Acrobats, bai jiu, and yet another hangover

I managed to recover from my birthday shenanigans on Thursday, even getting to class for a lesson on tenses in Chinese. I also tried to be proactive in life by attending a business networking function at the Hilton Hotel; I thought it would be good to see what the expat business environment is like here. It turned out to be a complete waste of time, partly due to my hangover but also as I couldn't stomach the dark-suited corporate types.

My lesson yesterday was cancelled as Lei was ill, but it gave me a chance to work on my reading skills in the morning and I took Andy and Alex on a bicycle tour in the afternoon. Last night we went to an acrobatics show at a theatre just down the road. It was pretty spectacular. After the show we had dinner in our hutong and then headed off to SanLiTun, the expat bar area. We noticed quickly that booze was ten times more expensive there than back in our hutong so we ended up drinking beers and bai jiu at the street stalls and eating the little chinese kebabs that are sold everywhere here in the evenings. From SanLiTun we headed across to the HouHai lake area to check out the lounge bars that proliferate that area. Again the stupidly hiked prices discouraged us from staying too long.

Some Chinese acrobats in the mix

Sorry about the blurred photos but as always I was in the cheap seats!

Come on... I can do that...

A well timed shot... an acrobat somersaults through a hoop over ten foot in the air

Today, after recovering from the previous nights bai jiu imbibations, we did some shopping at the crazily cheap Silk Street market and then headed to one of the beautiful parks around the Forbidden City for a bit of R&R. I think tonight will be a quiet one for a change...

Spring has sprung in Beijing!

Timmy diligently doing some Hanzi studying in the sunshine.