I am now a Beijinger

Although I’ve been in China for quite a few days now, the Great Firewall is not letting me access either my blog or facebook (sob!). Hopefully, I can fix that when I get to my village but for now I’ve asked my sister to post this up for me. I can still get email and am also sent any comments posted on my blog through yahoo.
Anyway – I’m loving Beijing. It’s a much cleaner and calmer city than I was expecting. When I took the subway to work during rush hour on Monday morning, you would never know that 23 million people were doing the same thing.
The VSO Chinese office staff are great – we all went out for a banquet lunch together on the first day and they’ve all been taking time to chat and answer questions.
On Tuesday, I had my first Chinese lesson here and as the level was too easy, I said I would just practice alone. However, VSO have found me a private tutor and I had my first 3 hour lesson with her today. After a bit of dialogue practicing asking for directions and finding my way about, we went out into the streets for a real life practice and it was hilarious. She would be walking beside me hissing in Chinese, “Ask him how to get to the nearest subway station,” and when I did, she would be standing right behind me (clearly a local) so our victim would be looking at us both suspiciously while answering my halting Mandarin. Once when I asked, “Can you tell me which number bus to get to Jianguomin?” the guy gave me a very strange look and said, “The bus timetable’s right behind you.” Oops!
Yesterday, I took the afternoon off and went to Tian’an’men Square. It was great just to have the chance to wander around on my own, taking photos and people-watching. Once I get to my placement, I can hopefully post some pics. I wandered up to but not into the Forbidden City and also went into Mao’s Mausoleum which was very interesting although I won’t explain why here (on a public site.)
On Saturday, I’m heading out of the city to visit the Great Wall. Soooo looking forward to it!

One day to go!

I've now said goodbye to Edinburgh and moved out of my flat. I'm back home with my parents in Fife for the final two nights. I finally feel that I've done everything I can do before I go. All the packing, all the cleaning, all the many,many telephone calls to various companies to cancel things...
So far, I have two big bags to check in and two fairly big bags to carry on. My job for tomorrow is to try to whittle things down a bit. ;-)
Today I got some details from the Beijing Office about my in-country training. The two weeks are a nice mix of cultural awareness, VSO training and language skills. Plus, next weekend I get to pay a visit to the Great Wall! Can't wait!