Note: I arrived Friday, and my internet in my hotel was unuseable, so I have to publish from work.
Trip here was really long (left at 10:30am, arrived at my hotel 16-20 hours later). The 10hr plane ride went past quickly because of all the free movies you can watch on the monitor set into the back of the seat in front of you. Amazing mountains around as I was landing that looked like infinitely detailed toys you could run your hand over, feeling the textures.
I arrived to a dismal day. Completely gloomy - I won't blame it on the smog yet... and about -15 outsite (pretty sure it's average for winter here). It was also the first time I've felt like a complete foreigner:
Get in the taxi, tell him where to go. He doesn't understand. Give him the written address (in Chinese). He appears to know the general area, but not the exact location. I remember the map I had, show it to him, and he knows where to go. Taxiing along, I notice that everywhere in the large city there's lots of big buildings, dirty streets, cars honking, and people. When we get to where the driver is going, it doesn't look right.
The place is kind of sketchy - not on a major road, cars strewn everywhere, just not a very happening place. He points at a (smallish) sign on a building saying 'Hotel' along with some Chinese. I show my unease (bad call), but he insists. The fare was 87 yuen (=$13CAD). I give him 100. He gives me 3 back. !?!? I look at him funny, then he prints the receipt, gives it to me, takes one of the 1's out of my hand, and points to the hotel again. Confused / Not expecting that, I get out and go in.
I could report him, but the $2 isn't worth my time. I guess he deserved the tip for getting me to the right place even if he was mean + mean looking... Oh yeah! No tipping in China! It's offensive because people earn enough to live with the wages they earn on the jobs Westerners would tip for.
Turns out it was the right place... falling action... I got to my 10th floor room (the hotel staff barely spoke english). It's a little bit smaller/not nearly as nice as I expected and looks really empty. The damningly slow internet that I'm probably sharing with the rest of the hotel comes from an unfindable hole in the wall behind one of the beds (=> roomate to come later). I dropped all my stuff, have a relievingly decent shower, and head out to explore the streets.
Cityscape unescapeable and no hint of flora, the streets look really dirty to a Canadian; industrial dirty. I learn quickly the degree to which big vehicles > cars > bikes > people. People get out of the way of cars, and it's almost difficult to go across a cross-(<-lol)walk, but I was expecting that. You can taste a subtle 'every person for themselves' mentality. I saw only two non-asian people since leaving the airport (and I've seen lots of people) => I stick out. Surprisingly, though, I get very few stares.
-dough
p.s. I've gotten a handle on the pronunciation of most of the pinyin characters (basically Mandarin phonemes), but I still literally only know one Mandarin word (Canada - which is basically the same, ja na da, now you do too)