Myself and Lostagent2 have landed in China – Beijing to be exact. A 12 hours flight with little sleep we landed just as the sun was coming up on a very cool Good Friday. Here are some interesting things we have experienced on our first day.
At the very nice looking and large international airport, we made our way through quarantine, immigration (took for ever) and the all important customs which we walked straight through without having to declare a thing or having our bags checked – only being asked “Why we take so long?”
Our trip in the private car to the hotel I think has taken a few years of my life. Lostagent2 defined it as “ordered chaos,” which it is, and something that is rather interesting to see. The only rule seems to be dont crash. Pedestrians have no rights on the road even at crossings.
The place we are staying in seems ok, all the staff are friendly and there are some interesting items in the room to purchase including vibrating condoms and a compressed towel that you just add water to uncompress it.
I tipped the bell hop 5 RMB which when converted to AUD is $0.80. We have been joking about that since not knowing if it was a good amount to give or not.
We have already experienced the Great Firewall of China, finding both Twitter and Facebook (who uses it anyway) blocked from access. That means no more stupid remarks till I get home.
For dinner we had some very nice duck but what was more impressive was the beer, 600ml bottles of the local beer. Although the beer isn’t that cold compaired to back home, it stayed the same temp for the entire time we were drinking and with the dew point in the minus we don’t get any condensation.