tiananmen square and the forbidden city

we explored tiananmen square on wednesday -- the centre of beijing and the centre of china.

also did the forbidden city on wednesday -- and took some fun photos of brett and me getting stuck in a doorway. the crowds are sneaking a peak of the emperor's throne room.

duff at the national chinese theatre

here is duff (as promised) at the national chinese theatre building, just north-east of tianenmen square.

the smog

our first views of beijing were smog, smog, traffic and more smog. the first shot is from the train coming from the airport. the second shot is the forbidden city yesterday.

day 3 - kung fu and big sleep in

wow - a good long sleep is always a welcome thing on a fun-packed holiday in a foreign place!

last night we saw an amazingly elecrifying and energetic show called the legend of kung fu. amazing choreography and sound track. very professionally done and we had a great time. after the show we walked through the rain, jumped on a local bus, caught the subway back to the hotel then went in search of a massage place for jane. didn't find any. instead we found a local public gym in the street and we did a little workout there at 11pm. moira, one of the girls on our tour group, came with us.

some impressions of china:

• a land of contrasts -- dirty and messy in some parts (eg, some back streets), ordered and clean in others (eg, subway)
• strictness and casualness mixed together

i'm trying to learn a little bit more chinese -- but often it's so much easier to just let jane do the talking since she has some language.

today's our last day in beijing. planning to vistit the "beijing normal university" and the "temple of heaven". plus catch up with some friends and encourage them. tomorrow we're off to the great wall -- a big 2 days with some hiking. that will be the first long stretch of time we have with our group, so some storming and norming of group dynamics are in the works.

"where is duff?" i hear you ask. (duff is the greek textbook we've taken along so jane can study for her greek exam right after we get back). well, he's been with us -- yesterday he was photographed at the beijing national theatre (aka "alien mother-ship landing on water") and he was also seen in a hutong. watch this space for some pics (when i can manage to get them off the camera).

something else interesting... we can't actually see our blog from here because that website is blocked by the great firewall of china. :)

roaming in Beijing...

we're on route to the supermarket, but got waylaid in the library with free internet.

 

nice one. and newspapers all in chinese, some about english teaching. but they were in chinese too.

 

the other day we went to the forbidden city and saw a lady looking after her toddler... the toddler wanted to do a number 2, so the mum put a map on the group for said toddler to do it on. quite pragmatic really!

 

haven't had breakfast yet... yesterday we had sweet soy milk (hot) with long donut like things. we wonder how healthy they are.

 

 

day 2 - walking in beijing

had a very late night with some encouraging friends sharing stories and some jiaozi. off on a walk of the city now -- first significant event with our group. duff is with us. he wants to appear on some photos.:)

day 1 - beijing with brett

brett (an old friend of jane's) met us at our hotel this morning and we set off to find some lunch. got some great noodles in a dirty old street (hutong) near tiananmen square. then took in the vastness of the square and its historical significance before heading on to the forbidden city. that's pretty vast too and steeped in history. day 1 had some interesting toilet experiences ... perhaps more of that another time.

tour group

tonight we met our tour group -- they're all from the UK, except for our leader "michael" who's chinese. over the next 3 weeks we'll travel together, eat together and talk together.

landed in beijing

after wandering around KL airport for a few hours we managed to get some sleep on the KL-beijing flight, arriving here at 6:30am to a smoggy, humid morning. the train was clean and fast getting into the city... interesting to see the traffic and movement starting up for the day. just checking in to our hotel (jane's sorting out something with the reception girls while i blog). ok. gotta go.

ready to fly

yummy! just had some panninis in the internation terminal at melbourne airport and our plane is boarding. oops... another call for our flight!? yikes! we'd better get going...

one more sleep

only one more sleep before our adventure. we've been busy getting tips from anna and glen tonight about what to see in shanghai and beijing. anna tells us that this particular type of steamed dumpling is all the rage in shanghai, but glen warned us about not squirting the hot soup into the person next to you -- the hot soup that's actually inside the dumpling!

jane's not feeling 100% -- so we're hoping she improves by tomorrow. a good sleep is in order...

anticipating cultural challenges

i've heard that spitting is commonplace in china.

i'm hoping to learn--and practise--this ancient art, and gain some cultural insights and perhaps credibility.

but it may prove a little costly...