work and play

My meal ticket into the Village was busy with work obligations outside of the Village so today I chose to catch up on some work and see a few 'sights'.

Morning spent swearing at my computer until successfully downloaded my email. Then I was promptly kicked off email so I did some replying and tried to reconnect. After 4 unsuccessful attempts I left my room in search of coffee. Found Starbucks. Almost cried tears of joy. Vanilla latte wiped away all frustrations and I went back to my room and managed to send/receive once more. Success.

As today is Sunday in Vancouver I decided to treat myself to 2 hours of sightseeing. This meant I walked 20 minutes to Tienanmen square from my hotel and then spent 40 minutes walking around taking photos and then I walked back to the hotel and squeezed in 40 minutes of shopping. Very effective use of time but I was sweating profusely at the end and needed a shower. Now doing some more work and may head to an electronic market to haggle over pirated items this evening. Had an unsuccessful attempt at bargaining for a camera battery during my shopping trip and I think I need to watch someone else in action.

Below is a photo from the Village. That was yesterday and today the smog is much better and I almost saw the sun. Almost.