Back in Beijing

So last weekend I headed to Beijing on a night train, and the Beijing I found on the other end was disturbingly familar and comfortably different.

Upon arrival in Beijing my host father came to get Tian Jing (host sister, so this is her dad) and me. He drove down to get us instead of making us catch public transit. It took us an hour and a half to drive home, while had we taken the subway it would have been about 35 minutes to a stop 10 minutes away from their house, where they could have come to get us. Its not like either of us had a lot of luggage. Nonetheless, I spent all of Friday morning in a car in traffic. Beijing's traffic has been notoriously bad for a few years, but this is still much worse than even last time I was in Beijing, 2005.

However I did get a lot of time to look out the window (and nap) and really got to see how Beijing is changing. The buildings going up nowadays are no longer crappy-looking plaster-walled apartments that all look identical, but they are beginning to use architecture and modern materials, and things are looking like they're building up well. Buildings are still of poor quality and going up far too quickly, but its still good progress.

My host family and the house seem almost the same as ever. My host mother still worries too much, the keys they gave me still work (though it took me a while to remember how to use them, there's a trick), my host sister is still sleeping in the office because she feels that my room (her old room) is, well, my room. They still have the stuffed Halloween bears that Ning sent me in a care package sitting on a shelf, as well as the black and white sketch of Zhouzhuang that I bought. Hanging on the door is still that wicker tassel thing, and the toiletries I left behind were still sitting on a shelf in the bathroom. I can't remember if those are from '05 or '04, but I find it extremely odd that they hold on to my astringent despite the fact that none of them use it. Other things that haven't changed are their cooking, which is still really disgusting, and the cow-pattern chair covers.

Friday evening I went by Chabad, where I found more changes. They've opened up Beijing's first kosher restaurant and so dinners aren't done in the Chabad house. The family was in South Africa as Dini was delivering a child (congrats again! its a girl!), and there was not one familiar face in the crowd. However that doesn't mean that I didn't thoroughly enjoy the evening, where I met some guys who were traveling to celebrate their completion of the bar exam and had a good conversation.

As for Beijing overall, I would have to call the changes olympic. Everywhere you look there are olympic advertisements, buildings have been ripped down everywhere i look to make room for new development, and everyone is talking constantly about the olympics. The new olympic mascots, the fuwa (or friendlies in English--definitely not as good a name) are adorable, and you can watch the first few minutes of this video to hear the song that was stuck in my head for a week or two after. I almost bought the plastic dolls like on the shelf at the end these guys were so cute, but then discovered the cost the same as three really nice Chinese meals here and decided they aren't quite worth it. Though if I see them in the airport I might break down and buy them anyway, because they really are cute.

The Olympic stadium has been built, but they are keeping it behind a wall with only a few small gaps, so I never really got the time to actually see it well, but it looks pretty neat. Maybe a little less graceful than they had intended, but a cool structure and a neat concept. All the locals call it the 'bird's nest'. There is a lot of heated debate on the architectural merit of the structure.

As for the olympic village, it is only a few blocks from my house, and is huge and going up quickly. They have a sleek modern design for the condos, though I can guarantee you that in 15 years the design is going to be considered soooo dated, but olympic things should be dated. Because they're improving the roads, the detour for buses goes through the village, so I had several opportunities to see what's going on there. They have built really crappy temporary housing for the construction workers that smells like human waste.

But Beijing looks like it is improving quickly, which is exciting. I should go and spend some good time out in Shanghai as I only have three days left here until Tokyo. So psyched. Until next time!