After a 13-hour flight, I was happy to get into China without any snags. Arriving at my hotel in Beijing, I headed straight to my room, threw my bags on the ground and went to sleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. The 7:30 a.m. wakeup call told me it was time to get up for breakfast, and to my surprise the time change hadn't really affected me at all.

As I walked into the continental breakfast at Rosedale Hotel, I noticed some very different stations at the breakfast buffet, but some that I was familiar with as well. There were many different kinds of soups, both hot and cold, some sushi, and congee, which is rice porridge with a consistency similar to oatmeal.

Not yet brave enough to try these authentic Chinese dishes, I headed for the fresh fruit, breads and cereal. None of the cereal had any refined sugar because the Chinese prefer to sweeten their cereal with dried bananas, raisins or honey. As I sat down to eat, I couldn’t help but notice that there was Christmas music playing in the background. First I thought I recognized an instrumental version of "Silent Night" and all doubt was erased when Bing Crosby started singing "White Christmas" in the next song. This was strange to me because most Chinese are Buddist, but I guess they just enjoy the music.

My guide picked me up from my hotel, and we were off to the first stop on my tour of Beijing – Tiananmen Square.

Tiananmen Square is the largest square in the world, and I began my exploration with a look at the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong, where his body now rests. The people of China are enthralled with Chairman Mao, and when he was alive, they prayed to him before breakfast and dinner everyday. His picture still presides over Tiananmen Square today.

Right next to Tiananmen Square is the Forbidden City, where the emperor of China lived. Many ceremonies were held here, and now it is open to the public in the form of a museum. The palace has many walls and a moat that protected the emperor from invasion. Everything has a meaning in China, and the walls were painted red to signify fortune. The golden roofs denote royalty. The emperor is the only one that was allowed to have golden roofs on his buildings.

Inside the walls of the Forbidden City is the Imperial Gardens. The gardens used to have many flowers and trees planted, but because of fires, there was a ban on planting more things, so only a few trees remain.

After a lot of walking, I stopped for my first meal of traditional Chinese cuisine. My guide ordered a few appetizers, and when they arrived, I dove right in. The first two were a Szechuan dish with chicken smothered in a spicy sauce, and soy sauce covered peanuts. The third dish was cabbage and semi-dried jellyfish head. The jellyfish had been chopped into little pieces about the size of potato chips, and was crunchy with a salty flavor. Let’s just say I stuck with the first two. My main course was egg noodles with pork and soy sauce. It was a very salty meal, but delicious nonetheless.

After finishing lunch, my final stop for the day was the Temple of Heaven, where the emperor prayed and made sacrifices in hopes of good harvests and fortunes for his people. The blue roofs and circular construction represent the heavens, compared to green and square shapes, which symbolize Earth.

After leaving the Temple of Heaven, I traveled by rickshaw to a traditional Chinese home inside Beijing. The home was off of a side street, and had rooms extending off a small courtyard in the middle. Each room housed a different member of the family; the elders and each of their son’s families all lived off the same courtyard.

This was interesting to me because the Chinese would never think about putting their elders in an assisted living home as many people in the United States do. Instead of looking at the elderly as a burden to take care of, they look at it as honoring where they came from. I was amazed at how quiet their home was even though it was in the center of Beijing.

Tradition is very important to the Chinese, and it seems as if they are more than willing to go out of their way to maintain it. While this may at times sacrifice productivity and progress, it preserves the thought that the family is one solid unit that cannot be broken.