Disclaimer - The detail in my first few blogs from China reflects only the intensity of the days and not as an indicator to the frequency of future blog posts...

Traveling
There's only two things of note from my incredibly long yet surprising mundane journey across the world; the window view and the airports. The route from Heathrow to Hong Kong went over Urumqi and while I was looking at the lights (at some unknown time) I may have seen the lights from my project, which was both exciting and incredibly depressing; its a long way back...

Now I've always been a fan of airports and Hong Kong and Beijing did not disappoint. While HK airport meant landing on a man made island (which they were expanding) BJ was the best. Apparently the longest building in the world the design very much resembled the Birds Nest Stadium. Now that my inner architect has been uncover onto the first (half) day...

Beijing - Day one
Beijing, first impressions? It's pretty much an all-out assault on the senses; like nothing else I have ever experienced. From the bright, flashing lights of the streets to the dull over hang of smog in the atmosphere. The beautiful aroma of various noodle, seafood and anything-else-under-the-sun food outlets (restaurants is a stretch) to the sudden and pungent whiff of sewage. While my English skills are not strong enough to give justice to my first impressions, it was truly memorable. As we got there at 6.20 we only had time to check into the hostel, meet our in-country representative and go for a meal, yet all of this seemed to last for days. Onwards and upwards! The place we ate was absolutley amazing, there are picture of it up on this blog. The meal was absolutly spectacular.

Beijing - Day Two
In the morning we had a talk from CAEIE (or something like that) which is an teacher exchange program which PT use. We met the lovely Doris who deals with the schools we will be working at. Beijing cleared right up, the sky was beautifully blue with no sign of smog at all. We then got a subway to another part of Beijing and walked through the banking district to Tianamin square. Some of the buildings here are unbelievable, they put London to shame. Highlights of the walk: seeing where the chinese political leaders live, the national music theatre and the Chinese regional development bank (alright so the last one doesn't sound interesting but the building was amazing). Finally we arrived at Tianamen Square.

Funily enough, Tianamen Square is a rather large square. The Maosoleum was closed (but I plan on going back to see Mao at the end of the year). The whole area felt rather, well, touristy. I don't know what I expected. Anyway from Tianamen we had to make our own way back to the Youth Hostel we were staying at, without Mike (our PT representative). Me and a couple of others decided to blindly walk in one direction to see more of Beijing. We managed to get to the other side of the circle line of the subway, so we must have gone quite far (and in the completely wrong direction). Still feeling jet laged that was an early night.

Beijing - Day Three

So I always liked Hadrians wall. I thought it was really impressive, building that wall thousands of years ago. A real feat of human engineering, determination and resolve. Then I saw the Great Wall of China.
Rarely does reality exceed expectation but I can honestly say the Great Wall was beyond impressive. The sheer scale of it is emense. I would encourage everyone to go, it certainly a must-see. Also the bit we went to had a tobogon ride down the hill back to the town, and that was great.

Beijing - Day Four

Our last proper orientation day before we started a language course with Beijing No. 50 Middle School. Mike set us an typical orientation activity, to get pictures of certain things in the local area. In effect it was another day just walking around Beijing - which I absolutly love. After that it was another nice meal; proper Beijing duck. By this point I was getting over the jet lag and ready to start the language course and get over to my host family the following day!