So, just continuing where Thelma left off…

Buying a ticket at Beijing West Station was interesting. It took us a while to find the right ticket line after a bit of to-and-fro-ing inside and outside the station. Once we got there it was a pleasant surprise to find that the lady behind the counter spoke English - after the hell we’d had trying to get to the station due to the lack of communication skills (and no Chinese language skills to speak of), it was refreshing, to say the very least. So, tickets in hand, we decided we were going to go and see the Forbidden City next, which happened to be at the other end of Beijing. Not terribly hard, but for the fact that the shark-like nature of scam artists in the form of taxi drivers really set the tone for the rest of the afternoon.

We approached a group of what appeared to be genuine metered taxis, but when we asked we were told “No meter! 80 RMB!”. Not having any of that, we walked away, set on finding another taxi when we were approached by a guy saying he’d take us to the City for 5RMB (or what we assumed was 5RMB). as it turned out, he, like many other private cab drivers in the city, worked in conjunction with one of the many hotels and during the trip he tried to earn his commission by setting us up with a room, regardless of what we tried to tell him. It took Thelma talking to someone on the phone from the hotel (who spoke English) that we were perfectly fine in the hostel we were staying at and thus the problem began when we tried to pay the guy once we got to the City. He wanted more than what he quoted, probably because he missed out on a rather juicy commission. Tired and incredibly peeved at this point, we thrust 100RMB (about $13 Aussie dollars) at him and jumped out of the car.

And thus began the actual walk through the gauntlet of hawkers and beggars to the front gate of the Forbidden City.

TBC.

… and I’ve thought about posting something on this for the last few days, so… that counts, right?

Ahem.

Anyway, since I hear that certain parents have been wanting to know when this was going to get updated (and for once, it wasn’t mine), and since we’ve been in Beijing for two full days now, I guess this is about due.

After an uneventful flight from Osaka to Beijing, followed by an uneventful drive into the city, we got to our hostel, located in a hutong right in the city. The hostel itself is pretty fantastic- all of the rooms are arranged around a central, cobblestoned courtyard, the people at reception all speak English, and there’s a restaurant right in the place. Oh, and there’s the beer that cheaper than water, of course. We’re hoping to manage to get a room in the same place on the way back through Beijing before we fly back to Japan.

Our first day in Beijing was spent getting ripped off, going to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, where many people tried (unsuccessfully) to rip us off some more, wanderinga round Beijing, and then collapsing back at the hotel in the evening. Oh, and there was also a Bus Ride From Hell (that cost all of twelve cents, so I guess it’s true that you get what you pay for). And duck. There was also duck.

First, the sad story of our “Welcome To Beijing!” scamming. Because I decided that it would be “smart” to go to the train station to buy our tickets to Pingyao ourselves (as opposed to buying them through the hostel which, for the record, is the better option, as we now know). Silly me for trying to be adventurous. Our hours-long odyssey began with a crowded, long ride on the number 47 bus, on which I’m fairly sure at least fifty percent of Beijing’s population were riding. Everyone was very nice, the lone English speaker aboard explaining to the ticket lady just where it was we were trying to go. We paid a whole yuan (about twelve and a half cents in US money), and off we went. And went. And went.

The trip took almost forever, and nice as our fellow passengers were, I hadn’t planned on getting to know them quite as intimately as I did jammed up into a Buddhist monk’s armpit from our hostel’s street to the train station- a ride that took about an hour. Of course, it would have taken less time, but we had to stop and switch buses. Sort of. One stop before the station, the conductor told everyone to get off the bus, which we did. Then, we watched as our bus drove away while several other number 47 buses stopped, dropped off all passengers, and took off, as well. KindlyEnglishSpeaker guy explained that we wouldn’t need to get another ticket, and would “get on the same bus.”

Well. I thought by “same bus,” he meant the same number, not the exact same bus. But sure enough, after about fifteen minutes of standing around, up pulls our bus, same driver, same ticket lady, same passengers getting back on. We never did find out what happened, due to the language barrier, but the conductor was munching away on some dumplings. Maybe it was their lunch break. Welcome to China.

This post is already long, so details of our fleecing at the hands of the Beijing West Station piranas- sorry, cab drivers will have to follow in the next post. The fun never stops around here (at least not the fun at our expense. Hah).