Grey skies
I took 6 photos in Beijing. I whined a little about the bad haze condition on Instagram which was why we left within 36 hours of arriving. I had grand plans! Of climbing the Great Wall, of touching and seeing cherry blossoms for the first time in my life, of stuffing my face with good dumplings, of visiting 798 Art District and Cao Chang Di (my translation: field of grass) to get a bit closer to Ai Wei Wei’s legacy.
We did none of the above, got nowhere close in fact. The haze made everything harder to do – breathing, seeing, walking, navigating, getting lost, asking for directions. Even with our N95 masks, I couldn’t handle the haze and succumbed to a migraine by late afternoon. Me thinks everyone who lives in Beijing is superhuman. Even their dogs are superdogs. They love their doggies there, it’s so sweet! Fun fact: The only two times I’ve seen this dog IRL was in Shanghai and again in Beijing.
Back to the 6 photos, I took these while roaming the streets of Sanlitun. On hindsight, we should have gone somewhere else for the only day we had in the city. In fact my instincts failed me horribly the entire time in Beijing because the places I picked for lunch and dinner were disappointing too.
The photos make me sound like I’m crazy right? What haze? Everyone’s out and about, sitting outdoors with their friends. Superhumans, I told you. And also, pictures lie. I follow FLOTUS on Instagram and she was visiting Beijing a few weeks before us. She was doing tai chi in a park! I even told my family, if Michelle Obama’s allowed to go to Beijing, the haze can’t be that bad. My friend gave it back to me good though, she said Beijing probably cleared the haze for MObama :\ Possible, possible.
I’m not sure if we’re coming back for you, Beijing. I still check the haze index on random days, for fun, hoping there’s one day I can tell Ben, “oh my god I think it’s getting better, let’s go back!”.
