Before we start just a few words about the flight. Comfortable and smooth journey with very little sleep arriving way ahead of time, but any advantage we started with quickly evaporated as the aircraft was forced to perform a lengthy taxi around the airport perimeter to avoid roadworks on one of the main runways. We could see out of the cabin window a line of road building machines eating up and relaying the runway surface. We complete formalities and on exiting the customs hall we are met by our guide for the next few days, David. He is certainly a sociable fellow, very good English spoken, but suffering a bit from hay fever. He apologises for his mask for this reason. We drive in to the city, the roads being a bit quite on the way in to the city David informs us that this weekend, the first three days of April, people are celebrating the Chinese “tomb sweeping” festival, when people take to the roads and head off to their ancestral homes to remember their previous generations. This is self evident looking at the queues of cars heading in the opposite direction. David’s chatter is fortunate, as he is distracting us from what is going on outside with our driver seeming to swerve into the path of traffic, bicycles and mopeds only to hoot his horn at them and take avoiding action at the last minute. He, the driver, has the appearance and voice of someone straight out of central casting, rough voice, and dour features.
Arriving at the hotel, David leaves us arranging to meet up again in the morning at half past eight. We check in, and quickly wash and change to head out on our own unassisted. We decide on a quick trip to Beijing Zoo, to see some pandas, something which we did not put on our intinerary with David. We find the subway station nearest to us more by luck than design, and sort out our tickets priced at the equivalent of just under a pound each for a journey of 45 minutes. The stations appear to us to be rammed with people, as do the trains and as we get closer to the zoo the crowds increase in volume. Families with children, often with nannies and granddads in charge of the pushchair charge ahead through the crowds with scant regard for the safety and well being of their fellow passengers. Indeed my fellow traveller is bashed by one individual swinging his rucksack carelessly about. We escape the subway system and queue for our zoo tickets, reasonably priced at under the equivalent of three pounds each, including entry to see the pandas.
We make our way into the zoo, and towards the pandas swept along with everyone else it would be pointless to resist the flow. We see three pandas in their individual enclosures. They seem aloof and sad in equal measure, but I imagine that it is just a general panda way.
We leave the zoo now feeling tired and head back to the hotel for a snooze in readiness for the adventures to come over the next few days. Oh the puppies, what is that about I hear you ask. At the subway station entrance on our return journey a gentleman is hawking Tibetan terrier puppies which he has contained in a cardboard box, and he was having a bit of a job trying to stop them escaping 🐶.
One final observation after just a few hours in Beijing. Everybody seems to be messaging, on the subway, on the pavements, everywhere. And they do it with such a speed and alacrity which would not seem possible given the complex nature of the Chinese alphabet.