Beijing, July 4, 1999

Today I arrived in Beijing. I managed to get a taxi from the airport, find a hotel, etc. Then I spent the whole day walking. Initially for what might have even been an hour, I walked in the wrong direction because people in the hotel didn't locate the hotel on the map properly. Then I asked some people to show me on the map where I was and eventually I knew where I was. I was really surprised that people had a lot of trouble deciding where we were on the map. I wonder why. I ended up passing by the Forbidden City (didn't go inside yet) and walked around Tiananmen square. I also got my ticket to Chengdu.

I do not feel as strange walking on the streets as I thought I might. The fact that everyone around is Chinese does not seem to matter too much because they smile, they hurry, they frown, etc like everybody else in the world. Maybe not quite. What I wanted to say is that to me they look like a very typical urban population and on certain level I do not see big differences between the people of Beijing and the people of other large cities I have been to.

But I have to say that I am quite surprised by the size of Beijing. A block here is often half a kilometer long. I couldn't find the scale on my map and I was very surprised when I saw how much time I needed to get from one place to another.

At one point a child, a little girl, grabbed my pants and started screaming something at me. Clearly she was asking for money. I gave her the only coin I had in my pocket. When she saw what I gave her she got furious ¨C it must have been worth very little ¨C but this let me free myself from her. I didn't mean to give her that little: I just did not know how much it was worth. A few men watched the scene. They looked like they had fun. One of them laughed when he saw me dodge the girl after I gave her the coin.

I also ate. You can laugh but I thought it was quite an achievement. Not only did I not know the language but I also didn't have the slightest clue as to what kind of food people usually eat here. I entered a simple but clean place. It reminded me of Polish milk bars or some clean and nice American diner. Inside I requested some soup by pointing at an appropriate phrase in my little book. The ladies made me understand that they did not have any but would I be so kind as to choose something from the menu. I thought they had figured out by then that I couldn't read ChineseĄ­ Anyway, they had some of their dishes on the counter and I just chose one. Afterwards I got some baked item from a small bakery. The first thing was some kind of a small pie with scallions and other stuff inside. The other thing was a steam bun with some black bean paste inside. Oh, I forgot to mention that I also bought a plug, yet a plug, so that I could recharge my laptop. People in the shop found it infinitely funny that a white guy wanted to buy a plug. They kept laughing at me. And the worst thing is that it turned out that the plug does not fit! It is the right shape but it is just a tiny bit larger than the sockets in the wallsĄ­ Do they have two sizes of the same kind of plug? That would be rather unusual. What's really embarrassing about it is the fact that it turned out that the plug that I cut off from the connecting cable to make place for the new one, would have fit in one of the sockets! And now I cannot even put it back on. Oh well, tomorrow I will buy yet another plug amusing even more people.

Oh, I have just remembered that I have a phone number of Xiang Xian's friend here! I will go and call him now. Perhaps we can have a lunch tomorrowĄ­

22:30

Conversation with Bikui (this friend of Xiang Xian) and an hour spent in a brightly lit bar made me feel much better. I think my biggest problem with most hotel rooms it the lack of bright light and space. Most of rooms I've stayed in, including the one I am currently in, only have lights on the walls but do not have a bright ceiling light.

Bikui is going to come to my hotel tomorrow morning and has offered to help me plan my next two days. I hope we will end up going out for a meal.

01:15

And I thought that US had an obsession with "ice cold" drinks. Chinese beat them when it comes to selling water. It's not only ice cold, it actually is ice. Water can be bought from numerous street vendors. They either have a little stand or they cruise along the pavements carrying everything with them. When I first saw those stands, I thought that the water I would get would be at best warmish. Instead it was really really cold. The next bottle I bought was half frozen. Not bad. Especially that Beijing in the middle of the day is really hot. But still bearable. I guess Boston is worse because it's even more humid. Or, perhaps, I arrive in Beijing on a good day. I will see tomorrow.

I have problem falling asleep. Not good because Bikui will come at 8:30 tomorrow and I ordered a wake up call for 7:00. Less than 6 hours left. But I finally managed to make the air conditioning work so perhaps I will manage to fall asleep soon.