Summer-time in Beijing

I’m not totally sure that it is summer but it is close enough and the heat is proving it. Today it felt exceptionally warm and sticky but that could be because I’m from Colorado where there is no such thing as humidity.

The smog is also something to write home about. It seems like it is just a regular cloudy day but it never lifts and that is something that being from and living in Colorado my entire life shocks me and will likely continue to shock me every day. Unfortunately, it seems like the Chinese are not doing very much to counter the pollution issue. I am not a huge green living activist but anyone could see how terrible the air quality is.

There are also a lot of people that wear surgical masks around which I had seen before in TV shows or documentaries but I am realizing that it is not because of SARS or something of the like, it is simply because the air quality is so poor. In the picture of the Buddist temple at the Summer Palace you can see just how hazy it is . . . that is literally the clearest picture I have. When I post the photo album (the internet is being slow currently) I will post some that really show the amount of smog.

So despite the heat and smog we went to the Summer Palace and the Old Palace which were amazing sights to see. The Summer Palace felt like a movie set, there were fully intact ancient buildings and people sitting around playing flute. Of course there were 9,000 other people that were trying to see the same thing so that kind of deterred from the movie set feel but it was still amazing.

 The Old Palace was burnt down and destroyed in the early 1900s and the Chinese government has not decided whether they want to restore it or leave it as is, so for now it remains as is. The cool part about the Old Palace compared to the Summer Palace is you can actually walk amongst most  of the ruins and touch them. There was also a really fun maze, which is saying a lot coming from a person who hates mazes.

 After we walked around the palaces we went to a pizza place which was kind of odd to eat New York style pizza in China but it was really good. Once dinner was finished a small group of us took a stroll around the area, got some chocolate cake, purchased a nice winter jacket (for $35 I might add!), ate some more octopus, and got yelled at for eating said octopus in the lobby of the hotel.

 Overall, it was a pretty stellar evening/day and a good way to kick off what is sure to be two intense weeks of school. Oh yeah . . . we had class as well, I’m sure we will get to that somewhere along our narrative journey.

 Till next time faithful readers!