I'm currently on a 1-week work trip to Beijing. I'm just wrapping up my first 24 hours here.
The flight itself is uneventful. It's an approximately 12 hour direct from Seattle, roughly following the Pacific coastline through Alaska, then passing into Russia and flying the last 6 hours over Siberia and China. Funny thing is, the Delta flight tracker on our entertainment systems stopped working right around the time we hit Russian airspace. Coincidence, or something more? Who knows.
As we were landing, we were told that anyone experiencing flu-like symptoms, vomiting, fever, etc, or anyone who has recently been to West Africa needs to notify the flight staff and fill out a card. They must then present that card to the quarantine officer, who may decide to detain them. I wonder how many people comply ...
Beijing is physically giant. It's made of a giant core and an even more giant suburb. After all, 20 million people have to fit somewhere. Unlike Mexico City, it has a fair number of tall buildings and probably higher density.
Beijing is externally famous for two things: scary driving and smog. After getting through customs and immigration, I bought some yuan and hailed a cab. One of my colleagues had warned me not to take up any free-lancing cabbies on their offers, so I instead stood in the longest cab line I've ever been. Vegas can compete. However, no one really tries to cut in line in Vegas, then argues with a cop who tells him to get to the back of the line. Also unlike Vegas, I found communication with my cabbie impossible. The same colleague had also told me to just show them written text of where I want to go, but that wasn't working. The cabbie just looked confused and angsty. I was about to ask if I should get out of the car (which made him even more anxious, probably because he'd have to circle around for a new fare) when one of the line attendants came to our aid. I kept pointing at my hotel name; turns out they needed a phone number to call. Once that happened, all was well. And unlike Mexico City, the drivers were relatively normal. Aggressive, but normal.
We got to the hotel without incident. I checked in and went up to my room and admired the view. I look down the 3rd ring road as it passes between some large, lit-up buildings. Smog shmog. Good night.
My view was considerably different in the morning. I woke to a PM2.5 rating of 198, which is nearly ten times the levels in Seattle, 4 times New York and double LA (though to be fair, these values change a lot daily, so these factors may vary). I could barely see skyscrapers a half a mile away. There was also a slight sensation in my throat for a good part of the day. A local coworker later exclaimed "Oh, it's a pretty clear day today!"
I took the subway to work. I can't tell a Chinese character from another one to save my life (or find my direction). I prepped by cross-checking subway maps I'd printed out. 13 stops. The one with the name made of 3 characters, immediately after the one with 4. The rest before those are 5. These are my path markers. In reality the subway had been overhauled for the 2008 Olympics so not only were the names also present in Pinying (like how we type, for example "SuZhouJie" or "LiangMaQiao"), but there was even good English on everything. Despite the warnings, it wasn't horribly crowded. Standing room only, for sure, but no sliding in each others' sweat while a 4'10" woman squeezes between everyone, selling stuff for 5 pesos. Just like in Mexico, I (or my immediate party) was the only non-local in the transit system.
I was well aware that a lot of people might not speak English. I was not, however, prepared for how isolating it is to not even be able to attach a sound to a written character. It's how I imagine telling a 4 year old to read a map and find their way would play out.
The internet is another funny. It seems like they mostly dislike Google (and Youtube), Twitter, and Facebook. My hotel has CNN and BBC news (so western propaganda or whatever seems not to be an issue in that sense) and both their sites load (however, most CNN stories don't load). Microsoft services all work, but only in china-specific form. The only way I can check my gmail account from the hotel is to VPN to my corp network, remote into a machine physically sitting in Redmond, and run my browser there. Same with Facebook. However, both at least kinda worked at the airport. Maybe the Great Firewall has a few holes in it?
My hotel is very nice. The nightly rates are not outrageous (~150). However, the dinner options at the hotel are crazy. There's restaurant that serves the most expensive steak I think I've ever seen. $130 for a ribeye and $105 for a sirloin. They do have attached marbling ratings and probably the life story short movie of the cow, but ... wow.
Other tidbits: a lot of people smoke, but it seems predominantly to be the men. Women wear very little makeup or jewelry (at least on the #10 subway line) and very few high heels. And, I got a nosebleed after dinner.
The flight itself is uneventful. It's an approximately 12 hour direct from Seattle, roughly following the Pacific coastline through Alaska, then passing into Russia and flying the last 6 hours over Siberia and China. Funny thing is, the Delta flight tracker on our entertainment systems stopped working right around the time we hit Russian airspace. Coincidence, or something more? Who knows.
As we were landing, we were told that anyone experiencing flu-like symptoms, vomiting, fever, etc, or anyone who has recently been to West Africa needs to notify the flight staff and fill out a card. They must then present that card to the quarantine officer, who may decide to detain them. I wonder how many people comply ...
Beijing is physically giant. It's made of a giant core and an even more giant suburb. After all, 20 million people have to fit somewhere. Unlike Mexico City, it has a fair number of tall buildings and probably higher density.
Beijing is externally famous for two things: scary driving and smog. After getting through customs and immigration, I bought some yuan and hailed a cab. One of my colleagues had warned me not to take up any free-lancing cabbies on their offers, so I instead stood in the longest cab line I've ever been. Vegas can compete. However, no one really tries to cut in line in Vegas, then argues with a cop who tells him to get to the back of the line. Also unlike Vegas, I found communication with my cabbie impossible. The same colleague had also told me to just show them written text of where I want to go, but that wasn't working. The cabbie just looked confused and angsty. I was about to ask if I should get out of the car (which made him even more anxious, probably because he'd have to circle around for a new fare) when one of the line attendants came to our aid. I kept pointing at my hotel name; turns out they needed a phone number to call. Once that happened, all was well. And unlike Mexico City, the drivers were relatively normal. Aggressive, but normal.
We got to the hotel without incident. I checked in and went up to my room and admired the view. I look down the 3rd ring road as it passes between some large, lit-up buildings. Smog shmog. Good night.
My view was considerably different in the morning. I woke to a PM2.5 rating of 198, which is nearly ten times the levels in Seattle, 4 times New York and double LA (though to be fair, these values change a lot daily, so these factors may vary). I could barely see skyscrapers a half a mile away. There was also a slight sensation in my throat for a good part of the day. A local coworker later exclaimed "Oh, it's a pretty clear day today!"
I took the subway to work. I can't tell a Chinese character from another one to save my life (or find my direction). I prepped by cross-checking subway maps I'd printed out. 13 stops. The one with the name made of 3 characters, immediately after the one with 4. The rest before those are 5. These are my path markers. In reality the subway had been overhauled for the 2008 Olympics so not only were the names also present in Pinying (like how we type, for example "SuZhouJie" or "LiangMaQiao"), but there was even good English on everything. Despite the warnings, it wasn't horribly crowded. Standing room only, for sure, but no sliding in each others' sweat while a 4'10" woman squeezes between everyone, selling stuff for 5 pesos. Just like in Mexico, I (or my immediate party) was the only non-local in the transit system.
I was well aware that a lot of people might not speak English. I was not, however, prepared for how isolating it is to not even be able to attach a sound to a written character. It's how I imagine telling a 4 year old to read a map and find their way would play out.
The internet is another funny. It seems like they mostly dislike Google (and Youtube), Twitter, and Facebook. My hotel has CNN and BBC news (so western propaganda or whatever seems not to be an issue in that sense) and both their sites load (however, most CNN stories don't load). Microsoft services all work, but only in china-specific form. The only way I can check my gmail account from the hotel is to VPN to my corp network, remote into a machine physically sitting in Redmond, and run my browser there. Same with Facebook. However, both at least kinda worked at the airport. Maybe the Great Firewall has a few holes in it?
My hotel is very nice. The nightly rates are not outrageous (~150). However, the dinner options at the hotel are crazy. There's restaurant that serves the most expensive steak I think I've ever seen. $130 for a ribeye and $105 for a sirloin. They do have attached marbling ratings and probably the life story short movie of the cow, but ... wow.
Other tidbits: a lot of people smoke, but it seems predominantly to be the men. Women wear very little makeup or jewelry (at least on the #10 subway line) and very few high heels. And, I got a nosebleed after dinner.
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