I actually lied am currently in singapore airport on my way yo China but i have a 5 hour wait so i thought i would update it a bit. So we had a 10 hour flight from new zealand to singapore, we flew with singapore airlines which i was expecting to be amazing but i didnt rate it that much i didnt like the food but that mght just be me being fussy and after 3 hours they told us that the inflight entertainment (the tv) was broken so i thought oh my god what am i going to do for the next 7 hours but then it started working again but i had a huge a****** in front of me he had the whole row to himself and he put his seat right back so i couldnt even see my tv screen and was practically on my lap so i asked him to move it forward and he told me to deal with it as he is entitled to put his seat back to which i replied and i am entitled to see the tv and have some room so i ignored him for the whole trip giving him evils whereever possible abd good old Jono moved for me so i could sit in his seat and he went and sat next to the a******.

We arrived at the airport and was told on the plane that it was -4 degrees eek!!! The hostel said they was picking us up so we waited....and waited....and waited then this man comes to get us and we arrive at the hostel which is in a place called a hutong where its all the original little alleyways in Beijing, its very basic but its ok. We ventured out to the Drum Tower first and gladly spoted to mcdonalds on the way and apart from that all little shops and street stalls but it smelt awful, then we had a little nap and went to see an acrobatic show that was booked through the hostel cost us a fiver and we got taken there in a taxi and brought back again and the show was amazing all these kids aged between 5-16 doing amazing acrobatics and juggling, pole jumping balancing on each other was really amazing so pleased we saw it, went off to the loo and was panic stricken when i only saw the squat variety i had a good scout round and found the clenaing cupboard which had a western toilet in but it was filthy but i braved it and went in there as i just couldnt face the squat just yet! Next day we went to the Forbidden City which was lovely to see but so cold walking round it we were walking round for about 5 hours and we had only seen just half of it, then we went to Tianmen square and tried to find the place where Mao body was but it is closed this time of year and Jon was really disapointed as he really wanted to see it, so off we ventured to find the night market and the centre of town we got lost loads and after a few hours of wandering around getting freezing we found it and the night market was different, not used to haggling everything but nice experience. We went to a restaurant on our first night and had the famous peking duck and we went in and everyone just stopped to stare at us we ordered from a chinese menu and then we got the food, jon had ordered a large sprite and i had ordered orange juice, we got a 2l bottle of sprite and i got a carton of orange juice was very bizare, so the whole restaurant is staring at us and the waiters and waitresses so we start to make a little pancake and the waitress comes over and makes one for Jon which was sweet but everyone was just staring at us so we felt very self conscious and everywhere we go the girls stare at Jon and men stare at me and kids wave and say hello which is quite sweet but today Jon kept on waving at everyone then this girl and little boy came over and started reading my lonely planet with me which was sweet at first then got a bit freaky so we moved on!!! We have booked our train ticket to Shanghai for Fri and going soft sleeper so we have a dorm to our little compartment and its a sleeper train takes 12 hours...should be fun and iv heard that there are only squat toilets so i shall not be drinking for the entire trip cos i am not squatting its gross!!!! Am finding it very hard out here tho very big culture shock and dont like hardly any of the food even mcdonalds chicken nuggets were black so living off egg fried rice and chips at the mo will prob look like an ethiopian soon!!!!

Today we went to the Beijing Zoo and the Aquarium, you have to visit the zoo in order to see the Aquarium so off we went in a taxi and the roads here are crazy there are like 2 lans but 4 lanes of traffic no-one indicates so the journey in itself is scarey, anyway we arrived at the zoo and the cages that the animals are in are truly shocking, the tigers and lions were inside and in cages about 5m big and dry concrete and that was it they looked so unhappy and some were just pacing up and down looking like thery were going to flip any second and the elephants were the same all chained up by their feet to these posts and were trying to use their trunks to get the chain off it was really upsetting and after seeing that we didnt really want to see much more because it wasnt a zoo it was horrible so we went to the aquarium which was amazing we fed all these tropical fish and saw dolphins, sea lions and sharks etc was good, then we wanted to go to the Lama Temple but when we got there it looked closed and the chinese taxi driveer was shouting at us and we didnt know what he was saying but we eventually made it back to our little alleyway where our hostel is. Were off to the restaurant we found the first night tonight to try some more things but ill prob stick to rice again cos im a woss and tomorrow were off on a tour of the Great Wall. There are about 6 different places where you can go were goint to a place called Mutianyu its not as busy as the Badaling section and there is option to get cable car up then have 2 hours walking around it then you come back down then off to see the Ming Tombs. The hostel offer a tour that Jono wanted to do but i didnt fancy it it involved a 5 and a half hour hike....i think not!!!! So ill update you tomorrow about our wall adventure!!!

Well we visited the Great Wall today and it was truly amazing, we got picked up in the morning and realised we were the only ones on the tour so we had a driver and an english speaking guide called Peter for the day, we started by visiting the Ming Tombs to see where all the emperors were buried, the guide told us that they used feng shui to find where the best place in Beijing was to bury them and it was to be the ming tombs, so we had a look there and walked along the sacred road which is supposed to be the road that the soul traveles after death to heaven which was good then we went to a jade factory and saw how they make jade and that was all nice and got told how to tell real jade from fake jade, then we left for the great wall, to get there we had to go all through rural parts of china which was surreal villages with shacks for homes and the roads covered with rubbish, sand, dirt and blood from the way they kill animals was quite weird, then we arrived and took a cable car up and spent 2 hours walking along both directions of the wall the time went really quick but was amazing to be up there and felt really surreal definately recommend going there, and the guide was telling us about different sections of the wall, Badaling is the really touristy part packed with people and all restored so none of it was from the original time and at Simatui where we Jon wanted to go for that mammoth hike some parts are so steep they are at 90 degree angles and people have fallen and been killed before so so glad we didnt do that one would have been rubbish!!! Then we headed to a chinese restaurant for lunch and went somewhere called the friendship store which are dotted around China its more western in there and we had a nice lunch of about 8-10 dishes all included in our 15 quid!!!! ticket price then went to the gift shop downstairs and was so made up to find amy name in chinese in this little framed piece of paper so for a quid i had to buy it, i never find anything with my name on!!!! and then Jon found his name with the right spelling so we had to buy that one to made my day!!!(small things please small minds etc), then we went on to a copper making factory and saw all the locals making the vases etc was good and then we went to one of the biggest silk factories in Beijing inside their old stadium and we got to see how silk was made from the silk worm and Jon ate the silk worm yes you did just hear me right he ate it and then we got to pull all the silk threads just like you see on TV was really good and wanted to buy all the silk bed covers etc but we couldnt afford it then we saw the sight of the new stadium beung built for the olympics which they are all very proud of was the best day weve had in Beijing and really pleased we went on the tour otherwise we might not have had such a good day. Off to Shanghai tomorrow night on the train

Our last day was spent goint to see the body of Mao which was a very famous communist leader here and is like their god we had to only queue for a bit and went in and his actually body is so called been poreserved for the past 20 years so its actually a real dead body eugh!!! i thought it still looked fake and was prob fake but its free to get in so theyre not ripping you off then we went to this weird temple where it believes in Taoist religion and shows you all the different types of things that can happen to you when you go to the gates of heaven and hell...very odd then i got my purse robbed not sure where but i suspect a small child in mcdonalds the b****!!!! and i kept my purse in my inside pocket of my coat so she was smart il give her that but such a pain in the arse so 3 months in and both me and jon have lost or had our wallets stolen not a great start!!!! we must learn from these things though i suppose!!!! Anyway finally time for this 12 hour train journey cant wait!!!!