Beijing Zhisheng Inn

... viewing pleasure, as well as a cropped/chopped/spliced view of Beijing driving. Keep in mind that the taxi driver knew he was being filmed and was on his best driving behaviour. I will also attempt to load walking in the hutong, and several other general bits I have been negligent on posting. (hooray!)

After the show, I took a cab with probably the only female (and cautious) taxi cab driver in all of Beijing back to BLCU for my placement test the next morning.

... into the ground, inserting vertical pipes that circulate liquid nitrogen and cold nitrogen gas into the ground. Then they had to build hollow concrete pipes beneath the tracks to keep the rail bed frozen and use metal sun shades to deflect the sun!! Construction of the line involved building 160kms of (675) bridges and elevated track, 7 tunnels (Fenghuoshan tunnel is the highest in the world at 4,905m and 1,338kms long and the Yangbajing ...

... the various sections. The salespeople are pushy to say the least. Calling out at you and grabbing hold of your clothes, quite intimidating. Especially when you're not used to it! The tou guide from the great wall told us not to pay more than 10% of the original price. Don't mind a it of haggling, but dropping down 90% got to be a pain in the ****! Got back to the hostel and immediately grabbed a beer. It'd been a long day! Told my story to the Aussie couple, retred ...

... before the tickets check. I assumed it was the legacy from the Olympic Games. It was a bit of a hassle, but nothing serious. If it could guarantee us all a safe ride, then I was all for it. The morning was warm and sunny. In Beijing way, of course. Waiting for PingPing on Xichang'an Jie, right by the station exit, I noticed a large number of policemen. Or whatever they were. It was difficult to know since they all looked like police to me, and on the other hand, not all of ...

... own by foot. My first stop was Jingshan Park. I am so happy that I stopped there. The park gate is across the street from the back gate of the Forbidden City. Inside I walked through the garden. Then I made my way up a big hill to a pagoda atop. Reaching the summit was great because here was a magnificent never ...

... market too. It is famous for serving weird foods on a stick like scorpions, star fish, sea urchin, sea horses...well you get the picture! WEIRD! Side notes: China put in a new policy. No stores could give out plastic bags for free, they have to be bought if you want one. So, you had to bring your own bags to the grocery store/shopping! It was really cool to see the change in behavior and almost everyone had a "shopping" bag with them ...

... but it was from the dust form the Gobi desert, which is a few miles off the city. They say that the desert is moving towards the city, and could take over the city if they don't develop a way to keep it in control. The afternoon we went to a few of the markets...mental!! We have been to a few markets in Asia, and this was the most in your face market. They all run up at you, grab you, scream at you, and as you pass one shoe shop the next shoe shop owner runs to you and ...

... them ham it up when they realize I have my camera out, and generally watch local people do what local people do instead of racing from monument to museum to palace to mosque to pagoda and seeing real life only from inside a bus, which prevents you from getting more than a glimpse. The first five days that I was in Beijing, I did it my way, which means that I wandered back streets a lot, took most of a rainy day off to update this blog, ate at restaurants ...

... China is opening two new coal-fired power stations a day. The terrible consquences of this short term energy policy were all too apparent to us. From Pingyao we caught a night train to Datong. Our tickets were for hard-sleeper class, requiring that we sleep in compartments of six, in bunks of three storeys, separated from the other compartments by an open doorway. It was obvious from the start that we would get little sleep! The evening went by ...

... i Beijing d. 4. januar og så har vi vores skriftlige i Danmark d. 25. januar, interkontinental eksamen, det er ikke hvert år at man gør det. Her i december har der også været et par arrangementer med ECCS, d. 9. december var vi ude og se et akrobatshow, det er jo helt sindsygt som de piger og drenge kan bøje sig, en pige bed sig fast i et mundstykke hvorefter at hun bøjede ryggen så meget at hendes bagdel ramte hendes isse, og derefterbegyndte hun så at gonglere. Det var ret ...