depthq - ccm|mac

I received a call yesterday at 8:30am and it woke me up. It was Monica, my cousin from the US. I was delighted to hear from her. It has been 12 years since we last seen each other in Malaysia. She is heading off to the Badaling Great Wall for the day and wanted to meet up somehow.

I woke up, got ready and toyed with the idea that I will go to Badaling to meet up with her. I definitely should do it, I told myself and I went online to do some research.

I knew I could go from Tiananmen but I wanted a shorter and faster way. Miya was online and I asked her and she suggested taking a 419 and then a 919 at "qing he xiao ying qiao nan" and that is what I ended up doing.

I arrived at "qing he xiao ying qiao nan" and I didn't see any 919 bus stop. I asked around and no one knew. So I was walking around and I saw atleast two 919s passing on the "qing he xiao ying qiao". Oh no! I must be at the wrong stop!

So I walked towards the "qing he" station, which I guessed must be where those 919s were coming from, and suddenly another 919 appears and passes me. I didn't think much and I gave chase. I see that it didn't stop at that "qing he xiao ying qiao nan" and it was resting due to the red traffic light. I was still running and I stopped to ask a passerby about the location of a 919 stop and he said its just ahead. So I continued to run for about 100-200 metres till I reached the next stop.

I remember seeing on the sign board that there are two 919 routes but I didn't think much about it then and boarded the bus. I paid for my ticket and sat down and was proud of myself for a bit.

I fired off a few text messages to Monica to tell her I'm on the way. I was thinking that I should have enough time until I saw a sign post that indicated that Badaling Great Wall is still another 45 kilometres away. I asked the staff in the bus and she said its another 2 hours, which is at least 30 minutes too late as Monica will leave and head towards Tianjin.

I couldn't understand why and then a bit later, over the PA, I heard that this is actually a "man che" (slow car) which kind of explains everything. Maybe that is why there are two 919 routes? One fast and one slow?

I was in a dilemma. What do I do now?

I alighted the bus at the next stop and wanted to catch a cab back to the city. I am about at least 1 hour away from the city by bus and I have no idea where I am and it was definitely the worst place to get a taxi. 15 minutes has gone by and nothing in sight. A few taxis passed by but was filled with passengers. One taxi did slowed down but didn't want to go back to the city.

One shady guy in a hatchback did stop and asked if I wanted a ride for a price to wherever I am going. I told him I wanted to go to Badaling and his opening price was RMB200 and it would take an hour. I said its too expensive and there's no point anyway since I needed to be there in 30 minutes to make it worthwhile. I asked about going back to the city and he said RMB150. I thought it was pretty outrageous and told him no. He left and I waited a bit more and when I least expect it an empty taxi came by and stopped.

I got in and told him where I wanted to go and he said okay at first and after a while he started complaining that its too far and would not be worth his effort. He suggested taking me to the subway and I had no problems with that. He took me to the Longze subway station and I went back to Dongzhimen.

It is now noon. I didn't really have breakfast and I am starting to feel hungry. I grabbed a set meal at McDonald's and downed it in a few minutes while toying the idea of going to Tianjin. I know it would probably be much less effort than going to Badaling Great Wall. I texted Monica and told her that I would meet her in Tianjin. She's an exchange student in Nan Kai University now and that is where I'll be meeting up with her.

I tried to take the subway to the Beijing station but it proved more tricky than I initially thought. I was kind of engrossed with reading Freakonomics that I didn't really pay attention to any announcements in the subway.

I totally didn't realise it and I was already in Qianmen. I was pretty sure I didn't hear the Bejing station announcement. So I got off at Qianmen and took a train going towards the other direction. Oh it was one of those spanking new trains, which is very clean and comfortable.

Right before reaching Chongwenmen, a voice over the PA indicated that this train will pass by the Beijing station but not stopping. I was wondering maybe its because its a new train so I came out in the Chongwenmen station. I waited for a few more minutes and another came train and I hopped into it. Right after I entered a manly voice boomed over the PA and said that this train does not stop at Beijing station. What is going on here? Am I so unlucky today that I managed to get into 2 trains that don't go to Beijing station.

I got off and started to ask a nearby security guard and she told me that no trains go to Beijing station. Its a recent ruling and she has no idea why but she did say that its possible to walk there from Chongwenmen. My Beijing geography is not very good for those places that I seldom go to so it was a good surprise for me.

After a few minutes, I arrived in Beijing station and I got the tickets to go to Tianjin and back. Finally things are going back to normalcy and nothing too exciting happened. I got a short nap in the train and I have to say that the 1st class seats in the "dong che" is great.

I eventually met Monica at Nan Kai University, had dinner with her and chatted till I had to leave at about 9:30pm. My train left Tianjin at about 10:17pm. I arrived back in Beijing at about 11:20pm (I think) and took a taxi back home. I arrived back in the apartment just a few minutes too late and had to walk 17 floors up to where I stay.

What a way to end the day and I am tired of writing now. I think this post is already longer than I wanted it to be and I am a bit too lazy to edit it further. (In fact when reading this post over another time to check for typos before I post it I fell asleep and again I got awoken by the mobile in the morning but this time its not Monica....)