We soon stumbled upon a traditional bakery/pastry shop and decided to see what we could get ourselves into. We selected some very random things, not have the slightest clue as to what they were. We ended up eating a sweet-bean dough roll, a cream-ish filled pastry topped with
some type of a berry sauce, which we could not pinpoint, something that represented an “airy” baklava, and some pieces of different flavored light cake. All of them were great and packed with exotic flavors.
At the Innovation Design Center
Moving on through the day we traveled to the Innovation Design Center which as a Design student I was able to witness first hand an amazing award-winning Center working on real world projects. Being able to see their facilities and processes was a great experience and gave me new insight to the field that I am so very interested in.
After being satisfied with how breakfast worked out a couple of us set to the night-lit city streets to find something authentic. Strolling down local side streets and through very dim alleyways in a nearby Hutong (an area housing traditional locals) we found a restaurant and
proceeded inward. We had a traditional meal of “Hot-Pot” in which we cooked out own food in a pot of boiling broths and flavors. The food was amazing, the atmosphere was great, and the bill was minimal. A great dinner, to say the least. Meandering back to the hotel we were able to check out the life of the locals, sitting outside, eating, drinking, and socializing at their very small neighborhood gathering area. This area included street vendors, open air meat markets, home-restaurants, and fruit stands which were mounted to the backs of bicycles. Arriving back
to the hotel we watched the traffic from our 18th-story window for awhile, just before falling asleep.
Jared-
City night
Bean roll
Hot-pot
