Millipedes and Scorpians

I only ate one of the above. Guess which.



So I'm in Beijing, I braved the crowds at the forbidden city, and became a bit of a tourist attraction myself along with a tall blonde lady I was with. There we were, listening to the dulcit tones of Roger Moore (who narrates the audio guide) and out of no-where Alex has been grabbed by an over-excited Chinese family who have started taking photos with her. This happened so much that there were suggestions of charging for our services as "impromptu freak show". The thing about the Forbidden city is that it's so bloody big. By the time we got to the South gate no amount of soothing facts from Roger Moore could entice us into any of the side streets, so we missed out the Concubines quarters and many of the exhibitions. It is spectacular, but I think I got a bit "over-spectacled"!



Yesterday I took a trip to the Great Wall. Not one of these soft "we'll drive you to the wall, let you wander around, take photos and then shop" trips for me - oh no, I opted for the 10km hike over a rough area of the wall, up and down steep slopes with broken pathways. In the absence of kendal mint cake the 1kg of honeycomb bought from a street market suddenly didn't seem like such a bad idea! I think I took about 100 photos, each of which looks like every postcard you see of the Great Wall, but I was on it! I could hardly believe it! Then at the end there was the option of walking ANOTHER 20 minutes, or of taking a flying fox from rather a large height, and across a lake, and getting to the restaurant by boat. I took the flying fox option - brilliant fun, just hanging from a harness over nothingness. More importantly I didn't have to walk any further before lunch!



There were loads of Millipedes on the wall. Some of which I later saw on skewers for sale at the night market. I, however, opted to try the scorpian. Still wriggling before being fried.

I have moved hostels and am deep inside a hutong district, which means taxis at night, but fantastic street food and many many bicycles during the day. Oh and that I hear the phrase "hello, pretty lady, I give you good price" at least every 50 paces when I step out of the hostel! I couldn't say whether there really are 10 million bicycles in Beijing, or whatever that number is, I keep losing count. And as anyone who has ever nearly been run down by a rickshaw knows you have other things to concentrate on whilst walking down the road! (Incidently, do rickshaws count as bicycles?)

p.s. Scorpian tastes a bit like ready salted crisps.