I、m in Beijing 北京

As the title describes, I’m in the middle of my BJ trip. Here is a quick post. Well, I don’t want to long list things again, pictures may be easier. I have bought a lomo DC earlier and this trip relies on it completely — the picture quality is fairly good but I like snapshotting.

Two more things to say:

• I have got a niece called Kaitlyn!
• Monkey Majik is cool!

Quick Note: Spain (and Portugal) Trip (22-28July09)

[[SPAIN]]

[PPL]

• people are happy
• people tend not to care about rules: no queue at bus station; some ignore traffic light (also the drivers!)
• people are nice, polite, and welcome tourist
• no bad kids
• not many people speak fluent English
• small population of chinese and other foreigner
• Chinese open “chinese store” beside chinese restaurant. chinese food has no place in spain
• people are sporty; have beautiful body — hard to see a fat man/woman

[ECON]

• SME shops everywhere
• privately owned small shops can survive
• things are not cheaper than UK
• food: expensive (6+euro for a mcdonal meal)
• public transport: cheap (1.xx euro for most bus; taxi costs almost half of that in UK)
• many people are paid at minimum wage (around 600 euro/month as i remember) and live a good life
• haven’t seen many manufacturing industries

[FOOD]

• i fallen in love with the bar-cafe
• bar-cafe: it’s like spainish style 茶餐廳; sell any kinds of drink + tapas and food
• all day
• sea food are nice
  tapas are nice
  diet coke is called “cola light”
  beer is cheaper than soft drink (1-2euro for a 300ml bottle of soft drink)

[LAYOUT]

• buildings are generally taller than those in liverpool
• old church and building everywhere but rather clean and tidy
• Graffiti everywhere like part of the culture
• roads filled with buses, taxis and motor car
• streets are wide and comfortable in commercial area
• blocks pack tight with lanes in residential and older regions

[WEATHER]

• was 45`C in Sevilla; around 30 in Malaga
• quite dry. nicely hot. slightly windy

[ETC.]

• English songs on the radio
• many festivals
• train: clean, tidy, big, comfortable
• beach, beach, beach

[[PORTUGAL]]

(this post is long enough!)