Now having read in the Lonely Planet Tibet I had an idea of what would be cool places to visit in Tibet, it was time to see what the travel agent had answered about permits and give her more detailed information about my itinerary. The mail had bounced, not so good. I instead called her and she texted me her mail, apparently there was typo in the mail from Mathias. I sent her a new mail with two example itineraries stolen from tibet-travels.com (thanks for the tip Lotta). It seems like I could have prepared this quite some time ago to be on the safe side, but where would the challenge and uncertainty be then?

We had brunch at Hatsume, a japanese restaurant that Alex had recommended for their excellent maki rolls. It was yet another nice japanese restaurant and we tried some of the different rolls. They were really nice, not necessary to the quality of the ingredients but rather the compositions. In addition one just have to try a roll named ninja if able.

Laura then wanted to visit, *drumroll* a market *cymbal* near the Beijing Zoo, Ulf and I figured they might have some parks nearby so we joined her. We thought of the Zoo but I’m kind of against the idea of caging animals in the first place and after reading that the Beijing Zoo was worse than most (except for pandas who got a decent treatment) we ditched that idea. Instead a short market-visit and some old school lounging in a park with the elders and enjoying the Beijing sun. This was another beautiful day and I think that we might been a bit too harsh on previous judgements regarding Beijing.

It seemed that my travel agent had managed to do some bookings for me now, I made some minor changes (who needs a soft sleeper for a 48 hours trip when there is a cheaper hard one?) and will get news tomorrow if she manages to book me the train ticket. If so, I leave for Lhasa via the newly built railway above the permafrost on saturday night.

We had a snack at a fast food chain previously neglected by me, KFC. I got myself a mexican twister and an ice cream, this was about 1.5 € and didn’t taste that bad at all. Ulf got some nuggets though which I could tell from the taste was pure unhealthiness and probably never originated from a living animal, least not chicken.

The last market for the day was a tour back to the black market, Ulf and I needed new bags for our cameras now when we had our sexy 18-200 OS lenses. Said and done, at least that’s what we thought. The driver dropped us at another market, Laura stayed while Ulf and I scouted for the familiar foul stench and entryway to the black market. We found it quite quick and managed to snag two bags about 3 € each, awesome.

Back at the hostel, it was time for some blogging before dinner which we had at Pink Loft. It’s a shame to eat somewhere twice but it was really nice and rather cheap so we figured it would be ok. The night was finished by cozily watching a film. Uffe having the laptop on his belly, Laura and me on each side. Not exactly my projector, surround system and lovely sofa but at least I’m still on vacation in China.

Back to Beijing, the city of pollution. The flight from Shanghai went all well but it was still quite late so we slept like babies back at Poachers Inn. When waking up we were informed that the previously included breakfast was not part of the 2008 prices. Which wasn’t much of a loss to be honest. We instead shopped at the local supermarket and realized that the sky was blue. Still the air had the Beijing aroma of gunpowder but it looked much better than earlier days.

We decided to do some sightseeing now when we had such a good weather. I had tried to google some information about cleaning my sensor but the best information I had was quite vague and two years old. So when we picked up some luggage that we had left at Alex fathers apartment, I asked Florence and a girl named Sara if they knew any canon locations. Some chinese googling and two phone calls later I had an address in chinese writing and a number. Sweet.

We first checked out the forbidden city which was big, really big. I guess one could say that we rushed through since we only spent two hours there though. What stood out from other similar places is that these are so young. The emperors had phono records and the dates on signs went in on the 20th century.
After visiting the Forbidden Palace we went to see Tiananmen Square as well. This is the worlds biggest public square and also gives a good position to take pictures towards the Heavenly Gate of Peace where Mao’s famous picture hangs.

We also saw the Monument to People’s Heroes which, not surprisingly, depicts patriotic characters in Chinese history. Again the feeling that this was really recent history came to my mind, and the rather tight security also reminded of the past.

While strolling around we were approached by a chinese girl in our age who was eager to train her english. She was actually traveling by her own and lived in the north-eastern parts close to Russia. She kept a good stream of compliments between inquiring sentences so we wondered if there was some hidden agenda but it seemed she was just a very talkative and friendly girl. After some chatting/listening we decided to jump in a cab to visit the canon quick service centre though and said a quick good-bye to the girl.

Languages are interesting, it was easier to explain that I wanted to clean my cmos sensor than saying Alex address in a way that Taxi drivers understand. 10 € and half an hour later my camera was as good as new, lovely. Celebration at some cheap chinese food chain where we enjoyed different dumplings and not as delicious sausages and some other meat.

This was enough work for one day but why not go to Yashow and fix a pair of jeans that needed customization and see how my suits fit? Said and done, I was perhaps a little picky but in the end it looked just fine. So I ordered two more shirts, and realizing that I would never fit this in the bags I brought with me I bought a cabin luggage as well. I paid 7 € for the the cabin luggage after some haggling and was later complimented by another peddler for my good deal (which may or might not be a truth ;))

When arriving home I saw that the jeans was magically too long anyway so I had to get back again. Finally happy with all purchases me and Ulf decided to split some noodles and a few meat-on-a-sticks for deserts. A long productive day came to an end but tomorrow I need to look into the Tibet traveling a bit more.

Today the breakfast at the hotel sounded like a better idea than yesterday, Ulf was still in bed so we brought some to go for him though. The general slowness hadn’t completely worn off so the plans were pack things up, check out and then see what we’ll do.

We went for elemental fresh again, the others wanted to get stuffed their to avoid being dependent of the quality of the food on their flight at 17. Laura, Ulf and me don’t leave until 21 so we went for a late check-out allowing us a room until 18. After another awesome brunch at elemental we strolled along Huaihai to check out some real stores.

Laura and Helen just had to check out the sale at H&M. When waiting for Helen to finish her shopping Laura and I stood still just minding our business when people started looking at us more than usual. A few couples even reacted like we scared them, and not looking more frightening than usual I was a bit confused. The next scared girl made us understand that they probably mistook us for showroom dummies. It was time for the swedes to leave the swedish store in Shanghai.

Back at the hotel we gave Ulf, who now started to get better some food from elemental. After some blog writing it’s now time to check out.