Being in Beijing

This was my first trip to the capital of "economic miracle". And true to all its hype it was indeed a eye popping event. I had with me a Britan national who had visited this same place in early 70. He was awe stuck as i was at the development of Beijing. The building touching the azure sky dotted every part of Beijing and the architecture of this buildings were as bold as the ones in Dubai.





The visa procedure was quite simple with a very dynamic passport control queue. Here is another place in the world other than India where i felt the vibrancy of all the people around. The previous experience in other cities like Geneva and Paris was that of huge building partaking in historical significance to the dwindling admirers of those beauty. The rates were reasonable, but i saved a lot using public transport. I used the airport shuttle to my hotel Park Plaza, Wuhufujing got dropped at some point and took the waiting cab to hotel for just 26RMB comapared to 100 RMB for taxi.



There is an efficient metro system which can take you to the venerable Tienanmen square and the places around it. The forbidden city beyond the Tienanmen square was reminiscent of the extravagant lifestyle of the old kings as well the overarching fear of a ruler. The palace are made of wood with some good paining though like in Indian palaces variety was missing with either the lion or the dragon adorning all the places.



The newer creation of Olympic stadiums, the bird nest and water cube was as majestic. But the latter is better viewed in television. I went to the great wall of china yet another symbol of the fear which right now in time looks like a colossal waste of money. There was a cable car to take you up and a slide to take you down. (Though there is cable car to take you down i recommend you to take the slide).

Food: The beijing duck is the famous delicacy which at least for a "preferably vegeterian" was edible. I recommend you to try this at Beijing DaDong Roast duck restaurant. They have two outlets but go the newer one as it has a nice ambience and a real good service. But you cannot take this daily if you are in my category so pack some "ready to eat" food from India.

Shop: Silk market and Pearl market. Be prepared to get 60-90% discount on listed price. So bargain hard which comes naturally for Indians. I could not go to this market so did some side shopping but even in India we never get so much discount on list price, so i always felt sad even after a good bargain.

Few thing that needs improvement in Beijing is:

• Without knowing chinese it is difficult to move around in Beijing. take the help of hotel coneigre to write everything in Chinese.
• When we were going to great wall (there are two sections near to Beijing, but the one which has a cable car) we saw the buildings facing the road were plastered and painted to cover the not so good house behind it. May be like in India, there is no point in covering up truth.

Newspaper: I also got a chance to read some english chinese daily. What really caught my fancy was an editorial on "Slumdog Millionaire", which when i arrived was awarded multiple oscar. The editorial was again pointing to the oscar's penchant for awarding oscar to movie's like slumdog from India and croaching tiger from China which is very superficial way of depiciting the Indian and chinese culture. But what i liked about the editorial is its positive tone and on a concept which we were taught in our childhood days "It is always nice to have people around you who will find fault with you, rather than prostrating individuals, as it provide a rare opportunity for you to know and hence improve your deficiencies".