Top 5 Must See Places in Beijing

Beijing is an old capital city with a lot of tourists attractions. What is the most representative place in Beijing? The answers are various. Here are the Top 5 Must See Places in Beijing.

1) Forbidden City

The Forbidden City is the ideal place for you to begin your exploration of Beijing. Make sure to wear comfortable shoes as you have to walk a lot! A multilingual guide recorder is recommended, as it can tell you the stories behind the palace.

Opening Hour: 8:30-17:00

Entrance Fee: RMB 60

2) Tian'anmen Square

Lying in the heart of Beijing City, it is the place for massive parades and gathering. It boasts of the largest square of such kind in the world. At sunrise and sunset the raising and lowering ceremony of the Chinese National Flag is well worth seeing.

Ticket fees: Free

Opening Time: Whole Day

3) Great Wall

    Most of the sections of the Great Wall in Beijing are well-preserved, and the most famous section is Badaling. For the Great Wall hiking, get ready for strong footwear. For hot weather, please also prepare sunblock, sunglasses and water.

Badaling Great Wall:

Ticket Fees: RMB40 (Nov. 01 to Mar. 31); RMB 45 (Apr. 01 to Oct. 31)

Open Hours: 6:40 to 18:30

4) Summer Palace

    Regarded as the largest imperial garden in China, the Summer Palace is in fact a park-styled royal retreat. With masterly design and artistic architecture integrating the highlight of Chinese garden arts, it has earned a title of "Royal Garden Museum".

Open Time: 6:30-20:30

Ticket Fee: RMB 40 (low season) / RMB 50 (peak season during the holidays)

5) Temple of Heaven

The Temple of Heaven worked as sacrificial compound buildings for the Ming and Qing emperors. What's the intriguing by-production of the temple is that if you enter the Temple of Heaven in the early morning, you can find many people doing all types of Kungfu, Taiji, dancing and other morning exercises.

Open Time: 6:00-21:00

Ticket Fee: RMB 35

    Chinese students aren't the only ones who have a sleep loss problem. In Australia, teenagers are also missing, on average, one hour's sleep every night during the school week.

    Organized activities and homework push bedtimes later, the first large-scale Australian study of children's sleeping habits has shown. Their sleep deprivation (剥夺) is enough to cause “serious drop-offs in school performance, attention and memory”, and governments should consider later or flexible school start times, said the study's leader, Tim Olds.

    His survey, of more than 4,000 children aged 9 to 18, found those who slept least did not watch more television but spent their time socializing (相处) with family or friends or listening to music.

    “Almost all children get up at 7 or 7:15 — they have to get to school on time,” said Olds. He favors a later start over an earlier finish because he believes organized sports and activities would still consume the latter end of the day.

    Olds' research also establishes lack of sleep as a cause of weight gain in children, and a possible source of future problems with depression, anxiety and increased susceptibility (易感性) to illness.

    It was already known that overweight children sleep less, but Professor Olds found sleep duration(时长) was strongly linked to weight across the full range of body sizes. The thinnest children sleep 20 minutes more than the obese. This showed being overweight had no specific effect on sleep patterns, and it was more likely that shorter sleep times stimulate (刺激) appetite and make kids hungry.

    The US National Sleep Foundation says teenagers aged 13 to 18 need eight to nine hours' sleep a night. Younger school-aged kids need 9 to 11 hours.

    On that basis, Professor Olds said, half of Australian children are under-sleeping on weekdays and a quarter on weekends.

    No matter where you live or how you define yourself, these are some of the best activities to get in touch with nature.

Hiking

    One of the easiest and most accessible ways to get close to nature is by setting out on a good old hike. Hiking generally doesn't require any special equipment or special skills; just a good pair of boots, a map, and a thirst for adventure. This activity can be as relaxing as you make it. Suggestion: consider doing a little advance research on Trails.com or EveryTrail.com.

    Backcountry Camping

    Why limit yourself to just a day hike when you can have a full weekend (or longer) adventure? Backcountry camping involves packing your tent, sleeping bag, food，and water on your back to set up camp in a remote location. If you're an experienced hiker and camper, this is an excellent way to test your survival skills and explore the wildness. Many parks require backpackers to obtain permits, so make sure to register and map your route before stepping on the trail.

    Mountain and Road Biking

    Unlike long hikes through the woods, biking allows you to cover more ground and travel farther while still being in nature. Mountain biking typically involves riding up and down steep slopes, between trees, and over rocks. If this sounds too intense or your tires aren't suited for a rocky path, consider taking a road bike or a hybrid on paved trails through forest preserves or along country roads.

    Tickets for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil have gone on sale, with fans able to apply on FIFA's website. FIFA is expecting a similar demand to that in Germany 2006, when there were about seven applicants for every ticket of the 64 matches. And now around 3.3 million tickets will be available for the matches in 2014.

    Tickets will range in price from￡58 for first-round matches to￡632 for the final at Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Brazilian citizens over 60, local students and members of some social programs can purchase tickets for ￡15.

    The Price of Football - World Cup 2014

    "It's always difficult to predict," said FIFA marketing director Thierry Weil. "But I truly believe that it will be more similar to what happened in Germany than in South Africa in 2010." According to FIFA, the 2006 World Cup was attended by more than 3.3 million fans. Almost two million tickets were sold to the general public in South Africa, although the number of applications during the first ticketing phase was significantly lower.

    All applications made before 10th October 2013 will enter a random selection draw if there are not enough tickets available to fulfill all requests. The sales of the leftover tickets will begin on 5th November on a first-come, first-served basis. Another phase（阶段） will begin on 8th December after the draw is made. The tournament begins on 12th June, with Brazil playing the opener in Sao Paulo.

    A study on the price of World Cup 2014 looked at the ticket prices and the cost of travelling to Brazil and found that our English fans face hotel costs of between￡46 and￡797 a night, while packages range from￡2,999 to￡14,999.

    From Antigua to Zanzibar, these spots promise an incredible trip for 2019.

    Antigua, Guatemala

    "Antigua is worth every penny, but that doesn't mean you'll have to empty your wallet," says Hudson. There are plenty of budget-conscious activities. It won't cost you a coin to visit Santo Domingo del Cerro, an outdoor sculpture park. Wanting something sweet? Head to ChocoMuseo. Admission is free and so are the samples!

    Odessa, Ukraine

    Odessa is having a bit of a tourism boom nationwide-not that we're surprised, given its sandy beaches and pastel-colored buildings-but it's still fairly under the order for international audiences. You can also count on this port city for affordable fun. Tickets to the Odessa Opera House start at a mere $ 2!

    Bogotá, Colombia

    "Travelers on budget will find Colombia's vast capital, far more of a bargain and every bit as fascinating," says Hudson. "It's free to visit Museo de Oro and on Sundays many of the big roads are closed to accommodate food carts, street entertainers, and pedestrians."

    Zanzibar

    Zanzibar attracts vacationers with its white sand beaches, greenish-blue tides, colorful coral reefs, and oceanfront seaside. Of course, wandering in historic Stone Town is pretty appealing too. Either way, you needn't spend a penny in this amazing place. It's also worth noting that Jozani Forest is the only place in the world you can see endangered red colobus monkeys.

    We have encountered a crisis around the corner. You mean global warming? The world economy? No, the decline of reading. People are just not doing it anymore, especially the young. Who's responsible?

Actually, it's more like, what is responsible? The Internet, of course, and everything that comes with it – Facebook, Twitter. You can write your own list.

    There's been a warning about the imminent death of literate civilization for a long time. In the 20th century, first it was the movies, then radio, then television that seemed to spell doom for the written world. None did. Reading survived; in fact it not only survived, it has flourished. The world is more literate than ever before – there are more and more readers, and more and more books.

    The fact that we often get our reading material online today is not something we should worry over. The electronic and digital revolution of the last two decades has arguably shown the way forward for reading and for writing. Take the arrival of e-book readers as an example.

    Devices like Kindle make reading more convenient and are a lot more environmentally friendly than the traditional paper book.

    As technology makes new ways of writing possible, new ways of reading are possible. Interconnectivity allows for the possibility of a reading experience that was barely imaginable before. Where traditional books had to make do with photographs and illustrations, an e-book can provide readers with an unlimited number of links: to texts, pictures, and videos. In the future, the way people write novels, history, and philosophy will resemble nothing seen in the past.

    On the other hand, there is the danger of trivialization. One Twitter group is offering its followers single-sentence-long "digests" of the great novels. War and Peace in a sentence? You must be joking. We should fear the fragmentation of reading. There is the danger that the high-speed connectivity of the Internet will reduce our attention span—that we will be incapable of reading anything of length or which requires deep concentration.

    In such a fast-changing world, in which reality seems to be remade each day, we need the ability to focus and understand what is happening to us. This has always been the function of literature and we should be careful not to let it disappear. Our society needs to be able to imagine the possibility of someone utterly in tune with modern technology but able to make sense of a dynamic, confusing world.

    In the 15th century, Johannes Guttenberg's invention of the printing press in Europe had a huge impact on civilization. Once upon a time the physical book was a challenging thing. We should remember this before we assume that technology is out to destroy traditional culture.