Day #84: Arrival in Beijing

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Beijing was enveloped in a smog when I arrived - visibility was less than 100m. This has the effect of making it hard to get a sense of the city's size, so it doesn't really feel as big as it is, and also making it hard to navigate, since you can't see any landmarks. Still, after a month in Mongolia, the city made my head spin. At least the Subway is easy - everything in English, air-conditioning (sometimes makes me want to travel by the Subway, just to cool off) and no busier than the Tube, even in rush-hour. They were even playing a Wallace and Gromit cartoon on the platform screens at one stop (as well as lots of footage of David Beckham's current trip to China). While I was on the train from the airport a Chinese couple asked if they could take a photo with me. I can't believe Westerners are still a novelty in Beijing, so I guess they were Chinese tourists travelling from another part of the country.

I am staying in a hutong, so was immediately plunged into a chaotic and authentic-feeling Beijing, all street food, red lanterns and markets, but I then walked to the Dong Hua Men night market, nearer the tourist centre, which is a terrible tourist trap: the place to go to eat weird food that the Chinese don't actually eat themselves, like silk worm and starfish kebabs, and skewered whole quail, and Westerners are charged about three times what the Chinese tourists pay (which is not usual practice across Beijing). Still it was a lively place, and I saw the street exercise classes, mostly older people doing Tai Chi or another popular exercise routine involving balancing a ball on a scooped racquet while performing various movements. It must be a set routine, because the more committed members of the class knew the moves off by heart.

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