Beijing made us really a wonderful farewell gift, as we are strolling through it this weekend under APEC conditions. As the impression often is shaped by how the whole experience ends, this looks like a perfect epilogue to our time in Beijing. Today we drove along the Changan Avenue, passing by Tiananmen Square to visit friends on the other side of the city. The sky was blue and the traffic in flow. The traffic management simply took half the cars off the road and put at least one traffic police every few hundred meters. The Tiananmen Square itself is heavily guarded by military and armed police. While we were driving along the landmarks of our memories of Beijing, we nearly felt like a "state guest" ourselves, even we were not in one of the black limousines, but just on the back seat of a shabby Hyundai taxi. Even the air is really clean in some areas you are advised not to open the window, as there are snipers on the roofs, which might misinterpret that move. Well, there is nothing I want less on my last days here than a nervous sniper. You can't have it all. But that's fine for me. As we say here: Ente gut, alles gut.
