Saturday, December 14 - Wangfujing

Once again we were situated on a swarming shopping street in Beijing so we set out both to explore as well as to hunt, hoping to find a hat and some mittens to protect little Maylia from Beijing’s much cooler temperatures. 

Since we were all getting hungry we decided to try a very common delicacy in China. KFC. It was everywhere -- even more prevalent than 7-11 or McDonalds which were everywhere as well. Kentucky Fried China did not disappoint and we were grateful that even Maylia found some food we enjoyed so after our meal we decided to brave bustling Beijing once again.

The further we walked the more lively and crowded the street became -- Wangfujing was much more commercialized than I had remembered it being. Aside from the market stalls there were now a number of high end American and European shops with two giant mall developments anchoring the square.  

The streets were packed with shoppers and we passed stores selling souveneirs as well as a number of American chain stores. At the entrance to another market we passed a stall selling scorpions and seahorses on skewers but decided with Maylia’s deteriorating mood to brave that market another day. 

We finally  entered into one of the massive malls and it felt like any other shopping mecca on a December weekend: busy, bustling , full of teens and families . We finally had to go into a GAP Kids before we found anything that would fit her. It felt annoying to pay such high prices knowing that somewhere near hats and mitts were being sold for less than a couple of dollars but we paid the price for both expediency ...and because I couldn’t bring myself to purchase the ones that were covered with lace and glued-on sequins. It was style over savings.  Maylia was more than fussy at this point and we decided to leave the crowds and return home to bed and to hopefully have a much quieter night.