philllee
24th Apr 2006Beijing dodgy!!!!! Hello all, hope you are all well. As you can gather from the title, Beijing is dodgy. I am going to impart the reason for this but would first like to highlight to my Mother that it may upset her, well it will, so stiff upper lip on this one Mrs Threlfall. We went out for a meal in a nice hostel down our dodgy and dimly lit street, this was a very pleasurable time in our trip. However, on the way back a sight was seen which has brought home the fact we are in China. Upon embarking on the return journey to the hostel we saw three "gentlemen" attacking some non-descriped item with a blow torch. Upon closer inspection, the said item was a dog, yes dear readers a dog. The dog was floppy so i suspect had only just met it grizzly end. I just hope that it did not meet it by way of these "Gents" burning it. This was happening on the street, in full view of others who seemed not to care, or find it at all peculiar. It certainly would be good if this was never seen by either of us again. Enough of torturing dogs though, onto the touristy bit. Original plan for today was to visit the great wall but neither of us got up in time so that has been postponed until tomorrow. Instead we trekked off to the forbidden city with Warren (dude we met at the hostel). Cool place but most of it is either covered in scafolding or freshly painted which is being done for the Olympics. They're also demolishing about half of the city around our hostel on the way there for the Olympics as well which seems a little odd. Didn't see all of the forbidden city as it all gets a bit samey after a while. Also a well hot day today so not the ideal time to be trapsing around. I (Phill) did get very excited when I discovered a Starbucks Coffee in the middle of the Forbidden City. Quite suprised to find that testament to capitalism in the heart of Communist China but it was most enjoyable. After that we headed off to the park but was told by the guy there that it was closed and it would never be open (ever). Get the feeling there was a bit of language problem. So we headed back to the hostel for some food, got a nice pizza (pisa) for 2 yuan (15p) but they were clearing the drains in the hostel so the lingering odour was most unpleasant. Due to that it was straight back out to try and go to a market. However, we forgot it was the middle of rush hour so buses were packed. Instead we headed off to a nicer part of Beijing in search of a different market. Lots of nice Western shops (burberry, rolls royce, audi, etc.) but too expensive for our tastes. Ate some very average food in Mr Lee's (kfc looking rip off) then back to the hostel for the evening which is where we are now. Overall not really the most succesfull of days but we have seen a lot more of Beijing. Feet are hurting so hopefully they'll be mended for the Great Wall tomorrow. Au revoir. PS pictures will be updated when we have a few more of the wall and stuff
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