China

It is now my 5th day in China with Sabrina. We just arrived this morning in Xi'an, our second destination. Beijing was hugelly massively impressive. It's just enormous. There are dozens of cranes in the city, as new sky scrapers are poping out every day. I am really amazed by the pace at which Beijing is going on. VW Passat is the must car, and indeed there are thousands of them on the jammed streets of the capital. Audi and Mercedes are also incredibely numerous. This city smells money being massively transfered between busy hands... But some do not manage to follow. Some rickshaw guys still wander around, but they seem lost in the middle of the 10+ lanes avenues, packed with thousands of cars and city buses...
Yesterday we took the bus to the Summer Palace, a couple of kilometers away from the central Forbidden City. The ride was at least 2 hours long, due to the incredible 24h traffic jams that characterize Beijing. The high rise appartment building are everywhere; for kilometers and kilometers they can be seen, as long as the smaug allow the sight. Beijing is huge.
Yet I already love China. People are great, and very helpfull. The first night I wasn't able to order food, for the language barrier is really a problem. But I'm already getting better. I even asked for soy sauce the other day to put in my rice. Also there is so many Chinese tourists that foreign ones aren't perceived as rats invading the country, as I felt in Latin America. I'm looking forward to be able to discuss in Chinese so I can talk with the people... Maybe get to visit some people living in one of the few Hutong left in Beijing (the traditional districts with houses with courtiards)... I think the comming 3 months are gonna be great.


3 km from downtown Xi'an...

The nice view from the plane, over Beijing.

Forbidden City...

And the view from the summer palace.