinese items we’ve come to expect along with some fruits (the first litchi fruit I’ve found so far) and rolls filled with fig.

         For some reason, all the hotel rooms on our floor have had the wall between the bathroom and the living space replaced with a glass wall.  A semi-transparent curtain can be drawn from the back of the shower to close off the view.  None of us are quite sure how this design element creates more benefits than it does oddities.   

         After breakfast we took a quick ride to the top of a nearby mountain that serves as an observatory to the city.  Dalian has several districts arranged among rocky mountain formations, and we could see one on each side of the mountain from this point.  The observatory itself looks like a UFO, and can be seen from just about everywhere in our district. 

The observatory

A view of Dalian from the base of the observatory

         We spent most of the afternoon at the hotel getting the wrinkles out of our dressier clothing in preparation for a special dinner.  The meal had almost thirty different dishes, and came courtesy of one of Xinli’s college buddies who made his millions (in dollars, I assume) by investing in the rapid development of the city.  Most of the dishes featured Dalian’s famous seafood, with similar items to what you might find in the Northeastern coastal United States but with slightly different species and preparation.  One of the dishes was large clam-like animals, which we’re told go for about $27 each.  They tasted like chicken but with a smooth instead of stringy texture, and are supposedly an amazingly healthy food.  Other items, like the octopus tentacles and thousand-year-old eggs (“century eggs” on Wikipedia if you’re curious) were only consumed by our more adventurous eaters, but I think all of us tried something new in the ongoing effort to keep an open mind in a new culture.  The beer served with dinner was excellent, and waitresses were constantly refilling our glasses. It took a lot of concentration to keep tabs on my consumption, especially with my cup seeming to refill itself every five minutes.  Social drinking is an important part of Chinese culture, and even (perhaps especially) at our host’s table, glasses of beer and rice wine were really put away.

Location: Dalian, China