Arrival in Beijing

We arrived at 5:00am, Beijing time, after 22 hours of travel.  It was tough, but we were able to sleep for quite a bit of the 10 hour flight from Zurich to Beijing.  We purposely stayed awake for the first 8 hour flight and for the 4 hour layover.  Sleeping was NOT a problem after that.  So far, we're wide awake and doing fine today.




Here's our itinerary for the next week:
-1/11 Fly in and rest
-1/12 Free Day
-1/13 Free Day
-1/14 Travel to get Jinny, come back to Beijing that evening
-1/15 Free Day
-1/16 Free Day
-1/17 Mike heads home and we head to Guangzhou




We skipped all the formal touring to save money, so we went to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square ourselves today.  It was only about a 20 minute walk. 



What an amazing place!  It was packed full of people.  It's a popular weekend destination for local folks and tourists alike. 


We ended up being quite the spectacle.  Mike's height (6'5" with his boots) and Erin's long blond hair seemed to draw lots of attention.  Not only were people staring at us and trying to covertly take our pictures, quite a few people walked right up and asked.  One family asked Mike for permission to take a picture with him and promptly shoved their baby into his arms and posed.  The poor little one was shocked and almost started crying, but the parents didn't mind.  They were so happy and thanked Mike repeatedly.  A couple of groups of teenage boys wanted to take pictures with Erin.  There was lots of giggling and staring at her hair.  She mentioned wearing a hat the rest of the week!  I think hat shopping will be on our agenda tomorrow.


I tried to upload pictures, but they weren't loading, so I'll have Mike try again later.