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As of today, I’ve had 10 language classes, which is about 25 hours so far.

I went to the PC bar with Harry for the second time, today. We ended up playing some Warcraft 3 and Counter Strike.

I’m talking to this Chinese university student about encyclopedias on my computer, and I mention my partial offline Wikipedia that I setup custom for myself. I also mention that the Chinese government blocks Wikipedia so no one here can easily see it. She disagrees and says the government doesn’t block anything. She says it is just an Internet problem, like a technical problem with the network. I say, that’s what the government wants you to think. I guess the Great Firewall of China is doing its job.

After class today I visited the Dongyue Temple, which is just a block or two away from my apartment. I’d say a pretty neat place. You can see it on Google Earth to the north of the apartment if you use the coordinates I gave.

Yesterday, 1.6 Million Olympic tickets went on sale at 9AM. My teacher was in line to buy them, but the entire system was overloaded and no one got tickets. So instead, I got an hour cut out of my class. Normally, I’d be happy with something like that, but I’m paying a lot of money for these classes. It seems like everyday I have to wait like 15 to get inside the office since the door is locked too.

The six year old girl in the family, Candy has gotten sick. I’m not quite sure it is the same virus I got since she seems to be coughing a lot more. I noticed the family got her about 10 bottles of medicine. Meanwhile, she is coughing into the food at the dinner table and coughing in my face. I’m not concerned though since I already got sick.

Today I visited the main 2008 Olympic site after class. The Olympics are less than a year away and the location is a huge construction yard. Today I wish I had a mask because I had to walk along a main highway in order to get there. I could feel the dirt and pollution in my throat today.

I got a glimpse of the National Stadium and National Aquatics Center under construction. There wasn’t too much to see since a fence blocked the view. I wanted to visit now so I could compare later on with what I see on TV or a later visit.

Later, the son, Harry said lets see the family’s new car. They bought a brand new 2008 model I think. It is a black Chrysler 300C with a 2.7L V6 engine. The same US model has a 5.7L V8 because Americans need to use up more gas. The car is assembled right here in Beijing, China. I did notice at least one USA part though!

And Google Earth users, if you want to see where this apartment is located, here are the coordinates: 39°55’10.16"N 116°26’16.57"E

This week I have a private Mandarin Chinese class from 9:30AM – 12:00. Today was mostly review so I can catch up for the group class starting November 12.

After class I was able to ride on the new subway Line 5 that opened up in Beijing just 3 weeks ago. That’s the exciting thing about this place, there is always something new.

Then I went to find Lunar Tones Maid Cafe. I mentioned these in Japan, but I never visited. I happened to go to the first one in Beijing on its opening day today. One of the people I met at the concert last week works here on Monday’s, so I decided to go. I didn’t know it was the opening day, so I was the first foreigner to ever visit. The waitresses dress up in French maid uniforms here and serve you.

For dinner we had a break from strange meat and instead more vegetables, which I think is better.

Today the skies really cleared up and it must have been one of the clearest days I have seen in the city. I made it to Peking University to meet up with a student and look around the campus. The university is supposed to be one of the oldest and best in Asia, something like the Harvard of China.

Today for dinner the family added pork liver to the menu, in addition to the donkey meat. Liver is another food I’m not used to eating. Tomorrow is my first day of class. I’ll have a week of classes, and then a week off.

Today began with a power outage that lasted until about 1PM. The surrounding block had no power and I’m not sure why. For the past two days, the skies have been filled with fog and apparently smog.

I also read today that on November 20, visitors to Japan will be photographed and fingerprinted. I avoiding having to go through that at least!

I still feel a little sick today. I almost was going to take a trip outside the city, but with this fog and feeling sick I decided to stay home today. I did get to go along to an outdoor vegetable market with the housekeeper which was pretty interesting though. I did some reading and thought about some travel plans for China today. I’m only going to have around three weeks, so I’m going to have to limit myself to certain areas.

Today I took a trip over to the Beijing Underground City. I ended up paying $2 to a pedicab driver to get me there. I didn’t want to, but he kept asking and I didn’t know for sure where it was. It is underground after all! I was close and it was only a minute or so ride. I wish he would have pointed the way instead, but he would have lost out on all the cash.

At the entrance, I paid the fee and a tour guide explained everything in English. Too bad there were no photos allowed inside. He said there were 500km of tunnels built between 1969 and 1979 mostly for protection from nuclear war. He claimed you could get anywhere in the city from this underground network, and even outside the city to the airport and the Great Wall of China. It is hard to tell if all of that is true or not. We only walked through 500m of tunnels. Most were 4 feet wide, one was 8 feet wide.

Later today I was walking through a different part of the city and I saw a door to an Air Raid Shelter. I think that must lead down into the underground city. There might be a thousand entrances scattered around.

Today I also walked through the Ming City Wall Ruins Park, a section of the wall that used to surround the entire city. Of note there was a sign there that said this was the end point of the Grand Canal of China, the longest canal in the world. I didn’t see any water though, only roads! Then I walked by the Ancient Observatory. I also walked by Zhihua Si Temple on the way back home.

For dinner there was four whole crabs on the table. I was given half of one and tried my best to get all the meat out. Not the easiest thing to eat. At one point I tried squeezing one of the legs to crack it open, but it exploded all over my shirt. We also had donkey meat at the table today. I can’t say donkey is the best food ever but it was alright.

When I first arrived in Beijing, the home stay guy said that people have changed a lot in the three months I’ve been gone. There have been politeness campaigns such as billboards in an attempt to make the city more hospitable for the 2008 Olympic games.

I’ve had a cold for the last couple days, so I’m just taking it easy today. I did make it out to the electronics market or the "Wonderful Digital Jungle" as it is called. Only one block away, I can get any computer parts or any electronics in one of the largest markets for that in the city. I also noticed the embassy of North Korea is next door to my apartment. Interesting.

The lunar orbiter successfully launched yesterday and from the amount of coverage on state run TV, it seems like big news. Tonight a "Family Education" person visited the family to give help on parenting.

I should note the Internet situation is much better at this home over the last home in Beijing. Instead of paying by the minute, they have a proper unlimited service. Still, it is only 1Mbit and I’m trying to talk them into upgrading to 2Mbit downloads. The first day I arrived, the son showed me a wireless 802.11g router stored away in a drawer. It took a while to get it working since it was all in Chinese (TP-Link is the brand). But now I have unlimited wireless Internet, so that has really worked out well. I thought I would have to buy a router at least.

Today the news in China is on the launch of a lunar orbiter that is due to launch today.

In the afternoon I headed to the Haidian District for a concert. I took some time to walk around some of the more back streets. I found a dirty street with a lot of street vendors and restaurants. I even saw a bunch of pool tables under a highway bridge. It was kind of risky, but I tried a restaurant and got a dish for under $1. It was steaming hot, so I didn’t get sick. It is starting to get cold out, enough so I’ll see my breath in the evening.

Outside the concert hall was a 1:1 model of the rocket that launched the first Chinese man into space. Too bad I didn’t have a camera with me. The Arch Enemy concert was pretty wild. I think they had to change the name of their tour from "World Tyranny" to "Holy Live" because their normal tour name was too appropriate for this country perhaps. An English speaking guy started talking to me and introduced me to a couple of his friends at the concert. He said this is the biggest type concert from a foreign band of this style so far in Beijing. There were high priced tickets and low priced tickets corresponding to areas separated by a fence. Barely anyone bought the high priced tickets, so there was a nearly empty area. Near the end of the concert, a bunch of people pushed down the fence and everyone rushed in, and security was unable to stop it. I thought that was surprising behavior for China maybe the reason this kind of foreign (in this case Swedish) music doesn’t gets stopped by the government most of the time.