Travelfood

The legendary and secretive Chinese capital has opened up for westerners who encounter air pollution and difficult traffic chaos before arriving to the city center. The city is so vast that it is difficult to perceive when you are in the center, but when the airport bus arrives at huge Tien-an-men Square, it is obvious what you have reached. The plaza is filled with army clothed security personnel and it certainly makes you unrest at the square of Heavenly Peace.

The expectations are big when you arrive to the Forbidden city, where emperors for centuries were isolated from their people, but when you have seen similar ancient administrative centers in for example Bangkok, Siem Reap or Moscow, you are not blown away by the imperial old town. What is much more impressive is the modern city life, where people march like a massive army wall against you on the sidewalk and if you are not in a similar formation yourself, you need to sidestep them all the time.

Many arrive to Beijing for the Great Wall of China, and it truly is a miracle and an uncomprehensive structure. My organized day-trip took me to Badaling, where the wall climbes dramatically over a mountain and I walked the numerous steps to the top, where a traditional observation tower offered a view of a fraction of the long wall. On the way to the wall the trip offered stops also at the Ming tombs and at a jade factory.

When in Beijing I wanted to taste Peking duck. It is served sliced with hoisin sauce and spring onions and along there are also small pancakes to roll the meat into. The duck was succulent and crispily roasted and absolutely worth its price. I would also like to mention my hotel’s Chinese buffet breakfast, which I had by a happy mistake since I did not know that the hotel had a separate western buffet breakfast for westerners. In a huge loud dining room I was the only westerner, but enjoyed utterly the Chinese dumplings, vegetables and colourful broths, which the Chinese loudly slurped into their mouths.

Asia, Beijing, China, food, travel, travel experiences