Day 1

Well I made it to Beijing and I have to say I am impressed. My flight was a long one that was only broken up by a brief stop in Tokyo. I wish I could have stayed there. All I go to do in Tokyo was watch sumo wrestling on TV. Interesting but that should be another entry because I do not understand the rules.

I arrived at 9:45pm local time in Beijing. That meant that I had been up for 48 hours with only 3 hours of sleep. After going through the check to get into the country, which was a slow moving long line (yes there were a bunch of them, but they were all moving slow). I gave the three different cards that I filled out on the plane about my health and recent contact with poultry, I was allowed in. I guess I was not sure what I was expecting, but the whole process seemed a little tame, my body cavities were not searched, and everyone I spoke to; spoke English and was very friendly. The guy that I was supposed to meet, was not in our agreed upon meeting spot. So I began to walk around, I was approached by many taxi drivers that would say "You want taxi?" and when I would say "No" they would always reply with "Maybe later then." I of course tried to explain, thinking they knew English, but apparently they only knew two phrases and expected only two responses.

My friend showed up with a taxi driver. Phew, I was relieved because this ariport was crazy packed with people creating a chaotic atmoshopere. The cool thing was that when we walked up to the taxi, he was cleaning his early 90's Volkswagen Pasat. The car was in great shape and very shiny from his attention to it. I could tell that his livlihood depended on this vehicle.

The ride to my hotel was very different, lanes are guidelines, and apparently changing lanes into on coming traffic is all right to do. Signals are optional, and honking should be done a lot. Pedestrians apparently can walk anywhere they want and are not phased by cars driving amongst them. Where I come from there would have been several dents in the taxi's hood from the driving that I witnessed.

I finally made it to my new home, it is called the Grand Hyatt Beijing. The taxi driver told my friend that this is the nicest hotel in Beijing. My company is paying for it and I would have to say, that I am very lucky to work for them because this hotel is really nice. I have a living room with a den in the corner, a small kitchen and a beautiful bathroom with a shower and a deep bathtub. The bed is King Size and the comforter is silk. I will be happy here. I unpacked and fell right asleep. That was around 1am or 10am where I come from.

I woke up at 5:25 am local time. What the heck, I want more sleep, I should need more sleep. I tried to go back to sleep, but it did not work. I pitter pattered around and tried to go back to sleep several times. I did not have any reading material because I had read it all on the plane. Reading would probably have worked, but sleep was not to be had. I got ready and called my friend. We met in the lobby and went on a hunt for breakfast. We found a big shopping mall. I was amazed to see all of the high end brand name shops. Tag Haur, Rolex, and several others. We found a place and got some cream filled pastries, then we decided to get stuffed roles with beef, some steamed soy milk that we dipped some fried bread in. It was also used to satiate our thirst. The food was good and we ordered too much of it. Oh well it only cost about $5.00 US. What a wastefull US citizen I am. To make me feel better I will call it experimenting with the local cuizine, now I don't feel like the lousy US citizent that I am.

We left the mall and went back to my room to call in some people that I would be working with during the next few weeks. We took a taxi to Tianmen Square to wait for them. I was surprised to see that taxi riding could be even more exciting. Our taxi driver had a cage around him. The cage looked to be protecting him from passengers, but it also looked sturdy enough to protect him in a crash.

I will finish the rest of this story tomorrow, as tomorrow will be spent mostly with work duties.