From Russia with Rees: The Wall (From Bucks Free Press)

From Russia with Rees: The Wall

11:25am Sunday 9th August 2009 in Blogs

Well there goes another week that has felt like about a month, and what a fantastic city Beijing is. It is also extra-marvellous because my parents have flown out to meet me, I can't explain the joy of a hotel room and a SHOWER after seven days on a train.

Our little legs are weary but we have really crammed a lot in to our time here.

We have ticked off all the major sites including Tian'anmen Square and Mao's Mausoleum (we were shoved by flower-weilding Chinese as we shuffled passed a very waxy-looking Mao), The Forbidden City (stunning and huge) and The Great Wall.

We even managed a swim in the Olympic pool, but only after a medical check and a 'depth test' and a good wash!

The highlight was easily the Wall. Two bus journeys and a huge mistake (not useful to have a two-year old guidebook in a fast developing city!) led us accidentally to the most secluded and beautiful section of the Wall and it was unbelievable.

The stone snaked gracefully along the green mountains as far as you could see in the mist (ok, smog) and we climbed step after step with not a soul in sight. It was just like the photos and that made it all the more surreal and special!

The peace of the Wall was bliss after the chaos of everywhere else, there are just so many Chinese tourists! The Forbidden City was like a football match; herds of camera-weilding Chinese sucking on pea-flavoured lollies and asking for our picture.

Mum was especially fascinating to them as she has blonde hair but they all wanted to know where we were from. I felt like a celebrity, or some sort of freak!

Aside from the obvious tourist things, what I really loved was getting glimmers of the real Beijing nestled in the shadows of the shiny skyscrapers flying up everywhere.

I would make an effort to peek down alleyways to where old women clinked mah jong tiles and young men munched on curious things on sticks (bbq-ed scorpions anyone?).

There were grubby shops selling everything and nothing, a man wobbling amongst the roaring traffic with a photocopier strapped to his bicycle and couples waltzing in the shade of the park.

I was struck by how quiet and serene the Chinese are, how they all sit out in the street in the cool evenings, how they eat all the time and how many public toilets there are!

It is a curious mixture of tradition and modernity, happy people with a turbulent past, expensive hotels and stupidly cheap noodles. If you haven't been, you need to!

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