Ní hăo!

I can' believe I am in China!! In Beijing to be exact.

After spending the night at the hostel, Mike picked us up, and laid out the plans for the day. The majority of the group cycled to our first meeting, but 4 of us used the subway. This was actually a really clean and effiecient method of transport.

Our first stop was to visit a previous volunteer called Patrick who volunteered in China in 89/90 ( so 25 years ago!!). He told us loads about China and gave us a 'health warning' about keeping ourselves safe etc.

We then were given 5 hours to do what we pleased in Beijing as long as we were at the CEAIE (China Education Association for International Exchange) by 4pm. Again, myself and the 3 other vols hopped on the Subway and popped back out at Tiananmen Square. This was a bit of a surreal experience - the 4 of us were stopped every couple of minutes by Chinese people who wanted to take their photos with us (see pic), or who pushed their kids towards us and asked us to stand with them as they took photos. We appeared to be the only white people in the square. Then about 12 more of the vols turned up. I thought that as I larger group people wouldn't approach us, but even more did approach, and at one stage we were completely surrounded by people taking our photos. It was slightly overwhelming.

After this we headed to the CEAIE building where we met Michael (or Jen Lie) and he gave us a talk about the promotion of cross culture education between China and foreign countries. He then took us to dinner in this beautiful restaurant and the food was absolutely amazing. It was Harrison's 18th birthday so Mike took us all out to an expat bar called 4corners which is a favourite of his and we celebrated with a drink before heading back to the hotel and crashing.

On Saturday 23rd we went to visit the Great Wall of China. . It was a 2 and a half hour bus ride from our hostel and then we spent 4 hours at the wall. Not everybody had the energy to walk up all those steps so 6 of us went by cable car or chair lift. Tazzy and I got a cable car together. The views were absolutely amazing. Once we were at the top (station 14) we had to walk along the wall to station 6 where the toboggan was for getting back to the bottom of the Wall. Most of the walk was pretty good, as it was mostly downhill. Some parts were really steep though, and there were 2 bits which were uphill. We made it along and took many photos of the stunning views. Reaching the toboggan area we discovered it was currently closed due to rain at the bottom of the hill - looking up at the blue sky above us, this was hard to believe - but we waited and soon it re-opened. The tobogganing experience was amazing! I can't believe I can say that I have tobogganed down the side of the Great Wall of China :D

Sunday 24th was slightly more relaxed. We got a lie in and then followed a map to reach the Beijing Duck Restaurant where we were having lunch. This place was absolutely amazing, and the food was most recognisable to the 'Chinese' that we get in the UK. In the afternoon we moved from the hostel to a hotel about 30 minutes away and just around the corner from the school - Beijing No.50 Middle School - where we are receiving our Mandarin lessons.

Now on the Sunday evening I got to do something I didn't think I would get to do until I returned to the UK - I went to church. Mike took me to the Beijing International Christian Fellowship (BCIF) church. When we arrived people were in and singing and we just joined in. The power of God felt so strong in the room, the intensity of these people's faith was just incredible. The experience was quite intense but really enjoyable and I plan on returning when I visit Beijing again.

On Monday we had quite an early start as we had to meet Iris, one of our teachers for this week, at 8.15am. She then led us from the hotel to Beijing No.50 Middle School where we are getting Mandarin lessons every morning this week. Iris (this is her English name) gave us a tour of the school. There were kids outside in the 'playground' doing a routine overseen by some high ranking officer. We couldn't take pictures due to this officer being there.

Iris then took us to our classroom and gave us our first Mandarin lesson. She taught us about initials (one of three parts of Chinese syllables) we then had a quick break and then our other teacher for the week, Harry Young (again, this is his English name as he is also Han Chinese). He taught us about introductions and how to address different people. I found this lesson much more helpful than the one on initials, but I know both are as important.

After the morning lessons, Mike and the 2 teachers took us to the 798 art district. You will have to look at some of my pictures to see how amazing this place is, and I'm sure I didn't even see a quarter of it as a lot was closed (I think this was to do with the time of year). We spent 4 hours here (including having dinner in a western restaurant - we got proper cutlery for the first time since arriving in China!!)

Every morning of this week we had Mandarin lessons with Iris and Harry, followed by lunch in the school canteen and then a cultural activity in the afternoon.

On Tuesday, Mike and Iris took us to the Forbidden City. This was really interesting as Mike gave us a guided tour and told us loads about the history. I took loads of photos but none of them really do it much justice (I'll try and get them up as soon as possible). We then walked across the road and climbed up a hill to a Buddhist Temple at the top where the view over Beijing was incredible. We were really lucky as the smog still hadn't reformed since the thunderstorm on Saturday night so the sky was completely blue (this has made it really really hot due to the direct sunlight). It was a good day and we were all really tired when we got back to the hotel so we have ordered McDonalds (McDeliveries, oh yeah xD) and are going to sit in and watch some tv,

Until next time,

Zàijiàn x