Touchdown! – The Great Wall'ker

After a long haul from London Heathrow to Beijing, I am at last in China! My brother gave me the address of a nice hotel close to the Beijing University and I have slept a little, as I didn’t get any sleep at all on the flight over. This is one of the blessings of being 1.85 cm (6 ft plus) tall and sitting in slightly cramped conditions on the plane.

Things have definitely changed since I was in China in 1998. The town looks a lot more developed and we drove past several of the spectacular Olympic arenas on the way here. The room I am in has both Norwegian, English and Chinese/US type power outlets. But some things remain the same. For instance I can hear the careful and more or less continuous beeping of cars, on the road outside the window, letting other cars in the vicinity know their whereabouts. In Norway, a car usually only beeps if there is a very close call, or one gets angry. Here it is just a happy signal letting you know: “Here I come!”.

Thanks to my parents and sister for giving me a lot of help these last days in Oslo! Much appreciated 🙂

Now that this is posted, it’s time to go out and get something to eat. I will stay in Beijing for a few days now, to get the last preparations finished and hopefully meet a representative for the Great Wall Organisation in Beijing and the Norwegian Embassy.

At the airport safety check, I ended up talking to a very sympathetic guy and told him about the trip I am about to start on. He kindly agreed to write a greeting on the back on the boarding card. Thanks a lot Ole Gunnar Solskjaer!	A very nice greeting
The taxi driver that brought me safely from the airport to the hotel. First he asked if I smoke, and then said he wouldn’t smoke as I didn’t. Five minutes later he asked again if I really didn’t smoke, and I confirmed the fact. Another five minutes later he caved in and opened the window and lit a cigarette.A very nice guy, and we managed to keep up a conversation in Chinese of sorts. I learnt the word “Leng” which means cold in Chinese, and often comes up in a conversation when I say I come from Norway. Then I asked him what the word for warm or hot was, and he uttered a word that could only consist of vowels, and was impossible to repeat… I’ll have to bring out the dictionary.Thanks Andreas and Sue – I have corrected to “Leng” third tone, and the “Re” fourth tone that he referred to.	Taxi driver reading the address of the hotel
The Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium from the 2008 summer Olympics. Taken from the road.	The Bird's nest Olympic stadium

6 thoughts on “Touchdown!”

Pedro April 1, 2009 at 11:53 am

Hei Stephen (Robert)

Regner med at du tar et bilde av ditt første steg på muren. Hva heter det forresten der du starter fra ? Fikk ikke vært med på kakefesten din, men ønsker deg lykke til og kan berolige deg med at jeg skal følge med på både vær og føreforhold etterhvert som du farer frem.

Robert April 1, 2009 at 12:10 pm

Hi Pedro,

Det blir bilder både her og der når jeg setter ut fra Jiayuguan om ca én uke. Takk for at du følger opp med værmann ansvar etter en fantastisk hjelp på http://www.langsnorge.no turen. Alltid kjekt å vite litt på forhånd når det kommer en storm!

Pedro April 1, 2009 at 12:26 pm

Hei igjæn!

I skal nok faa mældinger naar det stormer som værst. Bare mældingende kommer eder i hænde før stormen slaar til. Posten tager tid væt i.