- Terminal 3 of Beijing Airport, at which I landed, is larger than London Heathrow Airport's 5 terminals combined with another 17% to spare.
I spent the first week in Beijing, a city where I lived and worked for over three years. It had been eight years since my last visit. I got excited when I was still flying over the Pacific. Lots of memories about the city came back to me. I kept wondering what the city has changed into now.
It's a mixed feeling.
No difference from the past trips, the first difference I sensed was the air. The smell was a bit odd when I landed in Beijing. But soon my sense of smell was "neutralized". The pollution, which has been much better than before, however, still makes everything looks a bit dull and dirty. That's quite a turn-off to the folks who have been living long in the west.
- Post rush hour traffic on a major road in Beijing crossing with the 3rd Ring Road, an in-city highway (the bridge showed in the picture), including bicycle traffic (under the bridge). One big notable improvement - cars are driving in lanes now. But shadowed by pollution, you only get to see blue sky a few times every month.
Almost immediately after I left airport sitting in my friend's brand new beamer (BMW), I saw the biggest growth in China's recent history - cars. It was mind-boggling to watch so many cars, many of which are imported high-end cars, spinning on the streets in the unique Chinese ways - they change lanes every 10 seconds and they cut in & out as if there were no cars around them. I could hardly imagine what an amazing change has happened to the country, including people's lifestyle and many brand new industries, in such a short time thanks to the supersonic growth of the auto industry. To the large auto makers who suffered economy downturn in North America, China is no-doubt their new hope. To me, I hope soon I can drive a made-in-China Hummer.
Then, the third thing that impressed me was the infrastructure. The high way, the telecom system, online services, and the public transit system all have been greatly improved since my last visit. Crazy, for lack of better word, is the perfect match to China's growth in such major cities. Yet, what's equally impressive to me was the level of civilization of average Joes (lao bai xin, in Chinese) as I still see lots of cigarette smoking in public areas and spitting on the street. Apparently, the historical challenge won't be easily resolved in one or two generations.
- For about $50 per night, the comfort inn styled hotel room is way better than motels here. Not bad at all.
Before I left Toronto, I asked my friend in Beijing to book me a 4-star hotel. But he said:"Don't waste your money. Just live in a hotel close to my home so I can easily pick you up everyday - you know how bad the traffic is, don't you? The hotel is really not bad and it's cheap." I cannot argue with him since I have to rely on his car, and it turned out he was right. But I did feel funny when he drove me in his BMW 730 to this not star rated modest hotel called Hanting on the Northeast 3rd Ring. Looking could be deceiving. The hotel room and service are much better than I thought (pretty much the motel price you pay in North America for a 3 star hotel hardware and services). Bottom line, talking about cost effectiveness, it's very good. Each room comes with unlimited Internet access. So the first thing I did was getting online and checking if any of my clients missed me.
Naturally the dinner is on my friend - a tradition called "jie feng" or "xi chen" (give a dinner for a visitor from afar) that has been shared by Chinese for thousands of years. Again, riding his Beamer, we went to a Sichuan styled restaurant. My friend had to park his big car on the "island" between automobile lane and bicycle lane. It's legal and everybody does so. Obviously the city planning was way behind the auto market growth. It was a hot day, and the spicy but delicious Sichuan food only made me hotter. I was already sleepy when I returned to hotel - no need to worry about jet lag which was already gone thanks to the long flight.
More to find out about Beijing in the next post ...
