I returned from Qingdao on the coast to Beijing. This is the railway station and it's shocking what the air quality is like compared to Qingdao. It's really smoggy in Beijing and they blame it on Mongolia and the dust. I know it stung my eyes on the worst days.
I was in Pacific Coffee for my usual brunch. Tuya, my Mongolian friend from my previous trip happened to be chatting and we quickly arranged for her to fly over from Ulaanbaator (capital of Mongolia) to Beijing to spend a few days. On other days, we played a great deal of pool. I hadn't played much for years but while in Beijing I started to get pretty good again. I managed to avoid getting completely humilated.
We also frequented Huxley's in Hoohai park quite a lot. It's a beautiful, scenic area of traditional hootong buildings, packed with bars, restaurants, girlie bars, all surrounding a lake. We went there several nights, meeting old and making new friends. This is Gordon, Ana, and another Dutch-Indonesian girl I don't remember the name of.
This is the area known as Hoo Hai Lake or park. I like it a lot. So much to explore but I hardly scratched the surface.
Anyway, my time in Beijing and Asia was over much too quickly, even though I extended it by 3 days to have one more weekend. I flew back to LA with a great deal of sadness after a whole month away. My head tells me that I should be back in April but my impulsive nature being what it is, it might be considerably sooner.
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