Back in the saddle

Alright for the last few days I've been promising myself that I'd sit down and blog again. Today's will be brief as I don't want to drown my new readers with an overload.\

Sunday I left Shenzhen, checking out of my very first apartment. Packing, re-packing and then packing again my backpack for the next 6 weeks and the luggage I am going to send home with my good friend Chris.

And then it was time to go. I hadn't been sleeping well all week I was worried about leaving a job a liked, wonderful co-workers and a pretty enjoyable life for the unknown. But as I my taxi pulled up to the airport after understanding my rudimentary hand gestures for airport (a few wooshing sound effects may have been added.) The fear that I was doing the wrong thing melted away as I got very excited to go catch up with one of my closest friends in Beijing.

The flight was totally uneventful and complete with the usual disposable friend conversations with my seatmate (How did the manage to put the 2 people who spoke English together?) I arrived to the hostel and Chris had headed out with some Austrians about 20 minutes before I arrived. I took myself out for a stroll exploring the little Hutons in the neighbourhood of the hotel.

Hutons are wonderful little alley like streets that are teeming with activity in Beijing. They are from some of the oldest parts of the city and they are clearly not designed for cars as they are too small and are generally populated with fragrant food vendors, old people walking with fresh produce from the market and bicycles. Many many bicycles.

Chris and I finally caught up after he found his way back to the hostel around 1230 and we drank until the wee small hours.

The next morning we were up for 10ish and set out on a day of epic walking. We walked through a park to the North of the Forbidden City, and around the walls of said city before deciding we were too hungry to do it then. So we went out in pursuit of lunch, the first meal I've ordered entirely in Chinese! However, when we got back on track to go see the palace we discovered it had closed already as had the Mao Muesum.

We did however salvage the day by getting to see the Bird's Nest and Watercube, both of which were fantastically interesting pieces of architecture and fun to see in person. Thoroughly walked out we turned in for the night.

The next morning we were up at half five for a trek on the Great Wall. The views from and of the Wall were unbelievable. Considering that the section we were on was over 500 years old it was a truly impressive feat! I will sort out posting some photos this weekend.

At some point Chris and I lost sight of the group we were with, thinking it was because we had fallen very far behind while taking pictures and chatting with various hawkers we started to press our pace a little up and down over countless steps and hills. This wasn't an easy task as we had selected this section of the wall to visit because it was particularly hilly. We pressed hard though constantly trying to catch up with groups in front of us. None of them were from our group and so we continued to step it up just a little each time. Finally we came to where we were due to meet our driver. He was waiting at the gate and chuckled impressed that we were finished already.

We were almost 30 minutes ahead of the next closest group! Apparently at some point they had gotten off the wall to avoid a particularly difficult section and we'd passed them by pressing through. With legs like jello we stumbled our way to the waiting tasty lunch.

After sleeping like babies on the bus coming back we didn't really have much in the tank for heading out that night and instead spent some time reading before falling asleep around 9.

The next morning were up with a purpose! No more missing sights we added a Kiwi girl to our merry band and set out for the Summer Palace. It was beautiful, if repeptitive. Red EVERYWHERE, however, the company was good and the 3 of spent the day cracking jokes and walking countless kilometers. We spent about 8 hours that day at the Summer Palace before heading back to our hostel for a few beers and the official card game of backpackers everywhere: Shithead.

On day four, our last in Beijing we had 2 goals clearly in mind: The Forbidden City and seeing the preserved body of Chairman Mao. We arrived early with this mission in mind, however about a 90 minute line up had already formed to see Mao. I passed on my dreams of seeing a thawing revolutionary/dictator and we moved on to the Imperial City.

Four thoughts on the Forbidden City. First, please ANY other colour but red! Second, it is too big to maintain interest throughout, the sparse displays are too poorly maintained to capture the imagination. Three, the scale of this splendor has to be seen to be believed it is enermous. Four, if there is ever a zombie apocalypse this is the place to be! Giant doors abound!

Alright, next post I'll catch you up on my thoughts on the election and today's trip to the terracotta warriors in Xian and night train misery!