This is a photo I took when I first lived in China in 2002, in the southern province of Guangdong: a bus with metal seats Continue reading
Tag Archives: transport
Sleeping At Wuhan Airport
livepine posted a photo on Flickr of someone sleeping on the chairs at Wuhan Airport:
This photo was of particular interest to me, because I’d just finished writing about my experiences at Wuhan Airport and the Wuhan Tianhe Airport Hotel.
I’ve spent quite a bit of time on those chairs myself. I probably only pass through Wuhan Airport once every year or so, but I’ve had a fair bit of bad luck with flights being delayed due to extreme fog, both at Wuhan and our hometown up in the mountains, which is often pretty misty. Delays are common.
Anyway, I can symphasise with the person in the photo. But as I mentioned in my post about my experience at Wuhan Airport, you have to keep an eagle eye on the Departures screen if you want to make sure you don’t miss the flight. I hope the guy in this picture didn’t miss his flight!
The Cost Of Living In China
Recently, I was browsing a forum topic on the cost of living in China. I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to respond to question posed on the forum.
Beijing Railway Station At Night
Magnifique, lizixiang, 璀璨！ posted a couple of superb photos of the Beijing Railway Station (Beijing Zhan) at night:
It looks very impressive at night time. The building is lit superbly, but that’s not a surprise – the Chinese are excellent at lighting buildings at night.
opened in the 1950s, as can be seen from its architecture (which merges traditional architecture with 50s-design). It is located in an extremely central location, just next to Jianguomen, and is within the confines of the city’s 2nd Ring Road.
The Beijing Railway Station is a familiar site to me (and to many other visitors to Beijing), although I’ve never caught a train from here. I used to catch a bus near here and the bus stop was always very busy!
Beijing Metro (Subway)
The Beijing Metro has a name for being efficient and cheap, but my last experience with it was one of overcrowding and frustration.
One of our friends explained that the government had recently dropped the price on the subway (in about March), leading to a sharp increase in passengers. Apparently the overcrowding was a direct result of this. I hope they manage to find a solution to this before the Olympics.
A picture of a Beijing subway train by jcortell.
As I said, the Beijing Metro has (or had) a good name and is the recommended form of transport in Beijing. I haven’t used it much, but I’ve heard enough people say that to know it must be true (and let’s face it, it’s not hard to beat the Beijing traffic).
Anyway in this photo, the train appears pretty crowded, but believe me, I’ve seen worse, especially on other forms of transport.
I have a half written post somewhere, titled Bush Crush, about an experience where I couldn’t even get both feet on the ground (yes, I was standing). I’ll have to finish that post off!