Greetings from Beijing :) This place is an extra-sensorial extravaganza for a little Perth boy like me. I passed through customs without any pain and was greeted by my transfer driver Harry (yes he is Chinese). After not having any sleep all night, my adrenalin kicked in when we hit the Beijing streets. From driving on the right side of the road to weaving indiscriminantly between bicycles, pedestrians and a zillion other cars, buses and trucks, and the constant tooting of horns, I'm amazed there aren't more accidents. Harry dropped me off at the 5-star Beijing Hotel, which was nice, but it was the wrong hotel. I don't know why they didn't let me stay. Maybe it was my uggies and tracky dacks that couldn't compete with all the business suits, so I got a taxi to the right hotel, which has a few less stars but is comfortable enough.
After a shower and a change into warmer clothes I walked the streets in search of food, which wasn't hard as there's street vendors everywhere selling all manner of odd looking things. Feeling totally out of place as no one speaks English, I bought some squid-looking things on a stick, and downed some nice jasmine tea from some pretty girls in green silk. I had arranged for Harry to show me around the next day, and as the fatigue finally caught up with me, I crashed early in front of some Chinese television which I didn't understand but was nice to look at :)
