北京欢迎你

Awoke at nine as the train stopped and the engine blew it's shriek of a whistle. I checked the schedule to find that we were supposed to arrive at 大同 at 8, so we were only an hour behind schedule.

I got out my Ghengis Khan book and started my last day on the Trans-Siberian rail with a little light reading.

Brian woke up and we went to the dining car for some food. To our minor confusion, the dining car, which had yesterday been an ornate collection of tacky wood carvings, was now a tasteful and modern car serving Chinese food. Weird.

We had to pay in Yuan, Chinese currency. 57元, or a little under $10. I only had coins of yuan that I had found before our trip, however, and paid with 57 single yuan coins. The lady serving us was quite amused.

Several hours later we prepared to disembark in Beijing while going through the myriad tunnels the Chinese saw fit to build for this railway.

At 3 sharp we arrived. We walked out of the station into blaringly hot Beijing summer weather with large backpacks on our backs and bags on our fronts. We avoided the endless calls of "Taxi?" and walked up and over the road to a bank to get some Chinese money - can't pay for a taxi in coins.

Pulled out $100 worth and started asking for a cab. They all wanted ridiculous amounts and we argued down to a reasonable base price, taking into account how much we wanted AC from the heat and to put down our bags.

We arrived at the hostel a little before four and checked in. There was some confusion about the rooms and I ended up having to take a different room for this night than any of the other nights. Oh well. Brian and I took a quick siesta.

We walked down to a market building at 5 for some souvineers for Brian and for anything I wanted to send home with him.

It was incredible. Having come from two former soviet countries where bargaining did not happen, Brian and I were back in our element. Items listed originally at 380RMB quickly fell to 25. Our dangerously skilled and honed bargaining abilities were revived. Good cop / bad cop routines, fake arguments, yelling at the seller, telling sob stories about sick girlfriends who really want a dragon shaped puzzle, walking away and making loops of the building; these are just parts of life for us. Leaving the building was the icing on the cake. A shirt depicting Obama in a Chinese Communist uniform - originally 250, came down to 125 with ease. That's about $15... A reasonable price for a shirt, yes? We got it for 30RMB; $3.25 or so. The salesgirl shoved the shirt angrily into Brian's bag and cursed him out. We left feeling on top of the world.

Back in the hostel after a quick dinner break at a local noodle cafeteria around 7:30.

We left for an American Bar and BBQ at 9 but failed to find it. On the way Brian got a call from Ola Linder, our Swedish friend from the train in Russia. We told him where our hostel was and directed the cabbie back to there.

At the hostel, we got two beers and sat down to meet some people. Found ourselves sitting with a bunch of englishmen, defending the USA, as usual.

At 11 Brian announced he was leaving. I ran him out to the street to tell a cab where to go.

There were no free cabs on Chunxiu Lu, our street. We ran down to the first intersection, a busy one, and tried to hail one there. But any and every free cab was getting hailed down by other Chinese and they were not playing fair. So we didn't play fair either.

While a cab was waiting in traffic preparing for a U-turn to pick up a chinese group, Brian and I ran into the street, in front of a speeding bus and cars, jumped the divider (Brian with his huge bag on his back) and got in.

I told the cabby where we wanted to go, but he didn't understand. I changed the intonation slightly and we were all set. But first I had to get out. So I stepped out of the cab as it was about to head off. Didn't really get to say goodbye to Brian... And so began my 7 week solo journey.

Went back to the hostel to keep the beer flowing with Kat and Tom and Cris and Conor and David, the englishmen I'd met. Eventually, after ages of waiting, Ola showed up, with three of the guys from the train, all Swedes of course.

I broke out the vodka and we all drank some more. Then Conor took us to a club.

It was a 50元 cover, but worth it. The club was packed and loud as hell. We very quickly all separated as we went our own ways.

Several hours later it was time for me to go home. Conor and I left together, and David followed a bit later. I'm not sure where the others went... Later I got a text from Ola, saying they were all good and had a great time and we should definitely meet up in the future. We definitely should.

I got home and was in bed by 5:30am, and it was bright outside.