After Mum and Dad left on the Wednesday it was (sadly) time to return to normality. On the Friday night with the temperature plummeting and having been out of contact with my friends for awhile, I went to have hotpot with my friend Pip, but stupidly took us to a very fancy place and ordered chicken gizzards. Bless Pip, she was very sweet but it...

Yesterday I flew out of Narita and into Beijing's new airport. Fine flight, got fed well, and got to sit on the upper deck of a 747 in an exit row by the window with no one in the middle seat. Talk about luxury. Rather than take a cab from the airport, I decided to brave public transit and skillfully managed to transfer two buses, orient myself,...

The following morning we were up early and went to check out the Forbidden City (FC). As we entered the main gates we were slightly surprised to see a group of about 20 soldiers (cops?) practicing how to march and turn etc (musztra). A little bit farther there was a similar group doing morning exercises. Farther still there was a bunch dressed i...

We are in a ver large internet cafe with over 250 workstations. I'm guessing 80% are playing computer days - and having a LOT of fun!!! Too bad this nice internet cafe doesn't allow you too upload photos - so I'll provide links too other peoples photos (after all - we all take the same pictures). Pandas We visited the Giant Panda's at the Chengd...

This is a start of a 10-Day Tour of China. Good luck to us!

"No I dont know", "No I dont know", "No I dont know". Arggh, these are the responses we received by the Beijing taxi drivers upon being asked to take us to the Saga International Youth Hostel upon arrival in the Big Smoke. After a long smoky night on the sleeper train this was the last thing that we needed. Now, I know I didnt actually have an a...