Hangying Hotel Beijing

... of the other cities Ive been to... its even computerized with TV screens showing commercials. The place is packed with people everywhere so that is sort of in line with what I expected but its clean. The people dress like westerners for the most part but the girls will pull out a piece of crazy and add flourescent pink shoes to a cute outfit which kind of ruins it. The people obviously shower and there are lots of women everywhere.

Actually the ...

... Chineseness"
of an ancient and often mystifying land. What he finds is a country
with its feet suctioned in the clay of traditional culture and a head
straining into the polluted stratosphere of unencumbered capitalism,
where cyclopean portraits of Chairman Mao (largely perceived as mostly
good, except for that nasty bit toward the end) spoon comfortably with
Beijing, Beijing, China happysheep

... miles away from anything interesting." So, I arrived in Beijing about a week ago and by now, I've settled in pretty well, I think. I live in the campus area in a dormitory and share a room with a guy from South Korea. There are three dormitory buildings for foreign students here, and I think I ended up in a one that doesn't seem to have any other "Western" students. Most of the students living in this building seem to be Korean, Japanese, Mongolian etc. Not that it matters ...

... just hike the Great Wall made an amazing combination.  I would hike the terrible wall again just to have that feeling that you are really living!  It was really great.  We hopped on a boat, got back to the bus, and tried to sleep the rest of  the way back.   That night we each treated ourselves to footlong subs at Subway.  They don't have the $5 footlong deal here, but I think I would have spent $50 on a sub that night.  We also spotted a Chinese Walmart across the ...

... sold at the premium price of 40 yuan, which I happily paid! Just like imported Champagne, right?) Aside from a couple of cases of what I am calling "Mao-tezuma's" Revenge, we have had great meals, and even put on some weight. For those of y'all that thought Gregg and I were too skinny, wait 'til you check out our new Beijing Bellies... When in China...!

... complex of temples and stately buildings dominated by two features - a giant lake, Kunming Lake with Longevity Hill situated on the north bank and where many of the most impressive buildings lie. Shortly after arriving, Kirilee and I whisked ourseleves away from all the throngs of people and hired one of those little paddle-wheel rafts which you propel yourself by peddling on a bicycle-style mechanism which turns the water-paddles under the raft. It actually ended up ...

... shopping area. He picks one. I buy it. And within 20 minutes we are drinking Tsingtao (chinese beer) and eating chicken hearts and squid on wooden skewers outside in the 'crisp' winter air of the back streets of Beijing. Overlooking the square I notice a small stage with maroon velvet curtains where a Chinese opera singer performs every night whilst people enjoy their meat-on-a-stick. These skewers are lovely. But would never work in the UK. I can imagine the ...

So, beijing market day ....... First we caught a bus to the temple of heaven. The bus was so crowded that no one could move, but the bus driver kept letting people board the bus. Eventually I was too squashed, so we jumped off at the subway and caught the Metro. We found a market and bought some sweet bread, tomatoe, cucumber and some cold meats. We bought a junk of Beijing duck for dinner and then we did a quick journey on a tuk tuk to the ...

... gerealiseerd. Naast deze grote maquette zijn er ook nog aparte modellen o.a. van het CBD, de olympische stadia en het vernieuwde (en uitgebreide) vliegveld. Bovendien is er ook een groot schaalmodel van de Verboden Stad te vinden dat helemaal uit hout is opgetrokken en laat zien hoe gigantisch groot dit complex toch eigenlijk wel niet is. Ook was er nog een film te zien die liet zien hoe Beijing zich heeft ontwikkeld in het verleden en hoe het moet worden in de nabije toekomst ...

... great photos. I will give you all more tomorrow on this. The Chinese National Holiday is coming up this week, it starts on Friday and goes till the following Sunday. I will be traveling with the group to Pingyao, Taiyuan, and Datong. I hope to also hit up the coast with 4 buddies in a city called Qingtao. We are also talking about hitting up Vietnam in addition to all this. This coming week should be a ****ing ...