Beijing Travel Quotes

That's because true travel, the kind with no predetermined end, is one of the most selfish endeavors we can possibly undertake-an act in which we focus solely on our own fulfillment, with little regard to those we leave behind. After all, we're the ones venturing out into the big crazy world, filling up journals, growing like weeds. And we have the gall to think they're just sitting at home, soaking in security and stability. It is only when we reopen these wrapped and ribboned boxes, upon our triumphant return home, that we discover nothing is the way we had left it before.

I left Beijing because I wanted to be alone and to forge my own path, but I know now that no path is solitary, we all tread across other people's beginnings and ends.

Beijing has organised for itself the best of all three worlds: First World armed power, Second World economic strength and Third World handouts.

In fact, Wen'an was the prefect location for the scrap-plastics trace: it was close, but not too close, to Beijing and Tianjin, two massive metropolises with lots of consumers and lots of factories in need of cheap raw materials. Even better, its traditional industry - farming - was disappearing as the region's once-plentiful streams and wells were run dry by the region's rampant, unregulated oil industry. So land was plentiful, and so were laborers desperate for a wage to replace the money lost when their fields died. As I hear these stories, I can't help but wonder: How much of the plastic that Wen'an recycles was made from the oil pumped from Wen'an's soil? Are all those old plastic bags blowing down Wen'an's streets ghosts of the fuel that used to run beneath them?

But any time Kheim met the eye of any of his men, he saw the pain there. He saw also that they blamed him for her death. So he was happy to leave Nanking and travel with a gang of officials up the Grand Canal to Beijing. He knew that his sailors would scatter up and down the coast, go their ways so they wouldn't have to see each other and remember; only after years had passed would they want to meet, so that they could remember the pain when it had become so distant and faint that they actually wanted it back, just to feel again they had done all those things, that life had held all those things.

Reviewing the records of two million recruits, Feyrer and his colleagues also checked the natural iodine levels in their hometowns. Nationwide, the researchers found, the introduction of iodine raised the average IQ by an estimated 3.5 points. And in the parts of the country where natural iodine levels were lowest, Feyrer and his colleagues estimated that scores leaped 15 points. It may be hard to believe that such a straightforward change in people’s diets could have such a tremendous effect on intelligence. But as public health workers continue to bring iodine to more of the world, the same jumps happen. In 1990, Robert DeLong, an expert on iodine at Duke University, traveled to the Taklamakan Desert in western China. The region has extremely low levels of iodine in the soil, and the people in the region have resisted attempts to introduce iodized salt. It didn’t help that the people of the region, the Uyghurs, distrusted the government in Beijing. Rumors spread that government-issued iodized salt had contraceptives in it, as a way to wipe out the community. DeLong and his Chinese medical colleagues approached local officials with a different idea: They would put iodine in the irrigation canals. Crops would absorb it in their water, and people in the Taklamakan region would eat it in their food. The officials agreed to the plan, and when DeLong later gave children from the region IQ tests, their average score jumped 16 points.

Looking back from a safe distance on those long days spent alone, I can just about frame it as a funny anecdote, but the reality was far more painful. I recently found my journal from that time and I had written, ‘I’m so lonely that I actually think about dying.’ Not so funny. I wasn’t suicidal. I’ve never self-harmed. I was still going to work, eating food, getting through the day. There are a lot of people who have felt far worse. But still, I was inside my own head all day, every day, and I went days without feeling like a single interaction made me feel seen or understood. There were moments when I felt this darkness, this stillness from being so totally alone, descend. It was a feeling that I didn’t know how to shake; when it seized me, I wanted it to go away so much that when I imagined drifting off to sleep and never waking up again just to escape it, I felt calm. I remember it happening most often when I’d wake up on a Saturday morning, the full weekend stretching out ahead of me, no plans, no one to see, no one waiting for me. Loneliness seemed to hit me hardest when I felt aimless, not gripped by any initiative or purpose. It also struck hard because I lived abroad, away from close friends or family. These days, a weekend with no plans is my dream scenario. There are weekends in London that I set aside for this very purpose and they bring me great joy. But life is different when it is fundamentally lonely. During that spell in Beijing, I made an effort to make friends at work. I asked people to dinner. I moved to a new flat, waved (an arm’s-length) goodbye to Louis and found a new roommate, a gregarious Irishman, who ushered me into his friendship group. I had to work hard to dispel it, and on some days it felt like an uphill battle that I might not win, but eventually it worked. The loneliness abated. It’s taken me a long time to really believe, to know, that loneliness is circumstantial. We move to a new city. We start a new job. We travel alone. Our families move away. We don’t know how to connect with loved ones any more. We lose touch with friends. It is not a damning indictment of how lovable we are.

Politely utter the magic words “kōngtiáo” (pronounced “kung tee-ow”) or “qǐng kāi lěngqì)” (pronounced “ching kai lung chee),” meaning “please turn on the air-conditioning,” and the driver will usually oblige. On longer trips, be sure to take down the number of your taxi so you can report the driver if he “takes you for a ride” or if you leave something valuable in the cab that you need to retrieve. Do not assume you’re being cheated, however, if the taxi driver asks you for several yuan more than the price on the meter. In recent years taxis have added a fuel surcharge (what is called the “Beijing Taxi Special Invoice Of Bunker Adjustment Factor”!). So if the meter says 20 yuan, for example, get ready to pay 22 or 23 yuan. Also be aware that taxi fares in cities like Beijing and Shanghai are a bit more expensive late at night than during the day. Of

Two common Chinese words that are usually pronounced incorrectly here in the U.S., by nearly all television and radio broadcasters, are the words “Beijing” and “yuan.” The “j” in the name of China’s capital city is not pronounced with the soft “j” sound like Je suis in French. The Chinese language lacks that sound entirely. The “j” in “Beijing” is pronounced like the “j” in “jingle.” The yuan is China’s currency, just as the dollar is ours. It is not pronounced “you-anne” or “you-awn.” It is pronounced “you-when,” or “U.N.” when said quickly as if it were one syllable.

China, talking about restrooms is very important, especially when seconds count. Memorize these characters: (Nán) is male, (Nǚ) is female. Often they may be more prominently displayed than the words “Men” or “Women” or even the familiar gender-specific silhouettes we are accustomed to seeing. Not to worry, however, if you can’t read the Chinese characters for the two gender choices. The general rule of thumb in almost all of China is “men left, women right,” meaning that the men’s restroom will be on the left-hand side and women’s on the right. Only in the areas populated primarily by minority peoples is the opposite true. If you’re female, and at least half the human race is of that persuasion, then you have a special treat in store at some Chinese airport restrooms outside of the largest cities like Beijing and Shanghai. You may walk into one of the lovely modern stalls provided for you. Lulled into a sense of security and familiarity by such a modern-looking restroom so far from home, you don’t even think to check to see if there is any toilet paper in the stall. That’s because in America there are always several giant-sized rolls in industrial-looking acrylic dispensers.

Virtually everything of any value in North Korea originates in China, and it mostly reaches the DPRK via Dandong. North Korean officials and businessmen, like the men I met on the train from Beijing, coming cap in hand on state-sponsored shopping trips are everywhere. Easily spotted by their badges proclaiming their loyalty to the various Kims, at night they haunt the Korean restaurants and karaoke bars within view of the DPRK itself. During the day, they congregate on the street by the border post beneath the bridge that leads to North Korea. From the early morning to the late afternoon, the line of trucks waiting to cross into the DPRK tails back down the road. There are warehouses and wholesale shops all along it and a constant procession of North Koreans going in and out of them. They buy spark plugs and coils of wire, generators and tyres, household appliances and kitchenware. The goods are destined for North Korea’s armed forces, more than a million strong, for the few industrial concerns still working, or for the Pyongyang elite.

A similar phenomenon has occurred in Guangxi Province in the south-west, where the Zhuang minority has increased to well over sixteen million people in recent years, making them the most numerous of all China’s minorities. Intermarriage between the Zhuang and Han is common, allowing people of mixed ancestry to claim to be Zhuang. But deciding to become a minority viewed as no threat by Beijing is very different from identifying yourself as Uighur or Tibetan. I have never heard of any Han choosing to do that, despite the opportunity to have more kids or go to university.

I realised then that Hotan isn’t just the unofficial capital of Uighurstan; it is the current front line in Beijing’s battle to subjugate all Xinjiang. Not long after my visit, eighteen people died when the police station close to the bazaar was stormed by a group of Uighurs armed with petrol bombs and knives. They tore down the Chinese flag and raised a black one with a red crescent on it, before being killed or taken prisoner. Uighurs said the attack was prompted by the city government trying to stop women from wearing all-black robes and especially veils, an ongoing campaign by the Chinese across all Xinjiang. They claimed, too, that men were being forced to shave their beards. The Xinjiang government said the assault was an act of terrorism and that the attackers had called for a jihad. But no evidence was produced to demonstrate any tangible link between Uighur nationalists and the militant Islamic groups in Afghanistan, Pakistan and central Asia.

Now, I was unemployed in Beijing, and my former ambition seemed like the pollution that smudged the sky, a great green cloud composed of a billion different particles of fear and uncertainty. Without a career I hardly knew who I was anymore.

I'm a time traveler. I travel to far-off lands, places, and times you can only dream of. With a snap of a finger, a gasp, a blink, I am there. I've skinny-dipped in the sixties, robbed a steam train in the 1800s, run from gangsters during Prohibition, climbed to mountains outside Beijing. I don't know how many reincarnations I have left. I don't know my first parents, my first family. All I know is that I'm an orphan of the stars, born to countless families with countless sisters and brothers and lovers and friends. Countless enemies, I suppose, as well. I've toured Dante's castle in Limbo. I can speak Chinese and Danish. I've stolen treasures worth millions, turned them over in my hands. I've been shot twice. I broke a boy's nose at school. I know kung fu. I'm dying. I don't know how to trust. I'm angry, and I'm bitter, and you are the only bright spot in all of it.

Chinese clients used to talk only about prices and vintages, not what was in the bottle. Now the important thing is not how much money you have but how you express it in wine knowledge.” Tim Weiland, former general manager of the exclusive Aman at Summer Palace in the emperor’s onetime retreat in Beijing, suggests that the image of China’s wealthy class as crass nouveau riche—mixing expensive Bordeaux with Coca-Cola, for example—is entirely out of date. “The nouveaux riches of ten years ago are now the old rich,” he says. “They have homes in Switzerland and Aspen, they’re incredibly sophisticated and well traveled—much more well traveled than I am—and they know their wines.

By influencing the private and public pronouncements of economists, Beijing shapes global perceptions of China’s economic outlook. When financial risks to the Chinese economy became serious in 2015, the CCP began exerting subtle influence on international banks not to rock the boat with bad news. UBS, the largest Swiss bank, has a long history in China and has been actively pursuing a deeper role in its financial system.103 It too has been pressured to rein in its public commentary, and in 2018 one of its employees was detained in China, for no apparent reason, causing UBS management to bar travel by its staff to China.

100 Air China: 22" × 16" × 8" (max: Economy, 11 pounds/Business, 2 pieces of luggage, 17 pounds each) 101 American Airlines: 22" × 14" × 9" (max: undisclosed) 102 Delta Air Lines: 22" × 14" × 9" (max: 15 pounds when flying out of Singapore Changi Airport, 22 pounds when flying out of Beijing Capital Airport and Shanghai Pudong Airport) 103 EasyJet: 22" × 17.7" × 9.8" (max: undisclosed) 104 Emirates: 22" × 15" × 8" (max: 15 pounds) 105 Quantas: 22" × 14.2" × 9" (max: 15 pounds) 106 Ryanair: 21.7" × 15.7" × 7.9" (max: 22 pounds) 107 Southwest Airlines: 24" × 16" × 10" (max: 15.4 pounds) 108 Turkish Airlines: 21.7" × 15.7" × 9" (max: 17.6 pounds) 109 United Airlines: 22" × 14" × 9" (max: undisclosed)

What China cannot ignore is how the narrative of the CCP as the champion and redeemer of a victimised China could dangerously narrow China’s options if an accident with the US or Japan should occur. War is not in China’s interest, and Beijing may for all the reasons I have earlier set out, want to contain the incident. But Beijing could be trapped by its own historical narrative, and the highly nationalistic public opinion that the CCP both cultivates and fears may force China down paths it does not really want to travel. I think Chinese leaders are aware of this danger but cannot abandon or tone down the narrative they have chosen to legitimate their right to rule because they have no convincing replacement.

For CDC chief Redfield the Chinese failure to close down international flights was disastrous. He told colleagues the United States had silently filled with Covid-19 infections “from Italy, Spain, Germany, France, Great Britain, Belgium.” All this late-winter travel brought clusters of Covid to the United States. “Also unknown to us that probably half of those clusters weren’t even symptomatic, so you couldn’t find them” with airport screening. “It was difficult to understand how China had aggressive travel restrictions within China, and yet did not move to any travel restrictions” for people who wanted to leave China and go abroad, Redfield said. “If there could have been one major, global action that could’ve really saved hundreds of thousands of lives, it’s if they had just shut down their out-of-China travel at the same time they shut down their intra-China travel. “They really started moving in the latter part of January. That’s where they quarantined people. That’s where they shut down the city. That’s where they stopped the trains. They really locked down all of Wuhan at one point. I think they quarantined over 11 million people. You couldn’t go from Wuhan to Beijing, but you could go Wuhan to London.

Whenever I think of these things, I feel an exquisite pang of longing. I feel oddly depressed; it's almost like I know too much simply to be in the moment anymore, to enjoy what I used to relish so uncritically. I'm aware that there is a bigger, far more complicated world out there than I'd ever realized, and just like the students at Beijing University, I've glimpsed it only fleetingly, peripherally. I've sensed the vast expanse of my own ignorance now. I feel antsy and constricted and a deep, almost sexual yearning for velocity, for some sort of raw, transcendent experience that I cannot even begin to articulate.

Chinese techno-authoritarianism scares the West. The language used is dystopian, and the fear heightened. Readers or viewers are meant to take away the idea that Beijing under President Xi Jinping is destined to create a global infrastructure of control, a unique threat to the world and incomparable to any other nation. Take a September 2020 article in the Atlantic in which journalist Ross Anderson painted a petrifying image of China wanting to have worldwide domination of artificial intelligence. “In the near future,” he wrote, “every person who enters a public space could be identified, instantly, by AI matching them to an ocean of personal data, including their every text communication, and their body’s one-of-a-kind protein-construction schema.” He noted that algorithms will soon be able to gather a multitude of data points, such as reading habits, purchases, travel records, and friends, as well as predict political opposition before it occurs.