Wuk in China

Hello from Beijing,

 I only have a minute or two to say hello so I really will be brief. Everything is going well here -  We flew to Beijing with Sichuan Air early on Monday morning and then after a short rest we went to Tiananmen Square (where I took a lot of photos and filmed a short movie or two) and we watched the large PRC flag being taken down at the end of the night (it is raised every morning and brought down every night). That night I had a burger and Haixiao had a steak (it was the best western food I have had the whole trip - some of the ‘western’ restaurants REALLY don’t know what they are doing… including the imported restaurant chains).

The next morning we went on a bus-tour to visit the Badaling section of the Great Wall. On the way the tour took us to a jade carving factory and also to a ‘traiditional chinese medicine research centre’ - which was really just a scam to try and get money out of tourists even if it was genuine to some extent. The Great Wall was quite amazing and today my legs are still very sore from all the climbing up and down. There was also a very enjoyable cable-car ride which I took a cool movie from. (When I say cable-car I mean roller-coaster in slow motion, not a gondola like I was expecting)

On our tour was two other Australians, two ethnic russians now living in texas and a spaniard. We started to get to know each other and I decided it would be nice if we all went to dinner together. We had a sichuan hotpot (it was nowhere near as good as the hotpots they have in Sichuan but actually it was a perfect introduction for them because it was not as spicy as the ones I had in Chengdu) and then we went out to a couple of different nightclubs, the  night was quite enjoyable on the whole.

Unfortunately we were out until almost 4am and today we slept in so late and got delayed and messed around while we were trying to organise our remaining flights (here to Shanghai tomorrow morning, and from Shanghai to Chengdu on saturday afternoon) that we arrived at the forbidden city too late.and instead I just bought some tourist memorabilia from the hawkers out the front. (Having a native chinese speaker with me is fantastic :) - most tourists must spend around 2x - 5x more than they need to when they purchase things like postcards and t-shirts etc)

Anyway I have to run - tonight we are having roast peking duck with the two aussies again and as usual we are going to be late.

Take care all - I may or may not get around to posting from Shanghai so if not then I’ll see ya when I’m looking at ya and I’ll properly organise and post some new pictures on the site when I’m back home in wintry Adelaide.

 Cheers,

 Will