Beijing, Ancient (and current) Capital of China

I arrived in China early in the morning and, after a confusing exchange with our taxi driver, managed to get to the correct hotel. I can understand why English speakers are perceived as rude, because I did no research about the Chinese languages before arriving, resorting to pointing and uselessly repeating myself in English.

The guided tour I signed up for didn’t start until Saturday so I just did some shopping in the area and arbitrarily chose a restaurant for dinner that turned out to be delicious and inexpensive.

First Chinese meal. Very good, and very cheap!

We met our tour guide and group the next evening. Our guide, Howard, was a Chinese local in his 30’s (I think). He told us the plan for the next week then we all had dinner together.

Our hotel for the tour. It was a convenient location at least.

The giant bike/moped lane. Not that people really followed traffic rules.

Wandering around at night, we found a crazy food market. Which sells seahorse on a stick.

All kinds of meats, some of which I was way too grossed out to try (sheep testicles, anyone?).

We were told each city we would be visiting in China would have a different feel. So far, Beijing feels the most American because of the wide streets and the use of cars as a primary method of transportation. The unusual parts are the insane number of bicycles and mopeds in the designated lanes on the outside of the roads. All the mopeds are electric and completely silent, so a lot of honking happens. Coming from Japan the streets seem filthy, and the people are much more diverse in stature and dress than Japan or Korea. Prices are even cheaper than I imagined though, with food costing anywhere between $0.16 and $3.00 for fair sized portions. I like to eat a lot, so already this bodes well.