Beijing

We are in Beijing one day earlier than expected. I guess you could say that makes us ahead of schedule.

Before leaving Moscow, we toured the Kremlin. Of great interest was the Armoury which displays some of the treasures of the Tsars. The one thing I had hoped to see, the Trans-Siberian Faberge Egg, was not one of the Faberge items currently on display. But it was an interesting exhibit nonetheless. Learned a valuable lesson about crossing the roads inside the Kremlin: don’t.

The Trans-Mongolian was good. I would like to say uneventful, but if you believe that I have some prime real estate in Omsk (Milwaukee’s sister city) to sell you. We emerged from the cold in Russia in one piece, but with a few more rubles than we had planned. The warmth of Mongolia was a surprise. Spring has greeted us in China.

It is impractical to try to condense several days on the train into a short note, but a few things stand out. The guy two doors down who was always dragging more boxes down the hall to his cabin AFTER the customs people left. The foul smelling guy next door and his toy monkey. Our parting image of Mongolia: the line of border control officers that stood at attention on the train platform and saluted our train as we left for the Chinese border. Our train passing through the Great Wall this afternoon. Met our Russian teacher’s family at 2am on the train platform in Novosibirsk (Olga, if you are reading this, please thank Natalya and Yivgeny for the wine.)

We are at a residence house for foreign students studying Chinese – and we are trying desperately not to get them in trouble. It is an immersive program and they are not allowed to speak English to each other. They have been very helpful and have given us a laundry list of good places to eat in the area. Anything that does not have the phrase “Just add hot water” in the recipe has great appeal.

• Around the World
• Asia
• Beijing
• China