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Beijing from steph’s point of view!!

// October 7th, 2009 // by Steph

Well then since this is a joint travel blog I thought I better post! Andy has pretty much told you all the facts of what we have been up to but hasn’t really said much about how it feels to be here!!

Monday was our first whole day here and we started by going to the forbidden city! The place was amazing! I can’t believe just how well the Chinese have preserved it! I got a bit fed up though as everyone kept staring at me and I think I had my photo taken a million times!! People were even asking to have a photo taken with me!! I guess they are not used to seeing women with blonde hair and who are nearly 6ft!

Beijing is a very friendly place, all the locals are very friendly but their way of live is very very different to ours! It’s very rare to see a pushchair over here for example, apparently due to the one child rule they are very close to their children and prefer to carry them! Also they are considered a luxury and many Chinese people can’t actually afford them! Same goes for nappies! They cost £25 for a small packet over here so they just don’t bother with them and the children have splits in the clothes and just “go” when they need to!

You can really see in parts of Beijing where the government have tried to make it more westernised. The airport for example is very moden and in parts of Beijing the government have built walls around the less desired parts so that the tourists don’t get to see them.

Were off to Xi’an tomorrow! We are going to be brave and try an overnight train! It will take 12 hours! It should be an interesting experiance!!