The hospital placement finished and we flew back to Beijing on Sunday to start our Tibet Adventure tour.

The last week of placement was in Traditional Chinese Medicine which was very interesting! They brought in a medical student with very good english from her lectures just to translate for us! We attended outpatient clinic, which was hilarious. The doctor would get all of 2 minutes with the patient before the next one would walk in demanding his turn...and if you dared lock the door there is ceaseless knocking and scratching until opened! TCM is based on the concept of yin/yang and its imbalance as the cause of disease. We visited the TCM museum and even saw the pharmacy where they mix herbs and roots such as rose petals, ginseng, seeds (as well lizards, snakes and scorpions) for medicine!

We spent the last 2 days were in a charity hospital called Operation Smile. This is a worldwide charity that does cleft lip and palate repairs on children. The China chapter is based in Hangzhou and we were lucky to get to spend a few days here observing various different operations on children aged 12 months and above. The doctors were doing a great job making a huge difference to the lives of these children.

Back in Beijing we headed souvenir shopping in the Pearl Market, where you can find anything you want! we got a few chopsticks and an ipod shuffle after some hard bargaining! We met up with the rest of the tour group in the evening and went for dinner together..there is a couple from Canada, and a Ugandan Chinese lady from UK (only 5 of us in total).

The 2nd day of the tour was spent at the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. It was a clear sky, with a cool breeze and autumn was coming so the scenery was fantastic. That evening we went to see a Kung Fu show, which was very good and well choreographed. It was the story of a kung fu master chun yi and how he achieved his kungfuness.

We went to the Palace Museum aka the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square on our last day in Beijing. Tiananmen Square together with all its various buildings is 44 hectares big and 1 million people can fit in its central square. The Gate of Heavenly Peace with Mao Zedong's portrait is where he declared the People's Republic of China in 1949. His mausoleum is in the south of square. The Chinese Parliament is also in the square and 10,000 delegates discuss state matters! The 1st of October is National day and China is celebrating 60 years, so the square was under tight security with army and plain clothes policemen, as they prepare to celebrate.

The Forbidden City was the place the Ming and Qing dynasty emperors used to stay and handle affairs since the 15th Century. It was built from 1406-1420 by 1 million labourers and is huge! (72 hectares). We passed through the outer court with its famous Hall of Supreme Harmony, and the inner court with the Emperor's living quarters. In one corner here is a room where the last emperor's nephew writes calligraphy for sale. Loads of Japanese tourists buy it as an investment hoping one day the royal family will be recognised again in China!

That evening we took a 48hr hard sleepr train to Lhasa, Tibet...