Beihai and the Bird's Nest

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I have good news and bad news. The good news is that Ralph's laptop is now fixed. Hooray for the internet!

The bad news is that I may have difficulty getting a Russian visa. Apparently new rules mean that you can only get a Russian visa in a country of which you are a resident. So, not China. However there is a ray of hope. They consider residency to be 'over 90 days' and since on entry to Japan British citizens get a 90 day stamp, we're hoping to get our visas while there for 4 days next month... Yeah. So I would definitely appreciate prayers that that all works out! If it doesn't then my other option is to post my passport back to a company in the UK and get them to do it and send my passpart back to me... Which I would really rather not do, for obvious reasons! Of course the other option is to either fly home from Mongolia, or fly to the next country we were planning to go to and just miss out Russia!

Anyways, back to Beijing. Last week (I think, I'm losing track of time!) we went to Beihai Park which is an island shaped like a flag in a lake. On it is a temple which, like the Lama temple, goes back in stages, but this time up a hill. The park and temple were really beautiful (and we managed to go on a failry cool day, which was nice) but my favourite bit was the view from the top. Look one way and you see massive skyscrapers, look the other and poking out of the trees you see the rooftops of the buildings in the Forbidden City. I felt like by turning my head I had turned back in time hundreds of years. It was amazing. Sadly Beijing really does have as much smog as they say, so the photo didn't come out amazingly, but I'm hoping when I get home I can edit it and it'll look better.

What else have I been doing? Church again. Went out to a bar with Ralph and Josh. Went to a BBQ at a hutong, which is the name for a traditional set of houses joined together round a courtyard which share a bathroom and kitchen. Randomly there were 2 Chinese girls and an American guy and girl who all spoke Spanish, so we all had a good chat in Spanish. Ralph and I had previously been talking Spanish to each other whenever we wanted to say something that no one else could understand, so suddenly we were like, "oh yeah, other people than us can speak Spanish... Perhaps we should be a little more careful?" haha There was also an English girl there who works for an Italian entertainment company here in Beijing organising Italian singers to do tours and gigs in China. Sadly I did not get the chance to be like, "HOW DO I GET YOUR JOB?!?"

Today we were going to go to the Summer Palace but we didn't quite get up in time to go there and see it before Ralph had to be at work just after lunch. So instead we went to see Olympic Park. That was a surreal experience. The buildings themselves are so impressive, but the area is just dead. None of them are used any more, and you can't go inside them. There are these massive subway stations and motorway leading to it that are just deserted. There's even a massive pile of dirt where they just never finished building! It made me really hope that whatever we do for the 2012 Olympics lasts a bit longer and is a bit more than just for show.

Sadly that's pretty much all I've been up to. I'm really kinda bored. I've read 4.5 books on my kindle so far. At this rate I'm going to have to download some more before we even get our first train! Still to tick off on my list of things to do in Beijing; Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven, Great Wall. That's it. And I still have over 2 weeks left here. Take my advice, do not come to Beijing for longer than a week. There is not enough to do here! Okay there's probably other stuff I don't know about, but still. Anyway I can't complain, if I hadn't come out the early I wouldn't get to go to Japan which, as you may have guessed, I'm rather excited about!

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Photos

The Forbidden City
You can just about see the tops of the buildings.

Beihai - The Top
Shame about the guys leaning over the edge ruining my photo...

Tourist
If any proof were needed I'm a natural blonde, check out those roots! Yikes.

Comments

[Hamish]

Russian visa
Yeah, Alex and Martyn had exactly they same problem and beat a retreat back to France while they let the company in London take care of it.

[Hols]

=D
Hi lovely, You look like you're having an awesome time. I got your postcard yesterday!! It's stuck up on my wall. I've never had mail from China before. I've been telling my kids all about your adventures in Tiannamen Square cos they're doing a bit of Chinese history. Keep enjoying yourself and eating crazy food! Stay safe, lots of love. xxx