Beijing is freaking awesome! As happy as I am to be here, I can't help but feel that the universe has some weird vendetta against me as it seemed like everything was against me during this trip. My flight into Heathrow was delayed by an hour and a half (thanks British Airways!) which caused me to have a mini meltdown as I missed my flight to Hong Kong, so I had to travel on the next one by myself. I would be dead right now if it wasn't for airline movies. I'd like to thank Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger for keeping me sane and I'd like to thank Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone for making me cry :/

Anyway, upon arrival, I triumphantly reunited with the group and we went for a meal with Mike, our rep, at about 7.15 and checked into the hostel afterwards. By the way, sleeping in 29 degree heat pn a rock hard mattress is the worst thing ever.

Two days ago we hired out some bikes and cycled around Beijing which was an incredible experience; the drivers in Beijing are the craziest maniacs in the world. Their attitude seems to be 'I am the owner of a big Chinese car, GET OUT OF MY WAY!' I almost got run over about 3 times, it was awesome. The range of smells that I experienced in Beijing was not much unlike Glasgow as in a single inhale, I enjoyed the aroma of exotic cooking from a nearby stall and felt my mouth begin to water as I anticpated the flavours of the food. Then a split second later, the smell of feaces filled my nostrils and caused the water to be transferred from my mouth to my eyes. I could get over that, however, as everybody in our group was treated like a celebrity; the amount of pictures passersby took of us was ridiculous. I have to admit I quite like the attention though (Jill, if you're reading this, you were right...there I said it)!

The day after that we headed off to the Great Wall of China, and the jet lag hit me like a sledgehammer as soon as I got on the coach. The drivers were still maniacs by the way. There were lots of people trying to sell their wares at the entrance to the Wall who spoke very fragmented English who I had to try very hard not to laugh at. The Wall itself was gorgeous though, that is after the tedious treck up the thousands of steps that led to the top of the bleeding thing. Seriously, I hate steps, they should ban them. I think that because the Great Wall of China has been known to me for pretty much all my life, I just forgot that it was in fact finished in the 1400s. When I was actually there, though, I really felt like I was walking on something truly ancient.

Today was an interesting day - it was the last outdoorsy day in Beijing before we start our Mandarin classes - we were given a specific route to walk to where we were eating lunch today from Mike which led us through the richer parts of Beijing and into the old city. I thought this was a very surreal experience because we passed a beautiful lake, some quaint little shops, a few gorgeously constructed buildings and a park moments before going through a row of houses build out of crumbling brick, corrugated steel and wood. Many of the houses didn't even have a door. I saw a man cleaning a wagon attacted to an electric bike with what looked like a stick made of bamboo and then a few minutes later I saw a man chipping pieces away from his doorstep with a crude looking chisel. I think this is what made me realise that I was definitely not in Scotland anymore.

Wow, that was a long post! I hope I can keep these a little shorter in the future so I don't bore you lovely readers to tears. I'm currently sitting on my hotel bed (no more horribly uncomfortable hostel beds!) writing this and I think it's time for some sleep now. Goodnight all! Keep an eye out for my next post, you marvellously cool cats.