Made In China

In less than 12 hours I will be on a plane back to the U. S. of A. I'm of course filled with the usual excited to go home, sad to end such an awesome trip emotions that everyone gets at this point while traveling. But before I start reflecting, I should finish the story with some tales from Beijing.

Beijing is not what I expected. It isn't crowded, dirty, smoggy, humid, or cheap. Ok, it is all of those things for sure, but since I set the mental bar so high before arriving, I've been very pleasantly surprised at how blue the skies are, how much shoulder room I've felt in the streets, and how clean most places are.

I've skipped almost all of the tourist stops, save of course Tienanmen and a very nice Pagoda park in the city. Having Val here makes me want to explore more markets and streets where her language skills are a huge asset as opposed to places where I can easily revisit on an English tour group one day.

And when I say we explored the markets, I mean we fully detailed all eight floors of clothing, silks, jackets and jewelry. I've never bargained more in my life, nor left with the strange feeling that I was still ripped off for agreeing to pay $2 for a silk scarf. Everything really is as the title of this post describes.

We also attempted leg waxing, since it would cost less here than buying the packets over the counter at home. An hour and a half later, I would call it more a leg gooing and tweezing than anything else. Perhaps it was a bad sign when the woman took the jar out of a brand new box and started reading the instruction manual?

Last but not least, we've had lots more good eats: squid on a stick, melon on a stick, corn on the cob, popsicles (I average about seven a day, though the red bean and green bean ones are my least favorite, mango so far is the best), noodle soup, other noodle dishes, peking duck (for being the priciest dish here, it's not that good), taro pearl milk tea, stir fried stuff, really spicy can't breathe stuff, dumplings, and red bean cakes.

The food on the streets is insanely cheap and so delicious you scoff at anyone for eating anything else. That I will miss. In fact, a lot of this city I will miss. But it just means I'll definitely be coming back.

United Airlines, taaake me hoooome, to the plaaaaace where I belooooooooong.