A first

China is an immense country with diverse geography, climate and culture. In February, you can be snorkeling at a resort on Hainan Island in the South China Sea, or viewing the amazing ice sculptures at the Harbin Winter Carnival north of Beijing. Because of the tremendous scope of travel to China I have decided to narrow the focus to Beijing, China’s capital city.

I recently returned from two years in Beijing and hope that the information in this article will be useful to independent travelers. Tours are great if you have a limited amount of time and want to see maximize your sightseeing; or if you just want to relax and leave the organization in the hands of experts. On the other hand, Beijing is actually a very manageable city in which to do your own thing. There is virtually no crime against foreigners, you can walk the streets at night and feel perfectly safe. At the worst, you might have your pocket picked or be scammed by a taxi driver; however both of these are easily avoided. The biggest challenge for a tourist in Beijing is the language.

Let’s talk first about how to solve the language problem. Mandarin is a difficult language to master primarily because of the different tones used to convey different meanings. Learn some basics like hello and thank you, but you may have a hard time making yourself understood beyond that. With the exception of people who work in the tourist industry most people do not speak any English and this includes taxi drivers. There are two English language magazines That’s Beijing’ and City Weekend’ that you can find in most hotels. Both have listings of restaurants, malls, markets, things to see and do. Best of all, the names and addresses are printed in Chinese characters as well as English. You can get to wherever you want to go by showing that to a taxi driver or pointing to the Chinese characters on your map. Hotel staff will also be happy to write down an address for you.

Getting around is straightforward if you have a good map with both Chinese characters and English. Taxis are very cheap and easily flagged down except during rush hour. Use only metered taxis as those offering a flat rate can be up to ten times more expensive. The subway system is efficient and the stops are announced in English as well as Mandarin. It isn’t called the sardine express for nothing but it’s the quickest way to get to the main tourist sites. For the more adventurous, consider renting a bicycle for a day. That’s how