I arrived in Beijing last night. My hostal (Downtown Backpackers) arranged for me to be picked up at the airport so I was whisked into Beijing. The hostal itself is quite nice. Its located in a cute hutong (back alley street) about 2 miles north of the forbidden city, and close to the bell and drum towers. The street its on is filled with resturants and cafes, so its a great spot.
I went exploring by foot today, and am now exausted, having walked for about 8 hours. After quickly walking past the bell and drum towers (don't ask me which is which), on my way to Tianamen square, I wondered into Jingshan park. Now this park is lovely and huge, with an artificial hill in its center. People were singing, and dancing, and doing tai chi, and playing a hacksack varient (except with a badmitton birdy), playing badmitten, excercising, or just walking about. I saw many different groups making music or dancing. I probably saw a few thousand people in that park. And the strangest thing was... I was probably the youngest person in the park. Its funny, when I was in Greece last year, the youth and the oldery folks liked the same activities, but its certainly not the case here.
Finally I made it to the forbidden city and got waylayed by someone to "look at an art exhibit", and after about an hour of seeing stuff and negotiating, I eventually bought something and sent it home. At this point I was hungry, so ended up walking 1 mile or so to finally find food. But lunch was great (for $1.50 I got this large plate of tofu with bamboo, garlic, ginger, veggies in a tasty mild chili sauce), and I got a great haircut for $1.50, then I finally toured the forbidden city, which was disappointing to me. It was really realy big. And I did learn a lot about empresses killing concubines who got pregnant and so on...
In sad news, my grandfather just died. I am glad I saw him 2 weeks ago. I think he would have liked the $1.50 haircut. I can't quite see him eating tofu for lunch.
Anyway, goodbye grandpapa (and goodbye WAMU) I will miss you...
