Beijing

I arrived in Beijing on 19 Jan, I was due to spend a few days in there before moving on to Dalian. My first few hours in Beijing were inauspicious, to say the least. On leaving the plane I was politely informed that my luggage was delayed, until tomorrow.

The lost baggage office at Beijing Airport causes an interesting clash of cultures. The newly arrived 'westerners' instinctively form a queue, observing a respectful distance to the person in front. While the Chinese shove their way in from any angle. The rule with Chinese queuing seems to be: "This big nosed westerner is leaving a gap in front of him, so he won't mind me squeezing into his personal space in front of him". Of course, big nosed westerners are too polite to say anything, until it happens a few times and then you know not to leave a gap big enough to slide a cigarette paper through.

Having advised the lost baggage office of my hotel and cleared immigration, I jumped into a taxi. I had to remind the taxi driver to switch on the meter, which he did. When I got to the hotel, the driver asked for 350yuan (10yuan~1euro). This seemed a bit steep for China, but that was displayed on the meter so I couldn't argue. It turns out that the real fare should have been less that 100yuan and that this taxi had a 'modified' meter. Ripped off on my first cash transaction, I was not happy.

I checked in (this process took about an hour), rested and then went out to get my bearings. It was COLD; -15°C, but with the wind chill, it felt more like -20°C. Beijing was the middle of a cold snap. I was wearing a jacket, but it wasn't up to these extremes. The Siberian wind was attacking any exposed flesh. It wasn't pleasant. All my stuff was still en-route from Europe so I couldn't add more layers.The silk market in Beijing is famous for the fake watches and designer clothing, but they also have western style outdoor gear. So I headed there, and saw a "North-Face" climbing jacket. Just the thing to keep out the wind. The vendor was asking 2900¥ (300€), for this "Genuine?" item. I haggled her down to just 300¥ (30€) and bought the Jacket. I was satisfied that I had a good deal, until the man at the next stall offered me a second jacket for 150¥ !!!

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The lakes in Beijing Freeze in Winter

The cold snap in Beijing only lasted a couple of days. The wind died down and the temperatures went up to about -5oC. Once wrapped up, it was pleasant enough.

All of the lakes in Beijing are frozen at this time of the year. People use the frozen lakes as a short-cuts, for skating and, most popular of all, were small iron chairs with blades welded to the legs and pushed along by rudimentary ski poles!!

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A lot of people were ice fishing also, and catching quite a few decent sized fish. I walked across the lake and took a few photos, the ice was about 8inches thick and because its so cold the ice is very dry and not very slippery.

In Beijing, there is a large tower with big ceremonial drums called, surprise-surprise, the Drum Tower. The most interesting thing there was the flock of white dove which constantly circled the tower. Apparently someone had caught a few of the doves and glued some form of whistle to their backs. Now the flock gives off a strange UFO-like 'Wooooohh' sound as they fly around. Very spooky when you hear it first!!