Thought I'd upload a few images of Beijing that I hadn't gotten around to putting up yet. I was up in Beijing a few weeks ago (seems like months ago). Here's a picture of one of the guys who directs traffic and helps pedestrians across the road. They have them on virtually every corner in the busy parts of the city, Shanghai too. These people vary in personality. Some are real tyrants, I can't say I've met any who are particularly friendly or want to have a conversation. They all have a whistle, and they will use it. But actually their bark is worse than their bite, if you walk across anyway, there is nothing they can do. You can also see some of the bikes around. There are still heaps of people on bikes riding around the city. I'm thinking about getting one to ride to work. You can get them for about 150RMB ($30AUS). They are pretty crap, but better that way as they're less likely to get stolen. But no one wears a helmet. But they do ride at a very leisurely pace. Any Chinese on bikes tend to avoid Westerners. Apparently its because there's that 'avoid a collision with someone who doesn't speak the same language as you at all costs because it will be a really difficult situation' mentality and the 'Westerners are too rich to collide with' mentality that contribute to this.
There's a pretty area to the north of the Forbidden city with a nice lake, called Beihai Park. There's also a massive number of people to ride you around on the back of a bike in a little carriage so you can tour the hutongs, which are the old style houses in Beijing. They are basically four buildings around a courtyard, and a number of families would live in them. The building to the south would be lower than the others, to let the sun into the courtyard in winter.
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Me in the pedicab thing. It was a rainy day.x
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Just love driving into oncoming traffic.....
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