Florida Coalcracker Chronicles: China Day 4 of 160 - Walking Around Downtown Beijing

Saturday, August 24, 2019

China Day 4 of 160 - Walking Around Downtown Beijing

Our Beijing Hilton for first week.

It is Sunday morning at 7 AM here in Beijing. We are watching the Gators play the Hurricanes on our Slingbox. We still are having fits with jet lag. I slept yesterday from 1 PM to 10 PM - and then was up all night. I try to lie down and be still or listen to Sirius radio with my earphones. But sleep doesn't come. We try to get lots of sun - to adjust - jet lag will be gone soon. We never made a 12 time zone flight before.

Yesterday - Saturday - we took the subway to Tiananmen Square. We we got there - we did not have our passports and could not go into the complex. It was a beautiful day so we walked around the pedestrian street downtown shopping. What beautiful big department stores - 6 stories of shopping. We did that until about noon - and we were very tired. So we headed back to the Hilton. Then we slept all afternoon and evening.

MONEY

We have not straightened out our money yet. We turned some American dollars into Chinese Yuan. We put $60 in the machine - and out came about 400 Yuan. That was easy - but I am sure there was a fee. They use a program over here called WeChat. It is like email - text - credit card - all in one. It is similar to Apple Pay. We must connect it to a bank account - and then that is all we will use.

The subway was cheap - 12 stops costs 60 cents total - to downtown from our hotel - about 6 miles. There is a bank called CITIC that we think lets us open an account. Then we will be set.

PEOPLE

The people are very nice. They love Americans. They love Lulu's hair and fair good looks. She will be Lady Gaga if they want. A grandmother brought her granddaughter over to talk to Lulu. It was a nice moment. We look forward to many like that.

Gators 7 Miami 3 - we are watching along live.

PHONES - COMPUTERS

The biggest success we have is our T-Mobil iphones. We use them for everything here. I love the Google maps for getting around and subways. We have free text - email - data. We do have to pay 25 cents a minute for world calls. We can video chat free - we did that yesterday with both our sons' families. One is in Paris - one is in the Bahamas. It is the same plan we have at home - $90 a month for 2 phones. That includes unlimited service - free unlimited calls on Delta planes - and free service in 200 countries. We can also hook our computers wirelessly to the iphone and surf the net with our computers.

We are watching the game on ESPN over our phone right now.

HILTON

Our Hilton Hotel - our home for the first week - is just next to the American Embassy. Tomorrow at 9 AM our orientation starts there. It will be really neat going in there. They will probably help us with the bank angle - among other things. They do not want us to take our laptops there.

The breakfasts here are wonderful - so many choices. I am trying many things - in a way I was hoping I would lose weight here. Not if I eat like I have been. I weighed 100 kilos when I arrived. There are tons of American restaurants - even more local ones.

CLEAN

We are in a very nice section of Beijing. You do not see litter anywhere. You do not see any graffiti. There are people with brooms constantly sweeping. Lots of machine sweepers. Most of the bikes and scooters are electric so it is very quiet. In the sparkling subways - people hardly talk - just whispers. There is a cop on each train. A guy was watching his phone with the volume too high - the cops told him to silent it - he did - no argument. There are a lot of guards all over - I attempted to take pictures of them - and got a quick "halt." I complied - no problem there.

CAMPUS

Thursday they move us to our campus apartment. That will be our home for the rest of our 160 days. Lulu will teach one library class a week - the rest of the time is ours. If our apartment is 1/10th as nice as our hotel room - we will be happy.

REVIEWS

All in all - our worst problem is the jet lag. We will adjust normally. They take us out to dinner for Peking duck tonight - that will help us a bit.

A person with OCD would certainly love the litter thing - and the organization. The Internet seems to
have aligned the people with the rest of the world. They love American products and style. This country has over a billion people - almost 4 times what the USA has. They have risen rapidly - passing out Germany - England - France - and Japan - to become the number 2 world power.