Unlike London, the underground trains in Beijing are very cheap; 2 RMB per trip (that equates to approximately 13p) and by trip I mean you can travel from anywhere on the underground to anywhere else on the underground, no matter how many different lines you need to use and how long your journey is. At present there are only 4 lines operating; Line 1, Line 2, Line 5 and Line 13. These serve Beijing pretty well but, again unlike London, they don't cover the entirety of the city. If you live in the east or west, you'll have to get a taxi everywhere (or at least to the closest station), since the subway only really covers central Beijing, the north and the south (and even then it doesn't stretch all the way north or south). What there is, though, is pretty good ...   more »

Go to any bar on Sanlitun Lu (the British bar street) and there will be a semi-resident local there with a stack of DVD's for sale. Without being asked, they will sit at your table and thrust into your hands a pile of DVD's in an attempt to get you to buy them ...   more »

After spending hours scouring the various markets and supermarkets of Beijing in an attempt to find a replacement part that would enable me to plumb in the washing machine, I was beginning to feel a little despondent. Would we ever be able to live like modern humans in China and possess a working washing machine? It seemed like a distant pipe dream and believe me, if having a working washing machine becomes a dream for you then you know things are not particularly rosy ...   more »

Well, it's been a bit of a chore getting all the utilities on our new place (photos of which to come soon) set up and working. Electricity and gas, on the face of it, seem to be quite simple; they both work on a prepayment system. Put money on a card, put card into meter, get two of the necessities of modern living piped into your lovely abode. Not quite so simple, sadly. For instance, where do you go to fill up these cards? Quite strangely, no one seems to know. The leasing office were unable to help, they didn't know. Management couldn't supply the information (which seems insane, surely the management of the apartment complex should know these things!) ...   more »

Without the internet and having to traipse around Beijing in order to make our stay in China as easy as possible, I have been plugged almost permanently into my shiny and lovely iPod Touch (it's amazing, this contraption, the touch screen is phenomenal and I love it!). I was walking around a market street, looking at some guitars during a moment off from chores when one of the proprietors came up to me and thrust a guitar into my hands ...   more »

Sorry for the absence, folks, but it's been tricky trying to get an internet connection. I've been asking various different people at the management and leasing offices where I can get connected, both in English and (very) broken Chinese ("Wo xiang shangwang"). Someone at the leasing office who spoke English managed to tell me that I had to go to Xibahe and apply there. My first question was the rather obvious "where is Xibahe"? I was curtly told that any taxi driver would take me there. So, emboldened with the knowledge that internet access couldn't be far away, I got a taxi and said in a fairly confident voice "Xibahe". He had no idea where that was ...   more »